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In the early morning of September 8, 1755, a force of French Regulars, Canadians and Indians crouched unseen in a ravine south of Lake George.

Under the command of French general Jean-Armand, Baron de Dieskau, the men ambushed the approaching British forces, sparking a bloody conflict for control of the lake and its access to New York's interior. Against all odds, British commander William Johnson rallied his men through the barrage of enemy fire to send the French retreating north to Ticonderoga. The stage was set for one of the most contested regions throughout the rest of the conflict. Historian William Griffith recounts the thrilling history behind the first major British battlefield victory of the French and Indian War.

In 1857, the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) took over Pennsylvania's Main Line of Public Works, a state-owned railroad and canal system built in the 1830s. Most are gone, but fortunately some still stand and are in use today.

Costly to build and maintain, and never attracting the traffic needed to sustain it, the state was eager to let it go. Keeping the rail portion and combining it with its own lines, the PRR ultimately developed a well-built and well-run rail line from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh all while keeping the main line moniker. The eastern section between Philadelphia and Harrisburg was especially successful, particularly after the railroad built new communities along the line that were at first summer destinations and later year-round homes for daily commuters. Other towns and cities along the main line had a strong industrial or agricultural base needing rail access, and many of these communities had attractive train stations. Images of America: Pennsylvania Main Line Railroad Stations: Philadelphia to Harrisburg documents many of these passenger stations through vintage photographs and other images.

Pittsburgh: 1758-2008 surveys the city's evolution from strategic fort in the wilderness to bustling industrial workshop to high-tech center for universities and health care.

A boatbuilding center and gateway to the West at the beginning of the 19th century, Pittsburgh later produced iron and steel used to construct bridges and buildings around the country and provided the cannons, shot, and ships that helped win wars around the world. In the process, Pittsburgh became a magnet for successive waves of immigrants - workers and entrepreneurs who shaped the culture and character of the city with their customs, churches, clubs, food, and an impressive collection of museums. With a roster of notable historical figures and as the birthplace of a slew of world-changing innovations, Pittsburgh is a city that left its mark on the history books.

As 1753 came to a close, European empires were set on a collision course for a triangular piece of land known as the Forks of the Ohio.

The valuable patch of land, now known as Point State Park, is located at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers; the navigable waterways were valuable to the French to complete their control of the Ohio Valley as the British looked to create a center for their booming fur trade and westward expansion. Former soldier turned trader William Trent set out for the untamed wilderness to stake Britain’s claim, and he would build the first fort to form the humble beginnings of Pittsburgh and to set the stage for the French and Indian War. Author Jason A. Cherry details the history of William Trent and Pittsburgh’s forgotten first outpost.

Culinary Memories from Philadelphia's Past...Beyond the Cheesesteak

Long before Philadelphia’s food scene was splashed on covers of Bon Appetit and local establishments garnered accolades like “America’s best restaurant,” culinary pioneers set the city’s restaurant industry ablaze. Frenchman Georges Perrier brought the city the highest, most-respected opulence, Le Bec-Fin, for 40 years running. The ultimate seafood institute, Old Original Bookbinder’s, held the title of the world’s largest lobster tank and prepared impeccable oyster Rockefeller. Steve Poses changed the culinary game with the Frog that captivated palates with the infusion of international flavors. The nation’s very first automat, Horn & Hardart’s, consistently delivered near-perfect comfort food classics via vending machine.

Amy Strauss revisits celebrated spaces, unforgettable personalities and must-have recipes that made Philadelphia’s historic restaurants remembered for their delicious moments in time.

Learn more about Fort Pitt, a key military bastion of the American Revolution and guard of the Western "frontier", Pittsburgh, through this vivid illustrated history.

With vivid detail, historian Brady Crytzer traces the full history of Fort Pitt, from empire outpost to a bastion on the frontlines of a new Republic. A keystone to British domination in the territory during the French and Indian War and Pontiac's Rebellion, it was the most technologically advanced fortification in the Western Hemisphere. Early patriots later seized the fort, and it became a rallying point for the fledgling Revolution. Guarding the young settlement of Pittsburgh, Fort Pitt was the last point of civilization at the edge of the new American West.

A blow-by-blow account of the Conestoga Indians massacre, the aftermath and how the perpetrators got away with it.

On two chilly December days in 1763, bands of armed men raged through camps of peaceful Conestoga Indians and killed 20 women, children and men to effectively wipe out the tribe. These murderous rampages by Lancaster County's Paxton Boys were the culminating tragedies in a series of traded atrocities between European settlers and native tribes. Lancaster journalist Jack Brubaker allows the bloody trail left by the killers through the Pennsylvania countryside.

It's a conveinent-store giant in the Mid-Atlantic region today, but Wawa's history dates back to its days as an iron manufactuer over 200 years ago.

Founded in 1803 and incorporated in 1865, Wawa has roots in the manufacture of cast-iron water pipes and decorative lampposts. Using the resources and surplus water power from the iron business, the family opened a cotton mill and began producing cotton piece goods, including Red Star diapers. The first Wawa milk plant opened in 1902 and by the late 1950s, the Wawa Dairy had expanded its home delivery business to include over 145 routes. The first Wawa Food Market opened on April 16, 1964. Today, the company is familiar to many as a chain of 545 convenience stores in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia that offers a wide selection of fresh foods, coffee, and gasoline. Wawa contains vintage images documenting the evolution of the company as it adapted to changing economic and social conditions. From the early days of iron manufacture to the opening of the first store in Folsom, Pennsylvania, Wawa brings to life the many facets of one of America's top privately owned companies.

While Antietam remains one the most famous engagements of the Civil War, history largely overlooks the lower end of the battlefield.

Only here did the Confederates use Antietam Creek as a barrier, so it was the only place where Union troops had to force their way across. Here the Union army waged its final attack, and the Confederates launched their last counterattack led by A.P. Hill’s division. It might as well have been a different battle entirely from the more famed northern field.

Using dozens of journals, diaries, newspaper accounts and reports, author Robert M. Dunkerly examines the action in detail and explores the gradual preservation of this oft-neglected portion of America’s bloodiest battle.

Take a nonstop journey through 131 years of the Western Maryland Railway's history in this photographic tale.

The Western Maryland Railway was never a large Class 1 rail carrier, but during its 131 colorful years of existence, it provided extremely fast, efficient, and reliable freight; coal-hauling; and passenger service in the states it served. This book contains images from the history of this remarkable railroad and also provides the reader the opportunity to see how the legacy of the Western Maryland Railway is being maintained and remembered even today at some of its well-known train stations, such as in Cumberland and Union Bridge, Maryland, now home to the Western Maryland Railway Historical Society (WMRHS). The Western Maryland is now gone, but through the wonderful images captured and preserved by the WMRHS and private archival photograph collections, the dream of the railway will live on.

Since William Penn presided over the state's only official witch trial in 1684, witchcraft and folk magic have been a part of the history of the Keystone State.

