Ken Burns

Do you have to destroy the things you love?

George Horse Capture Jr. quoted in Blood Memory
When I was a girl in the 50s the Indian head nickel (1913-1938) with the buffalo on the back was still circulating. The model for the buffalo was caged in New York City’s Central Park Menagerie. His name was Black Diamond. No one wanted his care, and he slaughtered for meat.

In a nutshell, Black Diamond’s story reflects the story of America’s interaction with the buffalo: holding them as iconic and show more representational of America while slaughtering them for profit.

Millions of these beasts were killed in a few decades for quick money and the thrill of killing. Europeans thought in terms of profit and money, not sustainability. The Native Americans knew the value of the buffalo. Today we understand the prairie ecosystem and the buffalo’s central role in it. But did we really learn anything? We still take and use and destroy and then grouse when it’s gone.

From the start there were a few who wanted to protect and preserve the buffalo. Some tried to interbreed them with cattle. Small herds were kept on ranches. One man gave a buffalo to the natives so they could have their Sun Dance. But mostly, people came from far and near to kill them. Some took the hides which were a hot commodity for a while. Some just wanted to kill a huge animal. Some wanted to replace them with cattle, some wanted to destroy the native way of life so they would become farmers.

And then they were gone, but for a few. People banded together and created a society and preserves. The buffalo have survived, but diminished, no longer roaming across the wide prairies.

This companion book to Ken Burn’s documentary series “Blood Memory” includes 217 color photographs. Drayton Duncan’s text is heartfelt and informative, damning and hopeful. If you loved the series, read it. (I read it first, and plan now to watch the series.) Put it on your list for Christmas giving.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book.

People–nations–can make grievous mistakes. They’re also capable of learning from those mistakes, of acknowledging them and then deciding to fo in a different direction.

Dayton Duncan in Blood Memory show less

Goosebump-inducing. Absolutely stunning. If I could give it 6 stars, I would.

This is the companion book to what was possibly the best documentary ever made, Ken Burns 11.5 hour epic “The Civil War”. Burns spent five years researching and producing it – one year longer than the war itself took – pouring through thousands of photographs, interviewing prominent Civil War historians such as Shelby Foote and James McPherson, and paying attention to the both the larger historical context show more for the War and at the same time poignant personal stories. Among other things, he invented what came to be known as the “Ken Burns effect”, the slow zooming and panning across photos, which has since been adopted by many other filmmakers.

The book does the documentary justice. It contains over 500 photographs and illustrations and is truly beautiful. There are of course all the “big” things you’d expect: the genius of Lincoln as politician, preserver of the Union, commander-in-chief, and orator. The pompous and overly cautious General McClellan, who after being replaced would run against Lincoln in the election of 1864. (As an aside, the picture of their last meeting that Burns includes says everything about the personalities and relationship Lincoln and McClellan had.) The public turning out to watch the First Battle of Bull Run from a nearby hill, as if it were theater. The horrors of slavery and the blatant racism of the 19th century, set against the gentility of the Southern way of life. The horrors of battlefield carnage, set against the incredible bravery and valor of soldiers who sometimes found themselves fighting on the opposite side of relatives or friends from before the war. The genius of the Southern Generals like Robert E. Lee of course, but also Stonewall Jackson and Nathan Bedford Forrest, who despite having a two to one disadvantage in armed forces had the South within a battle or two of improbably winning the war.

American men of letters are here: Herman Melville recognizing the significance of Jackson’s death in his poems, one ending, “By the edge of those wilds Stonewall had charged – but the year and the Man were gone.” Walt Whitman, after having worked in the appalling Union hospitals, saying “Future years will never know the seething hell and the black infernal background, the countless minor scenes and interiors of the secession war; and it is best that they should not. The real war will never get in the books.”

If that’s true, Burns must surely come close. There is no way to do his work justice in a review, but I’ll close with two scenes that have stuck to me all these years after having seen the documentary and read the book. They are indelible and unforgettable.

The first, after the battle of Fredericksburg on December 11, 1862, former college professor Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (and then commander of the 20th Maine), hearing the wounded at night on the freezing battlefield:
“But out of that silence…rose new sounds more appalling still…a strange ventriloquism, of which you could not locate the source, a smothered moan…as if a thousand discords were flowing together into a key-note weird, unearthly, terrible to hear and bear, yet startling with its nearness; the writhing concord broken by cries for help…some begging for a drop of water, some calling on God for pity; and some on friendly hands to finish what the enemy had so horribly begun; some with delirious, dreamy voices murmuring loved ones names, as if the dearest were bending over them; and underneath, all the time, the deep bass note from closed lips too hopeless, or too heroic to articulate their agony.”

