The Ride of Her Life

The Ride of Her Life PDF Author: Elizabeth Letts
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0525619321
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Horse and The Eighty-Dollar Champion presents a “heartwarming [and] engaging folk-hero biography” (Kirkus Reviews) of a woman who fulfilled her lifelong wish to see the Pacific Ocean by riding her horse across America. “[Letts] vividly portrays an audacious woman whose optimism, courage, and good humor are to be marveled at and admired.”—Booklist, starred review In 1954, sixty-three-year-old Maine farmer Annie Wilkins embarked on an impossible journey. She had no money and no family, she had just lost her farm, and her doctor had given her only two years to live. But Annie wanted to see the Pacific Ocean before she died. She ignored her doctor’s advice to move into the county charity home. Instead, she bought a cast-off brown gelding named Tarzan, donned men’s dungarees, and headed south in mid-November, hoping to beat the snow. Annie had little idea what to expect beyond her rural crossroads; she didn’t even have a map. But she did have her ex-racehorse, her faithful mutt, and her own unfailing belief that Americans would treat a stranger with kindness. Annie, Tarzan, and her dog, Depeche Toi, rode straight into a world transformed by the rapid construction of modern highways. Between 1954 and 1956, the three travelers pushed through blizzards, forded rivers, climbed mountains, and clung to the narrow shoulder as cars whipped by them at terrifying speeds. Annie rode more than four thousand miles, through America’s big cities and small towns. Along the way, she met ordinary people and celebrities—from Andrew Wyeth (who sketched Tarzan) to Art Linkletter and Groucho Marx. She received many offers—a permanent home at a riding stable in New Jersey, a job at a gas station in rural Kentucky, even a marriage proposal from a Wyoming rancher. In a decade when car ownership nearly tripled, when television’s influence was expanding fast, when homeowners began locking their doors, Annie and her four-footed companions inspired an outpouring of neighborliness in a rapidly changing world.

The Ride of Her Life

The Ride of Her Life PDF Author: Elizabeth Letts
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0525619321
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 337

Get Book Here

Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Horse and The Eighty-Dollar Champion presents a “heartwarming [and] engaging folk-hero biography” (Kirkus Reviews) of a woman who fulfilled her lifelong wish to see the Pacific Ocean by riding her horse across America. “[Letts] vividly portrays an audacious woman whose optimism, courage, and good humor are to be marveled at and admired.”—Booklist, starred review In 1954, sixty-three-year-old Maine farmer Annie Wilkins embarked on an impossible journey. She had no money and no family, she had just lost her farm, and her doctor had given her only two years to live. But Annie wanted to see the Pacific Ocean before she died. She ignored her doctor’s advice to move into the county charity home. Instead, she bought a cast-off brown gelding named Tarzan, donned men’s dungarees, and headed south in mid-November, hoping to beat the snow. Annie had little idea what to expect beyond her rural crossroads; she didn’t even have a map. But she did have her ex-racehorse, her faithful mutt, and her own unfailing belief that Americans would treat a stranger with kindness. Annie, Tarzan, and her dog, Depeche Toi, rode straight into a world transformed by the rapid construction of modern highways. Between 1954 and 1956, the three travelers pushed through blizzards, forded rivers, climbed mountains, and clung to the narrow shoulder as cars whipped by them at terrifying speeds. Annie rode more than four thousand miles, through America’s big cities and small towns. Along the way, she met ordinary people and celebrities—from Andrew Wyeth (who sketched Tarzan) to Art Linkletter and Groucho Marx. She received many offers—a permanent home at a riding stable in New Jersey, a job at a gas station in rural Kentucky, even a marriage proposal from a Wyoming rancher. In a decade when car ownership nearly tripled, when television’s influence was expanding fast, when homeowners began locking their doors, Annie and her four-footed companions inspired an outpouring of neighborliness in a rapidly changing world.

The Ride of My Life

The Ride of My Life PDF Author: Mat Hoffman
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0062004506
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 418

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Book Description
I had seriously reached a point in my life where I wasn't scared of anything. Panic was replaced by awww, shit, how can I fix this before I hit the ground? Childhood for Mat Hoffman was packed with hazardous behavior and a constant searching for a new rush: sliding down the laundry chute, blatantly misusing a trampoline, leaping off the roof holding an umbrella, executing a two-story bomb drop into a swimming pool on a bike, and more. After experimenting with his bike on a plywood ramp at age eleven, Mat found his true calling. He became addicted to aerials. By the time he was fourteen years old, Mat had earned national notoriety with his ramp skills and landed a factory sponsorship from Skyway Recreation. He was consumed by a love of bike riding, a passion that took him around the globe and beyond the limits of what people said was possible. Always pushing for more height or another way to turn air into art, he's shattered world records, conventional wisdom, and his own body in a quest to experience all that life has to offer. The price? More than a dozen major surgeries, fifty broken bones, countless concussions and knockouts -- Mat's sacrifices are evident in a medical file that's 400 pages thick. When the boom years of BMX freestyle bottomed out during a bike industry recession in the late 1980s, Mat's enthusiasm never wavered. To save his sport, he bought a semi truck when he was seventeen and became his own sponsor, spreading the word one demo at a time. He and his friends formed Hoffman Bikes and began running bike stunt contests. It was an era of progress for Mat as a rider, as he unveiled jawdropping tricks like the no-handed 540, backflip fakie, and flair, and became the first rider in action sports to pull a 900. In The Ride of My Life, Mat takes readers on his humorous, hardcore, harrowing journey to the top as a bike stunt pioneer, ten-time world champion, video game superstar, X Games ambassador, recreational ninja, and the most innovative rider to ever hit a ramp. He shares stories of the wild experiences he's had while touring with some of the best riders around -- Dennis McCoy, Dave Mirra, Rick Thorne, Kevin Robinson, Mike "Rooftop" Escamilla, and many others. Spanning two decades of action sports history, as Mat crosses paths with high-risk heroes like Tony Hawk, Johnny Knoxville, and Evel Knievel, The Ride of My Life is the insane, true story of Mat Hoffman, the greatest bike rider of all time.

It's All About the Bike

It's All About the Bike PDF Author: Robert Penn
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1608195767
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
Robert Penn has saddled up nearly every day of his adult life. In his late twenties, he pedaled 25,000 miles around the world. Today he rides to get to work, sometimes for work, to bathe in air and sunshine, to travel, to go shopping, to stay sane, and to skip bath time with his kids. He's no Sunday pedal pusher. So when the time came for a new bike, he decided to pull out all the stops. He would build his dream bike, the bike he would ride for the rest of his life; a customized machine that reflects the joy of cycling. It's All About the Bike follows Penn's journey, but this book is more than the story of his hunt for two-wheel perfection. En route, Penn brilliantly explores the culture, science, and history of the bicycle. From artisanal frame shops in the United Kingdom to California, where he finds the perfect wheels, via Portland, Milan, and points in between, his trek follows the serpentine path of our love affair with cycling. It explains why we ride. It's All About the Bike is, like Penn's dream bike, a tale greater than the sum of its parts. An enthusiastic and charming tour guide, Penn uses each component of the bike as a starting point for illuminating excursions into the rich history of cycling. Just like a long ride on a lovely day, It's All About the Bike is pure joy- enriching, exhilarating, and unforgettable.

The Ride of a Lifetime

The Ride of a Lifetime PDF Author: Robert Iger
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 0399592091
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Book Description
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A memoir of leadership and success: The CEO of Disney shares the ideas and values he embraced while reinventing one of the world’s most beloved companies and inspiring the people who bring the magic to life. AN NPR BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR Robert Iger became CEO of The Walt Disney Company in 2005, during a difficult time. Competition was more intense than ever and technology was changing faster than at any time in the company’s history. His vision came down to three clear ideas: Recommit to the concept that quality matters, embrace technology instead of fighting it, and think bigger—think global—and turn Disney into a stronger brand in international markets. Today, Disney is the largest, most admired media company in the world, counting Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, and 21st Century Fox among its properties. Under Iger’s leadership, Disney’s value grew nearly five times what it was, making Iger one of the most innovating and successful CEOs of our era. In The Ride of a Lifetime, Robert Iger answers the question: What are the qualities of a good leader? He shares the lessons he learned while running Disney and leading its 220,000-plus employees, and he explores the principles that are necessary for true leadership, including: • Optimism. Even in the face of difficulty, an optimistic leader will find the path toward the best possible outcome and focus on that, rather than give in to pessimism and blaming. • Courage. Leaders have to be willing to take risks and place big bets. Fear of failure destroys creativity. • Decisiveness. All decisions, no matter how difficult, can be made on a timely basis. Indecisiveness is both wasteful and destructive to morale. • Fairness. Treat people decently, with empathy, and be accessible to them. This book is about the relentless curiosity that has driven Iger since the day he started as the lowliest studio grunt at ABC. It’s also about thoughtfulness and respect, and a decency-over-dollars approach that has become the bedrock of every project and partnership Iger pursues, from a deep friendship with Steve Jobs in his final years to an abiding love of the Star Wars mythology. “The ideas in this book strike me as universal,” Iger writes. “Not just to the aspiring CEOs of the world, but to anyone wanting to feel less fearful, more confidently themselves, as they navigate their professional and even personal lives.”

Enjoy the Ride

Enjoy the Ride PDF Author: Steve Gilliland
Publisher: Advantage Media Group
ISBN: 1601940025
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 110

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Book Description
With a compelling challenge to ""Check Your Passion, "" this book ignites people's ability to choose what they do, why they do it, and who they do it with.

