Service Alert
Website maintenance April 24 10pm ET
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
On Wednesday April 24 at 10pm ET the CELA website will be unavailable for about 15 minutes for planned maintenance.
Showing 1 - 20 of 5537 items
By Wesley Lowery. 2021
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERAn NPR Best Book of the Year • Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the YearLonglisted for the…
2024 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence“American Whitelash is indispensable. Really. It is.” – Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an AntiracistPulitzer Prize–winning journalist Wesley Lowery confronts the sickness at the heart of American society: the cyclical pattern of violence that has marred every moment of racial progress in this country, and whose bloodshed began anew following Obama’s 2008 election.In 2008, Barack Obama’s historic victory was heralded as a turning point for the country. And so it would be—just not in the way that most Americans hoped. The election of the nation’s first Black president fanned long-burning embers of white supremacy, igniting a new and frightening phase in a historical American cycle of racial progress and white backlash.In American Whitelash, Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and best-selling author Wesley Lowery charts the return of this blood-stained trend, showing how the forces of white power retaliated against Obama’s victory—and both profited from, and helped to propel, the rise of Donald Trump. Interweaving deep historical analysis with gripping firsthand reporting on both victims and perpetrators of violence, Lowery uncovers how this vicious cycle is carrying us into ever more perilous territory, how the federal government has failed to intervene, and how we still might find a route of escape.By Denise Chong. 2024
From the bestselling author of The Concubine&’s Children and The Girl in the Picture, a gripping story of a domestic assault…
that shocked the world, of the exercise of power and political influence, and of the Bangladeshi woman whose irrepressible spirit found light in sudden darkness.From the outside, Rumana seemed an unlikely victim of domestic abuse: married to a man of her own choosing and progressing in her career as a professor of international relations at Dhaka University. But in 2011, on return from graduate studies at the University of British Columbia, her husband attacked and blinded her in front of their young daughter. As Rumana's horrifying story garnered international headlines, and connections brought her to Vancouver in an attempt—ultimately futile—to restore her sight, her plight underscored the fact that there are no typical victims of intimate-partner violence. Denise Chong goes behind the headlines to reveal the devolution of a love story into a tale of tyranny behind closed doors, and the pursuit of justice that proved all the more elusive during the rise of social media. Out of Darkness tells a globe-spanning narrative of loyalty, perseverance and a woman&’s determination to face the future and rebuild a life with meaning.By David Wilock. 2024
This volume explores the extent to which the Revolutionary period (1740–1815) impacted the faculty, students and institutional life of Yale…
College and how those changes shed insight into the nature of the American Revolution itself as a conservative or radical event.Throughout the eighteenth century, Yale continued a tradition of producing individuals who would perpetuate the economic and social status quo. At the same time, the institution was undergoing an evolution reflective of the broader movements in America that would persist into the era of the early republic. In order to examine Yale’s influence on those who attended, this study uses the student experience as a major source of evidence. Yale’s curriculum and culture prior to 1776 were beginning to embrace Enlightenment ideas, though not fully, and due in no small part to the petitions of students. From literary societies to student militias, there were ways for students to engage in an exchange of ideas about new courses and new modes of national government outside the classroom.The book is intended for both undergraduate and graduate students as well as general readers who are interested in the history of higher education, the American Revolutionary Era and the history of Connecticut.By Summer Cherland. 2024
Student-Centered Oral History explores the overlaps of culturally relevant teaching, student-centered teaching, and oral history to demonstrate how this method…
empowers students, especially those from historically underrepresented communities. With tangible tools like lesson plans and reflection sheets, available to download as eResources from the book's website, each interactive chapter is applicable to classrooms and age groups across the globe. Educators from all levels of experience will benefit from step-by-step guides and lesson plans, all organized around guiding questions. These lessons coach students and educators from start to finish through a student-centered oral history. Background research, historical context, cultivating a culture of consent, analysis, promotion, and gratitude are among the many lessons taught beyond writing questions and interviewing. With a specific focus on the ethics influencing a teacher’s role as guide and grader of a student-centered oral history, this book also highlights successful approaches across the world of students and teachers discovering oral history. These examples reveal how student-centered oral history empowers academic achievement, radicalizes knowledge, develops relationships, and promotes community engagement. This book is a useful tool for any students and scholars interested in oral history in an educational setting.By Ernesto Che Guevara. 2011
