Overrated? Underrated?

November 2025

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September 1999

14 years ago By admin

Volume

50

Issue

5

There Stephen King goes again, pulling our chain, saying that the Beatles are the most overrated rock band—when everyone knows it’s The Doors.

Stories published from "September 1999"

Staging War

Authored by: Shawn Mcburney

One of the earliest and most evocative photographs of the killing fields at Gettysburg is not what it seems

Lee Defeats Grant, and Other Alternative History

Authored by: Phil Patton

IN THE WORLD OF ALTERNATE HISTORY, IT ALL CAME OUT DIFFERENTLY. AND, IN AN ERA WHEN REAL HISTORY IS TAKING SOME VERY STRANGE TURNS, THE GENRE IS FLOURISHING AS NEVER BEFORE.

Losers' Resentments and Obsessions in Alternative History

Authored by: Fredric Smoler

THE BEST OF TODAY’S ALTERNATE HISTORY ISN’T LIKELY TO CHEER YOU UP. BUT IT CERTAINLY WON’T BORE YOU.

Gettysburg, 1862

Authored by: James M. McPherson

A LEADING CIVIL WAR HISTORIAN CHANGES ONE SMALL HAPPENSTANCE—WHICH IN TURN CHANGES EVERYTHING

How Smart Should a President Be?

Authored by: Richard Brookhiser

Smarter than stupid, of course, but does the intellectual tradition that began with the century suggest that there's such a thing as being too smart for the country’s good?

Would JFK Have Pulled Us Out of Vietnam?

Authored by: Sheldon M. Stern

A tantalizing archival discovery suggests the perils of historical evidence.

The Rise And Decline of the Teenager

Authored by: Thomas Hine

The word emerged during the Depression to define a new kind of American adolescence, one that prevailed for half a century and may now be ending.

Teenagers And Crime

Authored by: The Editors

From Puritan New England to Littleton in 1999, youth violence has been a fact of American life and a frequent national preoccupation

They Said They Spoke With the Dead

Authored by: Barbara M. Weisberg

A century and a half ago, two young girls started hearing noises they said came from beyond the grave, and then embarked on a lifetime career that began a national obsession with spiritualism that has lasted to this day.

1974 Twenty-five Years Ago

Authored by: Frederic D. O'Brien

The Banality of Evel

Overrated? Underrated?

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