Minneapolis roared into the 1920s as a major metropolis, but it lacked the kind of outdoor amusement facilities common elsewhere across the country. In 1925, Fred W. Pearce introduced the Twin Cities to his "Picnic Wonderland." Crowds eagerly poured onto the shores of Lake Minnetonka by the trolley load. Luckily, Excelsior Park survived the Great Depression and World War II on the strength of its celebrity acts. Changes in the forms of transportation, combined with innovations in the outdo...

It was a time of unregulated madness. And nowhere was it madder than in Chicago at the dawn of the Roaring Twenties. Enter a slick, smooth-talking, charismatic lawyer named Leo Koretz, who enticed hundreds of people to invest as much as $30 million—upward of $400 million today—in phantom timberland and nonexistent oil wells in Panama. This rip-roaring tale of greed, financial corruption, dirty politics, over-the-top and under-the-radar deceit, illicit sex, and a brilliant and wildly charmi...

Ken Morriss journey began one cold Pittsburgh morning in 1935. In the middle of the Great Depression, he was going to see the country as a door-to-door salesman. Detroit was to be his first and last stop. Life was hard and few people during this time of crisis knew how their future would evolve. After months of unemployment, Ken found a job at the Briggs Manufacturing Company, the toughest auto company in Detroit. Ken could not have known then he would eventually play a pioneering role in ...

**Winner of the Frederick Douglass Book PrizeWinner of the American Book AwardWinner of the Merle Curti Social History AwardWinner of the James A. Rawley PrizeWinner of the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Legacy Award (Nonfiction)Finalist for the John Hope Franklin PrizeFinalist for the Harriet Tubman PrizeFinalist for the Cundill History Prize**A New York Times Editor’s Choice selection**“If many...

The sand dunes stretched higher than many skyscrapers, with the remnants of an abandoned lumber industry at their feet. The sandy, overgrown land was nothing that Michigan City residents cared to develop, let alone visit. The area was largely forgotten until Mayor Martin Krueger decided that his town would have a park and bathing beach. In a few short years, the deserted area was transformed into a family amusement center on Lake Michigan�s southern shores. These beginnings helped shape th...

In the late 1960s, Indian families in Minneapolis and St. Paul were under siege. Clyde Bellecourt remembers, “We were losing our children during this time; juvenile courts were sweeping our children up, and they were fostering them out, and sometimes whole families were being broken up.” In 1972, motivated by prejudice in the child welfare system and hostility in the public schools, American Indian Movement (AIM) organizers and local Native parents came together to start their own communit...

Santa Claus, Indiana, acquired its famous name in 1856 and has been celebrating the spirit of Christmas ever since. Postmaster James Martin began answering children�s letters to Santa and his elves in 1914, a tradition that continues to this day and makes Santa Claus a favored destination for those seeking the holiday spirit. The town�s unique name prompted Robert Ripley to feature it in his popular cartoon strip, and businessmen such as Carl Barrett and Milton Harris raced to erect Christ...

Not many developers would build an amusement park next door to the successful LeSourdsville Lake amusement park, but Edgar Streifthau was a one-of-a-kind man in Butler County, Ohio. Streifthau, the original owner of LeSourdsville, was forced to sell his beloved park, but he still had the amusement-park bug, and in 1963 he built Fantasy Farm directly next to LeSourdsville. Fantasy Farm's audience was young children, and the concept was successful for decades. The two parks coexisted for 28 ...

Forest Park Highlands was once St. Louis�s largest and best-known amusement park. In its earliest years, the Highlands boasted a fine theater and one of the largest public swimming pools in the United States. After the 1904 world�s fair closed, several attractions found a new home at the Highlands; the large pagoda�a re-creation of the temple of Nekko, Japan�served as the park�s bandstand for several years. Roller coasters are the lifeline of every good amusement park, and the Highlands al...

To many rural Iowans, the stock market crash on New York’s Wall Street in October 1929 seemed an event far removed from their lives, even though the effects of the crash became all too real throughout the state. From 1929 to 1933, the enthusiastic faith that most Iowans had in Iowan President Herbert Hoover was transformed into bitter disappointment with the federal government. As a result, Iowans directly questioned their leadership at the state, county, and community levels with a renewe...

As July 7, 1861, dawned, war was in the air in Lexington, Indiana. The county seat of Scott County was abuzz with the latest news of the southern rebellion. The _Madison Daily and Evening Courier_ told of skirmishes between Federal troops and “secesh” forces at Harpers Ferry and Falling Waters, Virginia. Closer to home, word had come that William A. Sanderson had organized a new outfit, the Twenty-Third Indiana, and was recruiting throughout the Second Congressional District for men to joi...

Founded in 1802, Lebanon, Ohio, was once dubbed by noted author and broadcaster Charles Kurault as the most historic spot in the state. Home to Ohio�s oldest business, the iconic Golden Lamb, and the oldest weekly newspaper west of the Allegheny Mountains, the Western Star, Lebanon has sat quietly by the side of the road for over two centuries and waited while the world came to it. Located midway on the main stage route between Cincinnati and Dayton, Lebanon was a natural stopping point fo...