…and then after scraping out shallow graves for the dead, and looking up to see the Northern Lights dancing in the winter sky. “Who would not pass on as they did,” he asked, “dead for their country’s life, and lighted to burial by the meteor splendors of their native sky?”

And the second moment, this letter, written by Major Sullivan Ballou to his wife a week before the first battle of Bull Run:

“July the 14th, 1861
Camp Clark, Washington

My very dear Sarah:

The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days—perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more...

I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans upon the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing—perfectly willing—to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt…

Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me to you with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me unresistibly on with all these chains to the battle field.

The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when God willing, we might still have lived and loved together and seen our sons grow up to honorable manhood around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me—perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar—that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have often been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness…

But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the brightest day and in the darkest night… always, always, and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah, do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again…”

Burns then notes that Sullivan Ballou was killed at the first battle of Bull Run. show less

This is my second time taking in the Dayton Duncan-Ken Burns audiobook about plucky doctor-turned-adventurer Horatio Jackson's historic first crossing of the U.S. continent by automobile. The challenges, the individual triumph, the unplanned three-way race make for a compelling, exciting American tale. Cameo narration by Tom Hanks and, at the NYC end, George Plimpton, and others make for a great, exciting, entertaining telling. However, Ken Burns' lengthy, self-indulgent introduction borders show more on narcissism and takes away from the initial energy, while Duncan's panoramic road trip paean and excessive Walt Whitman quotes take away from the already perfect conclusion: Horation finally making it home. show less

It was NOT the best of times — it was damn near the worst of times. The Vietnam war tore the fabric of American society asunder. Moreover, despite the loss of more than 50,000 American lives and more than 1 million Vietnamese lives, the war was nearly a total failure from the American point of view.

This book, informatively, if not cleverly, titled The Vietnam War, by Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns, vividly brings that unpleasant time back to life. It is accompanied by a film series by Ken show more Burns and Lynn Novick. The book follows fairly closely the narrative of the famous Pentagon Papers that originally appeared in the New York Times. Although it doesn’t have much if anything new to say about the war, what it says does so forcefully and graphically. The authors effectively employ the broad overview of an omniscient narrator intermixed with poignant asides from some of the “little people” most affected by the war, such as the grunts who fought, the surviving family members of those who did not return, and some Vietnamese from both South Vietnam (our allies) and North Vietnam (our enemy).

Especially moving is the depiction of the final days of the South Vietnamese Republic. The North Vietnamese army was ineluctably closing in on Saigon while the American government was doing its best to rescue the few remaining Americans. But it had all but abandoned its former allies to their uncertain fate at the hands of their enemies.

Discussion: Some reviewers have criticized this book (and the accompanying series on PBS) for shifting attention away from the militarism behind for American intervention and focusing on sentimental stories of survival and perseverance.

I don’t disagree with their criticisms. But the anecdotal approach taken by the authors to accompany the drier histories is not without merit .

I do not agree, however, with their contention that America is still divided over Vietnam. The country is divided over plenty, but I don’t see Vietnam at the top of the list. It would be more accurate, in my opinion, to say that America is still divided over the Civil War.

I also was disappointed that the authors did not give more attention to the use of Agent Orange by the Americans. Between 2 and 5 million Vietnamese people were exposed to the toxic chemical, which poisoned the soil, river systems, lakes and rice paddies of Vietnam, and entered the food chain. Large tracts of that land remain degraded and unproductive to this day.

Moreover, birth defects in those who were exposed have been extensively documented, both among the Vietnamese and the American pilots who disseminated the agent. As Propublica reported, “the odds of having a child born with birth defects were more than a third higher for veterans exposed to Agent Orange than for those who weren’t.” You can read more about harm to American veterans here and here. Needless to say, the profound lingering effects on the Vietnamese are even greater.

This important “legacy” of the Vietnam War deserves as much attention as any other.

Note: There is a PBS website to accompany the book and television series which includes resources for veterans, a reading list, photos, videos, and music lists.

Evaluation: This book is a good introduction to the war for young people who did not live through those times and a decent, if sometimes unpleasant, reminder to those of us who did.

A Few Notes on the Audio Production:

I listened to the audio version of the book, capably read by Ken Burns, who excels at media presentations. Many of the interviewees are also featured in the recording, which added auditory interest.

(JAB) show less