Traces the route, history, and geography of US 20, America’s longest road. “I know US 20, I live on it, grew up near it, commute to work on it, and have run on it most mornings for twenty-five years. It has become the Main Street of my life. I am fond of it, and want to tell its very American story.” ― from the Introduction Whether he’s on foot, in a car, or even in a canoe, Mac Nelson will delight readers with his rambling, westward depiction of America as seen from the shoulders of its longest road, US Route 20. As the “0” in its route number indicates, US 20 is a coast-to-coast road, crossing twelve states as it meanders 3,300 miles from Boston, Massachusetts, to Newport, Oregon. Nelson, an experienced “shunpiker,” travels west along the Great Road, ruminating on history, literature, scenery, geology, politics, wilderness, the Great Plains, and national parks―whatever the most interesting aspects of a particular region seem to be. Beginning with the great writers and founders of religion in the East who lived and wrote on or near US 20, including Anne Bradstreet, Phyllis Wheatley, and Sylvia Plath, then crossing the plains to the forests, mountains, and deserts of the West, Nelson’s journey on this beloved road is personal and idiosyncratic, serious and comic. More than a mile-by-mile guidebook, Twenty West offers a glimpse of a boyish and very American fascination with the road that will entice the traveler in all of us to take the long way home.

Twenty West: The Great Road Across America

Politics & Social Sciences

Mac Nelson

Social Sciences

Excelsior Editions

Traces the route, history, and geography of US 20, America’s longest road.“I know US 20, I live on it, grew up near it, commute to work on it, and have run on it most mornings for twenty-five years. It has become the Main Street of my life. I am fond of it, and want to tell its very American story.” — from the IntroductionWhether he’s on foot, in a car, or even in a canoe, Mac Nelson will delight readers with his rambling, westward depiction of America as seen from the shoulders of its longest road, US Route 20. As the “0” in its route number indicates, US 20 is a coast-to-coast road, crossing twelve states as it meanders 3,300 miles from Boston, Massachusetts, to Newport, Oregon. Nelson, an experienced “shunpiker,” travels west along the Great Road, ruminating on history, literature, scenery, geology, politics, wilderness, the Great Plains, and national parks—whatever the most interesting aspects of a particular region seem to be. Beginning with the great writers and founders of religion in the East who lived and wrote on or near US 20, including Anne Bradstreet, Phyllis Wheatley, and Sylvia Plath, then crossing the plains to the forests, mountains, and deserts of the West, Nelson’s journey on this beloved road is personal and idiosyncratic, serious and comic. More than a mile-by-mile guidebook, Twenty West offers a glimpse of a boyish and very American fascination with the road that will entice the traveler in all of us to take the long way home.“Nelson manages to pull off the not-so-easy feat of being quirky, erudite and entertaining.” — Chicago Tribune“Armchair travelers and devotees of American history are in for a treat.” — Ann La Farge, The Independent“A wonderful read for armchair travelers, and the next best thing to touring the length of US Route 20 in person.” — Midwest Book Review“From New York state to Yellowstone National Park, Nelson visits the ridiculous and the sublime … Twenty West shows plenty and according to Nelson, ‘There is room for all of us.’” — ForeWord Magazine“This book is a celebration and a cornucopia of American history and culture. Nelson’s curious and fertile mind runs in many directions as he delivers fascinating stories about such diverse Americans as Buffalo Bill, Joseph Smith, Satchel Paige, George Pullman, Ronald Reagan, and Rutherford B. Hayes, as well as stunning insights into writers from Henry David Thoreau to Emily Dickinson. After the road trip, this is a book to savor by the fire.” — Hedrick Smith, author of The Russians and Rethinking America “The author’s subject has innate importance; it is a story that until now has been waiting to be told, and it is to the author’s credit that he seized the opportunity.” — Warren Roberts, Distinguished Teaching Professor of History, University at Albany, State University of New York“I like Mac’s way of combining interesting travel narrative with a wide, free-ranging knowledge of literature, geography, history, and local color. I can hear his voice throughout, and his clear, unique angle of vision.” — Sidner Larson, author of Captured in the Middle: Tradition and Experience in Contemporary Native American Writing “Neslon’s got it right. He’s an American, along for the ride, from sea to shining sea.” — Diana Hume George, author of The Lonely Other: A Woman Watching America

