Buried up to my eyeballs in 19th-century baseball stuff and loving every minute of it. Eric and I are up to nearly 400 pages and 165,000+ words. I'm on to photo acquisition!

Come back next Saturday (Feb 7) for a transcript of that multi-racial feature on Black History Month running in the FLS Town & County. See you then.

Other big news to come next week, new book contract and vintage baseball event both come to fruition!

Today I received an extremely detailed, 24-page document outlining The National Civil War Life Museum and Research Center Project Plan. As some of you may know, I sit on the NCWLF board and developed the foundation’s website. Recently, I was able to secure the endorsement and fund raising support of Civil War painter Mort Kunstler.

Of all of the projects that I am fortunate enough to be a part of, this is by far the biggest. And the fact that I will have some part in the establishment of a museum that my grandchildren will visit is a blessing beyond words.

The current board of directors consists of nine members from diverse experience, ethnic and gender backgrounds. These include: military, education, banking, financial, legal, historical research, writing and fundraising. Visit our website here.

I am also an exhibit advisor and have been assigned to review the Home Front, Militia, Life in Camp and Field Music exhibits and advise the design consultants. The descriptions of the exhibit spaces are outstanding and although I am not at liberty to share the exact details of this project, I will say that the list of advising experts is quite impressive.

This includes Col. Horace McCaskill Jr., Jeff Campbell, Terry Thomann, Robert Zeller, Daniel S. Goldstein, John Cummings, John Hennessy, Glenn Williams, Dr. Robert R. Mackey, George Wunderlich, Joyce Henry, Robert S. Driscoll, Kevin Hershberger, John H. Thillmann, Al Connor, John Richter, Scott Harper, Dean Levy, David Lenk, Randi Korn, Johanna Jones, Stephanie Downey, and ACE Everett.

Our mission statement says: To operate an inclusive national museum and research center that preserves and interprets the human story of the American Civil War and connects the lives of all people of that era to the Nation today.

Our vision is: We will achieve our mission by building the National Civil War Life Museum in Spotsylvania Courthouse, Virginia. This facility will be home to The Civil War Life Museum, The War in Photography and The Civil War Remembrance exhibits. The museum will offer excellent Civil War Study Tours to youth and school groups. The facilities will also include a 100-seat theater for our unique Civil War Life in 3-D theater program, a research library and study center, a conference center and a rotating exhibit gallery.

Stay tuned for updates.

For anyone that might be interested, I posted my recent talk on historical writing along with some lessons-learned and writing exercises. READ HERE

As many of you know Eric Wittenberg and I have been working on a HUGE baseball book highlighting the worst teams, players, calls, and moments in the history of Major League Baseball. The title of the book is “You Stink!” and it is already receiving some attention by the sports media.

Over the last few months this project has taken on a life of its own and we are having a tremendous time researching and writing about these terrible teams and pathetic players (in a highly detailed, but respectful manner.)

Between Eric’s unique vision and my background as a baseball historian, the manuscript has evolved far beyond our original expectations. Not only are we providing readers with detailed essays, but we are also including season schedules, team rosters and complete statistics. The addition of rare photos, bonus sidebars, quotes and lists has made this title a complete study.

As you can probably tell by the webpage teaser, Eric and I are very detailed-oriented guys. And the one detail that we did not take into consideration when we started this was a Foreword. As both of us wrote a portion of the Introduction, we felt that IF we were to include a Foreword, it MUST be written from someone as original and unique as the book itself.

You see, this book is not only a light-hearted historical text on really-really bad baseball; it is also a testament to the generations of fans who remained loyal to these futile franchises. In a way it is a tribute to the fanatics.

So… who better to write the preface to this book than THE #1 fanatic is all of baseball?

Yep, you guessed it, Dave Raymond!

Wait. Who is Dave Raymond you ask?

You know him. You just don't know that you know him.

Well friends, THIS IS DAVE RAYMOND.

And he is writing our Foreword with his perspective as THE fan on the front lines. Welcome aboard Dave! It is truly an honor and a privilege to have your participation on this project. No one fits the overall sentiment of this book more than you. For more on Dave, please visit his official website.

As I mentioned below, despite my personal disagreements with some of his politics, I was VERY impressed with Barack Obama’s inauguration speech and I did come away with an unexpected sense of hope. That said, I just read an insightful commentary (with a Civil War reference) in which a critic for The Weekly Standard took some participants in the ceremony to task for speaking in a revisionist tone. For example:

“Dianne Feinstein opened the ceremony by talking about how the ballot is more powerful than the bullet, how non-violence has made this day possible. It's a bizarre revision of American history that focuses on Martin Luther King rather than William Tecumseh Sherman or George Washington. It was the violence inflicted against British, Confederate, and German troops that made possible the inauguration of an African-American.”

In retrospect, I have to agree. Dr. Martin Luther King would never have been able to give his epic “I Have a Dream” speech if thousands of men had not already killed thousands of other men in the name of liberty. This includes ALL of America’s conflicts at home and abroad.

The unfortunate reality is that war has been just as beneficial to our existence as peace, hence the bullet is (historically) more powerful than the ballot, and that violence, however deplorable, has inevitably been responsible for establishing (and re-establishing) America time and time again.

So why do we have such a hard time accepting that nowadays? And why do we sometimes feel the need to misrepresent history in order to feel better about ourselves? We've killed millions of people over the years in order to stand where we do today. Ironically, our 44th president is a by-product of a legacy of violence. All presidents were.

I’m interested to see what other historians may think about this. Please feel free to email or comment.

Please note that this query is not meant to diminish Dr. King's peaceful contributions. It's more about our country's storied history of violence, how we have all prospered from it, and why we suppress it. Mrs. Feinstein's speech is a perfect example of candy-coating historical memory. This can be very dangerous when taken as truth. (President Obama properly acknowledged sacrifice and referenced Gettysburg, Normandy and Kah Sahn in his speech.)

ADDED: Brooks Simpson has a great post over at Civil Warriors on the many historical inaccuracies that plagued the last few days’ media coverage. READ HERE

Our good friend Richard Williams has added a wonderful post commemorating Thomas Jackson’s birthday today. READ HERE

Last nights talk to the lovely ladies of Kappa Delta Gamma (Beta Eta Chapter), a sorority of retired educators, could not have gone better. It was held at the new Heritage Center in the Maury Commons. We started off with a wonderful tour of the Center’s extensive archive collection of historical documents. I was most impressed and will definitely be spending some hours there in prep for my upcoming book on Confederate encampments. I intend on including civilian’s impressions of the troop’s presence (and not just the soldier’s recollections). Most impressive is their collection of local slave documentation, as well as the Chancellor family’s papers.

Following the tour, I gave a 25 minute talk on my process for historical research and writing. The Q&A session was very lively and enjoyable. I will be posting the transcripts as usual over on my website this weekend and I’ll be certain to add a link here. I would like to thank Becky Guy and the ladies of Kappa Delta Gamma, many who were historians and foundation directors, for their kind hospitality and attention. I made some new friends and look forward to working with some of them in the future.

Great prayer.

Great speech.

Great day.

I actually feel... hopeful.

And I didn't even see that coming.

(Rev. Warren did an outstanding job too.)

To all of our National Park Ranger buddies checking in at 3 am: Stay awake

To all of our friends and colleagues who are going: Stay warm

To all of the people that will be attending my talk at the Heritage Center: Just stay  :)