During the 1930s, the Federal Writers' Project undertook the task of locating former slaves and recording their oral histories. The more than ten thousand pages of interviews with over two thousand former slaves were filed in the Library of Congress, where they were known to scholars and historians but few others. From this storehouse of information, Belinda Hurmence has chosen twenty-seven narratives from the twelve hundred typewritten pages of interviews with 284 former South Carolina slaves. The result is a moving, eloquent, and often surprising firsthand account of the last years of slaver... View More...
De massa call me and tell me, "Woman, I's pay big money for you, and I's done dat 'cause I wants you to raise me chillum. I's put you to live with Rufus for dat purpose. Now, if you doesn't want whippin' at de stake, you do what I wants." I thinks 'bout Massa buyin' me off de block and savin' me from bein' separated from my folks, and 'bout bein' whipped at de stake. Dere it am. What am I to do? So asks Rose Williams of Bell County, Texas, whose long-ago forced cohabitation remains as bitter at age 90 as when she was "just a ingnoramus chile" of 16. In all her years after freedom, she never ha... View More...
An unsurpassed chronicle of the remarkable people who made up the great events and sweeping forces of the century: the leaders (Roosevelt to Gorbachev), the activists (Ghandi to King), the pioneers (the Earharts, the Cousteaus), the innovators (Henry Ford to Bill Gates), the scientists (Einstein, Curie), and the artists (Picasso to the Beatles). View More...
Together in one book, the two most important documents in United States history form the enduring legacy of America's Founding Fathers including Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton. The Declaration of Independence was the promise of a representative government; the Constitution was the fulfillment of that promise. On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress issued a unanimous declaration: the thirteen North American colonies would be the thirteen United States of America, free and independent of Great Britain. Drafted by Thomas Jefferson, the Declaration set forth the ... View More...
Take a stroll on Capitol Hill, an elevator to the top of the Washington Monument, or a ferry across the Potomac in this fully-illustrated photographic tour of our nation's capital. Visit such national treasures as the Lincoln Memorial, Embassy Row, and the White House. More than 100 photographs are accompanied by quotations, captions, and anecdotes from some of America's most notable statesmen. View More...
Step into the perfumed parlors of the Everleigh Club, the most famous brothel in American history-and the catalyst for a culture war that rocked the nation. Operating in Chicago's notorious Levee district at the dawn of the last century, the Club's proprietors, two aristocratic sisters named Minna and Ada Everleigh, welcomed moguls and actors, senators and athletes, foreign dignitaries and literary icons, into their stately double mansion, where thirty stunning Everleigh "butterflies" awaited their arrival. Courtesans named Doll, Suzy Poon Tang, and Brick Top devoured raw meat to the delight o... View More...
The New York Times Bestselling Travel Memoir The author of Turn Right at Machu Picchu travels the globe in search of the world's most famous lost city. "Adventurous, inquisitive and mirthful, Mark Adams gamely sifts through the eons of rumor, science, and lore to find a place that, in the end, seems startlingly real indeed."--Hampton SidesA few years ago, Mark Adams made a strange discovery: Far from alien conspiracy theories and other pop culture myths, everything we know about the legendary lost city of Atlantis comes from the work of one man, the Greek philosopher Plato. Stranger still: A... View More...
A history of Britain in the violent and unruly era between the first Scandinavian raids in 789 and the final expulsion of the Vikings from York in 954. In 865, a great Viking army landed in East Anglia, precipitating a series of wars that would last until the middle of the following century. It was in this time of crisis that the modern kingdoms of Britain were born. In their responses to the Viking threat, these kingdoms forged their identities as hybrid cultures: vibrant and entrepreneurial peoples adapting to instability and opportunity. Traditionally, Alfred the Great is cast as the centra... View More...
To find the leaders of a terrorist organization, Marine Force One heads to Yemen-but the terrorists have kidnapped an American Air Force officer-and getting close to them puts his life at risk. View More...
"The American Civil War -- April to April, Sumter to Appomattox, 1861 to 1865 -- pervades the national conscience....It makes a great story...," writes Shelby Foote in his foreword to this volume. "I know of none since the "Iliad" that rivals it either in drama or in pathos...." "The Blue and The Gray" tells that story, the epic of the first great modern conflict. In so doing, it raises issues still of urgent concern in many lands today: What unifies a diverse nation? What justifies the formation of a new one? What sustains democracy and law in the range of the guns? What peace can follow the... View More...
Concise introduction to the Gettysburg campaignFacts about all aspects of the battle and its participantsRevised and expanded for the 150th anniversary of the battleJust some of the fascinating topics covered: What led to the battle and why it was fought at GettysburgWho led the troops on both sides of the fieldWhat average soldiers experienced, in their own wordsHeroic actions and calamitous mistakes in judgmentWhat weapons were used and how effective they wereWhat happened to local civilians during and after the figh View More...
For 35 years, the author of this book has been a devoted student of the history, beliefs, and ways of The United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, better known as the Shakers. Out of his extensive research into manuscripts and primary sources and his conversations with friends in present-day Shaker communities has come a warm, illuminating history, the most thorough ever written on these pious, humble people and the distinct impression they made on American life.The book opens with an introductory assessment of the Shaker contribution to the history of American social experime... View More...
