Although Illinois enjoys the indisputable title of "The Land of Lincoln," one small town in New York State played a significant role in the history of the 16th president. Three native sons of Homer---a detective, a journalist, and a painter---helped to inscribe Abraham Lincoln's place in the nation's iconic imagery. Private investigator Eli DeVoe foiled an assassination plot against Lincoln before his first inauguration, journalist William Osborn Stoddard rose from an early booster of Lincoln's political career to become an influential secretary of the president, and artist Francis Bicknell Carpenter painted The First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation before the Cabinet, the renowned painting that still hangs in the U.S. Capitol. This exploration of these men and the town that produced them offers insight into the complexities of presidential image-making and reveals why the Lincoln Forum Bulletin has named Homer "a new Lincoln mecca."]

In The Heart of Central New York: Stories of Historic Homer, NY Martin A. Sweeney makes the past come alive through this collection of articles from his column in The Homer News. Through his writing, Sweeney offers readers a glimpse of the excitement he brought to his classrooms by bringing to life the people, events, manners, and mores of the past in a community that is the heart of Central New York State. This compilation represents Sweeney's successful efforts as a public historian in using the press as a tool for generating interest in his community's unique historical identity.With annotations and a touch of humor, this book illustrates for current and emerging public historians how to successfully engage a community in acknowledging their history matters-that the fibers of "microhistory" contribute to the rich tapestry that is county, regional, state, and national history.

The Remarkable Life of Albert Haskell, Jr.: The King of Crown City is the first comprehensive portrait of the Cortland, New York schoolboy who forged a path of his own that garnered him a reputation in New York State and the Northeast of the nation as an accomplished lawyer, politician, banker, civic organizer, supporter of higher education, and promoter of industrial expansion.As a district attorney, Haskell crossed paths with the prohibition government agents, murderers, white slavers, members of the “Black Hand� gang, and the Ku Klux Klan. He successfully prosecuted those who were part of a tubercular cattle scandal. As a state assemblyman, he was an advocate for the state’s dairy farmers during the violent milk strikes in the 1930s. Haskell co-founded a chapter of Rotary International in 1919 and played a pivotal role in the 1950s in making the place of his birth “the typewriter capital of the world.� Based on a trove of scrapbooks assembled by Haskell through his lifetime and kept by his grandchildren, this biography reveals exactly why Haskell’s life of integrity and public service merits the title of “King of ‘Crown City.’�

This addition to the prestigious Studies in Antiquity and Christianity (SAC) series is the first of a two-volume set of essays on the interpretation of the Hebrew Bible. The essays focus on the exegetical methodology developed by Rolf P. Knierim at the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity in Claremont, California. The exegetical foundations of Knierim s methodology pay special attention to the literary forms and conceptual underpinnings of biblical texts. But the method moves well beyond the concerns of traditional form criticism to address the overall interpretation of the Hebrew Bible from the perspectives of the ancient biblical writers and contemporary readers. The result is a comprehensive interpretive methodology that employs a close reading of biblical texts, integrating concerns about literary form and theological perspective with the settings in which biblical texts were composed as well as the ways they are read in the present and the future. Such readings, the editors maintain, constitute the cutting edge of biblical interpretation at the outset of the millennium. Volume 1 contains twenty-one essays, including seven by Knierim. Other contributors are: Mary Deely, Michael Floyd, John Goldingay, Robert Hubbard, Mignon Jacobs, Isaac Kalimi, Joel Kaminsky, Paul Kim, Wonil Kim, Charles Mabee, Steven Reed, and Janet Weathers. Editors: Deborah Ellens is an independent scholar. Michael Floyd is Professor of Old Testament at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest. Wonil Kim is Assistant Professor of Old Testament Studies at La Sierra University. Marvin A. Sweeney is Professor of Hebrew Bible at Claremont School of Theology and Professor of Religion at Claremont Graduate University. For: Pastors, college and seminary courses in Hebrew Bible, scholars>