The Great Task Remaining Before Us

"... An impressive array of new scholarship on Reconstruction that explores gender and race relations, the politics of Reconstruction, and historical memory... Recommended." -Choice "... the collection is a good reminder to students of the mid-nineteenth century that in some cases it is more useful to think about the connections and continuities between the years of the war than merely to stop and start narratives at 1865." -Virginia Magazine "This is an important volume that should be read by everyone interested in nineteenth-century America. Editors Cimbala and Miller have assembled an outstanding collection of essays that examine the post-Civil War years from a wide array of vantage points while sharing a common theme: that Reconstruction was in many respects a continuation of the war. This book should serve as a valuable reminder to Americans that, as they prepare to observe the Civil War sesquicentennial, they should be looking ahead to the Reconstruction sesquicentennial and pondering the meaning and legacy of the years 1865-1877." -- -Stephen V. Ash University of Tennessee, author of A Year in the South: 1865 "An unusually strong collection of essays ... the scholarship is impeccable." -- -Gaines M. Foster Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge "Cimbala and Miller have edited an important book that will help historians understand both Reconstruction and its connection to the larger Civil War era." -American Historical Review "Cimbala and Miller offer an extraordinary contribution to the historiography of Reconstruction by demonstrating its enormous diversity. Often misunderstood, Reconstruction was a time of defining liberty and for whom, of rebuilding physically and psychically, of changing and enduring. This collection of sound, thoughtful essays provides an extensive examination of this significant and complex period of U.S. history. A must-read for anyone examining Reconstruction, this book shows that the "great task" still remains before us. -- -Orville Vernon Burton Author The Age of Lincoln