Odd Bits
Chicago Celebrates Casimir Pulaski
For my first ten or twelve or thirty years in Chicago, I was regularly taken by surprise by a local holiday. On the first Monday in March, Chicago’s administrative offices, and public libraries are closed for Pulaski Day, a holiday honoring Casimir Pulaski, the Polish nobleman who fought on the colonial side in the American…
Read More
Back to the Basics
Every time I start writing a new book, I intend to read or re-read books about the craft of writing as I work. (The practice evaporates about two weeks into each project.) For the current book, I actually pulled all the books I wanted to read off the shelf and stacked them on the floor…
Read More
Reading My Way to The 19th Amendment
Like many of us, I had plans for the hundredth anniversary of the 19th Amendment. One of those plans was to run a series of blog posts about the suffrage movement in July and August. Then my life took a sharp turn: first I wrote a history book for kids in thirty days and then…
Read More