Excelsior the Lost Pioneer


Book Description

After an earlier attempt at telling the story of Excelsior motorcycles, I decided the first book didn't go deep enough into the companys story. So after much research and work, the new and improved book is now available. I have been a lifelong motorcycle enthusiast, so the book has been the ultimate incarnation of my obsession.




Pioneer Muskoka


Book Description

The history of Ontario's premier cottage destination, Muskoka, was not commonplace or uneventful. Beginning in the 1860's, emigrants from the British Isles and Europe were lured to this desolate region with the promise of free land grants for farming. What they found were mature forests, swamp, and never ending rock. Their heroic attempts to make a living farming on the Precambrian Shield did not come without considerable discomfort. Pioneer Muskoka documents the struggles faced by these early homesteaders and their response to hardship, isolation, disease and poverty. This is the tale of a community banding together to overcome fear with courage and determination. Readers will be astounded by the lengths these settlers went in their quest to make a home for themselves and future generations in Muskoka. The eventual shift from farming to more profitable industries such as lumber and tourism brought a shift in attitude towards this now highly sought after locale. The first families, through their enormous efforts, were able to create this positive and enduring change....




Base Ball Pioneers, 1850-1870


Book Description

By 1871, the popularity of baseball had spread so thoroughly across America that one writer observed, "It is as much our national game as cricket is that of the English." While major league teams and athletes that played after this prophetic statement was made have been exhaustively documented and analyzed, those that led the game during its pioneer phase from 1850 to 1870 have received relatively little attention. In this welcome work, leading historians of early baseball provide profiles of more than fifty clubs and their players, from legendary teams such as the Red Stockings of Cincinnati and the Nationals of Washington to forgotten nines like the Pecatonica (Illinois) Base Ball Club and the Morning Star Club of St. Louis. Engaging narratives bring these long-ago clubs back to life, stimulating more research on this fascinating era and creating a standard reference source for all who study America's national pastime.




The Firelands Pioneer


Book Description




The Life of Bret Harte, with Some Account of the California Pioneers


Book Description

This work presents an incredible biography of the American author and poet Bret Harte. The book explores Harte's life, from his childhood to his rise to literary fame in the late 19th century and his involvement in the California Gold Rush. Merwin also provides insights into California's cultural and historical context during the mid-1800s and its impact on Harte's literary works. The book is essential for those interested in American literature and California's rich history.










Here, Everything Is Dreaming


Book Description

Poems and stories that stream directly from dreams and shamanic adventures in the world-behind-the-world.




The Heroic Age of Diving


Book Description

A comprehensive history of the first three decades of underwater exploration in antebellum America. Beginning in 1837, some of the most brilliant engineers of America’s Industrial Revolution turned their attention to undersea technology. Inventors developed practical hard-helmet diving suits, as well as new designs of submarines, diving bells, floating cranes, and undersea explosives. These innovations were used to clear shipping lanes, harvest pearls, mine gold, and wage war. All of these underwater technologies were brought together by entrepreneurs, treasure-hunters, and daring divers in the 1850s to salvage three infamous shipwrecks on Lake Erie, each of which had involved the loss of hundreds of lives, as well as the worldly goods of the passengers. The prospect of treasure, combined with the national notoriety of these disasters, soon attracted the attention of local adventurers and the country’s leading divers and marine engineers. In The Heroic Age of Diving, Jerry Kuntz shares the fascinating stories of the pioneers of underwater invention and the brave divers who employed the new technologies as they raced with—and against—marine engineers to salvage the tragic wrecks of Lake Erie. “Jerry Kuntz has filled in a previously blank page in the story of diving—and done it well. The Heroic Age of Diving tells the story not only of the development of salvage technology but also the human side of this always-dangerous and often-deadly career. This is not a tale for the faint of heart (‘helmet squeeze’ is a gruesome fate), but one well worth reading for those interested in early technology and the men brave (or foolish) enough to gamble their lives using it. This book is a window on an unexplored (and unexpected) world, and the author deserves great credit for bringing it back into the light.” — Chuck Veit, author of Raising Missouri: John Gowen and the Salvage of the U.S. Steam Frigate Missouri, 1843–1852 “The Heroic Age of Diving is both very interesting and very important. Having spent over twenty years researching and publishing general diving history, I am confident that this book will fill an important gap in the nation’s diving history.” — Leslie Leaney, Cofounder, Historical Diving Society




Nebraska History and Record of Pioneer Days


Book Description

"Nebraska's dead: names of men from our state who gave their lives in the World War" in v. 2, no. 1, p. 4-8.