Résultats de recherche de titre
Articles 30921 à 30940 sur 36886
This Union soldier&’s diary recounts his journey from enlistment to postwar life, with extensive historical and biographical context provided by…
the editor. When war broke out between the states, William J. McLean left his home in Fairfield, NY, and joined the 34th New York Infantry. He kept a diary that tells of his many wanderings and adventures, from his time in Washington, D.C. to picket duty along the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. William also describes the first death of a soldier in his regiment, the excitement over Bull Run, and an incursion into rebel-infested Virginia. Offering much more than a simple diary transcription, editor Dennis D. Urban sheds light on the actions of the 34th at Edward&’s Ferry during the Battle of Balls Bluff; McLean&’s effort to correct his military and pension records; and the post-war years of William, his brother, and his father, all of whom served the Union cause. Extensive chapter notes also provide biographical information about the regimental friends and other individuals William mentions in his entries.City for Empire: An Anchorage History, 1919-1941
Par Preston Jones. 2010
The story of the early years of Alaska&’s largest city, its surprisingly diverse people, and its role in twentieth-century American…
history. First settled in 1915, Anchorage, in what was then known as the Territory of Alaska, was founded with the American empire in mind. During World War I, it served as a conduit through which coal could be shipped to the Pacific, where the US Navy was engaged with Japan. Years later, during World War II, Anchorage became an equally important site for the defense of the mainland and the projection of American power. City for Empire tells the story of Anchorage&’s development in that period, focusing in particular on the international context of the city&’s early decades and its surprisingly diverse inhabitants. A thorough yet accessible read, City for Empire captures the history of this remarkable city.A Civil War Captain and His Lady: A True Story of Love, Courtship, and Combat
Par Gene Barr. 2016
A True Cold Mountain from the Northern PerspectiveMore than 150 years ago, 27-year-old Irish immigrant Josiah Moore met 19-year-old Jennie…
Lindsay, a member of one of Peoria, Illinoiss most prominent families. The Civil War had just begun, Josiah was the captain of the 17th Illinois Infantry, and his war would be a long and bloody one. Their courtship and romance, which came to light in a rare and unpublished series of letters, forms the basis of Gene Barrs memorable A Civil War Captain and His Lady: A True Story of Love, Courtship, and Combat.The story of Josiah, Jennie, the men of the 17th and their families tracks the toll on our nation during the war and allows us to explore the often difficult recovery after the last gun sounded in 1865.Josiahs and Jennies letters shed significant light on the important role played by a soldiers sweetheart on the home front, and a warriors observations from the war front. Josiahs letters offer a deeply personal glimpse into army life, how he dealt with the loss of many close to him, and the effects of war on a mans physical, spiritual, and moral well-being. Jennies letters show a young woman mature beyond her age, dealing with the difficulties on the home front while her brother and her new love struggle through the travails of war. Her encouragement to keep his faith in God strong and remain morally upright gave Josiah the strength to lead his men through the horrors of the Civil War. Politics also thread their way through the letters and include the evolution of Jennies fathers view of the conflict. A leader in the Peoria community and former member of the Illinois state house, he engages in his own political wars when he shifts his affiliation from the Whig Party to the new Republican Party, and is finally elected to the Illinois Senate as a Peace Democrat and becomes one of the states more notorious Copperheads.In addition to this deeply moving and often riveting correspondence, Barr includes additional previously unpublished material on the 17th Illinois and the wars Western Theater, including Fort Donelson, Shiloh, Vicksburg, and the lesser known Meridian Campaignactions that have historically received much less attention than similar battles in the Eastern Theater. The result is a rich, complete, and satisfying story of love, danger, politics, and warfare, and it is one you wont soon forget.Targeted Tracks: The Cumberland Valley Railroad in the Civil War, 1861–1865
Par Scott L. Mingus Sr., Cooper H. Wingert. 2019
The Civil War was the first conflict in which railroads played a major role. Although much has been written about…
