Author: Peter John Blodgett
Publisher: Huntington Library Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 156
Book Description
"The year 2000 ... marks the sesquicentennial of California's statehood. California entered the Union on September 9, 1850--fewer than three years after the discovery of gold at Sutter's sawmill on January 24, 1848. Such a transformation in so short a span of time seems remarkable itself but not unanticipated, given the great interest shown by the English, French, Russians, and Americans during the 1830s and 1840s in exploiting Mexican California's abundant natural resources. Even before the discovery of gold, the Englishman Sir George Simpson wrote in 1847 that 'the English race, as I have already hinted, is doubtless destined to add this fair and fertile province to its possessions on this continent. ... The only doubt is, whether California is to fall to the British or the Americans.' Gold only hastened what some saw as inevitable. In contemplating California's fate, Simpson referred to what was 'destined' to happen. 'Manifest destiny' became the cliché of many American historians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who saw the acquisition of California as both the logical and appropriate conclusion to the conquest of North America begun two centuries earlier by the first European colonists. The Huntington's exhibition Land of Golden Dreams takes a broader look at the impact of the Gold Rush on California, the nation, and the world. Like other contemporary historians, Peter Blodgett, curator of Western American historical manuscripts, examines the complete social fabric of California in the decade 1848-58 and its radical transformation, catalyzed by gold discovery, from 'a captured Mexican province to the thirty-first state of the American Union.' He notes that 'the events of the Gold Rush would remain a touchstone for generations of later Californians.' "--From Foreword, page 7.
Land of Golden Dreams
Author: Peter John Blodgett
Publisher: Huntington Library Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 156
Book Description
"The year 2000 ... marks the sesquicentennial of California's statehood. California entered the Union on September 9, 1850--fewer than three years after the discovery of gold at Sutter's sawmill on January 24, 1848. Such a transformation in so short a span of time seems remarkable itself but not unanticipated, given the great interest shown by the English, French, Russians, and Americans during the 1830s and 1840s in exploiting Mexican California's abundant natural resources. Even before the discovery of gold, the Englishman Sir George Simpson wrote in 1847 that 'the English race, as I have already hinted, is doubtless destined to add this fair and fertile province to its possessions on this continent. ... The only doubt is, whether California is to fall to the British or the Americans.' Gold only hastened what some saw as inevitable. In contemplating California's fate, Simpson referred to what was 'destined' to happen. 'Manifest destiny' became the cliché of many American historians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who saw the acquisition of California as both the logical and appropriate conclusion to the conquest of North America begun two centuries earlier by the first European colonists. The Huntington's exhibition Land of Golden Dreams takes a broader look at the impact of the Gold Rush on California, the nation, and the world. Like other contemporary historians, Peter Blodgett, curator of Western American historical manuscripts, examines the complete social fabric of California in the decade 1848-58 and its radical transformation, catalyzed by gold discovery, from 'a captured Mexican province to the thirty-first state of the American Union.' He notes that 'the events of the Gold Rush would remain a touchstone for generations of later Californians.' "--From Foreword, page 7.
Publisher: Huntington Library Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 156
Book Description
"The year 2000 ... marks the sesquicentennial of California's statehood. California entered the Union on September 9, 1850--fewer than three years after the discovery of gold at Sutter's sawmill on January 24, 1848. Such a transformation in so short a span of time seems remarkable itself but not unanticipated, given the great interest shown by the English, French, Russians, and Americans during the 1830s and 1840s in exploiting Mexican California's abundant natural resources. Even before the discovery of gold, the Englishman Sir George Simpson wrote in 1847 that 'the English race, as I have already hinted, is doubtless destined to add this fair and fertile province to its possessions on this continent. ... The only doubt is, whether California is to fall to the British or the Americans.' Gold only hastened what some saw as inevitable. In contemplating California's fate, Simpson referred to what was 'destined' to happen. 'Manifest destiny' became the cliché of many American historians in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who saw the acquisition of California as both the logical and appropriate conclusion to the conquest of North America begun two centuries earlier by the first European colonists. The Huntington's exhibition Land of Golden Dreams takes a broader look at the impact of the Gold Rush on California, the nation, and the world. Like other contemporary historians, Peter Blodgett, curator of Western American historical manuscripts, examines the complete social fabric of California in the decade 1848-58 and its radical transformation, catalyzed by gold discovery, from 'a captured Mexican province to the thirty-first state of the American Union.' He notes that 'the events of the Gold Rush would remain a touchstone for generations of later Californians.' "--From Foreword, page 7.
