Valiant Ambition by Nathaniel Philbrick

Nathaniel Philbrick's new book Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution, like his previous book Bunker Hill (my review found at here), changes how we think about the American Experience.

Philbrick tears away the veil of myth to reveal a far messier path to Democracy, one rife with conflict. We see that Washington was not always right and Arnold was a brash hero who resented being overlooked. The Revolution was, Philbrick points out, in itself an act of treason.

The book started slow for me, then picked up interest and in the end swept me along to its conclusion.

Benedict Arnold was motivated by ruthless self-interest, his betrayal based on a desire to be lauded for bringing peace to the war-weary Americans by reuniting the colony to Britain.

 I am hoping for a next book to continue the American story.

I was just finishing the book when I happened to catch NPR's interview with Philbrick on the book. You can read the interview at http://www.npr.org/2016/05/16/478188328/valiant-ambition-tells-of-benedict-arnolds-turn-from-hero-to-traitor

I was visited by an aching nostalgia while reading about so many places I had lived near or had visited. I wished I had understood more deeply the history of these places. Particularly moving for me was the account of the Battle for Fort Mifflin.

We visited Fort Mifflin several times. It sits on Mud Island in the Delaware River south of the city, not far from the airport. The fort is restored to its 1834 condition. The first time we visited was on a warm summer day. The stone powder room was cool and dark. The air hummed with the sounds of nature. We watched a Green Heron sitting on a tree near the water. Suddenly a jet came overhead and at that moment the Heron started and took off, the two flying in tandem. It was an awesome sight that summed up everything I was struggling with at the time: the battle between the man-made and God's nature, the pull between the excitement of the city and the peace of the Maine woods.

Oh, had I realized the blood that had spilled on those grounds! I would have seen ghosts and heard the cries of anguish instead of the frogs and birdsong near the still waters. Reading the account of the Battle of Fort Mifflin I could not connect that summer stillness to the continual bombardment of cannonade, the groan of the wounded, the sleepless weeks under barrage.

After the British took Philadelphia they wanted sea access to bring in supplies. That meant clearing out the Patriot forts. Fort Mifflin's four hundred American soldiers held off thousands of British troops and 250 ships for several months. Philbrick's account is devastating to read, the horrors endured by one soldier accounted the worst he had undergone. The end the British ships drew up to the island and lobbed in grenades. The fort was finally abandoned. 250 of the 400 men were killed.

Valiant Ambition is a complex, controversial, and dramatic portrait of a people in crisis and the war that gave birth to a nation. The focus is on loyalty and personal integrity, evoking a Shakespearean tragedy that unfolds in the key relationship of Washington and Arnold, who is an impulsive but sympathetic hero whose misfortunes at the hands of self-serving politicians fatally destroy his faith in the legitimacy of the rebellion. As a country wary of tyrants suddenly must figure out how it should be led, Washington's unmatched ability to rise above the petty politics of his time enables him to win the war that really matters. from the publisher

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.



Valiant Ambition
Nathaniel Philbrick
Viking
$30 hard cover
ISBN:9780525426783

Old Fort Mifflin

by Nancy A. Bekofske

Wide vistas where once colonial soldiers trod

with its perimeter of aged barracks,

the cool dark recesses of powder houses,

slit windows looking out into summer sun,

history's memory, empty and still

but for voyeurs peering on the past's leavings.

Nearby the river ran round like a moat,

catchment of brush and reed, crickets

and frogs singing and leaping,

and looking down in contemplation

sitting on its barren branch, a heron.

Unexpectedly, a mechanical roar disturbed

this Eden of river and fort.

Above us hovered a great silver belly

its mass blocking out the sun,

its labored ascent a mystery.

We believed we could have stroked the silver belly,

it hung so low above us.

Machine made holier than all else

diminishing the heron's tandem flight

parallel under the great belly.

Convergent deities of flight

vying for preeminence.

And when the two had flown

we were left godless on the wide vistas

of a wasteland past.

Himelhoch Brothers Department Store Hanky

In a West Branch, MI antique mall I found this hand painted rayon handkerchief in it's original box, including the paper lace doily that covered it.

The handkerchief is made of rayon, mimicking silk. The edge is not bound, but has a frayed edge. It has a lovely Columbine flower, delicately hand painted.

The box read Himelhoch Brs & Co, Detroit. I needed to know more.

Being a 'recent' transplant to the Detroit area (1963 when I was ten years old) I am not familiar with much of its history. When I was a teen my friends liked to window shop at Jacobson's in Birmingham. Mom liked Federal's in Clawson. But before the suburban shopping centers, people went downtown to shop.

And Himelhoch Brothers and Company was one of the big downtown Detroit department stores.

Michigan Jewish History has a full article on the Himelhoch family and business. You can read it at
http://michjewishhistory.org/pdfs/vol49.pdf.

In the article Marilyn Shapiro writes that in 1907 the Himelhoch family moved its Caro, MI store to downtown Detroit. (Caro was in the heart of the lumbering area.) The automobile executive wives money attracted New York stores like Saks to locate in the city. With funding from Marshall Fields the Himelhochs built a . store near Hudson's Department Store and B. Speigel on Woodward Ave.

The next decade was a time of huge growth. The store was moved to another Woodward Ave location, to a building being remodeled by renowned architect Albert Kahn. An article found in Goggle Books here details the luxurious new store:

Will Rebuild Store-Garment Retailing Concern to Have Handsome Eight Story Structure

A handsome eight story building of reinforced concrete fireproof construction is to be erected on the site now occupied by the store of Himelhoch Bros 8 Co retailers of women's outer garments, Detroit, Mich and will be used in its entirety by that concern.

The new building is to be completed before the close of the present year. The exterior walls to the height of the third story will be faced and trimmed with marble. The walls above will be of ivory white terra cotta trimmed with cream glazed terra cotta. The cornice marquee and window casings will be of copper. The vestibule will be deep thus increasing the extent of the display windows. The interior finish on the first and second floors will be in Circassian walnut, on the third fourth and fifth floors in mahogany, and on the other floors and in the basement in fumed quartered oak. The equipment will include two electric passenger elevators enclosed in polished wire glass and an electric freight elevator. The offices will be located on a balcony over a part of the main floor. Sanitary locker rooms and rest rooms will be provided for the employees and there will be a handsome rest room for customers. A vacuum cleaning system will also be installed. The firm have been in their present location five years and now find a serious need for the additional space which will be provided by the new building.  

The high end store included furs and a bridal department and the novelty of rest rooms for customers.

With the growth of the suburbs the family built stores in Grosse Point, Birmingham, and Northland (once one of the world's largest shopping mall whose last store closed in 2015, It has been torn down.) Fewer people went downtown to shop. The flagship store downsized. The suburban stores did not carry high end goods, but focused on sure sellers. Himelhoch closed in 1979, hurt by the rise of the suburbs, the race riots, and flight from the city.

The business had a life cycle of fifty years. The demise of Detroit killed it.

Learn about the Detroit department stores at HOUR magazine here. 

Ogemaw County, MI Quilts and Ancestors

Sunset over Lake St. Helen

We took a week to go 'Up North' and stay at my brother's cabin on Lake St. Helen, MI. The area is famous for being beloved by actor Charlton Heston who owned a great deal of the lakeside property which he kept natural for outdoor sports. We went down the road to West Branch, MI.

The West Branch Historical Society showed me their recently acquired appliquéd coverlet.

The green fabric was amazing--no fading! So was the Chrome orange and Turkey red.

 The family history was that the coverlet was made in 1864 by Harriet Gordon.

 It was hand appliquéd, machine pieced, and one layer finished with red binding.

In a downtown West Branch antique store I found this quilt. It has cotton appliqué and embroidery on cotton and wool with a pieced cotton outer border.

It may have been bought at auction near Mio, MI. For $99 it was a bargain...if only I had room to store it! 

West Branch City Hall next to the library with a great resale shop

Of course we also hit the West Branch Library and brought home several dozen books!

The Ecker Family of Ogemaw County, MI

We went on the Genealogy Trail for my husband's g-g-grandparents Henry Ecker (Ecer, Acker, Acer) and Sophronia Van Slyke (Slack) whose child Jennie Melissa Ecker married John Hazen Bellinger. Their child was Loretta Valdora Bellinger Bekofske who I wrote about in the post Girl, A Lamp, and the Shipwreck Coast.

We went to the West Branch Public Library, the Rose City Public Library where the historical society holds its library, and to the library at Tawas, MI. We searched the cemeteries at Prescott and Tawas.

Henry Ecker (Acker, Ecer) and Sophronia Van Slack (Slyck) were born in Ontario, Canada and immigrated to the States in 1890. Their daughters had already come to Iosco County upon their marriages: Jennie married Jacob Hazen Bellinger and her sister Margaret married his brother John Wesley Bellinger.

Henry and Sophronia's children included Margaret, Ettie, Jennie Melissa, Abraham, Joseph H., Sarah Elizabeth, Charity, Leona, Cynthia S., Ralphie (Ralphia/Rafee/Ralph), Allen Thulman, and Truman.

Henry and Sophronia Ecker were some of the earliest land owners in Prescott, Richfield Twsp, MI, purchasing 40 acres in 1890. Prescott was 'lumber camp No. 6" belonging to C. H. Prescott. He developed the town which grew to have a post office, church, and all the other small town highlights.

Henry shows up on the 1900 Federal Census with his family "Safrona', Jos., Rafee, and Truman."

Henry appears on a 1903 Plat; he owned 40 acres in Logan Twsp. A Prescott history shows Henry was baptized into the newly built Judson Baptist Church along with his son John H. Ecker in 1891.

In 1903 Jacob and Sophronia with their children Elias, Robert, and Ethel were admitted into the Indiana Quaker Meeting. In 1906 they were "disowned." There is a story here. Especially as Jennie died in 1906!

We discovered a 1919 probate notice for Henry Ecker in the name of Sophronia.


Then Henry disappears.

The Children

Raphie/Raphia/Rafe Courtland Ecker bought land near his father's farm in 1913.

Joseph H. I believe died in 1939; he had been living with his mother in Burleigh Tsp, Iosco Co, Tawas, MI. Joe died from alcoholism.

Truman was the youngest child born in 1890, the year of his family's immigration. His death certificate shows him living at the Ogemaw County Poor Farm near the present golf course in West Branch. He was 50 at the time of his death.

We found marriages and death notices for the children and grandchildren. I pieced together a history of tragedy for Ralphie. In 1906, at age 21,  Raphie married Miss Louise 'Lonsay' Jane Van Meer. She died in 1907 from "eclampsia" and their baby Mary S. died of convulsions ten days later. In 1909 Raphia Cortland Ecker married Ellen Nichols, 19 years old. She died of measles. In 1929 R.C. Ecker, 44 years old, married Mrs. Arletta Barrington, nee' Brown. She appears as Synthia Arletta on the 1940 Federal Census.

Abraham married divorcee' Ellen Fountain, nee' Kerr, in 1906. Their baby girl Sohpronia was stillborn later that year. Abe's occupation on the 1920 census was 'trapper of fur', 'farmer' in 1930 and WPA worker in 1940.

In 1907 Allan Ecker married Mary Van Meer (sister to Lonsay Jane who married Allen's brother Raphie). Allan's wife.

Ettie married Edward Sheehan; their child was Jennie Elizabeth. Sarah Elizabeth married James Augustus Farrand.

After Edward's death Ettie married William Warner.

Sophronia (Saphronia, Sofronia, or Synthia/Synthie) lived to be 99 years old. She is buried in the Richfield Township Cemetery near Etta. But her husband Henry does not show up on any list of internments in the county.

Joseph H. is also buried here but I found no headstone.

Raphie Courtland's son Henry and his wife Ettie are buried near Sophronia.

I am still searching to see how Ralph Delton Ecker fits into the family! He was born in 1945.

And also David H. Ecker.

Bellinger Family

We also went to Tawas, MI to find the grave of Jennie Melissa Ecker Bellinger (daughter of Henry and Sophronia who married Jacob Hazen Bellinger). She died at age 44 from complications of childbirth; shortly later her baby also died. The date reads June 1, 1889. She left behind a large family, including my husband's grandmother Loretta Valdora. (Whose brother Elias Howard also lived in Ogemaw Co and is buried in West Branch.)

It is hard to read, but the top of the headstone reads "WIFE."

Her son Edward and daughter-in-law Martha are also buried there. We found no headstone for her brother-in-law John Wesley who appears on the cemetery list.

Our next step to find Henry Ecker's death date and burial place is to go to Oscoda, MI and the Huron Shores Genealogy Society library and if that fails apply to the State of Michigan.

How "The Great Humanitarian" Herbert Hoover Failed as President

A man was quoted in my local newspaper as saying that the idea of having a businessman as president is a good idea, but it had to be the right man. The speaker added that he had lost faith in politicians.

Americans have elected a number of businessmen to the presidential office. Herbert Hoover in the White House: The Ordeal of the President by Charles Rappleye show how the 'wrong' businessman failed to alleviate the ills of the Depression and failure of farms during the dust bowl days.

I requested the book because I wanted to know how a great humanitarian who orchestrated massive relief efforts to Europe, saving hundreds of thousands of lives, came to be remembered as distant, uncaring, and unmoved by American's sufferings.

Rappleye's detailed study on Herbert Hoover shows how his personality, experience, and beliefs impacted and derailed his presidency.

Hoover's intractable belief in the importance of charity at home and non-government involvement in relief were based in his own life experience. He grew up in rural poverty, was orphaned as a child, lived with uncles on an Indian reservation and in a sod hut, and scrambled to get an education. He became an successful engineer. That was life as he knew it, and he expected others could do as he did. He believed 'charity at home' was essential to building American character.

Hoover's success also meant he believed anyone could do the same. "If a man has not made a fortune by 40 he is not work much," Hoover said in his thirties. (My grandfather was born to a single woman, orphaned at age nine, worked hard to get through college, and had a long and varied career. It is done. Gramps also had intelligence, an uncle who rewarded academic achievement, and an excellent high school education.)

Hoover also believed in the power of positive thinking. He wanted to keep up morale. But suffering Americans thought Hoover was out of touch. Behind the scenes, Hoover's wife Lou handled the hundreds of letters and requests for help, aiding those she could, and giving of away his presidential salary to charity.

Farmers were starving, their children did not have clothing so they could attend school. Urban unemployment in some cities soared to 40%. It was feared that "slackers" would misuse government relief. Instead of direct relief the president worked with business and labor leaders and banks, increased Federal spending, limited immigration, increased tariffs, and increased taxes to keep a balanced budget.

Hoover recalls Richard Nixon: both of Quaker parents, both thin skinned and prone to anger, both sending staff to break into political enemies offices, both disdained by the press. Hoover was a pacifist.

'Bonus Army' of unemployed WWI veterans came to Washington D.C. to demand the bonus promised. The homeless men and families were installed in empty buildings and in a camp along the Potomac. When disorder sprouted up, and reports that radicals and communists had infiltrated the camps, Hoover was convinced to give carte blanch to Army Chief of Staff MacArthur. Mac Arthur was to return them to their camps. MacArthur ignored the president's instructions and the veterans were routed out of the city by soldier using tear gas and swords. Hoover failed to repudiate MacArthur for disobedience. Hoover was vilified as cold and heartless.

This book shows how hard Hoover tried to solve the problems of the country, but also how his fatal flaw of personality left him the legacy of being an ineffectual president. He was a shy, private person who avoided eye contact and read his speeches. As the publisher's promo says, Hoover had "a first-class mind and a second-class temperament"-- the "temperament of leadership."

The idea of electing a businessman to the presidency as a response to mistrusting politicians is not a good option. History has shown that businessmen make for failed political leadership. Consider the failed presidencies of businessmen like Warren G. Harding and Jimmy Carter. In fact, according to studies and ratings NO president with a successful business background is among the top rated. The skills of business and the ability to lead in government are not the same.

Presidential success is based on empathy, persuasive eloquence, and compromise. Hoover's failure to appear empathetic and his ineffectiveness as a speaker clearly hurt him. Considering the hundreds of thousands of lives he saved after WWI and WWII organizing relief abroad I know he had empathy. What a complicated man.

I received an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Herbert Hoover in the White House
Charles Rappleye
Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: May 10, 2016
$32.50 hard cover
ISBN: 9781451648676

Herbert Hoover/Curtis silk campaign handkerchief. Collection of Nancy A. Bekofske

Love For Lydia by H. E. Bates

Lydia arrived an awkward girl, bloomed into an attractive woman, discovered men liked her, and gaily left a wake of bodies in her path. When she saw what she had accomplished she tried to burn herself out in a two year binge of dancing and drink and ended up desperately lonely and guilty in a sanitarium.

Some might believe Lydia was a tease and vixen, partying her way into destruction. Others may feel she was a girl-child who, when released from the 'cotton-wool'  prison of her girlhood, mishandles her sudden sexual power over men. Or is she the genetic product of her profligate parents, an alcoholic mother paid off to keep away and the distant, womanizing father who proscribed her sheltered girlhood?

Love for Lydia by H.E. Bates is an autobiographical homage to his home town, with the narrator Richardson sharing Bates' early jobs and family.
It is the story of young people growing up, the thrill and torment of first love, the end of a way of life, and class stricture. It is the story of what happens when four young men fall for Lydia and how she handles their adulation. It is the story of learning what love really means. It is a love story to England's pastoral beauty.

A cuckoo flew with bubbling throaty calls across the wheat-field, disappearing beyond the copses. In the still air I caught again a great breath of grass and hawthorn and bluebell and earth beating through new pulses of spring loveliness to the very edge of summer.

The novel begins in 1929 when Richardson is nineteen and a reporter for the town paper. Richardson is sent to the Aspen manor to learn about the eldest Aspen brother's demise. The deceased's elderly spinster sisters introduce Richardson to his heir and daughter, Lydia. The aunts suggest he take her skating, show her some fun, for they don't want her growing up in isolation. Ill dressed and stick thin with candlestick curls, Lydia is having fun with peers for the first time. It is a magical time.

Above the trees a mass of winter stars, glittering with crystal flashes of vivid green, then white, then ice-clear blue, flashed down through a wide and wonderful silence that seemed to splinter every now and then with a crack of frost-taut boughs in the copses, down where the drive went, above the frozen stream.

Richardson discovers that Lydia is game for anything, pushing him past his comfort zone. And into regular clandestine meetings where she enjoys his physical attention. As Lydia fills out her aunt's hand-me-down dresses Richardson falls in love, and Lydia claims to love him too.

'Oh! Darling--don't stop loving me'--she said. 'Don't ever stop loving me-'...'Even if I'm bad to you--would you?--will you always?''Yes,' I said.

The aunts press the young people to attend dances and Lydia's social network expands. Richardson's best friend, Alex, local yeoman's son Tom, and chauffeur Blackie all fall under Lydia's charm and vie for her love. Lydia is 'excitable and impulsive," following her instincts thoughtlessly.  In the battle for Lydia's attention hearts are broken and even a death occurs.

The descriptions of the landscape are beautifully written. Richardson seeks out nature as a respite and for its restorative effects. The town is a center of shoe manufacturing, an unattractive and crowded place. Richardson is very aware that the loveliness of the land has been infringed upon by mankind.

In 1977 I watched and enjoyed the Masterpiece Theater's series Love for Lydia but had not read the book until now. I am so glad I did. I will look to read more by Mr. Bates in the future.

Anyone interested in the English Language must read Mr. Bates, one of its outstanding masters. Times Literary Supplement.

Learn more about H. E. Bates at
http://www.bloomsbury.com/author/he-bates/
http://hebatescompanion.com
http://www.thevanishedworld.co.uk/index.html
See a clip of the series Love for Lydia at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EV2MkbRI4I

I received a free ebook through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Love for Lydia
by H. E. Bates
Bloombury Books
Publication Date May 12, 2016
ISBN: 9781448216444
ebook

New Quilt Idea & 1857 Blocks & Nancy Meets Author of Station Eleven

I loved making William Shakespeare so much I want to do another portrait. I am thinking about fabrics for Edgar Allen Poe.

Last night I attended a talk and Q&A with Emily St. John Mandel whose novel Station Eleven is the 2016 Michigan Reads book. I read her novel last year and again last month for my local book club. Read my review here.

Mandel's presentation was thoughtful and revealing. She walked through how her decision to write Literary Fiction with a strong plot and crime element leading to her being considered a Noir genre writer. To avoid being typecast she wanted to write a novel that was completely different. Her first thought was to write about actors. She also wanted to write about the awesome wonder of our world--the technology that we take for granted. She decided to set up the loss of modern marvels due to a pandemic and traced her research back to ancient Rome when soldiers brought smallpox back to Italy, devastating the population. As it did to the Native American of North America during the earliest days of exploration.

Mandel had first visited Northern Michigan on a book tour to Traverse City and thereafter made excuses to return. The novel is set in the upper section of Michigan's lower peninsula, where the traveling Symphony stays close to the fresh water of the Great Lakes.

I loved the second reading of Station Eleven. I think I helped my book club appreciate some of the themes and messages of the book.

I have completed two more 1857 Album blocks, mostly finished another, and have the fourth ready to appliqué. I also need to add some embroidered details on the bird in the cherry tree.

What is it?

nearly done

ready to go

The Methodist Episcopal Church and the Sand Creek Massacre

We grew up on stories of Indian raids, the scalps taken and women and children murdered. We have heard tales of children kidnapped by Indians. We were raised on tv shows and movies full of pioneer families fearful of Indian attack. In 1764, my own sixth great-grandparents were murdered by Native Americans led by a white criminal. Rev. John Rhodes was a Swiss Brethren pacifist, an early settler in the Shenandoah Valley. Theirs was not the only family targeted in the area. It must have been a frightful time for the new immigrants. Their ancestors had faced persecution and death because of their faith. They had hoped their life in the New World would offer better.


What we don't often hear about is America's policy of genocide, the massacre of Native women and children, the broken treaties--justified by European Christians who believed that God had ordained them to inherit the earth and to convert the savage.

Massacre at Sand Creek: How Methodists Were Involved in an American Tragedy by Gary L, Roberts was commissioned by the General Commission on Archives ad History of the United Methodist Church. It rose out of the 2012 General Conference of the United Methodist Church through the Council of Bishops call for repentance and healing of relationships with Indigenous peoples. They called for a full disclosure of the Methodist Episcopal Church's involvement in the Sand Creek Massacre.

In 1864 at Sand Creek in the Colorado Territory, 250 Cheyennes and Arapahos under the protection of the US. government--mostly women and children--were murdered in a raid led by John M. Chivington, a popular Methodist minister. The Territorial Governor whose policies led to the attack, John Evans, was a prominent Methodist layman. 

Roberts book is scholarly in its approach. It is not a popular narrative history. He details the culture and mindset of American society at the time and considers how Native American and Western cultural paradigms differ. He offers a synopsis of American/Native relations.We learn about Chivington and Evans as religious, political, and military leaders. The natives were divided, some seeking American protection but some bands attacking the settlers. Fear was magnified and all Natives were vilified. Chivington became adamant about decimating all natives.

Thankfully, Roberts does not dwell on the outrage of the massacre, for the details he offers are too horrendous to want to know more. The reaction to the massacre was explosive and polarizing. It was considered the worst crime ever committed by America. But Methodists were reluctant to accept the charges against those responsible. They were, after all, church leaders and greatly admired.

What was the culpability of the Methodist church? Was it a lack of moral leadership, its alliance with an immoral culture? Why did the local Methodists not take a stand against Chivington? Can we judge the actions of our forefathers based on today's values and understanding? How could a society based on freedom enact such evil? Roberts explores these crucial issues.

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

"It is time for this story to be told. Coming to grips with what happened at Sand Creek involves hard questions and unsatisfactory answers not only about what happened but also about what led to it and why. It stirs ancient questions about the best and worst in every person, questions older than history, questions as relevant as today's headlines, questions we all mus answer from within." from the publisher

Massacre at Sand Creek: How Methodists Were Involved in an American Tragedy
by Gary L. Roberts
Abingdon Press
$19.99 hard cover
ISBN:9781501819766