Roundup: Talking About History

August 8, 2005

NYT Ombudsman Says the Paper Shouldn't Have Ignored the Toledo Blade Series on Alleged Vietnam War Crimes

Daniel Okrent, ombudsman for the NYT (Feb. 1, 2004):THIS week, it's time for some journalism heresy. I'd like to suggest that newspapers with aspirations to greatness - like the one you're holding in your hands - learn to be generous to their rivals, and in the process provide value for their readers.It has long been Times policy to credit other news organizations for the

August 8, 2005

How Herodotus Led a Canadian Exploration Crew to an Ancient Persian Invasion Fleet that Sank (And Saved Greece)

Randy Boswell, writing in the Ottawa Citizen (Jan. 21, 2004): With help from Herodotus and an Aegean Sea octopus, a Canadian-led scientific expedition appears to have discovered the site of a turning point in world history: the sinking of a massive Persian invasion fleet in a fierce storm that saved Greece at the dawn of western civilization. During an October dive off the country's northeast coast near Mount Athos -- a site pinpointed by the ancie

August 8, 2005

James McPherson: Another Phony Account of Lincoln's Death

AHA president James McPherson (2003), writing in the AHA's Perspectives, about Lincoln books that falsify history (Jan. 2004):The latest entry in the field is Dark Union: The Secret Web of Profiteers, Politicians, and Booth Conspirators That Led to Lincoln’s Death

August 8, 2005

Lewis & Clark: Vanguard of an American Imperialist Mission

Robert J. Miller, associate professor of Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon, writing in the Seattle Times (Jan. 28, 2004):Meriwether Lewis and William Clark sit high in the pantheon of American folk heroes. Even today, Lewis and Clark are viewed as brave adventurers who went where no one had gone before, exploring and conquering the wilderness for the b

August 5, 2005

What Recent Scholarship Concludes About Hiroshima

From the Wilson Quarterly (Summer 2005): A decade ago, heated controversy marked the 50th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945. Some historians said the bomb had been necessary to end the war and save hundreds of thousands of American lives, while revisionists insisted that Japan had been on the verge of capitulating and would have offered a surrender if only the Tru

August 5, 2005

Lawrence S. Wittner: 60 Years After Hiroshima ... What We Need to Do to Make Progress Controlling Nukes

Lawrence S. Wittner, in the Washington Examiner (8-5-05):It has been 60 years since the U.S. government used atomic bombs to destroy Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The weapons killed 200,000 people outright and left tens of thousands of others dying of radiation-induced cancers or afflicted by birth defects, immunological disorders and psychological traumas. It was a grim beginning t

August 5, 2005

Fred Ikle: We Were Lucky After Hiroshima

Fred Ikle, in the WSJ (8-5-05): [Mr. Iklé was undersecretary of defense for policy in the Reagan administration. His book, "Annihilation from Within," written at the Center for Strategic & International Studies, will be published by Columbia University Press next year.] ... The news about Hiroshima reached the White House on Aug. 5, 1945 -- precisely 60 y

August 5, 2005

A Texas Scholar Digs into The Dark Truths About the Role of the Texas Rangers in Early-20th-Century Border Wars

Whether he gallops across TV screens on a steed named Silver or kickboxes drug dealers and other contemporary miscreants, the Texas Ranger is an iconic figure in American culture. But it has fallen to a Texas-based scholar named Benjamin H. Johnson, a 33-year-old assistant professor of history at Southern Methodist University, to help turn the popular images of the Lone Ranger and of Walker, Texas Ranger, upside down. Mr. Johnson's 2003 book, Revolution in Texas: How a Forgotten Reb

August 5, 2005

Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin: The Myth of Hiroshima

Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, in the LAT (8-5-05): [ KAI BIRD and MARTIN J. SHERWIN are coauthors of "American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer," published earlier this year by Knopf.] ... A decade ago, on the 50th anniversary, this narrative [that the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki brought about the end of WW II] was rei

August 5, 2005

Geoffrey Wheatcroft: Hiroshima Wasn't Uniquely Wicked.

