The History Press

Learn more about the "Father of the Franchise Industry" in this illuminating history about the Howard Johnson restaurant franchise and the man behind it all.

Howard Johnson created an orange-roofed empire of ice cream stands and restaurants that stretched from Maine to Florida, and all the way to the West Coast. With a reputation for good food at affordable prices, hungry customers would regularly return for more. The attractive white Colonial Revival restaurants, with eye-catching porcelain tile roofs, illuminated cupolas and sea blue shutters, were described in "Reader's Digest" in 1949 as the epitome of "eating places that look like New England town meeting houses dressed up for Sunday." Highlighted in television shows such as Mad Men and films Netflix's 2019 The Irishman, it's obvious that Howard Johnson's occupies an indelible and pleasant place popular culture. Boston historian and author Anthony M. Sammarco recounts how Howard Johnson introduced twenty-eight flavors of ice cream, the "Tendersweet" clam strips, grilled frankforts and a menu of delicious and traditional foods that families eagerly enjoyed when they traveled.

The Civil War never left South Carolina, from its beginning at Fort Sumter in 1861 through the destructive, harrowing days of Sherman's march through the state in 1865.

Included here are the stories of Confederate civilians and soldiers who remained true to their cause throughout the perilous struggle. An English aristocrat risked his life to run the blockade and become one of the defenders of Charleston. The Haskells of Abbeville sent seven sons into Confederate service. Many South Carolina women made heart-rending sacrifices, including a disabled woman from Laurens County whose heroic efforts preserved Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington, from wartime ravages. Author Karen Stokes details the lives of men and women whose destinies intertwined with a tragic era in Palmetto State history.

Fifty-seven Irish immigrant laborers arrived in the port of Philadelphia in June 1832 to work on Pennsylvania's Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad. They all perished within six weeks.

Contractor Philip Duffy hired them to work a stretch of track in rural Chester County known as Duffy's Cut. For more than 180 years, the railroad maintained that cholera was to blame and kept the historical record under lock and key. In a harrowing modern-day excavation of their mass grave, a group of academics and volunteers found evidence some of the laborers were murdered. Authors and research leaders Dr. William E. Watson and Dr. J. Francis Watson reveal the tragedy, mystery and discovery of what really happened at Duffy's Cut.

Although several people had considered constructing a railroad to Key West beginning in the early 1800s, it took a bold industrialist with unparalleled vision to make it happen.

In 1902, Henry Flagler made the decision to extend the Florida East Coast Railway to "the nearest deepwater American port." In this book, renowned Florida historian Seth H. Bramson reveals how the Key West Extension of the Flagler-owned FEC became the greatest railroad engineering and construction feat in U.S., and possibly world, history, an accomplishment that would cement Flagler's fame and legend for all time. Join Bramson as he recounts the years of operation of this great railroad, what it did for the Florida Keys and what it meant to the resident conchs.

Bruce Venter meticulously details the Revolutionary War battle that saved the Continental Army and possibly America.

British and German troops ran into stubborn rebel resistance at Hubbardton, Vermont, on July 7, 1777. The day would ultimately turn the tide for the Patriot cause. After capturing Fort Ticonderoga, the British, under Lieutenant General John Burgoyne, pursued a retreating Continental army under Major General Arthur St. Clair. In the fields and hills around Hubbardton, a tenacious American rear guard of about 1,200 derailed the British general's plan for a quick march to Albany. The British won a tactical victory, but they suffered precious losses. Patriots, under Colonel Seth Warner, Colonel Ebenezer Francis and Colonel Nathan Hale, left the British and Germans bloodied while also saving untold casualties from their own army. Burgoyne and his weakened force ultimately surrendered at Saratoga on October 17, 1777, paving the way for a French alliance with the colonies and American independence.

Centuries ago, Europeans desperate for gold and a route to the East found a lush, green paradise populated by native tribes in the New World.

Subsequent violence and disease all but wiped out the native population. The land nurtured Charlton Heston and Ernest Hemingway in their youths and spawned the assassin of President William McKinley. Northern Michigan also bore witness to the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, one of the worst shipwrecks in Great Lakes history, and to the bizarre kidnapping of Gayle Cook, an ill-fated attempt to save the Perry Hotel in Petoskey from bankruptcy. Author and storyteller Dave Rogers recounts these and other historical tales from Up North.

In the Southern Appalachian Mountains, no character was more loved or despised than George W. Kirk.

This inured Union officer led a group of deserters on numerous raids between Tennessee and North Carolina in 1863, terrorizing Confederate soldiers and civilians alike. At Camp Vance in Morganton, Kirk's mounted raiders showcased guerrilla warfare penetrating deep within Confederate territory. As Home Guards struggled to keep Western North Carolina communities safe, Kirk's men brought fear and violence throughout the region for their ability to strike and create havoc without warning. Civil War historian Michael C. Hardy examines the infamous history of George W. Kirk and the Civil War along the Blue Ridge.

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 belnded 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.

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

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.

The history of the Western North Carolina Railroad is a tale like no other, filled with tragedy, heroism, brains, blood, sweat, tears, nitroglycerin and humor.

