U.S. History E-books: 250 Years of Inspiration, Adventure and Struggle
History disguises itself as an endless litany of dates, names and places. Under that dry exterior are countless stories of ordinary people doing astounding things, and astounding people doing ordinary things. The path of history won’t stop with the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, but it’s a good time to acknowledge where we’ve been and look forward to where we are going. Check out these e-books that feature people and events from U.S. history that shaped our country on its path. As always, if you need more suggestions you can talk to a librarian.
The most enduring feature of U.S. history is the presence of Native Americans, yet most histories focus on Europeans and their descendants. This retelling of U.S. history acknowledges the enduring power, agency, and survival of Indigenous peoples,…
From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of millions of people changed the face of America. Wilkerson compares this epic migration to those of other peoples throughout history. A book group favorite, Wilkerson takes three families' stories and weaves their…
An unforgettable human drama deep with contemporary resonance, this is a vivid, soldier's-eye view of an extraordinary lost chapter of American history. The Polar Bears, hailing mainly from Michigan, heroically waged a courageous campaign in the…
Between 1785 and 1812 a midwife and healer named Martha Ballard kept a diary and recorded her arduous work as well as her domestic life in Hallowell, Maine. On the basis of that diary, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich gives us an intimate and densely imagined…
On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard gunned down unarmed college students protesting the Vietnam War at Kent State University. In a deadly barrage, students were shot, wounded and killed. It was the day America turned guns on its own children in…
White women actively participated in the slave market, profited from it, and used it for economic and social empowerment. Because women typically inherited more slaves than land, enslaved people were often their primary source of wealth. Not only…
Making use of little-studied material, Lepore brings Jane Franklin to life in a way that illuminates not only this one woman but an entire world usually lost to history. The life of Jane Franklin, with its strikingly original vantage on her…
Americans initially welcomed Chinese arrivals, but as their numbers grew, horrific episodes of racial terror erupted on the Pacific coast. A prolonged economic downturn that idled legions of white workingmen contributed to the conditions for what…
For too long the Panthers' story has been a footnote to the civil rights movement rather than what it was. This revolutionary socialist movement drew thousands of members, many of them women, and became the target of one of the most sustained…
A groundbreaking study of the first Black female novelist and her life as an enslaved woman, from the biographer who solved the mystery of her identity with a preface by Henry Louis Gates Jr. In 1857, a woman escaped enslavement on a North Carolina…
An exceptional, all-encompassing overview of Hispanic America based on personal interviews, deep research, and Arana's life experience. Latinos were some of the earliest immigrants to what is now the US—some of them arriving in the 1500s—and are now…
This is the story of how the criminal justice system convicted two innocent men of brutal sexual assault, and of how two other men built successful careers on the back of that structure. For nearly two decades, Hayne, a medical examiner, performed…
In the 19th century, American meals were about subsistence not enjoyment. But as a new century approached, appetites broadened and David Fairchild, a young botanist with an insatiable lust to explore and experience the world, set out in search of…
Sibert Award winner Sally M. Walker crafts an engaging narrative of the American Indian soldiers who bravely fought in the Civil War. The Anishinaabe offered their assistance during the war, and were not given proper credit afterward, but this story…
Angry mobs burned Black churches to the ground and chased down pacifists and immigrants. Men and women were jailed solely for what they had written or said, even in private. An astonishing 250,000 people joined a nationwide vigilante group sponsored…
The astonishing story of an immigrant sweatshop worker who married into an American fortune and became one of the most charismatic radical leaders of her time. Rose Pastor arrived in New York City in 1903, a Jewish refugee and factory worker from…
Newly freed African American men had gained their voting rights and would soon have a chance to transform Southern politics, but former Confederates and other white supremacists mobilized to stop them. After the first political assassination carried…
The United States Postal Service is a wondrous American creation. Seven days a week, its army of 300,000 letter carriers delivers 513 million pieces of mail, forty percent of the world's volume. It is far more efficient than any other mail service…
Vivian Gordon went out before midnight in a velvet dress and mink coat. Her body turned up the next morning in a desolate Bronx park, a dirty clothesline wrapped around her neck. At her stylish Manhattan apartment, detectives discovered notebooks…
In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, the Osage rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in…
