New Book Releases

McKeesport documents the rich and interesting history of this unique community.

McKeesport's location at the junction of the Youghiogheny and Monongahela Rivers facilitated shipping and transportation for the early coal and steel industries. Multiple large manufacturers were located here, including the National Tube Works, the American Tin Plate Company, Firth Sterling, and the D.L. Clark Candy Company. McKeesport's downtown supported numerous theaters, banks, stores, schools, churches, and civic organizations. In the first half of the 20th century, the population increased dramatically, and McKeesport was a growing, thriving city.

Mt. Lebanon depicts the interesting and engaging history of this community.

From the mid-1700s to the early 1900s, farming was the principal occupation in the area that would become Mt. Lebanon. When the federal government placed an excise tax on whiskey in 1794, area farmers protested in what became known as the Whiskey Rebellion. The 1901 arrival of the streetcar began transforming the area from a rural countryside to a modern suburban community. Within a few months of the streetcar's arrival, the first real estate subdivision, the Mt. Lebanon Plan, was laid out, and by 1905, no less than 11 subdivisions had been approved. When the Liberty Tunnels opened in 1924, Mt. Lebanon's population exploded, and the community became a premier example of the modern automobile suburb.

Called the ""Gem of the Endless Mountains,"" Sullivan County has been a crossroad and ethnic melting pot in the highlands of northern Pennsylvania for more than two centuries

In New York's Sullivan County, there are villages, ghost towns, family farms, and hunting camps scattered along valley floors and clinging to the mountainsides. Early lumber mills were built along the Big and Little Loyalsock Creeks and tributaries in the early 1800s, and outdoor sports and modern tourism became major industries in the 20th and 21st centuries. Land speculation by companies such as Asylum Land Company led to the development of coal, lumber, and railroad industries throughout the county.

Vintage images document the historical transformations of Crown Heights and Weeksville.

The communities of Crown Heights and Weeksville are historically significant Brooklyn neighborhoods with foundations that trace back to New York's early founding. Revolutionary War skirmishes took place there, and following the emancipation of slaves in 1827, Weeksville became the site of one of New York's earliest independent African American townships. The hills of Brooklyn's Green Mountains hindered early settlement, and as a result a plethora of community institutions instead abounded in this far-flung outpost, including a penitentiary, hospitals, almshouses, old-age homes, convents, and monasteries. Traces of some of these early structures still remain. Using vintage images, Crown Heights and Weeksville chronicles the dynamic evolution of this area from rural township to the desirable center of culture, urban convenience, and architectural beauty.

Through vintage photographs, Chester documents the community's golden years from the post-Civil War era to the 1950s.

In 1682, William Penn chose Chester as his landing place in Pennsylvania. A hub for commerce in Colonial times, Chester continued its prosperous reputation during the industrial revolution, and it is famous for its textile and paper mills. The town is home to the oldest public building in continuous use--the 1724 courthouse. Kimberly-Clark, formally Scott Paper Company, is among the successful local businesses today. Through the years, many prominent people, including the Wetherill, Scott, Deshong, and Crozer families, called Chester home.

Located in upstate New York on the western banks of the Mohawk River, Schenectady's Historic Stockade District is recognized as New York's first local historic district.

As one of the oldest European-settled areas in the United States, the Stockade contains the highest concentration of historic buildings in the country, over 40 of which are older than 200 years. As a result of the Stockade's longitude, a mix of architecture from 17th century Dutch to modern US design exists within the four blocks that make up the historic Stockade. Through photographs and maps, Schenectady's Stockade: New York's First Historic Districttells the story of one of America's earliest and longest lasting communities.

Join local historians William and Amanda Schleicher on a visual tour of Bedminster's heritage as they celebrate the town's history.

Settled in the first half of the 1700s, the fertile fields of Bedminster Township attracted Dutch, German, and Scottish farmers. During the American Revolution,the town served as a safe haven for the American army. For over a century, following the war, Bedminster returned to its previous way of life as a sleepy little farming community. In 1890, the area became home to Charles Pfizer's exclusive Essex Hunt Club. The lush green hills and dales of Bedminster were perfect for hunting foxes, and the level meadows were well suited for polo. Millionaires from New York sought to establish greatestates in Bedminster's picturesque countryside.

Lighthouses were built on the Hudson River in New York between 1826 to 1921 to help guide freight and passenger traffic. One of the most famous was the iconic Statue of Liberty. This fascinating history with photos will bring the time of traffic along the river alive.

Set against the backdrop of purple mountains, lush hillsides, and tidal wetlands, the lighthouses of the Hudson River were built between 1826 and 1921 to improve navigational safety on a river teeming with freight and passenger traffic. Unlike the towering beacons of the seacoasts, these river lighthouses were architecturally diverse, ranging from short conical towers to elaborate Victorian houses. Operated by men and women who at times risked and lost their lives in service of safe navigation, these beacons have overseen more than a century of extraordinary technological and social change. Of the dozens of historic lighthouses and beacons that once dotted the Hudson River, just eight remain, including the iconic Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor's great monument to freedom and immigration, which served as an official lighthouse between 1886 and 1902. Hudson River Lighthouses invites readers to explore these unique icons and their fascinating stories.

