Westward Bound debunks the myth of Canada’s peaceful West and the masculine conceptions of law and violence upon which it rests by shifting the focus from Mounties and whisky traders to criminal cases involving women between 1886 and 1940. Erickson’s analysis of these cases shows that, rather than a desire to protect, official responses to the most intimate or violent acts betrayed an impulse to shore up the liberal order by maintaining boundaries between men and women, Native people and newcomers, and capital and labour. Victims and accused could only hope to harness entrenched ideas about masculinity, femininity, race, and class in their favour. This fascinating exploration of hegemony and resistance in key contact zones draws prairie Canada into larger debates about law, colonialism, and nation building.
A study of the migration patterns that characterized the colony and (later) state of Virginia over the three century history following its European founding. Dividing the topic into three patterns--migration to, within, and from Virginia--Fischer (history, Brandeis U) and Kelly (Virginia Historical Society) study the reasons behind the migrations of various populations, paying special attention to African Americans, and explore the cultural legacy of the migrations. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
To trace the course of the Yankee from Gloucester harbor around the world is to re-draft in no small degree a map of strange and remote parts of the globe. Among her ports of call was Floreana in the Galapagos, then the home of the tragic Baroness and her companions. Then 3000 miles of open sea brought the Yankee to tiny Pitcairn, famous from the saga of the Bounty. And in succession Tahiti, Cook Islands, the Fiji and Solomon Islands, the New Hebrides, North Borneo, and the China Sea. Followed the far East, Siam, Singapore, the East Indies and South Africa, around the Cape of Good Hope, and finally, after eighteen months across the Atlantic to reach again her home port in Gloucester.On this voyage Captain Johnson and his interesting ship's company made many inland explorations among strange lands and native peoples. New islands were charted and places visited hitherto unknown to white men's experiences. Their discovery of one of the highest waterfalls in the world, which they promptly named "Yankee Falls," is an unusual tale among modern seafaring chronicles. They day by day story of the Yankee's voyage and the uncommon experiences of her people is written in the good deep sea tradition--a simple terse style and great economy of expression. All in all the reader will find here a grand tale of the sea.
An expanded edition of one of the most original and provocative works of American history of the last decade, which documents the pioneering experiences and grit of American frontier women.
Growing up motherless with an outlaw father made Ginger Freeman hard and unforgiving—and for the past seven years she's been driven by a single goal: to make Grant Kelley pay for letting her brother die. Now that she's tracked the hated doctor to a westward-bound wagon train, her mission of vengeance is nearly completed. But the sense of family and community that suddenly surrounds her is unlike anything Ginger has ever experienced. And under the nurturing eye of Miss Sadie, the outlaw's daughter begins to lose her rough edges. Here, in the company of loving, newfound friends, Ginger feels herself becoming part of something much bigger than revenge. But catastrophe is in the wind when her pa and his gang arrive to infiltrate the wagon train. Will Ginger's new relationship with God tear her away from her family forever . . . and cost her everything she's now begun to hold dear?
The United States grew rapidly from the time of the Louisiana Purchase to the building of the Transcontinental Railroad. All of this expansion came at the expense of Native American populations that had either lived in the region for centuries or been forced there from ancestral homes in the East. Tribes memorably fought on their own and together in an doomed effort to retain the land and a lifestyle that had long sustained their families. This book outlines some of the major conflicts of the Westward Expansion, and of the treaties and were signed, and often broken, by representatives of the tribes and the government of the United States.
“Well written, moving . . . stimulating,” this account of racially unified abolitionism “could provide the occasion for a constructive national conversation” (New York Times). The civil war brought to a climax the country's bitter division. But the beginnings of slavery's denouement can be traced to a courageous band of ordinary Americans, black and white, slave and free, who joined forces to create what would come to be known as the Underground Railroad, a movement that occupies a romantic a place in the nation's imagination. The true story of the Underground Railroad is much more morally complex and politically divisive than even the myths suggest. Against a backdrop of the country's westward expansion arose a fierce clash of values that was nothing less than a war for the country's soul. Not since the American Revolution had the country engaged in an act of such vast and profound civil disobedience that not only challenged prevailing mores but also subverted federal law. Bound for Canaan tells the stories of men and women who risked their lives to build the Underground Railroad. Interweaving thrilling personal stories with the politics of slavery and abolition, Bound for Canaan shows how the Underground Railroad gave birth to this country's first racially integrated, religiously inspired movement for social change. “Utterly compelling.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “[An] engrossing account.” —The New Yorker “Blending historical imagination with a novelist's sense of character, Bordewich...brings to life . . . Americans who defied popular opinion and the authority of the federal government to combat . . . a fundamental moral evil.” —Washington Post “Excellent . . . as close to a definitive history as we’re likely to see.” —Wall Street Journal “A profoundly American tale.” —USA Today
