Peoria harkens back to the 1670s glory days of the French voyageurs and became the now-familiar face of Americana--its townsfolk have touched every aspect of national and international life, often significantly. In comedy, Fibber McGee and Molly, Charles Correll, Richard Pryor, Sam Kinison, and even Bishop Sheen with his witty homilies have made Peoria the "Habitat of Humor." Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique jump-started the 1960s feminist movement, while Philip José Farmer's The Lovers rocked the 1950s sci-fi universe. Dr. C.T. Vivian, Dr. Romeo Garrett, and John Gwynn Jr. held the frontline against racism. Representing the best of society's core values, Barb and Dick Hammond founded Friends of the Children of Haiti, a medical organization tending to the year-round needs of the earth's poorest. And unheralded Bill Noel has shouldered the sorrows and burdens of others who have leaned on him for decades. When it comes to all the legendary locals, they play in Peoria . . . and the world.
The latest volume in Methuen's Collected Brecht includes two plays previously untranslated into English Volume 8 of Brecht's collected plays contains his last completed plays, from the eight years between his return from America to Europe after the war and his death in 1956. Brecht's ANTIGONE (1948) is a bold adaptation of Holderlin's classic German translation of Sophocles' play. A reflection on resistance and dictatorship in the aftermath of Nazism, it was a radical new experiment in epic theatre. THE DAYS OF THE COMMUNE (1949) is a semi-documentary account of the Paris Commune, and Brecht's most serious and ambitious historical play. TURANDOT is Brecht's version of the classic Chinese story is a satire on the intelligentsia of the Weimar Republic, Nazi bureaucracy, and other targets.
A compelling story of our ever-evolving relationship with the mountains and wilderness. Thirty years after its initial publication, this beloved classic is back in print. Superbly researched and written, Forest and Crag is the definitive history of our love affair with the mountains of the Northeastern United States, from the Catskills and the Adirondacks of New York to the Green Mountains of Vermont, the White Mountains of New Hampshire, and the mountains of Maine. Its all here in one comprehensive volume: the struggles of early pioneers in Americas first frontier wilderness; the first ascent of every major peak in the Northeast; the building of the trail networks, including the Appalachian Trail; the golden era of the summit resort hotels; and the unforeseen consequences of the backpacking boom of the 1970s and 80s. Laura and Guy Waterman spent a decade researching and writing Forest and Crag, and in it they draw together widely scattered sources. What emerges is a compelling story of our ever-evolving relationship with the mountains and wilderness, a story that will fascinate historians, outdoor enthusiasts, and armchair adventurers alike. Just like a good map is essential equipment for any backcountry adventure, Forest and Crag is an essential read for anyone who enjoys spending time in or is charged with the stewardship of the Northeasts trails and mountains. Michael DeBonis, Executive Director, Green Mountain Club Forest and Crag stands as the most important history of Northeastern mountain exploration. I marvel at the depth of the Watermans exhaustive research and the skill in which they synthesized it. Anyone who cares about and writes about mountains laps up these chapters regularly. I reach for this book all the time. The added photographs and prefaces make this new edition from SUNY even better. Christine Woodside, editor of Appalachia Journal and author of Libertarians on the Prairie: Laura Ingalls Wilder, Rose Wilder Lane, and the Making of the Little House Books No other volume weaves together across landscapes and time both the individual stories and broad themes of the history of hiking in the Northeast. It is not, however, its breadth and depth which makes Forest and Cragunique. Rather, it is the Watermans gift for storytelling which makes the reader feel that he or she has been invited to pull up a chair and listen, spellbound, to two masters of their craft. In sharing the stories of those who came to the mountains before, the Watermans invite all to join in preserving the future of these iconic landscapes. Julia Goren, Education Director and Summit Steward Coordinator, Adirondack Mountain Club PRAISE FOR FOREST AND CRAG This is a superb, monumental history. The Watermans are adept at the capsule profile, whether of peaks or persons. A gallery of characters unrolls, as diverse as those in a novel by Dickens. Paul Jamieson, former editor, The Adirondack Reader Written with grace, style, and good humor, seasoned with a refreshing sense of wonder, Forest and Crag reads more like a gripping novel than the serious research work it really is. Magnetic North In its quality, comprehensiveness, and regional orientation, Forest and Crag is unprecedented in American letters. It will become a classic in social, intellectual, and environmental history. Roderick Frazier Nash, author of Wilderness and the American Mind, Fifth Edition Forest and Crag presents an incredible gift for todays hikersthe opportunity to take a thoughtful and vigorous ramble into the past, and to explore the Northeastern mountains of yesteryear. What an adventureand what better way to contemplate how we shape the regions future? Peter Crane, Mount Washington Observatory Forest and Crag traces the Northeasts human and natural history by following the hiking experience from the early adventurers to the more recent development of an environmental ethic. The Watermans tell this story with clear respect and deep joy for the mountains that shaped the stories of the regions hikers and hiking clubs. Mary Margaret Sloan, Chief Operating Officer, Positive Tracks The Watermans true genius is their ability to string all the facts together in a narrative so lively that even the footnotes and endnotes are read as eagerly as one would devour dessert at the end of a good meal. Tony Goodwin, coeditor of High Peaks Trails, 14th Edition
This first-ever volume focusing on sports pulp fiction devoted to America's two most popular pastimes of the 1935-1957 era--baseball and football--provides extensive detail on authors, along with examination of key plots, themes, trends and categories. Commentary relates the works to real-life baseball and football of the period. The history of the genre is traced, beginning with the debut of Dime Sport (later renamed Dime Sports), the first magazine from a major publisher to provide competition for Street & Smith's long-established Sport Story Magazine. Complementing the text is a complete catalog of fiction from the six major publishers who competed with S&S, also noting the cover themes for 1,054 issues.
