Book Review: "The Civil War: Strange & Fascinating Facts" by Burke Davis

Despite the title, these strange and fascinating facts may interest Civil War buffs, and not many others.

Burke Davis, the author of several history books, takes the little stories and factoids he has collected in research and puts them all here in small anecdotes. To appreciate the value of these stories, the reader should have more than a passing knowledge of the Civil War. Many names, dates, and battles are tossed around by an author who knows his subject, and requires his readers to know some, too.

The stories here are very entertaining, covering various subjects. The Civil War was full of "Firsts," First: successful submarine, hospital ships, tobacco and cigarette taxes, and U.S. presidential assassination. The book also mentions Confederate States president Jefferson Davis more than Abraham Lincoln, possibly because Davis is barely a footnote in high school history books today. Stonewall Jackson, Ulysses Grant, and Robert E. Lee are also profiled. One entertaining chapter debunks many myths surrounding Grant's drunken war behavior. Davis also gets serious, writing about widespread venereal disease, and atrocities committed on civilians by both sides.

Davis' book was published in 1960, and the publishers decided to reprint the book many times without updating it. Davis mentions the upcoming centennial of the war, and descendants of the major figures of the war and what they are doing today, or at least today many decades ago. Another drawback is the lack of an index, leaving a serious researcher to have to skim the book looking for useful information. The author mentions prices for Civil War memorabilia at current auction prices- again from many decades ago. Davis writes that more people lost their lives in the Civil War than in all the wars from the Revolution to our most current conflict- Korea. I will recommend this book as a cursory page turner. As a displaced Texan who descends from Confederate (and one Yankee) soldiers, I appreciated Davis' balanced view of both sides of the conflict. Too often today we lose sight of the fact that over 600,000 people lost their lives in this war, and still not many people know much about it.

Book Review: "Famous Movie Stars and Directors" by Joseph Stewart

I had reviewed the nightmarish book from Santa Monica Press entitled Guide to Home Video and Movies by someone named Ryan Reed. That self-proclaimed ultimate video guide was full of misspellings and absent films, and an embarrassment to all the better video guides out there. At the same thrift store where I picked up that tome, I found Famous Movie Stars and Directors by Joseph Stewart. Also from Santa Monica Press, also exactly 128 pages, this sad book did not have as many misspellings, but the factual errors alone make it an awful choice for anyone out there writing a film studies paper, interested in movies, or just looking for a brief read.

This book is a collection of one and a half page profiles of well-known performers and directors- at least well-known when this was published in 1993. I decided to bring up some of the glaring errors from the Actor section only because if I corrected everything here, I would have enough material for a book of my own. I will mention that Faye Dunaway has been rechristened Faye "Dunawaye" every time she is written about, including the table of contents and her own profile.

From Dustin Hoffman's entry: "Hoffman has been nominated for four Academy Awards, for his performances as Ben Braddock in The Graduate (1967), Ratso Rizzo in Midnight Cowboy (1969), Lenny Bruce in Lenny (1974), and Raymond in Rain Man (1988). He finally won for this last film..." Good for Dustin, except he won his first Oscar for 1979's "Kramer vs. Kramer", and was also nominated for "Tootsie". Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone each get just one page for their entries. The longest entry is Bette Davis, who gets a whopping two and a half pages. Burt Reynolds' page and a half has only one of his films mentioned- "Deliverance." After naming James Stewart's films "Bell, Book, and Candle" and "Anatomy of a Murder," author Stewart writes "Arguably, he has not had a significant role since these films..." Pardon me while I get arguable, but did our author simply forget about "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," "How the West Was Won," "Shenandoah," "The Flight of the Phoenix," "The Shootist," and "Airport '77," or did he not possess the simplest film reference book?

Finally, he gets John Wayne, one of my favorite actors, all wrong. Back to the work: "Throughout the 1940's, he appeared in several uninspired movies, mostly Westerns and war films." While most of Wayne's output in the 1940's was Westerns and war films, see if you recognize some of these "uninspired" flicks: "Flying Tigers," "They Were Expendable," "Angel and the Badman," "Fort Apache," "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon," and his uninspired Oscar-nominated role in the uninspired "Sands of Iwo Jima." Whether a Wayne fan or not, you have to agree that Joseph Stewart has no idea what he is talking about, and Leonard Maltin, master of the film guide, had nothing to worry about.

