September 10, 2009.  James G. Buck, author of Journey to Honor: A History of the 23rd New Jersey, will talk about Quaker Josiah Crispin and his 23rd New Jersey, a regiment rushed to Fredericksburg without training.  Growing up in New Jersey and graduating from West Point, Mr. Buck is a lifelong military history fan. 

October 8, 2009.  Roger L. Ransom will discuss Gambling on War, great military gambles from Lee at Gettysburg to the German Schlieffen Plan in World War I.  A Professor of History and Economics and winner of the Distinguished Teaching Award  at the University of California, Riverside, he is the author of The Confederate States of America: What Might Have Been; One Kind of Freedom: The Economic Consequences of Emancipation; Conflict and Compromise: The Political Economy of Slavery, Emancipation and the Civil War, and other books and articles.  He has been a Guggenheim Foundation Fellow, and President of the Economic History Association. 

November 12, 2009.  Cynthia Wilson will discuss the military and family life of several of the 26 African American soldiers buried in Washington,  whom she has identified with pension records.  They include a Union sailor, a Black Confederate, and one soldier belonging to an all-white unit.  Ms. Wilson is President of the Black Genealogy Research Group of Seattle and is the resident Genealogist for the Northwest African American Museum's Multi-Media Learning Center. 

December 10, 2009.  The great Civil War Quiz Contest, with all participants and no spectators.  Tables will compete as teams against each other to come up with the best answers to open-ended  BIG questions (not trivia questions) about the Civil War.  Winners will be determined by vote of all present, with no one allowed to vote for their own table.  Prizes will be indescribably wonderful. 

January  14, 2010.  Larry Jones will tell the story of Dealton Tichenor,  a Wisocnsin lawyer and political leader who served in his 40s in the 31st and 36th Wisconsin.  Tichenor's  letters are full of humor, battlefield religion, and the horrors of Union medicine.  After surviving the slaughter at Spotsylvania, he was captured on the North Anna and suffered and died at Andersonville.  Co-author of Civil War POW: The Life and Death of a Farmer-Lawyer-Soldier, Larry Jones is a Seattle lawyer for families of persons with intellectual disabilities.  A former Professor of Sociology at St. Martin's University, Lacey, he holds a doctorate from University of Chicago Divinity School.  

February 11, 2010.  Larry Cenotto will talk about Gettysburg, the greatest battle fought on the continent, in the stifling heat of July 1863:  what led Lee and Meade there, what shaped their tactics and strategy, and what the outcome on the field meant for the war.  The talk will feature slides, many of them made after the renovation of the Cyclorama.  A Kodak All-American quarterback at Pomona College who played briefly with the Denver Broncos,  Larry is an insurance agent in Lynnwood, a freelance writer, a football commentator with Comcast on Demand, a rabid history buff, and a travelholic who has been to 32 countries and counting. 

March 11, 2010.  Gregory J. W. Urwin will discuss Glory and Me, an insider's view of the making of that famous Civil War film about the 54th Massachusetts.  A Professor of History and Associate Director of the Center for the Study of  Force and Diplomacy at Temple University,  Professor Urwin  is the author of Custer Victorious: The Civil War Battles of George Armstrong Custer; Facing Fearful Odds: The Siege of Wake Island; The United States Infantry,  and other books and articles. 

April 8, 2010.  Michael B. Ballard will describe Grant's time of trial, after Shiloh to the end of 1862.  Accused of negligence at Shiloh, shelved by Halleck during the Corinth campaign, performing poorly at Iuka, and calling off pursuit after second Corinth,  Grant seemed to be in a slump after Shiloh.  By the end of 1862, his first thrust toward Vicksburg  ended with the loss of his supply base and the defeat of Sherman's force.  This low point in Grant's career is often overlooked.  Coordinator of the Congressional and Political Research Center, University Archivist, and Associate Editor of the U.S. Grant Papers Projects at the Mississippi State University Library, Professor Ballard is author of Vicksburg: The Campaign that Opened the Mississippi;  U.S. Grant: The Making of a General, 1861-1863; Pemberton: A Biography;  A Long Shadow: Jefferson Davis and the Final Days of the Confederacy; Maroon and White: Mississippi State University, 1873-2003, and other books and articles. 

May 13, 2010.  Tom O'Connell  will discuss Confederate President Jefferson Davis, comparing his performance to that of his adversary, Abraham Lincoln.  Co-author of Friendships across Ages: Johnson and Boswell, Holmes and Laski, and former President of Bellevue Community College, Dr. O'Connell has taught American Literature, Spanish, and many other subjects, and has given many fine talks to our Round Table.