For Crew and Country

For Crew and Country PDF Author: John Wukovits
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250021243
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
In For Crew and Country, John Wukovits tells of the most dramatic naval battle of the Pacific War and the incredible sacrifice of the USS Samuel B. Roberts. On October 25, 1944, the Samuel B. Roberts, along with the other twelve vessels comprising its unit, stood between Japan's largest battleship force ever sent to sea and MacArthur's transports inside Leyte Gulf. Faced with the surprise appearance of more than twenty Japanese battleships, cruisers, and destroyers, including the Yamato, at 70,000 tons the most potent battlewagon in the world, the 1,200-ton Samuel B. Roberts turned immediately into action with six other ships. Captain Copeland marked the occasion with one of the most poignant addresses ever given to men on the edge of battle: "Men," he said over the intercom, "we are about to go into a fight against overwhelming odds from which survival cannot be expected." The ship churned straight at the enemy in a near-suicidal attempt to deflect the more potent foe, allow the small aircraft carriers to escape, and buy time for MacArthur's forces. Of 563 destroyers constructed during WWII, the Samuel B. Roberts was the only one sunk, going down with guns blazing in a duel reminiscent of the Spartans at Thermopylae or Davy Crockett's Alamo defenders. The men who survived faced a horrifying three-day nightmare in the sea, where they battled a lack of food and water, scorching sun and numbing nighttime cold, and nature's most feared adversary—sharks. The battle would go down as history's greatest sea clash, the Battle of Samar—the dramatic climax of the Battle of Leyte Gulf.

For Crew and Country

For Crew and Country PDF Author: John Wukovits
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250021243
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

Get Book Here

Book Description
In For Crew and Country, John Wukovits tells of the most dramatic naval battle of the Pacific War and the incredible sacrifice of the USS Samuel B. Roberts. On October 25, 1944, the Samuel B. Roberts, along with the other twelve vessels comprising its unit, stood between Japan's largest battleship force ever sent to sea and MacArthur's transports inside Leyte Gulf. Faced with the surprise appearance of more than twenty Japanese battleships, cruisers, and destroyers, including the Yamato, at 70,000 tons the most potent battlewagon in the world, the 1,200-ton Samuel B. Roberts turned immediately into action with six other ships. Captain Copeland marked the occasion with one of the most poignant addresses ever given to men on the edge of battle: "Men," he said over the intercom, "we are about to go into a fight against overwhelming odds from which survival cannot be expected." The ship churned straight at the enemy in a near-suicidal attempt to deflect the more potent foe, allow the small aircraft carriers to escape, and buy time for MacArthur's forces. Of 563 destroyers constructed during WWII, the Samuel B. Roberts was the only one sunk, going down with guns blazing in a duel reminiscent of the Spartans at Thermopylae or Davy Crockett's Alamo defenders. The men who survived faced a horrifying three-day nightmare in the sea, where they battled a lack of food and water, scorching sun and numbing nighttime cold, and nature's most feared adversary—sharks. The battle would go down as history's greatest sea clash, the Battle of Samar—the dramatic climax of the Battle of Leyte Gulf.

For Crew and Country

For Crew and Country PDF Author: John Wukovits
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 0312681895
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 369

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Book Description
Wukovits tells of the most dramatic naval battle of the Pacific War and the incredible sacrifice of the USS "Samuel B. Roberts." Faced with the surprise appearance of more than 20 Japanese battleships, cruisers, and destroyers, the 1,200-ton "Samuel B. Roberts" turned immediately into action with six other ships.

American Harvest

American Harvest PDF Author: Marie Mutsuki Mockett
Publisher: Graywolf Press
ISBN: 1644451166
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 416

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Book Description
An epic story of the American wheat harvest, the politics of food, and the culture of the Great Plains For over one hundred years, the Mockett family has owned a seven-thousand-acre wheat farm in the panhandle of Nebraska, where Marie Mutsuki Mockett’s father was raised. Mockett, who grew up in bohemian Carmel, California, with her father and her Japanese mother, knew little about farming when she inherited this land. Her father had all but forsworn it. In American Harvest, Mockett accompanies a group of evangelical Christian wheat harvesters through the heartland at the invitation of Eric Wolgemuth, the conservative farmer who has cut her family’s fields for decades. As Mockett follows Wolgemuth’s crew on the trail of ripening wheat from Texas to Idaho, they contemplate what Wolgemuth refers to as “the divide,” inadvertently peeling back layers of the American story to expose its contradictions and unhealed wounds. She joins the crew in the fields, attends church, and struggles to adapt to the rhythms of rural life, all the while continually reminded of her own status as a person who signals “not white,” but who people she encounters can’t quite categorize. American Harvest is an extraordinary evocation of the land and a thoughtful exploration of ingrained beliefs, from evangelical skepticism of evolution to cosmopolitan assumptions about food production and farming. With exquisite lyricism and humanity, this astonishing book attempts to reconcile competing versions of our national story.

