An engaging look at the rise and fall of cultural diversity in the colonial South and its role in shaping a distinct southern identityThe 18th-century South was a true melting pot, bringing together colonists from England, France, Germany, Ireland, Switzerland, and other locations, in addition to African slaves—all of whom shared in the experiences of adapting to a new environment and interacting with American Indians. The shared process of immigration, adaptation,...

A multicultural, multinational history of colonial America from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Internal Enemy and American RevolutionsIn the first volume in the Penguin History of the United States, edited by Eric Foner, Alan Taylor challenges the traditional story of colonial history by examining the many cultures that helped make America, from the native inhabitants from milennia past, through the decades of Western colonization and co...

The sleeper history hit of 2008, released in paperback to coincide with the heart of hurricane seasonOn September 2, 1775, the eighth deadliest Atlantic hurricane of all time landed on American shores. Over the next days, it would race up the East Coast, striking all of the important colonial capitols and killing more than four thousand people. In an era when hurricanes were viewed as omens from God, what this storm signified to the colonists about the justness of their ca...

In 'Pioneers of the Old South: A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings', Mary Johnston masterfully interweaves historical narrative with vivid storytelling to explore the English colonial experience in the Southern United States. Set against a backdrop of burgeoning settlements and complex interactions between European settlers and Native American tribes, Johnston's prose reflects a meticulous attention to detail and a deep understanding of historical contexts. The book captures the spi...

History retold for children, with lots of anecdotes. According to Wikipedia: "Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804 –1864) was an American novelist and short story writer... Much of Hawthorne's writing centers around New England and many feature moral allegories with a Puritan inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the Romantic movement and, more specifically, dark romanticism. His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity and his works often have moral messages and d...

The City of New York has always been a melting pot of ideas and politics, and has seen many different riots during its history. This guide concentrates on those that took place in the 18th and 19th Centuries, such as the Stamp-Act Riot, the Draft Riots and the Orange Riots.

In this fascinating social history of America’s first frontier, Charles Clark brings to life the people and settlements of Maine and New Hampshire before the Revolutionary War. He describes what life was like beyond the Merrimack from the early fishing camps on the coast to the settlement of mid-eighteenth-century wilderness towns in the interior.The sturdy, independent men who first settled the craggy islands and salt marsh harbors of northern New England were a very different bre...

Who doesnt love a good homicide? Murders, Mysteries and History pulls 150 years of forgotten crimes straight from the pages of yesterdays news and stirs them in a historical mix to produce a book like no other. Get the scoop on more than a hundred real-life murders and unsolved killings. Vics, suspects, perps. Judges and juries. Jails and penitentiaries. Hangings, electrocutions and nothing less than simply getting away with murder. Sometimes brutal, often haunting, always entertaining. Mu...

The New History in an Old Museum is an exploration of "historical truth" as presented at Colonial Williamsburg. More than a detailed history of a museum and tourist attraction, it examines the packaging of American history, and consumerism and the manufacturing of cultural beliefs. Through extensive fieldwork—including numerous site visits, interviews with employees and visitors, and archival research—Richard Handler and Eric Gable illustrate how corporate sensibility blends with ...

Unfortunately, one of the best known aspects of Alexander Hamiltons (1755-1804) life is the manner in which he died, being shot and killed in a famous duel with Aaron Burr in 1804. But Hamilton became one of the most instrumental Founding Fathers of the United States in that time, not only in helping draft and gain support for the U.S. Constitution but in also leading the Federalist party and building the institutions of the young federal government as Washingtons Secretary of Treasury. One ...

How did neighborhood groceries, parish halls, factories, and even saloons contribute more to urban vitality than did the fiscal might of postwar urban renewal? With a novelist’s eye for telling detail, Douglas Rae depicts the features that contributed most to city life in the early urbanist” decades of the twentieth century. Rae’s subject is New Haven, Connecticut, but the lessons he draws apply to many American cities.City: Urbanism and Its End beginswith a richly textur...

This book contains the substance of the lectures originally given at the Washington University, St. Louis, in May, 1887, in the course of my annual visit to that institution as University Professor of American History. The lectures were repeated in the following month of June at Portland, Oregon, and since then either the whole course, or one or more of the lectures, have been given in Boston, Newton, Milton, Chelsea, New Bedford, Lowell, Worcester, Springfield, and Pittsfield, Mass.; Farm...