New book uses newspapers to chronicle American Revolution

Toledo Free Press ^ | 12-23-12 | [review by] James A. Molnar

[Pharmboy]

Todd Andrlik became a newspaper collector by chance.

It happened at a bookstore in Galena, Ill., where he came across a copy of an old newspaper declaring President Abraham Lincoln dead.

“I was reading the first draft of history about the assassination of Abraham Lincoln and the reward for the capture of his conspirators,” Andrlik said. “It triggered in me this intense passion and enthusiasm in history that I previously hadn’t had.” From there, Andrlik said he went around the country searching for old newspapers and found many from 18th-century colonial America.

These newspapers inspired Andrlik, a marketing-media professional by day, to write his first book, “Reporting the Revolutionary War: Before It Was History, It Was News.”

“For the next five years, I began collecting newspapers that were discovered in attics and found behind walls and in trash and salvaged those that had been damaged,” he said in a phone interview with Toledo Free Press.

After five years, Andrlik said he had “compiled one of the most significant private collections of American Revolution newspapers.”

Many of those newspapers, published between 1763-83, are printed in full color throughout the 400-page book.

“Having a full color reproduction laid out,” Andrlik said, “you are transported back in time and feel like you are reading over the shoulders of George Washington and Paul Revere and experiencing the revolution as it happened.”

There is a guide at the beginning of the book with tips about reading revolutionary newspapers.

Readers are cautioned to be wary of perspective, bias, propaganda, credibility, grammar, humor and sarcasm, irony and context.

[Pharmboy]

I have been waiting for this book...although I did not know about it until this AM. I bought a few British newspapers from the 1770s on eBay that had reported on the RevWar, but could ever afford the American papers.

This is just great...

[gusopol3]

$26.39 @ Amazon; not bad.

[Pharmboy]

One of the more important books ever published on the RevWar, IMO, Freepers. Forty bucks, but ask Santa...he's a Patriot.

The RevWar/Colonial History/General Washington ping list

[Pharmboy]

One of the more important books ever published on the RevWar, IMO, Freepers. Forty bucks, but ask Santa...he's a Patriot.

The RevWar/Colonial History/General Washington ping list

[Pharmboy]

Thanks...I should have checked! No...that is not bad at all for this compilation.

[cripplecreek]

That does sound good.

[Inyo-Mono]

Me too. I bought one American newspaper from 1777 with a Paul Revere engraving in the masthead.

[GeronL]

bump

[NonValueAdded]

reference bump

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Readers are cautioned to be wary of perspective, bias, propaganda, credibility, grammar, humor and sarcasm, irony and context.

LOL. Some things NEVER change. How did these early journalists learn these things without professional journalism universities?

[ZULU]

Thanks Pharmboy. Have a great Holiday.

Looks like a real great read.

[Pharmboy]

Thanks so much...Merry Christmas to you and your family! All the best...

[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks Pharmboy and GeronL. Just adding to the catalog, not sending a general distribution. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.

[huldah1776]

Tomorrow 1 pm is the reenactment...

http://www.ushistory.org/WashingtonCrossing/reenactment/index.htm

Going to try and get there with camera.

Merry Christmas!

[This I Wonder32460]

An ancestral Uncle of mine was there helping to guide the way. I was very excited to discover that info as this is my favorite time to learn more about.

[gusopol3]

I hate to cast a negative or only qualified positive on the book, if by chance you haven’t picked it up yet. My kids got it at Barnes and Noble a couple of days after Christmas at half price. They said the author had been through on a book tour a couple weeks before. My beef with it is that it has a very “coffee-table book” presentation of the newspapers. They are lain out as the background in a murky photo-copied kind of way, with blurbs high-lighted and “pop-up” style commentary overlain. Th articles are readable but pages shown are chopped off at top , bottom and sides. maybe it will grow on me with more time spent, but it’s a little disappointing at first glance. BTW, the Barnes and Noble edition “exclusively” has souvenir-style replicas of four one-page broadsides sewn in the back, appendix-style.