A semi-memoir covering a decade of the acclaimed cartoonists formative years (1935-1945), and including many reproductions of famous drawings and photos from the authors personal collection.

    He was a below-average student with a lackluster work ethic and a bad attitude, who hung with the wrong crowd and made a lot of bad choices. He was a kid whose life was headed for disaster—until a local coach took interest in him, suggested that he take up amateur wrestling, and offered to work with him if he promised to stay out of trouble.It was in North Dakota that Bob Backlund had the first of several chance encounters that would shape his destiny. While working out at the YMCA gymnasium in Fargo, North Dakota, where he wrestled for North Dakota State, Backlund met a well-known professional wrestler, “Superstar” Billy Graham. The men talked, and at Graham’s suggestion, Backlund was inspired to pursue a career in professional wrestling.Less than five years from that day, on February 20, 1978, Backlund would find himself halfway across the country, standing in the middle of the ring at Madison Square Garden with his hand raised in victory as the newly crowned World Wide Wrestling Federation Heavyweight Champion. The man Backlund pinned for the championship that night was none other than Superstar Billy Graham.Featuring contributions from Bruno Sammartino, Harley Race, Terry Funk, Pat Patterson, Ken Patera, Sergeant Slaughter, The Magnificent Muraco, George “The Animal” Steele, “Mr. USA” Tony Atlas, The Iron Sheik, and many others, this book tells the incredible story of the life and nearly forty-year career of one of the most famous men to ever grace the squared circle.Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Sports Publishing imprint, is proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in sports—books about baseball, pro football, college football, pro and college basketball, hockey, or soccer, we have a book about your sport or your team.In addition to books on popular team sports, we also publish books for a wide variety of athletes and sports enthusiasts, including books on running, cycling, horseback riding, swimming, tennis, martial arts, golf, camping, hiking, aviation, boating, and so much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to publishing books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked by other publishers and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

    At forty-five years old, my life’s mission was complete. If I died tomorrow, I would be proud of the life I lived.” - Loving Tiara Loving Tiara is a compelling memoir that will encompass your every thought, break your heart, fill you with hope, and leave you with a sense of awe. When Tiffani married the love of her life, Lou, after graduating from college, she assumed she would continue to live the affluent life she had always known, having grown up in Newport Beach, California. She never imagined she would soon be stalked by creditors, driving a car on the repossession list and forced to worry about providing basic necessities for her family, such as buying diapers and groceries. This increasingly desperate situation forced her to decide to return home to her parents with her baby and husband. After getting their life back on track, and with Tiffani in her final year of law school, they decided to have another baby. At eight months old, however, they discovered that their new daughter Tiara had Tuberous Sclerosis, a rare genetic disorder resulting in intractable epilepsy, developmental delay, chronic hospital admissions, and uncontrollable violent behaviors. So how did Tiffani cope with her new reality? She chose to fight. She challenged the doctors, battled the insurance companies, and refused to give up caring for Tiara even when her own life was at risk. The author’s story of unconditional love, unimaginable challenges, and, ultimately, triumph, is a compelling one, which will take hold of your heart and not let go. This memoir will, hopefully, inspire you to tackle fear, encourage you never to give up, and remind you always to trust your gut instincts.

    This chronicle of a beautiful, brutal journey speaks to anyone who yearns for deeper, truer relationships and a more abundant, authentic life.

    Abandoned by Ted Hughes, Sylvia found companionship and care in the home of Becker and her husband, who helped care for the estranged couple’s two small children while Sylvia tried to rest. In clear-eyed recollections unclouded by the intervening decades, Becker describes the events of Sylvia’s final days and suicide: her physical and emotional state, her grief over Hughes’s infidelity, her mysterious meeting with an unknown companion the night before her suicide, and the harsh aftermath of her funeral. Alongside this tragic conclusion is a beautifully rendered portrait of a friendship between two very different women.

