Search results for ""Louisiana""

Louisiana State Penitentiary is one of the largest and most brutal maximum-security prisons in the United States. Built on the grounds of a former plantation, the prison is commonly referred to as "Angola" apropos of the country of origin for many of the enslaved people who inhabited the land. Despite notoriously inhumane conditions within the prison, people incarcerated at Angola have sustained a rich and dynamic musical legacy since the late nineteenth century, attracting folklorists such as John and Alan Lomax and Harry Oster. Well-known musicians including Huddie William "Lead Belly" Ledbetter, Charles Neville, and James Booker played a part in this history, in addition to a litany of others who proved vital to the prison's musical culture but for various reasons were unable to establish their careers upon release. In Instrument of the State, author Benjamin J. Harbert interweaves oral history and archival research to show how incarcerated musicians find small but essential freedoms by performing jazz, R&B, country, gospel, rock, and fusion throughout the Twentieth Century. In doing so, he expands folkloric definitions of "prison music." considering the ways in which music manifests among the incarcerated and the prison's administration as a lens to better understand state power and the fragments of hope and joy that remain in its wake. Instrument of the State acts as an indictment of the carceral state, highlighting the many ways in which the US penal system disproportionately affects African American people through desperate profiteering of a deliberately underfunded state agency.

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An Open Access edition of this book will be made available on publication on our website and on the OAPEN Library, funded by the LUP Open Access Author Fund. The history of Louisiana from slavery until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 shows that unique influences within the state were responsible for a distinctive political and social culture. In New Orleans, the most populous city in the state, this was reflected in the conflict that arose on segregated streetcars that ran throughout the crescent city. This study chronologically surveys segregation on the streetcars from the antebellum period in which black stereotypes and justification for segregation were formed. It follows the political and social motivation for segregation through reconstruction to the integration of the streetcars and the white resistance in the 1950s while examining the changing political and social climate that evolved over the segregation era. It considers the shifting nature of white supremacy that took hold in New Orleans after the Civil War and how this came to be played out daily, in public, on the streetcars. The paternalistic nature of white supremacy is considered and how this was gradually replaced with an unassailable white supremacist atmosphere that often restricted the actions of whites, as well as blacks, and the effect that this had on urban transport. Streetcars became the 'theatres' for black resistance throughout the era and this survey considers the symbolic part they played in civil rights up to the present day.

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The distinctive feature of this Federal Courts casebook, and the main difference between it and other Federal Courts books, is its systematic focus on remedial issues, especially the problems that arise when a litigant tries to enforce federal constitutional or statutory rights against state or federal governments and officers in the federal courts. Departing from the traditional approach of Federal Courts books, we begin with a chapter on section 1983 litigation. The book stresses economy of means, clarity of presentation, and attention to the real-world Federal Courts issues that students need to understand and anticipate. This edition covers the major cases decided by the Supreme Court over the past four years. New main cases include Rucho v. Common Cause, Lexmark v. Static Control Components, and Spokeo v. Robins (all in chapter 4). In chapter 5, Lapides v. Board of Regents is now a main case. In the notes we discuss Ziglar v. Abbasi (chapters 1 and 2), Knick v. Township of Scott (chapters 1 and 2), Armstrong v. Exceptional Child Center (chapters 1 and 5), Lightfoot v. Cendant Mortgage Corp. (chapter 3), Virginia House of Delegates v. Bethune-Hill (chapter 4), Franchise Tax Board v. Hyatt (chapter 5), Davila v. Davis, Johnson v. Lee, Wilson v. Sellers, Shoop v. Hill, and Montgomery v. Louisiana (all in chapter 9), Wellness International Network v Sarif, Oil States Energy Services v. Greene's Energy Group, and Ortiz v. United States (all in chapter 10.)

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An astonishing novel of epic ambition, Vandal Love--winner of the prestigious Commonwealth Writers' Prize for best first book in 2007--follows generations of a unique French-Canadian family across North America and through the twentieth century. A family curse--a genetic trick resulting from centuries of hardship--causes the Herve children to be born either giants or runts. Book One follows the giants' line, exploring Jude Herve's career as a boxer in Georgia and Louisiana in the 1960s, his escape from that brutal life alone with his baby daughter Isa, and her eventual decision to enter into a strange, chaste marriage with a much older man. Book Two traces a different kind of life entirely, as the runts of the family discover that their power lies in a kind of unifying love. Francois seeks the identity of his missing father for years, while his own son, Harvey, flees from modern society into spiritual quests. But none of the Herves can abandon their longing for a place where they might find others like themselves. In assured and mystically powerful prose, Deni Y. Bechard tells a wide-ranging, spellbinding story of a family trying to create an identity in an unwelcoming landscape. Imbued throughout with a deep sensitivity to the physical world, Vandal Love is a breathtaking literary debut about the power of love to create and destroy--in our lives, and in our history.

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How did the ideology that inspired the American Revolution and the U.S. Constitution translate into foreign policy? John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton each struggled with this question as they encountered foreign powers. The French Revolution, the purchase of the Louisiana Territory, and the illegal seizures of U.S. ships and sailors on the high seas all brought diplomatic challenges. In the process of developing foreign policy, the founding generation refined the meaning of republicanism. In Keeping the Republic, Robert W. Smith identifies three contending brands of republicanism—classical, whig, and yeoman—that shaped the founders' thinking. Jefferson and Madison pursued a yeoman republicanism with its faith in economic sanctions rather than military might as a means of diplomacy. Nations dependent upon American agricultural exports, they thought, would bow to American interests. Both Adams and Hamilton, originally admirers of classical republicanism and its belief in public virtue, came to adopt a whig republicanism that applied the balance-of-power principle, exemplified by the three branches of the federal government, to the international community. In this view, nations should have equal naval power. Ideology had real consequences: Jefferson's insistence on imposing a trade embargo rather than considering alternative solutions resulted in the War of 1812. This process of translating ideology into foreign policy, so ably described in Keeping the Republic, continues to shape American international relations in the twenty-first century.

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In this original and provocative book, Colin Dayan tackles head-on the inexhaustible world, at once tender and fierce, of dogs and humans. We follow the tracks of dogs in the bayous of Louisiana, the streets of Istanbul, and the humane societies of the United States, and in the memories and myths of the humans who love them. Dayan reorients our ethical and political assumptions through a trans-species engagement that risks as much as it promises. She makes a powerful case for questioning what we think of as our deepest-held beliefs and, with dogs in the lead, unsettles the dubious promises of liberal humanism. Moving seamlessly between memoir, case law, and film, Dayan takes politics and animal studies in a new direction-one that gives us glimpses of how we can think beyond ourselves and with other beings. Her unconventional perspective raises hard questions and renews what it means for any animal or human to live in the twenty-first century. Nothing less than a challenge for us to confront violence and suffering even in the privileged precincts of modernity, this searing and lyrical book calls for another way to think the world. Theoretically sophisticated yet aimed at a broad readership, With Dogs at the Edge of Life illuminates how dogs-and their struggles-take us beyond sentimentality and into a form of thought that can make a difference to our lives.

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Known for its soaring towers that mark the skylines of the world's great cities, Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects is also a leading designer of performing arts centres, including critically acclaimed venues for opera, dance, plays, and concerts. The firm's award-winning work in this highly demanding field is vast, with examples ranging from one of largest performing arts centres in the United States to intimate theatres on college campuses. Highlighting the firm's technically rigorous and aesthetically inspiring designs, Perform features a selection of concert halls and theatres, and cultural centres, including such prominent and distinctive works as the Overture Center for the Arts in Madison, Wisconsin, and the Adrienne Arsht Center in Miami. Designed with renowned acousticians and theatre planners, these performance halls are both architecturally exciting and technically advanced. This book explores the design of beautiful and uplifting spaces that allow the performing arts to shine while adding life to their surroundings. Selected Projects: - Hancher, University of Iowa - The George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Theater - Wintrust Arena - Multi-purpose Auditorium, Hong Kong University - Science and Technology - The Theatre School, DePaul University - St. Katherine Drexel Chapel, Xavier University of Louisiana - BOK Center - Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall and Samueli Theater - The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County - Overture Center for the Arts - South Coast Repertory Theater - Schuster Performing Arts Center - Dewan Filharmonik at Petronas Towers - Aronoff Center for the Arts - North Carolina Blumenthal Performing Arts Center.