En abril de 1965, el Che Guevara se marcha de La Habana al Congo para dirigir a 200 veteranos cubanos…
que asisten al movimiento de liberación africana contra los colonialistas belgas, cuatro años después del asesinato del presidente socialista democráticamente electo, Patrice Lumumba.Porque el diario trata el admitido "fracaso" del Che, examina cada detalle doloroso de lo sucedido para poder extraer enseñanzas constructivas para futuros movimientos guerrilleros.Único entre sus libros, Pasajes de la Guerra Revolucionaria: Congo es un retrato del Che brutalmente honesto que ilustra su capacidad como cuentista; en sus relatos de los fascinantes episodios de conflicto armado de la guerrilla no hay hesitación, endulzamiento o jerga. Algunos lo consideran el mejor libro del Che, también es uno de los pocos que editó para la publicación luego de escribirlo.By Susan Page. 2024
The definitive biography of the most successful female broadcaster of all time—Barbara Walters—a woman whose personal demons fueled an ambition…
that broke all the rules and finally gave women a permanent place on the air, written by bestselling author Susan Page.Barbara Walters was a force from the time TV was exploding on the American scene in the 1960s to its waning dominance in a new world of competition from streaming services and social media half a century later. She was not just a groundbreaker for women (Oprah announced when she was seventeen that she wanted to be Barbara Walters), but also expanded the big TV interview and then dominated the genre. By the end of her career, she had interviewed more of the famous and infamous, from presidents to movie stars to criminals to despots, than any other journalist in history. Then at sixty-seven, past the age many female broadcasters found themselves involuntarily retired, she pioneered a new form of talk TV called The View. She is on the short list of those who have left the biggest imprints on television news and on our culture, male or female. So, who was the woman behind the legacy? In The Rulebreaker, Susan Page conducts 150 interviews and extensive archival research to discover that Walters was driven to keep herself and her family afloat after her mercurial and famous impresario father attempted suicide. But she never lost the fear of an impending catastrophe, which is what led her to ask for things no woman had ever asked for before, to ignore the rules of misogynistic culture, to outcompete her most ferocious competitors, and to protect her complicated marriages and love life from scrutiny. Page breaks news on every front—from the daring things Walters did to become the woman who reinvented the TV interview to the secrets she kept until her death. This is the eye-opening account of the woman who knew she had to break all the rules so she could break all the rules about what viewers deserved to know.By Michael J. Gerhardt. 2024
A unique and illuminating exploration of the key relationships that shaped Franklin Delano Roosevelt into one of America&’s most definitive…
leaders and impacted his influence on the world stage, from presidential historian Michael J. Gerhardt, the acclaimed author of Lincoln&’s Mentors and principal adviser in the official annotation of the Constitution at the Library of Congress. Franklin Delano Roosevelt wasn&’t a born leader. He became one. As a boy he was in poor health, was insecure, and an average student at best. Growing into manhood, the lessons he learned came not from books but from influencers of his lifetime, beginning with Endicott Peabody, the most renowned US headmaster of the twentieth century. He instilled in Roosevelt a confidence and strength that empowered the young student and propelled him to greatness as one of the most revered presidents of the United States. For Roosevelt, Peabody was only one of a small number of people who helped him develop the skills and temperament that enabled him to overcome the devastating effects of polio, to lead the nation through two crises, and to secure America&’s leadership in the world. In FDR&’s Mentors, Michael Gerhardt tells the extraordinary stories of the men and women who had a vital impact on Roosevelt&’s life, career, and pragmatic personality: his distant cousin Teddy; his wife Eleanor; President Woodrow Wilson; journalist Lewis Howe; Winston Churchill; and New York Democratic Party leader Al Smith. Form the creation of the New Deal through Roosevelt&’s war with the Supreme Court to the attack on Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt persevered with never-ending grit, grace, limitless optimistism, and patience. It is thanks to the invaluable personal connections, inspiration, and wisdom of those who shaped and informed FDR&’s historic presidency—one that has become a model of resilience and, in turn, an influence on every president who has followed in his path.By Bakari Sellers. 2024
The New York Times bestselling author of My Vanishing Country examines the modern political landscape and policies that are impacting…
