The Ghost of the Donner Party
The Ghost of the Donner Party

Author: Caitlind L. Alexander

Publisher: Learning Island

Published: 2015-01-03

Total Pages: 15

ISBN-13:

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“Is there any decent place to stop between here and the mountains?” I asked the storekeeper. “You can pretty much camp anywhere along the way,” he said. “The Indians are pretty friendly here abouts.” “If you’re at all concerned about making it over the mountains, though, I suggest you stop at old lady Williams’ place at the base of the mountains.” “What’s so special about Old lady Williams’ place,” Charlie asked. “Well, don’t laugh at me for saying so, but that old lady can tell the future. Some say it’s in her bones. Some say she talks to spirits. Either way, she seems to know when it’s safe to cross the pass and when it isn’t. You’d do best to listen to her.” I smiled to myself. Living out in the middle of nowhere could really play with a man’s head. Imagine believing in ghosts! Find out what happens to this wagon train in this short, but creepy tale. Ages 9 and up. LearningIsland.com believes in the value of children practicing reading for 15 minutes every day. Our 15-Minute Books give children lots of fun, exciting choices to read, from classic stories, to mysteries, to books of knowledge. Open the world of reading to a child by having them read for 15 minutes a day.

Desperate Passage
Desperate Passage

Author: Ethan Rarick

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2008-02-04

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 0198041500

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In late October 1846, the last wagon train of that year's westward migration stopped overnight before resuming its arduous climb over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, unaware that a fearsome storm was gathering force. After months of grueling travel, the 81 men, women and children would be trapped for a brutal winter with little food and only primitive shelter. The conclusion is known: by spring of the next year, the Donner Party was synonymous with the most harrowing extremes of human survival. But until now, the full story of what happened, what it tells us about human nature and about America's westward expansion, remained shrouded in myth. Drawing on fresh archaeological evidence, recent research on topics ranging from survival rates to snowfall totals, and heartbreaking letters and diaries made public by descendants a century-and-a-half after the tragedy, Ethan Rarick offers an intimate portrait of the Donner party and their unimaginable ordeal: a mother who must divide her family, a little girl who shines with courage, a devoted wife who refuses to abandon her husband, a man who risks his life merely to keep his word. But Rarick resists both the gruesomely sensationalist accounts of the Donner party as well as later attempts to turn the survivors into archetypal pioneer heroes. "The Donner Party," Rarick writes, "is a story of hard decisions that were neither heroic nor villainous. Often, the emigrants displayed a more realistic and typically human mixture of generosity and selfishness, an alloy born of necessity." A fast-paced, heart-wrenching, clear-eyed narrative history, A Desperate Hope casts new light on one of America's most horrific encounters between the dream of a better life and the harsh realities such dreams so often must confront.

The Ghost of the Donner Party: A Scary 15-Minute Ghost Story for Brave Souls
The Ghost of the Donner Party: A Scary 15-Minute Ghost Story for Brave Souls

Author: Caitlind L. Alexander

Publisher: Learning Island

Published:

Total Pages: 43

ISBN-13:

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“Is there any decent place to stop between here and the mountains?” I asked the storekeeper. “You can pretty much camp anywhere along the way,” he said. “The Indians are pretty friendly here abouts.” “If you’re at all concerned about making it over the mountains, though, I suggest you stop at old lady Williams’ place at the base of the mountains.” “What’s so special about Old lady Williams’ place,” Charlie asked. “Well, don’t laugh at me for saying so, but that old lady can tell the future. Some say it’s in her bones. Some say she talks to spirits. Either way, she seems to know when it’s safe to cross the pass and when it isn’t. You’d do best to listen to her.” I smiled to myself. Living out in the middle of nowhere could really play with a man’s head. Imagine believing in ghosts! Find out what happens to this wagon train in this short, but creepy tale. Ages 9 and up. Educational Versions have exercises designed to meet Common Core standards. LearningIsland.com believes in the value of children practicing reading for 15 minutes every day. Our 15-Minute Books give children lots of fun, exciting choices to read, from classic stories, to mysteries, to books of knowledge. Open the world of reading to a child by having them read for 15 minutes a day.

The Expedition of the Donner Party and Its Tragic Fate
The Expedition of the Donner Party and Its Tragic Fate

Author: Eliza Poor Donner Houghton

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 1997-01-01

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 9780803273047

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George and Tamsen Donner and their children, among the very first to leave from Illinois, joined emigrants headed to California in the spring of 1846. Beyond Fort Bridger, Captain Donner led a large party through a much-advertised shortcut. Delays and difficulties caused them to be snowbound in the High Sierras, facing the grim specter of starvation and extreme suffering. Though only four years old at the time of the expedition, the captain’s youngest daughter, Eliza Donner, would never forget the excitement of crossing the prairies—or the horror of that winter. Details impressed on her young mind were later substantiated by the recollections of her older sisters and other survivors. Her book, originally published in 1911, is an intimate and authoritative account of the Donner disaster. George and Tamsen Donner and those who shared their fate are fully humanized in the telling. Eliza also relates what happened to her and a sister after being rescued and what it was like to grow up in a world that turned the Donners into a grisly legend.

