Going to the Sources Chapter 4

I believe a lot of emphasis should be placed on finding a source from different time periods. As in chapter four, Brundage talks about two books on the same topic: Washington D.C. during the Civil War. He talks about Margaret Leech's book Reveille in Washington and Ernest B. Fergurson's Freedom Rising: Washington in the Civil War. Brundage points out the difference between the two books, from their titles to who each writer wrote about. He points out that Leech's book was written in the middle of World War Two and many elements were influence by the war. Fergurson on the other hand wrote in depth on the African American perspective and the leading abolitionists at the time. Brundage points out that the African American articles and monographs were not available to Leech at the time of  her writing her book. So I believe an enormous amount of emphasis should be put on finding resources and books because you can find  out what type of materials a writer in the fifties had compared to a writer in the 21st century.  

Looking at writers from varying backgrounds allow readers and researchers to discover a certain writers prejudice and own opinions about the topic. We should also look at authors with familiar connections. I believe it is a double edge sword; we want to have the truth and no biases but we also want some sort of familiarity and connection to what we read. I believe it is as important to read about a German's historical thought on World War Two as well as a Jewish German historical thoughts on the war. Historians benefit from these two different thoughts because it gives them two perspectives and the historian can weave out the right and the wrong. But my problem is that do historians have to have a connection to a topic based on family or ethnic background or can they find a topic interesting just because they are curious? Can I study African American history the same way an African American does?