The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio
Author: Lloyd Alexander
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company (BYR)
ISBN: 1429986735
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 317
Book Description
A beautiful Kirkassi girl, cold-eyed villains and smiling killers, a bazaar merchant peddling slightly used dreams—could any young adventurer ask for more? Not Carlo Chuchio, who is seeking hidden treasure on the legendary Road of Golden Dreams. With Baksheesh, the world's worst camel-puller, Carlo leads a caravan through the realm of Keshavar. Robbed of all but his underdrawers, mistaken for a mighty warrior and then for a crown prince, Carlo risks his life for a prize that may not even exist. Newbery medalist Lloyd Alexander weaves a glorious tale of adventure, love, and the treasures that matter most. The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio is a 2008 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company (BYR)
ISBN: 1429986735
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 317
Book Description
A beautiful Kirkassi girl, cold-eyed villains and smiling killers, a bazaar merchant peddling slightly used dreams—could any young adventurer ask for more? Not Carlo Chuchio, who is seeking hidden treasure on the legendary Road of Golden Dreams. With Baksheesh, the world's worst camel-puller, Carlo leads a caravan through the realm of Keshavar. Robbed of all but his underdrawers, mistaken for a mighty warrior and then for a crown prince, Carlo risks his life for a prize that may not even exist. Newbery medalist Lloyd Alexander weaves a glorious tale of adventure, love, and the treasures that matter most. The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio is a 2008 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.
The Golden Dream
Author: Robert Silverberg
Publisher: Ohio University Press
ISBN: 0821441027
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 446
Book Description
One of the most persistent legends in the annals of New World exploration is that of the Land of Gold. This mythical site was located over vast areas of South America (and later, North America); the search for it drove some men mad with greed and, as often as not, to their untimely deaths. In this history of quest and adventure, Robert Silverberg traces the fate of Old World explorers lured westward by the myth of El Dorado. From the German conquistadores licensed by the Spanish king to operate out of Venezuela, to the journeys of Gonzalo Pizarro in the Amazon basin, and to the nearly miraculous voyage of Francisco Orellana to the mouth of the Amazon River, encountering the warlike women who gave the river its name, violence and bloodshed accompanied the determined adventurers. Sir Walter Raleigh and a host of other explorers spent small fortunes and many lives trying to locate Manoa, a city that was rumored to be El Dorado—City of Gold. Celebrated science fiction author Robert Silverberg recreates these legendary quests in The Golden Dream: Seekers of El Dorado.
Publisher: Ohio University Press
ISBN: 0821441027
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 446
Book Description
One of the most persistent legends in the annals of New World exploration is that of the Land of Gold. This mythical site was located over vast areas of South America (and later, North America); the search for it drove some men mad with greed and, as often as not, to their untimely deaths. In this history of quest and adventure, Robert Silverberg traces the fate of Old World explorers lured westward by the myth of El Dorado. From the German conquistadores licensed by the Spanish king to operate out of Venezuela, to the journeys of Gonzalo Pizarro in the Amazon basin, and to the nearly miraculous voyage of Francisco Orellana to the mouth of the Amazon River, encountering the warlike women who gave the river its name, violence and bloodshed accompanied the determined adventurers. Sir Walter Raleigh and a host of other explorers spent small fortunes and many lives trying to locate Manoa, a city that was rumored to be El Dorado—City of Gold. Celebrated science fiction author Robert Silverberg recreates these legendary quests in The Golden Dream: Seekers of El Dorado.
