The book I've been working on has become so big that I might cut the subject matter in about half and write a single book about one person.
Originally its proposed title was Elocutioner's Daughter, and I'd planned to focus on both the elocutioner, or elocutionist, and her daughter. It also was planned to focus on the daughter (my grandmother)'s scrapbook, an ancient thing with old peeling newspaper in it. I have barely begun to categorize things in it, set back temporarily by printing projects.
but the other thing that happened was that I found so much about the elocutionist herself, that I could easily write a book about her alone, and might.
She lived in the late 1800's; born in 1852, she was but a girl during the Civil War, and first got out there in the world of elocution after she married and moved to Toledo, in about 1877. By now she was 25 but had had time to practice and develop a career in elocution.
What happened was she fell in with the veterans. It's quite a story, which I will tell as soon as possible. Stay tuned.