their role in general, little has been written about specific lines. The Cumberland Valley Railroad, for example, played an important strategic role by connecting Hagerstown, Maryland to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Its location enhanced its importance during some of the Civil War’s most critical campaigns. Despite the line’s significance to the Union war effort, its remarkable story remains little known. The publication of Targeted Tracks: The Cumberland Valley Railroad in the Civil War, 1861-1865, by Scott L. Mingus Sr. and Cooper H. Wingert, rectifies that oversight. Because of its proximity to major cities in the Eastern Theater, the Cumberland Valley Railroad was an enticing target for Confederate leaders. As invading armies jostled for position, the CVRR’s valuable rolling stock was never far from their minds. Northern military and railway officials, who knew the line was a prized target, coordinated—and just as often butted heads—in a series of efforts to ensure the railroad’s prized resources remained out of enemy hands. When they failed to protect the line, as they sometimes did, Southern horsemen wrought havoc on the Northern war effort by tearing up its tracks, seizing or torching Union supplies, and laying waste to warehouses, engine houses, and passenger depots. In October 1859, Abolitionist John Brown used the CVRR in his fateful Harpers Ferry raid. The line was under direct threat by invading Confederates during the Antietam Campaign, and the following summer suffered serious damage during the Gettysburg Campaign. In 1864, Rebel raiders burned much of its headquarters town, Chambersburg, including the homes of many CVRR employees. The railroad was as vital to residents of the bustling and fertile Cumberland Valley as it was to the Union war effort. Targeted Tracks is grounded on the railway’s voluminous reports, the letters and diaries of local residents and Union and Confederate soldiers, official reports, and newspaper accounts. The primary sources, combined with the expertise of the authors, bring this largely untold story to life.John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General
Par Stephen M. Hood. 2013
WINNER of the 2014 ALBERT CASTEL BOOK AWARD and the 2014 WALT WHITMAN AWARDJohn Bell Hood was one of the…
Confederacys most successfuland enigmaticgenerals. He died at 48 after a brief illness in August of 1879, leaving behind the first draft of his memoirs Advance and Retreat: Personal Experiences in the United States and Confederate States Armies. Published posthumously the following year, the memoirs immediately became as controversial as their author. A careful and balanced examination of these controversies, however, coupled with the recent discovery of Hoods personal papers (which were long considered lost) finally sets the record straight in John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General.Outlived by most of his critics, Hoods published version of many of the major events and controversies of his Confederate military career were met with scorn and skepticism. Some described his memoirs as nothing more than a polemic against his arch-rival Joseph E. Johnston. These unflattering opinions persisted throughout the decades and reached their nadir in 1992, when an influential author described Hoods memoirs as merely a bitter, misleading, and highly distorted treatise replete with distortions, misrepresentations, and outright falsifications. Without any personal papers to contradict them, many historians and writers portrayed Hood as an inept and dishonest opium addict and a conniving, vindictive cripple of a man. One writer went so far as to brand him a fool with a license to kill his own men. What most readers dont know is that nearly all of these authors misused sources, ignored contrary evidence, and/or suppressed facts sympathetic to Hood.Stephen M. Sam Hood, a distant relative of the general, embarked on a meticulous forensic study of the common perceptions and controversies of his famous kinsman. His careful examination of the original sources utilized to create the broadly accepted facts about John Bell Hood uncovered startlingly poor scholarship by some of the most well-known and influential historians of the 20th and 21st centuries. These discoveries, coupled with his access to a large cache of recently discovered Hood papersmany penned by generals and other officers who served with Hoodconfirm Hoods account that originally appeared in his memoir and resolve, for the first time, some of the most controversial aspects of Hoods long career.Blindly accepting historical truths without vigorous challenge, cautions one historian, is a perilous path to understanding real history. The shocking revelations in John Bell Hood: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of a Confederate General will forever change our perceptions of Hood as both a man and a general, and those who set out to shape his legacy.Battle Digest: Lexington-Concord (Battle Digest Series)
Par Christopher J. Petty. 2021
A concise summary of the fight that sparked the American Revolution, with key facts, maps, images, historical significance, and more.…
