Bücher veröffentlicht von William D. Turner

IN THE THICK OF IT is a biographical sketch of a teenage boy forced to leave school as the Civil War is about to begin. Joining the Union Army as a drummer boy, he survives through three major campaigns over four years.Landing in the coal counties of Eastern Pennsylvania following the War, 18-year-old C. Ben Johnson builds a career at the confluence of the country's westward expansion, the birth of the industrial revolution, the rise of anthracite coal and the steel industry, the historic wave of European immigrants to work in the mines and mills, and the area's economic boom.Making effective use of superior writing and speaking skills, C. Ben Johnson devotes four decades to championing the betterment of workers of all walks of life and political persuasions, and to boosting the progress and prosperity of the communities around him.Without family or financial wealth or connections on which to draw, his leadership skills, diligence, and persuasive personality make C. Ben Johnson a positive and influential force in the region's economy and in the early labor union movement across the country.

The first family named Dow in America landed in 1637, escaping from the persecution of the English kings and the Anglican Church as a part of the 'great migration' begun by the Pilgrims 17 years earlier.Two hundred and seventy years later, descendent George W. Dow captained the only seven-masted sailing vessel ever built-the Thomas W. Lawson-on its maiden cross-Atlantic voyage. Encountering unfathomable weather, and monstrous winds, tides, and waves as it approached the English coast, the Lawson slipped her anchors and sunk among treacherous rocks in the Scilly Isles. The schooner, its cargo, and 16 sailors were lost, but 'lucky' Captain Dow and his engineer were heroically saved from the rocks the next day.This story is an account of how Captain Dow was the culmination of the Dow family's evolution from immigrants in a primitive, 17th century foreign land, to seafaring as an occupation, as a new United States and global economy began to emerge. And, his life also was the last of the Dow's New England-based, sea faring existence, as the Captain's descendants-already five generations and counting-spread from Boston to homes, careers and lives far-flung from Maine and New England.