Since the 1920s, Daytona Beach has sold itself as "The World's Most Famous Beach," which, while not literally true, does suggest a city with a big personality and large plans. The people in these pages contributed to that personality and made those plans. These people include Matthias Day, the Ohio industrialist, educator, inventor, and newspaper editor who founded and gave his name to the new city in 1876; Mary McLeod Bethune, the daughter of former slaves, who founded the university that bears her name "with five little girls, a dollar and a half, and faith in God"; Bill France Sr., the race driver and promoter who took stock car racing from the beach sands to a state-of-the-art track and built a racing empire; and his son, Bill France Jr., who turned NASCAR into a national pastime. Other notable Daytonans include the builders, writers, artists, rockers, promoters, business founders, educators, journalists, politicians, pioneers, bootleggers, philanthropists, sports stars, and even a dog that made the city what it is today. They come to life in historical photographs from the Halifax Historical Museum, the Florida Archives, and files of the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
From the delectable Conchita Supervia (who made her debut at fourteen!) to the divine Maria Callas; from the gentle Elisabeth Schumann to the fiery Maria Jeritza (adored by the public, feared by several leading tenors and spat at by a fellow diva); from the giant Lauritz Melchior to the versatile Richard Tauber - More Legendary Voices mixes biography, anecdote, opinion, and penetrating analysis of each singer's strengths and weaknesses. Once more Nigel Douglas, the international tenor and well-known radio presenter, brings to this collection his professional knowledge of the world of opera, his infectious enthusiasm for the subject, and a natural gift for distilling the essence of a singer's life and career into one entertaining and instructive chapter.
World War I began disastrously for the English when the Germans routed them at Mons, Belgium, on August 23 and 24, 1914. On September 29, 1914, the Anglo-Welsh writer Arthur Machen fictionalized this encounter in a newspaper story, claiming that the English were saved by the appearance of angelic bowmen sent by St. George. But his fiction became accepted as fact. The believers--notables G. K. Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle and C. S. Lewis, along with almost forgotten figures like Harold Begbie, Phyllis Campbell and T. W. H. Crosland--wrote pamphlets, testimonies and poems, performed music and created motion pictures attesting to the existence of the guardian angels. This history of the Angels of Mons controversy for the first time collects and annotates Machen's work and the responses it inspired, most of which have not been available since their publication a century ago. Also reprinted for the first time are several of Machen's responses to the believers, including "The Angels of Mons: Absolutely My Last Word on the Subject" and "The Return of the Angels: This Time They Are at Ypres."
Nowhere in the annals of sport is there a family so gifted. In 1982 the seven Casey brothers were inducted into the Irish Sports Hall of Fame, the only family ever to receive that honour. The brothers, from Sneem in County Kerry, starred as Olympic-class oarsmen, Tug-O'-War champions, professional wrestlers and boxers and won fame throughout the sporting world. Steve, known as 'Crusher' Casey, became the supreme wrestler in the world and for a decade no one could match him. When he turned to boxing, the great Joe Louis refused to go into the ring with him. In 1983 at a family reunion in Sneem, five brothers, all in their seventies, climbed into the four-oar boat they used to win championships in the 1930s. Although they had not rowed together in fifty years, they still moved with natural unity and grace. Sports people from Kerry have achieved fame in many fields but the success of the Caseys surely outshines all.
The Second World War gave rise to a rich crop of legends, many of which persist in the public consciousness today. Some are well known, such as the escape of an undead Hitler to South America, Allied aircraft buzzed by 'Foo Fighters' and UFOs, German parachutists dressed as nuns, and a failed German invasion of Suffolk in 1940. Others are more subtle, such as the vaunted Dunkirk spirit, which portrayed the disaster of 1940 as a victory, and the conspiracy theories surrounding Rudolf Hess. Did he fly to Scotland to negotiate a peace treaty with members of the Royal Family? Was the aged prisoner who died in Spandau Prison a double? From tales of betrayal at Dieppe and Arnhem to Hitler's obsession with the occult and Nazi U-boat bases in Ireland, James Hayward offers a refreshing and intriguing perspective on the myths, legends and folk memories of the Second World War.
An unlucky gambler who haunts the Curtis House, the ethereal White Lady who wanders among the tombs of Union Cemetery and a ghostly diner who still insists upon joining the meal are among the otherworldly residents of Southwestern Connecticut. With a long and sometimes turbulent history, the region has become a host to lingering spirits who cannot leave behind the sites of their demise. Through spirit photography and firsthand accounts, Donna Kent, founder of the Cosmic Society of Paranormal Investigation, explores the most haunted locations from Stratford to Easton. These hair-raising tales are sure to intrigue seasoned enthusiasts and convert even the most skeptical reader into a believer.
