Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877

The Reconstruction era was something a little fuzzy from my high school education, probably just because we only had a short time to spend on it but maybe also because I grew up in the South. Anyway it's a fascinating time and in so many ways essential to where America is today. And Foner's book is the definitive contemporary history.

I'm writing this review a year or two after I read it, so I can't recall details. Honestly I only read 80% of it, I never quite finished it. It's a long book and a little dry and full of an awful lot of detail. Perhaps I would have preferred the abridged version, A Short History of Reconstruction, 1863-1877

Anyway, it's an excellent book. Really putting a lot of detail behind the modern theory that Reconstruction was such a powerful and hopeful moment in America. Despite all its problems it also had a lot of successes in the face of an impossible task resisted at every turn by the racist power in the South. And while it failed to fully liberate people in America that was probably impossible and maybe not a real goal in the first place.

The other resource I want to highlight here is PBS excellent miniseries on Reconstruction, which Foner contributed to. If reading a history book doesn't seem your speed maybe a 4 hour TV documentary is.