We Were There But Where

Seasoned traveler Arlene Blessing has roughed it in a tent in Montana, squeezed an old bus through a narrow tunnel in the Black Hills, shopped in Londons Piccadilly Square, and spotted a humpback whale in Alaska. In her amusing and educational travelogue, Blessing combines interesting historical facts with entertaining personal anecdotes that chronicle her many trips within the United States and around the world with family, friends, and acquaintances. Blessing begins with stories about her travels to Yellowstone, Montana, South Dakota, and beyond as she and her family set out to satiate their curiosity about the world outside the comforts of their own home. As she continues with details about her travels outside the border, Blessing provides a glimpse into her often humorous experiences as she toured Hell in George Town, Grand Cayman; crossed the Taieri Gorge in New Zealand aboard a narrow gauge train; and bravely cruised the Mexican Riviera after a tsunami in Japan. We Were There But Where? shares the experiences and history surrounding a veteran traveler as she embarked on remarkable adventures in the United States and beyond.

The war in Afghanistan creates an urgency for telling stories—between soldiers, as they hand off missions to each other, and between soldiers and civilians, trying to explain what is going on—while also denying a lot of the context that is important for the telling of that story. The landscape is so mountainous and isolating that one incident or anecdote might not fit into a bigger picture beyond itself. A patrol may have no effect on the one that comes next. The war has ground itself into such a stasis that it is hard to see movement or plot. Yet we’re there. We have to say something. We have to be accountable, even though the circumstances complicate the ability to talk about it while simultaneously creating a constant yearning to do so. The Longer We Were There follows a part-time soldier’s experience over seven years in the Iowa Army National Guard. He enlists at seventeen into the infantry, then bounces between college classes, army training, disaster relief, civilian jobs, a deployment in Afghanistan—first on the Afghan-Pakistani border, then into a remote valley in the Hindu Kush Mountains—and finally comes home. His stories are about having one foot on each side of the civilian-military divide, the difficulty of describing one side to those on the other, and how, as a consequence of this difficulty, that divide gets replicated within the self.

There are few days in American history so immortalized in public memory as November 22, 1963, the date of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination. Adding to the wealth of information about this tragic day is We Were There, a truly unique collection of firsthand accounts from the doctors and staff on scene at the hospital where JFK was immediately taken after he was shot.With the help of his former fellow staff members at Parkland Memorial Hospital, Dr. Allen Childs recreates the horrific day, from the president’s arrival in Dallas to the public announcement of his death. Childs presents a multifaceted and sentimental reflection on the day and its aftermath. In addition to detailing the sequence of events that transpired around JFK’s death, We Were There offers memories of the First Lady, insights on conspiracy theories revolving around the president’s assassination, and recollections of the death of Lee Harvey Oswald, who succumbed two days later in the same hospital where his own victim was pronounced dead. A compelling, emotional read, We Were There pays tribute to a critical event in American modern history—and to a man whose death was mourned like no other.

Travel with Renee' and Pete as they explore the United States in their forty-foot motor coach. Renee' writes e-mails to her family and friends, reporting all the wonders they have seen with full-color pictures depicting some of their favorite sites. Contending with weather and road hazards is part of their travels, and wrong turns only added to their fun and adventures. Their travels are not limited to their motor coach and included a cruise to Alaska on the Norwegian Star and to the Eastern Caribbean aboard the largest cruise ship in the world, the Allure of the Sea. From the majestic mountains of Zion National Park and the exhilarating Skywalk of Grand Canyon West to the beauty of fiery sunsets over both oceans, this is the life everyone dreams of.

"This may be the most exhilarating and revelatory history of our country. It is must reading for today's youth-as well as their elders." --Studs Terkel From the boys who sailed with Columbus to today's young activists, this unique book brings to life the contributions of young people throughout American history. Based on primary sources and including 160 authentic images, this handsome oversized volume highlights the fascinating stories of more than 70 young people from diverse cultures. Young readers will be hooked into history as they meet individuals their own age who were caught up in our country's most dramatic moments-Olaudah Equiano, kidnapped from his village in western Africa and forced into slavery, Anyokah, who helped her father create a written Cherokee language, Johnny Clem, the nine-year-old drummer boy who became a Civil War hero, and Jessica Govea, a teenager who risked joining Cesar Chavez's fight for a better life for farmworkers. Throughout, Philip Hoose's own lively, knowledgeable voice provides a rich historical context-making this not only a great reference-but a great read. The first U.S. history book of this scope to focus on the role young people have played in the making of our country, its compelling stories combine to tell our larger national story, one that prompts Howard Zinn, author of A People's History of the United States, to comment, "This is an extraordinary book-wonderfully readable, inspiring to young and old alike, and unique." We Were There, Too! is a 2001 National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature.

"We Were There at the Normandy Invasion" by Clayton Knight. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

I know what Yano was like before he started going out with my sister... And what he was like after she died. How he held the tears back and looked as if he wanted to die... I understand him a whole lot better than you. -- VIZ Media

We Were Warriors Once is a military-political suspense novel. It chronicles the careers of four officers from the 1960s to the 1990s. Military promotions are based on an up-or-out systemyou either progress within specified time frames or you get left behind. Many officers who retire from their military careers at the Pentagon go through the revolving door and return in short order either as defense contract employees or civil servants. Not infrequently, they return to the same office where they worked before retiring. The same holds true for many political appointees. Men who once worked in Washington go off for a period to high-level assignments with defense contractors and return to influential positions in government. These revolving doors can sometimes have unintended negative consequences. President, and former five-star general, Dwight D. Eisenhowers warning against the power of the military-industrial complex is well known. However, that complex is actually tri-foldmilitary, industrial, and political. We Were Warriors Once incorporates revised editions of two previously published novels, Duty and Character and Wrong Enemy, Wrong War, with entirely new material that plumbs deeper into the defense contractors influence on national defense policies. The officers who wear the uniforms of the United States armed forces are by in large extraordinarily dedicated men and women. But in the profession of war, sometimes even the best are tempted at times to stray from the straight and narrow.