This sweeping work of history explains the westward spread of cotton agriculture and slave labor across the South and into Texas during the decades before the Civil War. In arguing that the U.S. acquisition of Texas originated with planters' need for new lands to devote to cotton cultivation, celebrated author Roger G. Kennedy takes a long view. Locating the genesis of Southern expansionism in the Jeffersonian era, "Cotton and Conquest "stretches from 1790 through the end of the Civil War, weaving international commerce, American party politics, technological innovation, Indian-white relations, frontier surveying practices, and various social, economic, and political events into the tapestry of Texas history.

The innumerable dots the author deftly connects take the story far beyond Texas. Kennedy begins with a detailed chronicle of the commerce linking British and French textile mills and merchants with Southern cotton plantations. When the cotton states seceded from the Union, they overestimated British and French dependence on Southern cotton. As a result, the Southern plantocracy believed that the British would continue supporting the use of slaves in order to sustain the supply of cotton--a miscalculation with dire consequences for the Confederacy.

As cartographers and surveyors located boundaries specified in new international treaties and alliances, they violated earlier agreements with Indian tribes. The Indians were to be displaced yet again, now from Texas cotton lands. The plantation system was thus a prime mover behind Indian removal, Kennedy shows, and it yielded power and riches for planters, bankers, merchants, millers, land speculators, Indian-fighting generals and politicians, and slave traders.

In Texas, at the plantation system's farthest geographic reach, cotton scored its last triumphs. No one who seeks to understand the complex history of Texas can overlook this book.

Wildfires are a fact of life throughout many arid and semi-arid regions, such as the American West. With growing population pressures in these regions, human communities are increasingly developing in so-called ???urban-wildland interface zones, ??? where severe fire driven ecosystems co-exist uneasily with humans and their property. This edited volume addresses this problem???and its potential solutions???from an interdisciplinary perceptive, with contributions from authors in public policy, sociology, economics, ecology, computer modeling, planning, and ecology. The first section of the book addresses institutional and policy aspects, including chapters on national fire policy in the United States, local fire planning and policy, smart growth approaches to planning in fire zones, and institutional roadblocks to fuels management. The second section deals with economic aspects, including chapters on the role of information and disclosure of hazards in real estate markets, methods of underwriting fire insurance, and the consequences of state-mandated fire insurers of last resort. The third section deals with community level involvement in fire management, addressing a wide range of issues including models of community engagement, criteria for success, and approaches for institutionalizing this process, both in the US and abroad. The final section deals with management and ecology and includes chapters on the predicted effects of climate change on wildfire activity, new computer modeling tools for mitigating fire risk, and complex institutional mechanisms behind large-fire suppression in the US.
Advances in the Economics of Environmental Resources is now available online atScienceDirect ??? full-text online of volumes 3 onwards.
For more information about the Elsevier Book Series on ScienceDirect Program, please visit:
http: //www.info.sciencedirect.com/bookseries/
*Addresses institutional and policy aspects, economic aspects, community level involvement in fire management, and the management and ecology of wildfires

Historic Homes of Minnesota is the engaging story of the evolution of architectural styles in Minnesota from 1830 to 1914 -- from the influence of the early French traders along the Mississippi and St Croix to the emergence of the school of Frank Lloyd Wright. Through photographs and colourfully informative text, internationally known historian Roger Kennedy helps readers understand the unique styles of Minnesota's first homes, including the Mower House in Arcola, the first large house on the St. Croix; Alexander Ramsey's 'Mansion House' in St Paul, influenced by Pennsylvania Dutch virtues; the whimsical Charles C. Clement house in Fergus Falls, clearly Norse in spirit; and the Purcell House in Minneapolis, a fine example of the Prairie School design. On a broad plane these architectural eras reflected social customs, politics, commerce, religion, and literature. On a personal level they often revealed the national origin and character of the families that made the house a home. In short, this is in large measure a history of the people. Kennedy has considered their heritage and traditions as carefully as he has examined the architecture they created, and he offers a fresh, holistic approach to the study of our state's great houses.

Thomas Jefferson advocated a republic of small farmers--free and independent yeomen. And yet as president he presided over a massive expansion of the slaveholding plantation system, particularly with the Louisiana Purchase, squeezing the yeomanry to the fringes and to less desirable farmland. Now Roger G. Kennedy conducts an eye-opening examination of the gap between Jefferson's stated aspirations and what actually happened.
Kennedy reveals how the Louisiana Purchase had a major impact on land use and the growth of slavery. He examines the great financial interests (such as the powerful land companies that speculated in new territories and the British textile interests) that beat down slavery's many opponents in the South itself (Native Americans, African Americans, Appalachian farmers, and conscientious opponents of slavery). He describes how slaveholders' cash crops--first tobacco, then cotton--sickened the soil and how the planters moved from one desolated tract to the next. Soon the dominant culture of the entire region--from Maryland to Florida, from Carolina to Texas--was that of owners and slaves producing staple crops for international markets. The earth itself was impoverished, in many places beyond redemption.
None of this, Kennedy argues, was inevitable. He focuses on the character, ideas, and ambitions of Thomas Jefferson to show how he and other Southerners struggled with the moral dilemmas presented by the presence of Indian farmers on land they coveted, by the enslavement of their workforce, by the betrayal of their stated hopes, and by the manifest damage being done to the earth itself. Jefferson emerges as a tragic figure in a tragic period.
Mr. Jefferson'sLost Cause was a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title for 2003.

