I’m looking to read 50 history books, one about each US state, next year so I’m starting to compile a list. It doesn’t have to be the state as a whole, it can focus on a single city or county or so on, but ideally it should be mainly centered around a single state.
by kalam4z00
5 Comments
The Ruin of All Witches focuses on the settling of Springfield, MA and how the political/religious climate as well as aspects of daily life as early settlers in the wilderness led to rampant accusations of witchcraft.
As a prelude I’d recommend John McPhee’s *Annals of the Former World.*
For Texas I’d say the first two books of The Years of Lyndon Johnson. Honestly, *Master of the Senate,* the third book, would work for DC, too.
Are you looking for books that make up the whole history of a place, or are you open to something that’s a little more focused? Joan Didion’s The White Album and John D’Agata’s About a Mountain are kind of classic books about California and Nevada respectively, but aren’t thorough histories.
Nancy Langston’s *Where Land and Water Meet* is about the Harney Basin in Oregon.
Old Jules by Mari Sandoz tells the story of the settlement of western Nebraska, through a slightly fictionalized biography, of Sandoz’ father, Jules. It’s a much better work (and much less sentimental) than Willa Cather’s My Antonia, which covers (on the surface) similar themes.
As a native person from Minnesota, I would recommend Warrior Nation: A History of the Red Lake Ojibwe by Anton Treuer
Or anything related to the native people located in Minnesota/Wisconsin/North and/or South Dakota