Download or read book A Natural History of North American Trees written by Donald Culross Peattie and published by Trinity University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-10 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A volume for a lifetime" is how The New Yorker described the first of Donald Culross Peatie's two books about American trees published in the 1950s. In this one-volume edition, modern readers are introduced to one of the best nature writers of the last century. As we read Peattie's eloquent and entertaining accounts of American trees, we catch glimpses of our country's history and past daily life that no textbook could ever illuminate so vividly. Here you'll learn about everything from how a species was discovered to the part it played in our country’s history. Pioneers often stabled an animal in the hollow heart of an old sycamore, and the whole family might live there until they could build a log cabin. The tuliptree, the tallest native hardwood, is easier to work than most softwood trees; Daniel Boone carved a sixty-foot canoe from one tree to carry his family from Kentucky into Spanish territory. In the days before the Revolution, the British and the colonists waged an undeclared war over New England's white pines, which made the best tall masts for fighting ships. It's fascinating to learn about the commercial uses of various woods -- for paper, fine furniture, fence posts, matchsticks, house framing, airplane wings, and dozens of other preplastic uses. But we cannot read this book without the occasional lump in our throats. The American elm was still alive when Peattie wrote, but as we read his account today we can see what caused its demise. Audubon's portrait of a pair of loving passenger pigeons in an American beech is considered by many to be his greatest painting. It certainly touched the poet in Donald Culross Peattie as he depicted the extinction of the passenger pigeon when the beech forest was destroyed. A Natural History of North American Trees gives us a picture of life in America from its earliest days to the middle of the last century. The information is always interesting, though often heartbreaking. While Peattie looks for the better side of man's nature, he reports sorrowfully on the greed and waste that have doomed so much of America's virgin forest.
Download or read book A History of Indigenous Latin America written by René Harder Horst and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-03-25 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A History of Indigenous Latin America is a comprehensive introduction to the people who first settled in Latin America, from before the arrival of the Europeans to the present. Indigenous history provides a singular perspective to political, social and economic changes that followed European settlement and the African slave trade in Latin America. Set broadly within a postcolonial theoretical framework and enhanced by anthropology, economics, sociology, and religion, this textbook includes military conflicts and nonviolent resistance, transculturation, labor, political organization, gender, and broad selective accommodation. Uniquely organized into periods of 50 years to facilitate classroom use, it allows students to ground important indigenous historical events and cultural changes within the timeframe of a typical university semester. Supported by images, textboxes, and linked documents in each chapter that aid learning and provide a new perspective that broadly enhances Latin American history and studies, it is the perfect introductory textbook for students.
Download or read book Natural Histories written by American Museum of Natural History and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Highlights 40 masterworks of illustrated scientific art from the Rare Book Collection of the American Museum of Natural History.
Download or read book A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America written by Donald Culross Peattie and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 1991 with total page 628 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A detailed handbook giving clear descriptions and full historical information about the trees that grow in North America--Résumé de l'éditeur.
Download or read book Natural History and Ecology of Mexico and Central America written by Levente Hufnagel and published by BoD – Books on Demand. This book was released on 2021-08-18 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Natural History and Ecology of Mexico and Central America presents an interesting overview of the frontiers of biodiversity and ecological research in the geographical area of Mexico and Central America. Chapters cover such topics as biodiversity and ecology of plant communities, tropical subterranean ecosystems, floating Sargassum species, the endangered species Dioon edule, Kemp’s ridley sea turtles, fish and fisheries, urbanization and bats, and food and sustainable diet.
Download or read book The Contemporary History of Latin America written by Tulio Halperín Donghi and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For a quarter of a century, Tulio Halperín Donghi's Historia Contemporánea de América Latina has been the most influential and widely read general history of Latin America in the Spanish-speaking world. Unparalleled in scope, attentive to the paradoxes of Latin American reality, and known for its fine-grained interpretation, it is now available for the first time in English. Revised and updated by the author, superbly translated, this landmark of Latin American historiography will be accessible to an entirely new readership. Beginning with a survey of the late colonial landscape, The Contemporary History of Latin America traces the social, economic, and political development of the region to the late twentieth century, with special emphasis on the period since 1930. Chapters are organized chronologically, each beginning with a general description of social and economic developments in Latin America generally, followed by specific attention to political matters in each country. What emerges is a well-rounded and detailed picture of the forces at work throughout Latin American history. This book will be of great interest to all those seeking a general overview of modern Latin American history, and its distinctive Latin American voice will enhance its significance for all students of Latin American history.
