American Western History

Barney Dwyer is a gentle giant who has yet to find a place in the world. Capturing two notorious outlaws has made a hero of him, so much so that rancher Robert Parmelee offers him a job on his ranch to put a stop to persistent rustling. Taking the job promises an income sufficient for Barney to marry his sweetheart. But this promise for the future falls into jeopardy when the outlaws escape, determined to kill Barney.

The gripping story of 200 freed Mississippi slaves who sailed to Liberia to build a new colony - where the colonists' repression of the native tribes would beget a tragic cycle of violence. When a wealthy Mississippi cotton planter named Isaac Ross died in 1836, his will decreed that his plantation, Prospect Hill, should be liquidated and the proceeds from the sale be used to pay for his slaves' passage to the newly established colony of Liberia in western Africa.

Leitha Watson presents "Love and Loyalty", a captivating Western Romance Fiction novel that will transport you to a world filled with passion, danger, and unwavering devotion. Prepare to be swept away on a thrilling journey where love and loyalty are put to the ultimate test. Get ready to immerse yourself in a tale that will keep you turning the pages, eager to uncover the secrets that lie within. Set against the backdrop of the Untamed Wild West, "Love and Loyalty" takes place during a time of great turmoil and change. As the sun sets on the American frontier, an extraordinary love story ...

Do you want to learn about Abigail Adams but don’t have the time or patience to read a thick book? Then this short and concise book “Abigail Adams: First Lady of the United States” is for you!! During Abigail Adams’ long and productive life, she had many interesting adventures and made many contributions to the young American republic, including the following: One of the “founding mothers” of the United States of America. Acted as a political advisor to her husband while he served as ambassador, vice president, and president, for the United States. An early advocate for the ...

A Minneapolis Reporter follows the boyhood dream to see Where Goes The River. On Memorial Day, 1925, he embarked from the headwaters of the Mississippi River-Lake Itasca, and spent the next 105 days on the river, becoming the first person to have made the complete 2500-mile journey by canoe. Averaging nearly 30 miles per day Tousley and his three separate companions, endured the elements and enjoyed the mighty grandeur of the river in the only way that one can truly experience it. . . by canoe. A 17-foot wood and canvas beauty named Charles H. Curly of St. Paul their canoe bore the brunt of...

Vice House: Presidential Vice and its Impact on American History takes listeners behind the scenes of the White House to uncover the vices, scandals, and moral failings that have shaped the nation’s highest office. From the Founding Fathers to modern presidents, this book delves into the personal lives of America’s leaders to reveal how their choices influenced policy, public opinion, and the course of history.

In 1980, Exxon U.S.A., the world's largest corporation, began development of a five-billion-dollar oil shale industry in the pristine Colorado River Valley. Within eighteen months, Exxon had canceled its elaborate Colony project and 2,100 workers were immediately laid off. Boomtown Blues chronicles the social, environmental, and economic havoc created by one of the most expensive boom and bust cycles in the history of the American West.

The exciting western novella born from the award-winning screenplay and concept short film... A town and a woman attacked and abandoned. A tangled past that leads a man to a heartbreaking truth. The Civil War has ended leaving Captain Trace Mitchell with nothing except an old letter from his wife. She has fled west to a mining town deep inside the Arizona Territory taking their son with her. When the captain arrives, he finds it strangely deserted and shrouded with secrets. Or is it? Alone in Remembrance, Joelle Carson has known nothing but misery. That is until a wounded Confederate ...

Do you like epic tales that sing the deeds of the world’s greatest heroes? If so, you will love this volume of epics from the West African country of Mali. Each is full of battles, derring-do, magic, and prophecies based on historical events.

In 1935, during the wind-swept years of the Dust Bowl, three people went missing on separate occasions in the rugged canyon country of southeastern Utah, a place “wild, desolate, mysterious”. A 13-year-old girl, Lucy Garrett, was tricked into heading west with the man who had murdered her father under the pretense of reuniting with him. At the same time, a search was underway for Dan Thrapp, a young scientist on leave from the American Museum of Natural History.