English and German settlers brought their beliefs in magic with them from the Old World--sometimes with dangerous consequences. In 1802, an Allegheny County judge helped an accused witch escape an angry mob. Susan Mummey was not so fortunate. In 1934, she was shot and killed in her home by a young Schuylkill County man who was convinced that she had cursed him. In other regions of the state, views on folk magic were more complex. While hex doctors were feared in the Pennsylvania German tradition, powwowers were and are revered for their abilities to heal, lift curses and find lost objects. Folklorist Thomas White traces the history and lore of witchcraft and the occult that quietly live on in Pennsylvania even today.

The Philadelphia Phillies, one of the oldest teams in Major League Baseball, have maintained a strong, loyal fan base for over 125 years.

Despite historic set backs, the franchise has proven resilient and evolved into a perennial contender with consistently large attendance figures. In fact, the Phillies claim 37 Hall of Famers, two World Series championships, seven National League pennants, and nine division titles. The Philadelphia Phillies chronicles the greatness of Grover Cleveland Alexander, the remarkable career of Richie Ashburn, the perfection of Jim Bunning, and the teams of success and luster as well as those shining stars of the less successful eras.

Lake Erie has seen its share of disasters, claiming more ships per square mile than any other body of freshwater. Read the mysteries of its most mysterious and notorious wrecks and disappearances.

The great lakes have seen many ships meet their end, but none so much as Lake Erie. As the shallowest of the Great Lakes, Lake Erie is prone to sudden waves and wildly shifting sandbars. The steamer Atlantic succumbed to these conditions when, in 1852, a late night collision brought 68 of its weary immigrant passengers to watery graves. The 1916 Black Friday Storm sank four ships -- including the unsinkable James B. Colgate -- in the course of its 20-hour tantrum over the lake. In 1954, a difficult fishing season sent the Richard R into troubled waters in the hopes of catching a few more fish. One of the lake's sudden storms drowned the boat and three man crew. At just 50 miles wide and 200 miles long, Lake Erie has claimed more ships per square mile than any other body of freshwater. Author David Frew dives deep to discover the mysteries of some of Lake Erie's most notorious wrecks.

Faith, family and food.

Between 1880 and 1924, more than four million Italians immigrated to the United States. Tens of thousands flocked to Newark and reshaped a city. Many settled in the Old First Ward, which once claimed the title of largest Little Italy in New Jersey. Clubs like the Spilingese Social Club sprang up to provide support and camaraderie and dishes like giambotta made their way into everyone’s kitchens. 

Author Andrea Lyn Cammarato-Van Benschoten traces the roots of Newark’s Italian communities.

Travel back in time through the heyday of the old Erie Canal and see how it unleashed the growth of the United States.

The building of the Erie Canal was spearheaded by the vision of Gov. Dewitt Clinton, New York State to build the engineering marvel that opened the West to settlement and made New York City the center of finance and commerce. Opened in 1825, the canal proved so commercially viable that construction of an enlarged Erie Canal began just 11 years later. The success of the canal spawned the growth of cities, towns, businesses, and industries along its route in upstate New York.

Erie Canal takes you on a journey where you can swim with the Volunteer Life Saving Corps as they sharpen their skills, view images of mule-drawn boats wending their way through scenic countryside, and marvel at the engineering of the bridges, aqueducts, and locks that facilitated the functioning of the canal. In addition, Erie Canal travels a step back in time and illuminates the people whose lives were shaped by the canal.

Local storyteller Jonathan Kruk shares the mysterious lore of the Hudson Valley, best known among them Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." 

This exciting volume and its author has been featured in the Travel Channel's "Mysteries at the Museum," and helped establish the galloping goblin's origin story.

The story of Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman is one of America's best known fables, but what other stories does the Hudson Valley hold? Imps cause mischief on the Hudson River, a white lady haunts Raven Rock, Major Andre's ghost seeks redemption and real headless Hessians search for their severed skulls. These mysterious and spooky tales from the region's past that inspired Irving and continues to captivate the imagination to this day.

New York City, one of the world's premier urban centers, is also home to the world's most famous and storied municipal law enforcement service: the NYPD.

Policing in New York is as old as the city itself, although much has changed since the first Dutch rattle watch patrolled streets in the 1620s. Technological improvements, advancing professional standards, and historical moments like the 1898 consolidation of New York City and the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, have each profoundly changed the way New York City police officers do their jobs. Still, as New York City Police emphasizes, certain elements of the job remain true through the decades and centuries. Being a police officer in New York City has always involved a certain amount of danger, sacrifice, and public coordination.

The history of Grand Central Terminal, from construction to world-famous landmark, and its influence on the New York City community surrounding it.

Built in the heart of the Empire City is the world's greatest and most iconic railway terminal. A colossal Beaux-Arts style transport nexus, Grand Central Terminal was completed in 1913 from the legacy of the railroad tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt. The terminal quickly became vital to travel and today accommodates 750,000 people daily. This book documents the construction of Grand Central Terminal, the former Grand Central Depot (1871) and Grand Central Station (1900), and illuminates the incredible story of the terminal that revolutionized transport, developed Midtown Manhattan, and opened railroad access to suburban areas.

Affectionately called Woodies by loyal Washingtonians, the beloved department store Woodward & Lothrop stood at the heart of downtown for over a century.

Crowds flocked to the flagship store on the F Street shopping corridor to find better service and the season's fashions. The store and its employees shared in the best moments in the lives of Washingtonians, from the elaborate holiday window displays to the Wedding Service department that helped countless brides choose their china patterns. For weary shoppers, the Bake Shop and seventh-floor Tea Room offered city favorites such as Wellesley Fudge Cupcakes and Chicken Pot Pie. Department store historian Michael J. Lisicky brings readers back to the store's golden age, chronicling the enterprise that made it a retail giant and the missteps that brought the store to its much lamented closing in 1995. Through interviews with store insiders, vintage images and a selection of recipes, Lisicky reveals the magic and the memories behind Woodward & Lothrop. With an introduction by Tim Gunn, American fashion icon and television personality.

From sprawling potato farms and incredibly lavish estates, to whaling ships and early race cars, Long Island has an incredibly rich history often lost through the generations.

In the world of racing, Long Island was once the horse racing capital of the state and hosted the nation's first professional auto races. Though farming still thrives in Suffolk County, there are only a few working farms left in Nassau County, where hundreds of farms dotted the landscape generations ago. Cold Spring Harbor, Greenport, Sag Harbor and Southampton were centers of the whaling industry in America and maintain a whaling heritage today. Author Richard Panchyk reveals fascinating narratives of Long Island's lost history.