Challenges readers to rethink the way we view the nation’s past and race relations in the present.Blending historical narrative with ideas for engaging young people as historians and thinkers, Alan J. Singer introduces readers to the truth about the history of slavery in New York State, and, by extension, about race in American society. Singer’s perspective as a historian and a former secondary school social studies teacher offers a wealth of new information about the past and introduces people and events that have been erased from history.New York, both the city and the state, were centers of the abolitionist struggle to finally end human bondage; however, at the same time, enslaved Africans built the infrastructure of the colonial city. The author shows teachers how to develop ways to teach about this very difficult topic. He shows them how to deal with racial preconceptions and tensions in the classroom and calls upon teachers and students to become historical activists, conduct research, write reports, and present their findings to the public.

New York and Slavery: Time to Teach the Truth

History

Singer, Alan J.

Americas

The inspirational story of an African American community that migrated from the Deep South to Albany, New York, in the 1930s.

Southern Life, Northern City: The History of Albany's Rapp Road Community

Lemak, Jennifer A.

The story of the Erie Canal’s completion and its place in the larger narrative of American modernity and progress. The stunning achievement of the Erie Canal’s completion is brought to life in this riveting story. In the spring of 1821, thousands of workers descended on the isolated village of Lockport, New York, twenty miles east of Niagara Falls. Their goal was to dig and blast a waterway through the so-called Mountain Ridge, the escarpment over which the Niagara River flows, and to divert some of that river’s flow eastward, thus completing the Erie Canal. This final obstacle would take five years to overcome, and the Lockport Locks, the ingenious device that carried boats to the top of the ridge, would come to be seen as an icon of American achievement―like the Erie Canal itself, a stairway to empire. Taking advantage of a rich trove of construction records, travelers’ writings, and visual material, Stairway to Empire examines the triumphs and tensions of this iconic American accomplishment and its place in the larger narrative of American modernity and progress. In the decades that followed its completion, the canal rearranged political and economic power on the continent, forming new connections and rupturing old ones, and creating winners and losers in the process. Piercing the barrier of the Appalachian Mountains, the Erie Canal established New York City as the American metropolis, the North’s economic ascendance over the South, and the United States as the dominant power in North America. Yet even as it explores these local and continental implications and the divergent meanings that have been attributed to them, Stairway to Empire also attends to the silences and shadows of a particular event (cutting through the Mountain Ridge), a particular place (Lockport), and the stories we have constructed to try to understand them.

Stairway to Empire: Lockport, The Erie Canal, and The Shaping of America

McGreevy, Patrick

The famous story of the Lakota healer and visionary, Nicholas Black Elk.

Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, the Premier Edition

Biographies & Memoirs

Neihardt, John G.

Community & Culture

Unsettling novel about frontier life in nebraska

The Dawn-Builder

Literature & Fiction

Genre Fiction

Indian Tales and Others

Anthology of short stories about American Indian life

First volume of the celebrated epic poem A Cycle of the West, covering the era of fur traders

The Mountain Men: The Song of Three Friends; The Song of Hugh Glass; The Song of Jed Smith (A Cycle of the West 1)

Poetry

Autobiographical journey down the Missouri River in 1908

The River and I

Travelers & Explorers

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Books by Excelsior Editions

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

Twenty West: The Great Road Across America

Twenty West: The Great Road Across America

New York and Slavery: Time to Teach the Truth

Southern Life, Northern City: The History of Albany's Rapp Road Community

Stairway to Empire: Lockport, The Erie Canal, and The Shaping of America

Black Elk Speaks: Being the Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, the Premier Edition

The Dawn-Builder

Indian Tales and Others

The Mountain Men: The Song of Three Friends; The Song of Hugh Glass; The Song of Jed Smith (A Cycle of the West 1)

The River and I