Geoffrey Wheatcroft, in the Guardian (8-5-05): [Geoffrey Wheatcroft's most recent book is The Strange Death of Tory England.] ... Some American admirals believed then and ever after that surrender was a matter of time, and not much of it, and a strong suspicion persists of an ulterior motive by Washington, wanting to end the war with Japan quickly before Soviet Russia joined in. In any case,

August 5, 2005

Richard Rubin: The Ghost of Emmett Till

Richard Rubin, in the NYT Magazine (7-31-05):We've known his story forever, it seems. Maybe that's because it's a tale so stark and powerful that it has assumed an air of timelessness, something almost mythical: Emmett Till, a 14-year-old black kid born and raised in Chicago, went down in August 1955 to visit some relatives in the hamlet of Money, Miss. One day, he walked into a country store there,

August 4, 2005

Why the Atomic Bombing of Japan Is Missing from Our WW II Cultural Memory

From Ascribe, the University Newswire (8-1-05):The 60th anniversary on Saturday, August 6, of the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima is likely to gain less attention in the United States than other World War II anniversaries, in part because it does not fit the heroic image that Americans have of themselves, says a Duke University professor who has written a book about World War II and memory. "Americans

August 3, 2005

The Left's Failure to Admit the Truth: Interview with Jack Cashill

From Frontpage.com (8-3-05):Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Jack Cashill, an Emmy-award winning independent writer and producer with a Ph.D. in American Studies from Purdue. He is the author of the new book Hoodwinked: How Intellectual Hucksters Have Hijacked American Culture.FP: Mr Cashill, welcome to Frontpage Interview. Cashill: Glad to be here.

August 3, 2005

Gar Alperovitz: 60 Years Later, Historians Are Still Arguing

Gar Alperovitz, at the website, Common Dreams (8-3-05):[Gar Alperovitz, Lionel R. Bauman Professor of Political Economy at the University of Maryland is the author of Atomic Diplomacy: Hiroshima and Potsdam and of

August 3, 2005

Scott Jaschik: The Debate About Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel

Scott Jaschik, in Higher Education (8-3-05):Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies has had the kind of impact that most scholarly authors can only dream about for their works. First published by W.W. Norton in 1997, the book won a Pulitzer Prize the next year for its author,

August 3, 2005

Max Boot: Why Feel Guilty About Hiroshima?

Max Boot, in the LAT (8-3-05):The 60th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, has not so far provoked the kind of anguished debate that accompanied the 50th anniversary. The lack of controversy is fitting because there wasn't much soul-searching at the time. In 1945, 85% of Americans approved of a step deemed necessary to

August 1, 2005

Barton J. Bernstein: Why We Dropped the Bomb

Barton J. Bernstein, in the Mercury News (7-31-05): [BARTON J. BERNSTEIN, a professor of history at Stanford University, has written extensively on the history of the A-bomb. He wrote this article for Perspective.]... During his White House tenure (1945-53), Truman's frequent explanation and general defense of his decision to drop atomic bombs encountered little mainline public criticism. And

July 30, 2005

Richard B. Frank: 60 Years After Hiroshima, We Have the Secret Intercepts that Shaped the Decision

Richard B. Frank, in the Weekly Standard (8-8-05) [Richard B. Frank, a historian of World War II, is the author of Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire.]The sixtieth anniversary of Hiroshima seems to be shaping up as a subdued affair--though not for any lack of significance.

July 29, 2005

Harold Bloom: Walt Whitman, America's Greatest Artist

Harold Bloom, in the WSJ (7-29-05):[Mr. Bloom is Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale. This essay is adapted from his introduction to "Leaves of Grass (July, 1855 ed.)," just published by Penguin Classics.]If you are American, then Walt Whitman is your imaginative father and mother, even if, like myself, you have never composed a line of verse.You can nominate a fair number o

July 28, 2005

David Broder: What Harry Potter Can Teach Us About Teaching History

David Broder, in the Wa Po (7-28-05):Along with millions of others, my granddaughters Lauren, Nicole and Julia eagerly tore open the boxes containing"Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" as soon as the books arrived at the airport near the cabin where they were on vacation. They then disappeared into their rooms -- barely to reappear for the next 24 hours, while they