travel

This book is a reprint of the original, so many of the black-and-white images are fuzzy. Nevertheless, it is a very exciting read. Many people assume that the prospectors who participated in the California Gold Rush traveled there overland from the eastern states. But it was actually a worldwide gold rush, with many prospectors traveling by sea. Even prospectors from Maine often traveled by sea. Because the Panama Canal had not yet been built, travelers to California had to sail around Cape Horn.

How fast could you write a 300 page book? Sensationalist journalist Jay Henry Mowbray turned out this edition of Sinking of The "Titanic" (complete with illustrations and ready for sale) by May 11, 1912, less than one month after the ship struck that infamous iceberg. Speed puts this book into a curious genre—the “instant book.” The instant book narrates a contemporaneous event through a collage of sources, like government hearings or embellished descriptions, coalesced by journalists, then sold door-to-door as soon as possible. But why the need for speed?

You may know the names of Jesse James, Billy the Kid, or Pat Garrett. But what about Buss Luckey, the Rufus Buck Gang, the Lighthorsemen, or Zeke Miller? Although whites dominate popular depictions of the lawless west, Black, Red and Deadly presents the sagas of African-American and American Indian outlaws and bona fide law enforcers in Indian Territory. Luckey was an African American convicted bandit who dynamited a train carrying $60,000 in gold bullion.

Black Stars in Orbit is an overview of the first African Americans who were selected to be astronaut candidates, the first who worked for NASA on new technologies for mission projects, and the first to travel to space as part of the NASA Space Shuttle program. This volume is beatifully illustrated and contains brief biographical overviews.

The Expedition Citroën crossed Africa (from October 1924 to June 1925) to establish a reliable automobile link between French territories in West Africa and Madagascar. Tourists, businessmen, and government officials would be able to travel in comfort, riding in Citroën’s new half-track vehicles and lodging in specially built, rather luxurious accommodations. The sixty-three photographs included in this volume are invaluable records of people, customs, and dwellings seen along the way.  The most iconic image is the head elongation and elaborate coiffure of the Mangbetu woman.

The year is 1890. The French public is eager to learn more about the new colonies that France has won in the "Scramble for Africa." Colonel Henri-Nicholas Frey addresses their curiosity by compiling this geography, which describes in vivid detail the people, places, and things on the coastal regions of West Africa, from southern Morocco to the Congo. Frey draws on his own military experience in West Africa, but his primary sources are the writings of explorers, missionaries, and travelers to the region.