April 2020 ECW Newsletter
|
|
From the Editor · Symposium Update · Behind the Scenes: Audiobooks · News & Notes
10 Questions with Kevin Pawlak · ECW Bookshelf
|
|
From the Editor
Route 1A from Brewer runs through Holden, past the Lucerne Inn with its golf course and gorgeous overlook, and into long stretches of pine forests and a few blueberry barrens before eventually finding its way into Ellsworth, the “crossroads of Downeast Maine.” In the early 90s, the road still ran in narrow ribbons, although tourism pressure had finally triggered a series of improvements and widenings. It’s been a few years since I’ve driven that route, so I don’t know shape the road is in today, but for four years, it was my daily commute.
That 35-mile drive taught me two invaluable lessons that I carry with me today: how to drive in any kind of weather conditions and how to love audiobooks.
I worked as a radio newscaster at the time, so my ear had already attuned itself to “listening for information”—a much different task than listening to music for enjoyment and entertainment. I was also working on my M.A. in English at the University of Maine at the time. As someone who’s undergraduate degree was in broadcast communications, I had some catching up to do—as in, the entire “English canon,” which basically consisted of all the so-called “Great Works” (with capital letters and all) of English and American literature. I had two and a half years to somehow cram it all in.
Audiobooks played a key role in that education: 50 minutes one way to work and 50 minutes back.
Today, I live in central Virginia and teach in western New York. That’s a 7-hour commute, although I only have to make it a couple times a year. “How do you do it?” people ask.
Audiobooks.
That’s why I was so delighted when Ted Savas asked me about the possibility of turning the books in the Emerging Civil War Series into audiobooks. I’m a huge audiobook fan, so the chance to hear our work in an audio format was exciting to me. In a way, it’s something I’ve been working up to for my entire adult life. I've even had the chance to perform the narration for a few of my own books, which has been an especially cool treat.
I hope you’ll take the opportunity to give one a listen. Audiobooks are good company not just for long, lonely stretches of icy road in the wilderness or during coronavirus isolation lock-down. Sometimes, it’s nice to hear the voice of someone who shares your passion for history. Sometimes, it’s nice to hear a well-told story.
-- Chris Mackowski, Ph.D.
Editor-in-Chief
|
|
Seventh Annual Emerging Civil War Symposium
at Stevenson Ridge
|
At press time, the Seventh Annual Emerging Civil War Symposium at Stevenson Ridge is still a “go.”
Virginia’s stay-at-home order remains in effect through June 10, at which time Governor Northam plans to issue an update. Based on any recommendations and regulations he issues at that time, we’ll assess the situation and make any updates as necessary. Because the order is currently set to expire almost two months prior to the Symposium, though, we’re still operating under the assumption that things will be back on the road to normal by August (although, of course, that road to recovery might take a while). ECW will continue to monitor the situation and follow the guidance offered by state health officials.
That said, we’re looking forward to a great time August 7-9, 2020 (
order tickets here
). We hope to see you then—and, in the meantime, we hope you and your families remain safe and healthy.
|
|
Emerging Civil War Series Audiobooks
by Theodore P. Savas
Why do I listen to audiobooks? Because I enjoy them. Why should you? Because you will love them. Seriously. You will.
I love print and have a half-dozen books going at the same time, but I am also a busy guy—either driving, working in the backyard, running on a treadmill, or taking a long walk on the rolling hills of our neighborhood. And when I do, I am usually listening to something, and more often than not, it’s an audiobook.
We put serious muscle into our audio program in 2018. Earlier in my publishing career you had to sell your print to audio producers who made them in-studio and distributed them on CDs. A few still do that, but the advent of Audible made it possible for Savas Beatie to seek out quality narrators and launch them in a partnership deal that made them more widely available at a cheaper price much faster.
I am embarrassed to say that it took me a while before I realized the Emerging Civil War series—the brilliant brainchild of Chris Mackowski and Kris White—offered outstanding candidates for digital translation. Each book is relatively short and none of them rely on heavy footnotes and pages of micro-tactical detail. A good narrator could turn these around relatively quickly, and the subject matter was as varied as it was excellent.
