Whether traveling among the mountains or climbing, hiking, or skiing, have you ever wondered where the names of the peaks, rivers and lakes ever came from, or who named them and why? This book is an effort to do just that for a particular part of North America that rivals the European Alps in fame. Climbing and exploration in the Canadian Rockies and the interior ranges of British Columbia is relatively recent compared to that of Europe?s Alps whose golden age occurred in the early 1800s. ...

This is the story of one car — a 1911 Stevens-Duryea Model Y "Big Six" — and its famous owner, Percival Lowell, the American astronomer best known for his studies of Mars and mathematical prediction of the discovery of Pluto. The narrative follows the vehicle, a product of Frank Duryea — of the pioneering Duryea brothers — through its time with Lowell and through subsequent owners to its present status as a moving landmark of history. Important developments in the early history of the gaso...

An Impetuous College Undergraduate ... A Nation at War ... A New Unit Seeking "Experienced Mountaineers ... Men of Good Physique ... Who Have Lived and Worked in the Mountains ... "Three letters of recommendation later, in early 1943, William Lowell Putnam joined what was to become the 10th Mountain Division, the first and only mountain warfare unit of the U.S. Army.Green Cognac: The Education of a Mountain Fighter is a superb account of the mountain and ski troops...

"My objective in setting forth this series of mostly autobiographical vignettes was not to inspire a rash of juvenile delinquency but to have something on paper before the age of involuntary repetition set in. I don't feel I owe much to Sir Walter Scott for cribbing the subtitle; he surely cannot have been the first grandfather to assemble stories for the benefit of a few young people of his acquaintance. Nevertheless, it's a good one and I'm grateful. Having been blessed with better than ...

Arctic Superstars is a thoroughly researched account of the fascinating lives and harrowing journeys of Adolphus Washington Greely and George Wallace Melville, career military officers and Civil War heroes who explored vast reaches of the Arctic during the early 1880s. Greely was best known for commanding the ill-fated Lady Franklin Bay Expedition and Melville for exploring the bitter-cold reaches of Siberia. Both men were among the first five Honorary Members elected by The American Alpin...

Germany's merchant marine fleet — the second largest in the world prior to 1914 — played an unintended but decisive role in that nation's defeat in World War I.There were those ships that went to war for the Kaiser on the high seas, those that stayed at home or otherwise played no significant part, and those that were commandeered (mostly in 1917 and by the United States) and used against Germany.This is a well illustrated history, both practical and romantic, of the associ...

Fred Stott says in his preface to this book that "if you ever hiked or skied a White Mountain trail between 1922 and 1959 you may well have met Joe Dodge. Certainly you know his name. If you have been on a trail since 1959 the chances are good you have heard of him, very possibly a tale about him. Without question the best-known inhabitant of the White Mountains in this century was Joseph Brooks Dodge, Huts Manager of the Appalachian Mountain Club, Pinkham Notch, New Hampshire. He became a...

In 1733, John Paul Zenger began to print the New York Journal, the newspaper that was to change Zenger's life and the direction of journalism in colonial America. The material published in the Journal so incensed Sir William Cosby, the royal governor, that Zenger was arrested for seditious libel. Zenger's case was taken on by Andrew Hamilton, the foremost lawyer in the colonies, and after several months in prison the printer was found innocent. The case became a landmark of journalistic fr...

This entire literary endeavor to separate Biblical literalism from observable reality was prompted by the fact that one supposedly erudite scholar managed to propound on American National Public Radio (with a presumably straight face) the "fact" that the Colorado River's Grand Canyon, a notable feature of the high plateau of Northern Arizona, was formed in one brief but eventful period of runoff when all the waters accumulated on Earth by the Great Flood associated with the Biblical patria...

"There may be worse weather, from time to time, at some forbidding place on Planet Earth, but it has yet to be reliably recorded." So begins The Worst Weather on Earth: A History of the Mount Washington Observatory. Mount Washington, at 6,288 feet above sea level, is one of the highest elevations in the eastern United States and is subject to some of the fiercest weather patterns in the world. Situated close to major centers of population, it has been an accessible objective for t...

Writing almost twenty years after the death of Roger Putnam, William has achieved a sufficient perspective to note the flaws as well as the fine points of his subject. But the reader cannot miss the loving respect that permeates the entire text. Roger Putnam was the quintessential Yankee: strong in principle, slow to bend his opinions, sure of his ground and dedicated to hard work. This book is a son's tribute to his distinguished parent — A YANKEE IMAGE.

William Putnam's book chronicles the history of two important routes through the Alps, which are devoted to treasuring the history of Mont Cenis and the Great Saint Bernard passages. Both of these passes were prominently and frequently used by the Romans in establishing and maintaining their empire. It is surmised that Hannibal and his troops found elephant-friendly passages through the Mont Cenis corridor. Both passes were adorned with hospices/shelters near their crest and both now have ...