First dubbed San Benito and then �Spanishtown,� Half Moon Bay is a coastside town with a long and intriguing story. Many know it for its lovely natural surroundings, quaint downtown architecture, and relaxed atmosphere, but not many people know that this town was the first to be established in San Mateo County as a result of 1840s land grants to early Spanish settlers. Isolated on the coast for a time, it became home to Mexican, Chilean, Italian, Portuguese, and other cultures after the 18...

Pacifica and its coast, once envisioned as a string of resorts, casinos, and vacation cottages in place of artichoke fields, was overlooked after the failure of the Ocean Shore Railroad in 1920. Demand for reasonably priced housing revived the boom, and Pacifica was incorporated in 1957.

**"The best all-around study of the American cowboy ever written. Every page crackles with keen analysis and vivid prose about the Old West. A must-read!" —Douglas Brinkley, The New York Times–bestselling author of The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for AmericaThe open-range cattle era lasted barely a quarter century, but it left America irrevocably changed. Cattle Kingdom reveals how the West rose and fell, and how its leg...

John L. Kessell’s Spain in the Southwest presents a fast-paced, abundantly illustrated history of the Spanish colonies that became the states of New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and California. With an eye for human interest, Kessell tells the story of New Spain’s vast frontier--today’s American Southwest and Mexican North--which for two centuries served as a dynamic yet disjoined periphery of the Spanish empire.Chronicling the period of Hispanic activity from the time of Colum...

"A true story of the battle for paradise…men and women fighting for a slice of earth like no other." —New York Times Book ReviewFrederick and May Rindge, the unlikely couple whose love story propelled Malibu’s transformation from an untamed ranch in the middle of nowhere to a paradise seeded with movie stars, are at the heart of this story of American grit and determinism. He was a Harvard-trained confidant of presidents; she was a poor Midwestern farmer’s...

The 1859 "gold fever" emboldened many adventurous souls to head west to the mineral-rich regions of the Kansas and Nebraska territories. Their destination, commonly called "Pike's Peak," was the area known today as Colorado's Front Range. The prospector's dream was of an easy life of wealth and the never-ending happiness that gold could buy. As you read the chapters in Rush to the Rockies!, imagine yourself 150 years ago, provisioning for a long wagon trip across the plains, prodding your ...

Since World War II, Hollywood has fought and won that same war many times, won the West even more often�plus got the girl�and laughed like crazy, too. The postwar era in the dream factory was a prosperous time of expansion and wealth through the 1970s, decline in the 1980s, and rebirth in the new century. Vintage photographs from the rare collections of Hollywood Heritage and Bison Archives depict the municipal, business, residential, and entertainment industry growth in Hollywood proper, ...

Downwind is an unflinching tale of the atomic West that reveals the intentional disregard for the inhabitants and the environment in nuclear testing by the federal government and in uranium extraction by mining corporations during and after the Cold War.Sarah Alisabeth Fox interviews residents of the Great Basin region affected by environmental contamination from the uranium industry and nuclear testing fallout. Those residents tell tales of communities ravaged by cancer e...

This is not AI-generated content. The contents were written and verified by subject matter experts from Aviation Supplies & Academics, an 85-year-old aviation company. Look for the ASA wings to ensure you are purchasing a reliable publication.In March 1967, a Cessna 195 flew from Oregon towards San Francisco carrying a family of three: Alvin Oien, Sr. (the pilot), his wife Phyllis and step-daughter Carla Corbus. Due to worse-than-predicted weather, it went down in ...

In her first book, Blonde Indian, Ernestine Hayes powerfully recounted the story of returning to Juneau and to her Tlingit home after many years of wandering. The Tao of Raven takes up the next and, in some ways, less explored question: once the exile returns, then what?Using the story of Raven and the Box of Daylight (and relating it to Sun Tzu’s equally timeless Art of War) to deepen her narration and reflection, Hayes expresses an ongoing frustration and anger ...

Growing south from the plaza where the city of Los Angeles was founded as a tiny pueblo in 1781, the area now known as downtown L.A. was first developed in the late 1800s as a residential neighborhood, complete with churches and schools. As the population surged at the turn of the 20th century, the downtown area was transformed into a busy business and entertainment center of shops, banks, hotels, and theaters. The explosion of the postcard craze in the early 1900s coincided with this peri...

In April 1942, a little over two years before the Tenth Mountain Division officially obtained its name, the U.S. Army began the unprecedented construction of a training facility for its newly acquired ski and mountain troops. Located near Pando in Colorado's Sawatch Range, the site eventually known as Camp Hale sits at an elevation of 9,250 feet. Immense challenges in its creation and subsequent training included ongoing racial conflict, the high altitude and blustery winters. However, tha...