    Teacher and musician. Marathoner and rock climber. At 66, Dierdre Wolownick became the oldest woman to climb El Capitan in Yosemite--and in The Sharp End of Life: A Mother's Story, she shares her intimate journey, revealing how her climbing achievement reflects a broader story of courage and persistence.Dierdre grew up under the watchful eyes of a domineering mother and realized early on that her parents' plans for her future weren't what she wanted for herself. Later, what seemed like a storybook romance brought escape, with new experiences and eye-opening travel, but she quickly discovered that her husband was not the happy-go-lucky man he had first appeared. Adapting as best she could, Dierdre juggled work and raising two young children, encouraging them to be fearlessly confident. She noted with delight how her "little lady" Stasia took it upon herself to look out for her baby brother, and watched in amazement as Alex started climbing practically before he could crawl.After years of struggle in her marriage and her ultimate divorce, Dierdre found inspiration in her now-adult children's passions, as well as new depths within herself. At Stasia's urging, she took up running at age 54 and soon completed several marathons. Then at age 58, Alex led her on her first rock climbs. A world of friendship and support suddenly opened up to her within the climbing "tribe," culminating in her record-setting ascent of El Cap with her son.From confused young wife and busy but lonely mother to confident middle-aged athlete, Dierdre brings the reader along as she finds new strength, happiness, and community in the outdoors--and a life of learning, acceptance, and spirit.

    Yet somehow, this normal boy became one of the youngest people on whom Dr. Walter Freeman performed his barbaric transorbital—or ice pick—lobotomy.Abandoned by his family within a year of the surgery, Howard spent his teen years in mental institutions, his twenties in jail, and his thirties in a bottle. It wasn’t until he was in his forties that Howard began to pull his life together. But even as he began to live the “normal” life he had been denied, Howard struggled with one question: Why?“October 8, 1960. I gather that Mrs. Dully is perpetually talking, admonishing, correcting, and getting worked up into a spasm, whereas her husband is impatient, explosive, rather brutal, won’t let the boy speak for himself, and calls him numbskull, dimwit, and other uncomplimentary names.”There were only three people who would know the truth: Freeman, the man who performed the procedure; Lou, his cold and demanding stepmother who brought Howard to the doctor’s attention; and his father, Rodney. Of the three, only Rodney, the man who hadn’t intervened on his son’s behalf, was still living. Time was running out. Stable and happy for the first time in decades, Howard began to search for answers. “December 3, 1960. Mr. and Mrs. Dully have apparently decided to have Howard operated on. I suggested [they] not tell Howard anything about it.”Through his research, Howard met other lobotomy patients and their families, talked with one of Freeman’s sons about his father’s controversial life’s work, and confronted Rodney about his complicity. And, in the archive where the doctor’s files are stored, he finally came face to face with the truth.Revealing what happened to a child no one—not his father, not the medical community, not the state—was willing to protect, My Lobotomy exposes a shameful chapter in the history of the treatment of mental illness. Yet, ultimately, this is a powerful and moving chronicle of the life of one man. Without reticence, Howard Dully shares the story of a painfully dysfunctional childhood, a misspent youth, his struggle to claim the life that was taken from him, and his redemption.

    I want a baby but not in that crazy, desperate way where I cringe whenever I see someone else with one, or I think nasty, evil thoughts about people who are pregnant, but a child of my own would complete my life and make my husband extremely happy.Jay-Jay Feeney has been married to Dom Harvey since 2004. She always imagined they'd get married, have children, grow old. But so far, things haven't worked out quite as she expected. A high-profile job, an unpredictable family life, and medical procedures and emergencies have kept her on her toes. Here is Jay-Jay's story, told with a mix of brutal honesty and humor, in which she charts the highs and lows of life lived both in the public gaze and in the shadow of infertility.

    "I am a woman. I am a fisherman. . . I am not a fisherwoman, fisherlady, or fishergirl. If anything else, I am a thirty-seven-year-old tomboy. It's a word I have never outgrown." Greenlaw also happens to be one of the most successful fishermen in the Grand Banks commercial fleet, though until the publication of Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm, "nobody cared." Greenlaw's boat, the Hannah Boden, was the sister ship to the doomed Andrea Gail, which disappeared in the mother of all storms in 1991 and became the focus of Junger's book.The Hungry Ocean, Greenlaw's account of a monthlong swordfishing trip over 1,000 nautical miles out to sea, tells the story of what happens when things go right -- proving, in the process, that every successful voyage is a study in narrowly averted disaster. There is the weather, the constant danger of mechanical failure, the perils of controlling five sleep-, women-, and booze-deprived young fishermen in close quarters, not to mention the threat of a bad fishing run: "If we don't catch fish, we don't get paid, period. In short, there is no labor union." Greenlaw's straightforward, uncluttered prose underscores the qualities that make her a good captain, regardless of gender: fairness, physical and mental endurance, obsessive attention to detail. But, ultimately, Greenlaw proves that the love of fishing -- in all of its grueling, isolating, suspenseful glory -- is a matter of the heart and blood, not the mind. "I knew that the ocean had stories to tell me, all I needed to do was listen." -- Svenja Soldovieri

