Voices of the Marketplace: American Thought and Culture, 1830-1860: American Thought and Culture, 1830-1860 Book

For a popular book of history, this is about as close to perfect as a one can get. Short, focused chapters, connections to present-day dilemmas, hidden villains and heroes (like John C. Fremont who really is due), Davis deserves a lot of credit here.

Davis sees echoes of 19th-century history in post-9/11 America, and he provides them without veering into polemic. As I read this, I kept thinking of "A People's History of the United States," for the way it illuminated the lives of oppressed peoples--Southern Indian tribes, slaves, Catholic immigrants. Yet Davis lets the facts speak for themselves and leaves plenty of room for readers to reach their own conclusions.

What really struck me was how many of these "untold tales" were located in the South. I live in Tennessee, and yet I found new insights into such events as the Creek & Seminole Wars, slave uprisings, and the addition of Florida, Alabama and Mississippi into the Union. Unlike the West, where Native Americans still factor into the culture because of the proximity of so many reservations, Indians in the South are both gone and forgotten.



I learned a lot. I think that's the highest compliment I can pay any book, and this one certainly earned that accolade.