On April 1, 1865, the steamboat Bertrand, a sternwheeler bound from St. Louis to Fort Benton in Montana Territory, hit a snag in the Missouri River and sank twenty miles north of Omaha. The crew removed only a few items before the boat was silted over. For more than a century thereafter, the Bertrand remained buried until it was discovered by treasure hunters, its cargo largely intact. This book categorizes some 300,000 artifacts recovered from the Bertrand in 1968, and also describes the invention, manufacture, marketing, distribution, and sale of these products and traces their route to the frontier mining camps of Montana Territory. The ship and its contents are a time capsule of mid-nineteenth-century America, rich with information about the history of industry, technology, and commerce in the Trans-Missouri West. In addition to enumerating the items the boat was transporting to Montana, and offering a photographic sample of the merchandise, Switzer places the Bertrand itself in historical context, examining its intended use and the technology of light-draft steam-driven river craft. His account of steamboat commerce provides multiple insights into the industrial revolution in the East, the nature and importance of Missouri River commerce in the mid-1800s, and the decline in this trade after the Civil War. Switzer also introduces the people associated with the Bertrand. He has unearthed biographical details illuminating the private and social lives of the officers, crew members, and passengers, as well as the consignees to whom the cargo was being shipped. He offers insight into not only the passengers' reasons for traveling to the frontier mining camps of Montana Territory, but also the careers of some of the entrepreneurs and political movers and shakers of the Upper Missouri in the 1860s. This unique reference for historians of commerce in the American West will also fascinate anyone interested in the technology and history of riverine transport.

Many great accounts of the fateful night of April 14th and 15th of 1912 have been told about the sinking of the RMS Titanic. Over the past one hundred and one years, the stories of the people and the disaster have been explained in art, movies, books, music and verse. This book begins with an original poem I have written to commemorate the ship's first, last and only voyage and the heroics demonstrated by some of those souls on board, some who survived and others who did not. Other wonderful and historic poems from the years immediately following the disaster are included here along with musical tributes, some of which can be linked to hear historic renditions on ebooks and computers. Some of the poems are famous, while others were penned by unknown poets. Newspapers of the day found that they received unsolicited poems by the hundreds on a daily basis - so many that the editor of the New York Times penned an editorial declaring many to be unworthy. The editorial concluded with a harsh admonition to its readers that simply because one had pen and paper didn't anoint them with the talent of a poet. Newspapers of today tend to be considerably friendlier to their declining readerships. What all those who wrote the poems of the Titanic shared in common was the desire of those authors to express shock, despair and sorrow in all the depths of human emotion. In addition, the very best attributes of character, heroics and courage were described in verse and song as exhibited or even imagined to have been displayed by the valiant on board the Titanic. Included here are two original poems penned by me along with my favorite story about the hero dog of the Titanic, Rigel, which I tell to visitors at the Titanic Museums in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee and Branson, Missouri, where I hope to see you when you visit. - Ken Rossignol

Queen Elizabeth: A Photographic Journey allows the reader to travel aboard Cunard's newest ship, the second largest ship to carry the Cunard colours. The ultimate in luxury cruising waits aboard Queen Elizabeth. From the three-storey Royal Court Theatre, complete with box seating, to the opulence of the Queens Room, the authors have captured the interior elegance of Queen Elizabeth with never-before-published images. Explore the behind-the-scenes areas, with a tour of the Engine Room, Stores and the Bridge, before returning to the passenger areas to discover bars, lounges, restaurants and cabins. This stunning volume is a must-have whether you're a seasoned Cunard passenger, or simply an armchair traveller. Written by two enthusiastic Cunard fans, travellers and historians, this book is beautifully illustrated with over 200 colour photographs and includes a foreword by Peter Shanks, former president of the Cunard Line, thoughts from Commodore Rynd on the ship's fifth anniversary and an afterword by Captain Chris Wells, Queen Elizabeth's First Master. This is Chris Frame and Rachelle Cross' sixth Cunard book and the fourth in their Journey series.

In the early morning hours of April 15, 1912 the R.M.S. Titanic slipped below the waters of the Atlantic becoming one of the greatest maritime disasters of the 20th century. 68 years later, a young boy would learn about the lost liner while spending the day with his grandfather. This is the story of that day and the collection of memorabilia which would be amassed over the years, the unbreakable bond between a grandfather and grandson joined together by the interest in the unsinkable ship.