Founding Father (Of Vermont)
A review by Robert K. Landers
By 1771, a conflict over frontier settlements in what is today Vermont had begun to turn violent. Colonial officials in New York, eager to profit from making land grants in the territory between Lake Champlain and the Connecticut River, refused to recognize grants already made there by the New Hampshire colony. The Hampshire settlers themselves, meanwhile, were determined to hold on to their property and not pay twice for it. Ethan Allen, a major property owner in the region known as the New Hampshire Grants, emerged as the leader of the opposition to New York's efforts. In June 1771, getting word that a New York surveyor was running lines in the woods 20 miles away, Allen and some of his followers went to the scene. Dressed as Indians, with soot-blackened faces, they threatened to kill the "Yorker" -- who fled with his crew. Later that year, Allen formally organized the "Green Mountain Boys" to defend the Hampshire settlements and scotch any New York-backed settlements. He and his ...
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Previously Reviewed by The Wall Street Journal
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I Have Seen the Future: A Life of Lincoln Steffens by Peter Hartshorn
 'I think that there's got to be in every ward somebody that any bloke can come to -- no matter what he's done -- and get help. Help, you understand, none of your law and your justice, but help." Thus did the notorious Boston ward boss Martin Lomasney justify himself in 1908 to investigative...
Lee Krasner: A Biography by Gail Levin
 Shortly before World War I, Marie-Hortense Cezanne, widow of the painter Paul, spent a weekend in Monaco as the guest of an art dealer. He granted her unlimited credit at the casino, and after losing at the gaming tables, she had to cede him a cache of her husband's best watercolors to settle...
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The Best American Short Stories 2009 (Best American Short Stories) by Alice Sebold
 Alice Fulton's "The Shadow Table" is collected in The Best American Short Stories 2009, but it gestated for years before finally seeing the light of day, the author says in the contributors' notes. Set in the 1920s as part of Ms. Fulton's story-per-decade series spanning the 20th century, the tale...
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