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Books > Humanities > History > History of specific subjects > Local history
During the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century a growing
number of ordinary citizens had the feeling that all was not as it
should be. Men who were making money made prodigious amounts, but
this new wealth somehow passed over the heads of the common people.
As this new breed of journalists began to examine their subjects
with scrutiny, they soon discovered that those individuals were
essentially "simple men of extraordinary boldness." And it was easy
to understand how they were able to accomplish their sinister
purposes: "at first abruptly and bluntly, by asking and giving no
quarter, and later with the same old determination and ruthlessness
but with educated satellites who were glad to explain and idealize
their behavior."[i] "Nothing is lost save honor," said one infamous
buccaneer, and that was an attitude that governed the amoral
principles and extralegal actions of many audacious scoundrels.
Relying on secondary sources, magazine and newspaper articles, and
personal accounts from those involved, this volume captures some of
the sensational true stories that took place in the western United
States during the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century. The
theme that runs through each of the stories is the general contempt
for the law that seemed to pervade the culture at the time and the
consuming desire to acquire wealth at any cost-what Geoffrey C.
Ward has called "the disposition to be rich."
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Notes Introduction [i]Louis Filler, Crusaders for American
Liberalism (Yellow Springs, OH: Antioch Press, 1964), 14.
Literary Nonfiction. Asian & Asian American Studies. Middle
Eastern Studies. Women's Studies. Angie Chuang takes on an
assignment to "find the human face of the country we're about to
bomb" weeks after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Her five-year journey
into the lives of the Shirzai family transports her far beyond
journalism. She travels to their homeland Afghanistan, and becomes
intimately involved with the family's story of loss and triumph
over war. As she is drawn ever deeper into the Shirzais's lives,
Chuang confronts unknown territory closer to her own home. Her own
immigrant family from Taiwan is falling apart. Mental illness,
divorce, and deeply rooted cultural taboos have shattered her own
family's American Dream. Ultimately, she finds the two families are
more similar than she had imagined. It is in journeying far away
from her own home and family that she is drawn back to discover her
own roots--and to confront the hard truths and broken places that
lie at the heart of so many stories of migration and
intergenerational struggle.
A history of Reading's iconic gaol: architectural landmark,
cultural emblem and symbol for a community determined to cherish
the town's heritage. Layers of history and art are carefully peeled
back as Peter Stoneley reveals its past as architectural showcase
for Sir George Gilbert Scott's decorative (and expensive!) style,
location for experiments in prison reform, training ground for the
leaders of the Irish Independence movement and, of course, the
inspiration for Oscar Wilde's famous Ballad of Reading Gaol.
Bringing the narrative right up to the present day with the
discussions over its future use, the impact of the ArtAngel
exhibition and Banksy's graffiti, this book is a timely platform
for the building to tell us its story.
In Downtown, Pete Hamill leads us on an unforgettable journey
through the city he loves, from the island's southern tip to Times
Square, combining a moving memoir of his days and nights in New
York with a passionate history of its most enduring places and
people.
'An incredible testament to one man's determination' - The Sunday
Herald Calum MacLeod had lived on the northern point of Raasay
since his birth in 1911. He tended the Rona lighthouse at the very
tip of his little archipelago, until semi-automation in 1967
reduced his responsibilities. 'So what he decided to do', says his
last neighbour, Donald MacLeod, 'was to build a road out of Arnish
in his months off. With a road he hoped new generations of people
would return to Arnish and all the north end of Raasay'. And so, at
the age of 56, Calum MacLeod, the last man left in northern Raasay,
set about single-handedly constructing the 'impossible' road. It
would become a romantic, quixotic venture, a kind of sculpture; an
obsessive work of art so perfect in every gradient, culvert and
supporting wall that its creation occupied almost twenty years of
his life. In Calum's Road Roger Hutchinson recounts the
extraordinary story of this remarkable man's devotion to his
visionary project.
