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Books > Humanities > History > American history
A startling and eye-opening look into America's First Family, Never
Caught is the powerful story about a daring woman of "extraordinary
grit" (The Philadelphia Inquirer). When George Washington was
elected president, he reluctantly left behind his beloved Mount
Vernon to serve in Philadelphia, the temporary seat of the nation's
capital. In setting up his household he brought along nine slaves,
including Ona Judge. As the President grew accustomed to Northern
ways, there was one change he couldn't abide: Pennsylvania law
required enslaved people be set free after six months of residency
in the state. Rather than comply, Washington decided to circumvent
the law. Every six months he sent the slaves back down south just
as the clock was about to expire. Though Ona Judge lived a life of
relative comfort, she was denied freedom. So, when the opportunity
presented itself one clear and pleasant spring day in Philadelphia,
Judge left everything she knew to escape to New England. Yet
freedom would not come without its costs. At just
twenty-two-years-old, Ona became the subject of an intense manhunt
led by George Washington, who used his political and personal
contacts to recapture his property. "A crisp and compulsively
readable feat of research and storytelling" (USA TODAY), historian
and National Book Award finalist Erica Armstrong Dunbar weaves a
powerful tale and offers fascinating new scholarship on how one
young woman risked everything to gain freedom from the famous
founding father and most powerful man in the United States at the
time.
The "superb" (The Guardian) biography of an American who stood
against all the forces of Gilded Age America to fight for civil
rights and economic freedom: Supreme Court Justice John Marshall
Harlan. They say that history is written by the victors. But not in
the case of the most famous dissenter on the Supreme Court. Almost
a century after his death, John Marshall Harlan's words helped end
segregation and gave us our civil rights and our modern economic
freedom. But his legacy would not have been possible without the
courage of Robert Harlan, a slave who John's father raised like a
son in the same household. After the Civil War, Robert emerges as a
political leader. With Black people holding power in the Republican
Party, it is Robert who helps John land his appointment to the
Supreme Court. At first, John is awed by his fellow justices, but
the country is changing. Northern whites are prepared to take away
black rights to appease the South. Giant trusts are monopolizing
entire industries. Against this onslaught, the Supreme Court seemed
all too willing to strip away civil rights and invalidate labor
protections. So as case after case comes before the court,
challenging his core values, John makes a fateful decision: He
breaks with his colleagues in fundamental ways, becoming the
nation's prime defender of the rights of Black people, immigrant
laborers, and people in distant lands occupied by the US. Harlan's
dissents, particularly in Plessy v. Ferguson, were widely read and
a source of hope for decades. Thurgood Marshall called Harlan's
Plessy dissent his "Bible"--and his legal roadmap to overturning
segregation. In the end, Harlan's words built the foundations for
the legal revolutions of the New Deal and Civil Rights eras.
Spanning from the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement and
beyond, The Great Dissenter is a "magnificent" (Douglas Brinkley)
and "thoroughly researched" (The New York Times) rendering of the
American legal system's most significant failures and most
inspiring successes.
In this dazzling work of history, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author
follows Benjamin Franklin to France for the crowning achievement of
his career
In December of 1776 a small boat delivered an old man to France."
So begins an enthralling narrative account of how Benjamin
Franklin-seventy years old, without any diplomatic training, and
possessed of the most rudimentary French-convinced France, an
absolute monarchy, to underwrite America's experiment in democracy.
When Franklin stepped onto French soil, he well understood he was
embarking on the greatest gamble of his career. By virtue of fame,
charisma, and ingenuity, Franklin outmaneuvered British spies,
French informers, and hostile colleagues; engineered the
Franco-American alliance of l778; and helped to negotiate the peace
of l783. The eight-year French mission stands not only as
Franklin's most vital service to his country but as the most
revealing of the man.
In "A Great Improvisation," Stacy Schiff draws from new and
little-known sources to illuminate the least-explored part of
Franklin's life. Here is an unfamiliar, unforgettable chapter of
the Revolution, a rousing tale of American infighting, and the
treacherous backroom dealings at Versailles that would propel
George Washington from near decimation at Valley Forge to victory
at Yorktown. From these pages emerge a particularly human and yet
fiercely determined Founding Father, as well as a profound sense of
how fragile, improvisational, and international was our country's
bid for independence.
In the early days of the Civil War, Richmond was declared the
capital of the Confederacy, and until now, countless stories from
its tenure as the Southern headquarters have remained buried. Mary
E. Walker, a Union doctor and feminist, was once held captive in
the city for refusing to wear proper women's clothing. A coffee
substitute factory exploded under intriguing circumstances. Many
Confederate soldiers, when in the trenches of battle, thumbed
through the pages of Hugo's "Les Miserables." Author Brian Burns
reveals these and many more curious tales of Civil War Richmond.