Tension between Britain and her North American colonies had been building for years. After numerous protests and acts of defiance, things took a serious turn after the December 1773 Boston Tea Party, when an irate King George III and Parliament took more drastic action to teach their rebellious citizens in Massachusetts a lesson. After they shut down Boston’s port, dissolved elected government, and placed the colony under military occupation, the dry tinder of Colonial resentment was ready to ignite. The spark came on the morning of April 19, 1775, as a British force moved west to destroy military supplies secretly stored in Concord. When the column came upon a small company of militia waiting on Lexington Green, the fateful “shot heard round the world” rang out—and the American Revolution had begun. Learn about this world-changing encounter in this summary that includes all the key aspects of the campaign and battle, including maps, images, and lessons learned."No Such Army Since the Days of Julius Caesar": Sherman's Carolinas Campaign from Fayetteville to Averasboro, March 1865
Par Mark A. Smith, Wade Sokolosky. 2017
General William T. Shermans 1865 Carolinas Campaign receives scant attention from most Civil War historians, largely because it was overshadowed…
by the Army of Northern Virginias final battles against the Army of the Potomac. Career military officers Mark A. Smith and Wade Sokolosky rectify this oversight with No Such Army Since the Days of Julius Caesar, a careful and impartial examination of Shermans army and its many accomplishments.The authors dedicate their professional training and research and writing abilities to the critical days of March 11-16, 1865the overlooked run-up to the seminal Battle of Bentonville (March 19-21, 1865). They begin with the capture of Fayetteville and the demolition of the arsenal there, before chronicling the two-day Battle of Averasboro in more detail than any other study. At Averasboro, Lt. Gen. William J. Hardees Confederates conducted a well-planned and brilliantly executed defense-in-depth that held Shermans juggernaut in check for two days. With his objective accomplished, Hardee disengaged and marched to concentrate his corps with Gen. Joseph E. Johnston for what would become Bentonville.This completely revised and updated edition of No Such Army Since the Days of Julius Caesar: Shermans Carolinas Campaign from Fayetteville to Averasboro, March 1865 is based upon extensive archival and firsthand research. It includes new original maps, orders of battle, abundant illustrations, and a detailed driving and walking tour for dedicated battlefield enthusiasts. Readers with an interest in the Carolinas, Generals Sherman and Johnston, or the Civil War in general will enjoy this book.People Helping People: 75 Years of the Texas Credit Union League
Par Edward M. Walters. 2009
An in-depth look at the history of the financial institution, from its 1934 establishment to the 2008 US financial crisis.The…
first seventy-five years for the Texas Credit Union League have been extraordinary! From its modest inception to its solid stature enjoyed today, the membership’s collective voice has guided us and served as a steadying arm. For three-quarters of a century, we’ve reached out to support one another in our drive toward improving the financial health of credit union members. This book illuminates the individuals who championed the credit union movement in Texas and who worked tirelessly to safeguard our cooperative nature and to enhance our ability to meet member needs.The League story is one of vision, faith, and the firm belief that each of us is enriched because of the sum of our cooperative experiences. Because we continue to support one another, our association lives its mission of protecting credit unions and promoting their growth, strength, and unity.Santa Rita del Cobre: A Copper Mining Community in New Mexico (Mining the American West)
Par Christopher J. Huggard, Terrence M. Humble. 2012
The Spanish, Mexicans, and Americans, successively, mined copper for more than 200 years in Santa Rita, New Mexico. Starting in…
1799 after an Apache man led the Spanish to the native copper deposits, miners at the site followed industry developments in the nineteenth century to create a network of underground mines. In the early twentieth century these works became part of the Chino Copper Company's open-pit mining operations-operations that would overtake Santa Rita by 1970. In Santa Rita del Cobre, Huggard and Humble detail these developments with in-depth explanations of mining technology, and describe the effects on and consequences for the workers, the community, and the natural environment. Originally known as El Cobre, the mining-military camp of Santa Rita del Cobre ultimately became the company town of Santa Rita, which after World War II evolved into an independent community. From the town's beginnings to its demise, its mixed-heritage inhabitants from Mexico and United States cultivated rich family, educational, religious, social, and labor traditions. Extensive archival photographs, many taken by officials of the Kennecott Copper Corporation, accompany the text, providing an important visual and historical record of a town swallowed up by the industry that created it.The 8th Georgia Volunteer Infantry Regiment 1861–1865: A Biographical Roster
