American Honor

The American Revolution was not only a revolution for liberty and freedom, it was also a revolution of ethics, reshaping what colonial Americans understood as "honor" and "virtue." As Craig Bruce Smith demonstrates, these concepts were crucial aspects of Revolutionary Americans' ideological break from Europe and shared by all ranks of society. Focusing his study primarily on prominent Americans who came of age before and during the Revolution—notably John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington—Smith shows how a colonial ethical transformation caused and became inseparable from the American Revolution, creating an ethical ideology that still remains. By also interweaving individuals and groups that have historically been excluded from the discussion of honor—such as female thinkers, women patriots, slaves, and free African Americans—Smith makes a broad and significant argument about how the Revolutionary era witnessed a fundamental shift in ethical ideas. This thoughtful work sheds new light on a forgotten cause of the Revolution and on the ideological foundation of the United States.

“Not only is this book the best sort of true-crime writing, but it is also a stunning exploration of the concept of manhood in America” (Sebastian Junger, New York Times–bestselling author of War). Through six detailed accounts of murders involving gay men, American Honor Killings examines the facts of cases that are too often politicized, sensationalized, or simply ignored. David McConnell researched killings from small-town Alabama to San Quentin’s death row, and here recounts both notorious and lesser-known crimes. We may tend to think these stories involve either the perpetrator’s internal struggle over his own identity or a victim’s fatally miscalculated proposition. They’re almost never that simple. These riveting narratives reveal how different factors played into each case, among them ideas and beliefs about masculinity. Together, they form a secret American history of rage and desire. In each story, victims, murderers, friends, and relatives come breathtakingly alive. The result is a true-crime book of unusual power, depth, and psychological insight—“a journalistic tour de force made all the more impressive by jailhouse interviews” (Publishers Weekly). “A masterpiece of reportage . . . At turns heartbreaking and terrifying . . . If Truman Capote were alive today, he would die of envy. David McConnell has taken the mantle of great American nonfiction writer.” —Evan Wright, author of Generation Kill

Admiral Charles Stewarts had eleven sea commands during his sixty-three years as an officer in the United States Navy serving fifteen Presidents. Admiral Charles Stewart commanded and sailed most every type of war vessel from sloops to ship-of-the-line war vessels in the nineteenth century. His skills on the seas were demonstrated in his success in many major combat actions with enemy war vessels. Charles Stewart was a statesmen, diplomat, teacher, scholar, and perhaps most important, a man of truth and honor. Charles was the first officer in the United States Navy to bear the title Admiral. Admiral Charles Stewart fought in the Barbary wars, the War of 1812, the final battle with the Muslim pirates in 1815, as commander-in-chief in the defense of the Pacific (1821) in the breakup of the Spanish held colonies, and the protection of trade in the Atlantic and Mediterranean. He married Delia Tudor in 1813 and they had a son and daughter. The marriage did not last. Stewarts true love was Margaret Smith and they had a son. There was talk about running Charles Stewart for President of the United States beginning in 1840. Admiral Charles Stewart served as a pallbearer on the funeral train of President Lincoln in 1862. United States Navy destroyers and destroyer escorts named after Senior Commodore Charles Stewart. Destroyers were named after distinguished USN/USMC officers and enlisted men such as Charles Stewart. (DD, (Destroyers)-216, DD-291, and DE, (Destroyer Escort)-DE-238 and DE-224 carried Stewarts name.

Honor and Duty is a tribute Chinese Americans who served in the U.S. Armed Forces during WWII. Biographical information, detailed service record, and photographs provide vivid evidence of their service to the United States.

Paints a portrait of the killers of several gay men through research and jailhouse interviews, exploring the roots of hatred and sexual violence and claiming that the murders may be considered "honor killings" by their perpetrators.

Describes the political, diplomatic, and military challenges faced by the delegates from the 13 colonies at the Continental Congress and how they came together to agree to free themselves from British rule and forge independence for America.

The inspiring story of the first female Marine to fly a combat mission in an F/A-18—and the transformative events that led to her bold decision to take on the most powerful man in the U.S. Senate. Amy McGrath grew up in Edgewood, Kentucky, a childhood shaped by love of country, baseball (the Cincinnati Reds), and, from the age of twelve, a fascination with fighter jets. Her devastation at learning that a federal law prohibited women from flying in combat fueled her determination to do just that--and then, to help change the laws to improve the lives of all Americans. McGrath writes of gaining an appointment in high school to the U.S. Naval Academy, making it through Marine Corps training, graduating from Annapolis, Maryland, becoming a Second Lieutenant, and raising her right hand to swear to defend the U.S. Constitution, honor bound. She vividly recounts her experiences flying in the Marines, and her combat deployments to Iraq (Kuwait) and Afghanistan, her work as an Air Combat Tactics instructor—and what it was like to finally fly that fighter jet: high-speed, intense, and physically demanding. Here is McGrath, training to do the most intense tactical flying there is (think the Navy's TOPGUN ); meeting the man who would become her husband; being promoted to major and then lieutenant colonel; marrying, having three children, a career and life in Washington and then moving her family back to Kentucky to begin a whole new chapter in politics; her roller-coaster congressional campaign (she lost by three percentage points); and making the tough decision to run again, in an even bigger, higher-stakes national campaign, against the five-term leader of the U.S. Senate, Mitch McConnell. A moving, inspiring American story of courage, determination, and large dreams.

In a timely contribution to current debates over the psychology of boys and the construction of their social lives, On My Honor explores the folk customs of adolescent males in the Boy Scouts of America during a summer encampment in California's Sierra Nevada. Drawing on more than twenty years of research and extensive visits and interviews with members of the troop, Mechling uncovers the key rituals and play events through which the Boy Scouts shapes boys into men. He describes the campfire songs, initiation rites, games, and activities that are used to mold the Scouts into responsible adults. The themes of honor and character alternate in this new study as we witness troop leaders offering examples in structure, discipline, and guidance, and teaching scouts the difficult balance between freedom and self-control. What results is a probing look into the inner lives of boys in our culture and their rocky transition into manhood. On My Honor provides a provocative, sometimes shocking glimpse into the sexual awakening and moral development of young men coming to grips with their nascent desires, their innate aggressions, their inclination toward peer pressure and violence, and their social acculturation. On My Honor ultimately shows how the Boy Scouts of America continues to edify and mentor young men against the backdrop of controversies over freedom of religious expression, homosexuality, and the proposed inclusion of female members. While the organization's bureaucracy has taken an unyielding stance against gay men and atheists, real live Scouts are often more open to plurality than we might assume. In their embrace of tolerance, acceptance, and understanding, troop leaders at the local level have the power to shape boys into emotionally mature men.

"From the earliest records of human civilization until the dawn of the twentieth century, and in widely separated cultures throughout the world, the story of honor was inseparable from the story of mankind. Today, an acquaintance with the concept of honor is indispensable to understanding the culture of the Islamic world and its sense of grievance against the West, where honor has been disregarded or actively despised for three-quarters of a century." "James Bowman draws from an wealth of sources across many centuries to illuminate honor's curious history in our own culture, and he discovers that Western honor was always different from that found elsewhere. Its idiosyncratic qualities derived partly from the classical tradition but mainly from the Judeo-Christian heritage, whose emphases on individual morality and, more recently, on sincerity and authenticity in private and personal life have acted as continual challenges to the traditional notion of honor as it is still maintained in other parts of the world. These challenges to honor and the accommodations with it that they ultimately produced are a fundamental theme in our own culture's distinctive history; and the eventual collapse of the honor culture in the West is the background against which the War on Terror and the Clash of Civilizations ought to be seen."--Jacket.