In 1966 Jim Allen undertook the first professional excavation of a
European site in Australia. The 1840s military settlement of
Victoria was established at Port Essington, the northernmost part
of the Northern Territory and was the end point of Ludwig
Leichhardt's epic journey in 1844-45. This settlement was the
longest lived of three failed attempts by the British to establish
a settlement on the northern coast of Australia before 1850. Its
history reflects many of the dominant themes of wider colonial
history - isolation, tropical disease, poorly equipped and
inexperienced colonists, inept government bureaucracies and
relations with the Indigenous population. By looking at both the
material evidence produced by archaeological excavation and the
written sources, Allen sought to integrate both sorts of evidence
to produce an eclectic history that was neither social nor
political nor economic in its primary emphasis, but combined all
three. When his research was presented as a doctoral dissertation
at the Australian National University in 1969 its main theoretical
thrust concerned the problems of this data integration and this
remains a central issue in the discipline of historical archaeology
in Australasia. Some 40 years on, ASHA's decision to launch its new
monograph series by publishing this work has several purposes. At
one level this monograph is of historical importance in
establishing where the discipline began in this country. It
explains both the theoretical and methodological problems Allen
faced and how he sought to overcome them. At another level it
provides the data from an important excavation that has not been
previously published. On a third level it provides a particular
sort of historical account of a small but important chapter of
Australia's European beginnings that could not have been written
without the dual sources of written documents and archaeology.
Together they reflect a poignant episode in our past. In the decade
following this work Port Essington became the subject of a four
part ABC-TV drama, a musical composition by Peter Sculthorpe and
paintings by Russell Drysdale. Port Essington will appeal as a
reference book to both students and practitioners of historical
archaeology and to people interested in Australian colonial
history.
Georgetown's little-known Black heritage shaped a Washington, DC,
community long associated with white power and privilege. Black
Georgetown Remembered reveals a rich but little-known history of
the Georgetown Black community from the colonial period to the
present. Drawing on primary sources, including oral interviews with
past and current residents and extensive research in church and
historical society archives, the authors record the hopes, dreams,
disappointments, and successes of a vibrant neighborhood as it
persevered through slavery and segregation, war and peace,
prosperity and depression. This thirtieth anniversary edition of
Black Georgetown Remembered, first published in 1991, features more
than two hundred illustrations, including portraits of prominent
community leaders, sketches, maps, and nineteenth-century and
contemporary photographs. A new chapter includes a conversation
with former and current Georgetown residents reflecting on the
community, past and present. Black Georgetown Remembered is a
compelling and inspiring journey through more than two hundred
years of history. A one-of-a-kind book, it invites readers to share
in the lives, dreams, aspirations, struggles, and triumphs of real
people, to join them in their churches, at home, and on the street,
and to consider how the unique heritage of this neighborhood
intersects and contributes to broader themes in African American
and Washington, DC, history and urban studies.
An invaluable primary resource for understanding nineteenth-century
America. As a Georgetown resident for nearly a century, Britannia
Wellington Peter Kennon (1815 - 1911) was close to the key
political events of her time. Born into the prominent Peter family,
Kennon came into contact with the many notable historical figures
of the day who often visited Tudor Place, her home for over ninety
years. Now published for the first time, the record of her
experiences offers a unique insight into nineteenth-century
American history. Housed in the Tudor Place archives, "The
Reminiscences of Britannia Wellington Peter Kennon" is a collection
of Kennon's memories solicited and recorded by her grandchildren in
the 1890s. The text includes Kennon's memories of her mother Martha
Custis Peter and spending time at Mount Vernon with her
grandparents George and Martha Washington. It also includes her
recollections of childhood in Georgetown, life during the Civil
War, the people enslaved at Tudor Place, and daily life in
Washington, DC. Edited by Grant Quertermous, this richly
illustrated and annotated edition gives readers a greater
appreciation of life in early Georgetown. It includes a guide to
the city's streets then and now, a detailed family tree, and an
appendix of the many people Britannia encountered-a who's who of
the period. Readers will also find Britannia's narrative an
essential companion to the incredible collection of objects
preserved at Tudor Place. Notable for both its breadth and level of
detail, A Georgetown Life brings a new dimension to the study of
nineteenth-century America.
This new edition of Statehood and Union: A History of the Northwest
Ordinance, originally published in 1987, is an authoritative
account of the origins and early history of American policy for
territorial government, land distribution, and the admission of new
states in the Old Northwest. In a new preface, Peter S. Onuf
reviews important new work on the progress of colonization and
territorial expansion in the rising American empire.
On the 31st of October 1964 a very British institution took its
final bow. That was the night of the Windmill's farewell
performance and when the curtain fell for the last time on London's
world famous little theatre, and the stage door locked shut behind
its keeper, the Windmill's heart stopped beating. All that was left
was the lingering smell of a good cigar, the ghost of a fan dancer,
the last faint echoes of laughter and applause, and then darkness.
