Book picks similar to
Selected Chaff: The Wartime Columns, 1941-1945 by Al McIntosh
history
non-fiction
world-war-ii
minnesota
American Commando: Evans Carlson, His WWII Marine Raiders, and America's First Special Forces Mission
John F. Wukovits - 2009
Lieutenant Colonel Evans Carlson was considered a maverick by many of his comrades-and seen as a traitor by some. He spent years observing guerrilla tactics all over the world, and knew that those tactics could be adapted effectively by the Marines. Carlson and an elite fighting force-the 2nd Raider Battalion-embarked upon a thirty-day mission behind enemy lines where they disrupted Japanese supplies, inflicted a string of defeats on the enemy in open combat, and gathered invaluable intelligence on Japanese operations on Guadalcanal. And in the process they helped lay the foundation for Special Forces in the modern military. Here for the first time is a riveting account of one man, one battalion, and one mission that would resonate through the annals of military history.
Amelia Earhart: The Mystery Solved
Elgen M. Long - 1999
The authors offer evidence that the plane just simply ran out of fuel short of their Howland destination, and Earhart and Noonan were not captured by Japanese soldiers or islanders. The book covers the flying conditions under which Earhart flew - in an era before radar, with unreliable communications, grass landing strips and poorly mapped islands.
A State of Emergency
Richard Chambers - 2021
The electrifying behind-the-scenes account of a year that brought Ireland to the brink and back - the inside story of Ireland’s struggle to contain Covid-19.Based on a wealth of original research and over a hundred interviews with cabinet members, public health officials, frontline workers, and ordinary people on whom the crisis exacted a personal toll, A State of Emergency is the incendiary untold story of Ireland’s response to the biggest public health emergency of the past century.Ranging from the halls of Government Buildings, where conflict between the new Cabinet and its public health advisors threatened to derail the official response, to the frontlines of the containment effort itself, where doctors, nurses, and the communities they served found themselves pushed to breaking point, A State of Emergency is a landmark work of journalism and a riveting insider account of the struggle to bring Ireland back from the brink.
We, The Romanovs
Alexander Mikhailovich - 2016
Sandro was a crucial witness to the collapse of his family. He was the cousin, brother-in-law and close friend of the last tsar, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. He was with Nicky when thousands of Russian peasants died at Khodynka Field during Nicky’s coronation; he was with Nicky in the lead-up to the disastrous Russo-Japanese War; he was with Nicky during the failed revolution of 1905-6; he was with Nicky when the Russian Duma was established in an attempt to ward off future revolutions; he was with Nicky as Russia moved determinedly toward a military showdown with Germany; he was with Nicky fighting the German army of the Eastern Front during the First World War; he was with Nicky when he abdicated in favour of his brother, Michael, who refused the throne. This is a riveting first-hand account of the final days of the Russian Empire and of what it was like to be a member of the Russian Imperial Family at that time. And to our great good fortune, while Sandro may have been no Stolypin, he was a keen observer and an excellent writer. Anyone intrigued by the last days of the Romanovs as the ruling family of Russia should read this book.
Josephine Baker's Last Dance
Sherry Jones - 2018
In this illuminating biographical novel, Sherry Jones brings to life Josephine's early years in servitude and poverty in America, her rise to fame as a showgirl in her famous banana skirt, her activism against discrimination, and her many loves and losses. From 1920s Paris to 1960s Washington, to her final, triumphant performance, one of the most extraordinary lives of the twentieth century comes to stunning life on the page. With intimate prose and comprehensive research, Sherry Jones brings this remarkable and compelling public figure into focus for the first time in a joyous celebration of a life lived in technicolor, a powerful woman who continues to inspire today.
Nuremberg: The Reckoning
William F. Buckley Jr. - 2002
He hears the stories of the infamous Nazi killers and war makers, who face prosecutors determined to bring them to justice, and encounters the towering figures of twentieth-century legal, political, and military history, among them Justice Robert Jackson, Albert Speer, Hermann Goering, and the dark, untried shadow of Adolf Hitler. As the trial unfolds, Sebastian must come to terms with his family legacy and national identity. With his renowned authority and audacity, William F. Buckley Jr. creates a riveting thriller, taking the reader through unforgettable scenes of treachery and vengeance, love and hatred, and the struggle for justice found in a hangman's noose.