Images of America: Swedesboro and Woolwich Township is an educational and entertaining volume that will delight residents, visitors, and lovers of history everywhere.

In the mid-1600s, a group of Swedes from Delaware and Pennsylvania sailed up the Raccoon Creek and began a settlement on prime farmland in southern New Jersey.

Initially known as Raccoon, the town at the center of Woolwich Township was renamed Swedesboro in 1765. Transportation links to Swedesboro by creek, highway, and railroad made the town an attractive location for mills, shops, and farms. Today many residents are descended from the area's original Swedish settlers.

Swedesboro and Woolwich Township presents a diverse collection of photographs from the 1800s to the 1970s, illustrating daily life for residents of the community.

Today, over one-quarter of Pittsburgh's residents claim German heritage, the largest ethnic group in the region.

It might be surprising to know that German was an official language of Pittsburgh at one time, and a daily German newspaper was printed from the mid-1800s up through World War II, but Germans have been living in the area since the 1600s, and Pennsylvania saw a dramatic influx of German immigrants in the later part of the 19th century. Without those immigrants, Pittsburgh would be a very different place--German-speaking Pittsburghers include names like H. J. Heinz, Honus Wagner, and the Kaufmanns, and they produced beloved Pittsburgh beers such as Iron City and Penn Pilsner. Today, remnants of the German-speaking community can be found throughout the city, and over 300,000 residents can claim German ancestry.German Pittsburghexplores the multifaceted cultural history of German-speaking immigrants and residents in the Greater Pittsburgh area, and provides an overview of the contributions that this diverse ethnic community has made in the city.

Through vintage postcards, The Rockaways captures the history and charm of this seaside community.

The Rockaway Peninsula, also known as the Rockaways, is located off Long Island, within the borough of Queens. Its remoteness from Manhattan has made it a popular retreat and has provided an out-of-the-way area for families looking to relocate and live by the sea. The Rockaway's became a popular area for seaside hotels beginning in the 1830s, and its popularity grew with the coming of the Long Island Rail Road in the 1880s. In 1893, Hog Island, a resort known for entertaining Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall, sank into the sea. Located a few miles east of Breezy Point, and also known as Rockaway Island, the entire island disappeared during a storm. The Rockaways was also the home of Rockaway's Playland, a world renowned amusement park from 1901 to 1985. Through vintage postcards, The Rockaways captures the history and charm of this seaside community.

Poet Walt Whitman proclaimed his adopted home of Camden, in its heyday, "the city invincible," a powerhouse of industrial might destined for greatness.

Camden resurrects that fascinating era of invincibility through powerful images of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge construction; Cooper Hospital's nearly ill-fated founding; and the momentous birth of Campbell Soup Company, Victor Talking Machine Company/RCA, and New York Shipbuilding. Also included are images of Camden's neighborhoods, community life, and bustling downtown district, as well as the newsmakers and lawbreakers who defined the "biggest little city in the world."

No other city in the United States is home to more Slovaks than Pittsburgh. Through historical photographs, Slovak Pittsburgh celebrates the rich heritage there.

It is estimated that close to 100,000 Slovak immigrants came to the area in the 1890s looking for work and the chance for a better life. The hills and valleys of this new land reminded newcomers of the farms, forests, and mountains they left behind. They lived in neighborhoods close to their work, forming numerous cluster communities in such places as Braddock, Duquesne, Homestead, Munhall, the North Side, Rankin, and Swissvale. Once settled, Slovak immigrants founded their own churches, schools, fraternal benefit societies, and social clubs. Many of these organizations still enjoy an active presence in Pittsburgh today, serving to pass on the customs and traditions of the Slovak people.

Historic Congressional Cemetery dates from the days when Washington, DC, was a burgeoning city on the edge of a malarial swamp.

The stones--sandstone tablets with colonial calligraphy, ornate Victorian statues, 20th-century art nouveau carvings, and contemporary markers in shapes as strange as picnic tables and upended cubes--are a time line of the city. The most distinctive stones are 171 cenotaphs; large cubes designed by Capitol architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe from the same sandstone used in the Capitol. They are found nowhere else. The men and women buried under those stones led lives of beauty, courage, struggle, cunning, leadership, and humor--in short, the stories of American history.

Mount Pleasant--Samuel P. Brown must have thought the name perfect when he chose it for his country estate on a wooded hill overlooking Washington City.

The name Mount Pleasant suited the New Englanders who settled in the village that Brown founded near Fourteenth Street and Park Road just after the Civil War. Around 1900, the once-isolated village began its transformation into a fashionable suburb after the city extended Sixteenth Street through Mount Pleasant's heart, and a new streetcar line linked the area to downtown. Developers constructed elegant apartment buildings and spacious brick row houses on block after block, and successful businessmen built stately residences along Park Road. Change arrived again with the Great Depression and then World War II, as the suburb evolved into an urban, exclusively white, working-class enclave that eventually became mostly African American. In addition, a Latino presence was evident as early as the 1960s. By the 1980s, the neighborhood was known as the heart of D.C.'s Latino and counterculture communities. Today these communities are dispersing, however, in response to a booming real estate market in Washington, D.C.