Showing results by publisher "Books in Motion" in History

Within hours of the 1995 bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, the FBI had evidence pointing to Islamic extremists. But incredibly, federal authorities quickly squelched all investigations implicating Middle Eastern suspects. Here, award-winning investigative reporter Jayna Davis shares a gripping and intensely personal account of her arrival on the scene 13 minutes after the blast, the worldwide search for suspects, and the abrupt abandonment of the manhunt for John Doe #2.

On June 20, 1945, just before the end of the war, 123 American bombers took off from the island of Guam for an attack on Shizuoka, a Japanese city at the foot of Mount Fuji. The raid destroyed two-thirds of the city, taking the lives of 2,000 of its citizens. Twenty-three American airmen also died when two of their planes collided in mid-air. That these 23 men were enemy soldiers mattered little to one Japanese person who buried their remains next to the graves of the Shizuoka citizens killed in the attack....

Our American West, Volume 4 completes the collection of historical stories written by Gary McCarthy. These include tales of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, which proved once and for all that the storied and hoped for river across America didn't exist. That long before the Gold Rush of 1849, a diminutive but courageous priest, Fr. Junipero Serra, sacrificed everything to bring Christianity to the coastal Native Americans, while faithfully establishing a string of beautiful California missions.

In the spring of 1962, the early days of the Vietnam War, Air Commando Crew 139 was assigned their first mission. They were ordered to land a special forces Green Beret team on an unsecured Vietnamese air strip in a Viet Cong dominated area. This was just the beginning of an explosive tour of duty in the “Gooney Bird” over Vietnam.

Pearl Taylor left her conventional home and life in Toledo, Ohio, to take up gambling on the Mississippi. She survived life in a boom camp in the Arizona Territory and ultimately became an outlaw. Once caught, she awaited trial for an armed stagecoach robbery, while reporters dubbed her "The Bandit Queen".

Chief Joseph, of the Nez Perce tribe, lived from 1840 to 1904. He became a legend through his heroic efforts to keep his people in their homeland in Oregon's Wallowa Valley. For years he tried to accommodate encroaching white men on his tribal lands, but finally gave up and attempted, in the fall of 1877, to lead his people safely to Canada.

Perhaps no other figure in American history is more shrouded in myth and legend than David ("Davy") Crockett, the Tennessee frontiersman whose death at the Alamo in 1836 ensured his place in the Valhalla of American heroes. Crockett himself was responsible for much of the folklore about his life. A gregarious, fun-loving man, he was more than capable of spinning tall tales over a "horn" of liquor.

Grasshoppers in Summer examines the conflict between Native American plains tribes and the U.S. westward expansion from 1866 to 1876. It begins with the Fetterman massacre and negotiation of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. That treaty ended Red Cloud's war for control of the Bozeman Trail. President Ulysses S. Grant came to office a year later on a reform platform that included Indian peace policy. Relentless cultural, economic, political and religious pressure frustrated Grant's effort to reform Indian policy.

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.

Few civilians realize the immense role the brave pilots in C-130 aircraft played in the Vietnam War. Now, Major Curt Messex tells the hair raising tales he experienced piloting a C-130. Imagine flying a boxcar with four engines, loaded with high explosive fuel, at night, low, over a jungle with numerous Viet Cong shooting at you with 23mm, 37mm, and 57mm guns.

A poignant, true-survival story of a young boy who hid for years underground in Holland during World War II. A Boy In Hiding sheds a light on the difficult road that laid ahead for Anne Frank – had she survived. Now, 60 years later, Rubens gives a voice to the young boy, who – despite the hard time and difficulties he encountered, never lost his positive view on life.

Mary Edwards Walker (1832-1919) defied the conventions of her era. Born and raised on a farm in Oswego, New York, Walker became one of a handful of female physicians in the nation - as well as a passionate believer in the rights of women. She campaigned for women's suffrage and against traditional male-dominated marriage vows, and any issue involving the sublimation of her sex. From the outset of the Civil War, Walker volunteered her services as a physician.

Of War and Weddings is a moving and compelling true story of bitter wartime enemies who find peace through their children's marriage. A mysterious force that weaves its way into the lives of the Yellin and Yamakawa families ends up healing the wounds of war and nurturing a legacy of freedom and understanding for the children of America and Japan. We experience Jerry Yellin's destiny from childhood to retirement.

Our American West, Volume 2 begins with America’s first colonizers, the prairie dogs, and how out on the ranges they were so hated by ranchers that they were almost made extinct. Conestoga Wagons were once called “prairie schooners” crossing America long before the famed Pony Express. The indomitable courage of Sarah Winnemucca, the “Prairie Princess” rivals that of a tall Swede named Showshoe Thompson who skied the snowy river passes of the Sierra Nevadas.

Our American West, Volume 3 is filled with western frontier stories you’ll find entertaining. "The Roadrunner – Our Sagebrush Clowns" reflects on the speedy and often comical bird of our southwestern deserts. Wild and wicked Calamity Jane lived up to her reputation as the West’s most infamous outlaw woman. “The Donner Party – Frozen Horror” describes the horror that led to cannibalism. The 49er Gold Rush ruined the lives of two ambitious and well-intentioned men, John Augustus Sutter and John Marshal...

In Our American West, Volume 1, discover humor, tragedy, and courage in every one of these delightful stories. Gary McCarthy has been writing about the American West for 30 years and these are some of his favorite topics written - not for the expert or scholar - but for all the armchair admirers of thing historically written.

On June 25, 1876, five troops of the U. S. Seventh Cavalry, under command of General George Armstrong Custer, rode into the valley of the Little Big Horn River expecting to rout the Indian encampment there. Instead they were met by the gathered strength of the Sioux and Cheyenne warriors, who did not run, but turned to battle the soldiers.

Robbers Roost was a hideout for outlaws and hunted men long before Butch Cassidy found it in 1884. The wastelands of the high desert in Southeastern Utah seemed impenetrable. Cut through by canyons along the Green and Colorado rivers, bounded by the Dirty Devil river, the terrain was a natural barrier discouraging lawmen from pursuit.

Just as the big trees of the Pacific Northwest inspired the legend of Paul Bunyan, so did the Palouse Hills of southeastern Washington--where fantastic fields of wheat were raised on incredibly steep slopes--spawn tall tales about farmers, steamboat men, and the ingenious methods they used to get their grain to market. Though thirty-three-mule hitches and headers (whose downhill wheels were three times larger than the uphill ones) solved the harvesting problems, transporting the sacked grain two thousand vertical feet down to the steamboat landings took sheer genius.

Amity Whitford dared to stake her own claim on the endless plains of Western Kansas. She built her homestead, Dove's Nest, with her bare hands. But the ravages of the sun and drying winds took their toll.