The Antebellum Period

This volume in the "American Popular Culture Through History" series should be found on the shelves of anyone who is interested in how Americans (mostly, of course, the great middle class) lived c. 1820-60. At a hefty 367pp. of text, plus index, notes, and bibliographies, it covers just about everything--advertising, architecture and furniture, food, fashion, leisure activities, music, literature, performing arts, travel, the visual arts, technology, schools, and the reform mania that swept the nation during this era--and does it in an informal, easily understood way. Illustrations are rather sparse and there are a few minor errors of fact ("women were not permitted to correspond with men who were not relations"--simply not true: Abraham Lincoln, for example, wrote to Mary Todd while courting her; reference to author "Leigh Hun" (should be Hunt); reference to Edwin Drake's Titusville oil field as being extant in 1854 (I had always understood it opened in 1859); reference to the Metis "Indians" of Southern Canada (they were actually a class of partbloods); reference to Mandan Indian "huts" (they actually lived in large and well-built earth lodges); and the typical misconception that our school summer vacation is based on the agricultural year (in actual fact, kids were needed to work on the farm from spring planting through harvest, not just for two or three months in the summer)), but on the whole the book seems remarkably accurate and is full of intriguing information. (Did you know that insecticides were available commercially in 1861? Frank G. Johnson's Patent Powered Coal Tar was advertised in that year. Did you know that antebellum carpeting was sold in strips a bit over 24" wide and had to be pattern-matched and stitched together by professional installers? That the single greatest loss of life in a steamboat accident prior to the Civil War took place as early as January, 1840, when the coaster "Lexington" caught fire and sank?) The type is large and clear. I'll be looking for more volumes in this series.

Dr. James Volo is my hero. He totally taught me AP physics, so I figured that this book would teach me something about something completely unrelated. The truth is, this book saved my marriage. I loved this book. You probalby know nothing about the antebellum period, but after reading this book, you totally will. And you might also learn something about electromagnetic induction, and quite possibly the photoelectric effect.