After 32 years the Windmill had breathed its last breath. Or had
it? No one could have predicted that half a century later, in the
year 2014, the world would still remember with affection the
Windmill Theatre with its famous comedians and its legendary
Windmill Girls. Fifty years on, in the public's heart, this
particular British institution "Never Closed."This full colour
hardback special edition book commemorates the Windmill on the
fifty year anniversary of the theatre's closure. With over 600
illustrations (photographs and ephemera), stories and contributions
from ex Windmillite Barry Cryer OBE, Windmill girls and boys who
danced on through the blitz and many more, this book will remind
those who were there of the phenomenon that was the Windmill, and
give those who weren't the feeling of having visited the theatre
that famously never closed.
I felt like we had failed, said director of grid operations Jim
Detmers in a pained voice. In my mind, I pictured people stranded
in elevators. I pictured people stranded in stores and checkout
lines. All I could think of was the Inconvenience, and I'm sitting
here thinking...thinking, what rock did we not look under to maybe
prevent this? As the focal point of an unprecedented power crisis
that has tarnished the Golden State, the California Independent
System Operator (California ISO) carries the mixed burden of being
a disaster survivor. Established to maintain electrical system
reliability for the world's fifth-largest economy, California ISO
has been both praised and vilified for its efforts amidst the chaos
of blackouts, price volatility, political backlash, and market
manipulations by Enron and other ruthless competitors. This book
chronicles how the California ISO came to be and what happened
during its first five years. More importantly, though, this is the
story of the people who make up California ISO and give it an
identifiable character and culture--its soul. regulatory record or
media accounts of California's unparalleled power emergency.
"Having written about New Mexico history for more than forty
years," explains the author, "it was perhaps inevitable that in
time I should publish a few articles on Billy the Kid. After all,
he is the one figure from this state's past whose name is known
around the world. The Kid's career, although astonishingly short,
nonetheless, left an indelible mark in the annals of the Old West.
And his name, William H. Bonney, alias Billy the Kid, seems locked
forever into the consciousness of the starry-eyed public. "Upon
request," the author continues, "I was able to assemble a
collection of my varied writings pertaining to some of Billy's real
or imagined deeds. Each section opens a small window on an aspect
of his tumultuous life, or casts light upon others whose fortunes
intersected with his. In this book, I have stalked Billy in an
erratic rather than a systematic way, taking pleasure merely in
adding a few new and unusual fragments to his biography. I trust
that readers who have a fascination with the history and legend of
Billy the Kid will find in these pages something of interest and
value. As Eugene Cunningham wrote more than seventy years ago, 'in
our imagination the Kid still lives--the Kid still rides.'" Marc
Simmons is a professional author and historian who has published
more than forty books on New Mexico and the American Southwest. His
popular "Trail Dust" column is syndicated in several regional
newspapers. In 1993, King Juan Carlos of Spain admitted him to the
knightly Order of Isabel la Catolica for his contributions to
Spanish colonial history.
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Ventry Calling
(Paperback)
Bearnard O Lubhaing; Translated by Gabriel Fitzmaurice
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R414
Discovery Miles 4 140
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Ships in 18 - 22 working days
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Ventry Calling is a translation of Bearnard O Lubhaing's Ceann Tra
hAon - a memoir originally published in 1998 by Coisceim and now
translated by Gabriel Fitzmaurice. Ventry was a parish of two
religions, Catholic and Protestant, which learned to live together.
O Lubhaing's account of the religious and educational implications
of this co-existence is carefully recalled. The rich archaeological
heritage of the area, the feast days of the year, life in West
Kerry during the Second World War, encounters with the Blasket
Island heritage, are all lovingly related in this authoritative
account by a Ventry native who went on to become a national school
teacher, a member of An Taisce and a committed Gaelgeoir.
Affluent Seattle has one of the highest numbers of unhoused people
in the United States. In 2021 an estimated 40,800 people
experienced homelessness in Seattle and King County during the
year, not counting the significant number of "hidden" homeless
people doubled up with friends or living in and out of cheap
hotels. In Skid Road Josephine Ensign uncovers the stories of
overlooked and long-silenced people who have lived on the margins
of society throughout Seattle's history. How, Ensign asks, has a
large, socially progressive city like Seattle responded to the
health and social needs of people marginalized by poverty, mental
illness, addiction, racial/ethnic/sexual identities, and
homelessness? Through extensive historical research, Ensign pieces
together the lives and deaths of those not included in official
histories of the city. Drawing on interviews, she also shares a
diversity of voices within contemporary health and social care and
public policy debates. Ensign explores the tensions between
caregiving and oppression, as well as charity and solidarity, that
polarize perspectives on homelessness throughout the country.
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