RIP Shelby Foote

[Nathaniel Firethorn]

http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/books/06/28/obit.foote.ap/index.html

Picking any one moment or place is a romantic approach to history that I'm uneasy about. Singling out any one event from history as all-important. Every event is led up to by so many others, small and large. Besides, what you think about and where you'd want to go keeps changing.

"Right now I'm thinking a good deal about emancipation. One of our sins was slavery. Another was emancipation. It's a paradox. In theory, emancipation was one of the glories of our democracy-and it was. But the way it was done led to tragedy. Turning four million people loose with no jobs or trades or learning. And then, in 1877, for a few electoral votes, just abandoning them entirely. A huge amount of pain and trouble resulted. Everybody in America is still paying for it.

"It would be nice to talk to Lincoln. He'd really talk to you. Maybe run circles around you. Not like others who you figure would be mostly rhetoric."

- NF

[Azrael256]

I'm halfway through Fort Sumter To Perryville for the Civil War class next semester.  Gonna miss him.

[Sean Smith]

I'm about halfway through Red River to Appomattox.  

In Ken Burns's documentary on the Civil War, Foote told all the best stories, and did the best job telling them.

[The Rabbi]

What a shame.  BUt I didnt realize he was so old.

[Nathaniel Firethorn]

Old? He was only 88. If he'd have just given up that pipe, he could have lived forever.

- NF