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From one of rap’s most personal and evocative writers comes a stirring memoir about how Boosie Badazz, one of the industry’s most controversial figures, was able to overcome insurmountable odds to make his music dreams a reality.A Baton Rouge native who began rapping at age fourteen, Boosie Badazz was already a cult hero in Louisiana when, in 2009, he was sentenced to two years in prison. The next year, he was indicted on even more serious charges, eventually landing him on Death Row. Prosecutors played Boosie’s music in the courtroom in an attempt to paint him as a thug with no chance of redemption. However, against overwhelming odds and the backdrop of a social media campaign to #FreeBoosie, he was freed in March of 2014 with a rare second chance to make his music dreams come true. In this evocative and compelling memoir, Boosie explores the relationship between his life on the streets with his ceaseless tear through the rap industry. From near-death experiences to a ruthless bout with kidney cancer to a life-threatening diabetes diagnosis, Boosie has overcome remarkable challenges to make a name for himself as one of rap’s most influential voices. A redemptive story with an urgent voice, Cross the Tracks is the survival tale of a man who wasn’t sure he would live to see another day...but who rose from the ashes to change the rap industry forever.

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Field Guide to the Wildflowers of Georgia and Surrounding States is the first field guide devoted exclusively to Georgia’s wildflowers, while also including a large number of plants found in neighbouring states. Organized in a clear and logical way, Linda G. Chafin’s guide is both scientific and accessible to those who aren’t professional botanists. The guide includes nontechnical species descriptions and comparisons with similar plants, information on the habitats and natural communities that support Georgia’s wildflowers, and suggestions for the best places and times to see wildflowers. The guide includes descriptions of the wildflowers found in forests, woodlands, and wetlands, as well as those growing along roadsides that are often dismissed as “weeds” but may first attract the attention of budding naturalists.Features:A large set of 750 thumbnail photographs that allows users to identify plants by flower colourDetailed descriptions for 770 of the most common wildflowers found in Georgia and throughout most of the Southeast, as well as additional information for 530 “similar to” speciesDescriptions of the natural communities in Georgia where wildflowers may easily be seenAn alphabetical arrangement by plant family, with each plant family broken down alphabetically by genus and speciesA guide to the pronounciation of scientific namesLightweight and sturdy enough for the field but inclusive enough for the reference shelf90% or more of the species in this guide occur in Alabama, North Carolina, and South Carolina80% or more of the species in this guide occur in Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Virginia

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Funny and poignant, Newbery Medalist and New York Times bestseller Erin Entrada Kelly’s national bestseller You Go First is an exploration of family, bullying, word games, art, and the ever-complicated world of middle school friendships. In a starred review, School Library Journal wrote that Erin Entrada Kelly can “capture moments of tween anguish with searing honesty.” Twelve-year-old Charlotte Lockard and eleven-year-old Ben Boxer are separated by more than a thousand miles. On the surface, their lives seem vastly different—Charlotte lives near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, while Ben is in the small town of Lanester, Louisiana.Charlotte wants to be a geologist and keeps a rock collection in her room. Ben is obsessed with Harry Potter, presidential history, and recycling. But the two have more in common than they think. They’re both highly gifted. They’re both experiencing family turmoil. And they both sit alone at lunch.During the course of one week, Charlotte and Ben—friends connected only by an online Scrabble game—will intersect in unexpected ways as they struggle to navigate the turmoil of middle school. The New York Times-bestselling novel You Go First reminds us that no matter how hard it is to keep our heads above troubled water, we never struggle alone. Newbery Medalist Erin Entrada Kelly writes with an authentic, humorous, and irresistible voice. This engaging and character-driven story about growing up and finding your place in the world is for fans of Rebecca Stead and Rita Williams-Garcia.

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This Volume of "Advances in Econometrics" contains a selection of papers presented initially at the 7th Annual Advances in Econometrics Conference held on the LSU campus in Baton Rouge, Louisiana during November 14-16, 2008. The theme of the conference was 'Nonparametric Econometric Methods', and the papers selected for inclusion in this Volume span a range of nonparametric techniques including kernel smoothing, empirical copulas, series estimators, and smoothing splines along with a variety of semiparametric methods. The papers in this Volume cover topics of interest to those who wish to familiarize themselves with current nonparametric methodology. Many papers also identify areas deserving of future attention. There exist survey papers devoted to recent developments in nonparametric nance, constrained nonparametric regression, miparametric/nonparametric environmental econometrics and nonparametric models with non-stationary data. There exist theoretical papers dealing with novel approaches for partial identification of the distribution of treatment effects, xed effects semiparametric panel data models, functional coefficient models with time series data, exponential series estimators of empirical copulas, estimation of multivariate CDFs and bias-reduction methods for density estimation. There also exist a number of applications that analyze returns to education, the evolution of income and life expectancy, the role of governance in growth, farm production, city size and unemployment rates, derivative pricing, and environmental pollution and economic growth. In short, this Volume contains a range of theoretical developments, surveys, and applications that would be of interest to those who wish to keep abreast of some of the most important current developments in the field of nonparametric estimation.

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Whenever a major event requires police intervention, questions are raised about the nature of the police response. Could the police have prevented the conflict, been better prepared, reacted more quickly? Could they have acted more forcefully or brought the altercation under control more effectively? Based upon real case studies of events from all over the world, this volume explores the complex set of factors comprising the policing of major events. Topics covered include: Police procedures in Serbia in response to sporting events and violence The 2010 World Cup in South Africa as a model of best practice in governance structures, along with the region’s struggles in routine policing initiatives Security operations at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Canada and the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games in London in 2012 Community involvement to curb terrorist insurgency in North Eastern Nigeria Governmental response to Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana and Texas Revisions made to NYPD protocols following the September 11 attacks Policing strategies for major events on Aboriginal and tribal lands across Canada Other topics include the police/protestor relationship and low-profile versus high-profile policing strategies in crowd control, the growing strategy of private security in working with public police forces, and enhancing public safety in post-conflict regions. The concepts presented in Policing Major Events: Perspectives from Around the World will enable police departments to improve their readiness for policing major events across a diverse set of events and socio-political contexts. This book is a co-publication with the International Police Executive Symposium.

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Las Siete Partidas, or Seven Divisions, is the major law code of thirteenth-century Spain, compiled by Alfonso X the Learned of Castile. Seven centuries later, this compendium of legal and customary information remains the foundation of modern Spanish law. In addition, its influence is notable in the law of Spain's former colonies, including Texas, California, and Louisiana. The work's extraordinary scope offers unparalleled insight into the social, intellectual, and cultural history of medieval Spain. Built on the armature of a law code, it is in effect an encyclopedia of medieval life. Long out of print, the English translation of Las Siete Partidas—first commissioned in 1931 by the American Bar Association—returns in a superior new edition. Editor and distinguished medieval historian Robert I. Burns, S.J., provides critical historical material in a new general Introduction and extensive introductions to each Partida. Jerry Craddock of the University of California, Berkeley, provides updated bibliographical notes, and Joseph O'Callaghan of Fordham University contributes a section on law in Alfonso's time. Las Siete Partidas is presented in five volumes, each available separately: The Medieval Church, Volume 1: The World of Clerics and Laymen (Partida I) Medieval Government, Volume 2: The World of Kings and Warriors (Partida II) The Medieval World of Law, Volume 3: Lawyers and Their Work (Partida III) Family, Commerce, and the Sea, Volume 4: The Worlds of Women and Merchants (Partidas IV and V) Underworlds, Volume 5: The Dead, the Criminal, and the Marginalized (Partidas VI and VII)

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The history of New Orleans at the turn of the nineteenth centuryIn 1795, New Orleans was a sleepy outpost at the edge of Spain's American empire. By the 1820s, it was teeming with life, its levees packed with cotton and sugar. New Orleans had become the unquestioned urban capital of the antebellum South. Looking at this remarkable period filled with ideological struggle, class politics, and powerful personalities, Building the Land of Dreams is the narrative biography of a fascinating city at the most crucial turning point in its history.Eberhard Faber tells the vivid story of how American rule forced New Orleans through a vast transition: from the ordered colonial world of hierarchy and subordination to the fluid, unpredictable chaos of democratic capitalism. The change in authority, from imperial Spain to Jeffersonian America, transformed everything. As the city’s diverse people struggled over the terms of the transition, they built the foundations of a dynamic, contentious hybrid metropolis. Faber describes the vital individuals who played a role in New Orleans history: from the wealthy creole planters who dreaded the influx of revolutionary ideas, to the American arrivistes who combined idealistic visions of a new republican society with selfish dreams of quick plantation fortunes, to Thomas Jefferson himself, whose powerful democratic vision for Louisiana eventually conflicted with his equally strong sense of realpolitik and desire to strengthen the American union.Revealing how New Orleans was formed by America’s greatest impulses and ambitions, Building the Land of Dreams is an inspired exploration of one of the world’s most iconic cities.

