New Titles Tuesday, July 4

Here is a selection of recently added print books

 Blood and thunder: the epic story of Kit Carson and the conquest of the American West /Hampton Sides. Examines America’s westward expansion, describing the forcible subjugation of Native American tribes, including the fierce battles against the Navajo which ended with a brutal siege at Canyon de Chelly and the Long Walk migration.

 Columbia’s river: the voyages of Robert Gray, 1787-1793 /J. Richard Nokes ; foreword by Louis Leonard Tucker. The story of the Columbia River and its “discoverer”, Robert Gray, who in two trading voyages  captained the Columbia as it became the first American ship to circumnavigate the globe, and entered and explored the long-sought River of the West.

 Experiences in a promised land: essays in Pacific Northwest history /edited by G. Thomas Edwards and Carlos A. Schwantes ; foreword by Robert E. Burke.   The editors of Experiences in the Promised Land,  Edwards and Schwantes,  have carefully compiled a selection of essays that treats the full scope of the region’s history, with a special emphasis on 20th century topics. They have gathered together the best of recent scholarship: the work of regional authorities as well as contributions by some of the most promising of the new generation of scholars. A variety of writing styles and approaches, subjects ranging from individual biographies to studies of broad policies and movements, a chronological organization enhanced by concise, insightful chapter commentaries, and an extensive bibliography make this volume indispensable for reader of Northwest history.

 Father Marquette’s journal /[from the editors of Michigan history magazine]. Father Jacques Marquette was just one of the many missionaries and voyageurs who traveled to New France more than 300 years ago in search of new converts and new lands. After founding Sault Ste. Marie and St. Ignace, Marquette set forth on his greatest adventure–a journey with Louis Jolliet down the Mississippi River. Marquette’s writings reveal his enthusiasm for discovery, his devotion to his faith and his interest in the Native American peoples he encountered.

 Fishers of men: the Jesuit mission at Mackinac, 1670-1765 /James Boynton ; introduction by Phil Porter. The story of the Jesuit Missions at Mackinac is an historical vignette for all those interested in Church history and Michigan history as well. A truly romantic and real tale of trail-blazing for the Kingdom of God.

Forty years a fur trader on the upper Missouri: the personal narrative of Charles Larpenteur, 1833-1872 /historical introduction by Milo Milton Quaife. The life-record kept by Charles Larpenteur is one of our most important sources of information concerning the fur trade of the Upper Missouri in the nineteenth century.Forty Years a Fur Trader is also an insightful source of Native American history. Larpenteur had daily dealings with the Native American tribes of Montana, Wyoming and North Dakota and his journals reveal that he and many of the other trappers showed great respect to the native people, learning to live among them without attempting to eradicate established Native American life.

 French fur traders and voyageurs in the American West /edited by LeRoy R. Hafen ; selected, with an introduction by Janet Lecompte.  This volume documents the fact that in the nineteenth century the French dominated the fur trade in the United States. Twenty-two biographies, collected from Hafen’s classic ten-volume The Mountain Men and the Fur Trade of the Far West, represent a variety of origins and social classes, types of work, and trading areas. Here are trappers who joined John Jacob Astor’s ill-fated fur venture on the Pacific, St. Louis traders who hauled goods to Spanish New Mexico along the Santa Fe Trail, and those who traded with Indians in the western plains and mountains.

 Gold seeker: adventures of a Belgian Argonaut during the Gold Rush years /Jean-Nicolas Perlot ; translated by Helen Harding Bretnor ; edited and with an introduction by Howard R. Lamar. Perlot was a witty, gingery, intelligent man with a sharp eye for significant detail. This book is Perlot’s witty and informative account of his life in California and his subsequent career in the newly rich town of Portland, Oregon.

 Joseph N. Nicollet on the plains and prairies: the expeditions of 1838-39, with journals, letters, and notes on the Dakota Indians /translated from the French and edited by Edmund and Martha Bray  In 1838 and 1839 French scientist Nicollet led two U.S. government-sponsored expeditions into the land between the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. His findings, published in 1843 in the first authentic map of the region, influenced the future of cartography in the United States for generations. This book contains the translations of Nicollet’s journals, letters, and notes written during those expeditions. Nicollet came into contact with many Dakota people in the region, and his detailed observations are a valuable record of their way of life.

 Like Judgment Day: the ruin and redemption of a town called Rosewood /Michael D’Orso. Like Judgment Day is the true story of  a town called Rosewood, where, on New Year’s Day, 1923, a white mob descended, burning houses, killing uncounted numbers of black men and women and driving the rest of the inhabitants away forever. For over seventy years the events in Rosewood remained buried, the truth unacknowledged. This book  reveals the real story of the ruined lives, the shattered dreams, the haunting aftermath…and the ultimate hope and resilience of Rosewood’s survivors.

 Nine years under: coming of age in an inner-city funeral home /Sheri Booker. A dazzling and darkly comic memoir about coming-of-age in a black funeral home in Baltimore.  Booker was only fifteen years old when she started working at Wylie Funeral Home in West Baltimore. Reeling from the death of her beloved great aunt, she found comfort in the funeral home, and soon has the run of the place, from its sacred chapels to the terrifying embalming room.  As families came together to bury one of their own, Booker was privy to their most intimate moments of grief and despair. But along with the sadness, Booker encountered moments of dark humor: brawls between mistresses and widows, and car crashes at McDonald’s with dead bodies in tow. This vibrant tour of a macabre world reveals an urban funeral culture where photo-screened memorial T-shirts often replace suits and ties and the dead are sent off with a joint or a fifth of cognac. Nine Years Under offers readers an unbelievable glimpse into an industry in the backdrop of all our lives.

 Passage of discovery: the American Rivers guide to the Missouri River of Lewis and Clark /Daniel B. Botkin. Botkin retraces the Missouri River passage following the route of Lewis and Clark, guiding readers to nearly 50 legendary sites of historical and environmental importance with driving directions all the way from the river banks of St. Louis to the river’s headwaters in Montana in a lively, compelling book that brings this voyage of discovery to life.

 Power and place in the North American West /edited by Richard White and John M. Findlay.  This collection of twelve essays tackles the subject of power and place from several angles—Indians and non-Indians, race and gender, environment and economy—to gain insight into major forces at work during two centuries of western history. The essays, related to one another by their concern with how power is exercised in, over, and by western places, cover a wide range of times and topics, from 18th-century Spanish New Mexico to 19th-century British Columbia to 20th-century Sun Valley and Los Angeles. They encompass analyses of the concept and rhetoric of race, theoretical speculations on gender and powerlessness, and insights on the causes of current environmental crises.