Par Richard Michael Allen. 2021
The 7th, 8th, 9th, and 11th Georgia volunteer infantry regiments spent most of the Civil War fighting under Brig. Gen.…
George Thomas “Tige” Anderson in Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. Until now, no biographical roster of their members has ever been published. These Georgians saw it all, from the bloody battle of First Manassas through the ferocious combat of Second Manassas, Sharpsburg, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and the long siege of Petersburg. They finally furled their banners at Appomattox. Nearly 5,000 men passed through these four Georgia regiments. These rosters offer a long overdue record of these men. Each roster is organized by company in a simple and easy to use format. Entries feature full names (if known), promotions, demotions, casualties, transfers, and resignations for every rank—an unprecedented look into men and the structure and evolution of these organizations. They include the most comprehensive examination of the personnel originally enlisted and their subsequent service histories within these units in chronological order for the first time. Compiler and author Richard Allen has spent nearly two decades researching scores of archives and other sources to prepare these rosters. He utilized primary sources such as the Official Records, Compiled Service Records, newspaper accounts, diaries, letters, census information, burial records, and a variety of documents from both published sources and private collections. Students of the Civil War, genealogists, and enthusiasts of Georgia history will find these rosters invaluable. Everyone who uses them owes Rick Allen a hearty, and heartfelt, thank you.Liberty's First Crisis: Adams, Jefferson, and the Misfits Who Saved Free Speech
Par Charles Slack. 2015
When the United States government passed the Bill of Rights in 1791, its uncompromising protection of speech and of the…
press were unlike anything the world had ever seen before. But by 1798, the once-dazzling young republic of the United States was on the verge of collapse: partisanship gripped the weak federal government, British seizures threatened American goods and men on the high seas, and war with France seemed imminent as its own democratic revolution deteriorated into terror. Suddenly, the First Amendment, which protected harsh commentary of the weak government, no longer seemed as practical. So that July, President John Adams and the Federalists in control of Congress passed an extreme piece of legislation that made criticism of the government and its leaders a crime punishable by heavy fines and jail time. In Liberty’s First Crisis, writer Charles Slack tells the story of the 1798 Sedition Act, the crucial moment when high ideals met real-world politics and the country’s future hung in the balance.From a loudmouth in a bar to a firebrand politician to Benjamin Franklin’s own grandson, those victimized by the Sedition Act were as varied as the country’s citizenry. But Americans refused to let their freedoms be so easily dismissed: they penned fiery editorials, signed petitions, and raised "liberty poles,” while Vice President Thomas Jefferson and James Madison drew up the infamous Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, arguing that the Federalist government had gone one step too far. Liberty’s First Crisis vividly unfolds these pivotal events in the early life of the republic, as the Founding Fathers struggled to define America off the page and preserve the freedoms they had fought so hard to create.A collection of letters from a Union surgeon in the American Civil War, revealing what life was like for a…
doctor and a soldier in that era.Union surgeon James Dana Benton witnessed firsthand the suffering and death brought about by the ghastly wounds, infections, and diseases that wreaked havoc to both the Union and Confederate armies. A native of New York, Dr. Benton penned a series of letters throughout the war to his family relating his experiences with the 111th New York Infantry as an assistant surgeon, and later with the 98th New York as surgeon. This unique correspondence—which covers a wide array of topics beyond medicine and the treatment of the injured—is the basis of Death, Disease, and Life at War: The Civil War Letters of Surgeon James D. Benton, 111th and 98th New York Infantry Regiments, 1862-1865.Dr. Benton was present for some of the war’s most gruesome and important battles, including Gettysburg, Cold Harbor, and the siege of Petersburg. He was also present for the fall of Harpers Ferry, Abraham Lincoln’s second Inaugural address, and the collapse of Richmond. His pen offers an insightful and honest look into the everyday life of not only a Union surgeon, but also an officer who suffered the same basic hardships other soldiers in the ranks endured. Chris Loperfido’s Death, Disease, and Life at War is a valuable addition to the Civil War bookshelf.