When I pitched the idea Chris readily agreed and the series took off. We decided to organize them five at a time. It meant more work for Chris, who had to take the final edited text, tweak it a bit to make it as audio-friendly as possible, add a brief standard introduction, etc. and then get me the files.
We found three especially good narrators and kicked off the series with Mackowski’s own
Hell Itself
:
The Battle of the Wilderness
, narrated by the delightful Bob Neufeld (who would go on to narrate many of the books in this series).
Fight Like the Devil: The First Day at Gettysburg
, by Mackowski, White, and Dan Davis was next up with Joseph Williams, another excellent narrator, handling the duties. Three more entries quickly followed:
Battle Above the Clouds: Lifting the Siege of Chattanooga
, by David Powell, Meg Groeling’s
The Aftermath of Battle: The Burial of the Civil War Dead
(read by Joshua Saxon), and Lee White’s
Let us Die Like Men: The Battle of Franklin.
Sales were strong from the get-go and continue to be solid. The reviews have been uniformly positive, and emails, calls, and text messages thanking us for making the series available in this format rolled in. It was pleasing to hear.
To date we have 13 in audio and we just finished and posted
Derek Maxfield’s Hellmira: The Union’s Most Infamous Civil War Prison
.
As Mark Twain famously told Abraham Lincoln’s widow at a dinner with Sherman in attendance, “Variety is spice of your reading life, and that’s why when I take a steamboat down the Mississippi River, I always have my iPad with me loaded with Savas Beatie audio books.”
Or something like that.
— Theodore P. Savas
|
|
On Friday, April 24, several ECW historians joined the American Battlefield Trust for a live
Civil War Fantasy Draft
. ECW’s Chris Mackowski and Kris White co-hosted, with commissioner Dan Davis presiding and tech support by Connor Townsend. Historians Garry Adelman, Doug Douds, Jim Hessler, Chris Kolakowski, Dave Powell, and Doug Ullman chose army, corps, division, and brigade commanders, along with a wild card pick. It was fun arm-chair generalling at its best! You can
watch the draft here
.
Our sister site, Emerging Revolutionary War, has been hosting
ERW Rev War Roundtables
on Sunday evenings. You can watch those on Sunday evenings at 7:00 p.m.
on the ERW Facebook page
.
Did you following along with ECW’s “
Ending the War
” series in April? We had twenty-five posts, plus some dips into the ECW archives, that touched on a whole bunch of different aspects of the war’s ending. You can
catch up on the series here
.
|
|
|
|
10 Questions...with Kevin Pawlak
|
Kevin Pawlak is ECW’s newly elected Treasurer and the chair of our blog’s editorial board. He does lots of other cool stuff, too. You can
read his full ECW bio here
.
1) Since last we profiled you (
in the Oct. 2017 newsletter
), you have your own battlefield and historic site to look after. Tell us what you’re up to these days.
I've been in my new job with the Prince William County Historic Preservation Division for a little over one year now. It's flown by and been an excellent move for me. I have the privilege of managing two of the county's Civil War heritage sites: Bristoe Station Battlefield Heritage Park and Ben Lomond Historic Site.
The battlefield is the site of multiple Civil War encampments and two battles--the first on August 27, 1862, and the second on October 14, 1863. The American Battlefield Trust has just preserved 152 acres of land there. Once it is given to the county, the size of the park will more than double, so that will keep me busy.
Ben Lomond is an 1832 stone house used as a Confederate field hospital after First Manassas. Union soldiers visited the house later in the war and many wrote their names on the house's walls. The site is also home to one of only three original slave quarters still standing in the county. We recently installed a new exhibit in the building as well as a virtual reality experience. The projects and the fun never end!
2) You’re also a licensed battlefield guide at Antietam. How has the recent coronavirus lockdown impacted you?
We've been furloughed under the current circumstances, so no tours for the foreseeable future [editor’s note: this was written in mid-April, so check
https://antietamguides.com/
for the latest update]. It's been a bummer, but the group of us--about 25 total--have kept up our research and reading. One of my colleagues started a Guide Slack page, so we've been able to stay in touch and keep the debates and discussions going. I help run the Guide Facebook page, which has kept me in the loop also.