See how the Pennsylvania Turnpike proved the doubters wrong and came to be known as the World's Greatest Highway.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is one of the best-known highways in the United States. Most Pennsylvania Turnpike travelers are unaware that its construction was inspired by the route of the never-completed South Pennsylvania Railroad. In the 1930s, men of great vision conceived, planned, and built the nation's first long-distance superhighway using the abandoned railroad's partially finished tunnels as its foundation.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike draws from the extensive photograph collection in the Pennsylvania State Archives. Many were taken by photographers hired by both the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission and its contractors, and most have never been published previously. Originally predicted to be a financial failure, the project wound up being a tremendous success and, eventually was expanded and improved, laying the groundwork for the nation's Interstate Highway System.

Historical photographs, previously unpublished, portray historical Long Beach Island of New Jersey, from beaches to resorts to fishing.

Long Beach Island stretches for eighteen miles alongside the southern New Jersey mainland. A barrier island, it has a vivid history that includes wild game and bountiful fish, early whalers and tragic shipwrecks, paddle-wheel steamboats and grand hotels. With its rare and previously unpublished images, Long Beach Island portrays the unforgettable place that today is known for its white sandy beaches, fresh seafood, and bright red and white lighthouse. Shown are islanders engaged in pound fishing and salt hay harvesting, and, later, visitors crossing Barnegat Bay to the island resorts called Barnegat City and Beach Haven.

Offering a panoramic view of present-day Pittsburgh, Monongahela and Duquesne Inclines attract pedestrians traveling from the river's shore to the top of Mount Washington.

These inclines were completed in 1870 and 1877 by real estate speculators hoping to capitalize on undeveloped land at the top of Coal Hill, a name given due to its many coal mines. Housing in the valleys and other low-lying areas could not accommodate the influx of new residents following the Civil War. Using technology perfected to haul coal from mines, the region's first inclined railroads, or funiculars, carried people and goods and formed a part of the Allegheny Portage Railroad. By 1900, inclines were an integral part of the city's identity. During the early decades of the 20th century, however, automobiles and trucks made access to Pittsburgh's hilltops relatively easy. Before the automobile, there were at least 15 inclines in Pittsburgh. Today, there are two: the Monongahela and Duquesne Inclines.

In early twentieth-century New York, few could have imagined a train terminal as grandiose as Pennsylvania Station.

Sandhogs would battle the fiercest of nature to build tunnels linking Manhattan to New Jersey and Long Island. For decades, Penn Station was a center of elegance and pride. But the ensuing rise of the airplane and automobile began to diminish train travel. By the mid-1960s, the station was tragically destroyed. The loss inspired the birth of preservation laws in the city and the nation that would save other landmarks like Grand Central. Author Paul Kaplan recounts the trials and triumphs of New York’s Penn Station.

Hershey, Pennsylvania, went from relative unknown to an American dream come true thanks in large part to the risk taken by its founder, Milton Hershey.

In 1903, successful candy-maker Milton Hershey began a new enterprise that many people thought was doomed. He planned to build the biggest chocolate factory in the world, and a town to house its employees. The location he chose, near his birthplace in rural Derry Township, Pennsylvania, was most unlike the traditional urban factory settings of the era. Hershey is the pictorial history of what happened next. Through period photographs, many of them in print for the first time, and engaging narrative, Hershey reveals how the place, the people, the industrial age, and Milton Hershey himself contributed to the success of his scheme. Hershey includes an introduction to the history of Derry Township, tracing it from Milton Hershey's birth in 1857 to his return in the early 1900s. The book follows the intertwining stories of Milton Hershey's life, the growth of his chocolate company, the development of the school for needy boys that he endowed with his entire fortune, and the evolution of his model company town. The transformation of Hershey into a tourist destination and its survival after the death of its founder in 1945 conclude this chronicle of a vision turned into reality.

Illustrating the boroughs, townships and villages of Luzerne County in a rare collection of photographs, advertisements and history dating back to the 18th century.

The Susquehanna River meanders through Luzerne County in Northeastern Pennsylvania, passing communities historically known for the mining of anthracite coal. Settlement of the area began in 1769 during the first Yankee-Pennamite War. Historical photographs from the Luzerne County Historical Society depict businesses, churches, coal culture, street scenes, area disasters, entertainment, railroads, steamboats, and veterans, including the last survivor of the Battle of Wyoming in 1778 and the Civil War.

Schuylkill County is no stranger to disaster.

Schuylkill County is no stranger to disaster. Protected by volunteers since 1811, residents have faced block-burning conflagrations like the Great Memorial Day Fire of 1945, which consumed sixty-seven buildings in the Mahanoy City Business District, and commercial airplane crashes like United Flight 624 near Ashland, with no survivors. The Red Church propane truck explosion near Orwigsburg caused twelve fatalities, and the Reading Railroad passenger train collision with a gasoline truck in Port Carbon sparked death and destruction, as well as a frantic search for burning money.

Telling these stories with the help of rare and many never-before-seen images, authors and veteran firefighters Michael R. Glore and Michael J. Kitsock revisit some of the region’s most harrowing catastrophes.

Discover the people and places of Brooklyn from a decade of growth and prosperity in the 1920s.

Now home to approximately 2.5 million people, Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs that make up New York City. It was during the 1920s that Brooklyn experienced some monumental changes in the early motorized world of cars, trucks, buses, and trains. In this decade, Brooklyn saw the construction of the world's largest promenade, the Coney Island Boardwalk, as well as the construction of most of the homes that still exist in Brooklyn. The 1920s also brought Brooklyn's sewers and paved roads. Slowly but surely, farms and gardens began to vanish in the name of progress. Brooklyn became a refuge for many. It offered the opportunity for peaceful living in a growing urban society.

Travel back to the beginnings of a diverse community with a rich ethnic heritage and join author Eric Ierardi in this celebration of a unique American city with a fascinating past.Brooklyn in the 1920sis sure to appeal to both residents and newcomers and will serve as a valuable tool in teaching the history of Brooklyn to future generations.

Incorporated in 1827, the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad  was one of America's first railroads, and Maryland was its heart and soul.

The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad’s (B&O)   creation was a tangible symbol of the Industrial Revolution, representing commerce and progress to towns along its route. Its headquarters and operations, centered in Baltimore, provided years of economic growth for the port city. This book contains images of well-known stations in Maryland, including Ellicott City Station, Gaithersburg Station, Camden Station, and the Mount Clare Shops—a self-contained industrial city, now home to the B&O Railroad Museum. Some stations still exist and are home to small museums or restaurants; others no longer stand, but images of them will remind even the casual historian of a time when railroads were a part of everyday life in America.

Take a step back in time and revisit the sites, stations, and trains of the B&Othat were once part of everyday life in Maryland and remember the glory of a bygone era.

During the turn of the century, the railroad was an extremely important transportation and shipping resource to thousands of people and businesses in Pennsylvania.

Along the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad: From Cumberland to Uniontown dedicates its pages to this pivotal mass transportation provider. This book includes images from every B&O bridge and station from Cumberland, Maryland, to Uniontown, Pennsylvania, in 1891. Many of the towns stretched along the miles of tracks, such as Somerfield and Ohiopyle, are depicted in these vintage photographs. Experience the coal and coke booms of the 1880s to 1920s through people from many different locations who had one thing in common: the railroad.

