Books published by publisher Michigan State University Press

The St. Lawrence Seaway was considered one of the world's greatest engineering achievements when it opened in 1959. The $1 billion project-a series of locks, canals, and dams that tamed the ferocious St. Lawrence River-opened the Great Lakes to the global shipping industry. Linking ports on lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario to shipping hubs on the world's seven seas increased global trade in the Great Lakes region. But it came at an extraordinarily high price. Foreign species that immigrated into the lakes in ocean freighters' ballast water tanks unleashed a biological shift that reconfigured the world's largest freshwater ecosystems. Pandora's Locks is the story of politicians and engineers who, driven by hubris and handicapped by ignorance, demanded that the Seaway be built at any cost. It is the tragic tale of government agencies that could have prevented ocean freighters from laying waste to the Great Lakes ecosystems, but failed to act until it was too late. Blending science with compelling personal accounts, this book is the first comprehensive account of how inviting transoceanic freighters into North America's freshwater seas transformed these wondrous lakes.

A Michigan Notable Book for Young Adults On November 10, 1975, SS Edmund Fitzgerald, a giant freighter, sank with its entire crew of 29 aboard, in one of the most violent storms ever witnessed on Lake Superior. In 29 Missing, Kantar tells the Fitz's story from the christening in 1958 as the largest ship on the Great Lakes to the expedition in 1995 to recover the ship's bell in what proved to be a moving memorial to the lost crew. Using information from government investigative reports, the book provides a dramatic hour-by-hour account of what transpired during that terrible voyage, including dialogue from actual radio transmissions between the Fitzgerald and the Arthur Anderson, the freighter following the Fitz. This passionate retelling of the story is complemented by historical photographs and a map depicting the final journey. Designed primarily for young adults but enjoyed by all ages, 29 Missing provides the facts leading up to the disappearance, detailing the subsequent expeditions to the wreck site as well as the leading theories about the sinking that have been debated by maritime experts.

Albert Lambert had two passions in life: flying and his hometown of Saint Louis. After his first ride in a hot air balloon, Albert became a huge supporter of all things related to aviation. He learned to pilot a hot air balloon and fly an airplane. He was a friend of the Wright brothers and other early aviators, and organized exhibitions of the latest airplane technology. He helped St. Louis build airfields and promoted the city as a center for aviation. He even helped Charles Lindbergh raise money to build his airplane, The Spirit of Saint Louis, whose name honored Saint Louis as a center in the new aviation industry. The airport Albert Lambert started is still named in his honor, Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. This book is included in the nonfiction book series, Notable Missourians, for young readers in grades 4 to 6 about people who contributed to Missouri's history or culture and who were born or lived in Missouri.

Following the 1957 season, two of baseball’s most famous teams, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants,left the city they had called home since the 19th century and headed west. The Dodgers went to Los Angeles and the Giants to San Francisco. Those events have entered baseball lore, and indeed the larger culture, as acts of betrayal committed by greedy owners Walter O’Malley of the Dodgers and Horace Stoneham of the Giants. The departure of these two teams, but especially the Dodgers, has not been forgotten by those communities. Even six decades later, it is not hard to find older Brooklynites who are still angry about losing the Dodgers.This is one side of the story. Baseball Goes West seeks to tell another side. Lincoln A. Mitchell argues that the moves to California, second only to Jackie Robinson’s debut in 1947, forged Major League Baseball (MLB) as we know it today. By moving two famous teams with national reputations and many well-known players, MLB benefited tremendously, increasing its national profile and broadening its fan base. This was particularly important following a decade that, despite often being described as baseball’s golden age, was plagued with moribund franchises, low wages for many players, and a difficult dismantling of the apartheid system that had been part of big league baseball since its inception.In the years immediately following the moves, the two most iconic players of the 1960s, Sandy Koufax and Willie Mays, had their best years, bringing even greater status and fame to their respective ball clubs. The Giants played an instrumental role in the first phase of baseball’s global- ization by leading the effort to bring players from Latin America to the big leagues, while the Dodgers set atten- dance records and pioneered new ways to market the game.Sports historians, baseball fans, and historians of American culture on a broader scale will appreciate Mitchell’s reframing of baseball’s move west and his insights into the impacts felt throughout baseball and beyond.

