Full AspenCat Catalog

The California Gold Rush inspired a new American dream-the "dream of instant wealth, won by audacity and good luck." The discovery of gold on the American River in 1848 triggered the most astonishing mass movement of peoples since the Crusades. It drew fortune-seekers from the ends of the earth, accelerated Americas imperial expansion, and exacerbated the tensions that exploded in the Civil War. H.W. Brands tells his epic story from multiple perspectives:...

A history of the people and commercial imperatives that contributed to the California gold rush discusses the massive influx of hundreds of thousands of people to the area, which became a state in record time.

"Identical twins Ernesto and Raul Flores, seventeen, must flee El Salvador, make a . . . journey across the Rio Grande and the Texas desert, face capture by immigration authorities, and struggle to navigate life in America"--Provided by publisher.

[v.4. We have a plan]: The story of socialist author Upton Sinclair's 1934 run for governor of California is told. Sinclair's epic plan to end poverty in California called for seizing unused factories and fields (and film studios) and turning them over to the unemployed to run as self-managing cooperatives. Sinclair won the Democratic nomination and received 900,000 votes against the Republican incumbent. In the process he scared the pants off California's...

"The Gold Rush was a major event in the US during the 1800s. This book explores what the Gold Rush was and the lesser-known people who participated in the event"--

Working-class suburb Los Angeles, 1928. Christine says goodbye to her son, Walter, and departs for work. Arriving home, Christine discovers that Walter is nowhere to be found. Christine launches a desperate search for her son. Then, a boy claiming to be Christine's son appears out of thin air. Knowing the boy is not hers, Christine invites the child to stay in her home. Christine cannot accept the injustice being pushed upon her and continues to challenge...

Reyna Grande tenía nueve años cuando cruzó la frontera de México y los Estados Unidos buscando un hogar y el reencuentro con sus padres, quienes la habían dejado en su tierra natal para migrar a Los Ángeles en busca de una mejor vida. Sin embargo, lo que encontró fue a una madre indiferente y a un padre alcohólico y violento, en un país cuyo sistema educativo menospreciaba sus raíces. Reyna se refugió en las palabras. Su amor por la lectura...

From Oscar-winning filmmaker Freida Lee Mock. Father Greg Boyle, a white Jesuit priest, has spent some 25 years in the toughest part of East LA, offering jobs not jail, to tough, street-smart, and amazingly sweet young people, all former gang members. Father Boyle is a charismatic visionary, but he's made the dream real: his Homeboy Industries has become the largest, most successful gang intervention and rehab program in the U.S. and an inspiration...

In Betty Reid Soskins 96 years of living, she has been a witness to a grand sweep of American history. When she was born in 1921, the lynching of African-Americans was a national disgrace, minstrel shows were the most popular American form of entertainment, women were looked at suspiciously by many for exercising their right to vote, and most African-Americans in the Deep South could not vote at all. From her great-grandmother, who had been enslaved...