Join us Tuesday, May 13, 2025, at 7 p.m. CT, for an enlightening discussion with author Dr. Frank W. Garmon on his latest book A Wonderful Career in Crime: Charles Cowlam’s Masquerades in the Civil War Era and Gilded Age.

The book traces the career of Charles Cowlam, a Gilded Age swindler who received presidential pardons from Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis during the Civil War. His intrigues reveal how Americans built trust amidst the transience and anonymity of the nineteenth century and exposes the vulnerabilities of a political system built on personal connections. 

Frank W. Garmon Jr. is Assistant Professor, for the Department of Leadership and American Studies at Christopher Newport University specializing in American political economy. After studying history and economics at Christopher Newport University, he completed his MA and PhD in history at the University of Virginia. He has published articles in the Economic History Review, the Journal of the Early Republic, Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History, and Social Science Journal.

Garmon received the Provost’s Award for Faculty Excellence in Teaching Student Writing in 2023 and his first book, A Wonderful Career in Crime: Charles Cowlam’s Masquerades in the Civil War Era and Gilded Age, will be published by Louisiana State University Press in the fall of 2024.

Register HERE.