Letters

Abstract

his professional life with Menasha. This book followshis previously published history of the Menasha Corporation, Seeing theForestfor the Trees (2005). Coos County is replete with published histories,most of them selfpublished. (The only exceptions are William G. Robbins, Hard Times inParadise, University ofWashington Press, 1988; Nathan Douthit, A Guide to Oregon South Coast History, Oregon StateUniversity Press, 1999;andmy twobiographies, published byUniversity ofOklahoma Press.) Local his torydepends almost entirelyon self-published books, and those of us who are local history buffsaremost gratefulforthem.As a self-pub lished book, however, Lansing's stands alone because itcombines a professionally researched text with a fully formattedpicture book suitable for themost discriminating coffee table. There isvery littleto criticize,but here and therecaptions do draw comment. The caption forthebottom picture on page 25,forexample, reads, "Tail block on high lead logging opera tion,"but thepicture isobviously of a Tommy Moore block, almost certainlyground lead,not high lead.On page 57,the"construction crane" is actually a pile driver.There are few others, too petty tomention. The primary documents are the photo graphs, and Lansing supplements themwith a livelyand informednarrative about thehistory and locations of the railroads. There are chap terson the timberand coal industries, thefirst railroads, company histories, and a fascinating section on the Spruce Production Division of the U. S. Army, 1917-1918. An appendix shows twenty-eightof the locomotiveswith details of their manufacture and ownership histories.A special feature isa 24-by-341/2-inch map insert showing the locations of the rail lines,plotted by the author. It is a significant contribution to thehistory of the area. The book presentsoriginal informationon a subject that isshortonwritten documentation. As Lansing says inhis prologue, fewdetailed records were kept of theactivitiesof loggersand miners. Those old-timers did, however, enjoy showing off their equipment during a time when cameras were a novelty, and, as a result, there is a wealth of photographic evidence of their activities. The book is about the 220 photographs itcontains ? 70 percent ofwhich are from the extensive collection of theCoos County Historical andMaritime Museum. I am familiar with thenegativesfrom a large number of thephotographs, and I am amazed at the high quality of the reproductions. For readers interestedinhistoric photos, itisa trea sure trove.Railroad buffs will find itan endless source of interestand fascination, and anyone researchinghistories of the lumber and logging companies will find it indispensable. Lionel Youst Coos Bay, Oregon _LETTERS To theEditor: Inmy continuing quest for informationon Edward Bellamy and the interestinhiswork in thePacificNorthwest (see "Looking Backward atEdward Bellamy's Impact in Oregon," Oregon Historical Quarterly 104:1 Spring 2003), Iwas pleased todiscover thatThe Bookman: A Liter aryJournal,published monthly byDodd, Mead & Company inNew York, regularly printed listingof sales of books during themonth for severalU.S. and Canadian cities. The report fornew books sold between August 1,1897,and September 1, 1897,published in theOctober 1897 issue (vol. 6, no. 2) includes Portland, Oregon, as one of the thirty-one locations with sales data (p. 173).The number one book Letters 347 in sales as reported by "leading booksellers" in Portland forthat month was Bellamy's recently published Equality, the sequel to his Utopian novel, LookingBackward 2000-1887 (1888). Sev eralother locations, includingBuffalo,Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Louisville, Providence, Toledo, and Toronto, have Equal ity in the top six titles sold thatmonth, but Portland was the only location with thenovel being thenumber one seller. This isreflectivein someway of a continuing interestinBellamy's work in the region. It isalso interestingtonotewhat other titles were best sellers inPortland at this time.The other fivebooks on the listduringAugust 1897 inorder of saleswere TheMartian, byGeorge Du Maurier, From theLand of theSnow Pearls: TalesfromFuget Sound, byElla Higginson, The Choir Invisible,by JamesLane Allen, Soldiers of Fortune, by Richard H. Davis, Jerome, A Poor Man: A Novel, byMary Eleanor Wilkins, and Wolfville, byAlfredH. Lewis (Dan Quin). The nextmonth's listingforPortland (September 1897) shows Equality at thenumber fourposi tion in saleswith Quo Vadis, byHenryk Sien kiewicz, taking over thenumber one position while theworks by Wilkins, Allen, Higginson, and Davis remained in the top six. By the October 1897 listing forPortland, Equality is no longer in the top six; Quo Vadis retains the number one position and twoworks by Rudyard...