B. West, chief usher of the White House, directed the operations and maintenance of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue—and coordinated its daily life—at the request of the president and his family. He directed state functions; planned parties, weddings and funerals, gardens and playgrounds, and extensive renovations; and with a large staff, supervised every activity in the presidential home. For twenty-eight years, first as assistant to the chief usher, then as chief usher, he witnessed national crises and triumphs, and interacted daily with six consecutive presidents and first ladies, their parents, children and grandchildren, and houseguests—including friends, relatives, and heads of state.In Upstairs at the White House, West offers an absorbing and novel glimpse at America’s first families, from the Roosevelts to the Kennedys andthe Nixons. Alive with anecdotes ranging from the quotidian (Lyndon B. Johnson’s showerheads) to the tragic (the aftermath of John F. Kennedy’s assassination), West’s book is an enlightening and rich account of the American history that took place just behind the Palladian doors of the North Portico.

    With their broad canvas and large cast of fictional and historical characters, the novels in this series present a panorama of the American political and imperial experience as interpreted by one of its most worldly, knowing, and ironic observers. Burr is a portrait of perhaps the most complex and misunderstood of the Founding Fathers. In 1804, while serving as vice president, Aaron Burr fought a duel with his political nemesis, Alexander Hamilton, and killed him. In 1807, he was arrested, tried, and acquitted of treason. In 1833, Burr is newly married, an aging statesman considered a monster by many. Burr retains much of his political influence if not the respect of all. And he is determined to tell his own story. As his amanuensis, he chooses Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler, a young New York City journalist, and together they explore both Burr's past and the continuing political intrigues of the still young United States.

    Harry Jaffa provides the definitive analysis of the political principles that guided Lincoln from his re-entry into politics in 1854 through his Senate campaign against Douglas in 1858."Crisis of the House Divided has shaped the thought of a generation of Abraham Lincoln and Civil War scholars."—Mark E. Needly, Jr., Civil War History"An important book about one of the great episodes in the history of the sectional controversy. It breaks new ground and opens a new view of Lincoln's significance as a political thinker."—T. Harry Williams, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences"A searching and provocative analysis of the issues confronted and the ideas expounded in the great debates. . . . A book which displays such learning and insight that it cannot fail to excite the admiration even of scholars who disagree with its major arguments and conclusions."—D. E. Fehrenbacher, American Historical Review

    Using the popular literature of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and early nineteenth centuries-including captivity narratives, the Daniel Boone tales, and the writings of Hawthorne, Thoreau, and Melville-Slotkin traces the full development of this myth.

    Among the highlights: a brief history of the anthem, a reproduction of Francis Scott Key's original manuscript, music for guitar and piano chords and many photographs.A Child Study Children's Book Committee: Children's Book of the Year, An American Bookseller Pick of the Lists.

    Flying fleshpots. Lack of sleep. Endless spin. Lying pols.Just a few of the snares lying in wait for the reporters who covered the 1972 presidential election. Traveling with the press pack from the June primaries to the big night in November, Rolling Stone reporter Timothy Crouse hopscotched the country with both the Nixon and McGovern campaigns and witnessed the birth of modern campaign journalism. The Boys on the Bus is the raucous story of how American news got to be what it is today. With its verve, wit, and psychological acumen, it is a classic of American reporting.

    New York fell and the anguished retreat through New Jersey followed. Winter came with a vengeance, bringing what Thomas Paine called “the times that try men’s souls.”The Winter Soldiers is the story of a small band of men held together by George Washington in the face of disaster and hopelessness, desperately needing at least one victory to salvage both cause and country. It is a tale of unimaginable hardship and suffering that culminated in the battles of Trenton and Princeton. Without these triumphs, the rebellion that had begun so bravely could not have gone on.Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Richard M. Ketchum graduated from Yale Unviersity and commanded a subchaser in the South Atlantic during World War II. As director of book publishing at American Heritage Publishing Company for twenty years, he edited many of that firm’s volumes, including The American Heritage Book of the Revolution and The American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War, which received a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation. Ketcham was the cofounder and editor of Blair & Ketcham’s Country Journal, a monthly magazine about rural life. He and his wife live on a sheep farm in Vermont. He is the author of two other Revolutionary War classics: Decisive Day and The Winter Soldiers.

    Friedman tells the whole fascinating story of American law from its beginnings in the colonies to the present day. By showing how close the life of the law is to the economic and political life of the country, he makes a complex subject understandable and engrossing. A History of American Law presents the achievements and failures of the American legal system in the context of America's commercial and working world, family practices, and attitudes toward property, government, crime, and justice. Now completely revised and updated, this groundbreaking work incorporates new material regarding slavery, criminal justice, and twentieth-century law. For laymen and students alike, this remains the only comprehensive authoritative history of American law.

