Herrin City Library presents Reg Ankrom on Friday, September 16, 2022, at 2:00 pm, in the Tony Galines Meeting Room. Ankrom will discuss his new book, Stephen A. Douglas, Western Man: The Early Years in Congress, 1844-1850. The book, which the Illinois State Historical Society recognized earlier this year as “Best in Illinois History,” is the second of a three-volume biography Ankrom is writing about Illinois’ 19^th century U.S. Senator Stephen A. Douglas. The first in the series, Stephen A. Douglas: The Political Apprenticeship, 1833-1843, was published in 2015. We are pleased to welcome Reg and Jane Ankrom back to Herrin, where Reg served for six years as superintendent of the local CIPS team.

This event will be available to stream via Facebook Live during the event and will be archived on our Facebook Page after: https://www.facebook.com/herrincitylibrary

A contributor of more than 100 historical columns, articles, and essays to newspapers and historical journals, Ankrom also contributed to an anthology about the refuge 1,500 Quincy residents provided to more than 5,000 Latter Day Saints who in 1838 had been ordered to leave Missouri or be killed. Ankrom is a frequent lecturer on pre-Civil War and Illinois history. He has been invited to speak at the annual Abraham Lincoln Forum at Gettysburg in November.

The event is presented by the Herrin History Room, and is free and open to the public.