"This publication provides an historical overview of research undertaken by the U.S. federal government over the last 100 years to improve the health and safety of our nation's miners. Federal research efforts began with the establishment of the U.S. Bureau of Mines (USBM, or the Bureau) in 1910. They have continued over the past century, even after the Bureau's closure in 1996. It is hoped that this publication will give the reader an appreciation...

From the publisher: Provides a comprehensive history of the more than 120 African Americans who have served in the United States Congress. Written for a general audience, this book contains a profile of each African-American Member, including notables such as Hiram Revels, Joseph Rainey, Oscar De Priest, Adam Clayton Powell, Shirley Chisholm, Gus Hawkins, and Barbara Jordan. Individual profiles are introduced by contextual essays that explain major...

"As a young girl in a working-class neighborhood of Sydney, Australia, Geraldine Brooks longed to discover the places where history happens and culture comes from, so she enlisted pen pals who offered her a window on adolescence in the Middle East, Europe, and America. Twenty years later Brooks, an award-winning foreign correspondent, embarked on a human treasure hunt to find her pen friends. She found men and women whose lives had been shaped by...

"Anna Maria Gasteazoro (1950-1993) was a Salvadoran opposition leader and renowned prisoner of conscience. In her memoirs, Tell Mother I'm in Paradise, she recounts her trajectory from a privileged Catholic upbringing in El Salvador, with stints at school abroad and early jobs, to her increasing commitment to political work after witnessing the violence and corpses in the streets of San Salvador early in the civil war, to clandestine organizing against...

"A sweeping, groundbreaking, and comprehensive treasury of the most essential presidential writings, featuring a richly varied mix of the beloved and the little-known, from stirring speeches and shrewd remarks to behind-the-scenes drafts and unpublished autobiographies. From the early years of our nation's history, when George Washington wrote his humble yet powerful Farewell Address, to our current age, when Barack Obama delivered his moving speech...

"More than the story of a single, savage engagement, Unsinkable traces the individual journeys of five men on one ship from Casablanca in North Africa, to Sicily and Salerno in Italy and then on to Plunkett's defining moment at Anzio, where a dozen-odd German bombers bore down on the ship in an assault so savage, so prolonged, and so deadly that one Navy commander was hard-pressed to think of another destroyer that had endured what Plunkett had. After...

Why do dogs speak so profoundly to our inner lives? When poet Doty decides to adopt a dog as a companion for his dying partner, he finds himself bringing home Beau, a large golden retriever, malnourished and in need of loving care. Beau joins Arden, the black retriever, to complete their family. As Beau bounds back into life, the two dogs become Doty's intimate companions, his solace, and eventually the very life force that keeps him from abandoning...

"In 1833, Charles Darwin was astonished by an animal he met in the Falkland Islands: handsome, social, and oddly crow-like falcons that were "tame and inquisitive . . . quarrelsome and passionate," and so insatiably curious that they stole hats, compasses, and other valuables from the crew of the Beagle. Darwin wondered why these birds were confined to remote islands at the tip of South America, sensing a larger story, but he set this mystery aside...

Learn the essential techniques for playing classical guitar with exercises and demonstrations designed to develop ease of motion, efficiency, coordination, tone, control over dynamics and color, melodic connection, and harmonic balance while preventing injury.