March 1862. The Union ironclad warship, Monitor, with its two eleven inch Dahlgren smoothbores in a unique revolving turret assembly, leaves New York City under tow to serve blockade duty off the coast of North Carolina. Meanwhile, the Confederate ironclad Virginia (formerly the wooden frigate Merrimac) is raising havoc with Union blockaders in Hampton Roads. The inevitable showdown takes place on March 9th. For more than four hours the two ironclads battle furiously at close range. The Merrimac finally withdraws and returns to Norfolk to protect the river approaches to Richmond, leaving the Monitor in control of the Roads and in position to protect the Union blockaders. In May, the Merrimac is destroyed by its own crew to prevent capture; in December, the Monitor sinks in a storm off Cape Hatteras while under tow from Hampton Roads to North Carolina waters. An exciting account of two ships that would change naval warfare forever. Gene A. Smith holds a Ph.D. from Auburn University and is Assistant Professor of History at Texas Christian University. He is author, with Frank L. Owsley, Jr., of "For the Purpose of Defense" The Politics of the Jeffersonian Gunboat Program.

"Chinese mariners and their incredible craft represent one of the world's oldest and most advanced seafaring traditions. "Chinese Junks on the Pacific" is a scholarly and readable examination of the subject and how the West's mistaken perceptions of China's seafarers led to more than a century of neglect and misguided condescension."--James P. Delgado, Vancouver Maritime Museum "Van Tilburg's whole-hearted admiration of the achievements of Chinese shipbuilders and sailors underlies . . . his exploration of their role in modern North American and Chinese maritime culture."--Cheryl Ward, Florida State University Beginning in 1905, a handful of traditional Chinese sailing vessels, known as junks, sailed from China to North America across the Pacific. These were some of the last commercial sailing junks of China, most of which had little trouble crossing thousands of miles of ocean on their way to American ports. Crowds welcomed them in Victoria, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland, and San Diego, yet often regarded them with a mixture of surprise and contempt as quaint, unwieldy constructions in the fashion of sea monsters and even bizarre objects of fancy. As traveling cultural objects, displaying a variety of gruesome weaponry and other artifacts, some of them served as public floating museums. The arrival of these vessels allowed Western observers to catch a rare glimpse of a little-known yet sophisticated maritime technology and seafaring culture. Van Tilburg's study of this history--the maritime heritage of Chinese junks and their transpacific voyages--examines ten junks, how they were made, why and how they traveled, and how the West received them. Combining historical narrative with ethnology, anthropology, maritime archaeology, and nautical technology, he draws on a wide range of newspaper sources, secondary texts, nautical treatise, archaeological site work, rare historical photos and sketches, and the personal testimony of the sailors themselves to examine these vessels not only as transport vehicles but as complex cultural artifacts that "speak" of a distant seafaring past and intimate cultural ties to the sea. While attention to maritime China has focused primarily on periods versus centuries, "Chinese Junks on the Pacific" is the story behind the traditional Chinese vessels of the 19th century and how the West misunderstood them. Accessible reading, this book will appeal to scholars of Asian seafaring and archaeology, sailing aficionados drawn to the junk's form and sailing qualities, and those interested in Chinese-American interactions and encounters. Hans Konrad Van Tilburg, maritime heritage coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Marine Sanctuary Program in the Pacific Islands Region, has also served as an instructor in maritime archaeology and history at the University of Hawai'i, Manoa.

This new book consists of mini-biographies of 15 Americans who lived during the Antebellum period in American history. Part of The Human Tradition in America series, the anthology paints vivid portraits of the lives of lesser-known Americans. Raising new questions from fresh perspectives, this volume contributes to a broader understanding of the dynamic forces that shaped the political, economic, social, and institutional changes that characterized the antebellum period. Moving beyond the older, outdated historical narratives of political institutions and the great men who shaped them, these biographies offer revealing insights on gender roles and relations, working-class experiences, race, and local economic change and its effect on society and politics. The voices of these ordinary individuals-African Americans, women, ethnic groups, and workers-have until recently often been silent in history texts. At the same time, these biographies also reveal the major themes that were part of the history of the early republic and antebellum era, including the politics of the Jacksonian era, the democratization of politics and society, party formation, market revolution, territorial expansion, the removal of Indians from their territory, religious freedom, and slavery. Accessible and fascinating, these biographies present a vivid picture of the richly varied character of American life in the first half of the nineteenth century. This book is ideal for courses on the Early National period, U.S. history survey, and American social and cultural history.

This on-the-spot narrative of the February 1997 loss of three U.S. Coast Guardsmen from the Quillayute River Station during a maritime rescue is both a commemoration and a report of the failure of the Coast Guard's senior leadership to appreciate and support the work of enlisted men and women at often remote and dangerous small-boat stations.

The first in-depth look at a small-boat maritime rescue by the U.S. Coast Guard, this book is also the first to describe the role of those at small-boat rescue stations and of the policy setters at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C. Its author was in the right place at the right time on a night when everything went wrong. From the first alarm to the dramatic helicopter rescue of the crew of a foundering sailboat, from the onshore rescue of the sole survivor of the first dispatched Coast Guard crew to the tragic losses, this man-against-the-sea tale is told largely in the words of the participants and others who were with author Dennis Noble at the station near La Push, Washington, on the night the tragedy unfolded.

Noble also provides an analysis of the state of the Coast Guard, how its current problems have developed, and what effect they have on the service's operations. As the story unfolds, the views of senior enlisted personnel at the station paint a picture of an overworked small-boat rescue force and their feelings toward what they perceive as a distant, and in many cases unaware, officer corps. Noble contrasts these perspectives with those voiced by the investigating commissioned officers and higher-ups at Coast Guard headquarters.

Illustrated with 29 photos and maps, Noble's contribution to the annals of maritime history isa riveting account of extraordinary heroism in the face of regrettable human tragedy.