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A pocket-sized gift book packed with patriotic facts for ordinary Americans and history buffs alike.
 
This handbook is the perfect patriotic present for any engaged United States citizen. Who played the first game of baseball? What’s a bicameral congress? Where did Mount Rushmore come from? Who is Geronimo and why do we yell his name when we jump? Plus:

•  All about the Declaration of Independence
•  Ten Books Every American Should Read
•  Assassination Attempts on U.S. Presidents
•  The History of the Statue of Liberty
•  How to Bake the Perfect Apple Pie

Here are 100 ready-to-frame political campaign posters from the annals of American history! The candidates range from Andrew Jackson (“Defender of Beauty and Booty”) and William Henry Harrison (“Have Some Hard Cider!”) to Richard Nixon (“He’s the One!”), Barack Obama (“Hope”), and many, many more. The posters are backed with colorful historical commentary and additional artwork; best of all, they’re bound with clean microperforated edges so they can be removed, framed, and displayed.

Presidential Campaign Posters is the perfect gift for political junkies of all ages!

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS has been the guardian of the nation’s memory for more than two centuries. The writers and editors in its publishing office collaborate with curators, reference librarians, and subject specialists to produce books and other materials that open its ever-growing collections and activities to the nation and the world.

Everyone knows the story of the Boston Tea Party—in which colonists stormed three British ships and dumped 92,000 pounds of tea into Boston Harbor. But do you know the history of the Philadelphia Tea Party (December 1773)? How about the York, Maine, Tea Party (September 1774) or the Wilmington, North Carolina, Tea Party (March 1775)?

Ten Tea Parties is the first book to chronicle all these uniquely American protests. Author and historian Joseph Cummins begins with the history of the East India Company (the biggest global corporation in the eighteenth century) and their staggering financial losses during the Boston Tea Party (more than a million dollars in today’s money).

From there we travel to Philadelphia, where Captain Samuel Ayres was nearly tarred and feathered by a mob of 8,000 angry patriots. Then we set sail for New York City, where the Sons of Liberty raided the London and heaved 18 chests of tea into the Hudson River. Still later, in Annapolis, Maryland, a brigantine carrying 2,320 pounds of the “wretched weed” was burned to ashes.

Together, the stories in Ten Tea Parties illuminate the power of Americans banding together as Americans—for the very first time in the fledgling nation’s history. It’s no wonder these patriots remain an inspiration to so many people today.

They invented slums. They invented child labor. They put Saddam Hussein in power. They burned Joan of Arc at the stake. They made Elton John a knight.

We’re talking about Britain, of course, and the terrible evils they’ve set loose on the world. In The Evil Empire, American author Steven Grasse documents the 101 worst atrocities perpetrated by Mother England-everything from foxhunting and the invention of the concentration camp to the rock band Oasis. (This spring, he’s also launching a massive global Internet campaign for reparations worth $58 trillion.) With an irreverent mix of historical facts, smart-ass commentary, and red-blooded American arrogance, Grasse offers a devastating critique of the country that gave us the machine gun, factory labor, and Phil Collins. Publishing just in time for the Queen’s birthday (April 21), The Evil Empire is essential reading for anglophiles and true-blue Americans everywhere.

STEVEN A. GRASSE is the CEO of Gyro Worldwide, a multimillion-dollar ad agency. He has designed award-winning campaigns for clients such as Coca-Cola, MTV, and Puma. This is his first book. PENNY RIMBAUD is a drummer, writer, poet, and cofounder of the anarchist punk band Crass.

Everyone knows the fifty nifty united states—but what about the hundreds of other statehood proposals that never came to pass? Lost States is a tribute to such great unrealized dreams as West Florida, Texlahoma, Montezuma, Rough and Ready, and Yazoo. Some of these states came remarkably close to joining the Union. Others never had a chance. Many are still trying. Consider:
 
     •  Frontier legend Daniel Boone once proposed a state of Transylvania in the Appalachian
        wilderness (his plan was resurrected a few years later with the new name of Kentucky).
     •  Residents of bucolic South Jersey wanted to secede from their urban north Jersey
        neighbors and form the fifty-first state.
     •  The Gold Rush territory of Nataqua could have made a fine state—but since no women
         were willing to live there, the settlers gave up and joined California.
 
Each story offers a fascinating glimpse at the nation we might have become—along with plenty of absurd characters, bureaucratic red tape, and political gamesmanship. Accompanying these tales are beautifully rendered maps detailing the proposed state boundaries, plus images of real-life artifacts and ephemera. Welcome to the world of Lost States!

Secret Lives of Great Artists recounts the seamy, steamy, and gritty history behind the great masters of international art. 

You’ll learn that Michelangelo’s body odor was so bad, his assistants couldn’t stand working for him; that Vincent van Gogh sometimes ate paint directly from the tube; and Georgia O’Keeffe loved to paint in the nude. This is one art history lesson you’ll never forget!