“More than 600,00 men perished in the Civil War, and many more were wounded or fell ill. Prompt and timely attention from an army surgeon was often the difference between life and death. James Benton’s letters home provide a compelling glimpse into the everyday life of these doctors—their concerns and frustrations, their patients and colleagues, the places visited, and their opinions on the war. I commend Christopher Loperfido for bringing this interesting slice of the war to light.” —Scott L. Mingus, Sr., award-winning author of Confederate General William “Extra Billy Smith”: From Virginia’s Statehouse to Gettysburg Scapegoat“Loperfido’s excellent arrangement of [Benton’s] letters provide[s] a compelling look at the life of a Union doctor during a time when the practice of medicine was still primitive and an understanding of health in general was scanty at best. Death, Disease, and Life at War is another valuable piece to the puzzle of understanding what it was like to serve in the Civil War.” —Meg Groeling, author of The Aftermath of the Battle: The Burial of the Civil War DeadWhen Women Win: Emily's List and the Rise of Women in American Politics
Par Craig Unger, Ellen R. Malcolm. 2016
"A must-read, sure to engage. . . An important and richly narrated reminder to women of why, 'If you not…
at the table, you’re on the menu.'” —Jessica Valenti, founder of Feministing.com and author of Full Frontal Feminism “Women had to fight first for the vote, and then for the right to be voted for. No one, but no one, has been more crucial to this ongoing struggle than Ellen Malcolm, and no one has more revealing stories to tell, her own plus those of women candidates in all our diversity. When Women Win will give you faith that this country might one day become a democracy.” —Gloria Steinem In 1985, aware of the near-total absence of women in Congress, Ellen Malcolm launched EMILY’s List, a powerhouse political organization that seeks to ignite change by getting women elected to office. The rest is riveting history: since then, EMILY’s List has helped elect 23 women Senators, 12 governors, and 116 Democratic women to the House. When Women Win delivers stories of some of the toughest political contests of the past three decades, including the historic victory of Barbara Mikulski as the first Democratic woman elected to the Senate in her own right and Elizabeth Warren’s dramatic Senate win. When Women Win is both a page-turning political drama and an important look at the effects of women’s engagement in politics. “Both a rip-roaring political tale and an inspirational blueprint—with every trade secret revealed—of how and why Democratic women have been on the rise in electoral politics for three decades.” —Nancy Pelosi, House Democratic leader “Superwoman Ellen R. Malcolm, with Craig Unger, heroically continues to beat the drum for female equality in When Women Win.” —Vanity FairThe Rice Room: Growing Up Chinese-American from Number Two Son to Rock 'n' Roll
Par Ben Fong-Torres. 1953
An instant best-seller when originally published in 1994, this expanded and updated edition of The Rice Room tells of growing…
up with a double identity—Chinese and American. Ben Fong-Torres was torn between an alluring American lifestyle—including Elvis and rock ‘n’ roll—and the traditional cultural heritage his proud immigrant parents struggled to instill in their five children. Now illustrated with personal family photographs as well as photos of the author with various celebrities, Fong-Torres rounds out his life story with a new final chapter.Stuart's Finest Hour: The Ride Around McClellan, June 1862
Par John J. Fox. 2014
Many people are aware that Jeb Stuart was a famous cavalry general who rode for the Confederacy. Yet, how did…
this twenty-nine-year-old former US Army lieutenant become the 1860s version of a media sensation? At the beginning of June 1862, George McClellan s huge Union Army stood poised to decimate the Confederate capital of Richmond. The city faced chaos as thousands of civilians fled. Confederate Army commander Robert E. Lee wanted to launch his own attack, but he needed to know what stood on McClellan s right flank. John Fox s new book, Stuart s Finest Hour, uses numerous eyewitness accounts to place the reader in the dusty saddle of both the hunter and the hunted as Stuart s men sliced deep behind Union lines to gather information for Lee. This first-ever book written about the raid follows the Confederate horsemen on their 110-mile ride, all the while chased by Union troopers commanded by Stuart s father-in-law, Philip St. George Cooke.The 11th Georgia Volunteer Infantry Regiment 1861–1865: A Biographical Roster