Black families and communities and offers solutions for a better tomorrow. In late May in 2020, while discussing the murder of George Floyd on CNN, Bakari Sellers spoke from the heart sharing devastating insight that touched millions around the world: “It’s just so much pain. You get so tired. We have black children. I have a 15-year-old daughter. I mean, what do I tell her? I’m raising a son. I have no idea what to tell him. It’s just—it’s hard being black in this country when your life is not valued and people are worried about the protesters and the looters. And it’s just people who are frustrated for far too long and not have their voices heard.”In this powerful and persuasive book, Sellers expands on the issues he addressed in his New York Times bestseller My Vanishing Country, examining national politics and policies that deeply impact not only Black people in his home state of South Carolina but the lives of millions of African Americans in communities across the nation. Four years later, Sellers has an answer to the question he raised on CNN, offering much-needed prescriptions to help all Black American lives.Sellers explores inequities in healthcare, education, early childhood education, and policing, drawing on interviews with numerous thought leaders such as pioneering voting rights and poverty activist the Rev. William Barber, and Ben Crump, the civil rights legend who successfully uses the law to achieve justice for people of color in racially charged cases. He also shares his thoughts on conservative media and the forces and dark money behind firebrands such as Tucker Carlson. This thoughtful and practical work is a timely meditation on the state of our world today and how we can all play a part in making it better for tomorrow.By David L. Roll. 2024
From Franklin Roosevelt&’s final days through Harry Truman&’s extraordinary transformation, this is the enthralling story behind the most consequential presidential…
transition in US history. When Roosevelt, in failing health, decided to run for a fourth term, he gave in to the big city Democratic bosses and reluctantly picked Senator Truman as his vice president, a man he barely knew. Upon FDR&’s death in April 1945, Truman, after only 82 days as VP, was thrust into the presidency. Utterly unprepared, he faced the collapse of Germany, a Europe in ruins, the organization of the UN, a summit with Stalin and Churchill, and the question of whether atomic bombs would be ready for use against Japan. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was growing increasingly hostile towards US power. Truman inherited FDR&’s hope that peace could be maintained through cooperation with the Soviets, but he would soon learn that imitating his predecessor would lead only to missteps and controversy. Spanning the years of transition, 1944 to 1948, Ascent to Power illuminates Truman&’s struggles to emerge as president in his own right. Yet, from a relatively unknown Missouri senator to the most powerful man on Earth, Truman&’s legacy transcends. With his come-from-behind campaign in the fall of 1948, his courageous civil rights advocacy, and his role in liberating millions from militarist governments and brutal occupations, Truman&’s decisions during these pivotal years changed the course of the world in ways so significant we live with them today.By Ray Suarez. 2024
From a veteran broadcaster and historian comes a richly reported portrait of the newest Americans, immigrants from all over the…
globe who are living all across the country, filled with their own voices. We are a nation of immigrants, never more than now. In recent decades, the numbers have skyrocketed, thanks to people coming from many continents—especially Asia, Africa, and South America. Just like their predecessors, they face countless obstacles, including political hatred. And yet, just like their predecessors, they work hard. They persist. And they become us. The newest Americans are poorly understood and frequently presented only in stereotypes. Veteran journalist, broadcaster, and interviewer Ray Suarez has criss-crossed the country to speak to new Americans from all corners of the globe, and to record their stories. This portrait of our newest citizens is full of their own, compelling voices. It&’s a story as old as the country, yet each new wave of arrivals tells that classic story in new and crucially important ways.By Nell Irvin Painter. 2024
From the New York Times bestselling author of The History of White People and Old in Art School, a finalist…
for the NBCC Award, comes a comprehensive new collection of essays spanning art, politics, and the legacy of racism that shapes American history as we know it.Throughout her prolific writing career, Nell Painter has published works on such luminaries as Sojourner Truth, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Malcolm X. Her unique vantage on American history pushes the boundaries of personal narrative and academic authorship. Led by an unbridled curiosity for her subjects, Painter asks readers to reconsider ideas of race, politics, and identity. I Just Keep Talking assembles her writing for the first time into a single volume, displaying the breadth and depth of Painter&’s decades-long historical inquiry and the evolution of Black political thought—and includes a dazzling introduction and coda being published for the first time in this collection. From her mining of