Golden Dreams
Author: Kevin Starr
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199924309
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 601
Book Description
A narrative tour de force that combines wide-ranging scholarship with captivating prose, Kevin Starr's acclaimed multi-volume Americans and the California Dream is an unparalleled work of cultural history. In this volume, Starr covers the crucial postwar period--1950 to 1963--when the California we know today first burst into prominence. Starr brilliantly illuminates the dominant economic, social, and cultural forces in California in these pivotal years. In a powerful blend of telling events, colorful personalities, and insightful analyses, Starr examines such issues as the overnight creation of the postwar California suburb, the rise of Los Angeles as Super City, the reluctant emergence of San Diego as one of the largest cities in the nation, and the decline of political centrism. He explores the Silent Generation and the emergent Boomer youth cult, the Beats and the Hollywood "Rat Pack," the pervasive influence of Zen Buddhism and other Asian traditions in art and design, the rise of the University of California and the emergence of California itself as a utopia of higher education, the cooling of West Coast jazz, freeway and water projects of heroic magnitude, outdoor life and the beginnings of the environmental movement. More broadly, he shows how California not only became the most populous state in the Union, but in fact evolved into a mega-state en route to becoming the global commonwealth it is today. Golden Dreams continues an epic series that has been widely recognized for its signal contribution to the history of American culture in California. It is a book that transcends its stated subject to offer a wealth of insight into the growth of the Sun Belt and the West and indeed the dramatic transformation of America itself in these pivotal years following the Second World War.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199924309
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 601
Book Description
A narrative tour de force that combines wide-ranging scholarship with captivating prose, Kevin Starr's acclaimed multi-volume Americans and the California Dream is an unparalleled work of cultural history. In this volume, Starr covers the crucial postwar period--1950 to 1963--when the California we know today first burst into prominence. Starr brilliantly illuminates the dominant economic, social, and cultural forces in California in these pivotal years. In a powerful blend of telling events, colorful personalities, and insightful analyses, Starr examines such issues as the overnight creation of the postwar California suburb, the rise of Los Angeles as Super City, the reluctant emergence of San Diego as one of the largest cities in the nation, and the decline of political centrism. He explores the Silent Generation and the emergent Boomer youth cult, the Beats and the Hollywood "Rat Pack," the pervasive influence of Zen Buddhism and other Asian traditions in art and design, the rise of the University of California and the emergence of California itself as a utopia of higher education, the cooling of West Coast jazz, freeway and water projects of heroic magnitude, outdoor life and the beginnings of the environmental movement. More broadly, he shows how California not only became the most populous state in the Union, but in fact evolved into a mega-state en route to becoming the global commonwealth it is today. Golden Dreams continues an epic series that has been widely recognized for its signal contribution to the history of American culture in California. It is a book that transcends its stated subject to offer a wealth of insight into the growth of the Sun Belt and the West and indeed the dramatic transformation of America itself in these pivotal years following the Second World War.
Slouching Towards Bethlehem
Author: Joan Didion
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN:
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 264
Book Description
A RICH DISPLAY OF SOME OF THE BEST PROSE WRITTEN TODAY IN THE USA.
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN:
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 264
Book Description
A RICH DISPLAY OF SOME OF THE BEST PROSE WRITTEN TODAY IN THE USA.
GOLDEN DREAMS OF BORNEO
Author: Alex Ling
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1479791687
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 791
Book Description
Dreams of Gold Dreams of Power These drove men and women to seek their fortune in Sarawak. They came from Britain to carve a future on virgin soil from China - to escape grinding poverty. They fought and traded, lived and died in the struggle to fulfil their dreams. Some lost their lives to bloodthirsty headhunters, or in the disease-ridden swamps and trackless jungles of the interior; some survived to make their fortune. Chinese, British, Malays rubbed shoulders with fearsome Sea Dayaks, and nomads in the hunter-gatherer stage of evolution. The Steam Age met the Stone Age in this exotic, untouched land. Cultures clashed in a multiracial society. Charles Brooke, enigmatic White Rajah of Sarawak, was a man of vision, a man with a mission to tame the natives first, then to protect them from exploitation. His dream was to take them gently towards modern civilisation, to bring them the rewards of self-development. He was paternalistic but loving, a truly benevolent despot. Dreams of Adventure Dreams of Romance Stephen Young, a young graduate, arrives in Sarawak in 1898. Seduced by its virgin beauty steaming jungle, majestic mountains and noble savages he stays. Erotic intrigue, passion, violence and warfare surround him. His goal is to survive these with his head and his heart intact.
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1479791687
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 791
Book Description
Dreams of Gold Dreams of Power These drove men and women to seek their fortune in Sarawak. They came from Britain to carve a future on virgin soil from China - to escape grinding poverty. They fought and traded, lived and died in the struggle to fulfil their dreams. Some lost their lives to bloodthirsty headhunters, or in the disease-ridden swamps and trackless jungles of the interior; some survived to make their fortune. Chinese, British, Malays rubbed shoulders with fearsome Sea Dayaks, and nomads in the hunter-gatherer stage of evolution. The Steam Age met the Stone Age in this exotic, untouched land. Cultures clashed in a multiracial society. Charles Brooke, enigmatic White Rajah of Sarawak, was a man of vision, a man with a mission to tame the natives first, then to protect them from exploitation. His dream was to take them gently towards modern civilisation, to bring them the rewards of self-development. He was paternalistic but loving, a truly benevolent despot. Dreams of Adventure Dreams of Romance Stephen Young, a young graduate, arrives in Sarawak in 1898. Seduced by its virgin beauty steaming jungle, majestic mountains and noble savages he stays. Erotic intrigue, passion, violence and warfare surround him. His goal is to survive these with his head and his heart intact.
The Colour
Author: Rose Tremain
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312423100
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 400
Book Description
An epic of life in New Zealand during the nineteenth century explores the relationship between two newlyweds as they encounter the harsh realities of their chosen home in the South Pacific.