For decades, the vast Adirondack wilderness has beckoned.The Adirondacks: 1931-1990celebrates the years in which the six-million-acre preserve truly became a people's park.

Some, familiar with Adirondack-inspired art and literature, are drawn in by its spectacular beauty; many are lured by its year-round sports and recreational opportunities; others are enticed merely by its natural beauty-the clear air, sparkling waters, and dense woodlands. With some 200 rare images, the book includes photos of the Winter Olympics held at Lake Placid in 1932, attended by thousands from the world over, and pictures of American boys working in the CCC camps in the Adirondacks during the Great Depression. Follow the progression of history as steamboats ply Lake George and the Fulton Chain and other lakes, then as the railroads as they bring in more and more visitors, and trace the rise and fall of the grand hotels and their successors: the cabins, motels, cottages, second homes, and campsites of the motoring public.

The Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital was more than a building; it embodied an entire era of uniquely American history, from the unparalleled humanitarian efforts of Dorothea Dix to the revolutionary architectural concepts of Thomas Story Kirkbride.

After well over a century of service, Greystone was left abandoned in 2008. From the time it closed until its demolition in 2015, Greystone became the focal point of a passionate preservation effort that drew national attention and served to spark the public's interest in historical asylum preservation. Many of the images contained in this book were rescued from the basement of Greystone in 2002 and have never been seen by the public. They appear courtesy of the Morris Plains Museum and its staff, who spent many hours digitally archiving the photographs so that future generations may better know Greystone's history.

The story of Chesapeake pirates and patriots begins with a land dispute and ends with the untimely death of an oyster dredger at the hands of the Maryland Oyster Navy.

From the golden age of piracy to Confederate privateers and oyster pirates, the maritime communities of the Chesapeake Bay are intimately tied to a fascinating history of intrigue, plunder and illicit commerce raiding. Author Jamie L.H. Goodall introduces infamous men like Edward “Blackbeard” Teach and “Black Sam” Bellamy, as well as lesser-known local figures like Gus Price and Berkeley Muse, whose tales of piracy are legendary from the harbor of Baltimore to the shores of Cape Charles.

It may not be the Kentucky Derby, but Saratoga Springs went to the horses long before Churchill Downs.

Since the inaugural meeting of August 1863, Saratoga Springs is home to one of the oldest sports venues in the country and has been the scene of memorable races, often featuring legends of the sport. Although some of the epic moments are still familiar today, such as Upset's defeat of Man o' War in the 1919 Sanford Memorial, many of the triumphs and defeats that were once famous have been forgotten. Few remember the filly Los Angeles, who thrived at Saratoga, winning sixteen stakes races, or the influential, sometimes suspicious, reasons why the track was closed three times for a total of six years. Authors Allan Carter and Mike Kane take a look back at these and other important but neglected stories and present statistics from the pre-NYRA years and a rundown of the greatest fields assembled at America's oldest track.

The most trusted and prominent knife makers in the US, the history and background of W.R. Case & Sons is examined here with personal stories and photographs

In 1905, John Russell Russ Case brought the fledgling W. R. Case & Sons Company to Bradford, and it dominated the knife industry for the next century. From kitchen, hunting, and pocket knives to the V-42 Stiletto carried by U.S. Army soldiers in World War II, Case knives have been not only a tool but also a trusted companion for generations. Still handcrafted in Bradford, Case knives are the most collected knives in the world. W. R. Case & Sons Cutlery Company contains photographs of Russ Case and his family, the factory, special knives, Case collector events, and even the Case car. Rare finds from the Case archives, employees, and family members help chronicle the company's incredible history.

Levittown was created in Bucks County outside of Philadelphia in 1951. As one of the largest planned communities in America, this book's superb collection of history and photographs illustrates the birth and growth of this unique area.

In 1951, Levittown was created in Bucks County outside of Philadelphia by builder pioneers Levitt and Sons. Dubbed the largest and most perfectly planned community in America, it featured single-family homes, schools, churches, shopping centers, and swimming pools. A symbol of the American Dream, Levittown defined the phenomenon of post-World War II suburban developments, which for the first time gave working- and middle-class families the option of affordable, detached houses outside congested urban neighborhoods. Levittown was a melting pot, attracting people from cities, rural areas, and all walks of life, including many World War II veterans with young families. Houses came fully equipped with appliances and landscaping and started at $9,000. Levittown's superb collection of history and photographs illustrates the birth and growth of this unique area, explores the community that resulted, and features residents' personal memories of the golden years.  

Take a fascinating journey through the history of Allentown, Pennsylvania with more than 200 vintage photographs and anecdotes from the locals who experienced it.

Allentown, the Queen City of the Lehigh Valley, is the youngest but largest of the three cities in the valley. Founded in 1762 by William Allen, it was little more than a crossroads and small market town along the Lehigh Riveruntil it became the county seat in 1812. Heavy industries based on iron developed in the mid-eighteenth century along the Lehigh Riverand, by the 1860s, Allentown had become the largest community in the Lehigh Valley. In 1867, Allentown became a city.

In Allentown, readers nostalgic for times past will find photographs showing the places they remember from years ago, the Pennsylvania Power & Lighttower, and the effects of the devastating floods on the Lehigh River. Equally, newcomers who have heard about the great department stores of Hamilton Street, the trolley systems, Central Park, the breweries, and the iron and silk industries will treasure the images in this volume. Many places that still exist are shown in Allentown as they appeared in their earlier days.

Local historian and author Ann Bartholomew has compiled a riveting photographic record of the vibrant city of Allentown. Perusing these pages will evoke memories and will provide opportunities for parents and grandparents to introduce a younger generation to the city as it was in their youth.

Bordered by the Delaware River and dotted by dozens of delightful 18th-century towns and villages, Bucks County retains a wistful air of long ago.

Covered bridges, colonial homes, classic farmsteads, and a breathtaking countryside are only part of this beautiful county's story. In 1683, Pennsylvania's founder, William Penn, established his manor here and helped build a nation by inviting industrious immigrants to its fertile soil. In 1776, Gen. George Washington launched one of the most important battles of the Revolutionary War from its shores. Farmers harnessed the land for centuries, followed by writers, artists, and innovators who weaved its charms into their work for the world. Bucks County features photographs from area historical societies and collectors that capture the spirit of the everyday life, as well as the extraordinary people and events, that helped shape one of the most distinctive places in America.

A Fabulous Fable of the Supernatural Kind

The saga of the Morristown ghost has been told around campfires and dinner tables in Morris County for generations. Local legend claimed British Loyalists secretly buried stolen Patriot treasure on Schooley Mountain as they fled the oncoming forces of George Washington during the Revolutionary War. Years later in 1788, a former school teacher from Connecticut, Ransford Rodgers, convinced local prominent Morristown families that a ghost was protecting the true location of the treasure and he alone could exercise it. Little did the victims know, Rodgers was perpetuating an elaborate hoax and eventually extorted large sums of money from the embarrassed local elite. The tale has been recounted in various sensational pamphlets and publications ever since, leaving behind a mystery of what is true or myth.

