Richard McCormick at "My Civil War Obsession" Reviews "Lincoln's Labels"!

Richard McCormick was kind enough to review my book, Lincoln's Labels: America's Best Known Brands and the Civil War (Edinborough Press) at his "My Civil War Obsession" blog.

The full review is here and excerpts are below. Please make sure to check out Richard's terrific blog: he is a volunteer at the James A. Ramage Civil War Museum in Fort Wright, KY, and a good many of his posts have to do with the museum and the Civil War in northern Kentucky (great recent examples here, here, and here!)

Excerpts:

"One cliche in Civil War writing is that with so much written about the war, how can anybody find something new to write about? Well, as [Jim] Schmidt...shows, a hard-working researcher can find new information and perspectives about the Civil War even almost 150 years after it began."

"...the book is simply informative and enjoyable. It is well-written, very readable and understandable. It is not a chore to get through this book - in fact it is a very quick read, both because of the style of writing and due to how enjoyable the subject becomes thanks to the author...the author's ability to tie the history of these companies to the Civil War certainly caught my interest and attention."

(Even Richard's "complaints" are compliments...see below!)

"One small complaint I found with the book was that it's too short, with only 164 pages over seven chapters. Of course, this is as much a compliment as a complaint, as I simply wished to read more stories of other similar companies and their survival stories. I did not want it to end, which is one of the best compliments I can pay any book."

"...there was one other small, perhaps barely relevant, thing I did not particularly like about the book - the sad ending of the final chapter. It is appropriate and powerful, a very fascinating piece to include in that chapter about express companies, but it did make me a bit sad to have such an enjoyable book end on such a note. Still, it's hard to consider this to be much of a complaint."

and...the bottom line(!):

"All-in-all, Lincoln's Labels is a well-written, deeply-researched book that is very enjoyable, informative and readable...It is certainly a book that Civil War students or historians will want to find a place for on their shelves."

Thanks, Richard, for the kind words!