Three Hours of CSPAN: Are You Kidding!?

Last night instead of enjoying the Olympics, I spent almost three hours watching C-SPAN. Book Notes ran a taped interview with the famous author from Greenville, MS who lived almost 40 years in downtown Memphis, TN, named Shelby Foote. Although referred to by many callers as Dr. Foote, he only went to college for two years and never finished his degree. Now he has 9 honorary doctorates to his credit. One of those came from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; the school he started but never finished. Although Mr. Foote wrote for many years, his real exposure to the masses came as the distinctive voice and face of the south from Ken Burns epic documentary of the Civil War released back in the early 90's.

I learned last night that all his books were originally written by hand. He used a pen and ink well, and averaged about 500 to 600 words per day. He would work as much as two months at a time without taking a day off especially as he neared the end of the Civil War trilogy. Each one of these three books averaged 1,000 pages each, and he would do his own editing as well. Now, I have never taken the time to read his work, but I sat amazed as I listen to this 85 year old man talk about the events of the Civil War as if he personally knew all the characters. It is safe to say that Mr. Foote was passionate about "the war" as he called it on several occasions. And, although he fought in World War 2 and spoke about the Vietnam War, he stated that the Civil War was the only one that he cared to study. Mr. Foote died in June of 2005 at the age of 88.

As I sat and listened last night I was amazed at the look on this gentleman's face as he talked about the people and places associated with the many battles fought during the war. And as I stated earlier, he spoke as if he had personally met and interviewed each general and viewed the battles as they took place. As we journey through life, may we all find something that we are passionate about and be willing to invest our skills and talents into the greater understanding of our cause.