Download or read book Harvest of Empire written by Juan Gonzalez and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-06-14 with total page 561 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A sweeping history of the Latino experience in the United States. The first new edition in ten years of this important study of Latinos in U.S. history, Harvest of Empire spans five centuries—from the European colonization of the Americas to through the 2020 election. Latinos are now the largest minority group in the United States, and their impact on American culture and politics is greater than ever. With family portraits of real-life immigrant Latino pioneers, as well as accounts of the events and conditions that compelled them to leave their homelands, Gonzalez highlights the complexity of a segment of the American population that is often discussed but frequently misrepresented. This landmark history is required reading for anyone wishing to understand the history and legacy of this influential and diverse group.
Download or read book American Nations written by Colin Woodard and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2012-09-25 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: • A New Republic Best Book of the Year • The Globalist Top Books of the Year • Winner of the Maine Literary Award for Non-fiction Particularly relevant in understanding who voted for who during presidential elections, this is an endlessly fascinating look at American regionalism and the eleven “nations” that continue to shape North America According to award-winning journalist and historian Colin Woodard, North America is made up of eleven distinct nations, each with its own unique historical roots. In American Nations he takes readers on a journey through the history of our fractured continent, offering a revolutionary and revelatory take on American identity, and how the conflicts between them have shaped our past and continue to mold our future. From the Deep South to the Far West, to Yankeedom to El Norte, Woodard (author of American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good) reveals how each region continues to uphold its distinguishing ideals and identities today, with results that can be seen in the composition of the U.S. Congress or on the county-by-county election maps of any hotly contested election in our history.
Download or read book Our Continent written by National Geographic Society (U.S.) and published by . This book was released on 1976 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The plant and animal life on this continent are described over a 4-billion-year time span.
Download or read book A Brief History of South American Metatherians written by Francisco Goin and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-10-16 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book summarizes major aspects of the evolution of South American metatherians, including their epistemologic, phylogenetic, biogeographic, faunal, tectonic, paleoclimatic, and metabolic contexts. A brief overview of the evolution of each major South American lineage ("Ameridelphia", Sparassodonta, Didelphimorphia, Paucituberculata, Microbiotheria, and Polydolopimorphia) is provided. It is argued that due to physiological constraints, metatherian evolution closely followed the conditions imposed by global temperatures. In general terms, during the Paleocene and the early Eocene multiple radiations of metatherian lineages occurred, with many adaptive types exploiting insectivorous, frugivorous, and omnivorous adaptive zones. In turn, a mixture of generalized and specialized types, the latter mainly exploiting carnivorous and granivorous-folivorous adaptive zones, characterized the second half of the Cenozoic. In both periods, climate was the critical driver of their radiation and turnovers.
Download or read book An Environmental History of Latin America written by Shawn William Miller and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2007-08-27 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A narration of the mutually mortal historical contest between humans and nature in Latin America. Covering a period that begins with Amerindian civilizations and concludes in the region's present urban agglomerations, the work offers an original synthesis of the current scholarship on Latin America's environmental history and argues that tropical nature played a central role in shaping the region's historical development. Human attitudes, populations, and appetites, from Aztec cannibalism to more contemporary forms of conspicuous consumption, figure prominently in the story. However, characters such as hookworms, whales, hurricanes, bananas, dirt, butterflies, guano, and fungi make more than cameo appearances. Recent scholarship has overturned many of our egocentric assumptions about humanity's role in history. Seeing Latin America's environmental past from the perspective of many centuries illustrates that human civilizations, ancient and modern, have been simultaneously more powerful and more vulnerable than previously thought.
