All Titles

Detroit's role as the Arsenal of Democracy during World War II is well known, but the war effort in Michigan extended to all corners of the state. Schoolchildren showed their patriotism by raising money for war bonds to buy planes, tanks and jeeps. The locks in Sault Ste. Marie were considered a potential target of a German attack and were guarded accordingly. A spy ring in Detroit mobilized an unsuccessful attempt to help an escaped German POW flee the continent. A top-secret navy project, undisclosed until the 1990s, set aircraft carriers afloat on the Great Lakes. Compiling more than 180 images, including many never before seen, author Dan Mason unfolds the stories of Michigander grit and courage overseas and at home.

The soldiers and civilians who participated in the Patriot War, fought between 1837 and 1842, hoped to free Canada from supposed British tyranny, as the United States had done just over half a century before. Despite heavy losses throughout, the American and Canadian Patriots" refused to give up their noble cause. The Patriots launched at least thirteen raids on Upper Canada from the American border states. The western front, which spanned the British colony from Ohio and Michigan in western Lake Erie and along the Detroit River, saw some of the fiercest fighting, including the failed 1838 Battle of Windsor. In the wake of this engagement, many Canadians were outraged at the retaliatory hangings, while Americans protested the transport of their kin to the Tasmanian penal colony. With stories from both sides of the border, historian Shaun J. McLaughlin recalls the triumphs and sacrifices of the doomed Patriots."