Author Peter Zablocki separates fact from fiction in the story of the great Morristown ghost hoax.

From a distance, Shenandoah may look like any other small town, quaint and unassuming, and yet there are many more treasures than just the ""black diamonds"" of coal that run in her veins.

Discovery of the Mammoth Vein of anthracite in the 1860s brought tens of thousands of immigrants to work the local mines; in turn, they brought their cultures and dreams of a better life in America. Within a generation, rapidly increasing population created the ""Most Congested Square Mile in the United States."" Later, a shift from coal mine to Main Street fashioned recognition for retail fineries, along with distinction as the ""City of Churches."" At the center of the Molly Maguire troubles of the 1870s and the 1902 coal strike that changed the power of the presidency, Shenandoah has long been recognized for defiance and determination. Mining disasters, financial adversity, and ruinous fires scarred memories of decades of prominence; however, Shenandoah's spirit has endured through the last 150 years.

Since their creation thousands of years ago, the Niagara Falls have captured the hearts and imaginations of all those who witness their endless power and strength.

As settlers arrived and began to harness the falls as a resource, the population climbed. Small hamlets, including Bellevue, Clarksville, Schlosser, and Manchester, grew to become the villages of Suspension Bridge and Niagara Falls, which were incorporated in March 1892 into the current city of Niagara Falls. Niagara Falls: 1850–2000 depicts the natural beauty of the falls, the emergence of the booming tourism trade, and the advances of electrical technology that have relied on the mighty falls' power. Many hands have crafted and bent steel to span the Niagara Gorge while many others fought to keep industry from turning nature into asphalt. Culled from the archives of the Niagara Falls Public Library's Local History Department, these images represent the people, from those stepping close to the brink in amazement and awe to those who live and work within the roar of Niagara Falls, and places that make up the landscape that is Niagara's past.

Through an extraordinary collection of photographs, Jim Thorpe tells the story of not only the athlete but its famed coal-mining industry.

What was originally named Mauch Chunk, Jim Thorpe was established on the Lehigh River as a shipping depot for anthracite coal in 1818 by Josiah White, a Philadelphia Quaker and brilliant engineer, and his trusted business partner, Erskine Hazard. By 1829, White and Hazard had founded the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company and built an efficient transportation system that moved coal nine miles over the mountains to Mauch Chunk by Switchback Gravity Railroad, and 46 miles along the Lehigh Canal to Easton. With the arrival of the railroads, the Switchback became a major tourist attraction. As rail excursionists descended on Mauch Chunk to experience a hair-raising ride on America's first roller coaster and enjoy the magnificent scenery, the coal shipping town, billed by the railroads as the Switzerland of America, became a tourist destination second in popularity only to Niagara Falls. In a story stranger than fiction, the town exchanged its name for the name of Jim Thorpe when the 1912 Olympic hero was laid to rest there in 1954.  Jim Thorpe (Mauch Chunk) tells the story of the athlete and his burial, the Switchback Gravity Railroad, the Lehigh Canal, the social scene, and the town's Victorian legacy.

Philadelphia has been a magnet for Irish immigrants and their descendants since the 17th century, and the city wouldn't be what it is today without them.

The Irish distinguished themselves in the Revolutionary War with dozens of heroes, such as Wexford-born sailor Commodore John Barry. When refugees from Ireland's Great Famine poured into Philadelphia after 1845, the city changed forever—the thousands of Irish immigrants of the famine generation, after experiencing discrimination from anti-Catholicism and anti-Irish rhetoric, used their religious and cultural traditions to promote their own advancement by constructing a network of schools, Catholic churches, fraternal clubs, and cultural organizations. In Irish Philadelphia, images of their accomplishments and advancements are featured along with vibrant, personal stories of Irish residents.

Inwood, the northernmost neighborhood of Manhattan, has a rich yet little-known history.

For centuries, the region remained practically unchanged - a quaint, country village known to early Dutch settlers as Tubby Hook. The subway's arrival in the early 1900s transformed the area, once scorned as ten miles from a beefsteak, from farm to city virtually overnight. The same construction boom sparked an age of neighborhood self-discovery, when vestiges of the past - in the form of mastodon bones, arrowheads, colonial pottery, Revolutionary War cannonballs, and forgotten cemeteries - emerged from the earth. Waves of German, Irish, and Dominican immigrants subsequently produced a vibrant urban oasis with a big-city/small-town feel. Inwood has also been home to wealthy country estates, pre-integration sports arenas, and a lively waterfront culture. Famous residents have included NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Basketball Diaries author Jim Carroll, and Hamilton creator/star Lin-Manuel Miranda.

The Long Island Motor Parkway was constructed at a pivotal time in American history, and it often considered a precursor to the modern highway system.

A forerunner of the modern highway system, the Long Island Motor Parkway was constructed during the advent of the automobile and at a pivotal time in American history. Following a spectator death during the 1906 Vanderbilt Cup Race, the concept for a privately owned speedway on Long Island was developed by William K. Vanderbilt Jr. and his business associates. It would be the first highway built exclusively for the automobile. Vanderbilt's dream was to build a safe, smooth, police-free road without speed limits where he could conduct his beloved automobile races without spectators running onto the course. Features such as the use of reinforced concrete, bridges to eliminate grade crossings, banked curves, guardrails, and landscaping were all pioneered for the parkway. Reflecting its poor profitability and the availability of free state-built public parkways, the historic 48-mile Long Island Motor Parkway closed on Easter Sunday, April 17, 1938.

Hess's Department Store was a unique department store that with a combination of style and showmanship became a shopping legend for almost 100 years.

Founded in 1897 in Allentown by brothers Max and Charles Hess as a dry goods store, it became the downtown heart of Pennsylvania's third-largest city for much of the 20th century. The Hess family was from Germany, and it was Max Hess Sr. who realized the Germans in Pennsylvania had limited access to quality dry goods; with his sons’ backgrounds in the retail industry, and a higher quality of merchandise, particularly Hess’s French Room, filled with the most in vogue fashions from France. The department store entered its golden age under by Max Hess's son, a showman for merchandising who embraced the life of a department store mogul, living in a giant mansion and rubbing shoulders with celebrities such as Bob Hope and Zsa Zsa Gabor. From the single store in Allentown to more than 80 by the 1990s, it seemed that Hess’s was unstoppable, but a national recession and increased retail competition would eventually sink the titan of Pennsylvania retail. Through a series of photographs, many from private collections and seldom seen, Hess's Department Storebrings the glory days of Hess's to life again.

Altoona is a city built by the Pennsylvania Railroad. Cities usually grow to maturity and then sprout suburbs. With Altoona, it was the opposite. The suburban towns are older than the city and form a larger community.

