Central Michigan University by Jack R. Westbrook

Abstract

Book Reviews 169 eighteenth century, which owed much to increased transatlantic contact and exchange. As such, her work should be welcomed. Alex Murdoch University of Edinburgh Jack R. Westbrook. Central Michigan University. Mt. Pleasant, S.C.: Arcadia Publishing, 2007. Pp. 128. Introduction. Photographs. Paper, $19.99. Jack R. Westbrook's Central Michigan University is an arresting and eye-catching work of visual biography that charts the spatial evolution of CMU's Mount Pleasant campus. Beginning with the university's origins as the Central Michigan Normal School and Business Institute, which first held classes above a drugstore inMount Pleasant in 1892, Westbrook provides a visual tour of the institution's growth to the present day, with photographs that include campus buildings, portraits of former presidents and faculty members, and snapshots of student life. Billed as a companion piece to Westbrook's other pictorial histories on Michigan's oil and gas industry and the city of Mount Pleasant, Central Michigan University sweepingly demonstrates the many changes the university's expansion had on the cultural and physical landscape of mid-Michigan. The success or failure of Westbrook's book rests on his selection of photographs, and in this respect he succeeds admirably. Using the resources of CMU's Clarke Historical Library, Westbrook has found shots that convey both the physical presence of CMU's campus and the students and faculty who lived and worked in those buildings. Although the physical plant is the primary focus of Westbrook's book, it also includes intriguing photos that emphasize the lived element of CMU's history. The photo depicting students from the Central Michigan Normal School enjoying a marshmallow roast along the Chippewa River in 1906 or the one of CMU president William Boyd speaking to antiwar students who had occupied the ROTC building in 1970 (renaming it "Freedom Hall") are some of the striking snapshots peppered throughout the book. The main weakness of the work is relatively minor and ismore a function of the book's format than any fault of Westbrook's. Although the photos are visually interesting and the caption information well written, the photo-caption format is short on systematic analysis. The information presented seems disconnected, 170 Michigan Historical Review with little sense of why the institution developed in the way that it did over the years. One can argue that this was not Westbrook's intent, but it is unfortunate that the fixed Arcadia format did not allow him to include short, summary essays at the beginning of each chapter. Such essays would have gone a long way toward contextualizing the images in this book. Andrew D. Devenney Center for Transnational and Comparative History Central Michigan University ...