Uncommon Carriers

Uncommon Carriers PDF Author: John McPhee
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780865477391
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
McPhee, in prose distinguished by its warm humor, keen insight, and rich sense of human character, looks at the people who drive trucks, captain ships, pilot towboats, drive coal trains, and carry lobsters through the air: people who work in freight transportation.

Hell from the Heavens

Hell from the Heavens PDF Author: John Wukovits
Publisher: Da Capo Press, Incorporated
ISBN: 0306823241
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
From acclaimed historian John Wukovits, the untold story of the USS Laffey and her crew, who heroically withstood twenty-two kamikaze attacks at Okinawa which the US Navy describes Òas one of the great sea epics of the warÓ

Shadow Country

Shadow Country PDF Author: Peter Matthiessen
Publisher: Modern Library
ISBN: 1588368246
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 912

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Book Description
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • “Altogether gripping, shocking, and brilliantly told, not just a tour de force in its stylistic range, but a great American novel, as powerful a reading experience as nearly any in our literature.”—Michael Dirda, The New York Review of Books Killing Mister Watson, Lost Man’s River, and Bone by Bone—Peter Matthiessen’s great American epic about Everglades sugar planter and notorious outlaw E. J. Watson on the wild Florida frontier at the turn of the twentieth century—were originally conceived as one vast, mysterious novel. Now, in this bold new rendering, Matthiessen has marvelously distilled a monumental work while deepening the insights and motivations of his characters with brilliant rewriting throughout. Praise for Shadow Country “Magnificent . . . breathtaking . . . Finally now we have [this three-part saga] welded like a bell, and with Watson’s song the last sound, all the elements fuse and resonate.”—Los Angeles Times “Peter Matthiessen has done great things with the Watson trilogy. It’s the story of our continent, both land and people, and his writing does every justice to the blood fury of his themes.”—Don DeLillo “The fiction of Peter Ma­­tthiessen is the reason a lot of people in my generation decided to be writers. No doubt about it. Shadow Country lives up to anyone’s highest expectations for great writing.” —Richard Ford “Shadow Country, Matthiessen’s distillation of the earlier Watson saga, represents his original vision. It is the quintessence of his lifelong concerns, and a great legacy.”—W. S. Merwin “[An] epic masterpiece . . . a great American novel.”—The Miami Herald

God, Family, Country

God, Family, Country PDF Author: Craig Morgan
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
ISBN: 1665058668
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 305

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Book Description
Country music icon, army veteran, father, outdoorsman—Craig Morgan shares all aspects of his life, revealing stories even his most avid fans don’t know. Written with Jim DeFelice, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller American Sniper In 1989, as US news outlets declared an end to Operation Just Cause, Craig Morgan was part of an elite group of military operatives jumping into the jungle along the Panamanian border on a covert operation. Fans know the country music star from his hit songs and acclaimed albums, but there’s a lot more to him—a soldier who worked with the CIA in Panama, an undercover agent who fought sex traffickers in Thailand, and a dedicated family man who lives the values he sings. Craig details these many facets of his life and more in God, Family, Country. An on-stage appearance with his father’s band at age ten may have planted the seeds for life as a country star, but first he trained as a paratrooper in the army. After earning numerous distinctions, his path to sergeant major was all but assured. Then came a momentous decision: he left the active military to pursue music. With unwavering support from his wife and a pack of part-time jobs, he toughed out the lean years and achieved his first big success with the poignant ballad “Almost Home.” Other hits soon followed, from party songs like “Redneck Yacht Club” to the soul-rending “The Father, My Son, and the Holy Ghost.” Born from the anguish of his son Jerry’s passing, the song’s tribute has consoled and inspired millions across the world. Duty to country has been a constant throughout his life and globe-spanning career. In 2006, as “That’s What I Love about Sunday” topped country radio charts, Craig was riding in a convoy of Humvees in Iraq. An avid outdoorsman, a former sheriff’s deputy who’s still a member of the auxiliary, and always a husband and father first, Craig Morgan will inspire you with his life lived by the deepest values: God, family, country.