    The only difference between Ann and every other eighteen-year-old in the United States was that she was the editor of Tiger Beat, the hottest teen magazine in the country. Ann traveled the world, interviewing the Monkees, Paul Revere and The Raiders, David Cassidy, Bobby Sherman, the Bee Gees and the Osmonds. She schmoozed with the rich and famous in Hollywood, Hawaii and London, visited Elvis on the set of one of his movies, and joined the hottest rock stars in the recording studio. As a correspondent for the London-based New Musical Express, Ann covered America’s “British Invasion” from these shores. She jetted to San Francisco with Jefferson Airplane, and photographed the Rolling Stones and the Who. She made dinner for Harry Nilsson, rode in Bobby Sherman’s Rolls Royce, and had her heart broken by a superstar—a story she’s kept to herself until now. In Meow! My Groovy Life with Tiger Beat’s Teen Idols, Ann Moses is breaking her silence—about that heartbreaking rock-star romance, as well as what it was like to spend every day with the stars we all loved as kids, besides. She’ll squeal on Bobby Sherman (was he really that nice?), David Cassidy (was he really that snotty?), and the Monkees (which of them was a big meanie?). She’ll tell you everything she couldn’t tell you in the pages of Tiger Beat, back when it was her job to fuel your fantasy about your fave raves.

    Although it features a clan in which dysfunction was something of a family tradition, Dreaming is no victim's story. With a wry humor and not a trace of self-pity, See writes of fights and breakups and hard times, but also of celebration and optimism in the face of adversity. The story of See's family speaks for the countless people who reached for the shining American vision, found it eluded their grasp, and then tried to make what they had glitter as best they could.

    

    Now, more than thirty years later, he tells the story of how his own government failed him...For give hellish years, American soldier Frank Anton was held as a POW in Vietnam. Subject to disease, starvation, and physical and psychological torture, Anton and his fellow prisoners held out hope that the U.S. government would find and rescue them.When he was finally freed in 1973, Anton returned to the United States bruised and battered. And the most devastating blow of all had yet to even be struck. Upon his release, Anton and debriefed by the government and saw both aerial photographs of the prison camps where he was held and a close-us picture of himself walking the grueling Ho Chi Minh Trail. The government had known all along where and when Anton and his fellow soldiers were being held--and made no attempt to rescue them.now, in this harrowing first-person account and shocking expose, Frank Anton recounts his years as a POW and the aftermath--devoting his life to understanding why and how his own government left him and others to suffer and possibly die in the Vietnamese prison camps. And the answers he's uncovered will forever astound and disturb you.With eight pages of dramatic photosA main selection of the Military Book Club

    Finally allowing herself to be vulnerable enough to open up to others, she learned that it’s worth risking possible rejection for a chance at genuine relationships.Ultimately, it was Amy’s faith, as well as the support and encouragement of her community of loving family and good friends, that saw her through the dark times and allowed her to realize her greatest dreams and beyond. Amy’s memoir is an inspiring and at times heart-wrenching account of resilience and the strength of the human spirit to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

    Voted by her peers as one of the best lawyers in America, and described by Time as "one of the nation's most effective advocates of family rights and feminist causes," Allred has devoted her career to fighting for civil rights across boundaries of gender, race, age, sexual orientation, and social class. She has taken on countless institutions to promote equality, including the Boy Scouts, the Friars Club, and the United States Senate, often drawing from her creativity and wit to achieve results. And as the attorney for numerous high-profile clients -- she has represented Nicole Brown Simpson's family, actress Hunter Tylo, and Amber Frey, Scott Peterson's girlfriend -- Allred has helped victims assert and protect their rights. Throughout her extraordinary memoir, in such chapters as "To Conquer, You Must First Conquer Yourself" and "Don't Be Victimized Twice," Allred offers colorful -- sometimes shocking -- examples of self-empowerment from her personal and professional life. Presenting nearly fifty of her most memorable cases, she takes us deep inside the justice system to show how it's possible to win, even in the face of staggering odds. Allred opens our eyes not only to the significant positive strides we've made in recent decades, but more important, to how much further we still have to go to empower all members of society -- especially women, minorities, and others who are deprived of their rights. "Fight Back and Win" is a powerful testament to Gloria Allred's trailblazing career and the battles she has fought alongside countless brave individuals to win justice for us all.