Fire & Smoke
An Academic Conference on the Civil War at the American Philatelic Center
June 6, 2025 | 1:00-6:30PM
*Admission includes access to all ticketed Weekend events
Our first Civil War Weekend in Bellefonte has been designed to reward people with various degrees of interest in the American Civil War. On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday there will be numerous free events for the casual tourist or for those who just want to learn something about the great conflict which held our Nation together when it almost broke apart a century and a half ago.
More serious students of the Civil War can buy a Colloquium ticket to attend lectures and book talks offered by experts on Friday and Saturday to supplement the general offerings available to all.
A ticket for Friday’s Colloquium includes book signings with reknowned Civil War authors, as well as access to all ticketed events on Saturday.
1:00pm-1:45pm
Reception –
with special guests Generals Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman
The Colloquium begins with a reception featuring appetizers and drinks from the Civil War. To put us in the proper frame of mind, we’ve invited General Grant and General Sherman (who will perform together on Saturday in the play “Now We Stand By Each Other Always”) to attend as special guests. Later, General Grant, a.k.a. Derek Maxfield, will present one of the Colloquium talks.
Our three Colloquium speakers have chosen topics that peer into the universal cost of conflict. Destruction of lives and property is the way any war achieves its desired political end. We ought not to avert our gaze from the price we pay when we fight. The 2025 Colloquium stares straight into the inferno created by our ancestors, which fashioned the America we know today.
2:00-3:15pm
Scott Mingus
Author of Flames Beyond Gettysburg
Scott Mingus, prolific author of books about the Civil War (and with a surprising connection to the postage stamps we use these days), will speak about how a local militia frustrated Confederate General Jubal Early’s attempt to seize the longest covered bridge in America, which would have allowed Confederate troops to attack Harrisburg.
3:30-4:45pm
Derek Maxfield
Author of Man of Fire: William Tecumseh Sherman in the Civil War
Derek Maxfield will talk about the evolution of a troubled soldier from initial frustration, though despair, into a transformational friendship, and on to eventual triumph as “the most original genius of the American Civil War.”
5:00pm-6:30pm
Keynote Address: Fire in the Wilderness by Chris Mackowski
Author of several Civil War books and Series Editor for the Emerging Civil War Series, Chris Mackowski will present our keynote address about the battle of the Wilderness, when the armies of Grant and Lee surged against one another generating more suffering than strategic accomplishment. His presentation hones our theme to its sharpest edge, illuminating a time described by Horace Porter as when “Christian men had turned to fiends, and hell itself had usurped the place of earth.”
Civil War Weekend in Bellefonte 