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The Reconstruction Era
- GenresHistory
Published January 1, 2016
About the author
Robert K. Sutton
11 books13 followersRobert K. Sutton retired as Chief Historian of the National Park Service in 2016, after having served in the position for nearly nine years. He came to this position following his tenure as the Superintendent of Manassas National Battlefield Park for the previous 12 ½ years. From 1986 to 1990, he directed the Historic Preservation and Historical Administration public history programs at Arizona State University. He has published a number of books, articles and reviews on various public history topics. One of his primary interests as Chief Historian and as Superintendent at Manassas Battlefield was leading the emphasis on expanding the interpretation of the Civil War for the Sesquicentennial. As part of that effort, he encouraged Civil War battlefields to expand their interpretive programs to focus more attention to the social, economic, and political issues during the Civil War Era.
Dr. Sutton is currently serving as a consultant to the American Battle Monuments Commission, assisting commission staff in developing interpretive programs to commemorate the Centennial of World War I. In that program, he is editing a collection of essays by leading World War I historians that will be available in April 2017.
Dr. Sutton also has written a book on the Civil War Era in Kansas, that will be published by Skyhorse Publishing in August 2017. The book will explore the efforts of abolitionists to ensure that the Territory of Kansas would become a free state, focusing on the support of Amos Lawrence, a wealthy businessman in Boston, to the town that bore his name in Lawrence, Kansas. Dr. Sutton tells the story from the perspective of the major players. The book is titled: Stark Mad Abolitionists: Lawrence, Kansas and the Battle Over Slavery in the Civil War Era.
A blurb for the book is attached here: http://skyhorsepublishing.com/titles/....
Dr. Sutton is currently serving as a consultant to the American Battle Monuments Commission, assisting commission staff in developing interpretive programs to commemorate the Centennial of World War I. In that program, he is editing a collection of essays by leading World War I historians that will be available in April 2017.
Dr. Sutton also has written a book on the Civil War Era in Kansas, that will be published by Skyhorse Publishing in August 2017. The book will explore the efforts of abolitionists to ensure that the Territory of Kansas would become a free state, focusing on the support of Amos Lawrence, a wealthy businessman in Boston, to the town that bore his name in Lawrence, Kansas. Dr. Sutton tells the story from the perspective of the major players. The book is titled: Stark Mad Abolitionists: Lawrence, Kansas and the Battle Over Slavery in the Civil War Era.
A blurb for the book is attached here: http://skyhorsepublishing.com/titles/....
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
November 22, 2018
I picked up this collection, published by the National Park Service, at the Abraham Lincoln Home site in Springfield, Illinois, on a field trip with my daughter's class. With fourteen essays by preeminent historians (Thavolia Glymph, David Blight, Eric Foner, etc.), this slim volume offers a concise, authoritative, and readable primer on a fascinating period in American history that continues to echo today.
October 12, 2017
This easy to digest series of essays brings the immensely complex history of Reconstruction to readers regardless of their background. Whether brand new to Reconstruction or seeking to refresh your understanding, this is a great place to start.
September 9, 2026
This is messy. It‘s a collection of essays so disorganized and poorly coordinated, I have to wonder whether any editing was done at all.
Even individually, most of the essays themselves were poorly written. They kept to a format along the lines of “as x happened, y was happening and then z happened“, with no overarching analysis to be found, where one is absolutely indispensable. The reader cannot conjure context out of thin air! I want to know how people were living and feeling, what they were thinking and what motivated their actions.
The only reader I can think of who would benefit from this format is one that is already a committed scholar of the period, while miraculously lacking any and all knowledge of the reconstruction timeline. They would be able to embed the dry listing of dates and facts provided in this book into the lived experience of its subjects. That is the job of public history aka this book - sadly, it remains beyond the editors‘ capabilities as does a conclusion worthy of the title.
There is nothing in this book I wouldn‘t be able to learn from Wikipedia and I say that as someone who admires the immense value a historian‘s analysis USUALLY provides in published literature as opposed to internet encyclopedias.
I am convinced that the editors did not read all the individual essays and neither did the essayists read any of their fellow authors’ works. Otherwise, somebody would have noticed the sheer amount of repetition that easily takes up a good quarter of each essay despite theoretically being written about entirely separate subjects.
Every essay, we begin with a regurgitation of the basic timeline of the reconstruction period with only minimal diversion from the other 15 times it was detailed.
By page 130 of a book about the aftermath of the civil war, we can usually be relatively certain that readers know what the civil war is, right? Then why does the essayist feel the need to include paragraphs such as “The fight over whether slavery should expand into the West had transformed the 1860 election into a referendum on competing visions of the empire. […] After Abraham Lincoln‘s narrow victory, southern States began seceding, taking their congressional delegations with them“? Yes, thank you for explaining the civil war again, I had almost forgotten what it was.