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Although political and legal institutions are essential to any nation's economic development, the forces that have shaped these institutions are poorly understood. Drawing on rich evidence about the development of the American states from the mid-nineteenth to the late twentieth century, this book documents the mechanisms through which geographical and historical conditions--such as climate, access to water transportation, and early legal systems--impacted political and judicial institutions and economic growth. The book shows how a state's geography and climate influenced whether elites based their wealth in agriculture or trade. States with more occupationally diverse elites in 1860 had greater levels of political competition in their legislature from 1866 to 2000. The book also examines the effects of early legal systems. Because of their colonial history, thirteen states had an operational civil-law legal system prior to statehood. All of these states except Louisiana would later adopt common law. By the late eighteenth century, the two legal systems differed in their balances of power. In civil-law systems, judiciaries were subordinate to legislatures, whereas in common-law systems, the two were more equal. Former civil-law states and common-law states exhibit persistent differences in the structure of their courts, the retention of judges, and judicial budgets. Moreover, changes in court structures, retention procedures, and budgets occur under very different conditions in civil-law and common-law states. The Evolution of a Nation illustrates how initial geographical and historical conditions can determine the evolution of political and legal institutions and long-run growth.

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Several hundred tribes of Native Americans were living within or hunting and trading across the present-day borders of Texas when Cabeza de Vaca and his shipwrecked companions washed up on a Gulf Coast beach in 1528. Over the next two centuries, as Spanish and French expeditions explored the state, they recorded detailed information about the locations and lifeways of Texas's Native peoples. Using recent translations of these expedition diaries and journals, along with discoveries from ongoing archaeological investigations, William C. Foster here assembles the most complete account ever published of Texas's Native peoples during the early historic period (AD 1528 to 1722). Foster describes the historic Native peoples of Texas by geographic regions. His chronological narrative records the interactions of Native groups with European explorers and with Native trading partners across a wide network that extended into Louisiana, the Great Plains, New Mexico, and northern Mexico. Foster provides extensive ethnohistorical information about Texas's Native peoples, as well as data on the various regions' animals, plants, and climate. Accompanying each regional account is an annotated list of named Indian tribes in that region and maps that show tribal territories and European expedition routes. This authoritative overview of Texas's historic Native peoples reveals that these groups were far more cosmopolitan than previously known. Functioning as the central link in the continent-wide circulation of trade goods and cultural elements such as religion, architecture, and lithic technology, Texas's historic Native peoples played a crucial role in connecting the Native peoples of North America from the Pacific Coast to the Southeast woodlands.

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This is the authoritative book on sea level rise and its coastal consequences. On Shismaref Island in Alaska, homes are being washed into the sea. In the South Pacific, small island nations face annihilation by encroaching waters. In coastal Louisiana, an area the size of a football field disappears every day. For these communities, sea level rise isn't a distant, abstract fear: it's happening now and it's threatening their way of life. In "The Rising Sea", Orrin H. Pilkey and Rob Young warn that many other coastal areas may be close behind. Prominent scientists predict that the oceans may rise by as much as seven feet in the next hundred years. That means coastal cities will be forced to construct dikes and seawalls or to move buildings, roads, pipelines, and railways to avert inundation and destruction. The question is no longer whether climate change is causing the oceans to swell, but by how much and how quickly. Pilkey and Young deftly guide readers through the science, explaining the facts and debunking the claims of industry-sponsored 'sceptics'. They also explore the consequences for fish, wildlife - and people. While rising seas are now inevitable, we are far from helpless. By making hard choices - including uprooting citizens, changing where and how we build, and developing a coordinated national response - we can save property, and ultimately lives. With unassailable research and practical insights, "The Rising Sea" is a critical first step in understanding the threat and keeping our heads above water.

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(Edition updated in 2022) Michelin USA Deep South Map 177, including Florida (scale: 1:1,267,000) part of Michelin's US regional map series with green covers zooms in close for comprehensive coverage of six Southern states: Arkansas, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida, with parts of North and South Carolina. It contains city maps for easy driving in Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis, Miami, New Orleans, Orlando and Tampa/St. Petersburg. Michelin star-rated sights and a selection of not-to-be-missed annual events and festivals serve as inspiration for future road trips. Outdoor enthusiasts have a choice of several national parks for scenery and activities: Biscayne, Congaree, Dry Tortugas, Everglades, Great Smoky Mountains and Hot Springs. The QR code on the front cover offers even more travel information on destinations through Michelin's ViaMichelin website. The map includes a comprehensive index, a distance chart, and a multi-language legend in English and Spanish. Those traveling for business or pleasure, as well as locals traveling further afield, will appreciate Michelin's high standard of clear and accurate mapping and the additional information on parks, events and points of interest to make the journey more enjoyable. MICHELIN ZOOM MAPS are perfect to discover major tourist areas, with a high level of details in an easy to use format. They nicely complement our Michelin Guides and include: * Various leisure activities, such as water parks, tourist trains, horse racing, etc * Scenic routes and tourist sights crossed referenced with the famous Michelin's Green Guides * Camping sites information from Michelin's Camping Guides * Hotel information from the world famous MICHELIN Guides

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A “compelling portrait” (Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize­–winning author) of the controversial Confederate general who later embraced Reconstruction and became an outcast in the South. It was the most remarkable political about-face in American history. During the Civil War, General James Longstreet fought tenaciously for the Confederacy. He was alongside Lee at Gettysburg (and counseled him not to order the ill-fated attacks on entrenched Union forces there). He won a major Confederate victory at Chickamauga and was seriously wounded during a later battle. After the war, Longstreet moved to New Orleans, where he dramatically changed course. He supported Black voting and joined the newly elected, integrated postwar government in Louisiana. When white supremacists took up arms to oust that government, Longstreet, leading the interracial state militia, did battle against former Confederates. His defiance ignited a firestorm of controversy, as white Southerners branded him a race traitor and blamed him retroactively for the South’s defeat in the Civil War. Although he was one of the highest-ranking Confederate generals, Longstreet has never been commemorated with statues or other memorials in the South because of his postwar actions in rejecting the Lost Cause mythology and urging racial reconciliation. He is being discovered in the new age of racial reckoning as “one of the most enduringly relevant voices in American history” (The Wall Street Journal). This is the first authoritative biography in decades and the first that “brilliantly creates the wider context for Longstreet’s career” (The New York Times).

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This is the first biography written from a legal perspective on the public life of Judah P. Benjamin (1811-1884); a prominent figure in the common law world in the second half of the 19th century. Drawing on a range of primary source materials including newspaper articles, case law and extensive archival research in the UK and USA, it charts his rise as a lawyer first in the mixed legal system of Louisiana and then nationally. In 1853 he was the first person of Jewish heritage to be offered nomination to the US Supreme Court - an honour he declined. Benjamin was also a member of the US Senate, a slave owner and a supporter of Southern secession. In the Civil War he served continuously in the Confederate Cabinet initially as Attorney General, then as Secretary of War and finally as Secretary of State. Following the victory of the Union he fled America, a fugitive. In political exile in England he requalified as a Barrister at Lincoln's Inn. Within a decade he had written a scholarly and long-enduring treatise on commercial law and become the undisputed advocate of choice in appeals before the House of Lords and the Privy Council. This book considers the extraordinary career of this distinguished jurist and reflects upon his legal legacy. The volume includes a foreword by Stephen C. Neff, Professor of War and Peace at the University of Edinburgh and author of 'Justice in Blue and Gray: A Legal History of the Civil War' (Harvard University Press, 2010).

