Posted by Rob on September 16, 2009 – 6:33 am
Filed under Books, History
Tagged as book, civil war, confederate, federal, grant, History, lee, mcclellan, meade, military, none died in vain, north, rebel, robert leckie, south, union
As I had previously mentioned, despite the fact that I am a history nerd, specializing in American history, I was always ashamed that I knew little about the Civil War. Though most history nerds like myself love the Civil War, I did not, as my main area of focus is the colonies up through the War of 1812. So when I had to choose my final graduate level history course, I decided to finally learn about the Civil War, so I took a seminar on it. The first book we had to read was Robert Leckie’s None Died in Vain.
The book is an exhausting 640 pages of everything about the Civil War, starting with the Mexican War (where many of the generals who would fight for the North or South during the Civil War actually fought together for the U.S.) up to the assassination of President Lincoln. In this respect, it was great. I learned a lot about the war, and the varying causes of it. It was really interesting to learn how the future generals got their combat experience fighting alongside each other, and then later turned these tactics against each other on the battlefield.
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Posted by Rob on September 3, 2009 – 7:51 pm
Filed under School
Tagged as albany, big bad bob, bigbadbob, certification, civil war, class, college, credits, education, graduation, occc, oneonta, professor, School, text book
So as the title implies, this is clearly my cheapest semester in my…about nine years of college. I have only two classes, but am still full-time (my one class is a nine-credit class.)
One of the classes is a seminar on the Civil War, and requires about ten books. Luckily, one of my friends took the same class about a year ago, and the professor used the same books, so I was able to borrow most of them (only had to buy one book.)
The other class is my education class. The class only uses one text, and its written by the professor’s friend, so we get it for only $25. So in the end, I spent about $50 in books for the semester. I have never payed that little, whether at OCCC, Oneonta, or other Albany classes.
HUZZAH TO A CHEAP SEMESTER!!! What a great way to go through my last semester before graduation and certification.
Posted by Rob on August 24, 2009 – 10:28 pm
Filed under Books, History
Tagged as american, big bad bob, bigbadbob, biography, civil war, historian, History, lincoln, none died in vain, north, revolution, robert leckie, secession, south, war of 1812
While American History is my main passion, many will be surprised to learn that one of the things I know least is the Civil War. Im sure many would find this ridiculous, as most American historians love the Civil War. For some weird reason, I never found it as interesting as the American Revolution. I like earlier American History, from the original colonies probably up to the War of 1812. From then on, my knowledge kind of dwindles down.
So I started reading None Died in Vain by Robert Leckie. Its a huge 500+ page book with extremely small text, but so far it has been successful in keeping my interest. The book starts all the way at the beginning, going into the differences between the North and South, and some of the key events that started the South talking about secession. The chapter on Lincoln’s short biography was extremely interesting. I learned a lot about his early life, and didnt realize a lot of the stuff he did or went through.
The book will eventually go through the entire Civil War, which is good. I needed a book like this so that I can start learning about this important part of American History.