A "powerful" (The Wall Street Journal) biography of one of the 19th
century's greatest statesmen, encompassing his decades-long fight
against slavery and his postwar struggle to bring racial justice to
America.Thaddeus Stevens was among the first to see the Civil War
as an opportunity for a second American revolution--a chance to
remake the country as a genuine multiracial democracy. As one of
the foremost abolitionists in Congress in the years leading up to
the war, he was a leader of the young Republican Party's radical
wing, fighting for anti-slavery and anti-racist policies long
before party colleagues like Abraham Lincoln endorsed them. These
policies--including welcoming black men into the Union's
armies--would prove crucial to the Union war effort. During the
Reconstruction era that followed, Stevens demanded equal civil and
political rights for Black Americans--rights eventually embodied in
the 14th and 15th amendments. But while Stevens in many ways pushed
his party--and America--towards equality, he also championed ideas
too radical for his fellow Congressmen ever to support, such as
confiscating large slaveholders' estates and dividing the land
among those who had been enslaved. In Thaddeus Stevens, acclaimed
historian Bruce Levine has written a "vital" (The Guardian),
"compelling" (James McPherson) biography of one of the most
visionary statesmen of the 19th century and a forgotten champion
for racial justice in America.
The 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis was the most perilous event in history, when mankind faced a looming nuclear collision between the United States and Soviet Union. During those weeks, the world gazed into the abyss of potential annihilation.
Max Hastings’s graphic new history tells the story from the viewpoints of national leaders, Russian officers, Cuban peasants, American pilots and British disarmers. Max Hastings deploys his accustomed blend of eye-witness interviews, archive documents and diaries, White House tape recordings, top-down analysis, first to paint word-portraits of the Cold War experiences of Fidel Castro’s Cuba, Nikita Khrushchev’s Russia and Kennedy’s America; then to describe the nail-biting Thirteen Days in which Armageddon beckoned.
Hastings began researching this book believing that he was exploring a past event from twentieth century history. He is as shocked as are millions of us around the world, to discover that the rape of Ukraine gives this narrative a hitherto unimaginable twenty-first century immediacy. We may be witnessing the onset of a new Cold War between nuclear-armed superpowers.
To contend with today’s threat, which Hastings fears will prove enduring, it is critical to understand how, sixty years ago, the world survived its last glimpse into the abyss. Only by fearing the worst, he argues, can our leaders hope to secure the survival of the planet.
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Bainbridge Island
(Paperback)
Donald R Tjossem, Bainbridge Island Historical Museum
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R641
R528
Discovery Miles 5 280
Save R113 (18%)
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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Bainbridge Island sits in the middle of Puget Sound in Washington
State. Its unique history starts with the Native Americans and
includes logging, farming, fishing, and shipbuilding from the late
1800s through the present. Early explorers included George
Vancouver in 1792 and the Wilkes expedition of 1841. Ferry service
and other means of water transport were the only ways onto the
island until 1950, when a bridge was completed. Bainbridge Island
is only a 30-minute ferry ride from Seattle, and its only bridge
approaches the island from the west. The City of Bainbridge Island,
which includes the entire 65-square-mile island, incorporated on
February 28, 1991. Its 23,000 residents today share the rich
history that is told in images and captions within the pages of
this book.
At the close of the nineteenth century in the Ozark Plateau,
lawlessness ruled. Lawmakers, in bed with moonshiners and
bootleggers, fueled local crime and turned a blind eye to egregious
wrongdoing. In response, a vigilante force emerged from the Ozark
hills: the Bald Knobbers. They formed their own laws and alliances;
local ministers donned the Knobber mask and brought "justice" to
the hills, lynching suspected bootleggers. As community support and
interest grew, reporters wrote curious articles about Knobber
exploits. Join Vincent S. Anderson as he uncovers these peculiar
reports including trials, lovers' spats ending in coldblooded
murder and Ozark vigilante history that inspired a folk legend.
Join local food aficionado Bill Loomis on a look back at the
appetites, tastes, kitchens, parties, holidays and everyday meals
that defined eating in Detroit, from the earliest days as a French
village to the start of the twentieth century. Whether it's at a
frontier farmers' market, a Victorian twelve-course children's
birthday party replete with tongue sandwiches or a five-cent-lunch
diner, food is a main ingredient in a community's identity and
history. While showcasing favorite fare of the day, this book also
explores historic foodways--how locals fished the Detroit River,
banished flies from kitchens without screens and harvested frog
legs with miniscule shotguns. Wedding feasts, pioneer grub, cooking
classes and the thriftless '20s are all on the menu, too.