figures like Carrie Buck and Martin Delaney for their resonance today, to a deep dive into the history of exclusion through the work of Toni Morrison, to a discussion of the American political landscape after the 2016 election, Painter nimbly portrays the trials of a country frequently at war with itself.Along with Painter&’s writing, this collection offers her original artwork, threaded throughout the book as counterpoint and emphasis. Her visual art shows a deft mind turning toward the tragedy and humor of her subjects; pulling from newspapers, personal records, and original sketches, Painter&’s artwork testifies to the dialectic of tremendous change and stasis that continues to shape American history.These essays resist easy answers in favor of complexity, the inescapable sense of our country&’s potential thwarted by its failures. This collection will surely solidify Painter&’s place among the finest critics and writers of the last half century.By Dr Martin Luther King Jr.. 1963
A beautiful commemorative edition of Dr. Martin Luther King's speech "Our God Is Marching On,” part of Dr. King's archives…
published exclusively by HarperCollins.At the end of the march from Selma to Montgomery on March 25, 1965, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood in front of a crowd and celebrated the demanding work and effort that had been done by all in the fight against racial injustice for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In this speech, Dr. King testified that this march, for justice had been long and difficult and would continue to be so as those with him resisted the call of normalcy in the name of Jim Crow.“Our God Is Marching On” showcases a message of determination, faith, and the unyielding pursuit of equality while remaining committed to nonviolence. This beautifully designed hardcover edition presents Dr. King’s speech in its entirety, paying tribute to this extraordinary leader and his immeasurable contribution, and inspiring a new generation of activists dedicated to carrying on the fight for justice and equality.By Marion R. Casey. 2024
A historical exploration of the Irish image in popular cultureIt only took a century or so to segue from phrases…
like “No Irish Need Apply” to “Kiss Me, I’m Irish” in American popular culture. Indeed, the transformation of the Irish image is a fascinating blend of political, cultural, racial, commercial, and social influences.The Green Space examines the variety of factors that contributed to remaking the Irish image from downtrodden and despised to universally acclaimed. To understand the forces that molded how people understand “Irish” is to see the matrix—the green space—that facilitated their interaction between the 1890s and 1960s. Marion R. Casey argues that, as “Irish” evolved between the mid-nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries, a visual and rhetorical expanse for representing ethnicity was opened up in the process. The evolution was also transnational; both Ireland and the United States were inextricably linked to how various iterations of “Irish” were deployed over time—whether as a straightforward noun about a specific people with a national identity or a loose, endlessly malleable adjective only tangentially connected to actual ethnic identity.Featuring a rich assortment of sources and images, The Green Space takes the history of the Irish image in America as a prime example of the ways in which culture and identity can be manufactured, repackaged, and ultimately revolutionized. Understanding the multifaceted influences that shaped perceptions of “Irishness” holds profound relevance for examining similar dynamics within studies of various immigrant and ethnic communities in the US.By Vince Houghton, Eric Driggs. 2024
Secret operations, corruption, crime, and a city teeming with spies: why Miami was as crucial to winning the Cold War…
as Washington DC or Moscow. The Cuban Missile Crisis was perhaps the most dramatic and dangerous period of the Cold War. What's less well known is that the city of Miami, mere miles away, was a pivotal, though less well known, part of Cold War history. With its population of Communist exiles from Cuba, its strategic value for military operations, and its lax business laws, Miami was an ideal environment for espionage.Covert City tells the history of how the entire city of Miami was constructed in the image of the US-Cuba rivalry. From the Bay of Pigs invasion to the death of Fidel Castro, the book shows how Miami is a hub for money and cocaine but also secrets and ideologies. Cuban exiles built criminal and political organizations in the city, leading Washington to set up a CIA station there, codenamed JMWAVE. It monitored gang activities, plotted secret operations against Castro, and became a base for surveilling Latin American neighbors. The money and infrastructure built for the CIA was integral to the development of Miami.Covert City is a sweeping and entertaining history, full of stunning experimental operations and colorful characters--a story of a place like no other.By Elizabeth Neumann. 2024
A former counterterrorism official explores how modern evangelicalism and right-wing conservatism intermingled to form the combustible ideology that resulted in…