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Winner of the 2012 Bancroft Prize in American HistoryFinalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize in History To most people living in the West, the Louisiana Purchase made little difference: the United States was just another imperial overlord to be assessed and manipulated. This was not, as Empires, Nations, and Families makes clear, virgin wilderness discovered by virtuous Anglo entrepreneurs. Rather, the United States was a newcomer in a place already complicated by vying empires. This book documents the broad family associations that crossed national and ethnic lines and that, along with the river systems of the trans-Mississippi West, formed the basis for a global trade in furs that had operated for hundreds of years before the land became part of the United States. Empires, Nations, and Families shows how the world of river and maritime trade effectively shifted political power away from military and diplomatic circles into the hands of local people. Tracing family stories from the Canadian North to the Spanish and Mexican borderlands and from the Pacific Coast to the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, Anne F. Hyde’s narrative moves from the earliest years of the Indian trade to the Mexican War and the gold rush era. Her work reveals how, in the 1850s, immigrants to these newest regions of the United States violently wrested control from Native and other powers, and how conquest and competing demands for land and resources brought about a volatile frontier culture—not at all the peace and prosperity that the new power had promised.

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Notes of a Pianist chronicles the life of one of the most remarkable musical minds of the American experience, the great nineteenth-century New Orleans-born composer and pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk (1829-1869). An important cultural and historical work, the book recounts Gottschalk's experiences as he traveled and performed throughout the last decade of his life. Born to an English-Jewish father and a Haitian mother, Gottschalk is remembered as one of the great New Orleans musicians and composers, his music a combination of the classical tradition in which he was trained, and the New Orleans tradition into which he was born. His art form took him far outside the boundaries of Louisiana, however. While still a child, he studied piano in Paris and gave a concert at the Salle Pleyel, after which Frederic Chopin is said to have remarked: "Give me your hand, my child; I predict that you will become the king of pianists." Gottschalk returned to the United States in 1853, and later lived in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Panama, and South America, during which time he kept-sometimes sporadically, sometimes daily--the notebooks that formed the basis of Notes of a Pianist. Published for the first time in 1881, the book continues to resonate with American cultural and musical life. Notes of a Pianist demonstrates Gottschalk's importance not only as a reporter of the musical life and tastes of Americans during the Civil War, but also as a forefather of Louisiana's rich musical culture.

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In this exciting revisionist history, Stephen Tuck traces the black freedom struggle in all its diversity, from the first years of freedom during the Civil War to President Obama’s inauguration. As it moves from popular culture to high politics, from the Deep South to New England, the West Coast, and abroad, Tuck weaves gripping stories of ordinary black people—as well as celebrated figures—into the sweep of racial protest and social change. The drama unfolds from an armed march of longshoremen in post–Civil War Baltimore to Booker T. Washington’s founding of Tuskegee Institute; from the race riots following Jack Johnson’s “fight of the century” to Rosa Parks’ refusal to move to the back of a Montgomery bus; and from the rise of hip hop to the journey of a black Louisiana grandmother to plead with the Tokyo directors of a multinational company to stop the dumping of toxic waste near her home.We Ain’t What We Ought To Be rejects the traditional narrative that identifies the Southern non-violent civil rights movement as the focal point of the black freedom struggle. Instead, it explores the dynamic relationships between those seeking new freedoms and those looking to preserve racial hierarchies, and between grassroots activists and national leaders. As Tuck shows, strategies were ultimately contingent on the power of activists to protest amidst shifting economic and political circumstances in the U.S. and abroad. This book captures an extraordinary journey that speaks to all Americans—both past and future.

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Lying in a hospital bed, José P. Ramirez, Jr. (b. 1948) almost lost everything because of a misunderstood disease. When the health department doctor gave him the Handbook for Persons with Leprosy, Ramirez learned his fate. Such a diagnosis in 1968 meant exile and hospitalization in the only leprosarium in the continental United States--Carville, Louisiana, 750 miles from his home in Laredo, Texas. In Squint: My Journey with Leprosy, Ramirez recalls being taken from his family in a hearse and thrown into a world filled with fear. He and his loved ones struggled against the stigma associated with the term ""leper"" and against beliefs that the disease was a punishment from God, that his illness was highly communicable, and that persons with Hansen's disease had to be banished from their communities. His disease not only meant separation from the girlfriend who would later become his wife, but also a derailment of all life's goals. In his struggle Ramirez overcame barriers both real and imagined and eventually became an international advocate on behalf of persons with disabilities. In Squint, titled for the sliver of a window through which persons with leprosy in medieval times were allowed to view Mass but not participate, Ramirez tells a story of love and perseverance over incredible odds. José P. Ramirez, Jr., is a social worker in Houston, Texas. He has written articles about Hansen's disease for the Houston Chronicle, the Star Magazine, the National Association of Social Workers Newsletter, and other publications.

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THE CHILLING SERIAL KILLER THRILLER FROM THE CO-HOST OF CHART-TOPPING PODCAST MORBID'AMAZING TWISTS. UNPUTDOWNABLE' SAMANTHA DOWNING'CAPTIVATING. The reader might want to shut their eyes, but the joust between the killer and the pathologist makes that impossible' DAILY MAILWren was never afraid of the dark. Until she learned that some monsters are real . . ._________In deep Louisiana, a serial killer with a taste for medical experimentation is completing his most ambitious project yet. The media call him 'The Butcher' - and, so far, he's proved impossible to catch.With her encyclopaedic knowledge of humanity's darkest minds, and years of experience examining their victims, forensic pathologist Dr Wren Muller is the best there is. The longer the Butcher's killing spree continues, the more determined she is to bring him to justice.And yet, he continues to elude her.As body after body piles up on Wren's examination table, her obsession grows. Pressure to put an end to the slaughter mounts. And her enemy becomes more brazen.How far is Wren willing to go to draw the Butcher into the light . . .?_________An addictive read with straight-from-the-morgue details only an autopsy technician could provide, The Butcher and the Wren promises to ensnare all who enter.'Can a medical examiner outsmart a serial killer? The Butcher and the Wren will keep you waiting for an answer until the last bloody page. Prepare to be disturbed. A deliciously dark debut' REA FREY, bestselling author for Not Her Daughter and Secrets of Our House

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Inspired by the #1 New York Times bestseller She Persisted by Chelsea Clinton and Alexandra Boiger, a chapter book series about women who stood up, spoke up and rose up against the odds!In this chapter book biography by NAACP Image Award-winning author and Coretta Scott King Honor recipient Kekla Magoon, readers learn about the amazing life of Ruby Bridges--and how she persisted. As a first grader, Ruby Bridges was the first Black student to integrate William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans, Louisiana. This was no easy task, especially for a six-year-old. Ruby's bravery and perseverance inspired children and adults alike to fight for equality and social justice. Perfect for back-to-school reading!Complete with an introduction from Chelsea Clinton, black-and-white illustrations throughout, and a list of ways that readers can follow in Ruby Bridges's footsteps and make a difference! A perfect choice for kids who love learning and teachers who want to bring inspiring women into their curriculum.And don’t miss out on the rest of the books in the She Persisted series, featuring so many more women who persisted, including Oprah Winfrey, Harriet Tubman, Claudette Colvin, Coretta Scott King, and more!Praise for She Persisted: Ruby Bridges:"Bridges’ voice, quoted from various sources, gives readers access to her own perspective. A context-offering complement to Bridges’ own books for children." --Kirkus Reviews"Given the more relatable perspective of starting first grade, this volume makes Bridges’s story poignant for the intended audience." --School Library Journal

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A rare, magnified look at America's best-designed stamps from the mid-20th century! Every picture tells a story—even one on a postage stamp. Presented enormously enlarged, the 128 stamps in this book chronicle a stylish era of design: mid-20th-century America. Spanning the late 1950s to the early 1970s, these mini-masterpieces were created when the US post office started to lavish color on its stamps and to hire the best midcentury talents to design them. Magnifies the stylish beauty of 144 mini-masterpiece postage stamps chronicling a stylish era of design from the late 1950s to the early 1970s The roster includes Japanese American children’s book illustrator Gyo Fujikawa, barrier-busting Black graphic artist Georg Olden, Bauhaus master Herbert Bayer, and sultan of psychedelia Peter Max. Divulges the stories behind 144 tiny pieces of 1960s and 1970s art, including works by pop artist Robert Indiana and Bauhaus master Herbert Bayer A native of the cotton-ginning town of Oak Grove, Louisiana, and a lifelong philatelist, author David Cobb Craig became enchanted with postage when in the 1960s and ’70s he saw pictures of about-to-come-out stamps posted on the bulletin board at his small local post office (71263). Photographed at five, ten, and even fifteen times their actual size, each stamp is presented with a morsel of fun info that will broadly appeal to stamp collectors, history and nostalgia buffs, midcentury design fans, and everyone who likes to geek out on magnified views of teeny images.