Deadline Artists: America's Greatest Newspaper Columns
John P. Avlon - 2010
From the local and mundane-crime blotters, crop prices, and Sunday sermons-to the Federalist Papers and Watergate, the press has played an outsized role in our nation's culture and history. Newspapers in America have always been the crucible where our passions and debates are tried by the only judge this nation respects: public opinion. At a time of great transition in the news media, "Deadline Artists" celebrates the relevance of the newspaper column through the simple power of excellent writing. It is an inspiration for a new generation of writers--whether their medium is print or digital-looking to learn from the best of their predecessors. Contributors include: Jimmy Breslin, Mike Royko, Murray Kempton, Ernie Pyle, Peggy Noonan, Thomas L. Friedman, David Brooks, Mitch Albom, Dorothy Thompson, Ernest Hemingway, Benjamin Franklin, Fanny Fern, Richard Harding Davis, Grantland Rice, Will Rogers, Orson Welles, Langston Hughes, Woody Guthrie, Ambrose Bierce, Mark Twain, Theodore Roosevelt, H.L. Mencken, Ben Hecht, Westbrook Pegler, Heywood Broun, Damon Runyon, W. C. Heinz, Jimmy Cannon, Red Smith, Russell Baker, Art Buchwald, William F. Buckley, Hunter S. Thompson, Pete Dexter, Carl Hiaasen, Dave Barry, Leonard Pitts, Anna Quindlen, Thomas Boswell, Tony Kornheiser, Kathleen Parker, Maureen Dowd, Bob Herbert, Michael Kinsley, Cynthia Tucker, George Will, Jack Newfield, Mike Barnicle, Pete Hamill and Steve Lopez.
The Battle of the Bulge: A Graphic History of Allied Victory in the Ardennes, 1944-1945
Wayne Vansant - 2014
Thirty-one American divisions - fully one-third of the U.S. Army raised during World War II - saw action in this battle. This battle was truly a test: could this conscript army from a pacifistic democracy defeat the best remaining men and machines that Germany's totalitarian government could produce? In Battle of the Bulge, author and artist Wayne Vansant brings readers into the frozen foxholes, haunting forests, and devastated villages of the Ardennes during that freezing cold winter. With meticulous historical accuracy and hand-drawn visuals that can tell a story in ways words alone cannot, Vansant recounts the Bulge with insightful detail, replaying the thrusts and volleys of both the combined Allied and German forces during the tumultuous battle. This is a story of panic, fear, and physical misery; a story of how a generation of draftees, National Guardsmen, and a small core of regular officers and NCOs faced those three elements as snow piled around their foxholes and the incessant drumming of artillery splintered the woods that gave them shelter. It is the story of men, frozen and hurting, far from home and holding little hope of seeing it again until the killing finally ended. Above all, TheBattle of the Bulge is a story of incredible triumph, now beautifully illustrated in graphic novel format for the first time.
No Ordinary Time by Doris Kearns Goodwin
BookRags - 2011
It is also a psychohistory about Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt. Goodwin becomes a psychoanalyst, who delves into their childhood traumas, emotional lives, family relationships, and even their extra-marital affairs, to create an understanding of them as human beings.This study guide includes the following sections: Plot Summary, Chapter Summaries & Analysis, Characters, Objects/Places, Themes, Style, Quotes, and Topics for Discussion.
FDR's Splendid Deception: The Moving Story of Roosevelt's Massive Disability - and the Intense Efforts to Conceal It from the Public
Hugh Gregory Gallagher - 1985
It is an intensely personal view of FDR. It traces his developments from the early years, his battle with polio, his fight for rehabilitation, his paralysis and his need to hide it, both in public and in private as well as the impact the paralysis and its cover-up had on his political career, his personality, and his relations with others. Now complete with a detailed account of the FDR Memorial and the struggle by disability advocates to have FDR depicted as he was in his wheelchair. Must reading for everyone interested in presidential history, disability history, and modern American history. A book not to be missed.
Employee of The Month And Other Big Deals
Mary Jo Pehl - 2011
With biting wit, bracing satire, and boundless good cheer, Mary Jo-distinguished member of the First Family of Circle Pines, Minnesota; she'll explain-takes you on a poignant, hilarious journey through the world of keepin' on. Dispatched from her Midwestern home state, then New York, Texas, and exotic points beyond, these very personal stories and essays, with illustrations by Len Peralta, reveal a warm, smart, funny writer who can spot the absurdities in what she deals with every day, and make her readers LOL at them. There's nobody else like Mary Jo Pehl. But then, there's nobody else like you, either. Hey, you two should get together! Read this book, and you will, my friend: you will.
