In Yaphank, New York, hid the greatest threat to the United States war effort during World War II: the American Nazi.

Building on racial and ethnic biases, lack of trust in government and a dose of conspiracies, the German American Bund was able to contribute to a growing American fascist movement. Fueled partially by Nazi Germany’s financing of propaganda, thousands of New Yorkers embraced the ideals of an American Reich through retreats such as Yaphank’s Camp Siegfried, which groomed Nazi sympathizers to be ready for the fascist overthrow of the American republic. In opposition to Nazism, multiple local citizen groups fought to combat the Bund’s organized efforts to undermine America. Author Christopher Verga brings to life the often-overlooked history of New York’s World War II era through a story of Nazi sedition, espionage and citizen resistance to preserve the American republic.

The rise and fall of Camp Hale and the soldiers who shaped America’s ski legacy.

In 1942, at the beginning of World War II, the US Army built its most unusual military post for its most unusual division in a high, remote, Rocky Mountain valley 100 miles west of Denver, Colorado. Located at 9,250 feet above sea level, Camp Hale was the training home of the famed 13,459-man 10th Mountain Division, which trained in mountain warfare techniques for two years—and almost missed the war. After they were finally deployed for combat in early 1945 in the Northern Apennine Mountains of Italy, the young men of the 10th never lost a battle or gave up a foot of ground. And, after the war, many of the veterans returned home to create America’s ski and winter sports industry. Building Camp Hale was an incredible feat of wartime engineering and construction. To transform the wild, alpine meadow into an Army camp, 10,000 civilian construction workers were hired to scrape away the vegetation; level the valley floor; install roads and water and sewer lines; build 1,000 structures and two ski areas; and relocate a highway and railroad line—all within seven months and at a cost of $31 million (over a half billion dollars in today’s money). Yet Camp Hale was demolished two years after it was built.

During World War II, Michigan became a temporary home to six thousand German and Italian POWs.

At a time of homefront labor shortages, they picked fruit in Berrien County, harvested sugar beets in the Thumb, cut pulpwood in the Upper Peninsula and maintained parks and other public spaces in Detroit. The work programs were not flawless and not all of the prisoners were cooperative, but many of the men established enduring friendships with their captors. Author Gregory Sumner tells the story of these detainees and the ordinary Americans who embodied our highest ideals, even amid a global war.

A pictoral history of Willow Run - a relative unknown location that became the world's most famous bomber factory during World War II.

In May 1940, Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt called for the production of 50,000 military airplanes. He then drafted the president of General Motors, William Knudsen, to mobilize industry in the United States. The automotive companies were called upon to produce a massive fleet of bombers, as well as tanks, trucks, guns, and engines. By the Willow Run, a sleepy little creek near Ypsilanti, Michigan, Ford Motor Company built the world's most famous bomber factory, which was the ultimate manifestation of the automotive industry's role in building armaments during World War II. By the spring of 1944, Willow Run was producing a four-engine B-24 bomber each hour on an assembly line.

During World War II, more than six thousand prisoners of war resided at Camp Perry near Port Clinton and its branch camps at Columbus, Rossford, Cambridge, Celina, Bowling Green, Defiance, Marion, Parma and Wilmington. From the start, the camps were a study in contradictions. The Italian prisoners who arrived first charmed locals with their affable, easygoing natures, while their German successors often put on a serious, intractable front. Some local residents fondly recall working alongside the prisoners and reuniting with them later in life. Others held the prisoners in disdain, feeling that they were coddled while natives struggled with day-to-day needs. Drawing on first-person accounts from soldiers, former POWs and residents, as well as archival research, Dr. Jim Van Keuren delves into the neglected history of Ohio's POW camps.

World War II hinged on the Allies having enough ships to both fight the enemy and to carry millions of tons of war goods across the world's oceans. Shipyards on the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific Coasts built thousands of vessels, but America's sometimes forgotten Fourth Coast, the Great Lakes, built hundreds of ships as well. From 1940 to 1945, warships, cargo haulers, Coast Guard tenders, and fleet service auxiliaries of many types were launched from the two cities of Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin, which lie at the far western end of Lake Superior. During the war, half a dozen shipyards in Duluth-Superior produced more than 200 vessels of 10 main types, up to 338 feet long and 5,000 tons, all having to make close to a 2,400-mile journey to the ocean. The shipyards grew from nearly nothing in 1939 to become industries employing thousands of men and women by 1945 and making a major contribution to the story of America in World War II.