Unfortunately, only one example of many.
Two stars because I liked the illustrations and I am slightly more knowledgable about the reconstruction era than I was before, though not by much. National Parks, you can do better.
Even individually, most of the essays themselves were poorly written. They kept to a format along the lines of “as x happened, y was happening and then z happened“, with no overarching analysis to be found, where one is absolutely indispensable. The reader cannot conjure context out of thin air! I want to know how people were living and feeling, what they were thinking and what motivated their actions.
The only reader I can think of who would benefit from this format is one that is already a committed scholar of the period, while miraculously lacking any and all knowledge of the reconstruction timeline. They would be able to embed the dry listing of dates and facts provided in this book into the lived experience of its subjects. That is the job of public history aka this book - sadly, it remains beyond the editors‘ capabilities as does a conclusion worthy of the title.
There is nothing in this book I wouldn‘t be able to learn from Wikipedia and I say that as someone who admires the immense value a historian‘s analysis USUALLY provides in published literature as opposed to internet encyclopedias.
I am convinced that the editors did not read all the individual essays and neither did the essayists read any of their fellow authors’ works. Otherwise, somebody would have noticed the sheer amount of repetition that easily takes up a good quarter of each essay despite theoretically being written about entirely separate subjects.
Every essay, we begin with a regurgitation of the basic timeline of the reconstruction period with only minimal diversion from the other 15 times it was detailed.
By page 130 of a book about the aftermath of the civil war, we can usually be relatively certain that readers know what the civil war is, right? Then why does the essayist feel the need to include paragraphs such as “The fight over whether slavery should expand into the West had transformed the 1860 election into a referendum on competing visions of the empire. […] After Abraham Lincoln‘s narrow victory, southern States began seceding, taking their congressional delegations with them“? Yes, thank you for explaining the civil war again, I had almost forgotten what it was.
Unfortunately, only one example of many.
Two stars because I liked the illustrations and I am slightly more knowledgable about the reconstruction era than I was before, though not by much. National Parks, you can do better.
July 12, 2025
I vacillated between 3 and 4 stars. Not because the book is poorly written, it is well written. Not beccause of some deficiency in the reasoning, it is well-reasoned. What it lacks is depth and focus. The book is a series of curated essays by academicians which review the origin of the Reconstruction Era, list the enabling legislation, briefly - oh too briefly - cover the actual accomplishments of the era, and then go in depth on the historiography of the reasons it was overwhelmed by the forces of repression. Then many of the authors spall into their own favorite areas, be it fragmentation with th women's suffrage movment, economics, politics, American Imperialism, you name it. I understand that the writers being doctors of history will have expertise in their areas, but they all lose focus as they veer into those areas off the purpose of the volume - the editor deserves blame here to.
What I was looking for, in a book titled "The Reconstruction Era," was a deep dive into Reconstruction itself. What the politics looked like, how the legislation was created, crafted, massaged, and passed in the state legislatures. The what it looked like on the ground in these placed, how it was implemented, who it empowered, what flaws occured, how they were corrected. Then how these institutions - economic equality, freedman suffrage, public schools - all weathered the attacks from outside agencies leading to their erosion. And then what vestiges remained, and still influence us today. I did not get this, and I should have based on the title of the book.
What it is is a good, solid, if repetitive history of reconstruction without details of the actuality of it written by college professors for readers able to process that level of information.
What it is not is a look into how Reconstruction was implemented and what effect it had on those - freed peoples - it was specifically intended to empower.
What I was looking for, in a book titled "The Reconstruction Era," was a deep dive into Reconstruction itself. What the politics looked like, how the legislation was created, crafted, massaged, and passed in the state legislatures. The what it looked like on the ground in these placed, how it was implemented, who it empowered, what flaws occured, how they were corrected. Then how these institutions - economic equality, freedman suffrage, public schools - all weathered the attacks from outside agencies leading to their erosion. And then what vestiges remained, and still influence us today. I did not get this, and I should have based on the title of the book.
What it is is a good, solid, if repetitive history of reconstruction without details of the actuality of it written by college professors for readers able to process that level of information.
What it is not is a look into how Reconstruction was implemented and what effect it had on those - freed peoples - it was specifically intended to empower.
January 16, 2020
Wonderfully informative read about the often misunderstood and misinformed Reconstruction era of United States. While the individuals essays repeat details in each piece, as a collection, they offer such an in-depth study of the time, the people and the politics, it’s hard to believe it was created by the National Parks Service.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews