'Rising Tide' author to appear at MSU

The author of a book chronicling a period of Mississippi history will present a lecture here on Oct. 2.

John M. Barry, author of the best-selling "Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America," will speak at 6 p.m. in the Mitchell Memorial Library auditorium. An autograph session/reception will immediately follow.

"Rising Tide" is the story of the Mississippi River's 1927 flooding of an area approximately the size of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Vermont combined. Water as deep as 30 feet was left on land stretching from Illinois and Missouri south to the Gulf of Mexico. Nearly a million people were forced out of their homes.

Barry, the Washington editor of Dun's Review, also has written for the New York Times Magazine, Esquire, Newsweek, the Washington Post, and Sports Illustrated.

His other books include "The Ambition and the Power: A True Story of Washington" and "The Transformed Cell," which he co-authored.

Barry's visit is sponsored jointly by the MSU Libraries, the MSU Bookstore, the Department of History, and the Friends of the MSU Libraries.

For more information, contact Gail Peyton at 325-7671.