Dr. Bob and the Good Old Timers


Ed Nyland - 2015
    Its essence is sharing. Therefore, Bill W. and Dr. Bob are always referred to within the Fellowship as the co-founders. So far, among the majority of A.A. members, the Ohio surgeon has been less well known than his partner. He died in 1950, when A.A. was only 15 years old. But his influence on the whole A.A. program is permanent and profound. This book gives a portrait of Dr. Bob as full-sale and balanced as possible—for the most part, in the words of those who knew him personally. The young man who grew up in Vermont became a hard-drinking college boy, then a medical student fighting the onset of his own alcoholism, a respected physician, a loving but increasingly unreliable family man, and at last a desperately ill drunk. He was without hope until he met a stockbroker from New York—Bill W., who urgently needed a fellow alcoholic to help him maintain his own sobriety. His story then becomes inextricably entwined with that of Alcoholics Anonymous: from a fledgling Fellowship to a powerful spiritual movement with a worldwide reach. Dr. Bob’s story remains instructional and inspiring to those who read it today.

Scouting on Two Continents


Frederick Russell Burnham - 1926
     Born on a Dakota Sioux reservation he was taught the ways of the Native Americans from as soon as he could walk. At the tender age of fourteen, having had little formal education, he was supporting himself and learning from some of the last cowboys and frontiersmen of the Old West. These lessons would pay dividend in his later life, first as a tracker for the United States Army in the Apache Wars and later as a scout for the British Army in the Matebele Wars in Southern Africa. Frederick Burnham Russell was a remarkable figure who revolutionized the art of scouting in both the British and United States armies. Indeed his influence would lead his friend, Robert Baden-Powell, to begin the international Scouting Movement. In Scouting on Two Continents Burnham records the details of his brilliant life in fascinating detail and provides insight into the life of an unique adventurer in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. “Burnham in real life is more interesting than any of my heroes of romance.” Rider Haggard “Burnham is a most delightful companion ... amusing, interesting, and most instructive. Having seen service against the Red Indians he brings quite a new experience to bear on the Scouting work here. And while he talks away there’s not a thing escapes his quick roving eye, whether it is on the horizon or at his feet.” Robert Baden-Powell Frederick Burnham Russell has been described as the “Father of Scouting.” He fought in the Pleasant Valley War, Apache Wars, the First and Second Matabele Wars as well as the Second Boer War. His book Scouting on Two Continents was first published in 1926. He passed away in 1947.

The Captives of Abb's Valley: A Legend of Frontier Life


James Moore Brown - 1854
     The Moore family were early settlers from Ireland, who eventually made their home in Virginia. A branch of the family discovered Abb’s Valley; a remote settlement, isolated but idyllic, and which had once belonged to Cherokee and Shawnee natives. After many years of happiness, forming a successful and religiously-devoted community, the Moore family was brutally attacked. The Shawnees ruthlessly killed the majority of the family, taking the survivors prisoner, including Mary Moore, James Moore Brown’s mother. Mary found herself sold into slavery, and thus began a long and arduous journey to gain back her freedom and return to the home of youth. With unwavering faith in God and a belief that following His path would set her free, Mary was eventually rescued. This remarkable book, long suppressed because of the politically incorrect facts it contains about early frontier life and the interactions between white settlers and Indians, provides a dramatic insight into the sufferings of the early European pioneers in America. Indians regularly captured whites for use as slaves — although those were the lucky ones. The less fortunate were tortured and killed, often for sport. Written with a strong focus on Presbyterianism, the book’s value lies in its dispassionate detailing of the everyday life and dangers for families on the frontier. Born in Rockbridge, Virginia, USA on 1799 to Samuel Brown and Mary Moore (one of the captives of Abb’s Valley), James Moore Brown married Mary Ann Bell and had 6 children. He passed away on 1866 in Virginia, USA. His only book, The Captives of Abb’s Valley was first published in 1854.

The Karate Way: Discovering the Spirit of Practice


Dave Lowry - 2009
    Here, Dave Lowry, one of the best-known writers on the Japanese martial arts, illuminates the complete path of karate including practice, philosophy, and culture. He covers myriad subjects of interest to karate practitioners of all ages and levels, including:    • The relationship between students and teachers    • Cultivating the correct attitude during practice    • The differences between karate in the East and West    • Whether a karate student really needs to study in Japan to perfect the art    • The meaning of rank and the black belt    • Detailed descriptions of kicks, punches, evasions, and techniques and the philosophical concepts that they manifest    • What practice means and looks like as one ages    • How the practice of karate aims toward cultivating character and spiritual development After forty years studying karate and the budo arts, Lowry is an informative and reliable guide, highlighting aspects of the karate path that will surprise, entertain, and enlighten.