3) Assuming things clear up for the summer battlefielding season, is there anything in particular you’re looking forward to about getting back out on the Antietam battlefield more?
Living in Manassas and with the recommendations of not traveling, I haven't been to Antietam in a while. Just getting up there will be refreshing again. But I've kept up my Maryland Campaign research, which has forced me to create a mental of list of unit paths I want to walk in next time I can get to the battlefield. Dan Welch and I are working on a book about Ohioans at Antietam, so I'll be visiting their battlefield locations first.
4) I understand you are spending some time lately with the late John Brown. What’s that all about?
It was always a joke when I worked at Harpers Ferry--you can never escape John Brown. I guess that's true. But the story keeps drawing me back. I've had the great pleasure of working with my friend and colleague, Jon-Erik Gilot, on a John Brown's Raid installment for the ECW series. It is an oft-told story, but we believe we can tell the story in a new and fresh way. First, we'll be fitting Brown's Raid into the prism of earlier slave rebellions and examine how that affected Southerners' perceptions of Brown's action. Additionally, the main text will be accompanied by two tours related to the Raid--a walking tour of lower town Harpers Ferry and a driving tour of Raid sites outside the lower town. We're over the hump and can see the light at the end of the tunnel.
5) Are you working on anything else these days?
Where do I begin? Dan Welch and I are working on a study of Ohioans at Antietam, and I'm also collaborating with some of my colleagues at Antietam on a "Brigades of Antietam" book headed by Brad Gottfried. Then, I have a manuscript about Mosby's Rangers vs. Cole's Cavalry in the works. Lastly, I'm researching what I hope will become a trilogy covering the period between Antietam and the Fredericksburg Campaign as well as a study of the Army of the Potomac in the Maryland Campaign. These projects are all in various stages of (in)completion.
Lightning Round
Favorite primary source?
The
OR
s.
Favorite Civil War-related monument?
11th New Jersey Infantry at Gettysburg
Favorite unsung hero of the Civil War era?
Montgomery Meigs
What’s a bucket-list Civil War site you’ve not yet visited?
Perryville
Favorite ECWS book that’s not one of your own?
Dan Davis' and Eric Wittenberg's
Out Flew the Sabres
.
|
|
The latest book in the Emerging Civil War Series is out, in print and, shortly, in audio:
Hellmira: The Union’s Most Infamous Civil War Prison Camp—Elmira, NY
by Derek Maxfield
. Derided after the war as “the Andersonville of the North,” the prison camp at Elmira had a troubled history and an even more troubled place in Civil War memory, as Derek’s book explains.
“
Hellmira
is my first book,” he says, “and represents the realization of a dream for me, as I am certain it is for most professional historians.” The book is
available for order here
.
Speaking of audiobooks, here’s a complete list of our ECWS titles currently available in audiobook, although we have a bunch of others in the works. Moving forward, our goal is to try and release the audio editions around the same time we release the print editions, even as we try and fill in our back catalogue as we go.
If your stay-at-home order has you feeling cooped up, check out one of these titles to help you get out of the house a little, even if it’s just in the “theater of the mind.”
|
|
Emerging Revolutionary War News
|
April is a defining month in American Revolutionary War history. On the 19th day of the month, the war of words spilled over into bloodshed, as colonists and British Redcoats fought at Lexington and Concord, along what would become known as the "Battle Road." By the time darkness fell that evening, close to 350 colonists and British soldiers were killed or wounded.
April is also a defining moment for
Emerging Revolutionary War
. We have launched during the pandemic, a new effort to bring history alive via "Revolutionary War Roundtable with ERW." Sunday evenings at 7 p.m. EST, join in on Rev War revelry as the ERW crew and guest historians have a happy hour discussing the history of the era. Grab your favorite drink, head over to our Facebook page, and click to join. You can also watch archived editions. Questions and comments are always welcomed. See you there!
|
|
Feeling a little stir crazy and eager to get out of the house? Don’t forget to don your official Emerging Civil War ballcap!
Order yours now for only $22 (tax and shipping included). For ordering details,
click here
.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