Download or read book The American Museum of Natural History and How It Got That Way written by Colin Davey and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tells the story of the building of the American Museum of Natural History and Hayden Planetarium, a story of history, politics, science, and exploration, including the roles of American presidents, New York power brokers, museum presidents, planetarium directors, polar and African explorers, and German rocket scientists. The American Museum of Natural History is one of New York City’s most beloved institutions, and one of the largest, most celebrated museums in the world. Since 1869, generations of New Yorkers and tourists of all ages have been educated and entertained here. Located across from Central Park, the sprawling structure, spanning four city blocks, is a fascinating conglomeration of many buildings of diverse architectural styles built over a period of 150 years. The first book to tell the history of the museum from the point of view of these buildings, including the planned Gilder Center, The American Museum of Natural History and How It Got That Way contextualizes them within New York and American history and the history of science. Part II, “The Heavens in the Attic,” is the first detailed history of the Hayden Planetarium, from the museum’s earliest astronomy exhibits, to Clyde Fisher and the original planetarium, to Neil deGrasse Tyson and the Rose Center for Earth and Space, and it features a photographic tour through the original Hayden Planetarium. Author Colin Davey spent much of his childhood literally and figuratively lost in the museum’s labyrinthine hallways. The museum grew in fits and starts according to the vicissitudes of backroom deals, personal agendas, two world wars, the Great Depression, and the Cold War. Chronicling its evolution―from the selection of a desolate, rocky, hilly, swampy site, known as Manhattan Square to the present day―the book includes some of the most important and colorful characters in the city’s history, including the notoriously corrupt and powerful “Boss” Tweed, “Father of New York City” Andrew Haswell Green, and twentieth-century powerbroker and master builder Robert Moses; museum presidents Morris K. Jesup, Henry Fairfield Osborn, and Ellen Futter; and American presidents, polar and African explorers, dinosaur hunters, and German rocket scientists. Richly illustrated with period photos, The American Museum of Natural History and How It Got That Way is based on deep archival research and interviews.
Download or read book Latin American Libraries written by Charles Edwin Babcock and published by . This book was released on 1928 with total page 24 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Smithsonian s History of America in 101 Objects written by Richard Kurin and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-10-25 with total page 786 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Smithsonian Institution is America's largest, most important, and most beloved repository for the objects that define our common heritage. Now Under Secretary for Art, History, and Culture Richard Kurin, aided by a team of top Smithsonian curators and scholars, has assembled a literary exhibition of 101 objects from across the Smithsonian's museums that together offer a marvelous new perspective on the history of the United States. Ranging from the earliest years of the pre-Columbian continent to the digital age, and from the American Revolution to Vietnam, each entry pairs the fascinating history surrounding each object with the story of its creation or discovery and the place it has come to occupy in our national memory. Kurin sheds remarkable new light on objects we think we know well, from Lincoln's hat to Dorothy's ruby slippers and Julia Child's kitchen, including the often astonishing tales of how each made its way into the collections of the Smithsonian. Other objects will be eye-opening new discoveries for many, but no less evocative of the most poignant and important moments of the American experience. Some objects, such as Harriet Tubman's hymnal, Sitting Bull's ledger, Cesar Chavez's union jacket, and the Enola Gay bomber, tell difficult stories from the nation's history, and inspire controversies when exhibited at the Smithsonian. Others, from George Washington's sword to the space shuttle Discovery, celebrate the richness and vitality of the American spirit. In Kurin's hands, each object comes to vivid life, providing a tactile connection to American history. Beautifully designed and illustrated with color photographs throughout, The Smithsonian's History of America in 101 Objects is a rich and fascinating journey through America's collective memory, and a beautiful object in its own right.
Download or read book Early Latin America written by James Lockhart and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1983-09-30 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A brief general history of Latin America in the period between the European conquest and the independence of the Spanish American countries and Brazil serves as an introduction to this quickly changing field of study.
Download or read book The Natural History of Sexuality in Early America written by Greta LaFleur and published by Johns Hopkins University Press. This book was released on 2018-11-15 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ultimately, The Natural History of Sexuality in Early America not only rewrites all dominant scholarly narratives of eighteenth-century sexual behavior but poses a major intervention into queer theoretical understandings of the relationship between sex and the subject.
Download or read book Sarraceniaceae of South America written by Stewart McPherson and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Sarraceniaceae of South America" is one part of a two-part monograph providing the first complete study of the full diversity, ecology and taxonomy of all recognised species of the three genera of Sarraceniaceae, a family of pitcher plants, namely Darlingtonia, Heliamphora and Sarracenia. This volume examines all species of Heliamphora from the Guiana Highlands of Venezuela, Brazil and Guyana. All known species are illustrated in full detail for the very first time, including many that have been discovered only very recently. Notably, the description of one spectacular new species of Heliamphora is included in the Appendix of this work and is documented in detail. Complete with up-to-date conservation assessments, distribution maps and accounts of the wild ecology and habitats of each species of Sarraceniaceae, this work is a major and definitive taxonomic revision for all three genera of true pitcher plants of the New World. Visually beautiful and comprehensive, these books will appeal to both general readers and specialists who are interested in the natural history, diversity, ecology and relationships of Darlingtonia, Heliamphora and Sarracenia.
