James P. Sullivan

How NYC came to dominate the waters of its region

Revisado: 08-08-20 El oyente recibió este título gratis

Empire of Water is a worthwhile examination of how New York City became the owner and landlord of extensive acreage in the Catskills in its quest to build a reliable and clean water supply for its burgeoning population. The book, as its subtitle indicates, is a political, environmental, and really also a social survey and not an engineering study of the development of the water system, and how the city's relationship to that system changed over the course of a century. New York City, in the creation of this system, displaced thousands of upstate residents in several rounds of reservoir building, and in its final round even took control over the sources of the Delaware River, affecting Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Once the system was complete, however, the city became the quintessential absentee landlord, neglecting its properties to the detriment of its neighbors, leading to a series of crises in the late 20th century that forced a reckoning.

The book's chief faults are perhaps a too brief examination of just whom the city displaced, and a gloss over just why New York never tapped the Hudson.

The book is well narrated, and my chief quibble is that Ed Koch's last name should be pronounced like "Kotch", not "Coke" like the Koch brothers.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 2 personas

A Life of Service

Revisado: 05-04-20 El oyente recibió este título gratis

The American heartland is vast. We forget this today with our extensive road system, ubiquitous automobiles, and sprawling suburbs and metropolitan regions, but you can still attain something of a feel for the wide open spaces if you should ever drive across the Great Plains, as they stretch from northern Texas in the south, to Minnesota and North Dakota, and on into Canada, and from the Rocky Mountains to the Mississippi River, and arguably even across Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. If you have ever driven, hour after hour, across Nebraska or Kansas, you begin to grasp the true scale. Imagine crossing it on foot, or by horse-cart, or even by a 19th century steam train, where the hours turn into days, or the days into weeks. This was Father Nicola Yanney’s territory as a circuit-riding priest.

Father Nicola would eventually perform over a thousand baptisms, numerous weddings, and a great number of funerals, including his own daughter’s, when she was 12. He faced a perpetual struggle to balance the needs of his own local parish with the needs of scattered Orthodox communities in his vast territory, and the book often recounts him arriving home, only to be required to travel again within days due to some emergency or other. He often had to play peacemaker too, either within the Orthodox communities, or between them and others. He even served as an Orthodox priest at the replica of the Holy Sepulcher church built at the St. Louis World’s Fair.

Even by today’s standards of travel, Father Nicola’s schedule was punishing, and the distances enormous. But from this schedule, and surviving records, correspondence, and family recollections, Fr. Nicola’s devotion is readily apparent. He served even when financial support was lacking, acquiring significant debt to keep his 3 remaining children housed, fed, and in school while serving far afield. This is in marked contrast to other priests ordained after him, who sometimes would leave their assigned parishes for wealthier locales, forcing Nicola to keep up a longer travel schedule than he should have. It was his great piety that led his home community to nominate him to the priesthood, and that piety remained undiminished throughout his career.

In this time of the COVID pandemic, it is especially fitting to remember Father Nicola, for it was in the Spanish Flu pandemic that he lost his life, visiting with the sick and the dying in his own home town. Just as we are sometimes unaware of the size of our nation, we are often forgetful of how much our ancestors had to struggle, and how recently they lived with dangers that today we consider long forgotten. Apostle to the Plains is a worthy look at what service and devotion meant a century ago on the Plains, through the eyes of an itinerant immigrant priest.

Nota Bene: Ancient Faith provided me with a copy of the audio book for review.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

A delightful introduction to Orthodoxy in Alaska

Revisado: 04-17-19

Father Michael Oleksa is a retired Orthodox priest in Alaska, but he’s not actually from there - he’s from Allentown, Pennsylvania. How he came to Alaska, what he found there, and why he stayed are just a few of the many subjects he covers in his delightful collection of stories that he has compiled here in this one volume. Through these tales of Alaska, and other tales of his travels around Alaska, Europe, and Africa, Father Oleska weaves a remarkable chain of providence and miracles both great and small that have surrounded his life and ministry.

“Ever since I learned that there were Orthodox Christians who were also Alaskan Natives, I was determined to go there. Here my two greatest lifelong interests, Native Americans and Orthodoxy, were united in one place, and I didn’t even need a passport to get there! This was a phenomenon I sincerely wanted to experience and explore.” (Page 7)

Father Oleksa had longed to go to Alaska since he was quite young, and while in seminary at St. Vladimir’s, in New York, he finally was granted the opportunity when a small Aleut fishing village, in need of a priest (most Aleut are Orthodox) as it rebuilt after the disastrous Good Friday earthquake of 1964, and its diocese having no priests to spare, agreed to sponsor the young seminarian if he would come to Alaska during the summer months and teach. Thus began Michael’s first forays. In those summers up north, Michael tells the tales of how he immersed himself in their culture, learned their languages and traditions, and even met and married a young woman of the Yup’ik tribe (pronounced “YOO-pick”). Into those tales he weaves the history of the Russian traders and monks who brought Orthodoxy to the people as they too intermarried, fusing Christian Orthodoxy with the native traditions to create a new creole culture that has endured through to this day, and has contributed greatly to worldwide Orthodoxy.
As Father Oleksa establishes his roots in Alaska, he is also looking to reconnect with the far flung branches of his family still who still live in Europe, and how they endured two world wars and decades of communism. In time his travels to meet them also take him to their ancestral villages in Poland and Ukraine, and even to finding new friends in Romania, Bulgaria, and Finland. There are no coincidences in these meetings for him, as his life and work live out his faith and ministry. He sees the hand of God in all things, even in the actions of a Bulgarian pickpocket or a freelancing Romanian tour guide looking to brush up his English.
The volume is a short one that can be read in just a couple of hours, but it serves as an excellent and gentle introduction to the peoples of Alaska, introducing the reader to several Alaskan Orthodox saints and the miracles associated with them, and even why you might spot a helicopter in an icon of Saint Herman. There is also an audio version of the book, narrated by Father Oleksa who is a jovial and entertaining reader (and pronounces the various Aleut words correctly, I might add).
Note: Full Dislosure - I was given a copy of the audio book in consideration for posting this review. But I should add that I liked the book so much I also bought the print version.

Has calificado esta reseña.

Reportaste esta reseña

esto le resultó útil a 2 personas