The Chisholm Trail: A History of the World's Greatest Cattle Trail
Sam P. Ridings - 2014
It ran for eight hundred miles, from San Antonio, Texas to Abilene, Kansas, and was instrumental in creating the famous image of the cowboy. But how was this trail created? Who devised its route? And why were the cattle drives across states so important for the economy of the southwest? Sam P. Riding’s fascinating book The Chisholm Trail: A History of the World's Greatest Cattle Trail gives an in-depth overview of the route was created, who rode along it and how it eventually superseded by the emergence of the railways. Through the course of the book Ridings provides details on many of the famous figures who were associated with the trail including the route’s founder Jesse Chisholm, famous ranchers like Joseph G. McCoy and Charles Goodnight, gunslingers such as Billy the Kid, and of course men who attempted to keep the peace like Charles A. Siringo. Sam P. Ridings rode the trail many times throughout his life during the trail’s golden era and so was able to gather information from the cowboys who knew the route better than anyone else. This work is full of fascinating stories of incidents that occurred along the length of the trail, from gunfights to religious revivals, Native American raids to cattle stampedes, during the short but vibrant years that the trail was in full use. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the history of the southwest in the aftermath of the Civil War and how the image of the cowboy came into being. Sam P. Ridings was a frequent traveler on the Chisholm Trail and collected many of his stories from the men and women who had lived and worked on the trail during its golden years. His book The Chisholm Trail: A History of the World's Greatest Cattle Trail was first published in 1936. Ridings passed away in Kansas in 1942.
The Girl in building C
Mary Krugerud - 2018
She entered Ah-gwah-ching State Sanatorium at Walker, Minnesota, for what she thought would be a short stay. In January, her tuberculosis spread, and she nearly died. Her recovery required many months of bed rest and medical care.Marilyn loved to write, and the story of her three-year residency at the sanatorium is preserved in hundreds of letters that she mailed back home to her parents, who could visit her only occasionally and whom she missed terribly. The letters functioned as a diary in which Marilyn articulately and candidly recorded her reactions to roommates, medical treatments, Native American nurses, and boredom. She also offers readers the singular perspective of a bed-bound teenager, gossiping about boys, requesting pretty new pajamas, and enjoying Friday evening popcorn parties with other patients.Selections from this cache of letters are woven into an informative narrative that explores the practices and culture of a midcentury tuberculosis sanatorium and fills in long-forgotten details gleaned from recent conversations with Marilyn, who "graduated" from the sanatorium and went on to lead a full, productive life.
Ferdinand and Isabella
Malveena McKendrick - 2015
But the historic landfall of October 1492 was only a secondary event of the year. The preceding January, they had accepted the surrender of Muslim Granada, ending centuries of Islamic rule in their peninsula. And later that year, they had ordered the expulsion or forced baptism of Spain's Jewish minority, a cruel crusade undertaken in an excess of zeal for their Catholic faith. Europe, in the century of Ferdinand and Isabella, was also awakening to the glories of a new age, the Renaissance, and the Spain of the "Catholic Kings" - as Ferdinand and Isabella came to be known - was not untouched by this brilliant revival of learning. Here, from the noted historian Malveena McKendrick, is their remarkable story.
Those Who Hold Bastogne: The True Story of the Soldiers and Civilians Who Fought in the Biggest Battle of the Bulge
Peter Schrijvers - 2014
The plan nearly succeeded, and almost certainly would have, were it not for one small Belgian town and its tenacious American defenders who held back a tenfold larger German force while awaiting the arrival of General George Patton’s mighty Third Army. In this dramatic account of the 1944–45 winter of war in Bastogne, historian Peter Schrijvers offers the first full story of the German assault on the strategically located town. From the December stampede of American and Panzer divisions racing to reach Bastogne first, through the bloody eight-day siege from land and air, and through three more weeks of unrelenting fighting even after the siege was broken, events at Bastogne hastened the long-awaited end of WWII. Schrijvers draws on diaries, memoirs, and other fresh sources to illuminate the experiences not only of Bastogne’s 3,000 citizens and their American defenders, but also of German soldiers and commanders desperate for victory. The costs of war are here made real, uncovered in the stories of those who perished and those who emerged from battle to find the world forever changed.