North America History

Canada is known all over the world due to its undying commitment to multiculturalism and its social and ethnic diversity. In a time when these values were unspoken of, Canada was the first country to embrace an official multiculturalism policy. Nevertheless, the path that Canada followed to become the powerful nation it is today was like a labyrinth, filled with challenges and obstacles.

Have you ever wondered what country had the first truly global empire? Then pay attention... Folks used to say that the “Sun never sets on the British Empire” as a means of declaring Britain’s greatness. But it was the Portuguese who forged the first truly global empire. The major dominions of the Portuguese wrapped around the globe in a straight line, from Brazil to Angola, from Mozambique to India, and all the way to Macau. With its dominion under multiple time zones, the Sun, in fact, never did set on the Portuguese Empire.

The former Confederate states have continually mythologized the South's defeat to the North, depicting the Civil War as unnecessary, or as a fight over states' Constitutional rights, or as a David v. Goliath struggle in which the North waged "total war" over an underdog South. In The Myth of the Lost Cause, historian Edward Bonekemper deconstructs this multi-faceted myth, revealing the truth about the war that nearly tore the nation apart 150 years ago.

This fast-paced thriller tells the story of the pursuit and capture of John Wilkes Booth and gives a day-by-day account of the wild chase to find this killer and his accomplices. Based on James L. Swanson's best-selling adult book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer, this version, written especially for young people, is a fascinating look at the assassination of the 16th president of the United States.

Nat Turner, an enslaved black man, believed he was chosen by God to battle against the evils of slavery. Driven by visions, Turner banded with six others, and on August 22, 1831, his rebellion began with attacks at plantations in Southampton, Virginia. As he and his group moved from plantation to plantation, dozens of enslaved men joined them. Finally, the local militia put an end to their movement, arresting and hanging many of the men involved.

When the Irish Invaded Canada is the untold tale of a band of fiercely patriotic Irish Americans and their chapter in Ireland's centuries-long fight for independence. Inspiring, lively, and often undeniably comic, this is a story of fighting for what's right in the face of impossible odds.

The centerpiece of a major national campaign to indentify and preserve forgotten history, Here Is Where is acclaimed historian Andrew Carroll’s fascinating journey of discovery in which he travels to each of America’s 50 states and explores locations where remarkable individuals once lived or where the incredible or momentous occurred.

Though the importance of hats is easy to overlook, it was deadly serious in more ways than one, impacting the beavers and birds used to make fashionable hats, the environment of the region, and the people fighting over the resources. Beaver hats put the Dutch, British, and French in conflict, and later the Americans and Canadians.

Everybody has secrets, and former US presidents are no exception. Discover which stories about America’s past leaders are true and which ones are just tall tales.

Bernard Bailyn gives us a compelling account of the first great transit of people from Britain, Europe, and Africa to British North America, their involvements with each other, and their struggles with the indigenous peoples of the eastern seaboard.

Sarah Vowell exposes the glorious conundrums of American history and culture with wit, probity, and an irreverent sense of humor. With Assassination Vacation, she takes us on a road trip like no other, a journey to the pit stops of American political murder and through the myriad ways they have been used for fun and profit, for political and cultural advantage.

Horizontal Vertigo: The title refers to the fear of ever-impending earthquakes that led Mexicans to build their capital city outward rather than upward. With the perspicacity of a keenly observant flâneur, Juan Villoro wanders through Mexico City seemingly without a plan, describing people, places, and things while brilliantly drawing connections among them.

In February 1910, a monstrous blizzard centered on Washington State hit the Northwest, breaking records. The world stopped - but nowhere was the danger more terrifying than near a tiny town called Wellington, perched high in the Cascade Mountains, where a desperate situation evolved minute by minute: two trainloads of cold, hungry passengers and their crews found themselves marooned without escape, their railcars gradually being buried in the rising drifts.

This volume, aimed at the general audience, presents life and times of the amazing animals that inhabited Earth more than 500 million years ago. The Cambrian Period was a critical time in Earth's history. During this immense span of time nearly every modern group of animals appeared. Although life had been around for more than 2 million millennia, Cambrian rocks preserve the record of the first appearance of complex animals with eyes, protective skeletons, antennae, and complex ecologies.

The French and Indian War: 1660-1763 covers much more than the few years during which the English and French fought over the division of the North American continent in one of the most neglected periods of American history. In this volume in the Drama of American History series, authors Christopher Collier and James Lincoln Collier trace how England’s other rivals for control of America were eliminated over this period until the only source of conflict left would be between the British and their own colonists.

The 500 Amazing facts about the Negro Volume II: 101-200, is a continuation of the 500 Amazing Facts about the Negro series and a tribute to the 1934 classic the 100 Amazing facts about the Negro written by J.A. Rodgers. In Volume II we will focus on North America, the Caribbean, Central and South America with a special insight into FOUNDATIONAL BLACK AMERICANS. As we traverse the intricate tapestry of Black history, this volume takes us to new parts of the Americas not yet discussed, venturing into the enchanting realms of the Caribbean, Central, and South America. With our magnifying ...

In this sweeping, enthralling biography, acclaimed historian David Hackett Fischer brings to life the remarkable Samuel de Champlain - soldier, spy, master mariner, explorer, cartographer, artist, and Father of New France. We remember Champlain mainly as a great explorer. On foot and by ship and canoe, he traveled through what are now six Canadian provinces and five American states. Over more than 30 years he founded, colonized, and administered French settlements in North America.

The Statue of Liberty is the tallest woman in the United States and one of the country’s most beloved symbols of freedom. Listen as park ranger Jeanetta tells the amazing story of Lady Liberty’s journey in 1885 from France to New York Harbor.

This fourth book in the action-packed Guts & Glory series takes listeners through the exciting and fascinating history of the American Revolution. From George Washington crossing the icy Delaware, to Molly Pitcher fearlessly firing her cannon, the people of the American Revolution were some of the bravest and most inspiring of all time. Jump into a riot in the streets of Boston, join the Culper Spy Ring as they steal secrets in the dead of night, and watch the signing of the Declaration of Independence in this accessible guide to the birth of the United States.

At the end of the American Revolution, Britain and the United States imagined a future for each of their nations that stretched across a continent. They signed treaties with one another dividing lands neither country could map, much less control. A century and a half later, Canada and the United States had largely fulfilled those earlier ambitions. Both countries had built nations that stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific and had made an expansive international border that restricted movement.