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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * “Audacious…Life on the Mississippi sparkles.” —The Wall Street Journal * “A rich mix of history, reporting, and personal introspection.” —St. Louis Post-Dispatch * “Both a travelogue and an engaging history lesson about America’s westward expansion.” —The Christian Science Monitor The eagerly awaited return of master American storyteller Rinker Buck, Life on the Mississippi is an epic, enchanting blend of history and adventure in which Buck builds a wooden flatboat from the grand “flatboat era” of the 1800s and sails it down the Mississippi River, illuminating the forgotten past of America’s first western frontier.Seven years ago, readers around the country fell in love with a singular American voice: Rinker Buck, whose infectious curiosity about history launched him across the West in a covered wagon pulled by mules and propelled his book about the trip, The Oregon Trail, to ten weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Now, Buck returns to chronicle his latest incredible adventure: building a wooden flatboat from the bygone era of the early 1800s and journeying down the Mississippi River to New Orleans. A modern-day Huck Finn, Buck casts off down the river on the flatboat Patience accompanied by an eccentric crew of daring shipmates. Over the course of his voyage, Buck steers his fragile wooden craft through narrow channels dominated by massive cargo barges, rescues his first mate gone overboard, sails blindly through fog, breaks his ribs not once but twice, and camps every night on sandbars, remote islands, and steep levees. As he charts his own journey, he also delivers a richly satisfying work of history that brings to life a lost era. The role of the flatboat in our country’s evolution is far more significant than most Americans realize. Between 1800 and 1840, millions of farmers, merchants, and teenage adventurers embarked from states like Pennsylvania and Virginia on flatboats headed beyond the Appalachians to Kentucky, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Settler families repurposed the wood from their boats to build their first cabins in the wilderness; cargo boats were broken apart and sold to build the boomtowns along the water route. Joining the river traffic were floating brothels, called “gun boats”; “smithy boats” for blacksmiths; even “whiskey boats” for alcohol. In the present day, America’s inland rivers are a superhighway dominated by leviathan barges—carrying $80 billion of cargo annually—all descended from flatboats like the ramshackle Patience. As a historian, Buck resurrects the era’s adventurous spirit, but he also challenges familiar myths about American expansion, confronting the bloody truth behind settlers’ push for land and wealth. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 forced more than 125,000 members of the Cherokee, Choctaw, and several other tribes to travel the Mississippi on a brutal journey en route to the barrens of Oklahoma. Simultaneously, almost a million enslaved African Americans were carried in flatboats and marched by foot 1,000 miles over the Appalachians to the cotton and cane fields of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, birthing the term “sold down the river.” Buck portrays this watershed era of American expansion as it was really lived. With a rare narrative power that blends stirring adventure with absorbing untold history, Life on the Mississippi is a mus­cular and majestic feat of storytelling from a writer who may be the closest that we have today to Mark Twain.

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On 11 October 1492 the sun set on a clear Atlantic Ocean horizon and the night was cloudless with a late rising moon. As the lookouts high in the riggings of Christopher Columbus three ships strained their eyes into the golden light of the moon, near two o clock in the morning the watchman on the Pinta shouted out, Land, land igniting the era of exploration to the New World. The Age of Discovery became an epic adventure sweeping across the continent of North America, as the trailblazers dared to challenge the unknown wilderness to advance mankind s knowledge of the world. _Explorers Discovering North America_ traces the history of the discovery, exploration and settlement of the western hemisphere through the comprehensive biographies of fourteen explorers, who had the courage and inquisitiveness to search the limits of the world. The book features many famous adventurers including Hernan Cortes whose victorious battles against the Aztecs conquered Mexico for Spain, Henry Hudson s sea voyages in search of the Northwest Passage led to the colonization of New York and exploration of the Hudson Bay in Canada, while Meriwether Lewis journey across the Louisiana Purchase began the mass migration of settlers to western America. Among the lesser known explorers discussed in the work are Vitus Bering whose discovery of Alaska established Russia s claim to the region and Alexander Mackenzie s 107-day trek across western Canada that opened the frontier to settlement, commerce and development of its natural resources. From Columbus to Lewis the exploration of the New World became one of humankind s greatest quests that altered history forever.

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Shane K. Bernard's Teche examines this legendary waterway of the American Deep South. Bernard delves into the bayou's geologic formation as a vestige of the Mississippi and Red Rivers, its prehistoric Native American occupation, and its colonial settlement by French, Spanish, and, eventually, Anglo-American pioneers. He surveys the coming of indigo, cotton, and sugar; steam-powered sugar mills and riverboats; and the brutal institution of slavery. He also examines the impact of the Civil War on the Teche, depicting the running battles up and down the bayou and the sporadic gunboat duels, when ironclads clashed in the narrow confines of the dark, sluggish river.Describing the misery of the postbellum era, Bernard reveals how epic floods, yellow fever, racial violence, and widespread poverty disrupted the lives of those who resided under the sprawling, moss-draped live oaks lining the Teche's banks. Further, he chronicles the slow decline of the bayou, as the coming of the railroad, automobiles, and highways reduced its value as a means of travel. Finally, he considers modern efforts to redesign the Teche using dams, locks, levees, and other water-control measures. He examines the recent push to clean and revitalize the bayou after years of desecration by litter, pollutants, and invasive species. Illustrated with historic images and numerous maps, this book will be required reading for anyone seeking the colorful history of Louisiana and the Gulf Coast.As a bonus, the second part of the book describes Bernard's own canoe journey down the Teche's 125-mile course. This modern personal account from the field reveals the current state of the bayou and the remarkable people who still live along its banks.

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In American political fantasy, the Founding Fathers loom large, at once historical and mythical figures. In The Traumatic Colonel, Michael J. Drexler and Ed White examine the Founders as imaginative fictions, characters in the specifically literary sense, whose significance emerged from narrative elements clustered around them. From the revolutionary era through the 1790s, the Founders took shape as a significant cultural system for thinking about politics, race, and sexuality. Yet after 1800, amid the pressures of the Louisiana Purchase and the Haitian Revolution, this system could no longer accommodate the deep anxieties about the United States as a slave nation. Drexler and White assert that the most emblematic of the political tensions of the time is the figure of Aaron Burr, whose rise and fall were detailed in the literature of his time: his electoral tie with Thomas Jefferson in 1800, the accusations of seduction, the notorious duel with Alexander Hamilton, his machinations as the schemer of a breakaway empire, and his spectacular treason trial. The authors venture a psychoanalytically-informed exploration of post-revolutionary America to suggest that the figure of “Burr” was fundamentally a displaced fantasy for addressing the Haitian Revolution. Drexler and White expose how the historical and literary fictions of the nation’s founding served to repress the larger issue of the slave system and uncover the Burr myth as the crux of that repression. Exploring early American novels, such as the works of Charles Brockden Brown and Tabitha Gilman Tenney, as well as the pamphlets, polemics, tracts, and biographies of the early republican period, the authors speculate that this flourishing of political writing illuminates the notorious gap in U.S. literary history between 1800 and 1820.