From atop a towering redwood tree, seventeen-year-old Jesse can see beyond the difficult reality of his life on the ground. Homeless, Jesse camps in the forest with his drug-addicted mom and little sister. Diligent about showering, laundry, and school work, Jesse is determined to keep his circumstances a secret. But one girl cares enough to find out the truth.

Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose is a brilliant mystery set in a fictitious medieval monastery. The text is rich with literary, historical, and theoretical references that make it eminently re-readable. The Key makes each reading fuller and more meaningful by helping the interested reader not merely to read but also to understand Eco's masterful work. Inspired by pleas from friends and strangers, the authors, each trained in Classics, undertook to translate and explain the Latin phrases that pepper the story. They have produced an approachable, informative guide to the book and its setting--the middle ages. The Key includes an introduction to the book, the middle ages, Umberto Eco, and philosophical and literary theories; a useful chronology; and reference notes to historical people and events. The clear explanations of the historical setting and players will be useful to anyone interested in a general introduction to medieval history. Adele J. Haft is Associate Professor of Classics, Hunter College, City University of New York. Jane G. White is chair of the Department of Languages, Dwight Englewood School. Robert J. White is Professor of Classics and Oriental Studies, Hunter College, City University of New York.

A Michigan Notable Book for Young AdultsOn November 10, 1975, SS Edmund Fitzgerald, a giant freighter, sank with its entire crew of 29 aboard, in one of the most violent storms ever witnessed on Lake Superior. In 29 Missing, Kantar tells the Fitz's story from the christening in 1958 as the largest ship on the Great Lakes to the expedition in 1995 to recover the ship's bell in what proved to be a moving memorial to the lost crew. Using information from government investigative reports, the book provides a dramatic hour-by-hour account of what transpired during that terrible voyage, including dialogue from actual radio transmissions between the Fitzgerald and the Arthur Anderson, the freighter following the Fitz. This passionate retelling of the story is complemented by historical photographs and a map showing the Fitz's journey. Designed primarily for young adults but enjoyed by all ages, 29 Missing provides the facts leading up to the disappearance, detailing the subsequent expeditions to the wreck site as well as the leading theories about the sinking that have been debated by maritime experts.

Almost immediately, the Civil War transformed the way Southerners ate, devastating fields and food transportation networks. The war also spurred Southerners to canonize prewar cooking styles, resulting in cuisine that retained nineteenth-century techniques in a way other American cuisines did not. This fascinating book presents a variety of Civil War-era recipes from the South, accompanied by eye-opening essays describing this tumultuous period in the way people lived and ate. The cookbooks excerpted here teem with the kinds of recipes we expect to find when we go looking for Southern food: grits and gumbo, succotash and Hopping John, catfish, coleslaw, watermelon pickles, and sweet potato pie. The cookbooks also offer plenty of surprises. This volume, the second in the American Food in History series, sheds new light on cooking and eating in the Civil War South, pointing out how seemingly neutral recipes can reveal unexpected things about life beyond the dinner plate, from responses to the anti-slavery movement to shifting economic imperatives to changing ideas about women’s roles. Together, these recipes and essays provide a unique portrait of Southern life via the flavors, textures, and techniques that grew out of a time of crisis.

Cookbooks offer a unique and valuable way to examine American life. Their lessons, however, are not always obvious. Direct references to the American Civil War were rare in cookbooks, even in those published right in the middle of it. In part, this is a reminder that lives went on and that dinner still appeared on most tables most nights, no matter how much the world was changing outside. But people accustomed to thinking of cookbooks as a source for recipes, and not much else, can be surprised by how much information they can reveal about the daily lives and ways of thinking of the people who wrote and used them. In this fascinating historical compilation, excerpts from five Civil War–era cookbooks present a compelling portrait of cooking and eating in the urban north of the 1860s United States.

