This cultural history reappraises how the abduction, criminal actions, and trial of Patty Hearst reflected a 1970s America in moral crisis and conflict.It was a story so bizarre it defied belief: in April 1974, twenty-year-old newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst robbed a San Francisco bank in the company of members of the Symbionese Liberation Army—who had kidnapped her a mere nine weeks earlier. But the robbery—and the spectacular 1976 trial that ended with Hearst's...

Through the first decade of the twentieth century, Americans looked upon industrial accidents with callous disregard; they were accepted as an unfortunate but necessary adjunct to industrial society. A series of mine disasters in December 1907 (including one in Monongah, West Virginia, which took a toll of 361 lives) shook the public, at least temporarily, out of its lethargy.In this award-winning study, author William Graebner traces the development of mine safety reform in the ye...

BEST TRAVEL GUIDEBOOK 2014 in eBOOK AWARDS. Seen the Coliseum and the Vatican? Tired of ancient history? Looking for a more authentic, more contemporary experience? Walk the new Rome, without the tourists. Rome with the Romans.Following the success of their alternative guidebook, Rome the Second Time, authors Dianne Bennett and William Graebner offer four new Rome walks, all outside the city's tourist core, all easily accessible by Metro or tram, and all in neighborhoods where Roman...

The bestselling book revealing why Americans are so fearful, and why we fear the wrong things-now updated for the age of TrumpIn the age of Trump, our society is defined by fear. Indeed, three out of four Americans say they feel more fearful today than they did only a couple decades ago. But are we living in exceptionally perilous times? In his bestselling book The Culture of Fear, sociologist Barry Glassner demonstrates that it is our perception of danger...

Communities throughout the United States were convulsed in the 1980s and early 1990s by accusations, often without a shred of serious evidence, that respectable men and women in their midstmany of them trusted preschool teacherssecretly gathered in far reaching conspiracies to rape and terrorize children. In this powerful book, Debbie Nathan and Mike Snedeker examine the forces fueling this blind panic.

Now featuring an updated introduction celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Stonewall"The landmark portrait of 20th-century New York viewed through the eyes of gay New Yorkers." — The New York ObserverA New York Times Notable Book of the Year and winner of a Lambda Literary Award, The Gay Metropolis is a landmark saga of struggle and triumph that was instantly recognized as the most authoritative and substa...

Forty years after Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, and Gay Talese launched the New Journalism movement, Robert S. Boynton sits down with nineteen practitioners of what he calls the New New Journalism to discuss their methods, writings and careers.The New New Journalists are first and foremost brilliant reporters who immerse themselves completely in their subjects. Jon Krakauer accompanies a mountaineering expedition to Everest. Ted Conover works for nearly a year as a prison...

"Rich and often moving . . . at times shocking, but often enlightening and inspiring: oral history at its most potent and rewarding." — Kirkus ReviewsA completely revised and updated edition of the classic volume of oral history interviews with high-profile leaders and little-known participants in the gay rights movement that cumulatively provides a powerful documentary look at the struggle for gay rights in America.From the Boy Sc...

A collection of The New Yorker's groundbreaking writing on race in America—including work by James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Hilton Als, Zadie Smith, and more—with a foreword by Jelani CobbThis anthology from the pages of the New Yorker provides a bold and complex portrait of Black life in America, told through stories of private triumphs and national tragedies, political vision and artistic inspiration. It reaches back a...

The authoritative true crime biography of a seemingly ordinary woman who nearly killed President Ford.President Gerald Ford suffered two attempts on his life during his term in office: one by Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme of the Manson Family, and the other by a far less likely candidate—an average middle-aged mother of five—Sara Jane Moore. After thirty years of communication with Moore in prison, journalist Geri Spieler provides a riveting account of her path from chil...

A brilliant, disturbing portrait of the dawn of the culture wars, when America started to tear itself apart with doubts, wild allegations, and an unfounded fear for the safety of children.During the 1980s in California, New Jersey, New York, Michigan, Massachusetts, Florida, Tennessee, Texas, Ohio, and elsewhere, day care workers were arrested, charged, tried, and convicted of committing horrible sexual crimes against the children they cared for. These crimes, soci...

"A superb analysis of American paranoia . . . a terrific, measured, objective study of one of American culture's most loaded topics." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)Jesse Walker's The United States of Paranoia presents a comprehensive history of conspiracy theories in American culture and politics, from the colonial era to the War on Terror.The fear of intrigue and subversion doesn't exist only on the fringes of society, but has always ...