Murders of Merseyside


Tom Slemen - 2011
    In this compelling study of true crime, Liverpool's most popular author Tom Slemen recounts some of the most intriguing and baffling murders of Merseyside such as:• The baffling case of the Victorian canned corpse• The magistrate's beautiful granddaughter who was killed by a crazed admirer• The condemned man who was hanged twice• Frederick Deeming - the Rainhill psychopath who wiped out his own family and danced on their grave with his next victim• The bizarre link between a South Seas cult and the housewife who was stabbed fourteen times in her Knotty Ash home by a killer who struck under the cover of a fog• The unsolved case of the superintendent and his son who died of gunshot wounds under mysterious circumstances - in a police station• The enigmatic murder of Julia Wallace - and a very credible solution• The only assassination of a British prime minister - by a Liverpool businessman Plus many more fascinating murder cases.This fascinating book is a must for all readers of true crime in general and Liverpudlians and Merseysiders in particular.

One of the Family


John George Pearson - 2003
    Moreover, he was as legendary a figure on the streets of New York as on the streets of London.Pearson persuaded the mysterious criminal leader to talk to him - and the result was a story even more extraordinary than that of the Kray twins. Here Pearson reveals the true story of the Englishman who became the adopted son of Joey Pagano, the head of one of the major New York crime families. Here the Englishman tells the story that no-one else dared to tell.

REPORTS OF THEIR DEMISE


William Peter Grasso - 2021
    

Ninjutsu: The Art of Invisibility--Japan's Feudal-Age Espionage Methods (Tuttle Library of Martial Arts)


Donn F. Draeger - 1992
    Practitioners of the art, known as ninja, were masters of exotic weapons, martial skills, and techniques of stealth and concealment. Their ability to move swiftly and silently, and to strike at will with deadly force, made them seemingly invincible opponents, giving rise to stories of amazing exploits and supernatural powers.

As if it were yesterday: An old fat man remembers his youth as a Marine in Vietnam


Lee Suydam - 2017
    I try to tell what it was like for me and my brother Marines without fanfare or bravado and give the reader a vivid description of my 13 months.

SHARK AMONG THE MINNOWS: BOOK ONE OF THE HUNTER/KILLER SERIES (HUNTER/KILLER SERIES OF THE FIGHTING TOMCATS 1)


M.L. Maki - 2019
    He, and the 128 men on board, depart their home port of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on a six-month deployment as part of the USS Carl Vinson battlegroup. The San Francisco, SSN-711, is the state-of-the-art in submarine technology of the U.S. Navy. The Akula class submarine Kasholot, K-322, is the state-of-the-art submarine of the Russian Navy. These two ships, commanded by very different men, are destined to hunt each other in the Cold War game until a science experiment gone wrong takes them back in time to December 19, 1941, and the beginning of World War II.

Dodge City, the Cowboy Capital, and the great Southwest in the days of the wild Indian, the buffalo, the cowboy, dance halls, gambling halls and bad men (1913)


Robert Marr Wright - 1975
     With all that has been said about Dodge City no true account of conditions as they were in the early days was accessible until publication of Robert Wright's 1911 book "Dodge City, the Cowboy Capital." The author was especially well qualified to write a history of the "wicked city of the plains" since he had lived on the frontier for many years previous to the founding of the city and lived in the city from its opening. He had all the experience gleaned as a plainsman, explorer, scout, trader and as mayor of the town. His is a most interesting narrative of early days, as well as a very valuable contribution to western history. Prior to founding Dodge City in 1868, at 16 years old Wright came West to Missouri. In 1859 he made the first of six overland trips across the plains to Denver. He was later appointed post trader at Fort Dodge in 1867, when Kiowa, Comanche, Cheyenne, Arapahoe, and Prairie Apache abounded there. Wright was acquainted with old-school Western sheriff and gunfighter Bat Masterson, of whom he said, "Bat is a gentleman by instinct. He is a man of pleasant manners, good address and mild disposition, until aroused, and then, for God's sake, look out! "Bat was a most loyal man to his friends. If anyone did him a favor, he never forgot it. I believe that if one of his friends was confined in jail and there was the least doubt of his innocence, he would take a crow-bar and 'jimmy' and dig him out, at the dead hour of midnight; and, if there were determined men guarding him, he would take these desperate chances...." Wright describes a typical day in Dodge: "Someone ran by my store at full speed, crying out, 'Our marshal is being murdered in the dance hall!' I, with several others, quickly ran to the dance hall and burst in the door. The house was so dense with smoke from the pistols a person could hardly see, but Ed Masterson had corralled a lot in one corner of the hall, with his sixshooter in his left hand, holding them there until assistance could reach him...." Wright also describes one hair-raising encounter he witnessed from a roof on his ranch: "The savages circled around the poor Mexican again and again; charged him from the front and rear and on both sides. Presently the poor fellow's horse went down, and he lay behind it for awhile. Then he cut the girth, took off the saddle, and started for the river, running at every possible chance, using the saddle as a shield, stopping to show fight only when the savages pressed him too closely

