Norman Shavin (1927–1988)

Reviewed July 2006
Would you believe that I purchased this book on a road trip when I was 13 years old? I hadn’t read it all these years, but decided to when I was on another road trip with Stirling this summer. Newspaper articles written almost 100 years after the events happened - historian researched the years March 1860 - May 1865 an told of events as if they were taken from actual newspapers at the time. Actually I am not clear if the articles are really taken from newspapers or show more written as if they were. Each page of this 48 page book represents a real week 1860-1865. heavily illustrated stories reflect humor and sadness. Some articles may not be “newsworthy” at the time, but prove important later. For example March 5 1865 has an article about actor John Booth being ejected from Lincoln’s 2d inaugural speech (it was unknown why he wanted to get near the President) There are many human interest stories as well as just typical stories people would find of interest. A woo0cut of the moon, Tom Thumb visits the White House. General Lee visits his father’s grave, the Polar refrigerator ect... This 48 page book took a long time to read. The print is small and the whole page is covered. I bought this book when traveling the U.S. at 13 so it was fitting I would read it 30 years later on another road trip with my 15 year old son. To really understand the articles you need some background in the civil war. I don’t think I had enough knowledge 2 years ago let alone 30 years ago to get anything out of it.

15-2006 show less

For the history buff, this is an interesting account of the civil war, created by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, to portray the events and happenings in Georgia and throughout the South. The Atlanta Century was published weekly and intended to give the reader an idea of what the front page of a newspaper printed during the Civil War in Atlanta would have looked like.