An in-depth look at the unique actions of the newly formed state of
West Virginia during the Civil War While the taking of hostages by
both the Union and the Confederacy was common during the Civil War,
it was unique for an individual state government to engage in this
practice. The Governor's Pawns examines the history that led to the
taking of political prisoners in western Virginia, the
implementation of a hostage law by Virginia's pro-Union government
in 1863, and the adoption of that law by the newly recognized state
of West Virginia. The roots of state hostage-taking took hold prior
to the Civil War. Sectional politics between eastern and western
Virginia and their local communities, as well as long-standing
family rivalries, resulted in the extreme actions of secession and
war. Randall Gooden uses genealogical sources to tell the
fascinating stories of individuals swept up in the turmoil,
including hostages and their captors, freedmen, and government and
military officials. Gooden emphasizes the personal nature of
civilian arrests and hostage-taking and describes the impact on
communities and the families left scarred by this practice. The
Governor's Pawns takes readers into the city streets, state and
national capitol buildings, army camps, jails and military prisons,
hospitals, and graveyards that accompanied the tit-for-tat style of
pointedly personal warfare.
War in the post-9/11 world is far different from what we expected
it be. Counterinsurgency and protracted guerrilla warfare, not
shock and awe, are the order of the day. David Kilcullen is the
world's foremost expert on this way of war, and in The Accidental
Guerrilla, the Senior Counterinsurgency Advisor to General David
Petraeus in Iraq surveys war as it is actually fought in the
contemporary world. Colouring his account with gripping battlefield
experiences that range from the jungles and highlands of South and
Southeast Asia to the mountains of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border
to the dusty towns of the Middle East and the horn of Africa, The
Accidental Guerrilla will, quite simply, change the way we think
about war. While conventional warfare has obvious limits, Kilcullen
also stresses that neither counterterrorism nor traditional
counterinsurgency is the appropriate framework to fight the enemy
we now face. Certainly, traditional counterinsurgency is more
effective than counterterrorism when it comes to entities like Al
Qaeda, but as Kilcullen contends, our current focus is far too
narrow, for it tends to emphasize one geographical region and one
state. The current war presents a much different situation:
stateless insurgents and terrorists operating across large number
of countries and only loosely affiliated with each other.
A Times History Book of the Year 2022 From the #1 bestselling
historian Max Hastings 'the heart-stopping story of the missile
crisis' Daily Telegraph The 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis was the most
perilous event in history, when mankind faced a looming nuclear
collision between the United States and Soviet Union. During those
weeks, the world gazed into the abyss of potential annihilation.
Max Hastings's graphic new history tells the story from the
viewpoints of national leaders, Russian officers, Cuban peasants,
American pilots and British disarmers. Max Hastings deploys his
accustomed blend of eye-witness interviews, archive documents and
diaries, White House tape recordings, top-down analysis, first to
paint word-portraits of the Cold War experiences of Fidel Castro's
Cuba, Nikita Khrushchev's Russia and Kennedy's America; then to
describe the nail-biting Thirteen Days in which Armageddon
beckoned. Hastings began researching this book believing that he
was exploring a past event from twentieth century history. He is as
shocked as are millions of us around the world, to discover that
the rape of Ukraine gives this narrative a hitherto unimaginable
twenty-first century immediacy. We may be witnessing the onset of a
new Cold War between nuclear-armed superpowers. To contend with
today's threat, which Hastings fears will prove enduring, it is
critical to understand how, sixty years ago, the world survived its
last glimpse into the abyss. Only by fearing the worst, he argues,
can our leaders hope to secure the survival of the planet.
In the swamps and juke joints of Holmes County, Mississippi, Edward
Tillman Branch built his empire. Tillman's clubs were legendary.
Moonshine flowed as patrons enjoyed craps games and well-know blues
acts. Across from his Goodman establishment, prostitutes in a
trysting trailer entertained men, including the married Tillman
himself. A threat to law enforcement and anyone who crossed his
path, Branch rose from modest beginnings to become the ruler of a
treacherous kingdom in the hills that became his own end. Author
Janice Branch Tracy reveals the man behind the story and the path
that led him to become what Honeyboy Edwards referred to in his
autobiography as the "baddest white man in Mississippi."
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Grand Teton National Park
(Paperback)
Kendra Leah Fuller, Shannon Sullivan, Jackson Hole Historical Society
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R641
R528
Discovery Miles 5 280
Save R113 (18%)
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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The majestic beauty of Grand Teton National Park has moved people
throughout time. Native Americans believed in the spiritual power
of the towering mountain peaks and journeyed there to gain special
powers. Early fur traders, who had just crossed less ominous
mountain ranges, viewed with trepidation the massive obstacle that
loomed before them on their passage to the Pacific Northwest. In
others, the Tetons ignited vision and passion--a vision to preserve
for all generations to come and a passion to protect the
independent way of life known by the first settlers of this western
frontier. The formation of Grand Teton National Park spanned the
course of nearly 70 years. Although there were many people who
shared the struggle before them, it was not until Stephen Mather
and Horace M. Albright took up the fight in 1915 that steps towards
success were taken. Albright's tenacity and ability to convey his
vision to philanthropist John D. Rockefeller Jr. set in motion a
very long journey that culminated with Pres. Harry S. Truman
signing today's Grand Teton National Park into existence on
September 13, 1950.
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