In 1849, Altoona was farmland, a little hamlet in the mountains of central Pennsylvania. The site was chosen by the railroad for locomotive repair shops. Situated at the eastern base of the Allegheny Mountains, Altoona was destined to become the largest railroad yard in the world. The complex occupied 217 acres and included two huge roundhouses. Centered around the railroad, the city and its population grew. In this historic city were various shops that provided employment to early settlers and the old furnaces of the ironmasters. Also here were the Logan House hotel, where a meeting of governors saved the Union, and Cricket Field, where great athletes from across the country competed. Over the years Altoona has been visited by not only presidents and statesmen but also celebrities of stage and opera. It is home to the world-famous Horseshoe Curve and to Lakemont Park, which has the world's oldest roller coaster.

How the Adirondack region was first discovered, then explored and eventually maintained- all of which helped shape what it is today.

The East's greatest wilderness, the Adirondack region of New York State, shares its history and lore with Native Americans, early settlers, artists, writers, sportsmen, professors and others. The Adirondacks are known to outdoor lovers, skiers, and year-round visitors for their 46 high peaks, 100-mile canoe route, 133-mile Northville-to-Lake Placid Trail, 30,000 miles of mountain streams, and 3,000 lakes.

In addition to its finding, The Adirondacks: 1830-1930, shows how the six-million-acre Adirondack Park, which is the largest park in the contiguous United States and a patchwork of public and private lands governed by one of the largest regional zoning plans in the country, was preserved. With over 200 stunning photographs and fascinating tales of the region, it traces the development of the hamlets, the great camps, the guides, and the furniture and tanning businesses.

In the spotlight with the publication of The Great Gatsby, the North Shore's Gold Coast boasted perhaps the greatest concentration of wealth in the country during the first half of the 20th century.

In its heyday, over 1,200 grand homes lined the shoreline from Eaton's Neck to Great Neck and as far south as Old Westbury. With inspiration from around the globe, as well as the development of many new American styles, an architectural renaissance occurred, bringing together the greatest artisans, architects, landscape architects, and designers to create an exclusive enclave that flourished until World War II. Captains of industry, founding families, and even royalty called Long Island home. Everyone from Morgan, Woolworth, Vanderbilt, Hearst, Field, and Phipps to the Duke of Windsor resided here. Lavish parties celebrated weddings, Lindbergh's transatlantic flight, and other events. Today, approximately one-third of these houses still survive in various states, providing a glimpse of what was the Gold Coast.

Local historians Geoffrey Fleming and Amy Folk uncover this gruesome 19th-century story of revenge and murder on Long Island.

In the mid-19th century, James Wickham was a wealthy farmer with a large estate in Cutchogue, Long Island. His extensive property included a mansion and eighty acres of farmland that were maintained by a staff of servants. In 1854, Wickham got into an argument with one of his workers, Nicholas Behan, after Behan harassed another employee who refused to marry him.

Several days after Behan's dismissal, he crept back into the house in the dead of night. With an axe, he butchered Wickham and his wife, Frances, and fled to a nearby swamp. Behan was captured, tried, convicted and, on December 15, became one of the last people to be hanged in Suffolk County.

  Fort Holabird was a US Army facility near Baltimore, Maryland and began as a training center for a relatively new military technology, the motor vehicle, it would later bear witness to intrigue as a center of US Army intelligence and counterintelligence. /

Fort Holabird was a US Army facility near Baltimore, Maryland. Opened as Camp Holabird in preparation for World War I, Holabird trained vehicle drivers and mechanics. After World War II, Holabird became home to the US Army Intelligence School. It was around this time the facility was renamed Fort Holabird. The intelligence school relocated to Fort Huachuca, Arizona, in 1971, and Fort Holabird closed in 1973. Holabird has an amazing history. It began as a training center for a relatively new military technology, the motor vehicle. Holabird would later bear witness to intrigue as a center of US Army intelligence and counterintelligence. Holabird is also remembered by many Vietnam-era draftees as an induction center.

Author David B. Lari is an attorney, historian, US Army veteran, lifelong resident of Maryland, and a graduate of the University of Baltimore. The sources of these photographs include the US National Archives, the US Army Heritage and Education Center, the National World War I Museum and Memorial, the Dundalk–Patapsco Neck Historical Society and Museum, and the Kansas Historical Society. 

Author Phillip Thomas Tucker reveals the triumph and tragedy of the greatest sacrifice of life of any battleground in America.

On September 17, 1862, the forces of Major General George B. McClellan and his Union Army of the Potomac confronted Robert E. Lee's entire Army of Northern Virginia at the Battle of Antietam in Sharpsburg, Maryland. The Union forces mounted a powerful assault on Lee's left flank in the idyllic Miller Cornfield. It was the single bloodiest day in the history of the Civil War. The elite combat units of the Union's Iron Brigade and the Confederate Texas Brigade held a dramatic showdown and suffered immense losses through vicious attacks and counterattacks sweeping through the cornstalks.

This book invites the reader to step back in time and imagine the days when ancestors traveled through wooden spans to reach their daily destinations.

Starting in the early 1800s, Pennsylvania's rich forests provided natural material for the construction of more than 1,500 covered bridges across the state. The first covered bridge was built in 1805. Pennsylvania's Covered Bridges looks at the earliest covered bridges as well as those that have survived modern progress. Images also show rare railroad covered bridges that have been saved from destruction over the years.

Join Allen Meyers and Joel Spivak as they journey through the history of the railways that connected the Philadelpia communites.

Philadelphia became the railroad capital of the world in the 1830s when 12 distinct lines opened within a 100-mile radius of the city to carry people and freight. The railroad boom in the 19th century was made possible by the development of rural communities surrounding the city, the Industrial Revolution, excellent access to raw materials, and an influx of European immigrants. Philadelphia manufactured locomotives, railroad track, and other rail components and exported them around the world. The ability to move agricultural goods, manufactured products, and people commuting from home to work helped to unite the 27 boroughs, districts, and townships into one metropolis by 1854. Philadelphia Railroads features many unseen images and rare photographs documenting the leaders of Philadelphia's transportation world.

To demonstrate the special place Italian immigrants hold in the city of New York to this day, readers will experience a visual tour of their traditions and landmarks.

New York City’s five boroughs have been home to more Italian immigrants than any other place in America. Over the last 140 years, scores of Italian neighborhoods have spanned Manhattan, Brooklyn, Staten Island, Queens, and the Bronx. These communities preserve their heritage by celebrating special events and feasts, such as Manhattan’s 130-year-old Feast of St. Rocco, the Dance of the Giglio in East Harlem and Williamsburg, and saint processions for Padre Pio and Maria Addolorata; maintaining famous Mulberry Street storefronts and the Arthur Avenue Market in Little Italy, as well as popular bakeries and restaurants in Greenwich Village and Queens; and supporting and worshipping at notable Italian churches, like Brooklyn’s Our Lady of Mount Carmel Shrine Church and Alba House, a religious bookstore on Staten Island.

Take a historical walking tour and see how the Federal City grew from farmland to world capital.

When it was passed in 1789, the Constitution set out the boundaries not only for a new government but for a new capital city as well. At the time, the new District of Columbia covered 5,000 acres and was dominated by marshland on the south, pastureland on the area that is now the Mall, farms near the White House and Capitol Hill, and undeveloped woods throughout. This engaging photographic history has striking images and detailed captions that tell the fascinating stories behind many of the famous and not-so-famous buildings and monuments that cover the D.C. landscape - from Union Station and the Capitol to the White House and the Watergate Hotel and many important sites in between!

In June 1972, Hurricane Agnes hit the East Coast with a monstrous and devastating force, bringing a deluge across multiple states and slamming four counties in the Southern Tier: Steuben, Chemung, Tioga, and Broome.

Dozens died and property damage ran into the millions as Corning, Elmira, Owego, Binghamton, and other communities suddenly found themselves under water. The flood destroyed the Erie Lackawanna Railroad, staggered the Penn Central, shut down Corning Glass Works for weeks, and devastated the Corning Museum of Glass--a major cultural resource. Lives and landscapes were forever changed when homes and businesses washed away in a matter of minutes. Henceforth, the region's history became permanently divided into the times before and the times after the 1972 flood. Through stunning images, The 1972 Flood in New York's Southern Tier chronicles the extraordinary destruction of twisted rail lines, devastated streets, exhausted recovery workers, rivers bursting their banks, cars on houses, and houses on cars

Travel back to 20th century New York along the historic tracks of the Long Island Railroad through this stunning image collection.

Chartered on April 24, 1834, as a route from Brooklyn to Boston, the Long Island Rail Road commenced in 1836 with service between Brooklyn and Jamaica, New York. The railroad has linked Long Island and New York City through several periods of increasing immigration and population beginning in the 1880s. Farmers and fishermen have depended on the railroad for their livelihood, and every summer thousands of tourists flock to Long Island beaches on the Long Island Rail Road. It is still the nation's largest commuter railroad, transporting an average of over two hundred fifty thousand commuters daily. The Long Island Rail Road: 1925-1975 offers a behind-the-scenes look at freight and passenger activities and the people who worked on the railroad. These one-of-a-kind photographs depict structures no longer in use, such as towers, water tanks, and crossing shanties, as well as electric motive power and other facets of a working railroad.

In the early years of the 20th century, Queens County underwent an enormous transformation. The Queensboro Bridge of 1909 forever changed the landscape of this primarily rural area into the urban metropolis it is today.

Forgotten Queens shows New York's largest borough between the years 1920 and 1950, when it was adorned with some of the finest model housing and planned communities anywhere in the country. Victorian mansions, cookie-cutter row houses, fishing shacks, and beachside bungalows all coexisted next to workplaces and commercial areas. Beckoning with the torch of the new century and a bright promise for those who dared to pioneer its urban wilderness, Queens flourished as a community. Through vintage photographs being seen by the public for the first time, the five wards of Queens are highlighted for their unique character and history.

Bill Cotter is a longtime world's fair enthusiast and his collection of world's fairs photographs, the world's largest, has been featured in museum exhibits.

After enduring 10 harrowing years of the Great Depression, visitors to the 1939-1940 New York World's Fair found welcome relief in the fair's optimistic presentation of the ""World of Tomorrow."" Pavilions from America's largest corporations and dozens of countries were spread across a 1,216-acre site, showcasing the latest industrial marvels and predictions for the future intermingled with cultural displays from around the world. Well known for its theme structures, the Trylon and Perisphere, the fair was an intriguing mixture of technology, science, architecture, showmanship, and politics. Proclaimed by many as the most memorable world's fair ever held, it predicted wonderful times were ahead for the world even as the clouds of war were gathering. Through vintage photographs, most never published before, The 1939-1940 New York World's Fair recaptures those days when the eyes of the world were on New York and on the future.

Michael S. Adelberg brings to life the struggles within Monmouth County, a place that New Jersey governor William Livingston called "the theatre of spoil and destruction."

Like much of New Jersey during the American Revolution, Monmouth County was contested territory in between the great armies. As the Battles of Trenton, Princeton and Bound Brook raged nearby, the people of Monmouth County fought their own internal revolution; Loyalist partisans led insurrections and raids that laid waste to entire neighborhoods. In 1778, General George Washington rallied his Continental army and fought the British within Monmouth's borders, barely holding the field. Monmouth Countians joined the fight and then spent the following weeks caring for the wounded and burying the dead. The remaining war years brought more hardships, as they grappled with a local civil war charged with racial, religious and economic undercurrents - a local civil war that continued long after the Battle of Yorktown supposedly ended hostilities.

Beginning with Calman Zamoiski’s unlicensed and short-lived “wireless telephone” station in 1921, Baltimore would boast five commercial radio stations within the next 20 years.

Before the 1940s ended, commercial television appeared with the debut of WMAR, Channel 2, in 1947. WMAR was unique in that it had no personnel with television experience and, initially, no studios, broadcasting instead from various remote locations. Over the years, Baltimore radio and television stations served as the launchpad or stopover point of some of the most beloved personalities in the industry. Garry Moore, Arthur Godfrey, and Jim McKay all got their starts here, while Gene Rayburn, Jon Miller, Oprah Winfrey, John Saunders, Nick Charles, Spencer Christian, Bob McAllister, and others passed through en route to national broadcasting prominence. Baltimoreans did not just bond with the people and programs of their local stations. It was a genuine love affair.

Through historical images and regional folklore step into the past of the ""Grand Canyon of the East.""

Letchworth State Park, now a century old, grew out of a generous donation made by William Pryor Letchworth to the State of New York. The park's remarkable history reaches back as far as the last ice age. From the Portage Gorge to the mighty highbanks at Mount Morris, Letchworth State Park follows the flow of the Genesee River, exploring the natural and human events that have shaped this inspiring landscape. Drawing on historical images and regional folklore from the collections of the authors, the park, and various local sources, the reader is invited into the past of a park that has been called the ""Grand Canyon of the East.""

The story of firefighting in New York City is one of danger, tradition, pride, excitement, and tragedy. It is also the story of man's triumph over destructive forces.

From the gaslight days of horse-drawn steam engines to the World Trade Center tragedy of 2001, the heroic men and women who make up the city's most dynamic public service have risked and often lost their lives in order to protect and serve the people of New York City.New York City Firefighting: 1901-2001 chronicles the proudest fire department in America. The proximity of buildings in the city streets and the construction materials made each fire especially dangerous, but determined firefighters never hesitated to battle the flames and rescue the victims. Later, facing unprecedented heights and unparalleled danger, firefighters in New York City were called upon to battle infernos in the first skyscrapers, often using the most rudimentary equipment and barely protected from the flames. In its most trying moments, the Fire Department of New York responded to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in 1993 and 2001, dutifully rushing into the towers to save as many lives as possible and ultimately losing hundreds of their own.

No other city in the United States is home to more Slovaks than Pittsburgh. Through historical photographs, Slovak Pittsburgh celebrates the rich heritage there.

It is estimated that close to 100,000 Slovak immigrants came to the area in the 1890s looking for work and the chance for a better life. The hills and valleys of this new land reminded newcomers of the farms, forests, and mountains they left behind. They lived in neighborhoods close to their work, forming numerous cluster communities in such places as Braddock, Duquesne, Homestead, Munhall, the North Side, Rankin, and Swissvale. Once settled, Slovak immigrants founded their own churches, schools, fraternal benefit societies, and social clubs. Many of these organizations still enjoy an active presence in Pittsburgh today, serving to pass on the customs and traditions of the Slovak people.

Manhattan has long been renowned for the diversity of its offering of hotels--from some of the best in the world to some of the worst.

Around 1880, the entire nature of the hotel experience began to change. Formerly, hotels had been just a place to stop between here and there for a hot meal and a warm bed. Suddenly, the hotel itself became the destination. New affluence, new technologies, and new fashion all came together in the decades between 1880 and 1920 to influence the demands of hotel guests, eventually changing the hotel themselves. This book gives a glimpse into the hotels of the super rich, the not-so-rich, the middle class, the Bohemians, and the workers. In a city as dynamic as New York, it should come as no surprise that so many hotels have a juicy tidbit or two of historical gossip attached to them. Manhattan Hotels: 1880‚-1920 may well be the most extensive work in print on the subject of the city's hotels in this period. Far From being a book for specialists, however, it is designed to bring Manhattan and its hotels of this era to life for all those who have been captivated by the electric excitement of the place.

The 1964-1965 New York World's Fair: Creation and Legacy uses rare, previously unpublished photographs to examine the creation of the fair and the legacies left behind for future generations.

When the gates of the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair swung open on April 24, 1964, the first of more than 51 million lucky visitors entered, ready to witness the cutting edge of worldwide technology and progress. Faced with a disappointing lack of foreign participants due to political contention, the fair instead showcased the best of American industry and science. While multimillion-dollar pavilions predicted colonies on the moon and hotels under the ocean, other forecasts, such as the promises of computer technology, have surpassed even the most optimistic predictions of the fair.

Go inside the people, places and events of Jersey City with over 200 fascinating photographs that bring its past to life!

Author Patrick Shalhoub takes us on a journey into Jersey City's past. We see the farming communities which dominated the locality from the 1660s through the middle of the 19th century when the area was part of the larger Bergen Township. We then experience the arrival of the immigrants, the advent of industrialization, and the rapid growth of Jersey City from a cluster of farmsteads and villages into the second largest city in New Jersey. Immigration has been the lifeblood of Jersey City's history and through the images selected, here we witness how Jersey City sprang to life with the influx of immigrants between 1830 and 1920. At first it was Irish, German, and British, and, later, immigrants from southern and eastern Europe, including Italians, Poles, Russians, and Slovaks. African-Americans were present in Bergen Township from the early days of the city, but their numbers increased with the migration of laborers from the South in the first half of the 20th century and their important contribution to the city continued. In recent decades, new communities have grown in Jersey City, including Latin American, Asian Indian, Egyptian, Filipino, and Haitian communities. Shalhoub brings to life the people, places, and events which have created the city's vibrant and colorful history over the centuries.

Join author Amy Strauss as she traces the sizzling history and culture of a beloved and sustaining Pennsylvania Dutch iconic dish, scrapple.

The name may remind you of a certain word-based board game, but scrapple has been an essential food in Mid-Atlantic kitchens for hundreds of years, the often-overlooked king of breakfast meats. Developed by German settlers of Pennsylvania, scrapple was made from the scraps of meat cut from the day's butchering to avoid waste. Pork trimmings were stewed until tender, ground like sausage, and blended with broth, cornmeal, and buckwheat flour. Crispy slabs of scrapple sustained the Pennsylvanians through the frigid winter months and brutal harvest months, providing them with a high-energy and tasty breakfast meal that people enjoy even today.

No ballpark in Philadelphia was more revered than the one at Twenty-first Streetand Lehigh Avenue. A must-have for fans of Philadelphia and baseball history!

Originally called Shibe Parkand later Connie Mack Stadium, America's first steel-and concrete stadium opened in 1909. When it closed in 1970, it had earned a special place in the hearts and minds of Philadelphia sports fans. Home of the Athleticsfor 46 years, the Philliesfor 32 and a half seasons, and the Eaglesfor 18 years, it was also the site of many boxing matches, Negro Leaguebaseball games, and college and high school baseball and football games. Over the years, as the area developed, Shibe Parkbecame known for its obstructed views, delicious hot dogs, Sunday curfews, absence of beer, and boobirds. Along with memorable teams and games, the ballpark played host to eight World Seriesand two All-Star Games.

Join Rich Westcott, baseball writer, historian, author and president of the Philadelphia Sports Writers' Association, as he gathers archival photos capturing this legendary stadium's exciting history.

Join author and illustrator Lisa LaMonica as she recounts the history of this one-of-a-kind city.

Hudson, with its scarlet past, is still intriguing in many ways. It is the new go-to destination being discovered by tourists, chefs, world-famous artists and celebrities, motion pictures, and major magazines. Visitors say there is a palpable vibe of creative energy. Home to the largest number of self-employed people in New York, Hudson is a unique city where one can start their own business and not feel out of place. In vintage photographs, Hudson covers a rich history that includes the story of the Mohicans, whaling, and the multitude of factories in the Industrial Age, as well as the city's modern-day transformation.

In rare historical photos, discover the story of the hospital, her caretakers, and those cared for at Harrisburg State Hospital for over 150 years.

Harrisburg State Hospital opened in 1851 as the Pennsylvania State Lunatic Hospital, the first public institution in the state. Situated atop a hill overlooking the Susquehanna River, the original building was an early example of a Kirkbride design hospital. The facility closed in 2006 after serving the commonwealth for 155 years. Harrisburg State Hospital: Pennsylvania's First Public Asylum presents a pictorial history of the hospital from the first year of only 12 patients through the peak of state care, when the population reached over 2,500 in the 1950s. Harrisburg State Hospital was an innovative leader in the treatment of the mentally ill, pioneering new methods of therapy even before they were common practice. It was a community and a home for those whom society could not otherwise care for.

Join Harry Kyriakodis as he strolls Front Street, Delaware Avenue, and Penn's Landing to rediscover the story of Philadelphia's lost waterfront.

The wharves and docks of William Penn's city that helped build a nation are gone lost to the onslaught of over 300 years of development. Yet the bygone streets and piers of Philadelphia's central waterfront were once part of the greatest tradecenter in the American colonies. Local historian Harry Kyriakodis chronicles the history of the city's original port district from Quaker settlers who first lived in caves along the Delaware and the devastating yellow fever epidemic of 1793 to its heyday as a maritime center and then the twentieth century that saw much of the historic riverfront razed.