Now a tourist mecca, the Great Smoky Mountains were a remote and inaccessible place until well after the Civil War. Using first enslaved and later convict labor the Western North Carolina Railroad and Murphy Branch connected the mountains with the remainder of the state by rail for the first time in 1891. The railroad brought commerce and tourism. Though its vital role was eventually eclipsed by the automobile, tourists and rail buffs continue to come to Bryson City to experience travel by steam train on the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad.

Local authors Jacob Morgan Plott and Bob Plott tell the story of a line that refused to die.

Author and historian Anthony Sammarco reveals the fascinating history of Boston's beloved Jordan Marsh.

Jordan Marsh opened its first store in 1851 on Milk Street in Boston selling assorted dry goods. Following the Civil War, the store moved to Winthrop Square and later to Washington Street between Summer and Avon Streets. The new five-story building, designed by Winslow & Wetherell, unveiled the novel concept of department shopping under one roof. It attracted shoppers by offering personal service with the adage that the customer is always right, easy credit, art exhibitions and musical performances. By the 1970s, it had become a regional New England icon and the largest department store chain in the nation.

For eight decades, an epic power struggle raged across a frontier that would become Maine.

Between 1675 and 1759, British, French, and Native Americans soldiers clashed in six distinct wars to claim the land that became the Pine Tree State. Though the showdown between France and Great Britain was international in scale, the decidedly local conflicts in Maine pitted European settlers against Native American tribes. Native and European communities from the Penobscot to the Piscataqua Rivers suffered brutal attacks. Countless men, women and children were killed, taken captive or sold into servitude. The native people of Maine were torn asunder by disease, social disintegration and political factionalism as they fought to maintain their autonomy in the face of unrelenting European pressure. This is the dark, tragic and largely forgotten struggle that laid the foundation of Maine.

From City Hall to the Pabst Theater, reminders of the past are part of the fabric of Milwaukee. Yet many historic treasures have been lost to time.

Blocks of homes and apartments replaced the Wonderland Amusement Park. A quiet bike path now stretches where some of fastest trains in the world previously thundered. Today's Estabrook Park was a vast mining operation, and Marquette University covers the old fairgrounds where Abraham Lincoln spoke. Author Carl Swanson recounts these stories and other tales of bygone days.

Join author and historian James C. Clark as he chronicles the history of the Sunshine State in this concise and captivating history.

In 1513, Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon first set foot on Florida's east coast. The land he discovered was a geographic anomaly so distinctive that astronaut Neil Armstrong said Florida was the first shape on earth he recognized on his return from a visit to the moon 456 years later. This unique state witnessed momentous events from the 1959 arrival of the first Cuban exiles under Fidel Castro to the 1981 launch of the "Columbia," the first space shuttle.

Philadelphia was once the proud home of Wanamaker's, a department store of many firsts founded by the retail giant John Wanamaker in 1861.

Its name was synonymous with service, and Philadelphians still fondly remember the massive bronze eagle in the Grand Court, concerts from the world's largest pipe organ and the spectacular Christmas festivities. Philadelphia native Michael J. Lisicky takes a nostalgic journey through the history of the store, from its beginnings as a haberdashery to its growth into New York and Delaware and the final poignant closing of its doors. Lisicky brilliantly combines interviews with store insiders, forgotten recipes and memories from local celebrities such as Trudy Haynes and Sally Starr to bring readers back to the soft glow of the marble atrium and the quiet elegance of the Crystal Tea Room that was Wanamaker's

The stories, folklore, and history surrounding Maryland's most haunted places. A must-read for fans of the supernatural and Maryland history.

The demon car of Seven Hills Road, the ominousHell Houseabove the Patapsco River, the mythical Snallygasterof western Maryland--these are the extraordinary tales and bizarre creatures that color Maryland's folklore.

The Blue Dog of Port Tobaccofaithfully guards his master's gold even in death, and in Cambridge, the headless ghost of Big Lizwatches over the treasure of Greenbriar Swamp. The woods of Prince George's County are home to stories of the menacing Goatman, while on stormy nights at the nearby University of Maryland, the strains of a ghostly piano float from Marie Mount Hall.

From the storied heroics of the First Maryland Regimentin the Revolutionary Warto the mystery of the Poe Toaster, folklorists Trevor J. Blank and David J. Puglia unravel the legends of Maryland.

From January to July 1942, more than seventy-five ships sank to North Carolina's "Graveyard of the Atlantic" off the coast of the Outer Banks. A Standard oil tanker sank just sixty miles from Cape Hatteras.

German U-boats sank ships in some of the most harrowing sea fighting close to America's shore. Germany's Operation Drumbeat, led by Admiral Karl Donitz, brought fear to the local communities. The U-85 was the first U-boat sunk by American surface forces, and local divers later discovered a rare Enigma machine aboard. Author Jim Bunch traces the destructive history of world war on the shores of the Outer Banks.

Decorated with a breathtaking landscape and a treasured collection of diversely styled bridges, the Merritt Parkway runs thirty-seven and a half miles through Fairfield County.

From its complicated beginnings to the present, authors Laurie Heiss and Jill Smyth navigate the hard-fought yet picturesque path of this beloved road. Meet the bridge artist, the landscapers, the politicians and the activists whose involvement in the Merritt transformed Fairfield County from farms and country estates to one of the wealthiest counties in the nation. With the dedication of preservationists and conservationists, the Merritt Parkway today remains both functional and beautiful, holding a unique place in the heart of Connecticut's drivers.