Mass consumption is a defining feature of modern American culture. During the 20th century, mass production, discretionary income, and modern advertising combined to create and fulfill demand for more products than ever before. From butchers and bakers to big-box retailers, the story of the buying and selling of goods tells the history of our cities from a unique perspective. The Good Life approaches Sacramento's history from the bottom up, with a look at the city's past from the perspective of ordinary citizens. From the gold rush to the dot-com bubble and beyond, it tells the story of changing times, changing styles, and changing fortunes, and their effects on the lives of the people of Sacramento.
In 1921, a chance encounter with a radio receiver sent Sacramento Bee newspaperman Carlos McClatchy on a determined path to break into broadcasting. Ushered by the enterprising McClatchy family, the Bee became the first Pacific Coast newspaper to enter the radio business. For decades, broadcasting in Sacramento was shaped by the brilliant but fatally flawed Carlos McClatchy; his strong-willed, micromanaging father, C.K.; and his sister Eleanor McClatchy, who sacrificed her own aspirations for the sake of the family business. From a single five-watt station, the family built a large media company, established a radio network with William Randolph Hearst and helped shape media in the American West. Historian Annette Kassis tells the fascinating story of the pivotal McClatchy family and the path they charted through the "ether" above Sacramento.
In 1913, the merger of the Sacramento Motorcycle Club with the Capital City Wheelmen catapulted Sacramento into becoming one of the biggest motorcycle hubs in the state. Cycles roared into town from all corners of California to participate in championship races, hill climbs, endurance runs and field meets. Races teemed with motorcycles of every make and model, including Indian, Thor, Yale, Excelsior and Jefferson, piquing the interest of prominent merchants, city leaders and superior court judges. Discover the stories of a transcontinental motorcycle relay, a perilous ride through a blizzard to deliver film to network TV and the women who formed a trailblazing motorcycle club. Author Kimberly Reed Edwards brings to life the exciting early days of the "Greatest Sport in the World" in California's capital.
In 1874, David Lubin hung a provocative sign over a ten by twelve-foot space on the corner of Fourth and K Streets in Sacramento, California: "D. Lubin: One Price." Thus began the dry goods store that would evolve into Weinstock, Lubin, and Co., one of Sacramento's landmark businesses and eventually a regional giant. While many Sacramentans will remember Weinstock's spectacular Christmas displays, the signature children's milk bar and the gala openings of suburban stores at Country Club Plaza and Sunrise Mall, historian Annette Kassis goes beyond the storefront to uncover the philosophy that placed Weinstock's at the forefront of business innovation. More than a retail establishment, Weinstock's one-hundred-year legacy brought high fashion, progressive politics and the leading edge of modernization to California's Capital City.
Includes, beginning Sept. 15, 1954 (and on the 15th of each month, Sept.-May) a special section: School library journal, ISSN 0000-0035, (called Junior libraries, 1954-May 1961). Also issued separately.
A candid, compelling, and rollicking portrait of the pirate captain of Margaritaville—Jimmy Buffett. In Jimmy Buffett: A Good Life All the Way, acclaimed music critic Ryan White has crafted the first definitive account of Buffett’s rise from singing songs for beer to his emergence as a tropical icon and CEO behind the Margaritaville industrial complex, a vast network of merchandise, chain restaurants, resorts, and lifestyle products all inspired by his sunny but disillusioned hit “Margaritaville.” Filled with interviews from friends, musicians, Coral Reefer Band members past and present, and business partners who were there, this book is a top-down joyride with plenty of side trips and meanderings from Mobile and Pascagoula to New Orleans, Key West, down into the islands aboard the Euphoria and the Euphoria II, and into the studios and onto the stages where the foundation of Buffett’s reputation was laid. Buffett wasn’t always the pied piper of beaches, bars, and laid-back living. Born on the Gulf Coast, the son of a son of a sailing ship captain, Buffett scuffed around New Orleans in the late sixties, flunked out of Nashville (and a marriage) in 1971, and found refuge among the artists, dopers, shrimpers, and genuine characters who’d collected at the end of the road in Key West. And it was there, in those waning outlaw days at the last American exit, where Buffett, like Hemingway before him, found his voice and eventually brought to life the song that would launch Parrot Head nation. And just where is Margaritaville? It’s wherever it’s five o’clock; it’s wherever there’s a breeze and salt in the air; and it’s wherever Buffett sets his bare feet, smiles, and sings his songs.
