978: The Heart of Everything That Is by Bob Drury and Tom Clavin

978.0049752: Drury, Bob and Tom Clavin. The Heart of Everything That Is: The Untold Story of Red Cloud, an American Legend. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013. 365 pp. ISBN 978-1-4516-5466-0.

Dewey Breakdown:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 978: History of the Western United States
• 978.00497: History of American Native peoples (Great Plains)
• 978.0049752: Siouan Indians

Bob Drury and Tom Clavin come together in The Heart of Everything That Is to tell the tale of a forgotten man. Red Cloud, a member of the Oglala Lakota peoples, was born near the Platte River in 1821. In the beginning, he was trained as a superb warrior, fighting against other nations, namely the Pawnee and the Crow. But then gunfire came across the Great Plains. Gold rushers, homesteaders, and the US military blazed trails into the newly created states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Iowa. But, when settlers threatened to rob the Powder River Country in Wyoming and Montana of its resources and new forts emerged with new enemies, Red Cloud, with the help of the Cheyenne and Arapaho nations, fought back. The nation had just ended the Civil War the previous year, but was again at odds with people in its own borders.

976: William F. Winter and the New Mississippi by Charles C. Bolton

976.2063092: Bolton, Charles C. William F. Winter and the New Mississippi: A Biography. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi, 2013. 270 pp. ISBN 978-1-6170-3787-0.

Dewey Breakdown:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 976: History of the South Central United States
• 976.2: Mississippi
• 976.206: 1865 to present
• 976.2063: 1945-1999
• +092: Biography

Charles Bolton’s William F. Winter and the New Mississippi looks at the life and times of William F. Winter, governor of Mississippi from 1980 to 1984 and supporter of a racially-integrated South. He was a proto-typical “honest” politician who seemed to legitimately care about the welfare of all Mississippians and not just those who looked like himself. He moved through the standard ladder of local politics, from State representative to State Treasurer to Lieutenant Governor to the Governorship, but it did not come without obstacles and heartbreak. As a politician during the 70s, he suffered the backlash of the public’s reaction to the Nixon scandal: he was considered as untrustworthy as everyone else. Nevertheless, he persevered and tried to change the nation’s image of Mississippi.

979: Junipero Serra by Steven Hackel

979.402092: Hackel, Steven W. Junipero Serra: California’s Founding Father. 243 pp. ISBN 978-0-8090-9531-5.

Dewey Breakdown:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North American
• 979: Great Basin and Pacific Slope regions of the United States
• 979.4: California
• 979.402: Spanish period, 1769-1822
• +092: Biography

If you ask long-time Californians about the important people in the history of the state, you will invariably come across Junipero Serra. Interestingly, I had never heard of him before reading this book, but now it’s hard to imagine what the state of California would be if not for the efforts of this interesting Mallorcan Franciscan. Born in 1713, he eventually came to found missions at San Diego, San Francisco, and many more around California. He even collected donations to aid General Washington’s revolutionary cause. Steven Hackel’s Junipero Serra chronicles his life is a way that is both scholarly and readily accessible to the public.

970: The Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King

970.00497: King, Thomas. The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2013. 266 pp. ISBN 978-0-8166-8976-7.

Dewey Breakdown:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 970.004: Ethnic and national groups
• 970.00497: American native peoples

If you’re looking for a blunt collection of thoughts on the course of the history of North American Indians, then look no further than Thomas King’s The Inconvenient Indian. King, a member of the Cherokee Nation, tackles the history of the American Indian from the point of view of a novelist, and so this isn’t as stringent a history book as one might hope for. But that doesn’t prevent him from presenting a chronicle of how Native Indian history and North American history have intertwined. It’s interesting and insightful but clearly opinionated. In any case, however, King’s prose is fun, witty, and also challenging to hear.

971: The Nature of Empires and the Empires of Nature by Karl Hele

971.300497: Hele, Karl S., ed. The Nature of Empires and the Empires of Nature: Indigenous Peoples and the Great Lakes Environment. Waterloo, Ontario, Canada: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2013. 297 pp. ISBN 978-1-55458-328-7.

Dewey Breakdown:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 971: History of Canada
• 971.3: History of the province of Ontario
• 971.3004: Ethnic and national groups
• 971.300497: Native American peoples

Karl Hele’s Nature of Empire and the Empires of Nature is a collection of eco-historical essays on the indigenous peoples of Ontario, Canada. Originally delivered as talks during a conference in Canada, these essays focus on how empires seek to control the environments of their colonies and, more importantly, the ramifications of the British colonial rule on the First Nations of Canada. While many of the chapters digress and discuss other indigenous populations, such as the Aborigines of Australia and the peoples of the Central Africa, the focus is on Canadian history. They look at how indigenous Canadian culture, education, and attitudes toward nature have been shaped by world events.

974: The Island at the Center of the World by Russell Shorto

974.7102: Shorto, Russell. The Island at the Center of the World: The Epic Story of Dutch Manhattan and the Forgotten Colony That Shaped America. New York: Vintage, 2005. 325 pp. ISBN 1-4000-7867-9.

Dewey Construction:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 974: History of the Northeastern United States
• 974.7: History of New York State
• 974.71: History of the Borough of Manhattan
• 974.7102: History of Manhattan during the colonial period, 1620-1776

For years, Charles Gehring has been at the New York State Library, toiling away at a single task: translating the original Dutch records of the colony of New Amsterdam. In 1624, a contingent of settlers left The Netherlands to establish a permanent European presence just south of the Pilgrims who had settled just fours before. The next year, 45 more colonists arrived. They weren’t all Dutch—the atmosphere in The Netherlands was already one of religious, social, and political tolerance, so a mixture of European settlers came to the colony. Today, we now New Amsterdam by a different name, though. Today, it’s called Manhattan.

975: A Year at Monticello by Donald Jackson

975.5482: Jackson, Donald. A Year at Monticello — 1795. Golden, CO: Fulcrum, 1989. 104 pp. ISBN 1-55591-050-5.

Dewey Construction:

• 900: History and Geography
• 970: History of North America
• 975: History of the Southeastern United States
• 975.5: History of Virginia
• 975.5482: History of Albemarle County, Virginia

Well after Thomas Jefferson had penned his name on of the founding documents of the United States, after his stint as governor of Virginia and writing its constitution, and after becoming minister to France and Secretary of State, he retired. As he said goodbye to his governmental duties, he looked with contentment to his home in Virginia—Monticello. Although never fully constructed to his liking, he maintained the farms, the factory, and the family for a full year before the nation called on him to serve again.