This book restores Aaron Burr to his place as a central figure in the founding of the American Republic. Abolitionist, proto-feminist, friend to such Indian leaders as Joseph Brant, Burr was personally acquainted with a wider range of Americans, and of the American continent, than any other Founder except George Washington. He contested for power with Hamilton and then with Jefferson on a continental scale. The book does not sentimentalize any of its three protagonists, neither does it derogate their extraordinary qualities. They were all great men, all flawed, and all three failed to achieve their full aspirations. But their struggles make for an epic tale.

As the influence of popular culture increases, the collection of paper ephemera has emerged as a hobby. From bus tickets and postcards to shopping bags and matchbooks, these collectible memorabilia are usually discarded after their intended use. However, if properly stored and preserved, these items can record and illuminate our history and culture. Using a whimsical and engaging approach, Minnesota on Paper showcases some of the saved treasures that bring Minnesota history to life. With a nostalgic glimpse into the past, Moira and Leo Harris convey the aesthetic, historical, and cultural significance of particular ephemera, including beer labels, circus posters, postcards, and stamps, to name a few. By examining the creation and design of the paper ephemera, Minnesota on Paper also reveals a great deal about the development of Minnesota business, the evolution of printing technology and graphic design, and the history of advertising. In a tribute to these bygone days, the authors investigate ephemera from a variety of different perspectives. Who designed and printed each item and why? How and why did the item change and then cease to be used? Why is the item of interest, and what is its meaning? Who collects this item and why? A collection of treasures from the past, Minnesota on Paper features more than 240 color reproductions. Cultural historians, ephemera scholars, and Minnesotans intrigued by their history will appreciate these visual footnotes of Minnesota's culture. Moira F. Harris and Leo J. Harris are the publishers of Pogo Press, a small press located in St. Paul. Between them they hold six degrees from the University of Minnesota. Moira F. Harris has written numerous articleson art and popular culture for local and national magazines and is the author of several books including The Paws of Refreshment: The Story of Hamm's Beer Advertising, and Fire & Ice: The History of the Saint Paul Winter Carnival.

"An invaluable, splendidly illustrated overview of the grand construction projects of the precolumbian inhabitants of eastern North America."--Eduard F. Sekler, professor emeritus of architecture, Harvard University William Morgan, one of the nation's renowned architects, analyzes prehistoric architecture beginning more than 6,000 years ago and continuing through two periods of stunning creativity before Columbus's arrival in the New World. Magnificently illustrated with scaled drawings and aerial and eye-level photographs, it is the most comprehensive overview to date of ancient eastern North American monuments. Morgan organizes the book in three periods: the beginnings of architecture dating from 4000 B.C., at such sites as Watson Brake and Poverty Point in Louisiana; the first extraordinary era of architectural achievement near the beginning of the Christian era, at the ceremonial centers of the Ohio Valley; and the period just preceding Columbus's arrival, at the remarkable temple towns of the Mississippi Valley. In a clearly and concisely written account, Morgan describes architectural characteristics of 96 precolumbian sites and offers razor-sharp graphics and supplementary information about each. In addition, 12 well-known sites--such as Stonehenge, the Acropolis, and Angkor Wat--are presented at the book's graphic scale to assist readers in comprehending the size and character of the ancient North American monuments. Not only architects but archaeologists, anthropologists, geographers, artists, and anyone interested in the remote past will discover in this book prehistoric earthworks that are dramatically rich in both form and meaning. William N. Morgan, FAIA, a practicing architect in Jacksonville, Florida, is the author of Ancient Architecture of the Southwest and Prehistoric Architecture in Micronesia. A frequent visiting lecturer in architecture at universities throughout the United States, he recently was appointed the Beinecke-Reeves Distinguished Chair in Architectural Preservation at the University of Florida. During his career he has received numerous honors and design awards, including the AIA's 1998 Institute Honor for research and recording of ancient American civilizations.

"1934: A New Deal for Artists" celebrates the 75th anniversary of the US Public Works of Art Program, drawing on the Smithsonian American Art Museum's unparalleled collection. In 1934, against the backdrop of the Great Depression, the US government created its first program to support the arts. The Public Works of Art Program lasted for six months, from December 1933 to June 1934, and artists from across the US were encouraged to depict the American scene and boost morale through art. The Program paid artists to paint regional, recognisable subjects - portraits, cityscapes and landscapes, images of both city and rural life - that reminded the public of the essential American values of hard work, community and optimism. The 55 paintings in the book are a lasting visual record of America at a specific moment in time; a response to an economic situation all too familiar today.