New from Star Route Books, are the histories of North Carolina’s 26th and 61st Infantry Regiments in the Civil War. Through spellbinding narratives and fascinating photography we follow the story of the 26th Regiment and Company A, The Jeff Davis Mountaineers, that consisted almost entirely of men from Ashe County and the 61st, including Company I, The Alleghany Rangers, which was made up of Alleghany County volunteers.
The cover art from the History of the 26th NC Infantry depicting Picketts Charge at Gettysburg from a painting by Edwin Forbes. US Library of Congress.
Originally published in 1901, these eyewitness accounts were compiled by the State of North Carolina and were part of The Histories of the Several Regiments and Battalions from North Carolina, in the Great War, 1861-65.
Pontoon Bridge at Deep Bottom Virginia, Photographed by Timothy OSullivan for Gardners Photographic Sketchbook of the Civil War. US Library of Congress.
The 26th was noted for its participation in Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg, there losing more men than any other regiment from either side in the entire war. They were part of the Army of Northern Virginia, fighting at Richmond, Petersburg and they were with Robert E. Lee at his eventual surrender at Appomattox.
The 61st fought, primarily, along the coast of North and South Carolina, defending Charleston Harbor, Savannah and Wilmington. They were at Morris Island and just barely missed the attack of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry, depicted in the movie Glory. They were led by General Thomas Clingman and were with General Joseph Johnston when he surrendered at Bennett Place in Durham at the war’s end.
General Thomas Clingman, leader of Clingmans Brigade and the 61st NC Infantry. Clingmans Brigade fought at Goldsboro, Battery Wagner, Drewrys Bluff, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, Globe Tavern, Fort Fisher and Bentonville.
Along with the original text, we have added company rosters, photographs, battle descriptions and period maps obtained from the National Archives, the Library of Congress, Virginia Military Institute and many other resources.
The Regimental History of the 26th North Carolina Infantry won a Willie Parker Peace History Book Award from the North Carolina Society of Historians in 2011.
The cover art from the History of the 61st NC Infantry depicting New Berne, NC in 1864 from a lithograph by Del Comb. US Library of Congress.
Both books are available now, print-on-demand, through The Sparta Store.
Imaging Specialists has won a prestigious Garland P. Stout Publishers Award for excellence in the field of publishing from the North Carolina Society of Historians. This is the second Publishing Award for ISI. We received the first one in 2009 for our work in Alleghany County’s Sesquicentennial.
Regimental History of the 26th North Carolina. Cover Painting of Picketts charge by Edwin Forbes at US Library of Congress.
The Society also honored us with a Willie Parker Peace History Book Awardfor the book, Regimental History of the 26th NC Infantry, that we produced this summer, about Ashe County men in the Civil War. We gathered the text, photos, battle maps and battle summaries for the book; laid out and re-set the text; and optimized the photos for the book which is now available on-demand from Star Route Books and in our shop in Sparta.
We were also fortunate to receive a Robert Bruce Cooke Family History Book Award for our own, Family Photos – Eli Hamilton Halsey and Lillian Blanche Smith. This book is a photographic record of our own family, developed with the help of my Dad, Ronald Halsey’s, archive of negatives and our family’s photos. We scanned all images and assembled them into a chronological record of the lives of my Great-Grandparents and their family. The casebound book is printed in color and includes images from old prints, tintypes, 4×5 negatives, 35 mm and digital photography.
It is true that this “labor-of-love” will never have mass-appeal, but it was a real learning experience for us in the field of on-demand, self-publishing and we couldn’t be more proud of the result.
We also share in an award the Society presented to the Alleghany Historical – Genealogical Society. For the third year, AHGS has won a Joe M. McLaurin Newsletter Award, for the quarterly newsletter that we produce. The newsletter regularly includes text and historic photography from the county and this year, we’ve started adding our own photos of the Alleghany Historical Museum’s loans and acquisitions.
We are also pleased to have helped Lorene Sturgill, who received a Robert Bruce Cooke Family History Book Award for Descendants of William Black and Nancy Allison (We helped with photographic scanning, typesetting, page layout, design and production). This 296-page, casebound book containing genealogical records, photographs and stories is arguably our largest book project yet.
Of course, ISI has generated film for thousands of titles over the years, including many family histories and multi-volume sets, but this is the largest in which we’ve handled all aspects of the prepress work from design to production. The book is also available, on-demand from Star Route Books and the Sparta Store.
Congratulations Lorene, Kay, and Thelma for the recognition of your work and thanks for letting us be a part of your projects.
Lastly, we are happy to have played a part in the joint project of the Alleghany Historical – Genealogical Society and the Sparta Revitalization Committee‘s downtown Sparta walking tour, The Story of Sparta.
Window Decals designed and printed by ISI for the Sparta Revitalization Committee
We originally designed the SRC’s logo and were able to incorporate it into the vinyl, window decals for the self-guided tour. We are also pleased to have provided the cover photography for the Hospice’s Meals and Memories cookbook. Both projects won Paul Green Multimedia awards.
Star Route Books is the name of our new imprint, or the name for the line of books we generate. We will continue to concentrate on regional, historical and cultural subjects and feel this name fits our rural roots perfectly. Growing up, my family addressed mail to my grandparents, “Star Route, Sparta,” so to us, the name has a nice, down home quality.
According to the National Postal Museum website, “In 1845, postal officials tried a new approach to expand the nation’s mail service—Star Routes. The Post Office Department hired contractors for these new routes and allowed them to use any form of transportation they chose to carry the mail, from canoes to snowshoes. The mail has traveled along this network of Star Routes across America’s valleys, mountains, rivers, and highways ever since.”
Contractors were “to carry the mail with ‘celerity (speed), certainty, and security‘.”
I can’t think of a better way to describe our commitment to our customers. Imaging Specialists has delivered superior quality and service for over 20 years- from our beginnings as a trade shop for the printing industry, to the full service graphics we offer today.
If you need help with your novel, cookbook, family album- or whatever project you have in mind, we can help you get from an idea to a finished product. Contact us today!
One of our best customers, Parker Sales and Service, Inc. (psasinc.com), here in Sparta, will soon be one of our best vendors, also. PSAS will be supplying Imaging Specialists with vinyl materials for our banners.
We can get better quality and craftsmanship than we can anywhere else and we already have a relationship with them. ISI has maintained the PSAS website for several years, now.
Grommets, pockets, extra hems, special stitching- whatever your application demands, we can now supply it. Our first job with Parker is “high profile,” the new VISITOR INFO banner above the Chamber of Commerce!
Want to support your local economy? Let ISI quote your next banner project!
Imaging Specialists is now an official Business Partner with the United States Geological Survey. We can sell any USGS product from topographic maps to historic maps to satellite image posters!
We will begin with topographic prints of the county and we will also stock maps of the quadrangles including Independence, Grassy Creek and West Jefferson. Relief maps, large wall maps or any other USGS products will be available for order.
Alleghany is fortunate in that seven of the eight maps that make up the county are vintage 2010, vector images. (Note the different coloring on map D in the illustration. Also, the green county outline is for position only, it doesn’t print.) The most up to date map for the northeast, Cumberland Knob portion of the county is from 1981.
Vector images allow for the greatest flexibility in printing, we can turn off road names, for example, and they can be resized without loss of resolution. That is, they stay sharp at any size output.
If you need maps for your business, organization or even your living room wall, call us!
Alleghany County Topo Chart (County image will not print, it is to aid location only)Detail of USGS Map showing the forks of the New River
