Unsung Patriots

It’s one of the last overlooked parts of American military history: the significant role African Americans played in the wars of America. Their story is more than just the 54th Massachusetts in the Civil War, more than just a tank battalion in World War II: African Americans contributed to every war in American history. Gene Bétit tells this important story with verve and gusto, as well as respect. By their brave deeds, African Americans have secured a place in American military history, and Bétit makes sure they receive their due. In the colonial wars, the Revolution, and the War of 1812, African Americans served as seamen, gunners, and marine sharpshooters in the Navy and served as 15 percent of the Continental Army. During the Civil War, blacks constituted nearly 200,000 soldiers of the Union Army and served in some of the war’s most celebrated regiments and toughest battles, and their service inspired the farthest-reaching of the Union’s emancipation policies. In the decades after the Civil War, Black soldiers formed an important part of the U.S. Army, fighting as Buffalo Soldiers in the Indian Wars of the 1870s, up through the Spanish-American War. In World War I, the segregated 92nd and 93rd Divisions fought hard and received the Croix de Guerre from France. In World War II, more than one million Blacks served the United States—and more than a hundred thousand were assigned to combat duty, not only in the Black Panther tank battalion and the Tuskegee Airmen, but in other combat units and units that kept the American war effort supplied. In the years since World War II, Truman integrated the military during the Korean War, but the African-American soldiers remain a class apart—during Korea, during Vietnam, and beyond. This is a story with importance not only for military history, but for all of American history. And Gene Bétit does it careful, exciting justice.

Unsung Heroes of the American Revolution is not about dates and battles but about courage and character and beliefs. We know the stories of Washington, Adams, Franklin, and Jefferson, but what about the not so famous? What about the supporting cast -- everyone from tavern owners to lawyers? More than twenty are spotlighted in this book. To mention only a few --...the general who took a demotion to help his men...the merchant who stripped ballast from his ship to make bullets ...the sea captain who fought and won a battle by moonlight...the housewife who used her clothesline to send messages...the engineer who outmaneuvered Lord Cornwallis...the sea captain who fought with a handful of men in rowboats...the general who sent his signals with a turkey gobbler call

On biography of Wong Pow Nee, a first Chief Minister of Penang from 1957 to 1969.

For Salih Habibi, the last thing he remembered was his father telling him to carry freedom in his heart. It was just an idea, and there was no time or luxury to dream of such things, especially when each day was simply a matter of survival. Dean Sutton has always known the value of liberty but when he is sent to Iraq as a contract worker he finds himself in constant danger that tests his courage as he faces an unrelenting enemy. With their vastly different understandings of freedom, Salih and Dean are set on a collision course where the lives of thousands are at stake and one vision of liberty must prevail.

,Thomas Paines dream was the establishment of a new nation governed by the people for the people. His passion was the total independence of America, and the declaration of it to the world. Paines goal was democracy. By way of contrast, John Adams scheme was just the opposite. Adams worked to build an overriding national governing body, separate from the common people. His idea was governance by an elite ruling class patterned after the British system. Because Thomas Paine wrote in opposition to Adams intrigues, Adams detested Paine. Yet, later in his life, Adams would admit that History is to ascribe the American Revolution to Thomas Paine. It is the authors firm conviction that by reading The Real Thomas Paine, teachers of American History and anyone who is interested in learning about the formation of the United States and Thomas Paines role in its establishment will derive a much better understanding of Americas birth.

“It is not only the cause, but our manner of conducting it, that will establish character.” —John Dickinson, 1773 A nation at war and widespread mistrust of the mil­itary. A financial crash and an endless economic crisis. A Congress so divided it barely functioned. Bitter partisan disputes over everything from taxa­tion and the distribution of wealth to the role of banks and corporations in society. Welcome to the world of the Founding Fathers. According to most narratives of the American Revolution, the founders were united in their quest for independence and steadfast in their efforts to create a stable, effective government. But the birth of our republic was far more complicated than many realize. The Revolution was nearly derailed by extremists who wanted to do too much, too quickly and who refused to rest until they had remade American society. If not for a small circle of conservatives who kept radicalism in check and promoted capitalism, a strong military, and the preservation of tradition, our country would be vastly different today. In the first book to chronicle the critical role these men played in securing our freedom, David Lefer provides an insightful and gripping account of the birth of modern American conservatism and its impact on the earliest days of our nation. Among these founding conservatives were men like John Dickinson, who joined George Washington’s troops in a battle against the British on July 4, 1776, and that same week drafted the Articles of Confederation; James Wilson, a staunch free-market capitalist who defended his home against a mob of radicals demanding price controls and in the process averted a bloody American equivalent to Bastille Day; Silas Deane, who mixed patriotism with profit seeking while petitioning France to aid America; and Robert Morris, who financed the American Revolution and founded the first bank and the first modern multinational corporation in the United States. Drawing on years of archival research, Lefer shows how these and other determined founders cham­pioned American freedom while staying faithful to their ideals. In the process, they not only helped defeat the British but also laid the groundwork for American capitalism to thrive. The Founding Conservatives is an intellectual adven­ture story, full of gunfights and big ideas. It is also an extraordinary reminder of the punishing battles our predecessors fought to create and maintain the free and prosperous nation we know today.

A dramatic and moving tribute to the military’s unsung heroes, American Patriots tells the story of the black servicemen and women who defended American ideals on the battlefield, even as they faced racism in the ranks and segregation on the home front. Through hundreds of original interviews with veterans of every war since World War I, historic accounts, and photographs, Gail Buckley brings these heroes and their struggles to life. We meet Henry O. Flipper, who withstood silent treatment from his classmates to become the first black graduate of West Point in 1877. And World War II infantry medic Bruce M. Wright, who crawled through a minefield to shield a fallen soldier during an attack. Finally, we meet a young soldier in Vietnam, Colin Powell, who rose through the ranks to become, during the Gulf War, the first black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Fourteen years in the making, American Patriots is a landmark chronicle of the brave men and women whose courage and determination changed the course of American history.

"The State's Sexuality uncovers how the work and lives of women engaged in prostitution, long considered the most abased members of society, have been strategically intertwined with the lofty purpose of building South Korea's postcolonial nation-state. Through a complicated, contradictory patchwork of laws and regulations, which Park Jeong-Mi conceptualizes as a "toleration-regulation regime," the South Korean state did not merely exclude sex workers from ordinary citizenship; it also mobilized them for national security, national development, and the making of a gendered citizenry. In the process, the newly independent state was constructed, augmented, and consolidated. Sex workers often protested such draconian policies and sometimes utilized state apparatuses to get recognition as citizens. Based on expansive, meticulous archival research, and sophisticated interpretation of historical records and women's voices, Park Jeong-Mi rewrites the dynamic history of South Korea from 1945 to the present through the lens of prostitution"--