A deep-sea diver, a dancer, an activist, an aviator, a singer, and a soldier-Great Girls in Michigan History highlights some of the girls from Michigan's past who did amazing things before they turned twenty years old. Author Patricia Majher presents easy-to-read mini-biographies of twenty girls with ties to Michigan, representing a variety of personal backgrounds and interests, locations across the state, and historical time periods. Majher introduces little-known stories, like those of female aviator Nancy Harkness (Love), pioneer Anna Howard Shaw, freedom seeker Dorothy Butler, professional baseball player Marilyn Jenkins, union leader Myra Komaroff (Wolfgang), and Native American writer Jane Johnston (Schoolcraft). She also includes figures that many readers will recognize-including First Lady Betty Bloomer (Ford), jockey Julie Krone, Motown star Diana Ross, and tennis champion Serena Williams. Majher shows that while life wasn't always easy for these girls, they were able to overcome any number of obstacles to achieve their goals. Great Girls in Michigan History includes a brief section on each girl's life after the age of twenty and a glossary of selected vocabulary words at the end of the book. With its depictions of young women who have not typically been represented in history texts, this book will be inspirational reading for upper elementary school students (ages 8 to 12) and welcomed by Michigan schools, bookstores, and public libraries.

Ragged Anthem displays the same inimitable voice and unflinching gaze that made Chris Dombrowski a Poetry Foundation bestseller and silver medal winner of Foreword Reviews' Book of the Year Award in poetry. His work has been celebrated by renowned writers such as Jim Harrison and Alicia Ostriker, who have called his books (respectively) "extraordinarily powerful and graceful" and "one of the most beautiful books of poetry I've read in years." As in Dombrowski's previous books, in Ragged Anthem the natural world is as alive and as fully realized as language allows. His comfort with the naming of the world, combined with a life lived intimately with the other species that populate the landscape of home, suggest an authenticity that few can claim. Ragged Anthem is a demonstration in continued poetic growth and expanded terrain. Written from the speaker's midlife, the poems delve into the transformation of family, childhood tragedies, and politics. Dombrowski lifts the veil on the imbecilic bureaucracies-those on Capitol Hill and in the faculty meetings occurring in our own conference rooms-that often help to whittle our fates. The book contains well-placed and evocative allusions to such figures as American painter Mark Rothko and Saint Francis of Assisi, as well as the periodic highlighting of language from contemporary song lyrics. These "borrowings" set forth a conversation between the poet and other artists that evoke the original source while transforming it into something new, proving that words, although artifice, live within our bodies, changing our relationship to place. Ragged Anthem makes a powerful and important contribution to contemporary poetry. Fans of Dombrowski's past works and newcomers alike will bask in the poet's firm yet relaxed approach to the shaping of language.

Walking a dog in the park should be simple, but for Janice Gary and her dog, Barney, there was nothing simple about it. Gary, who had been attacked on the streets of Berkeley as a young woman, saw the world as a dangerous place and needed a big dog by her side to feel safe. When she found a stray Lab-Rottweiler puppy with a goofy smile and biscuit-sized paws wandering in a Piggly Wiggly parking lot, she thought she had discovered her biggest protector yet. But before Barney's first birthday, he is viciously attacked by another dog and becomes dog-aggressive from that day on. Walking anywhere with him is difficult, but for Gary, walking without him is impossible. It's only when she risks taking him to a local park that both of their lives change forever as Janice faces her deepest fears and Barney loses his fierce need to protect his mistress. Part memoir, part meditation and part love letter to the natural world, Short Leash is a moving tale of love and loss, the journey of two broken souls finding their way toward wholeness."Pema Chodron has said that the best way to deal with fear is to lean into it,diffusing its effect by letting it inform you and staying present. Sufferingthe after-effects of traumatizing attacks, Gary and her dog Barney leaned intotheir fears and in doing so, freed themselves from them. An inspiring anduncompromisingly honest story." - The Bark Magazine"Short Leash... isn't quite a dog book--even though the title and the cover picture both relate to a big, lovable black lab named Barney. No, Short Leash is instead an impossibly beautiful portrait of two damaged souls and how they lean on one another to heal, hurt, and find their way back to happiness after unspeakable tragedy." -Independent Publisher"There were innumerable times when I was just knocked over by this book. This is astunningly beautiful story told by a gifted writer."-Meredith Hall, author of N.Y. Times Bestseller Without a MapNamed an "Editor's Pick" from New Pages.comNamed an "Indie Groundbreaking Memoir:" Independent Publisher