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Old 08-24-2002, 11:33 AM
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Tamaroa Tamaroa is offline
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Default Danny Glover's "Civil War Journal" vs. Ken Burns "Civil War"

There seem to be a lot of well read people on this board, so I have a question for you all. If you are a true Civil War buff, no doubt you have read Shelby Foote, Bruce Catton, William C. Davis and Douglas Southall Freeman amongst others.

However if you are just getting into it or the history channel is your thing, most likely one of two TV series has been a part of your Civil War diet. I am of course referring to the two PBS series mentioned in the title.

I was wondering what you all thought about the two series. I own both of them: 9 tapes of the Civil War and 28 tapes of the Civil War Journal. Personally, I like the Civil War Journal series a lot better. I believe Ken Burns may have beat Danny Glover to the punch as far as release date, but after viewing the two series over and over again, I still give the nod to Civil War Journal. Most people seem to worship the ground that Ken Burns walks on. I thought the series was OK, not great but OK. At least I thought, it may get some people thinking about the war and with luck there would ber a resurgance(sp?) in studying the war. It is 11.5 hours spread between 9 tapes and is basically divided into campaigns. If you wanted to look up something specific about the war it is not the series for you. If you are a real Civil War freak as I am, some of the things in the film are bothersome. For example, Burns uses a photograph taken of the Fredricksburg trenches during the battle of chancellorsville and represents it as the Battle of Frericksburg. There are several extant prints of the same scene of the stone wall during Fredricksburg but he chose to take a photo of the trenches as they were during Chancellorsville. I grant you the typical person wouldn't know or problably wouldn't care. But for me, well, it was an irritation. Minor maybe but still an irritation.

On the other hand, The Civil War Journal has tapes of easy duration 44 to 48 minutes. So if you want to use one for a classroom presentation, it will fit the time frame. also the tapes are divided specifically into categories. If you're curious about color bearers you look up the tape Banners of Glory. If you want to get a better insight as to how West Point figured into the war, you look up the episode West Point Class Mates Civil War Enemies. Likewise there are tapes on the medical advances during the war, Zouves, Lincoln, Lee, Mosby, Jackson, artillery, Civil War newspaper Reporters, Photographers, the Monitor and the Virginia, etc.Like I said ,28 tapes. each long enought to hold your interest but not too long so you can still do honey-do stuff around the house without feeling too guilty.

What do you all think?

Bill
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