Duncan (a writer, no university affiliation) explored the American West, focusing on those counties with fewer than two people per square mile. He sketches the people he encountered, including ranche
Fresh out of a Defiance, Ohio, high school, Thomas Boyd (1898–1935) joined the Marines to serve his country in the patriotic heat of the spring of 1917. In 1919 he came home from the war with a Croix
For a generation the Lost Battalion exemplified the best of America’s involvement in World War I. Until World War II pushed the Lost Battalion out of the national memory with its own scenes of horror
A young man in modern America is terrorized by visions of an earlier, primitive life. Across the enormous chasm of thousands of centuries, his consciousness has become entwined with that of Big-Tooth,
In 1976 Roger Kahn spent an entire baseball season, from spring training through the World Series, with players of every stripe and competence. The result is this book, in which Kahn reports on a smal
Native American characters have been the most malleable of metaphors for filmmakers. The likeable Doc of Stagecoach (1939) had audiences on the edge of their seats with dire warnings about “that old b
Landmark court cases in the history of formal U.S. relations with Indian tribes are Corn Tassel, Standing Bear, Crow Dog, and Lone Wolf. Each exemplifies a problem or a process as the United States de
Guided by his speech-act theory, Kearns (English, U. of Texas-Permian Basin) combines traditional narratology, which seeks the rules or codes of composition of a narrative, with rhetoric's tools for a
Four newlywed couples, along with one single man, were sent to Oregon in 1838 to reinforce the two-year-old mission established by Marcus Whitman and Henry Spalding. These reinforcements were to becom
Never to Return is a witty, penetrating account of a woman’s inner journey to understanding through her encounter with Freudian psychoanalysis. On the brink of turning fifty, Elena suddenly falls into
Includes not only Marcelline's (1898-1963) recollections of growing up with her brother Ernest (1899-1961) in Oak Park, Illinois, first published in 1961, but also 81 letters, cards, and telegrams, mo
From 1860 to 1890 the United States military engaged in war after war with the indigenous peoples of the West. Although numerous treaties recognized the rights of individual tribes, the U.S. governmen
Hannah Szenes grew up in a loving home filled with books, plays, and music. Unfortunately, the rise of the Nazis in her native Hungary forced Hannah to immigrate to Palestine, where she became an arde
Hamlin Garland, a Pulitzer Prize-winner and author of more than forty books, was a central figure in American literary life for half a century. He was intimately involved with many of the major litera
If not by nature, then by habit, people tend to match one thing with another—man and woman, laughter and tears, sickness and health, fire and water, master and servant—thereby accentuating similaritie
Graced with illustrations by the author, Crane Music introduces the two North American crane species. The sandhill, most often seen, is within easy reach of bird-watchers in the center of the continen
First published in 1923, A Lost Lady is one of Willa Cather’s classic novels about life on the Great Plains. It harks back to Nebraska’s early history and contrasts those days with an unsentimental po
A collection of twenty-three tales involving Aj'ap'a, a tortoise with human traits who has relationships with an assortment of animal and human characters
James Cutler, a high school physics teacher, is shattered by the suicide of his most promising student. Hoping to gain perspective and peace of mind, he travels with his wife, Phyllis, to Vermont to s
Hero of the Soviet Union Dmitriy Loza has carefully crafted his World War II experiences with U.S.-provided Sherman tanks into a highly readable memoir. Between the fall of 1943 and August 1945, Loza
Distributed by the University of Nebraska Press for the University of Idaho PressIdaho, unknown to most and loved by those who have experienced it, comes alive in this innovative work. Schwantes, with
Rue Ordener, Rue Labat is a moving memoir by the distinguished French philosopher Sarah Kofman. It opens with the horrifying moment in July 1942 when the author’s father, the rabbi of a small synagogu
For many people the Bible is a dusty old book with little relevance to their lives. But for Vistozky the Bible is a living entity that can offer endless insights for its readers if they enter into dia
John Davis has a "dull aching sense of missing out, of not getting anywhere." There must be millions like him, he thinks. His relations with his wife, Serena, are shallow and unsatisfying. In the late
James Josiah Webb left Independence, Missouri, in the summer of 1844 and headed down the Santa Fe Trail with goods bought in St. Louis. Although his first venture as a trader was a failure, he eventua
At eighty-three Marcia Elder was alert and active but felt insecure about facing another winter alone, yet she dreaded giving up her old home and entering a retirement facility. So, with great resourc
One day Alice C. Fletcher realized that "unlike my Indian friends, I was an alien, a stranger in my native land." But while living with the Indians and pursuing her ethnological studies she felt that
"We are dealing here with a living literature," wrote Morris Edward Opler in his preface to Myths and Tales of the Chiricahua Apache Indians. First published in 1942 by the American Folk-Lore Society,
When President-elect Abraham Lincoln was preparing to go to Washington he appealed to his old friend and law partner Ward Hill Lamon: “I want you to go along with me. . . . In fact I must have you. So
Abraham Lincoln "was a tall, spare man, with large bones, and towering up to six feet and four inches. He leaned forward, and stooped as he walked...There was no grace in his movements, but an express
"Long before the Confederacy was crushed militarily, it was defeated economically," writes Charles L. Dufour. He contends that with the fall of the critical city of New Orleans in spring 1862 the Sout
This classic history is filled with colorful pathmarkers like Jedediah Smith, John C. Fremont, and Kit Carson; with packers, home seekers, and mail couriers; and with horse thieves and enslavers of In
The daughter of an Indianapolis mortician, Janet Flanner really began to live at the age of thirty, when she fled to Paris with her female lover. That was in 1921, a few years before she signed on as
"[Abel's] story is a tragic one, but leaving it untold would be a greater tragedy. Native American southerners shared the experience of the Civil War with other Americans, and their involvement in tha
These influential essay and lectures by T. S. Eliot span nearly a half century--from 1917, when he published The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, to 1961, four years before his death. With the lumino
The four life histories collected here—personal accounts of the Yaqui wars, deportation from Sonora in virtual slavery, life assoldaderas with the Mexican Revolutionary army, emigration to Arizona to
A classic of ethnobotany, Uses of Plants by the Indians of the Missouri River Region has been enlarged for this Bison Book edition with thirty drawings, by Bellamy Parks Jansen, of plants discussed by
A National Jewish Book Award WinnerMrs. Moskowitz and her cat move from their house into a new apartment and feel a little lost. They miss their house, filled with family memories. But then her son br
A gentle maiden aunt who has been victimized for years unexpectedly retaliates through her talent for making life-sized dolls filled with honey. “The Youngest Doll,” based on a family anecdote, is a s
It was an awesome sight, that regiment of Mounted Riflemen slowly marching up the Oregon Trail, already crowded with gold seekers and their animals in 1849. In May of that year five companies of men a
