To European explorers; it was Eden; a paradise of waist-high grasses; towering stands of walnut; maple; chestnut; and oak; and forests that teemed with bears; wolves; raccoons; beavers; otters; and foxes. Today; it is the site of Broadway and Wall Street; the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty; and the home of millions of people; who have come from every corner of the nation and the globe. In Gotham; Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace have produced a monumental work of history; one that ranges from the Indian tribes that settled in and around the island of Manna-hata; to the consolidation of the five boroughs into Greater New York in 1898. It is an epic narrative; a story as vast and as varied as the city it chronicles; and it underscores that the history of New York is the story of our nation. Readers will relive the tumultuous early years of New Amsterdam under the Dutch West India Company; Peter Stuyvesant's despotic regime; Indian wars; slave resistance and revolt; the Revolutionary War and the defeat of Washington's army on Brooklyn Heights; the destructive seven years of British occupation; New York as the nation's first capital; the duel between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton; the Erie Canal and the coming of the railroads; the growth of the city as a port and financial center; the infamous draft riots of the Civil War; the great flood of immigrants; the rise of mass entertainment such as vaudeville and Coney Island; the building of the Brooklyn Bridge and the birth of the skyscraper. Here too is a cast of thousands--the rebel Jacob Leisler and the reformer Joanna Bethune; Clement Moore; who saved Greenwich Village from the city's street-grid plan; Herman Melville; who painted disillusioned portraits of city life; and Walt Whitman; who happily celebrated that same life. We meet the rebel Jacob Leisler and the reformer Joanna Bethune; Boss Tweed and his nemesis; cartoonist Thomas Nast; Emma Goldman and Nellie Bly; Jacob Riis and Horace Greeley; police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt; Colonel Waring and his "white angels" (who revolutionized the sanitation department); millionaires John Jacob Astor; Cornelius Vanderbilt; August Belmont; and William Randolph Hearst; and hundreds more who left their mark on this great city. The events and people who crowd these pages guarantee that this is no mere local history. It is in fact a portrait of the heart and soul of America; and a book that will mesmerize everyone interested in the peaks and valleys of American life as found in the greatest city on earth. Gotham is a dazzling read; a fast-paced; brilliant narrative that carries the reader along as it threads hundreds of stories into one great blockbuster of a book.
#841444 in Books 1999-04-15Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 6.00 x 1.40 x 9.00l; 1.94 #File Name: 0195126718576 pages
Review
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful. I thought i knew some U. S. historyBy peorI am not a professional historian; but as an immigrant I am very interested in U. S. history. I thought I knew something about the pre-Civil War era and the slavery problem at the root of it. Professor Davis has opened my eyes to how much I didn't know; and how much I didn't know I didn't know.In an exhaustively; painstakingly researched trilogy; he traces first; the idea of slavery in ancient history; including what Plato and Aristotle had to say about it; and how they justified it; to the biblical texts; both in Old (are the blacks cursed as descendants of Ham; who made fun of his drunk; naked father Noah) and New Testament that appear to justify it; the evolution of the institution through Middle Ages philosophers (are the blacks condemned by original sin; were they redeemed by Christ?). to the discovery of America (Indians shouldn't be enslaved but is is permissible to enslave blacks instead); to Hume's; Locke's; Hobbes' ideas; and the comparisons between English; French and American slavery; all the way to right before the American Revolution when Rousseau's ideas about the 'noble savage' were applied to Indians but apparently not to blacks. This carries Davis through the first volume of the trilogy "The Problem of Slavery in the Western World'.'The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution' goes through the ages of Adam Smith and Utilitarianism; the abolition movement in Great Britain and the United States; the manumission of slaves who joined the English against the American in the Revolutionary War; the influence of the French Revolution on their policy toward their slaves in their Caribbean colonies; the revolution of the slaves and the creation of the republic of Haiti; and the abolitionist movement in the United States; which; rather than seek freedom for the slaves; sought their exile (or 'colonization') to Africa; Central America or Cuba; and the creation of Liberia by the United States following the model of England in creating Sierra Leone.The documentation is exhaustive; and it is not surprising that the work has taken Professor Davis from 1996; when the first volume appeared; to 2014 when he finished the final volume; he uses books; pamphlets; journals; letters and even contemporary newspaper editorials to back his conclusion that slavery; with its dehumanization and animalization of the slave; changes both the slave and the master in ways that we are stiil experiencing in our own lives.1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. History That Should Not Be IngoredBy Robert C. BerringMeticulously researched; this third volume of Davis's trilogy on slavery is a compelling read. The deft use of sources and the power of the narrative carry the day. The stain of racism; even in those who opposed slavery; is hurtful. But we ignore these truths at our peril. It is chilling to read this book on a day when the Texas School Board enjoins history texts to state that slavery was not at the core of the Civil War.1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. Enlightening and thoroughly soberingBy Fred MoodyIf ever there were books that should be required reading; it's these three; which tear away the delusional veil we keep over our eyes; denying the continued impact of slavery.