the January 6 attacks on the Capitol—and which threatens to destroy the American Church from within. How did a Church that purports to follow the teachings of Jesus - the Prince of Peace - become a breeding ground for violent extremism? When Elizabeth Neumann began her anti-terrorism career as part of President George W. Bush&’s Homeland Security Counsel in the wake of the September 11 attacks, she expected to spend her life protecting her country from the threat of global terrorism. But as her career evolved, she began to perceive that the greatest threat to American security came not from religious fundamentalists in Afghanistan or Iraq but from white nationalists and radicalized religious fundamentalists within the very institution that was closest to her heart – the American evangelical church. And she began to sound the alarm, raising her concerns to anyone in government who would listen, including testifying before Congress in February of 2020. At that time, Neumann warned that anti-Semitic and white supremacist terrorism was a transnational threat that was building to the doorstep of another major attack. Shortly after her testimony, she resigned from her role as Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Counterterrorism and Threat Prevention in protest of what she believed was then-President Trump&’s failure of leadership and his stoking of the hatred, anger, and division from which she had dedicated her life to protecting her country. Her worst fears came true when she witnessed the attack on the capital on January 6, 2021. In Kingdom of Rage, Neumann explores the forces within American society that have encouraged the radicalization of white supremacist, anti-government and other far-right terrorists by co-opting Christian symbols and culture and perverting the faith&’s teachings. While Neumann offers decades of insights into the role government policies can play to prevent further bloodshed, she believes real change must come from the within the Christian church. She shines a bright light on the responsibility of ordinary Americans – and particularly American Christians – to work within their families and their communities to counteract the narrative of victimization and marginalization within American evangelicalism. Her goal for this book is not only to sound a warning about one of the greatest threats to our security but to rescue the Church from the forces that will, if left unchecked, destroy it – culturally, morally, and ultimately quite literally. This is a book for anyone who wants to understand the unholy marriage of right-wing politics and Christian exceptionalism in America and who wants to be a part of reversing the current path towards division, hatred, violence and the ultimate undermining of both evangelical Christianity and American democracy.By James Davison Hunter. 2024
The long-developing cultural divisions beneath our present political crisis Liberal democracy in America has always contained contradictions—most notably, a…
noble but abstract commitment to freedom, justice, and equality that, tragically, has seldom been realized in practice. While these contradictions have caused dissent and even violence, there was always an underlying and evolving solidarity drawn from the cultural resources of America&’s &“hybrid Enlightenment.&” James Davison Hunter, who introduced the concept of &“culture wars&” thirty years ago, tells us in this new book that those historic sources of national solidarity have now largely dissolved. While a deepening political polarization is the most obvious sign of this, the true problem is not polarization per se but the absence of cultural resources to work through what divides us. The destructive logic that has filled the void only makes bridging our differences more challenging. In the end, all political regimes require some level of unity. If it cannot be generated organically, it will be imposed by force. Can America&’s political crisis be fixed? Can an Enlightenment-era institution—liberal democracy—survive and thrive in a post-Enlightenment world? If, for some, salvaging the older sources of national solidarity is neither possible sociologically, nor desirable politically or ethically, what cultural resources will support liberal democracy in the future?In Only a Few Blocks to Cuba, Mauricio Castro shows how the U.S. government came to view Cuban migration to…
Miami as a strategic asset during the Cold War, in the process investing heavily in the city’s development and shaping its future as a global metropolis.When Cuban refugees fleeing Communist revolution began to arrive in Miami in 1959, the city was faced with a humanitarian crisis it was ill-equipped to handle and sought to have the federal government solve what local politicians clearly viewed as a Cold War geopolitical problem. In response, the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, and their successors, provided an unprecedented level of federal largesse and freedom of transit to these refugees. The changes to the city this investment wrought were as impactful and permanent as they were unintended. What was meant to be a short-term geopolitical stratagem instead became a new reality in South Florida. A growing and increasingly powerful Cuban community contested their place in Miami and navigated challenges like bilingualism, internal political disputes, socioeconomic polarization, and ongoing struggles and negotiations with Washington and Havana in the decades that followed. This contested process, argues Mauricio Castro, not only transformed South Florida, but American foreign policy and the calculus of national politics.Castro uses extensive archival research in local and national sources to demonstrate that the Cuban diaspora and Cold War refugee policy made South Florida a key space to understanding the shifting landscape of the late twentieth century. In this way, Miami serves as an example of both the lived effects of defense spending in urban spaces and of how local communities can shape national politics and international relations. American politics, foreign relations, immigration policy, and urban development all intersected on the streets of Miami.By Faith S. Holsaert. 2024
