This book offers new insights into James Thurber, the man who has been called "America's Twentieth Century Mark Twain." The book places Thurber in the context of his early years in Ohio -- his highly dysfunctional family, his curious relatives -- his memory -- which evolved into his fictional world of "confusion, eccentricity and chaos." "The Man Who Was Walter Mitty" shows how his world was leavened by both humor and tragedy -- how his world was shaped by total blindness when he was at th...

Although Elvis Presley was never accused of a crime, FBI files about him show the theft of an executive jet he owned, which the FBI had to track down, death threats, blackmail threats and other matters the FBI had to handle confidentially. This book shows the dark side of American fame. 165 pages. Contains an Appendix of 36 facsimile pages of original FBI documents.

"The Man Who Was Dr. Seuss" is the first personal AND literary biography of Theodor Geisel, known world-wide for classic children's books such as "Green Eggs and Ham"; "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" and many others. It shows the morals that children instinctively understand from such simple story-telling; why parents are seldom seen in Dr. Seuss books, why the action in Dr. Seuss books always moves to the right and which character is a "trickster hero" -- This book is full of fabulous f...

John Howard Griffin was a Texan who traveled to France at 15, alone and was in France when World War Two began. He helped rescue French Jews and was hunted by the Gestapo before he was 2,. He came back to the U.S., joined the Army Air Force and was stationed in the South Pacific. He became blind during the war and returned to Texas. 10 years later his eyesight came back-- suddenly--no one knows why. Then he dyed his skin black and wrote the classic book "Black Like Me." Millions have read ...

Canadian Journalist Herbert Steinhouse met Oskar Schindler in1946; Schindler told Steinhouse his story. At first, Steinhouse didn't believe him,. but by 1949, Steinhouse had written an article "The Man Who Saved 1,000 LIves." That article pre-dates -- and validates --all subsequent Schindler research. An interview with Steinhoue and his original article open the book; there are sections about Schindler the man, the book "Schindler's List," the award-winning film and aspects of the Holocaus...

John Steinbeck published his epic novel "The Grapes of Wrath" in 1939--after observing the plight of he homeless and the dispossessed--the Okies-- "The Grapes of Wrath is now considered the seminal work of the Depression years. "Steinbeck's bitter fruit" is a two-part pat analysis--Steinbeck's work during the 1930s --the second half shows a how close we may still be to the poverty, hopelessness and black years of the 1930os. The "bitter fruit" in the title are the grapes in "The Grapes of ...

"at the dangerous edge of social justice" is a searing indictment of reprehensible - and often -- murderous racism in America -- from Huck Finn and Nigger Jim on the Mississippi, to the murder of Emmett Till in in Mississippi, in 1955, the murder of Medgar Evers in 1963, Malcolm X in 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968, James Byrd Jr., in Texas in 1998 and Trayvon Martin in 2012. Other chapters include pioneers who survived the Civil Rights years, such as Rosa Parks. This is stark, unvarn...

This book traces brutality, corruption and oppression in major police departments throughout the United States: from the Rodney King beating, caught on videotape in Los Angeles in 1991; corruption in the Albuquerque Police Department; a 62-police vehicle chase in Cleveland which resulted in the deaths of two unarmed suspects; the chokehold death of Eric Harris in Staten Island; the death of Michael Harris in Ferguson, Missouri, and police and civic corruption in Ferguson; the death of 12-y...

This is the complete formerly Top Secret record of the C.I.A. and the U-2 spy plane program. The U-2 was a spy plane that could fly at 70,000 feet, above the radar of any other country. To build such an aircraft was a daunting task. But on May 1, 1960 ,one U-2 was shot down over Russia; pilot Francis Gary Powers was put on a "show trial" in Moscow. The incident fractured U.S. - U.S.S.R. relations. 265 pages, plus Bibliography.

When John Steinbeck published "The Grapes of Wrath"in 1939- -- it generated a whirlwind of controversy . Some -- including J.Edgar Hoover and his FBI - -believed Steinbeck was a communist. The FBI files, many meaningless, cost Steinbeck a commission as an officer in the Army during World War Two. By the 1940s, John Steinbeck believed the FBI was following him --but he could not prove it --during his lifetime. FBI documents de-classified after Steinbeck's death, proved Steinbeck right--the ...

Children and adults alike remember Dr. Seuss's cat in the hat, the culinary delight to be found in green eggs and ham and the fate of the Grinch who stole Christmas. What few know is that Theodor Seuss Geisel's first book came to him while returning from Europe aboard an ocean liner; he found himself obsessed with the throbbing of the ship's engines and repeated the beat until the words of his first book "And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street" (1937) made it to the page. Throughout...

Nikita Khrushchev began correspondence with then-President John Kennedy in early 1960, as a way of improving USSR-USA relations. Eventually there were 120 letters between them, in this file, until Kennedy's assassination. They discussed: the Cuban Missile Crisis; the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; the divided Germany; the war in Laos and other major topics. This file was Top Secret until 2000 and published in book form in 2001. 575 pages. Ideal for analysis of the Kennedy years and the 1960s.