Smoke Over Oklahoma

Oklahoma was in the throes of the Great Depression when Preston George acquired a cheap Kodak folding camera and took his first photographs of steam locomotives. As depression gave way to world war, George kept taking pictures, now with a Graflex camera that could capture moving trains. In this first book devoted solely to George’s work, his black-and-white photographs constitute a striking visual documentary of steam-driven railroading in its brief but glorious heyday in the American Southwest. The pictures also form a remarkable artistic accomplishment in their own right. Prominent among the magnificent action images collected here are the engines that were George’s passion—steam locomotives pulling long freights or strings of gleaming passenger cars through open country. But along with the fireworks of the heavier steam engines slogging through the mountains near the Arkansas border on the Kansas City Southern or climbing Raton Pass in New Mexico on the Santa Fe, George’s photographs also record humbler fare, such as the short trains of the Frisco and Katy piloted by ancient light steamers, and the final years of that state’s interurban lines. Augustus J. Veenendaal Jr.’s brief history of railroads in the Sooner State puts these images into perspective, as does a reminiscence by George’s daughter Burnis on his life and his pursuit of railroad photography. With over 150 images and a wealth of historical and biographical information, this volume makes accessible to an audience beyond the most avid railfans the extent of Preston George's extraordinary achievement.

In this first book devoted solely to George's work, his black-and-white photographs constitute a striking visual documentary of steam-driven railroading in its brief but glorious heyday in the American Southwest.

This book, the first in a projected three-volume definitive history, traces the University’s progress from territorial days to 1917. David W. Levy examines the people and events surrounding the school’s formation and development, chronicling the determined ambition of pioneers to transform a seemingly barren landscape into a place where a worthy institution of higher education could thrive. The University of Oklahoma was established by the territorial legislature in 1890. With that act, Norman became the educational center of the future state. Levy captures the many factors—academic, political, financial, religious—that shaped the University. Drawing on a great depth of research in primary documents, he depicts the University’s struggles to meet its goals as it confronted political interference, financial uncertainty, and troubles ranging from disastrous fires to populist witch hunts. Yet he also portrays determined teachers and optimistic students who understood the value of a college education. Written in an engaging style and enhanced by an array of historical photographs, this volume is a testimony to the citizens who overcame formidable obstacles to build a school that satisfied their ambitions and embodied their hopes for the future.

This report is designed to arm the fire service and others with a statistical overview of the fire problem in the U.S. -- deaths of thousands of Americans each year, injury to tens of thousands, and destruction of billions of dollars in property -- that can motivate corrective action. It can also be used to select priorities and help target fire programs, serve as a model for state or local analyses of fire data, and provide a baseline for evaluating programs. Data was collected from the more than 13,000 fire departments that participate in the National Fire Incident Reporting System, and analyzed. One chapter focuses on deaths and injuries to firefighters.

Arguing that the greatest threat to Native American sovereignty in the United States can arguably be said to come from state governments and courts, Bays (geography, Oklahoma State U.) and Fouberg (geography, Mary Washington College) present nine contributions that explore tribal-state relations as it pertains to land use and ownership and other geographical issues. Much of the material analyzes case studies of particular litigations or cooperative programs between the states and the tribes, including jurisdiction and diminishment in South Dakota, the geographic expansion of Indian gaming, the territorial politics of environmental protection, transportation politics in Washington, and cooperative management of the allocation of Pacific Salmon. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR