Gun Smuggling, Castro's Cuba and the Pittsburgh Mafia
9781467157636
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A Thrilling Lost Chapter of Mob Rule
Western Pennsylvania’s New Kensington was in the grips of Mafia control throughout the 1950s, with a bevy of bookie joints, gambling casinos and brothels. An outgrowth of the Pittsburgh mob, New Kensington’s Costa Nostra ordered a group of Mafiosi to break into a National Guard station in Ohio and steal a shipment of weapons. The guns were destined for Fidel Castro, who was waging guerrilla war in Cuba. The Pittsburgh Mafia was hoping to get on Castro’s good side if he won the war to secure the reopening of gambling casinos. From a daring heist in Canada to Swiss bank accounts and CIA informants, this infamous gunrunning scheme was a high-speed saga of international intrigue. Join author Richard Gazarik as he presents a harrowing historical narrative of the criminal underworld of Western Pennsylvania.
Ventura County
9781467106955
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Ventura County has its roots in the founding of Mission San Buenaventura during the Spanish era (1769–1821). During the Mexican era (1822–1846), expansive mission lands were divided and granted out as ranchos for individual landownership to those with political influence and to former soldiers for loyal service during the war. When California became a state in 1850, settlers, prospectors, and developers began to purchase rancho lands. Ventura County became one of the most productive agricultural and oil-rich lands in the state and country. Farmland dominated much of the county’s landscape in the early years—oranges were its most popular fruit, and sugar beets were its prized commodity. Although the county still has an agricultural landscape in many of its cities and towns, the county is a patchwork of farms, islands, high-tech businesses, and military defense installations. It is as diverse as its people.
Latinos in Pasadena
9780738569550
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Histories of Pasadena are rich in details about important citizens, time-honored traditions, and storied enclaves such as Millionaires Row and Lamanda Park. But the legacies of Mexican Americans and other Latino men and women who often worked for Pasadena's rich and famous have been sparsely preserved through the generations—even though these citizens often made remarkable community contributions and lived in close proximity to their employers. A fuller story of the Pasadena area can be provided from these vintage images and the accompanying information culled from anecdotes, master's theses, newspaper articles, formal and informal oral histories, and the Ethnic History Research Project compiled for the City of Pasadena in 1995. Among the stories told is that of Antonio F. Coronel, a one-time Mexican Army officer who served as California state treasurer from 1866 to 1870 and whose image graced the 1904 Tournament of Roses program.
Hidden History of Spanish New Mexico
9781609497606
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New Mexico's Spanish legacy has informed the cultural traditions of one of the last states to join the union for more than four hundred years, or before the alluring capital of Santa Fe was founded in 1610. The fame the region gained from artist Georgia O'Keefe, writers Lew Wallace and D.H. Lawrence and pistolero Billy the Kid has made New Mexico an international tourist destination. But the Spanish annals also have enriched the Land of Enchantment with the factual stories of a superhero knight, the greatest queen in history, a saintly gent whose coffin periodically rises from the depths of the earth and a mysterious ancient map. Join author Ray John de Aragón as he reveals hidden treasure full of suspense and intrigue.
Mexican American Baseball in East Los Angeles
9781467124713
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Mexican American Baseball in East Los Angeles highlights the unforgettable teams, players, and coaches who graced the hallowed fields of East Los Angeles between 1917 and 2016 and brought immense joy and honor to their neighborhoods. Off the field, these players and their families helped create the multibillion-dollar wealth that depended on their backbreaking labor. More than a game, baseball and softball were political instruments designed to promote and empower civil, political, cultural, and gender rights, confronting head-on the reactionary forces of prejudice, intolerance, sexism, and xenophobia. A century later, baseball and softball are more popular than ever in East Los Angeles. Dedicated coaches still produce gifted players and future community leaders. These breathtaking photographs and heartfelt stories shed unparalleled light to the long and rich history of baseball and softball in the largest Mexican American community in the United States.
Little Havana
9780738543451
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For the past 50 years, Cuban refugees and Central American immigrants have moved to an old quarter of Miami known as Little Havana. This internationally known community is famous for its sizzle, its heated ethnic politics, its entrepreneurial zest, and its colorful street life and celebrations. Before it became Little Havana, the area was home to a vast array of people, including white and black Bahamians, Jews, people from parts of the Middle East, and folks with Deep South pedigrees. The quarter's most famous neighborhoods then were Riverside and Shenandoah. Riverside emerged from the piney woods at the start of the 19th century and hosted some of the earliest city institutions, as well as picturesque homes and tree-shaded streets. Shenandoah was farmland as late as the 1920s, before a real estate boom transformed it into a neighborhood of gorgeous Mediterranean Revival–style homes. Southwest Eighth Street, the famed Calle Ocho, once divided the two neighborhoods, but the vast influx of Hispanics erased that division as the thoroughfare developed its own identity.