A “long-shot” or “underdog” would best describe the former governor of Tennessee, James Knox Polk, who had lost two reelection bids and now sought his party’s vice-presidential nomination. Events unfolded rapidly at the Democratic convention in the warm summer of 1844. James Polk had hoped to be his party’s choice as front runner Martin Van Buren’s vice presidential nominee going into the fall general election. Seven ballots into the nomination process the convention was hopelessly deadlocked, then Polk’s friends began spreading the word that “Young Hickory” was Andrew ...

Award-winning western historian Andrew R. Graybill now sheds light on the overlooked interracial Native-white relationships critical in the development of the trans-Mississippi West in this multigenerational saga. Beginning in 1844 with the marriage of Montana fur trader Malcolm Clarke and his Piegan Blackfeet bride, Coth-co-co-na, Graybill traces the family from the mid-nineteenth century, when such mixed marriages proliferated, to the first half of the twentieth, when Clarke ’s children and grandchildren often encountered virulent prejudice.

The creation of the Texas Rangers, as a response to Indian retaliations and renegade assaults on the banking and transportation systems, was born of a need to react quickly. Special skills were required, and unlike the military, resourcefulness and improvisatory thinking were prized, alongside obedience to orders. Author Mike Cox described the ideal Texas Ranger as one who is "able to handle any situation without definite instruction from his commanding officer."

The Reconstruction era has begun. The country is moving forward. And so is the Bennett Family. With half of their family aboard the long overdue California II, including Jonathan who promised his wife to return home in time for the birth of their child, tension mounts. The family eagerly awaits news of the ship’s arrival, but when they finally receive the telegram, the news is bittersweet. The ship has returned to port, but Jonathan must now race against time to make it home for the momentous event. Meanwhile, Samantha’s brother, Adam, embarks on a mission to find his lost son, born ...

While attempting to join up with her lover Matt Jorgensen as he joins Confederate Calvary, Ginny McBride is hit by a musketball from a Union rifle. She develops amnesia, losing all memory as to who and where she is. Matt spends his military time trying to find her. When she returns to herself, she in turn tries to find Matt. It is a story that also engulfs the Western folklore of Jesse James, Cole Younger and his brothers and Belle (Starr) Shirley as they became legends.

Francis is found. Beyond Francis, a family is found—in archival material that barely deigned to notice their existence. This is the story of Francis Sistrunk and her children, from enslavement into forced migration across South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. It spans decades before the Civil War and continues into post-emancipation America. A family story full of twists and turns, Finding Francis reclaims and honors those women who played an essential role in the historical survival and triumph of Black people during and after American slavery.

From the 1830s onward, a succession of well-born Britons headed west to the great American wilderness to find adventure and fulfillment. They brought their dogs, sporting guns, valets, and all the attitudes and prejudices of their class. Prairie Fever explores why the West had such a strong romantic appeal for them at a time when their inherited wealth and passion for sport had no American equivalent.

Erin Hogan hit the road in her Volkswagen Jetta and headed west from Chicago in search of the monuments of American land art: a salty coil of rocks, 400 stainless steel poles, a gash in a mesa, four concrete tubes, and military sheds filled with cubes. Her journey took her through the states of Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas. It also took her through the states of anxiety, drunkenness, disorientation, and heat exhaustion. Spiral Jetta is a chronicle of this journey.

Edward Zane Carroll Judson aka Ned Buntline (1821-1886) was responsible for creating a highly romantic and often misleading image of the American West, albeit one that the masses found irresistible in the mid-to-late 19th century. Some scholars estimate that he wrote at least 400 dime novels over his lifetime and perhaps as many as 600. The Notorious Life of Ned Buntline is an open-eyed look at the man who sparked an American legend but whose own scandalous life somehow escaped history's limelight.

After five years of virtual banishment because he sold out his small outfit to the Middle Arizona Cattle Company, giving it a foothold on the Mesa Grande range, violent-tempered Joe Bonnyman is summoned back to Lodgepole by his father when it appears that a cattle war between the syndicate and the various rangers is imminent. During his short stay in town, Joe has an unpleasant meeting with Ed Merrill, the brother of a girl Joe had once courted.