Dream Country

Dream Country PDF Author: Shannon Gibney
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0735231680
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 369

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Book Description
The heartbreaking story of five generations of young people from a single African-and-American family pursuing an elusive dream of freedom. "Gut wrenching and incredible.”— Sabaa Tahir #1 New York Times bestselling author of An Ember in the Ashes "This novel is a remarkable achievement."—Kelly Barnhill, New York Times bestselling author and Newbery medalist "Beautifully epic."—Ibi Zoboi, author American Street and National Book Award finalist Dream Country begins in suburban Minneapolis at the moment when seventeen-year-old Kollie Flomo begins to crack under the strain of his life as a Liberian refugee. He's exhausted by being at once too black and not black enough for his African American peers and worn down by the expectations of his own Liberian family and community. When his frustration finally spills into violence and his parents send him back to Monrovia to reform school, the story shifts. Like Kollie, readers travel back to Liberia, but also back in time, to the early twentieth century and the point of view of Togar Somah, an eighteen-year-old indigenous Liberian on the run from government militias that would force him to work the plantations of the Congo people, descendants of the African American slaves who colonized Liberia almost a century earlier. When Togar's section draws to a shocking close, the novel jumps again, back to America in 1827, to the children of Yasmine Wright, who leave a Virginia plantation with their mother for Liberia, where they're promised freedom and a chance at self-determination by the American Colonization Society. The Wrights begin their section by fleeing the whip and by its close, they are then the ones who wield it. With each new section, the novel uncovers fresh hope and resonating heartbreak, all based on historical fact. In Dream Country, Shannon Gibney spins a riveting tale of the nightmarish spiral of death and exile connecting America and Africa, and of how one determined young dreamer tries to break free and gain control of her destiny.

The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom

The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom PDF Author: John Pomfret
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company
ISBN: 1429944129
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 705

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Book Description
A remarkable history of the two-centuries-old relationship between the United States and China, from the Revolutionary War to the present day From the clipper ships that ventured to Canton hauling cargos of American ginseng to swap Chinese tea, to the US warships facing off against China's growing navy in the South China Sea, from the Yankee missionaries who brought Christianity and education to China, to the Chinese who built the American West, the United States and China have always been dramatically intertwined. For more than two centuries, American and Chinese statesmen, merchants, missionaries, and adventurers, men and women, have profoundly influenced the fate of these nations. While we tend to think of America's ties with China as starting in 1972 with the visit of President Richard Nixon to China, the patterns—rapturous enchantment followed by angry disillusionment—were set in motion hundreds of years earlier. Drawing on personal letters, diaries, memoirs, government documents, and contemporary news reports, John Pomfret reconstructs the surprising, tragic, and marvelous ways Americans and Chinese have engaged with one another through the centuries. A fascinating and thrilling account, The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom is also an indispensable book for understanding the most important—and often the most perplexing—relationship between any two countries in the world.

Ready All! George Yeoman Pocock and Crew Racing

Ready All! George Yeoman Pocock and Crew Racing PDF Author: Gordon Newell
Publisher: University of Washington Press
ISBN: 0295997982
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
In the 1920s, an upstart West Coast college began to challenge the Eastern universities in the ancient sport of crew racing. Sportswriters scoffed at the “crude western boats” and their crews. But for the next forty years, the University of Washington dominated rowing around the world. The secret of the Huskies’ success was George Pocock, a soft-spoken English immigrant raised on the banks of the Thames. Pocock combined perfectionism with innovation to make the lightest, best-balanced, fastest shells the world had ever seen. After studying the magnificent canoes built by Northwest Indians, he broke with tradition and began to make shells of native cedar. Pocock, who had been a champion sculler in his youth, never credited his boats for the accomplishments of a crew. He wanted every rower to share his vision of discipline and teamwork. As rowers from the University of Washington went on to become coaches at major universities across the country, Pocock’s philosophy—and his shells—became nationally famous in the world of crew. Drawing on documents provided by Pocock’s family, photographs from the University of Washington Crew Archives, and interviews with rowers who revered the man, Newell evokes the times as well as the life of this unique figure in American sport.