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 9780312423100
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 400
Book Description
An epic of life in New Zealand during the nineteenth century explores the relationship between two newlyweds as they encounter the harsh realities of their chosen home in the South Pacific.
Looking Forward, Looking Back
Author: Jana Pohl
Publisher: Rodopi
ISBN: 9401200718
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 294
Book Description
How is the life-altering event of migration narrated for children, especially if it was caused by Anti-Semitism and poverty? What of the country of origin is remembered and what is forgotten, and what of the target country when the migration is imagined there a century later? Looking Forward, Looking Back examines today’s representation of Jewish mass migration from Eastern Europe to America around the turn of the last century. It explores the collective story that emerges when American authors look back at this exodus from an Eastern European home to a new one to be established in America. Focusing on children’s literature, it investigates a wide range of texts including young adult literature as well as picture books and hence sheds light on the dynamics of the verbal and the visual in generating images of the self and other, the familiar and the strange. This book is of interest to scholars in the field of imagology, children’s literature, cultural studies, American studies, Slavic studies, and Jewish studies.
Publisher: Rodopi
ISBN: 9401200718
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 294
Book Description
How is the life-altering event of migration narrated for children, especially if it was caused by Anti-Semitism and poverty? What of the country of origin is remembered and what is forgotten, and what of the target country when the migration is imagined there a century later? Looking Forward, Looking Back examines today’s representation of Jewish mass migration from Eastern Europe to America around the turn of the last century. It explores the collective story that emerges when American authors look back at this exodus from an Eastern European home to a new one to be established in America. Focusing on children’s literature, it investigates a wide range of texts including young adult literature as well as picture books and hence sheds light on the dynamics of the verbal and the visual in generating images of the self and other, the familiar and the strange. This book is of interest to scholars in the field of imagology, children’s literature, cultural studies, American studies, Slavic studies, and Jewish studies.
The Dreamt Land
Author: Mark Arax
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101875216
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
A vivid, searching journey into California's capture of water and soil—the epic story of a people's defiance of nature and the wonders, and ruin, it has wrought Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion. No other chronicler of the West has so deeply delved into the empires of agriculture that drink so much of the water. The nation's biggest farmers—the nut king, grape king and citrus queen—tell their story here for the first time. Arax, the native son, is persistent and tough as he treks from desert to delta, mountain to valley. What he finds is hard earned, awe-inspiring, tragic and revelatory. In the end, his compassion for the land becomes an elegy to the dream that created California and now threatens to undo it.
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101875216
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
A vivid, searching journey into California's capture of water and soil—the epic story of a people's defiance of nature and the wonders, and ruin, it has wrought Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion. No other chronicler of the West has so deeply delved into the empires of agriculture that drink so much of the water. The nation's biggest farmers—the nut king, grape king and citrus queen—tell their story here for the first time. Arax, the native son, is persistent and tough as he treks from desert to delta, mountain to valley. What he finds is hard earned, awe-inspiring, tragic and revelatory. In the end, his compassion for the land becomes an elegy to the dream that created California and now threatens to undo it.
Where I Was From
Author: Joan Didion
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307763293
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 241
Book Description
From the bestselling, award-winning author of The Year of Magical Thinking: In this "arresting amalgam of memoir and historical timeline” (The Baltimore Sun), Didion—a native Californian—reassesses parts of her life, her work, her history, and ours. Didion applies her scalpel-like intelligence to California's ethic of ruthless self-sufficiency in order to examine that ethic’s often tenuous relationship to reality. Combining history and reportage, memoir and literary criticism, Where I Was From explores California’s romances with land and water; its unacknowledged debts to railroads, aerospace, and big government; the disjunction between its code of individualism and its fetish for prisons. Whether she is writing about her pioneer ancestors or privileged sexual predators, robber barons or writers (not excluding herself), Didion is an unparalleled observer, and this book is at once intellectually provocative and deeply personal.
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307763293
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 241
Book Description
From the bestselling, award-winning author of The Year of Magical Thinking: In this "arresting amalgam of memoir and historical timeline” (The Baltimore Sun), Didion—a native Californian—reassesses parts of her life, her work, her history, and ours. Didion applies her scalpel-like intelligence to California's ethic of ruthless self-sufficiency in order to examine that ethic’s often tenuous relationship to reality. Combining history and reportage, memoir and literary criticism, Where I Was From explores California’s romances with land and water; its unacknowledged debts to railroads, aerospace, and big government; the disjunction between its code of individualism and its fetish for prisons. Whether she is writing about her pioneer ancestors or privileged sexual predators, robber barons or writers (not excluding herself), Didion is an unparalleled observer, and this book is at once intellectually provocative and deeply personal.