Our February 23, 2026 Meeting

Our February meeting will be on Monday, February 23, 2026, at 6:30 pm at the lower level of the Farmington Library, on the corner of Grand River and Farmington Road. Our guest speaker, Jack Dempsey, well-known Civil War author, with an appearance on C-SPAN, will begin around 7:00 pm, after our 6:30 pm business meeting.

The Roundtable welcomes Jack Dempsey as our February 2026 speaker, presenting “Radical of Radicals: Austin Blair—Civil War Governor in His Own Words.

Austin Blair (1818-18940 was the Republican Governor of Michigan during the Civil War. He was a formidable opponent of slavery and secession. He and the Michigan legislature sent the first Western regiment to the scene of combat in mid-May 1861. He also worked to give women and blacks the right to vote and abolish capital punishment.

Jack’s new book, “Radican of Radicals: Austin Blair-Civil War Governor-In His Own Wors” will be available for purchase at our meeting. Sales assist his Antietam monument project. Jack is an award-winning author specializing in the Civil War, and Michigan history and culture. From Detroit, he is a graduate of Michigan State and George Washington University. He is a retired attorney. He chaired Michigan’s Civil War Sesquicentennial Committee, led the Michigan Historical Commission, and served on the Black Historic Sites Committee of the Detroit Historical Society.

He is working to place a monument at Antietam to recognize Michigan’s contribution in the 1862 battle. Jack has authored several books to help raise funds for the monument. The Michigan Civil War Association manages fundraising. This will be an outstanding presentation on Monday evening, January 26, 2026!

The latest edition of our Newsletter is available here

MRRT: Who We Are

When & Where We Meet

We meet on the last Monday of the month (except in October, when we go on our Annual Field Trip, and December, when we traditionally do not meet) at the Farmington Community Library, Farmington Branch, 23500 Liberty St. Farmington, MI 48335. (248) 553•0300 Meetings start at 6:30 p.m.

• Get Driving Directions to the Farmington Branch from MapQuest.
  
  
• Farmington Branch Library Location on Google Maps

What We Do

We meet monthly to hear from our members on the latest books, issues of preservation, and other items of Civil War interest. At each meeting, a keynote speaker provides a presentation on a Civil War topic. A monthly newsletter is send by email and also snail-mailed to members.

In addition, each October we take our Annual Field Trip, in which MRRT members travel to a Civil War battlefield for a weekend tour. Though the COVID-19 Pandemic has put a damper on our 2020 and 2021r Field Trips, we resumed in 2022.

Join Us—Become A Member

The monthly program is open to all, but only members receive the monthly newsletter and can participate in the MRRT annual field trip. Annual membership dues are $5 for students and $25 for all others. The dues are used to cover expenses for speakers, facilities, preservation and administrative costs. Checks should be made out to Jeanie Graham and can be mailed to her home at 29835 Northbrook, Farmington Hills, MI 48334-2326. The bank does NOT like checks made out to the Roundtable. Our checks may also be brought to our monthly meeting and given to Jeanie. Cash is always welcome.

For information on how to join the MRRT, come visit us at our monthly meeting, or email Jim Burroughs.

Past CWRT Online Lectures / Speakers

Did you know that all of the videos the Civil War Round Table Congress (CWRT) has recorded are available to you on our website? In all, there are well over 200 lectures by authors and historians, living history presentations, interviews with key Civil War community leaders, online classroom discussions and more. These lectures are pre-recorded YouTube-type videos made from the original Zoom presentations. You can browse them here. Be sure to click on the blue links that are in all caps serving as the title for each lecture.