So what did I do with these horrible reads? I donated them to the local library in my former hometown for their annual book sale. This was decades ago, but I'm willing to bet the quarter each I paid for these that they never sold.

Book Review: "The Good Little Mermaid's Guide to Bedtime" by Eija Summer, illustrated by Nici Gregory

This charming book was a perfect fit for my two daughters, ages 6 and 4, who make it their nightly campaign to not go to bed.

An unnamed "good" little mermaid gets ready for bed. She thinks of herself as a predator who doesn't have time for such niceties as tidying up her room and brushing her (razor sharp) teeth. She's too busy striking fear into other marine life...while yawning...and will only go to sleep on her terms.

My daughters were enraptured throughout the book, even my sometimes distracted four year old. My six year old is obsessed with mermaids (she recently suggested the name "the Mermaids" for her soccer team), and this was a perfect fit. Gregory's illustrations are bold and splashy (sorry), with a lot of blues and greens. The book is large, and the illustrations pop off the page. This was a fun book to read, as well. I used a nice, calm voice to read the story about the good little mermaid getting ready for bed, and then a funny voice when the mermaid complains why she can't get ready. As the good little mermaid, I yawned at one point in the story and my six year old did, too.

The Good Little Mermaid's Guide to Bedtime is a delightful book perfect for the three to seven year old in your life. I see myself reading this a lot in the next few years.

Book Review: "The Simple Truths of Service: Inspired by Johnny the Bagger" by Ken Blanchard & Barbara Glanz

This very short book is full of platitudes praising going above and beyond the customer service call. While sometimes inspiring, I was suspicious that either author had ever worked in a corporate retail environment. The book reads like the notes taken at a human resources seminar.

Johnny the Bagger was a bagboy with Down Syndrome who worked at a grocery store. He would print positive thoughts on his computer, and put one of these "thought of the day" slips in the customers' bags. This proved so popular that customers would line up in his cash register line just to get a new thought. The authors then follow up Johnny's story with other stories about employees who would go out of their way, doing that extra mile, in order to keep a customer for life.

While the book is short and sweet, Blanchard and Glanz have not set out to solve every problem you might have in the working world. Difficult customers, lazy coworkers, clueless human resources personnel, stupid corporate decisions, and micro-managing supervisors are not addressed. Some of the ideas are nice, showing the positive side of giving perfect customer service, but I read the stories with a lot of harumphing and rolling my eyes.

I worked retail most of my adult life, with the greatest chunk of that time spent at one big box retailer (nineteen years). I always thought about writing a book about my many experiences, entitled He Really Loves That Dog -featuring a true story about a boss who made me cancel a medical appointment for my son so I could work, but called in sick that very shift when his mutt was ill. When I complained, I was told my proposed title by another boss. I only thought about writing these incidents down but I figured "who would read them?" Every employee has stories like this, what would set me apart? I was no angel, threatening to punch that same boss after being harassed by him at work (and I was the one who got in trouble, of course), so I kept my head down and trudged through. Could these simple truths of service inspire me to be a better employee? No, because they still wouldn't inspire the various companies I worked for to be better employers. Maybe an HQ corporate higher-up, whose "surprise" visits we had to clean up for, can glean something from these little stories, but the Level 1 peon grunt out there will probably have the same reaction I did- yeah, right.

The Simple Truths of Service seems sincere, if a little overly obsessed with this Johnny guy, and maybe the book and accompanying video (in some editions) will give that boss in your life the warm fuzzies, but the truth is in the three decades I worked, I can't think of one situation where incredible customer service would help me love my job, much less make it tolerable. This "truth" hurts.

Book Review: "Blondie, From Punk to the Present: A Pictorial History" by Allan Metz

"Blondie, From Punk to the Present: A Pictorial History" is a massive 512 page book chronicling the rise, the fall, and the rise of the musical group Blondie, covering their start through their late 1990's tour in support of their album "No Exit."