The Ride of Our Lives

The Ride of Our Lives PDF Author: Mike Leonard
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0345490940
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
Mike Leonard is a lucky man. It’s not everyone who gets parents like Jack and Marge. At eighty-seven, Jack is a pathological optimist with an inexhaustible gift of gab. Marge, Jack’s bride of sixty years, though cut from the same rough bolt of Irish immigrant cloth, is his polar opposite–pessimistic and proud of it. What was their son, Mike, thinking when he took a sabbatical from his job with NBC News so he could pile these two world-class originals along with three of his grown kids and a daughter-in-law into a pair of rented RVs and hit the road for a month? Mike was thinking that he wanted to give his parents the ultimate family reunion. And so, one February morning, three generations of Leonards set out on their journey under the dazzling Arizona sky. Thirty minutes later, one of the humongous recreational vehicles has an unplanned meeting with a concrete island at a convenience store. Thus begins the adventure of a lifetime–and an absolute gem of a book. In the course of their humorous, often poignant cross-country tour, from the desert Southwest to the New England coastline, the Leonards reminisce about their loves, their losses, and their rich and heartwarming (and sometimes heartbreaking) lives, while encountering a veritable Greek chorus of roadside characters along the way. The home stretch finds the clan racing back to Chicago, hoping to catch the arrival of the next generation, Jack and Marge’s first great-grandchild. Through it all, Mike pieces together acentury of family lore and lunacy–and discovers surprising sides to his parents that allow him to see them in a whole new light. Mike Leonard has captivated millions of television viewers with his wry and witty feature stories for NBC’s Today. Now he brings that same engaging charm and keen insight to the foibles and passions of his own blessedly unique family. By turns uproariously funny and deeply moving, The Ride of Our Lives delivers a lifetime of laughs, lessons, and priceless memories. This edition’s exclusive DVD features never-before-seen footage from the trip as well as candid family video and photographs.

The Ride of My Life

The Ride of My Life PDF Author: Bob Brown
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 9781462063284
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
Insightful, humorous, and inspiring memoir of self-described "regular guy" Bob Brown's courageous battle with pancreatic cancer and his journey through the medical community to save his life. In a conversational tone that feels like youre chatting with a lifelong friend, Bob shares the play-by-play of his fight to stay alive and make the right treatment decisions, affirms the difference a positive attitude can make, and celebrates the unexpected gift of a new perspective on life. What would you do upon hearing your doctor utter the words "inoperable pancreatic cancer"? If you or someone you love has been diagnosed, this amazing story of survival will move you, amuse you, and instill hope in your heart.

No Easy Ride

No Easy Ride PDF Author: Ian Parsons
Publisher: Heritage House Publishing Co
ISBN: 1927527171
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 234

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Book Description
On July 3, 1961, Ian Parsons reported to RCMP Depot Division in Regina as a raw recruit. It was the beginning of a 33-year adventure that took him from Newfoundland to Vancouver Island and many points between. By the time he retired with the rank of inspector, Parsons had a policeman’s trunk full of colourful stories and insightful observations that he now shares in this memoir. Parsons writes candidly of his many roles within the RCMP, from postings in rural detachments, where he dealt with diverse policing issues, to stints teaching at the Canadian Police College in Ottawa and at the RCMP Academy in Regina. Always an independent thinker, Parsons lectured sometimes-resistant RCMP senior officers on the adoption of new ways and helped introduce programs to modernize recruit training and make it more relevant to the demands of a rapidly changing Canadian society. In recent years, Parsons has observed the troubled state and tarnished reputation of his beloved force as it faces crisis after crisis. Against the entertaining backdrop of his life in red serge, he gives a thoughtful assessment of things gone wrong in the iconic institution and identifies the drastic steps necessary to save it.

Life is Good

Life is Good PDF Author: John Jacobs
Publisher: Disney Electronic Content
ISBN: 1426215703
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 254

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Book Description
This inspiring book of wisdom, life lessons, and self-help from National Geographic celebrates the power of optimism: the driving force behind the authors’ beloved, socially conscious clothing and lifestyle brand, now worth more than $100 million. Following the chronology of their personal and professional journeys, Bert and John share their unique ride—from their scrappy upbringing outside Boston to the unlikely runaway success of their business. The brothers illuminate ten key "superpowers" accessible to us all: openness, courage, simplicity, humor, gratitude, fun, compassion, creativity, authenticity, and love. Their story, illustrated with the company's iconic artwork, shows how to overcome obstacles and embrace opportunities—whether it's growing stronger from rejection, letting your imagination loose, or simplifying your life to focus on what matters most. In these colorful pages, Bert and John's plainspoken insights are paired with inspiring quotations, playful top-ten lists, deeply moving letter from the Life is Good community, and valuable takeaways from tapping the power of optimism to live your best life. Both entertaining and profound, Life is Good: The Book is the ultimate guide to embracing and growing the good in your life.

The Ride of Her Life

The Ride of Her Life PDF Author: Lorna Seilstad
Publisher: Baker Books
ISBN: 0800734475
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
In this lighthearted historical romance set in 1906, a charming roller coaster designer takes a no-nonsense young widow on the ride of her life.