United States Books

PREFACE The purpose of this volume is to show the action and reaction of the most important social, economic, political, and personal forces that have entered into the make-up of the United States as a nation. The primary assumption of the author is that the people of this country did not compose a nation until after the close of the Civil War in 1865. Of scarcely less importance is the fact that the... more...

PREFACE When I was a boy, some years before I obtained my appointment in the navy, I spent many of those happy hours that only childhood knows poring over the back numbers of a British service periodical, which began its career in 1828, with the title Colburn's United Service Magazine; under which name, save and except the Colburn, it still survives. Besides weightier matters, its early issues... more...

PREFACE. At the election of President and Vice President of the United States, and members of Congress, in November, 1872, Susan B. Anthony, and several other women, offered their votes to the inspectors of election, claiming the right to vote, as among the privileges and immunities secured to them as citizens by the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States. The inspectors, Jones,... more...

CHAPTER I THE NAVAL CAMPAIGN ON LAKE CHAMPLAIN1775-1776 Preponderant effect of Control of the Water upon the Struggle for American Independence Deducible then from Reason and from Experience Consequent Necessity to the Americans of a Counterpoise to British Navy This obtained through Burgoyne's Surrender The Surrender of Burgoyne traceable directly to the Naval Campaigns on Lake Champlain, 1775,... more...

John Tyler JOHN TYLER, second son of Judge John Tyler, governor of Virginia from 1808 to 1811, and Mary Armistead, was born at Greenway, Charles City County, Va., March 29, 1790. He was graduated at William and Mary College in 1807. At college he showed a strong interest in ancient history; was also fond of poetry and music, and was a skillful performer on the violin. In 1809 he was admitted to the... more...

PREFACE. The site now occupied by the two cities of New York and Brooklyn, and over which they continue to spread, is pre-eminently "Revolutionary soil." Very few of our historic places are more closely associated with the actual scenes of that struggle. As at Boston in 1775, so here in 1776, we had the war at our doors and all about us. In what is now the heart of Brooklyn Revolutionary... more...

CHAPTER I PATRICK HENRY The Last French War had cost England so much that at its close she was heavily in debt. “As England must now send to America a standing army of at least ten thousand men to protect the colonies against the Indians and other enemies,” the King, George III, reasoned, “it is only fair that the colonists should pay a part of the cost of supporting it.” The English... more...

A SHACK ON THE PRAIRIE At sunset we came up out of the draw to the crest of the ridge. Perched on the high seat of the old spring wagon, we looked into a desolate land which reached to the horizon on every side. Prairie which had lain untouched since the Creation save for buffalo and roving bands of Indians, its brown grass scorched and crackling from the sun. No trees to break the endless monotony or... more...

CHAPTER I. TALKING OF MICHIGAN. My father was born in 1793, and my mother in 1802, in Putnam County, State of New York. Their names were John and Melinda Nowlin. Mother's maiden name was Light. My father owned a small farm of twenty-five acres, in the town of Kent, Putnam County, New York, about sixty miles from New York City. We had plenty of fruit, apples, pears, quinces and so forth, also a... more...

California Romantic and Resourceful One of the most important acts of the Grand Parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden West which met at Lake Tahoe in 1910 was the appropriation of approximately fifteen hundred dollars for the creation of a traveling fellowship in Pacific Coast history at the State University. In pursuance of the resolution adopted, a committee of five was appointed by the head of the... more...