One of the interesting things about the way Paul Collins writes is the many coincidences he uncovers during his research. The Trouble with Tom is obstensibly about the death of revolutionary writer Thomas Paine and then what happened to his body afterwards. (His bones were dug up, transported from the US to England and are in a box being used as a chair at the point of the book I'm currently reading.) Along with his actual body however, Collins follows the impact of Paine throughout the book. So that's how the reader learns about Richard Carlile, a British radical who used his pen to fight for the rights of Englishmen (which is ironic at first to read as American revolutionaries fought for their rights as Englishmen and then we find out that the average English guy pretty much had no voice at all in his life and livelihood). Carlile was a determined and fascinating character who even believed in women's rights of all things - which probably made him more of a radical then anything else. Carlile is not the only historical revelation in the book though, there is also the novelist George Lippard, the man who created the myth about the Liberty Bell's crack (and why do we still believe this even though we know it is a myth?), the phrenologists and publishers, Fowler & Wells, who published a book by the spirit of Thomas Paine (and yes, you read that right - apparently in the 1850s dead people did tell tales!) and the fascinating guy I'm currently reading about, Moncure Conway.
Conway was a Unitarian minister from Virginia who was a friend and contemporary of Emerson, Thoreau, Alcott, Holmes and Whitman. He almost seemed to have lived a Forrest Gump kind of existence, bouncing from one famous American to another (of course they were not all luminaries at the time, but still....). Collins wanders through Conway's effects in boxes at Columbia University as he recounts the story of the man's life, and how he intersected with the legacy of Thomas Paine. I have never heard of Moncure Conway but he seems to have been a player on every level with the thinkers and fighters on both sides of the slavery issue leading up to the Civil War. (He wanted freedom for slaves but also believed in nonviolence - not so easy in the 1850s.) Conway was a fan of Margaret Fuller, who has been called the "first American feminist" and someone I have never heard of (that bachelor's degree in American History becomes less and less impressive with every book I read). Conway never met Fuller however, as she drowned with her husband and child in 1850 in an accident in Long Island Sound.
How come I never heard of Margaret Fuller?
I almost feel like I am on a literary and historical treasure hunt when I read Paul Collins (and Sarah Vowell hits me the same way). I follow along as he makes discoveries and tells his story, a story that I don't think he had any idea was going to turn out the way that it did when he started it. I enjoyed all of his earlier books, and have copies of them all, but I think he is really hitting his stride with The Trouble with Tom. He has found the way to bring history to the masses - to make it compelling without being the slightest bit overwrought or dull. You do not get the idea while reading this book that YOU MUST MEMORIZE THESE FACTS! You are just sitting with a friend who is telling you the oddest stories about the most fascinating people. The fact that these stories have to do with American history is just an afterthought. You learn because it interests you to hear what Collins has to say, not because you must. Because of this relaxed style, The Trouble with Tom is quite simply the best sort of book for the general historian and I am really really enjoying it.
Yesterday we listened to Sister Hazel, whom I love and must get more cds from, and Gordon Lightfoot. As usual when Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald came on, I sang along at the top of my lungs. The little guy loved it. I am trying to resist buying The Mighty Fitz, but I doubt I will hold out long. I have several books on sunken ships (Robert Ballard is a hero), and the Edmund Fitzgerald in particular fascinates me. I have no idea how Gordon Lightfoot found out about this ship, but he immortalized it. And now, I just want to know more!
Today is all Creedence Clearwater Revival - proof that sometimes there is nothing better than American music in the 1970s.
