We are sad to have to announce the recent death of Robert Sobel, author of the classic alternate history For Want of a Nail. Robert Sobel was a prolific historian of American business life, whose topics ranged from the economic philosophy of President Calvin Coolidge to the influence of the junk bond financier Michael Milken. He was a Professor at Hofstra University, New York, for over 30 years. Most of his books were written for a general audience, but he never bristled when some scholarly writers dismissed him as a 'populariser'. 'That did not stop Professor Sobel,' as the Obituary in the New York Times said 'from taking a gentle revenge on his ivory-tower critics in 1973, with publication of For Want of a Nail, his mock textbook recounting the history of North America had General Burgoyne won the Revolutionary War battle at Saratoga. His spoof included pompous footnotes about petty disputes among imaginary scholars and a wholly invented bibliography of ludicrously boring and arcane references – as well as an appendix featuring a list of the "leaders of the United States of Mexico" starting with its first president, Andrew Jackson.' Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 92 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com