When the Barger's farmhouse burns and it is discovered that they were murdered before the fire started, both the county deputy and a rookie reporter hunt the killer, each with a different motivation

Sudden Ice

Leeke, Jim

Literature & Fiction

St Martins Pr

On a sunny Fourth of July during World War I, King George V went out to a ball game. Along with Queen Mary and other royalty, Winston Churchill, dozens of VIPs, thousands of troops and ordinary Londoners, the monarch cheered an extraordinary "baseball match" between American soldiers and sailors. This historic event helped solidify the transatlantic alliance that was vital to winning the war. The game itself was a thriller, reported throughout the English-speaking world. The players ranged from kids fresh off the sandlots to a handful of major and minor leaguers and a future Hall of Famer. The two veteran pitchers went the distance, the outcome in doubt until the last batter. Drawing on American and British sources and game-day coverage, this first-ever full account of the "King's game" records every play and explores the lives of several players. The author provides a brief history of the Anglo-American Baseball League and armed forces baseball played in England, France and the United States during the Great War.

Nine Innings for the King: The Day Wartime London Stopped for Baseball, July 4, 1918

History

Americas

McFarland Company

2018 SABR Baseball Research Award Winner Baseball, like the rest of the country, changed dramatically when the United States entered World War I, and Jim Leeke brings these changes to life in From the Dugouts to the Trenches. He deftly describes how the war obliterated big league clubs and largely dismantled the Minor Leagues, as many prominent players joined the military and went overseas. By the war’s end more than 1,250 ballplayers, team owners, and sportswriters would serve, demonstrating that while the war was “over there,” it had a considerable impact on the national pastime. Leeke tells the stories of those who served, as well as organized baseball’s response, including its generosity and patriotism. He weaves into his narrative the story of African American players who were barred from the Major Leagues but who nevertheless swapped their jerseys for fatigues, as well as the stories of those who were killed in action—and by diseases or accidents—and what their deaths meant to teammates, fans, and the sport in general. From the Dugouts to the Trenches illuminates this influential and fascinating period in baseball history, as nineteen months of upheaval and turmoil changed the sport—and the world—forever.

From the Dugouts to the Trenches: Baseball during the Great War

Military

University Of Nebraska Press

Strawberry Hill Pr

Remembered today as the author of Ben-Hur, Lew Wallace was first an Indiana lawyer whose leadership and talent for action won him fame in the Civil War. Brash, handsome and charismatic, he quickly rose from colonel of a volunteer regiment to major-general of a division. A popular hero in wester Virginia and the capture of Fort Donelson, he later saw his military carreer nearly runied at Shiloh, where a series of disastrous miscommunications delayed his divisions's arrival of the field. Drawn from Lew Wallace: An Autobiography,published posthumously in 1906, this book offers the sights and sounds of the Civil War filtered through the memory of a keen-eyed romantic. Wallace emerges here in all of his compelling complexity.

Smoke, Sound & Fury: The Civil War Memoirs of Major-General Lew Wallace, U.S. Volunteers

WALLACE, LEW

More than half a century ago, New York City suffered from a drought that lasted through 1949 and into 1950. By February, the desperate city had to try something different. Mayor William O’Dwyer hired a municipal rainmaker. Dr. Wallace E. Howell was an inspired choice. The handsome, thirty-five-year-old Harvard-educated meteorologist was the ideal scientist—soft spoken, modest, and articulate. No fast-talking prairie huckster, he took credit for nothing he couldn’t prove with sound empirical data. Howell’s meticulous nature often baffled jaded New Yorkers. Over the next year, his leadership of a small ground and air armada, and his unprecedented scientific campaign to replenish the city’s upstate reservoirs in the Catskills, captured the imagination of the world. New York’s cloud seeding and rainmaking efforts would remain the stuff of legend—and controversy—for decades. Howell’s Storm is the first in-depth look at New York City’s only official rainmaker—an unintentional celebrity, dedicated scientist, and climate entrepreneur, whose activities stirred controversy among government officials, meteorologists, theologians, farmers, and resort owners alike.

Howell's Storm: New York City's Official Rainmaker and the 1950 Drought

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

Chicago Review Press

Grover Cleveland Alexander was one of the greatest pitchers in baseball history, with 373 career victories during twenty seasons in the Major Leagues. Elected into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1938, the right-hander remains a compelling--and tragic--figure. "Pete" Alexander's military service during World War I was the demarcation line between his great seasons with the Philadelphia Phillies and his years of struggle and turmoil with the Chicago Cubs and the St. Louis Cardinals after the Great War. Indeed, Alexander's service during World War I has all but been forgotten, even though it dramatically changed his life--and his game. Alexander served in the 342nd Field Artillery Regiment, which included big leaguers and star athletes among its officers and men. Naturally, the regiment fielded an outstanding baseball team, but it also faced hard service during the final weeks of the war. After the armistice in November 1918, the unit undertook occupation duty in Germany. The Best Team Over There examines this crucial period closely: where Alexander was stationed, how he was trained, how he withstood the effects of combat and shelling, how he interacted with his fellow athletes and soldiers, and how the war changed his baseball career, revealing for the first time the little-known details of this critical stage in the legendary pitcher's life and career. We can't truly understand Alexander and his enduring appeal to baseball fans without also understanding his life as a gunner and soldier. &nbsp;

The Best Team Over There: The Untold Story of Grover Cleveland Alexander and the Great War

Leaders & Notable People

The ‘Turtle’ and the ‘Dreamboat’ is the first detailed account of the race for long-distance flight records between the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy less than fourteen months after World War II. The flights were risky and unprecedented. Each service intended to demonstrate its offensive capabilities during the dawning nuclear age, a time when America was realigning its military structure and preparing to create a new armed service—the United States Air Force.\nThe first week of October 1946 saw the conclusion of both record-breaking, nonstop flights by the military fliers. The first aircraft, a two-engine U.S. Navy P2V Neptune patrol plane nicknamed the Truculent Turtle, flew more than eleven thousand miles from Perth, Western Australia, to Columbus, Ohio. The Turtle carried four war-honed pilots and a young kangaroo as a passenger. The second plane, a four-engine U.S. Army B-29 Superfortress bomber dubbed the Pacusan Dreamboat, flew nearly ten thousand miles from Honolulu to Cairo via the Arctic. Although presented as a friendly rivalry, the two flights were anything but collegial. These military missions were meant to capture public opinion and establish aviation leadership within the coming Department of Defense.\nBoth audacious flights above oceans, deserts, mountains, and icecaps helped to shape the future of worldwide commercial aviation, greatly reducing the length and costs of international routes. Jim Leeke provides an account of the remarkable and record-breaking flights that forever changed aviation.

The Turtle and the Dreamboat: The Cold War Flights That Forever Changed the Course of Global Aviation

POTOMAC BOOKS

The Gas and Flame Men: Baseball and the Chemical Warfare Service during World War I

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Leeke, Jim. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Leeke, Jim

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Leeke, Jim. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Sudden Ice

Nine Innings for the King: The Day Wartime London Stopped for Baseball, July 4, 1918

From the Dugouts to the Trenches: Baseball during the Great War

Sudden Ice

Smoke, Sound & Fury: The Civil War Memoirs of Major-General Lew Wallace, U.S. Volunteers

Howell's Storm: New York City's Official Rainmaker and the 1950 Drought

The Best Team Over There: The Untold Story of Grover Cleveland Alexander and the Great War

The Turtle and the Dreamboat: The Cold War Flights That Forever Changed the Course of Global Aviation

The Gas and Flame Men: Baseball and the Chemical Warfare Service during World War I