    A captain during the Revolutionary War, Boone faces court-martial and hanging for such high crimes as betraying his command to the Indians, conspiring to surrender Boonesborough, consorting with the enemy, and accepting favors from the British. And Boone pleads guilty to all of the actions detailed in the charges against him. But he also pleads not guilty to the charge of treason, and to the amazement of the court, he insists on defending himself - disregarding the advice of experienced counsel in favor of a plan only he himself knows. Strong, seemingly irrefutable evidence is added to the prosecution's case with each witness. To a man, they corraborate the capture of Boone and his company by Shawnee Indians, Boone's preferential treatment in the Indian camp.

    Anthony Lukas’s account of the Watergate story to date. Six months later, a second installment ran in another full issue. Later the Times asked him to write a third issue, on the impeachment, which never appeared because of Nixon’s intervening resignation. But all of Lukas’s painstaking reporting on Nixon’s last months in office appears here, along with added information on every aspect of Watergate.Widely acclaimed as a major text of the Watergate saga, J. Anthony Lukas’s Nightmare is a masterwork of investigation, highlighted by in-depth character sketches of the key players. For students of history coming to these events for the first time, this book reveals in depth the particular trauma of a nation in turmoil; for those who remember, the upheaval and what was at stake are once more brought to life.

    Deadwood Dick, Mary Fields, a.k.a. Stagecoach Mary, Cranford Goldsby, a.k.a. Cherokee Bill—and a host of other intrepid men and women who marched into the wilderness alongside Chief Osceola, Billy the Kid, and Geronimo.Featuring captivating narratives and photographs (many from the author’s world-famous collection), The Black West enriches and deepens our stirring frontier saga. From slave runaways during the colonial era, to the journeys of Lewis and Clark, to the charge at San Juan Hill, Katz vividly recounts the crucial contributions African Americans made during scores of frontier encounters. With its stirring pictures and vivid eyewitness accounts, The Black West is an exhilarating treasure trove.

    In this first installment of his Pulitzer Prize-winning Freedom from Fear, Kennedy tells how America endured, and eventually prevailed, in the face of that unprecedented calamity. Kennedy vividly demonstrates that the economic crisis of the 1930s was more than a reaction to the excesses of the 1920s. For more than a century before the Crash, America's unbridled industrial revolution had gyrated through repeated boom and bust cycles, consuming capital and inflicting misery on city and countryside alike. Nor was the alleged prosperity of the 1920s as uniformly shared as legend portrays. Countless Americans eked out threadbare lives on the margins of national life. Roosevelt's New Deal wrenched opportunity from the trauma of the 1930s and created a lasting legacy of economic and social reform, but it was afflicted with shortcomings and contradictions as well. With an even hand Kennedy details the New Deal's problems and defeats, as well as its achievements. He also sheds fresh light on its incandescent but enigmatic author, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Marshalling unforgettable narratives that feature prominent leaders as well as lesser-known citizens, The American People in the Great Depression tells the story of a resilient nation finding courage in an unrelenting storm.

    More than fifteen years after his death, this collection of his work from I.F. Stone's Weekly and elsewhere is astonishing in its relevance to our age, addressing the clash between national security and individual liberty, the protection of minorities, economic fairness, social justice, and the American military abroad. The core of Stone's genius was his newsletter, I.F. Stone's Weekly, published from the mid-1950s to the early 1970s. His meticulous dissection of the news was unsurpassed, a direct descendent of the great pamphleteers like Thomas Paine, and a forerunner to the best of today's political blogs. Stone's brilliant, investigative reporting; his wonderful, impassioned style; and his commitment to his values all make this collection an inspiration, and a revelation.

    Written by a leader of the communist movement in the U.S. and organizer of the Teamsters union during the rise of the CIO. Indispensable tools for advancing revolutionary politics, organization, and trade union strategy.The growth and consolidation of the Teamsters union in Minneapolis and its class-struggle leadership, and the 11-state over-the-road organizing campaign that brought union power for the first time to many areas of the Midwest.

    Utley combines scholarship and drama to produce an impressive history of the final, massive drive by the Regular Army to subdue and control the American Indians and open the West during the twenty-five years following the Civil War. Here are incisive accounts of the campaign directed by Major General William Tecumseh Sherman—from the first skirmishes with the Sioux over the Bozeman Trail defenses in 1866 to the final defeat and subjugation of the Northern Plains Indians in 1890. Utley's brilliant descriptions of military maneuvers and flaming battles are juxtaposed with a careful analysis of Sherman's army: its mode of operation, equipment, and recruitment; its lifestyle and relations with Congress and civilians.Proud of the United States Army and often sympathetic toward the Indians, Utley presents a balanced overview of the long struggle. He concludes that the frontier army was not "the heroic vanguard of civilization" as sometimes claimed and still less "the barbaric band of butchers depicted in the humanitarian literature of the nineteenth century and the atonement literature of the twentieth." Rather, it was a group of ordinary (and sometimes extraordinary) men doing the best they could.

    Freda DeKnight's selection from the thousands of American Negro recipes in her collection is unique. It preserves many dishes that might otherwise be lost to a TV-dinner generation. It provides a guide and reference for everyone, from novice cook to discriminating gourmet, who loves good food. The uses of herbs, spices and wines, a 'Guide for the Housewife' (which really tells how to cook), and a section of complete menus supplement the organized presentation of recipes for everything from appetizers to dessert.

    The Parker family, unused to any kind of pioneering life, leaves St. Joseph, Missouri, in 1860, part of a westward-bound wagon train. Each family member is challenged by the hardships of a difficult journey in which a jumble of classes and types of people must learn how to pull together. Jerry thrives on the life, and is prepared, when the call comes, to sacrifice much for the sake of the common good. Here is an unusually realistic and moving tale of pioneer spirit on the American plains. Ages 12 and up."

    These societies ranged from small bands that survived less than a year to powerful states encompassing thousands of members and surviving for generations and even centuries. The volume includes eyewitness accounts written by escaped slaves and their pursuers, as well as modern historical and anthropological studies of the maroon experience. From the recipient of the J.I. Staley Prize in Anthropology.

    This volume tells the story of that offensive, one which eventually involved more than four and a half million troops, including ninety-one divisions, sixty-one of which were American. The focus of the volume is on the role of the American armies -First, Third, Seventh, Ninth, and, to a lesser extent, Fifteenth- which comprised the largest and most powerful military force the United States has ever put in the field. The role of Allied armies -First Canadian, First French, and Second British- is recounted in sufficient detail to put the role of American armies in perspective, as is the story of tactical air forces in support of the ground troops.

    Biography of Frank Costello, one of New York City's most famed crime bosses of all time.

    American West. History. Introduction by Ronald A. Wells. "This book is meant to help the reader toward an understanding of two things: namely, the modern American state of California, and our national character as displayed in that land"--Josiah Royce, 1886. California has recently been blessed with a number of careful and colorful works by authors who do not hesitate at-and perhaps even enjoy-shattering the state's historic icons in order to present an honest view of the state's formative events and their causes. Josiah Royce's CALIFORNIA, published in 1886, is the prototype for this approach. With keen attention to detail, Royce produced a passionate narrative-at times ironic, at times outraged, at times in awe of pioneer courage-that sought to ground our history in truth and to reveal the moral consequences of the American conquest of Mexican California.

    

    

    Total in set: 312 plates.

    Each biography offers a uniquely personal and provocative glimpse into the lives of these Americans and shows how their experiences are linked to historical events, covering everything from the environment to popular culture. From These Beginnings can be used as a stand-alone core text, or as a wonderful supplement to any U.S. History survey course, inviting students to see history not as a collection of names and dates, but as an evolving tale about people like themselves.

    An account of the lives and work of cowboys in the old West, lavishly illustrated with contemporary paintings and photographs.

    They would be wrong. Contrary to the myth perpetrated by his literary executors Twain ended his life as a frustrated writer plagued by paranoia. He suffered personal tragedies, got involved in questionable business ventures, and was a demanding and controlling father and husband.  As Mark Twain: God’s Fool demonstrates, the difficult circumstances of Twain’s personal life make his humorous output all the more surprising and admirable.   “Ham[lin] Hill remains among the smartest, most honest, and most humane of Twain scholars—and . . . God’s Fool parades those qualities on every page.”   Jeff Steinbrink, Franklin & Marshall College“Fills a great, long-standing need for a thoroughly researched book about Mark Twain’s twilight years. . . . Splendidly, grippingly written and excellently documented. . . . Likely to be a standard work for as long as anyone can foresee.”   Choice

    This book tells what the leading Americans were really like, as deducted from their letters, diaries, and reminiscences, up to the moment they openly declared revolution - the hearts and minds of those bold men and women of 1776 who won their desperate gamble to be free.