Allan Metz is credited as "compiler" on the book since that is exactly what it is- a compilation of hundreds of newspaper clippings, magazine articles, interviews, and photographs of the band. With Deborah Harry on vocals, Clem Burke on drums, Jimmy Destri on keyboards, and Chris Stein on guitar, Blondie proved some bands just need a twenty year break in order to collect their thoughts and come out with a strong album.

The book is divided into four parts: Then, Between Acts, Now, and In Retrospect. Each section features tons of articles, as well as some average black and white photography of the group. There are even different indexes, categorizing names, band and performer names, and song names. My reservations about the book are due to its repetition and some cosmetic complaints. The most interesting part of the book was the first section, chronicling the Punk music movement as an American phenomenon, before the rightfully angry Brits took it and made it a political statement. The American Punk movement had similarities to the "slackers" of the '90's, including such famous names as Television, Lou Reed, the Ramones, and Patti Smith. One of the writers justified Blondie's inclusion in the Punk group by labeling their music "subversive pop." Blondie was never a group to pick a genre and stick to it, branching into rock, disco, country, reggae, ska, pop, and they can be credited- I prefer the term "blamed"- for bringing rap music to mainstream listeners. The opening history of the New York Punk scene is fascinating stuff. I was enthralled, and read the entire first section in one sitting. Once Blondie got together, the infighting began. They released some great albums, broke up, and got back together again.

Chris Stein's near fatal skin disease. Blondie is a band, not Harry. Deborah Harry sang with the Jazz Passengers at one time. Harry was almost another victim of one Ted Bundy- a story I've seen debunked a couple of times now. Two of the original Blondie founders sued the band when they reunited, but lost in court. The album "No Exit" is not a comeback, just a continuation. All of these facts and more are literally repeated dozens and dozens of times throughout the articles. Maybe the book was not meant to be read from one end to the other like I did, but I was soon bored with reading some of the exact same things in every article. Deborah Harry's film past is touched upon, but is never as thoroughly discussed as I would have liked to see. While billed as a pictorial history, the grainy black and white photos are nothing ground shaking, consisting mostly of candid and performance shots. However, having the photographers talk about their thoughts and reactions at shooting Blondie is interesting. Also, the book measures 8 1/2 by 11 inches, but the text is on one continuous line across each page. Columns may have broken up the monotony, as my eyes would sometimes repeat a line. The book is compiled by an obvious fan, but there are a few negative articles amongst all the praise. The cover is a mess of fonts and type.

"Blondie, From Punk to the Present: A Pictorial History" is like a really cool textbook from a really cool popular culture class given at a really cool liberal arts college back when they existed.

A Brief History of Sims, North Dakota by Charles T. Tatum, Jr.

Before 1878, the Northern Pacific surveyors made their way west from Mandan, North Dakota and discovered a valley now known as Sims Valley. A thick vein of coal was discovered in 1878 when the NPRR was extending their road bed. Thanks to the coal, clay, and ample running spring water that did not freeze in the winter, a station was built. Trains could now take on water all year round. In 1879, the railroad tracks reached the new stop.

Sims wnet through a few names at first. Baby Mine and Bly's Mine were considered, as was Carbon, named for a new brick plant. Sims was named after George V. Sims, chief clerk in the executive office of the railroad in New York, on July 5, 1879. It is also reported that the town was named for a Captain W.H. Sims, a northern Missouri River boat captain. 1879 also saw the opening of the N.P. Coal Company by Charles W. Thompson.

Charles William Thompson was a native of Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, and the son of an Army general. He went to Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, and attended the U.S. Military Academy, before becoming a civil engineer for the South Pacific Railway. Thompson was a colonel in the National Guard Dakota, and fought in the Indian Wars.

The mines grew until there were seven in operation. A post office was established on May 2, 1883, with Theodore Shenkenberg serving as postmaster. The same year, the NPRR platted the townsite. Thompson also opened the first store in May, and organized a bank in July with himself as president and Shenkenberg as cashier. The bank was constructed but never opened. In 1884, the output from the coal mine was about 100 tons a day, taken from five different veins.

The coal company built a $15,000 hotel, which was opened to the public as the Oakes House. It was the largest hotel west of Fargo, according to some. Thompson was then the general manager of the coal company.

Charles W. Thompson also opened a brick yard in Sims. The Carbon Pressed Brick and Lime Company had Thompson as president, W.A. Dows as vice president, and J.H. Hansel as secretary and treasurer. Thompson had the contract to build the first state capitol building. Sims brick went into many local buildings, and the Morton County Courthouse in Mandan. It is said that Sims lost the county seat designation to Mandan by just one vote.

Also in 1884, the community organized the Sims Skandinavian Evangelical Lutheran Congregation. The members built a parsonage and held services in the top story, and the minister and his family lived on the main floor. The members got the needed materials to construct their church from an abandoned building in Sims. The church was also said to be the oldest Lutheran church west of the Missouri River.

As Sims was growing, the railroad would send in work gangs of over a hundred people. They would dig ovens in the surrounding hills, and the smell of baked bread woul be evident for miles. Since Sims was the main shipping point west of Mandan, there was a 21-pen stockyard west of the depot. Herds from as far away as South Dakota were driven there for delivery to Chicago or St. Paul.

At its peak, the town was over a mile long. Two additions, Balasta and Ramstown, were added to the town. Sims boasted saloons, a brick schoolhouse, three stores, a lumber yard, two real estate offices, and a Presbyterian church. A fortress was dug out on top of the Anderson hill for protection against Native Americans. The coal mines and brick yard employed over 500 people, with Sims' population being well over a thousand at this time.

The old central part of the state capitol in Bismarck was faced with brick from Sims. It was light colored, and considered very attractive. Unfortunately, the surface began to crumble. The clay from Sims had specks of lime, which slacked and left holes in the brick. The $30,000 brick plant was abandoned. Hard coal was discovered in Montana, so the railroad decided to close the Sims mines in favor of the new hard coal. Speculators not interested in settling moved on as well.

Charles W. Thompson ended up in Washington state in 1890. He became president of Washington Cooperative Mining Syndicate, and Montezuma Mining Company. He owned several valuable copper, gold, and silver properties in Pierce County, Washington. He made his home in Tacoma, Washington and later died.

Sims, North Dakota died as well. In 1906, the population was 300. In 1910, Sims could claim just 86. On October 31, 1947, the post office was discontinued and the mail was routed to Almont. The town continued with a few businesses until December of 1947 when a railroad line change took place. A new line went from New Salem to Glen Ullin, cutting off Sims, Almont, and Curlew. The railroad tracks were taken up a year later. In 1975, Sims had a population of one, and it disappeared from most state atlases and road maps.
--Charles T. Tatum, Jr.

SOURCES:
Almont Golden Jubilee 1906-1956, Almont, ND: 1956.

Crawford, Lewis F., History of North Dakota, Vol. 1, Chicago and New York: The American Historical Society, Inc., 1931.

Fristad, Paula, Historical Mandan and Morton County: Early Days to 1970, Mandan, ND: 1970.

Gallagher, John S., and Patera, Alan H., North Dakota Post Offices 1850-1982, Burtonsville, MD: The Depot, 1982.

Peterson, Marion Plath, ed., Morton Prairie Roots, Dallas, TX: Taylor Publishing Co., 1975.

"Thompson, Charles William," Who Was Who in America, Vol. 1: 1897-1942, Chicago: Marquis Publications, 1968.

Tostevin, Sarah, ed., "Mantani" A History of Mandan- Morton County including Fort McKeen and Fort Abraham Lincoln 1738 to 1964, Mandan, ND: 1964.

Reading in 2025

-BOOKS:
5. John D. Rockefeller on Making Money (Compilation)
4. Paradoxia: A Predator's Diary by Lydia Lunch
3. Scenes with My Son: Love and Grief in the Wake of Suicide by Robert Hubbard
2. Thoughts in Solitude by Thomas Merton
1. Monasticism: A Very Short Introduction by Stephen J. Davis

-PERIODICALS and ZINES:
"Imprimis," March/April 2025, Volume 54, Number 3/4
"Imprimis," June 2025, Volume 54, Number 6

"The Voice of the Martyrs," April 2025, Volume 59, Number 4
"The Voice of the Martyrs," May 2025, Volume 59, Number 5
"The Voice of the Martyrs," June 2025, Volume 59, Number 6
"The Voice of the Martyrs," July 2025, Volume 59, Number 7

(Updated July 8, 2025)