Part guide, part meditation, part history, this beautifully written and lavishly illustrated book sets the moral scene in which we must commemorate the lives of those who died for their country in war. Through the evidence of two centuries and more than 125 memorials in the five boroughs of the city, in small neighborhoods and grand civic settings, in gold and bronze and stone, on plinths and walls, from common New Yorkers to great leaders, the author takes us through the pantheon of American valor and sacrifice. This timely book invites us to reflect not only on the bravery and the glory but also on the nature of remembrance, on the dignity and pathos of timeless memorials as well as on the more modern traps of expediency and opportunism than can inhibit our ability to remember and exalt the strength of American values built on such sacrifice.

Cal Snyder served in Vietnam before finding his way into field biology and the American Museum of Natural History where he works in The National Center for Biodiversity>/i>. A passionate New Yorker he lives not far from the 307th Infantry Memorial in Central Park.