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Between 1850 and 1900, over one million Swedes left their homeland for America in an epic wave of humanity. One of the emigrants was a young Swedish farm servant no longer content to exist in the harsh realities of his native country. Determined to fulfill his dream for a different life, Franz Albert Anderson left for America in the spring of 1880, and it was not long before other family members followed. In a compilation of letters discovered in a trunk in a North Dakota farmhouse and later translated by a direct descendent of the Anderson family vividly describes the compelling reasons they left Sweden for the unknown frontiers of America without knowing the language, customs, or practices. While following their dream for freedom, they had few illusions about the hardships they would face. This treasure trove of correspondence documents the emigrants resolve to own and work their own land, an impossible prospect in Sweden at that time. As their fascinating story unfolds, the Anderson family reveals how they followed the dream initiated by a young Swede’s vision of a better life to ultimately achieve great success in a new land.
In this unusual blend of chronological and personal history, Dorothy Hubbard Schwieder combines scholarly sources with family memories to create a loving and informed history of Presho, South Dakota, and her family's life there from the time of settlement in 1905 to the mid 1950s. Schwieder tells the story of this small town in the West River country, with its harsh and unpredictable physical environment, through the activities of her father, Walter Hubbard, and his family of ten children. Walter Hubbard’s experiences as a business owner and town builder and his attitudes toward work, education, and family both reflected and shaped the lives of Presho's inhabitants and the town itself. While most histories of the Plains focus on farm life, Schwieder writes entirely about small-town society. She uses newspaper accounts, state and county histories, census data, interviews with residents, and the childhood memories of herself and her nine siblings to create an entwined, first-hand social and economic portrait of life on main street from the perspective of its citizens.
The Thomas Ward is like a small stream in the mountains, that emerges from a tiny spring and trickles on down the hillside to join the creek on its way to the river. No attempt has been made to get all the information, about all the people who live, or have lived, within its boundaries. Neither is the material collected, considered to be the most important or free from errors. This book is just "a cup of water" dipped from the little stream, as it journeys on its way, no attempt is made to dip up all the water or stop its flow. It is hoped, that like the cup of cool water from the tiny stream, this book will refresh the reader, and the stream of time flows on. To those pioneers, both young and old who had the courage to combine all the natural resources which the creator so wisely stored in these mountains, rivers and valleys along with the brawn and brain that He gave man. The Miracle of the Desert came to be.
Sparkle is an epic tale linspired by the story of The Supremes. It's 1968 Detroit and a time when the entertainment world is thoroughly mesmerized by the Motown sound. In the midst of that musical and entrepreneurial phenomenon three beautiful sisters -- the daughters of a former R&B singer-turned-Bible thumper -- leave the bosom of the church and, against the strenuous objection of their mother, dive headfirst into the tough, unforgiving world of R&B. As Sister, Dolores and Sparkle submit to the Svengali-like styling of their manager and fight against the ruthless ambitions of a cast of characters bent on taking advantage of their fortune and fame, the close-knit family is torn apart by greed, ambition, broken loyalties, and the merciless glare of the spotlight. But one sister, Sparkle, may yet have what it takes to emerge as the brightest star of them all.
Time often stands still along the picturesque shores that dot one of North Carolina's favorite barrier islands. Islanders have always loved Topsail's quiet, small-town charm and seclusion.
What could induce a young pilot to walk out onto the wing of his burning aircraft at 13,000 feet? Why would a plucky young woman descend into the bowels of a sinking ship knowing that she would almost certainly die there? Why did a family remain on their farm, tending crops while suffering four long years of deadly artillery shelling? How did a former fishing trawler sink one of Hitler’s deadliest U-boats, and who were the two Australian nurses who protected wounded patients with their own bodies while experiencing a savage machine-gun attack? Why did a young naval apprentice keep rowing when his hands had been so badly burned, they were literally glued to his oar? And who were the two selfless ‘Dad’s Army’ soldiers who miraculously saved the lives of hundreds of their comrades even when it meant sacrificing their own? These and many other fascinating questions are answered in one of the most remarkable books of gallantry, fortitude and selfsacrifice you will ever read. Quiet Courage: Forgotten Heroes of World War Two is a book about thoughtful, intelligent actions and above all, an enviable capacity for bravery.
An exploration of early modern accounts of sickness and disability—and what they tell us about our own approach to bodily difference In our age of biomedicine, society often treats sickness and disability as problems in need of solution. Phenomena of embodied difference, however, have not always been seen in terms of lack and loss. Where Paralytics Walk and the Blind See explores the case of early modern Catholic Canada under French rule and shows it to be a period rich with alternative understandings of infirmity, disease, and death. Counternarratives to our contemporary assumptions, these early modern stories invite us to creatively imagine ways of living meaningfully with embodied diffe...
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Selected from papers presented at the 2000 Citadel Conference on the South, this collection of essays casts additional light on the southern experience and illuminates some of the directions its formal study may take in the new century. Emory Thomas opens the collection with a meditation on the shortcomings of the historical literature on the Civil War era. Essays by James McMillin, Kirsten Wood, and Patrick Breen revise estimates about the volume of the African slave trade, reveal how white widows embraced paternalism, and explore new ramifications of the fear of slave insurrection. Essays by Christopher Phillips on the birth of southern identity and by Brian Dirck and Christopher Waldrep on the key role language played in waging and in resolving the Civil War round out the discussion of the Old South. Turning to the New South, the next groups of essays examine religion and race relations during the Jim Crow era. Paul Harvey, Joan Marie Johnson, James O. Farmer Jr., and William Glass show how the beliefs of various Protestant churches - Pentecostal, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, and Methodist - produced surprising episodes of racial interaction, gave rise to at least one vocal c