Footnote #5
A Literary Journal of History
46 Pieces by 41 Authors
PAPERBACK $14.99
EBOOK $7.99
PDF (PAY-WHAT-YOU-CAN)
Foot•note (fŏŏt’nōt’) n. 1. A note placed at the bottom of a page of a book or manuscript that comments on or cites a reference for a designated part of the text. 2. Something related to but of lesser importance than a larger work or occurrence. 3. A kickass literary journal of history-themed pieces that will make you rethink how you view history.
The fifth issue of our annual literary publication contains 46 works of poetry, fiction, essays, articles, and nonfiction by 41 authors about various historical topics, paired with dozens of photographs. Within these pages, you will find contemporary outlooks on history right alongside little-known public domain works that feel as fresh and as vibrant (and as scary) as if they were written today. Here, the old meets the new, and you’ll discover fascinating history from a personal, accessible, nonscholarly literary approach.
With our current atmosphere being what it is—uncaring and unjust to so many people—there’s an abundance of social justice writing in this issue, showing the cyclical nature of history throughout world wars, American wars, the Civil Rights era, and beyond. We begin with the father of all modern wars, World War II, as we dissect a Nazi octopus, dive into the darkness of the Holocaust, and go through an alternative history of wartime medical experiments and the polio vaccine. Girls face mistreatment as “comfort women” in Indonesia, hostages in Budapest, and massacre victims of U.S. violence in Korea. We travel through Siberia with the Czechoslovak Legion, flee with refugees, and hold our breath through 1960s protests, lynchings, and the race-related hate crimes of the American Civil Rights movement. From the Orangeburg massacre to the Freedom Summer murders, we meet the lives lost tragically by racists, and round out the 60s with voices from the Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike and anti-apartheid demonstrations in South Africa. Nigerian bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther talks about his time in bondage, which leads us into the horrors of slavery in the American Civil War, where we meet plenty of unsavory characters getting away with awful crimes—among them the Confederates of Thomas’ Legion—and a few sparks of hope and kindness circling the gloom. Follow Civil War troops into Florida, North Carolina, Georgetown, and Virginia, and spend time with Dr. Mary Edwards Walker and other nurses and surgeons who administered to fallen soldiers. Women face adversity with their passions and skills in a stiff patriarchy, and we watch female doctors, laborers, immigrants, and even Mozart’s sister succeed among the difficulty or fail with sorrow at the whims of powerful men. Immigrants tell their stories of the Lower East Side and Thanksgiving Day parades, and historical LGBTQUIA2+ stories are told through Henry David Thoreau, Aphra Behn, and the gutting mass-removal of government employees during the Lavender Scare. We visit 1700s witch hunts, ride unicorns through Medieval tapestries, and get goosebumps from featured writer Kathryn Smith’s take on the Spiritual movement, where P. T. Barnum, the Fox Sisters, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle all weigh in about mediums and communing with the dead. Utopian societies and Shaker villages aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, and hummingbirds during the Luminist period make way for dog-headed human beasts from 16th-century conquistador nightmares and illnesses of everyone from George Washington’s brother to chain-smoking miners of 19th-century Australia.
Content Warning: Nazism, child cruelty, forced medical experiments, murder, graphic images, sexual misconduct toward women and girls, war, prisoners of war, massacres, race-related violence, the N word, mild language, protest violence, epithets, police brutality, riots, slavery, offensive period language, death, abortion, LGBTQUIA2+ themes and discrimination, gender inequity, sexuality, persecution of women, witchcraft, spiritualism, torture, slaughter, genocide, conquering of native peoples, chain-smoking
2019 Charter Oak Award for Best Historical
2019 Charter Oak Award Winners
1st Place: “Lynnhaven River, 1706” by Chelsea Bunn
2nd Place: “Cardinal Virtues” by Gretchen Rockwell
3rd Place: “The Girl from No Gun Ri” by Esther Ra
Authors
• Eneida P. Alcalde
• Barbara Alvarado
• Horace Doyle Barnette
• Patrick Barton
• Aphra Behn
• Chelsea Bunn
• Clare Chu
• Samuel Ajayi Crowther
• Arthur Conan Doyle
• Deva Eveland
• Ayokunle Falomo
• Jamie Todd Hamilton
• Chris Helgens
• Myrlin A. Hermes
• Jahman Hill
• Gareth Hipwell
• Amanda Hodes
• D. Seth Horton
• Morgan Jeffery
• Jeremy Ray Jewell
• Marion Avrilyn Jones
• P. D. R. Lindsay
• Caitlin Mariah
• Mary Jane Panke
• Jonathan Andrew Pérez
• Eric Pierzchala
• Esther Ra
• Johannah Racz Knudson
• Greg Rappleye
• henry 7. reneau, jr.
• Gretchen Rockwell
• Daryl Scroggins
• Kathryn Smith
• J. W. Stewart
• Stuart Stromin
• William Sutherland
• Bob Sykora
• Anique Sara Taylor
• Henry David Thoreau
• Laura Budofsky Wisniewski
Other Footnote Issues
Also by Eneida P. Alcalde
You Might Also Like:
Footnote is our annual literary publication dedicated to historical and contemporary views on history. It contains poetry, images, fiction, and nonfiction by various authors, both contemporary and historical, about any topic of history. We are excited by pieces that give an author’s intimate or emotional take on historical places, people, events, or ideas.
• Historical: Poems | Fiction | Nonfiction
• 46 Pieces by 41 Authors
• 5.5” x 8.5” Perfectbound Trade Paperback
• Cream Paper, 268 Pages
• Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-946580-20-7
• Paperback ISBN-10: 1-946580-20-1
• Ebook ISBN-13: 978-1-946580-49-8
• Ebook ISBN-10: 1-946580-49-X
• First Edition: July 23, 2019
• Second Edition: December 12, 2023
• Short URL: acpbook.link/footnote5
• Permalink
• Read Excerpt Sample
• Download Press Release
• Book Club Reading & Discussion Guide
• Request Review Copy
• Get DRC on Edelweiss+
Cover design by Leah Angstman, with some elements by Dorothe of Darkmoon Art, Jean-Pierre Pellissier, Gordon Johnson.
About the Editor
LEAH ANGSTMAN is the founder and executive editor of Alternating Current Press since 1993. She has also been an editor/fact-checker for Pacific Standard, Underscore News, Mother Jones, Departures, and Smithsonian, and she is the author of Out Front the Following Sea, Shoot the Horses First, and Falcon in the Dive.
Media & Images
Distribution & Sales
Booksellers can order this book through their Ingram ordering catalogs for 50% discount with free returns or through Asterism Books for 50% discount with no returns (we will accept free returns of Asterism purchases back to us directly; please email altcurrentpress @ gmail . com if you need this return service option).
Booksellers ordering direct from us can get a 50% discount, no shipping costs, free returns accepted. Enter quantity here. If you prefer to be invoiced or need to use a purchase order number, please email altcurrentpress @ gmail . com.
Booksellers who’d like shelf talkers, point-of-sale signage, bookmarks, or author signing/reading posters, you can download the book’s sales kit here.
Contributing authors ordering direct from us can enter quantity here. If you prefer to be invoiced, please email altcurrentpress @ gmail . com.
For reviewers, promotional outlets, or desk copies, please request a copy. Booksellers and book industry professionals can read or download a DRC at Edelweiss+.