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  The Sundowners Pegasus and...

  Brian D. Laslie

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  The Sundowners, Pegasus, and Little Butch provides a new perspective on the Pacific War by following the exploits of a single Navy unit, Carrier Air Group 11 (CVG-11), beginning in 1943. Author Brian D. Laslie tells the riveting story of how the unit produced several aces, built a storied combat record, and played an important role in the defeat of Japan. 
   
   
   
  Like other Carrier Air Groups, CVG-11 comprised three aircraft squadrons: fighter (VF-11), bomber (VB-11), and torpedo (VT-11). CVG-11 saw its first action on Guadalcanal in 1943. It was then deployed on the aircraft carrier USS Hornet (CV 12) and fought throughout the Central and Southwest Pacific areas, from 1944 to 1945. The air group's achievements during World War II were laudable, amassing 103 air-to-air victories, destroying 272 grounded planes, and sinking more than 100,000 tons of Japanese shipping. During its time on the Hornet, CVG-11 also produced four aces, with top ace Charlie Stimpson shooting down an impressive sixteen enemy planes. VF-11 took great pride in protecting their shipmates and other squadron members in VB-11 and VT-11 and logged a perfect escort record, losing no bombers or torpedo planes to Japanese aircraft during the entire conflict. Laslie weaves together diaries, interviews, archival research, and official battle reports to present CVG-11's compelling story.

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  A Most Awkward Ridiculous...

  Benjamin Franklin

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  Benjamin Franklin left behind quite a legacy as an inventor, politician, and philosopher. Yet when he first arrived in Philadelphia, his future wife thought he had “a most awkward, ridiculous appearance.” Franklin recalls that this was because at the time he was carrying a large dinner roll under each arm and eating a third as he walked down the street. This delightful excerpt from his memoir shows how Franklin got his start in the printing business and demonstrates his skill as a humorist.  

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  Lowdown The: A Short History of...

  John Lee

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  A concise history of the origins of the “war to end all wars”.Many of us know that the first world war began when Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife were assassinated in Sarajevo in June of 1914.   But have you ever wondered exactly what chain of events led up to the incident that caused the whole world to erupt into one of the bloodiest conflicts in our history?Expert military historian and lecturer John Lee explains the causes behind the origins of the war and gives us a unique insight into the unfolding drama that defined and shaped a generation – and generations to come.©2010 Creative Content Ltd (P)2010 Creative Content Ltd

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  The Matryoshka Memoirs - A Story...

  Sasha Colby

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  Irina Nikifortchuk was nineteen years old and a Ukrainian schoolteacher when she was abducted to be a forced laborer in the Leica camera factory in Nazi Germany. Eventually pulled from the camp hospital to work as a domestic in the Leica owners' household, Irina survived the war and eventually found her way to Canada. 
   
   
   
  Decades later Sasha Colby, Irina's granddaughter, seeks out her grandmother's story over a series of summer visits and gradually begins to interweave the as-told-to story with historical research. As she delves deeper into the history of the Leica factory and World War II forced labor, she discovers the parallel story of Elsie Kühn-Leitz, Irina's rescuer and the factory heiress, later imprisoned and interrogated by the Gestapo on charges of "excessive humanity." 
   
   
   
  This is creative nonfiction at its best as the mystery of Irina's life unspools skillfully and arrestingly. Despite the horrors that the story must tell, it is full of life, humor, food, and the joy of ordinary safety in Canada. The Matryoshka Memoirs takes us into a forgotten corner of history, weaving a rich and satisfying tapestry of survival and family ties and asking what we owe those who aid us.

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  Most Famous Leaders of Native...

  Editors Charles River

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  Throughout history, there have been men of war and men of peace, but few have actually had a war named after them. One of them was Pontiac, also known as Obwandiyag, an Odawa chief who left his mark on history by continuing the battle against the British after their official triumph during the French and Indian War.  
  	The new United States was faced with a fundamental problem: to expand, it had to settle lands to the west of the Appalachian Mountains, ceded to it by the British. However, the mountains were occupied by Native American groups who had no desire to make way for white settlers. The treaty had created a vast frontier for the fledgling nation, and any American settlers pushing west along it were bound to encounter hostile natives.  
  	For the most part, the conflicts that followed consisted mostly of the Native Americans suffering defeat in the face of a better-equipped adversary, interspersed with binding treaties, which, on the side of the federal government, proved not very binding at all. Occasionally, however, there arose a Native American leader of such ability that such defeats were temporarily reversed, and Little Turtle, the war chief of the Miami tribe, was one such man. Under his leadership, a confederation of Miami and other tribes inflicted the worst defeat ever suffered by an American army in the newly independent nation. Almost a quarter of the Army’s total strength was lost in a single battle, but while later Native American leaders such as Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse have become legends, Little Turtle is not as well-remembered. This is particularly odd, given that he actually defeated the American military and helped shape the development of the nascent United States and its military.

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  Story Behind Hyperface

  Rekha Balakrishna

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  This woman entrepreneur's startup is reimagining how technology can empower transactional credit offered to customers

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