Book Notes

By Dana M. Caldemeyer

The Greatest Brush: Love, Tragedy, and Redemption of an Artist. By James Ott. (Wellesley, Mass.: Branden Books, 2016. Pp. 338. $24.95 paper)

A native of Covington, Kentucky, Frank Duveneck (1848–1919) was an American artist whose work earned acclaim in Europe for his Rembrandt-like style. After founding schools for painters in Munich and Florence, Duveneck returned to the United States and began teaching in Cincinnati, winning international recognition for his contribution to art. This book is an account of Duveneck’s life, chronicling his development from his birth to Midwestern pioneer parents to his legacy after death. Those interested in art history and Duveneck’s work will find this account informative and interesting.

Northern Kentucky University: A Panoramic History. Photographs by Thomas R. Schiff. (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2015. Pp. 156. $34.95 cloth)

This collection of Northern Kentucky University (NKU) images by photographer Thomas R. Schiff captures the transformation of the NKU campus from a branch of the University of Kentucky to a major educational institution. Recent panoramic photographs of the campus are interspersed with older photographs of the university, showing how it has changed over time. These photographs are accompanied by essays from faculty and alumni, including an introduction by Professor Emeritus James Claypool. Well organized and designed, this book will make students, alumni, and faculty of NKU appreciate the campus and its history all the more.

Wild Wolf: The Great Civil War Rivalry; Colonel Frank Wolford, Commander, 1st Kentucky Calvary. By Ronald Wolford Blair. (Morely, Mo.: Acclaim Press, 2015. Pp. 466. $29.95 cloth)

Wild Wolf is an account of Colonel Frank Wolford, a Union army colonel from Kentucky who fought against Confederate raider John Hunt Morgan. This detailed account of Wolford’s life, written by his great-great-grandnephew, focuses primarily on Wolford’s role in the battles against Morgan’s Raiders but also discusses his politics and personal life, including his disagreement with Abraham Lincoln over the use of African American soldiers in the Union army. The account is accompanied by dozens of maps and photographs that will interest Civil War buffs or those interested in the Civil War battles in and around Kentucky.

By Andrew P. Patrick

The Lost Gettysburg Address: Charles Anderson’s Civil War Odyssey. By David T. Dixon. (Santa Barbara, Calif.: B-List History, 2015. Pp. 246. $18.95 cloth; $3.99 ebook)

The story of native Kentuckian Charles Anderson, whose largely forgotten speech followed President Abraham Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg Address, provides useful context to the dedication ceremony at the cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, on November 19, 1863. Anderson’s life serves as a case study of a slaveholder who became a staunch Unionist, and Dixon argues that Anderson’s fiery oration provided emotional support for Lincoln’s moral reframing of the purpose of the conflict. Written for a general audience, Dixon’s biography brings an overlooked character back into the narrative and helps ground Lincoln’s famous speech in its immediate political and wartime context.

Mountaintop Mining in Appalachia: Understanding Stakeholders and Changes in Environmental Conflict. By Susan F. Hirsch and E. Franklin Dukes (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2014. Pp. 160. $55.00 cloth; $22.95 paper; $18.99 ebook)

Authors Hirsch and Dukes use the hot-button topic of mountain-top mining as a case study to explore the complex processes by which controversial issues are debated and decided. They keep the residents of Appalachia, a diverse cast with diverse views, at the center of the narrative and seek to move beyond the tired bumper-sticker slogans to examine the institutions, policies, and ideological differences that underlie the competing positions. More than a primer on a single environmental disagreement, the book also introduces concepts from the field of conflict analysis and resolution that inform an array of ecological disputes across the world.