An often riveting history of a family that left an indelible impact on the nation.
A history of a prominent American family’s entrepreneurial rise and the way that it shaped modern philanthropy.
In 1638, Englishman Chad Browne set sail for Boston in search of religious freedom, and he later converted to a Baptist denomination, impressed with its optimistic spirit and commitment to egalitarianism. In 1722, his descendant, James, who was fascinated by all things maritime, established the family trading business that set the stage for its future wealth. Obadiah Brown changed the spelling of the family name, and his son, Nicholas, oversaw a tremendous expansion of the family business, coterminous with the transformation of Providence, Rhode Island, into a major commercial port. However, Nicholas Brown II is the real focal point of the book, not only because his 40-year partnership with Thomas Ives was so lucrative, but also because he greatly changed the nature of the family’s charitable activity. Previously, the Browns’ generosity was a function of self-interested desire for social station and influence, but Nicholas II took seriously the notion of philanthropy as social responsibility. In 1804, he made a significant contribution to the College of Rhode Island when it was in dire straits, and as a result, it was renamed after the family. In the 1820s, Nicholas II made Brown University the principal object of his attention, and worked hard to make it an instrument of morality and civic-mindedness. By approaching his role as benefactor as a more participatory one, with a view toward long-term results, he helped to create the model for modern philanthropic strategy. Brown (The Post-Pregnancy Handbook, 2003) took more than a decade to research and write this book, and her mastery of her own family’s history is undeniable. It has the scrupulousness and detail of a journalistic effort, meticulously weaving a large amount of information into a coherent tapestry. One could quibble that, at times, she includes too much detail, particularly about the family’s finances. Brown candidly declares up front that one reason that she wrote the book was to address the demonization of family members who participated in the slave trade. She notes that the Browns were conflicted; Nicholas II, for example, inherited his opposition to slavery from his uncle Moses (“one of the earliest and most fervent advocates of abolition”), but he also expressed worry about the social consequences of its elimination. The author never excuses her family’s participation in the slave trade, but she does attempt to situate their moral transgression in the full historical context in which it occurred, instead of simplistically applying “the precepts of the present to the mores of the past.” Later, the author shows that the Brown family’s transformation of its attitude toward philanthropy mirrored what was happening in the country at large. During a discussion of Jacksonian America, she astutely juxtaposes the nation’s principled commitment to egalitarianism with the burgeoning inequality produced by urbanization and industrialization. Throughout, Brown’s prose is clear and spirited, and the story unfolds briskly and dramatically.
An often riveting history of a family that left an indelible impact on the nation.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4808-4417-9
Page Count: 411
Publisher: Archway Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.
Rootin’-tootin’ history of the dry-gulchers, horn-swogglers, and outright killers who populated the Wild West’s wildest city in the late 19th century.
The stories of Wyatt Earp and company, the shootout at the O.K. Corral, and Geronimo and the Apache Wars are all well known. Clavin, who has written books on Dodge City and Wild Bill Hickok, delivers a solid narrative that usefully links significant events—making allies of white enemies, for instance, in facing down the Apache threat, rustling from Mexico, and other ethnically charged circumstances. The author is a touch revisionist, in the modern fashion, in noting that the Earps and Clantons weren’t as bloodthirsty as popular culture has made them out to be. For example, Wyatt and Bat Masterson “took the ‘peace’ in peace officer literally and knew that the way to tame the notorious town was not to outkill the bad guys but to intimidate them, sometimes with the help of a gun barrel to the skull.” Indeed, while some of the Clantons and some of the Earps died violently, most—Wyatt, Bat, Doc Holliday—died of cancer and other ailments, if only a few of old age. Clavin complicates the story by reminding readers that the Earps weren’t really the law in Tombstone and sometimes fell on the other side of the line and that the ordinary citizens of Tombstone and other famed Western venues valued order and peace and weren’t particularly keen on gunfighters and their mischief. Still, updating the old notion that the Earp myth is the American Iliad, the author is at his best when he delineates those fraught spasms of violence. “It is never a good sign for law-abiding citizens,” he writes at one high point, “to see Johnny Ringo rush into town, both him and his horse all in a lather.” Indeed not, even if Ringo wound up killing himself and law-abiding Tombstone faded into obscurity when the silver played out.
Buffs of the Old West will enjoy Clavin’s careful research and vivid writing.Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21458-4
Page Count: 400
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
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