The industrial city of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, was originally settled in colonial times by Moravians from southeastern Germany. These religious utopians were noted for urban planning. In this large-format, richly illustrated volume, historian William Murtagh compares more than 20 Bethlehem landmarks with other Moravian communities for a fascinating glimpse into a part of America's past.

"Piquant, and uncommonly eloquent."--Kirkus Reviews "Stutz is an eloquent advocate for the river and the region's preservation."--Publishers Weekly The Delaware River flows out of New York's Catskill Mountains and winds its way through woodland and rural farmland, through the great Water Gap ravine, and finally past one of the world's most industrialized riverfronts. Yet it remains one of the country's last undammed rivers, with a natural life as rich and varied as its human history. In Natural Lives, Modern Times, Bruce Stutz has written a thoroughly modern natural...

A picture of Philadelphia radically different from the conventional portrait of a staid old city, corrupt and contented. The men and women of Philadelphia who emerge in these pages are anything but staid, and certainly not contented. Although much has been written about elite Philadelphians, only in recent decades have historians paid attention to the Jews and working-class blacks, the immigrant Irish, Italians, and Poles who settled in the city and gave such sections as Moyamensing, Southwark, South Philadelphia, and Kensington their vitality. In this classic of social and ethnic history,...

The revolutionary patriot known as Henry Free had come to America as the boy Henner Dellicker--his new life as different as his name and the childhood he left behind in Germany. He had traveled to colonial Philadelphia in a ship crowded with starving emigrants, only to discover that it was indentured servitude, not freedom, to which he sailed. Conrad Richter's 1943 novel, now restored to print, tells the rousing story of Free's journey, of his time in service, and of his struggle for freedom--his own, and that of the young nation of which he becomes a part. In the process of telling this...

E. B. White once said, only places that are a bit decadent are pleasant to live in. Charm, especially Philadelphia charm, wouldn't be the same without the tinge of decadence found in the lives of Philadelphia's upper class. The Perennial Philadelphians tells the story of the city's inherited aristocracy--of Wanamakers and Drexels, of Biddles and Cadwaladers. Drawing on history, genealogy, politics, economics, the fine arts, private diaries, and the impressions and anecdotes of myriad living witnesses, Nathaniel Burt paints a fascinating portrait of Old Philadelphians. He traces the...