Through her childhood spent in 1940s New York being raised by two mothers, her work with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating…
Committee during the Civil Rights Movement, and raising her own children in the coalfields of West Virginia, Faith S. Holsaert has been defined by the intertwined forces of race, activism, and family. As a young woman on the front line of the Civil Rights Movement, she learned the power of contested narratives and came to understand her whiteness, her queer identity, and her stakes in overturning racism. Later in life, she confronted sexual abuse and mental illness across three generations of women in her family to find that these painful histories have played a significant role in the development of her identity as a woman, activist, and mother. Through a lifetime laid bare in prose and poetry, Holsaert beautifully quilts memoir, social history, and historic events into a gripping and inspirational narrative. This powerful and structurally innovative work lends new categories of meaning to those who would strive to find their place, hope, and sense of belonging in efforts to fight against systemic racism and lead lives characterized by openness and love.By Bill Wasik, Monica Murphy. 2024
A compassionate, sweeping history of the transformation in American attitudes toward animals by the best-selling authors of RabidOver just a…
few decades at the end of the nineteenth century, the United States underwent a moral revolution on behalf of animals. Before the Civil War, animals' suffering had rarely been discussed; horses pulling carriages and carts were routinely beaten in public view, and dogs were pitted against each other for entertainment and gambling. But in 1866, a group of activists began a dramatic campaign to change the nation&’s laws and norms, and by the century&’s end, most Americans had adopted a very different way of thinking and feeling about the animals in their midst.In Our Kindred Creatures, Bill Wasik, editorial director of The New York Times Magazine, and veterinarian Monica Murphy offer a fascinating history of this crusade and the battles it sparked in American life. On the side of reform were such leaders as George Angell, the inspirational head of Massachusetts&’s animal-welfare society and the American publisher of the novel Black Beauty; Henry Bergh, founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; Caroline White of Philadelphia, who fought against medical experiments that used live animals; and many more, including some of the nation&’s earliest veterinarians and conservationists. Caught in the movement&’s crosshairs were transformational figures in their own right: animal impresarios such as P. T. Barnum, industrial meat barons such as Philip D. Armour, and the nation&’s rising medical establishment, all of whom put forward their own, very different sets of modern norms about how animals should be treated.In recounting this remarkable period of moral transition—which, by the turn of the twentieth century, would give birth to the attitudes we hold toward animals today—Wasik and Murphy challenge us to consider the obligations we still have to all our kindred creatures.By Kristalyn Marie Shefveland. 2024
Separating “Old Florida” myths from realities in a tourist haven with a deep Indigenous past Themes of unspoiled paradise tamed…
by progress can be seen in stories about pioneer history across the United States, especially in Florida. Selling Vero Beach explores how settlers from northern states created myths about the Indian River area on Florida’s Atlantic Coast, importing ideas about the region’s Indigenous peoples and marketing the land as an idyllic, fertile place of possibilities. In this book, Kristalyn Shefveland describes how in the Gilded Age, Indian River Farms Company and other boosters painted the region as a wild frontier, conveniently accessible by train via Henry Flagler’s East Coast Railway. Shefveland provides an overview of local Aís and Seminole histories that were rewritten by salespeople, illustrates how agricultural companies used Native peoples as motifs on their fruit products, and includes never-before-published letters between Vero Beach entrepreneur Waldo Sexton and writer Zora Neale Hurston that highlight Sexton’s interest in story-spinning and sales. Selling Vero Beach unpacks real and fabricated pasts, showing how the settler memory of Florida distorted or erased the fascinating actual history of the region. With a wide variety of stories invented to lure investors and tourists, many of which circulate to this day in a place that remains a top vacation destination, Vero Beach is an intriguing example of why and how certain pasts were concocted to sell Florida land and products. A volume in the series Florida in Focus, edited by Andrew K. Frank