Layton Looks at Life : Timely Essays on the Past, Present and Future by a Virginia Octogenarian. This item is unavailable.Layton Looks at Life : Timely Essays on the Past, Present and Future by a Virginia Octogenarian

Collection of uplifting, inspirational, and sometimes humorous essays covering a wide range of topics, including the civil war, holidays, family life, childhood, famous personages and life in America, spanning several decades.

William Wendell Layton, African American, was born on July 17, 1915, at the Virginia Manual Labor School (the Negro reformatory for Virginia), now Hanover Learning Center, where his father served as superintendent from 1927 to 1948. He was educated in the Richmond, Virginia public schools, Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, with graduate work at Fisk University and Michigan State University. His career included serving as a truant officer in Nashville, TN, the Urban League of Columbus, Ohio, executive director of the Urban League at Muskegon Michigan, and officer wth the Dept. of Agriculture and the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, DC. Layton has had a lifelong interest in the Civil War, and his civil war collection is on microfilm at the National Archives. He has been a lecturer on the Civil War for many years. He is a published poet, author, civil war historian, with a deep and abiding love for his country and an unbound optimism for its future.