    Truman, features memorable quotations, quips, and comments by one of our most outspoken presidents. Quotations are arranged alphabetically by subject, with a brief year-by-year history of Truman's life, and the best things said about him during his presidency. Memorable sayings popularized by Harry S. Truman include: "Do what you think is right and let them all go to hell, " "It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose your own, " and "The buck stops here" (the sign on Truman's desk at the White House). This is the perfect book for quotation fans, history students, and anyone who experienced the Truman presidency firsthand, as well as an ideal introduction for young people to one of America's greatest presidents.

    From the courtyards of the Sun King to the royal chambers of Charles II, Penn was a "Friend" of kings and princes, scientists and Native Americans. A member of the Royal Society, Penn knew Edmund Halley and Isaac Newton. He met Peter the Great while the Czar was visiting London and introduced him to Quaker ideas. As the founder of Pennsylvania, Penn treated the Native American tribes with dignity and respect and by his integrity established the longest standing peace treaty between European settlers and Native Americans. His commitment to religious freedom became a cornerstone of American democracy. In her inimitable fashion, Foster has brought Penn's story to a new generation of readers. --Rea Berg, Editor 2008

    Their heroic but futile battle at Fort Wagner was memorialized by sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens in Boston Common in 1897. Both the commemorative book and limited-edition volume depict the monument in stirring detail while celebrating its 100-year anniversary. For photography connoisseurs and Civil War buffs. First Edition, 1973

    Clifton, the President's Military Aide.

    Published by The California Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with Save-The-Redwoods League and the Calaveras Grove Association.

    Newspapers and other familiar sources record the lives of only the prominent five percent of the population. Beyond these privileged few lie the millions who are born, live, and die unnoted by the chroniclers of their era. Now, with the assistance of computers and a team of researchers, Stephan Thernstrom has gone to the available records of these people, to the raw and uninterpreted data in old city directories, fading marriage license applications, and abandoned local tax records. He has assembled and analyzed this neglected body of evidence to provide one of the most thorough series of observations ever made on the patterns of migration and social mobility in a changing American community. "Thernstrom has written a superb book. It is the best and most ambitious analysis of social mobility yet to appear and will undoubtedly serves as a model for future studies." -American Historical Review "The best piece of quantitative history yet published. It is destined to be a highly influential book." -New York Times Book Review "This is an important book-indispensably important-for students of American social mobility." -American Journal of Sociology

    Mike Hanley ranches near Jordan Valley, Oregon, in the shadow of the Owyhee Mountains. With Ellis Lucia, he recounts the boisterous past and present of this wild and rugged corner of the west.

    

    He chronicles events leading up to Washington's crossing of the Delaware and the ensuing Battle of Trenton, a turning point in the War of Independence.

    Louis Nizer brings the perspective of a lawyer to this review of the trial of Julius & Ethel Rosenberg for espionage in 1951.

    Eulalio Baltazar is constructing a theology of process, imagination, mystery, mythology and darkness. The practical orientation of this book is the understanding of the philosophic and religious roots of racism in the West.

    

    It offers a critique of the liberal tradition and a new social philosophy for the future based on the long-cherished ideal of the past: fraternity, a relation of affection founded on shared values and goals.This is a study of the idea of fraternity both as philosophic abstraction and as social-psychological reality in the American historical experience. In one sense, it is a long and sustained reflection on the American political tradition, with side glances at other cultures and other traditions; in another sense, it is an impressive beginning at an original and quite comprehensive theory of politics, rooted in a new reading of virtually every conceivable relevant source.Fraternity is a permanent social and psychological necessity of human development, yet one that is discouraged and inhibited by the institutions and processes of modern industrial societies.In American, two cultural traditions, the formal and intellectual 'liberal tradition' deriving from the Enlightenment and the religious tradition rooted in habit and custom, appeal to the symbol of 'fraternity'. The religious tradition sees fraternity as an ethic in intra-personal relations which is essentially a means to the goal of human excellence. The 'liberal tradition', by contrast, conceives fraternity as an end, the chief characteristic of an ideal society to be reached by historical progress.Despite these radically different conceptions, the fact that the liberal tradition promised fraternity at the end of historical 'progress' enabled many Americans to escape from the ambivalence deriving from the widely divergent ethics of their two cultures and to accept modern institutions censured by the religious tradition on the assumption that these would work to produce fraternity."This is an astonishing book -- in terms of scholarship, of insight, of breadth of vision. It is bound to become a major point of reference for any informed discussion of political ideas and political reality in America.…Anyone concerned with the future of democracy will be profoundly stimulated by this truly remarkable book." -- Peter Berger