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Mobile: The New History of Alabama's First City. Edited by Michael V. R. Thomason. Foreword by Joe Langan. (Tuscaloosa and London: University of Alabama Press, c. 2001. Pp. [xiv], 416. $45.00, ISBN 0-8173-1065-7.)
Mobile: The New History of Alabama's First City is a collection of carefully Grafted essays that cover the long range of Mobile's history. Scholars interested in the evolution of southern history, urban history, and the history of the Atlantic world will find this book informative and enjoyable to read. Yet despite its scholarly appeal, the book is also aimed at the reading public. And indeed, evidently it has already found its way into the homes of Mobilians interested in their city's past.
Joseph Langan, the former mayor of Mobile, writes touchingly in his foreword about the diversity of Mobile's past. In organizing this collection about one of the country's most interesting but least understood cities, Michael V. R. Thomason chose contributors who would carefully mark out that diversity. Each is...