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Protecting the Empire’s Frontier tells stories of the roughly eighty officers who served in the 18th (Royal Irish) Regiment of Foot, which served British interests in America during the crucial period from 1767 through 1776. The Royal Irish was one of the most wide-ranging regiments in America, with companies serving on the Illinois frontier, at Fort Pitt, and in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, with some companies taken as far afield as Florida, Spanish Louisiana, and present-day Maine. When the regiment was returned to England in 1776, some of the officers remained in America on staff assignments. Others joined provincial regiments, and a few joined the American revolutionary army, taking up arms against their king and former colleagues. Using a wide range of archival resources previously untapped by scholars, the text goes beyond just these officers’ service in the regiment and tells the story of the men who included governors, a college president, land speculators, physicians, and officers in many other British regular and provincial regiments. Included in these ranks were an Irishman who would serve in the U.S. Congress and as an American general at Yorktown; a landed aristocrat who represented Bath as a member of Parliament; and a naval surgeon on the ship transporting Benjamin Franklin to France. This is the history of the American Revolutionary period from a most gripping and everyday perspective. An epilogue covers the Royal Irish’s history after returning to England and its part in defending against both the Franco-Spanish invasion attempt and the Gordon Rioters. With an essay on sources and a complete bibliography, this is a treat for professional and amateur historians alike.

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In Biography and the Black Atlantic, leading historians in the field of Atlantic studies examine the biographies and autobiographies of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century African-descended people and reflect on the opportunities and limitations these life stories present to studies of slavery and the African diaspora. The essays remind us that historical developments like slavery and empire-building were mostly experienced and shaped by men and women outside of the elite political, economic, and military groups to which historians often turn as sources. Despite the scarcity of written records and other methodological challenges, the contributors to Biography and the Black Atlantic have pieced together vivid glimpses into lives of remarkable, through previously unknown, enslaved and formerly enslaved people who moved, struggled, and endured in different parts of Africa, the Americas, and Europe. From the woman of Fulani origin who made her way from Revolutionary Haiti to Louisiana to the free black American who sailed for Liberia and the former slave from Brazil who became a major slave trader in Angola, these stories render the Atlantic world as a densely and sometimes unpredictably interconnected sphere. Biography and the Black Atlantic demonstrates the power of individual stories to illuminate history: though the life histories recounted here often involved extraordinary achievement and survival against the odds, they also portray the struggle for self-determination and community in the midst of alienation that lies at the heart of the modern condition. Contributors: James T. Campbell, Vincent Carretta, Roquinaldo Ferreira, Jean-Michel Hébrard, Martin Klein, Lloyd S. Kramer, Sheryl Kroen, Jane Landers, Lisa A. Lindsay, Joseph C. Miller, Cassandra Pybus, João José Reis, Rebecca J. Scott, Jon Sensbach, John Wood Sweet.

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In September 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland and initiated World War II, a strong strain of isolationism existed in Congress and across the country. The U.S. Army stood at fewer than 200,000 men—unprepared to defend the country, much less carry the fight to Europe and the Far East. And yet, less than a year after Pearl Harbor, the American army led the Allied invasion of North Africa, beginning the campaign that would defeat Germany, and the Navy and Marines were fully engaged with Japan in the Pacific.The story of America’s astounding industrial mobilization during World War II has been told. But what has never been chronicled before Paul Dickson’s The Rise of the G. I. Army, 1940-1941 is the extraordinary transformation of America’s military from a disparate collection of camps with dilapidated equipment into a well-trained and spirited army ten times its prior size in little more than eighteen months. From Franklin Roosevelt’s selection of George C. Marshall to be Army Chief of Staff to the remarkable peace-time draft of 1940 and the massive and unprecedented mock battles in Tennessee, Louisiana, and the Carolinas by which the skill and spirit of the Army were forged and out of which iconic leaders like Eisenhower, Bradley, and Clark emerged; Dickson narrates America’s urgent mobilization against a backdrop of political and cultural isolationist resistance and racial tension at home, and the increasingly perceived threat of attack from both Germany and Japan.An important addition to American history, The Rise of the G. I. Army, 1940-1941 is essential to our understanding of America’s involvement in World War II.

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From the world of Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls comes a story based on the life of Madam C.J. Walker, America's first female self-made millionaire.Sarah is the first person in her family who wasn't born into slavery in Delta, Louisiana. But being free doesn't mean that Sarah doesn't have to work. She cooks, she cleans, she picks cotton, she does laundry, and she babysits. And when she works, she wraps up her hair.One day, Sarah's hair starts to fall out! It's itchy, crunchy, patchy, and won't grow. Instead of giving up, Sarah searches for the right products. And then she invents something better than any shampoo or hair oil she's used before. Her hair grows and grows! That's when she decides to rebrand herself as "Madam C. J. Walker," and begins her business empire.Madam C. J. Walker Builds a Business is the story of a leader in the hair care industry, but it's also an inspiring tale about the importance of empowering women to become economically independent.This historical fiction chapter book includes additional text on Madam C. J. Walker's lasting legacy, as well as educational activities designed to encourage entrepreneurship.About the Rebel Girls Chapter Book SeriesMeet extraordinary real-life heroines in the Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls chapter book series! Introducing stories based on the lives of extraordinary women in global history, each stunningly designed chapter book features beautiful illustrations from a female artist as well as bonus activities in the backmatter to encourage kids to explore the various fields in which each of these women thrived. The perfect gift to inspire any young reader!

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Don’t miss this humorous and heartwarming picture book by debut creator Breanna Carzoo about an unlikely everyday hero: a fire hydrant! Perfect for fans of The Good Egg and The Bad Seed.Meet Lou. Lou has an important job . . . as the neighborhood toilet for dogs on their walks.Useful as he may be, he gets the feeling that deep down inside, there might be more to him than that. He just doesn’t seem to know exactly what yet. When disaster strikes, will Lou find out what he’s made of and save the day?From debut creator Breanna Carzoo comes a charming and funny story that reminds us to never let anyone—including yourself—hold you back from sharing your gifts with the world.Kids will fall in love with Lou and his journey of self-discovery as he saves the day from a fire that breaks out in an apartment building nearby. You’ll never be able to look at a fire hydrant the same way again! A BARNES & NOBLE CHILDREN'S BOOK AWARDS SHORTLIST PICK! A KIRKUS BEST PICTURE BOOK OF 2022! A 2024 COLORADO CHILDREN'S BOOK AWARD NOMINEE! A 2023 GRAND CANYON READER AWARD NOMINEE! THE NORTH CENTRAL MICHIGAN COLLEGE CHILDREN'S BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023! A MISSOURI BUILDING BLOCK PICTURE BOOK AWARD NOMINEE! CHOSEN FOR THE 2022 SOCIETY OF ILLUSTRATORS ORIGINAL ART SHOW! A 2024 DONNA NORVELL OKLAHOMA BOOK AWARD NOMINEE! A BLUE CRAB YOUNG READER AWARD HONOR BOOK! A 2024-2025 LOUISIANA YOUNG READERS AWARD NOMINEE! AN OKLAHOMA REDBUD READ-ALOUD AWARD NOMINEE! A 2023 MICHIGAN LIBRARIAN ASSOCIATION TOP ELEVEN MITTEN AWARD FINALIST!

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This comprehensive Cajun and Creole cookbook presents over seventy recipes from all the top New Orleans restaurants.From Brennan's and Emeril to Commanders Palace—providing all the heady Cajun and Creole flavors of this fabulous food city in one handy volume. Author John DeMers is one of New Orleans' leading food writers, and he starts by giving you a comprehensive overview of the history and food culture of New Orleans—an insightful and spirited look at everything this city stands for in terms of food, with incredible photographs including some family album shots of local food celebrities. Next is a detailed "how-to" introduction to the local ingredients and cooking techniques. The main body of this Creole and Cajun cookbook presents incredible recipes for all the classic New Orleans dishes served at leading restaurants—from Jambalaya to Creole Gumbo and Beignets. These Creole and Cajun recipes are all written by top local chefs and restaurants like Andrea's, Arnaud's, Bayona, K-Paul's Louisiana Kitchen, Emeril and the Sazerac. Relive the rich flavors of the Big Easy in the comfort of your own kitchen with this book! Authentic Cajun and Creole recipes include: Pain Perdu Oysters Rockefeller Seafood Gumbo Crawfish Etouffee Muffuletta Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce World Food Cookbooks allow people to bring the cuisines of the world into their own homes. These beautiful books offer complete information on ingredients, utensils, and cooking techniques. Each volume presents the best authentic recipes and detailed explorations of the cultural context in which dishes are created.