Par Richard Michael Allen. 2021
The 7th, 8th, 9th, and 11th Georgia volunteer infantry regiments spent most of the Civil War fighting under Brig. Gen.…
George Thomas “Tige” Anderson in Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. Until now, no biographical roster of their members has ever been published. These Georgians saw it all, from the bloody battle of First Manassas through the ferocious combat of Second Manassas, Sharpsburg, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and the long siege of Petersburg. They finally furled their banners at Appomattox. Nearly 5,000 men passed through these four Georgia regiments. These rosters offer a long overdue record of these men. Each roster is organized by company in a simple and easy to use format. Entries feature full names (if known), promotions, demotions, casualties, transfers, and resignations for every rank—an unprecedented look into men and the structure and evolution of these organizations. They include the most comprehensive examination of the personnel originally enlisted and their subsequent service histories within these units in chronological order for the first time. Compiler and author Richard Allen has spent nearly two decades researching scores of archives and other sources to prepare these rosters. He utilized primary sources such as the Official Records, Compiled Service Records, newspaper accounts, diaries, letters, census information, burial records, and a variety of documents from both published sources and private collections. Students of the Civil War, genealogists, and enthusiasts of Georgia history will find these rosters invaluable. Everyone who uses them owes Rick Allen a hearty, and heartfelt, thank you.Decision at Tom’s Brook: George Custer, Tom Rosser, and the Joy of the Fight
Par William J. Miller. 2016
The Battle of Tom’s Brook, recalled one Confederate soldier, was “the greatest disaster that ever befell our cavalry during the…
whole war.” The fight took place during the last autumn of the Civil War, when the Union General Phil Sheridan vowed to turn the crop-rich Shenandoah Valley into “a desert.” Farms and homes were burned, livestock slaughtered, and Southern families suffered. The story of the Tom’s Brook cavalry affair centers on two young men who had risen to prominence as soldiers: George A. Custer and Thomas L. Rosser. They had been fast friends since their teenage days at West Point, but the war sent them down separate paths—Custer to the Union army and Rosser to the Confederacy. Each was a born warrior who took obvious joy in the exhilaration of battle. Each possessed almost all of the traits of the ideal cavalryman—courage, intelligence, physical strength, inner-fire. Only their judgment was questionable. Their separate paths converged in the Shenandoah Valley in the summer of 1864, when Custer was ordered to destroy, and Rosser was ordered to stop him. For three days, Rosser’s gray troopers pursued and attacked the Federals. On the fourth day, October 9, the tables turned in the open fields above Tom’s Brook, where each ambitious friend sought his own advancement at the expense of the other. One capitalized upon every advantage fate threw before him, while the other, sure of his abilities in battle and eager to fight, attempted to impose his will on unfavorable circumstances and tempted fate by inviting catastrophe. This long-overlooked cavalry action had a lasting effect on mounted operations and influenced the balance of the campaign in the Valley. Based upon extensive research in primary documents and gracefully written, award-winning author William J. Miller’s Decision at Tom’s Brook presents significant new material on Thomas Rosser, and argues that his character was his destiny. Rosser’s decision-making that day changed his life and the lives of hundreds of other men. Miller’s new study is Civil War history and high personal drama at its finest.The Ultimate Guide to the Gettysburg Address
Par David Hirsch, Dan Van Haften. 2017
Abraham Lincoln’s November 19, 1863, Gettysburg Address is generally recognized as one of the greatest leadership speeches ever written. The…
Ultimate Guide to the Gettysburg Address explains the 272-word speech more thoroughly than any book previously published. With the aid of colorized step-by-step diagrams, the authors deconstruct the speech into its basic elements and demonstrate how the scientific method is basic to the structure of the Gettysburg Address. Lincoln’s fascination with geometry is well documented. Authors David Hirsch and Dan Van Haften, however, are the first to discover and then demonstrate Lincoln’s use of the six elements of a proposition and then diagram and explain how his in-depth study of geometry helped him compose the Gettysburg Address. The result is a deeper and richer understanding of the Gettysburg Address that was not previously possible. This concise color examination of one of our nation’s most treasured and important speeches is perfect for all ages and especially for those interested in history, the use of language, and logic.How tea’s political meaning shaped the culture and economy of the Anglo-American world.Americans imagined tea as central to their revolution.…