Prisoner in the mud: A young German's diary from 1945


Herwarth Metzel - 2020
    The front lines are collapsing all around, bombs are falling. On Thuringia too, a state in the centre-east of Germany. The Second World War is nearing its end. Boys of fifteen and sixteen from the Jungvolk and Hitler Youth movements set off in the belief that they can still save the fatherland – they are determined to defend it, bravely and loyally. Inadequately armed, however, they are forced to retreat from the advancing enemy in an entirely pointless march. They are taken prisoner and transferred to one of the infamous camps near Bad Kreuznach. Conditions in the camp are tough. The diarist is fortunate enough to survive and to be released relatively early, at the end of June 1945. Germany, spring 2005. The fatherland too has survived and has been reunified. It is a year of commemoration days, of monuments and memorials, and in the run-up to the sixtieth anniversary it is already being declared by all the media as a year of remembrance of the downfall of the ‘Third Reich’. Inspired by this, the diarist, now seventy-five years old, remembers the notes and diary entries kept at that time by his fifteen-year-old self. Originally written on scraps of toilet paper, he copied them out after his fortunate return in July 1945, and has not looked at them since. The notes are very personal and honest and, above all, authentic. They give an insight into the experiences and the thoughts of a young boy who by his own admission left as a ‘proud soldier’ and returned home as a ‘pitiful vagabond’. It is a historical document. It is not the story of an individual fate. Thousands had the same experiences. That is why the diarist decided, with some hesitation, to publish his diary as a part of the historical truth, even if there already existed numerous reports and publications about the camps in Bad Kreuznach, Bretzenheim, Dietersheim, Bingen, Heidesheim and the other ‘Rhine Meadows camps’. All these records are testament to the fact that tyranny often abounds when one group of people is given unchecked power over another. According to Livy, as many as 2400 years ago the Gaulish king Brennus called to the defeated Romans: ‘Vae victis!’ – woe to the vanquished! Herwarth Metzel

Welcome To Dong Tam (Jayhawk Two One Book 1)


Michael Trout - 2014
    This is the first in a series of true stories about a young helicopter pilot’s tour of duty in Vietnam.

The Battle of Panchavati and Other Stories from Indian Scriptures


Divya Narain Upadhyaya - 2019
    These are the stories most of us have grown up with. The book is an attempt to revisit these timeless stories in a new rendition to make them more acceptable and interesting to the modern reader. This collection of seven timeless classics is an ideal companion of the traveller, the vacationer or even the casual reader. About Author : Divya Narain Upadhyaya is a medical doctor and a Plastic Surgeon by profession. He works in the Department of Plastic Surgery, at King Georges' Medical University, Lucknow, as an Associate Professor. His fields of interest in medicine are cleft and craniofacial surgery and treating brachial plexus injuries. He is a fellow of the American College of Surgeons and has trained extensively in craniofacial and maxillofacial surgery from the United States and Switzerland. He is an International Fellow of the American Society of Maxillofacial Surgeon and also an AO-CMF Fellow. His primary literary interests lie in Indian scriptures, religion and Indian history. He has a blog on dnu1blog.com where he writes about a variety of topics. This is his first book.

Battle for the Solomons (Illustrated)


Ira Wolfert - 2019
    Wolfert was in the thick of it, facing death alongside the troops, and he reproduces events as they happen in real time, making for a tense, suspenseful read. Wolfert risked his life on several occasions for the sake of authenticity, and survived to write this, one of the most remarkable combat memoirs of World War 2.