The Hunger
The Hunger

Author: Alma Katsu

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2023-09-05

Total Pages: 417

ISBN-13: 0593544293

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"Supernatural suspense at its finest . . . It will scare the pants off you." —The New York Times Book Review Evil is invisible, and it is everywhere. That is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the wagon train known as the Donner Party. Depleted rations, bitter quarrels, and the mysterious death of a little boy have driven the isolated travelers to the brink of madness. Though they dream of what awaits them in the West, long-buried secrets begin to emerge, and dissent among them escalates to the point of murder and chaos. As members of the group begin to disappear, the survivors start to wonder if there really is something disturbing, and hungry, waiting for them in the mountains...and whether the evil that has unfolded around them may have in fact been growing within them all along.

Donner Party Cookbook
Donner Party Cookbook

Author: Terry del Bene

Publisher: Horse Creek Pub

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 136

ISBN-13: 9780972221733

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The tale of the 1846-1847 Donner Party whose members were snowbound in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Anthropologist, Terry Del Bene uncovers the layers of social and cultural belief and action that resulted in the tragedy. To lighten the mood, the author also includes 19th century recipes that the travelers cooked on the trail--before the food ran out.

Haunted Southern California
Haunted Southern California

Author: Charles A. Stansfield

Publisher: Stackpole Books

Published: 2009-01-21

Total Pages: 130

ISBN-13: 081174079X

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Is there a shadow over this sunny land of healthful vigor and natural abundance? This region includes the Central Coast, the San Joaquin Valley, and metropolitan Los Angeles and San Diego, where readers will encounter the spirits of gold prospectors, cowboys, Spanish padres, and movie stars, as well as the phantom camels of Fort Tejon, the shape-shifting witch of Tulare, underwater UFOs, ghosts aboard the Queen Mary, and the tragic specter of Marilyn Monroe.

The Ghost Hunter's Field Guide
The Ghost Hunter's Field Guide

Author: Rich Newman

Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide

Published: 2014-05-08

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 0738728306

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The Ghost Hunter's Field Guide features over 1,000 haunted places around the country in all fifty states that you can investigate yourself. Experience ghostly activity at battlefields, theaters, saloons, hotels, museums, resorts, parks, and other spooky sites—all of which are completely safe and accessible. From Alabama to Wyoming, you'll find out where to go to glimpse the unquiet spirits of Civil War soldiers, plantation slaves, criminals, and other entities. This alphabetized reference guide features over 100 photos and, for each location, includes the fascinating tales behind the haunting. Flip to your state to see what kind of paranormal phenomena commonly occur at each site: apparitions, shadow shapes, phantom sounds and scents, residual hauntings, psychokinetic activity, and more. Ford's Theatre The Whaley House Museum The Lizzie Borden Bed and Breakfast Alcatraz Island The Queen Mary The Bell Witch Cave

History of the Donner Party
History of the Donner Party

Author: Charles F. McGlashan

Publisher: Courier Corporation

Published: 2013-02-01

Total Pages: 208

ISBN-13: 048647903X

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In 1846, a band of California-bound pioneers took a fatefulshortcut that left them stranded in the frigid Sierras— horrifyingly, some resorted to cannibalism to survive.Newspaperman Charles F. McGlashan, who interviewed survivorsand studied the party members’ journals, declaredtheir story “more thrilling than romance, more terrible thanfiction.” His gripping account reveals not only a stark tale ofdesperation but also many inspiring acts of heroism.Reprint of the A. L. Bancroft, San Francisco, 1880 edition.

Donner Dinner Party (Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales #3)
Donner Dinner Party (Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales #3)

Author: Nathan Hale

Publisher: Abrams

Published: 2013-08-06

Total Pages: 136

ISBN-13: 1613125240

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In author-illustrator Nathan Hale’s Donner Dinner Party, discover the shocking and true story of the ill-fated expedition in this Hazardous Tale from the New York Times bestselling graphic novel series. “These books are, quite simply, brilliant. . . . Thrilling, bloody, action-packed stories from American history.” —New York Times In the spring of 1846, a group of families left Illinois and began the long journey toward a new life in California. To save time, they took an ill-advised shortcut—with disastrous consequences. Their story would not take them to California but into history. Bad weather, bad choices, and just plain bad luck forced the pioneers to spend a long, cold winter in the mountains, slowly starving. What they did to stay alive and the lengths that others went to in order to rescue them make this one of the most tragic and infamous stories of the American frontier. Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales take young readers into American history with graphic novels that bring the dangerous, bloody, exciting history of America to life. The Revolutionary War and the Civil War, World War I and World War II, the Donner Party, the Marquis de Lafayette, Harriet Tubman, the Alamo, and more all come to life in a way that will excite young readers of history. Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales! Read them all—if you dare! One Dead Spy: A Revolutionary War Tale (#1) Big Bad Ironclad!: A Civil War Tale (#2) Donner Dinner Party: A Pioneer Tale (#3) Treaties, Trenches, Mud, and Blood: A World War I Tale (#4) The Underground Abductor: An Abolitionist Tale about Harriet Tubman (#5) Alamo All-Stars: A Texas Tale (#6) Raid of No Return: A World War II Tale of the Doolittle Raid (#7) Lafayette!: A Revolutionary War Tale (#8) Major Impossible: A Grand Canyon Tale (#9) Blades of Freedom: A Tale of Haiti, Napoleon, and the Louisiana Purchase (#10) Cold War Correspondent: A Korean War Tale (#11) Above the Trenches: A WWI Flying Ace Tale (#12)