After years of colonial boycotts against the commodity, the Sons of Liberty kindled the fire of independence when they dumped tea in the Boston harbor in 1773. To reject tea as a consumer item and symbol of “taxation without representation” was to reject Great Britain as master of the American economy and government. But tea played a longer and far more complicated role in American economic history than the events at Boston suggest.In The Trouble with Tea, historian Jane T. Merritt explores tea as a central component of eighteenth-century global trade and probes its connections to the politics of consumption. Arguing that tea caused trouble over the course of the eighteenth century in several different ways, Merritt traces the multifaceted impact of that luxury item on British imperial policy, colonial politics, and the financial structure of merchant companies. Merritt challenges the assumption among economic historians that consumer demand drove merchants to provide an ever-increasing supply of goods, thus sparking a consumer revolution in the early eighteenth century.The Trouble with Tea reveals a surprising truth: that concerns about the British political economy, coupled with the corporate machinations of the East India Company, brought an abundance of tea to Britain, causing the company to target North America as a potential market for surplus tea. American consumers only slowly habituated themselves to the beverage, aided by clever marketing and the availability of Caribbean sugar. Indeed, the “revolution” in consumer activity that followed came not from a proliferation of goods, but because the meaning of these goods changed. By the 1750s, British subjects at home and in America increasingly purchased and consumed tea on a daily basis; once thought a luxury, tea had become a necessity. This fascinating look at the unpredictable path of a single commodity will change the way readers look at both tea and the emergence of America.“By tackling a commodity we think we already know in its political, economic, and cultural dimensions, Jane T. Merritt demonstrates that the true story of tea is more complex and global than readers might expect. The Trouble with Tea is a surprising and detailed look at how the long-term moral debates over tea overlapped with and offered a vocabulary for the politicized debates of the Revolutionary War era.” —Ellen Hartigan-O’Connor, author of The Ties that Buy: Women and Commerce in Revolutionary America“Long before Bostonians dumped tea overboard, tea was trouble: as trading companies pushed it and consumers sipped it, tea sparked debates over free trade and dangerous luxuries. With her wide-ranging command of global commerce and domestic politics, Merritt tells a vital tale about how tea shaped our world.” —Benjamin L. Carp, author of Defiance of the Patriots: The Boston Tea Party and the Making of AmericaAn in-depth examination of the role U.S. House leadership plays in shaping America’s national policy and political system.Many studies of…
Congress hold that congressional leaders are “agents” of their followers, ascertaining what legislators agree on and acting to advance those issues rather than stepping to the forefront to shape national policy or the institution they lead. Randall Strahan argues that this approach to understanding leadership is incomplete. Here he demonstrates why and explores the independent contributions leaders make in congressional politics.Leading Representatives is a study that draws on both historical and contemporary cases to show how U.S. House leaders have advanced changes inside Congress and in national policy. Exploring the tactics, tenure, and efficacy of the leadership of three of the most colorful and prominent Speakers of the House—Henry Clay, Thomas Reed, and Newt Gingrich—Strahan finds that these men, though separated in time and of differing thought and actions, were all leaders willing to take political risks to advance goals they cared about deeply. As a result, each acted independently of his followers to alter the political landscape. Strahan makes use of a wide range of resources, including the former representatives’ papers and correspondence and interviews with Gingrich and his staffers, to demonstrate how these important leaders influenced policy and politics and where they ran aground.In expounding lessons Strahan has gleaned over two decades of studying U.S. legislative politics, Leading Representatives offers a new theoretical framework—the conditional agency perspective—that effectively links contextual perspectives as applied to congressional leadership with those emphasizing characteristics of individual leaders.