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Leonidas Polk was a graduate of West Point who resigned his commission to enter the Episcopal priesthood as a young man. At first combining parish ministry with cotton farming in Tennessee, Polk subsequently was elected the first bishop of the Louisiana Diocese, whereupon he bought a sugarcane plantation and worked it with several hundred slaves owned by his wife. Then, in the 1850s he was instrumental in the founding of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. When secession led to war he pulled his diocese out of the national church and with other Southern bishops established what they styled the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Confederate States of America. Polk then offered his military services to his friend and former West Point classmate Jefferson Davis and became a major general in the Confederate Army.Polk was one of the more notable, yet controversial, generals of the war. Recognizing his indispensable familiarity with the Mississippi Valley, Confederate president Jefferson Davis commissioned his elevation to a high military position regardless of his lack of prior combat experience. Polk commanded troops in the Battles of Belmont, Shiloh, Perryville, Stones River, Chickamauga, and Meridian as well as several smaller engagements in Georgia leading up to Atlanta. Polk is remembered for his bitter disagreements with his immediate superior, the likewise-controversial General Braxton Bragg of the Army of Tennessee. In 1864, while serving under the command of General Joseph E. Johnston, Polk was killed by Union cannon fire as he observed General Sherman's emplacements on the hills outside Atlanta.

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Hungry for your favorite meal from Chili's, P.F. Chang's, or The Cheesecake Factory? You can satisfy those cravings at home-without the expensive bill after dessert.Bestselling authors Bruce Weinstein and Mark Scarbrough are the authorities on getting the most out of your Instant Pot, having sold hundreds of thousands of copies of their Instant Pot Bible cookbooks. Now, they reveal the secrets to bringing all the flavor and excitement from dozens of beloved restaurants into your own Instant Pot-from Applebee's and Buca di Beppo to Olive Garden and Ruby Tuesday.Not only do these 175 original recipes taste like the real thing, they put you in control of the cooking. That means you can avoid processed foods, use the ingredients you prefer, and adjust each dish to meet your dietary needs. Plus, they have all been tested to work with every model of Instant Pot.With Instant Pot Bible: Copycat Recipes, any night can taste like dining out on the weekend, featuring original Instant Pot versions of:- Chipotle's Queso Blanco- Hale and Hearty's Chicken Pot Pie Soup- Red Robin's Creamy Artichoke and Spinach Dip- The Capital Grille's Lobster Mac-and-Cheese- P. F. Chang's Spicy Miso Ramen- Applebee's Three Cheese Chicken Penne- Buca di Beppo's World-Famous Meatballs- Cracker Barrel's Sunday Pot Roast- Café Rio's Sweet Pork Barbacoa Tostadas- Noodles & Company's Pad Thai with Shrimp- Popeye's Louisiana Kitchen's Cajun Rice- Marie Callender's Famous Golden Cornbread- The Cheesecake Factory's Marshmallow S'mores Cheesecake...and other dishes inspired by Buffalo Wild Wings, Rao's, Outback Steakhouse, Red Lobster, TGI Friday's, and more!

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NOW A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! ‘AN INTENSE AND BROODING THRILLER ’ – THE OBSERVER A intensely romantic and atmospheric thriller for young adults, full of twists and turns with a simmering supernatural undercurrent. Perfect for fans of Holly Jackson, Karen McManus and Delia Owens’ Where the Crawdads Sing When seventeen-year-old Grey makes her annual visit to La Cachette, Louisiana – the tiny bayou town that proclaims to be the “Psychic Capital of the World” – she knows it will be different from past years: her childhood best friend Elora went missing several months earlier and no one is telling the truth about the night she disappears. Grey can’t believe that Elora vanished into thin air any more than she can believe that nobody in a town full of psychics knows what happened. But as she digs into the night that Elora went missing, she begins to realize that everybody in town is hiding something—her grandmother Honey; her childhood crush Hart; and even her late mother, whose secrets continue to call to Grey from beyond the grave. When a mysterious stranger emerges from the bayou – a stormy-eyed boy with links to Elora and the town’s bloody history – Grey realizes that La Cachette’s past is far more present and dangerous than she’d ever understood. She doesn’t know who she can trust. In a town where secrets lurk just below the surface, and where a murderer is on the loose, nobody can be presumed innocent—and La Cachette’s dark and shallow lies may just rip the town apart.

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101st Airborne Division was activated in August 1942 in Louisiana, and its first combat mission was Operation Overlord. On D-Day—June 6, 1944—101st and 82nd Airborne dropped onto the Cotentin peninsula hours before the landings, tasked with capturing bridges and positions, taking out German strongpoints and batteries, and securing the exits from Utah and Omaha Beaches. Things did not initially go smoothly for 101st Airborne, with cloud and antiaircraft fire disrupting the drops resulting in some units landing scattered over a large area outside their designated drop zones and having to waste time assembling—stymied by lost or damaged radio equipment—or trying to achieve their objectives with severely reduced numbers. Casualties were high in some areas due to heavy pre-registered German fire. Nevertheless, the paratroopers fought on and they did manage to secure the crucial beach exits, even if they only achieved a tenuous hold on some other positions. A few days later, 101st Airborne were tasked with attacking the German-held city of Carentan as part of the consolidation of the US beachheads and establishment of a defensive line against the anticipated German counteroffensive. The 101st forced their way into Carentan on 10 and 11 June. The Germans withdrew the following day, and a counteroffensive was put down by elements of the 2nd Armored Division. This fully illustrated book details the planning of the airborne element of D-Day, and the execution of the plans until the troops were withdrawn to prepare for the next big airborne operation, Market Garden.

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The Texas coast offers rich avian treasures for expert birders and beginners alike, if only they know where to look. For those familiar with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department's maps to the Great Texas Coastal Birding Trail, this book on the Upper Texas Coast offers more - more information, more convenient and detailed maps, more pictures, more finding tips, and more birding advice from one of the trail's creators, Ted Lee Eubanks Jr., and trail experts Robert A. Behrstock and Seth Davidson. For those new to the trail, the book is the perfect companion for learning where to find and how to bird the very best venues on this part of the Texas coast.In an opening tutorial on habitat and seasonal strategies for birding the Upper Texas Coast, the authors include tips on how to take advantage of the famous (but elusive) fallouts of birds that happen here. They then briefly discuss the basics of birding by ear and the rewards of passive birding before turning to the trail itself and each of more than 120 birding sites from the Louisiana-Texas border, through Galveston and Houston, to just south of Freeport.While not intended as a field identification guide, the book contains more than 175 color photographs of birds and their coastal habitat, giving readers an excellent feel for the trail's diversity and abundance. Whether you are making your annual spring pilgrimage to Texas, leisurely traveling with the family along the coast, or wondering what to do during a layover in Houston, using this book as your guide to the trail will greatly enhance your birding experience.

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The Garden District of New Orleans has enthralled residents and visitors alike since it arose in the 1830's with its stately white-columned Greek Revival mansions and double-galleried Italianate houses decorated with lacy cast iron. Photographer West Freeman evokes the romance of this elegant neighborhood with lovely images of private homes, dazzling gardens, and public structures. Author Jim Fraiser vividly details the historical significance and architectural styles of more than a hundred structures and chronicles both the political and cultural evolution of the neighborhood.The Garden District, unlike the French Quarter, evolved under the auspices of predominantly Anglo-American architects hired by newly arriving, and newly wealthy, Americans. Beyond these wealthy homeowners, the Garden District also offers a startlingly diverse and freewheeling history teeming with African American slaves, free men and women of color, French, Italians, Germans, Jews, and Irish, all of whom helped fashion it into one of America's first suburbs and most extraordinary neighborhoods. Fraiser animates the Garden District's story with such notables as Mark Twain; Jefferson Davis; occupying Union general Benjamin Butler; flamboyant steamboat captain Thomas Leathers; crusading Reverend Theodore Clapp; Confederate generals Jubal Early and Leonidas Polk; jazzmen Joe ""King"" Oliver and Nate ""Kid"" Ory; champion pugilist John L. Sullivan; local authors Grace King, George Washington Cable, and Anne Rice; Mayor Joseph Shakespeare; architects Henry Howard, Lewis Reynolds, and Thomas Sully; cotton magnate Henry S. Buckner; and Louisiana Lottery co-founder John A. Morris.In words and photographs, Fraiser and Freeman explore the unexpected evolution of this district and reveal how war, plagues, politics, religion, cultural conflict, and architectural innovation shaped the incomparable Garden District.

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Featured on LeVar Burton Reads “Like Oscar Wilde or Ray Bradbury, E. Lily Yu writes the kind of delicious short stories that come with a sting in the tail. Utterly beguiling.” —Kelly Link, bestselling author of Get in Trouble“Each story here is a gem. A trove of fantastical treasures.” —Kirkus Reviews STARRED REVIEW “An astonishing collection of stories…transformative.” —Library Journal STARRED REVIEWThe strange, the sublime, and the monstrous confront one another with astonishing consequences in this collection of twenty-two stories from award-winning writer E. Lily Yu.In the village of Yiwei, a fallen wasp nest unfurls into a beautifully accurate map. In a field in Louisiana, birdwatchers forge an indelible connection over a shared glimpse of a Vermilion Flycatcher, and fall. In Nineveh, a judge who prides himself on impartiality finds himself questioned by a mysterious god. On a nameless shore, a small monster searches for refuge and finds unexpected courage.At turns bittersweet and boundary-breaking, poignant and profound, these twenty-two stories sing, as the oldest fables do, of what it means to be alive in this strange, terrible, beautiful world. For readers who loved the intelligence and compassion in Kim Fu's Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century and the dreamlike prose of Kelly Link's Magic for Beginners, this collection introduces the short fiction of E. Lily Yu, winner of the Astounding Award for Best New Writer and author of the Washington Book Award–winning novel On Fragile Waves, praised by the New York Times Book Review as "devastating and perfect.""A lovely story." —LeVar Burton, on "The Pilgrim and The Angel" (from Jewel Box: Stories)

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The best professional advice Henry Horenstein ever received was to “shoot what you love.” He’s been doing that for more than four decades, capturing photographs that often richly evoke older cultures and places, especially ones that are disappearing: country musicians in Branson, horse racing at Saratoga Springs, nightlife in Buenos Aires, fais do-dos in Cajun Louisiana, old highways everywhere. Horenstein brings these images together in this rich visual memoir, along with behind-the-scenes stories, insights, and tips and suggestions for being a better photographer. His photographs and engaging, often humorous stories chronicle a career that begins in the 1960s, when photography was a trade and even the greatest photographers were not considered to be artists. He amusingly recounts his early assignments. Using his family and friends as subjects for a book on drug abuse was not too much of a stretch, he says, and while shooting Dolly Parton for what would become the Boston Phoenix, the star told him, “Honey, people don’t come out to see me looking like them.” He engagingly recalls his shoots with stars like the Lennon Sisters and Emmylou Harris, as well as his encounters with Ansel Adams, Minor White, Aaron Siskind, Harry Callahan, Nan Goldin, and many other photo legends. Commanding these pages, though, are the subjects with whom Horenstein has chosen to spend most of his professional career, shooting what he loves. His images of honky-tonk stars, stock car drivers, exotic sea creatures, mixed-race residents of rural Maryland, and Venezuelan baseball players tell what he calls “a good story . . . with humor and a punch line, if possible.”

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* AN OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK * ‘A spectacular achievement’ ANTHONY DOERR ‘Extravagantly beautiful’ DAILY MAIL ‘One of the greatest writers of all time’ JACQUELINE WOODSON ‘Extraordinary’ GUARDIAN ‘The best book I’ve read in years’ LOUISE KENNEDY ----------------------- The first weapon I ever held was my mother's hand. On a slave plantation in the Carolinas, Annis has survived in the light of her mother’s resilience, comforted by stories of her African warrior grandmother. Everything she knows, she learned from her mother – how to fight, how to be strong, how to grow up in a world shrouded in darkness. When she is sold south by the white enslaver who fathered her, Annis must venture onward through the rich but unforgiving landscapes of the American South alone: from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans, and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation. Searching for relief in memories of her mother, she opens herself to a world beyond her own, teeming with spirits of earth, water, history and myth. A reimagining of American slavery as beautifully rendered as it is heart-wrenching, Let Us Descend offers a magnificent portrait of the strength of the human spirit and its ability to emerge from darkness into light. This is a story of beauty, love, rebirth and reclamation – a masterwork for the ages. Praise for Sing, Unburied, Sing ‘A must’ Margaret Atwood ‘One of the most important writers in America today’ Ann Patchett ‘Ward is a lyrical, visceral storyteller’ Daily Mail ‘A searing, urgent read’ Celeste Ng ‘Plays out like a grand epic … Staggering’ Marlon James

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A visionary and poignant novel centered around former newspaperman Sam Cunningham as he prepares to die, Late City covers much of the early twentieth century, unfurling as a conversation between the dying man and a surprising God. As the two review Sam's life, from his childhood in the American South and his time in the French trenches during World War I to his fledgling newspaper career in Chicago in the Roaring Twenties and the decades that follow, snippets of history are brought sharply into focus. Sam grows up in Louisiana, with a harsh father, who he comes to resent both for his physical abuse and for what Sam eventually perceives as his flawed morality. Eager to escape and prove himself, Sam enlists in the army as a sniper while still underage. The hardness his father instilled in him helps him make it out of World War I alive, but, as he recounts these tales on his deathbed, we come to realize that it also prevents him from contending with the emotional wounds of war. Back in the US, Sam moves to Chicago to begin a career as a newspaperman that will bring him close to all the major historical turns of the twentieth century. There he meets his wife and has a son, whose fate counters Sam's at almost every turn. As he contemplates his relationships - with his parents, his brothers in arms, his wife, his editor, and most importantly, his son - Sam is amazed at what he still has left to learn about himself after all these years in this heart-rending novel from the Pulitzer Prize winner.

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In the 150 years since the birth of the petroleum industry oil has saturated our culture, fueling our cars and wars, our economy and policies. But just as thoroughly, culture saturates oil. So what exactly is “oil culture”? This book pursues an answer through petrocapitalism’s history in literature, film, fine art, wartime propaganda, and museum displays. Investigating cultural discourses that have taken shape around oil, these essays compose the first sustained attempt to understand how petroleum has suffused the Western imagination. The contributors to this volume examine the oil culture nexus, beginning with the whale oil culture it replaced and analyzing literature and films such as Giant, Sundown, Bernardo Bertolucci’s La Via del Petrolio, and Ben Okri’s “What the Tapster Saw”; corporate art, museum installations, and contemporary photography; and in apocalyptic visions of environmental disaster and science fiction. By considering oil as both a natural resource and a trope, the authors show how oil’s dominance is part of culture rather than an economic or physical necessity. Oil Culture sees beyond oil capitalism to alternative modes of energy production and consumption. Contributors: Georgiana Banita, U of Bamberg; Frederick Buell, Queens College; Gerry Canavan, Marquette U; Melanie Doherty, Wesleyan College; Sarah Frohardt-Lane, Ripon College, Matthew T. Huber, Syracuse U; Dolly Jørgensen, Umeå U; Stephanie LeMenager, U of Oregon; Hanna Musiol, Northeastern U; Chad H. Parker, U of Louisiana at Lafayette; Ruth Salvaggio, U of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Heidi Scott, Florida International U; Imre Szeman, U of Alberta; Michael Watts, U of California, Berkeley; Jennifer Wenzel, Columbia University; Sheena Wilson, U of Alberta; Rochelle Raineri Zuck, U of Minnesota Duluth; Catherine Zuromskis, U of New Mexico.

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