Showing results by narrator "Arthur Morey" in All Categories

At age 26, broke and knee-deep in gambling debt, Ed Ugel serendipitously landed a job as a salesman for The Firm, a company that offered up-front cash to lottery winners in exchange for their gradually doled-out prize money. Ed made a lucrative living by taking advantage of lottery winners' weaknesses - weaknesses he knew all too well.

The years from 1815 to 1848 were arguably the richest period in American life. In Waking Giant, award-winning historian David S. Reynolds illuminates the era's exciting political story alongside the fascinating social and cultural movements that influenced it. He casts fresh light on Andrew Jackson, who redefined the presidency, as well as John Quincy Adams and James K. Polk, who expanded the nation's territory and strengthened its position internationally.

Having the Time of My Life is a rich account of Peter Chapel's life, depicting the people, places, and events he wishes to remember and acknowledge. This memoir shows how everything and everyone around him genuinely enriched his life and brings back poignantly remembered fragments of his history.

Here are the dramatic stories of the fall of Bataan, the siege of "the Rock," the daily struggles to tend the sick, the wounded, and the dying, during some of the heaviest bombardments of World War II. Once captive, the doctors and corpsmen waged a desperate war against disease and starvation for nearly three and a half years, amid an enemy who viewed surrender as a disgrace. To survive, the four POWs tried to function as a family.

Originally published anonymously, The Federalist Papers first appeared in 1787 as a series of letters to New York newspapers exhorting voters to ratify the proposed Constitution of the United States. Still hotly debated and open to often controversial interpretations, the arguments first presented here by three of America's greatest patriots and political theorists were created during a critical moment in our nation's history.

The remarkable life and career of a recently rediscovered photography legend. He was a trailblazing 20th-century British photojournalist but George Rodger lived in the adventurous tradition of 19th-century explorers. Cofounding Magnum Photos, in 1947, with Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Capa, the modest Rodger was eclipsed by his partners - until now. Rodger's Indiana Jones-style escapades are legendary and worth the telling. He once covered over 75,000 miles of "old Africa" in a Land Rover. He even survived a white rhino charge. He went on to become a key photographer of African tribal life.

Slave narratives are extremely rare. Of the 100 or so of these testimonies that survive, a mere handful are first-person accounts by slaves who ran away and freed themselves. Now two newly uncovered narratives, and the biographies of the men who wrote them, join that exclusive group.

The race to make the first nonstop flight between New York and Paris attracted some of the most famous and seasoned aviators of the day, yet it was the young and lesser known Charles Lindbergh who won the $25,000 Orteig Prize in 1927 for his history-making solo flight in the Spirit of St. Louis. Drawing on many previously overlooked sources, Bak offers a fresh look at the personalities that made up this epic air race - a deadly competition that culminated in one of the 20th century's most thrilling personal achievements.

Meet Gerald. Gerald is a griffin - a creature with the body of a lion and the head of an eagle. According to the Code of the Griffins, that means he should be: 1. Brave and fierce in all situations! 2. A guardian of a great treasure! 3. Completely and totally hidden from the human realm! But what if a Griffin isn't brave or fierce? What if he's never found a great treasure (or any treasure, for that matter)? What if he feels like such an embarrassment that the only thing left to do is run away?

Been there, done that, indeed. Texas-born and Harvard-educated, Jack Valenti led several lives, any one of which could have provided ample material for an unforgettable memoir. As it is, This Time, This Place is the gripping story of a man who saw the terrible face of war; who was in the room as political decisions were made that would benefit or devastate countless lives; and who championed the interest of the vast and globally influential movie industry with tenacity and vision.

In Seattle in 1962, Walter Cousins, a mild-mannered actuary - “a guy who weighs risk for a living” - takes a risk of his own, and makes the biggest error of his life. He sleeps with Diane Burroughs, the sexy, not-quite-legal British au pair who’s taking care of his children for the summer. Diane gets pregnant and leaves their baby on a doorstep, but not before turning the tables on Walter and setting in motion a tragedy of epic proportions.

From the Battle of Yorktown (1781), where a fledgling America learned hard lessons about what kind of military it would need to survive, to Fallujah (2004), which epitomized the dawn of the privatization of war, The Hidden History of America at War takes listeners inside the battlefield, introducing them to key characters and events that will shatter myths, misconceptions, and romanticism, replacing them with rich insight.

With his usual storytelling flair and unparalleled research, Tom Fleming offers a compelling, intimate look at the founders—George Washington, Ben Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison—and the women who played essential roles in their lives.

On September 30, 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain flew back to London from his meeting at Munich with the German chancellor Adolf Hitler and was greeted with a hero's welcome. As he paused on the aircraft steps, he held aloft the piece of paper, bearing both his and the Fuhrer's signatures, that contained the promise that Britain and Germany would never go to war with each other again.

Everyone in a position of responsibility knows the tension of leadership. It may be between tasks or people, money or mission, the present or the future. One often neglected tension is between our inner spiritual longings and the outward needs of the group we lead. But we need not feel forced to choose between the two. Leadership has more in common with an ellipse with two focal points than a bull's-eye with a single target.

General Richard B. Myers has unique insight into how the American national-security system works. In Eyes on the Horizon, he recounts his military career and outlines a bold blueprint for a strategic overhaul of our security system, including the military, so that the nation is adequately protected and prepared to fight in this era of what he calls the "Grand Insurgency".

Firoze and Gnomon: two rival nations that share the same island. The powerful Firozians are famous for their magical swords and warlike spirit. The gentle Gnomons are known for their precision clocks - and for their power over time itself. The death of an innocent boy sparks war between Gnomon and Firoze. Swords are sharpened and spells prepared. But no sooner than the battle lines are drawn, a foreign power attacks the island.

AlterNet editor Joshua Holland demolishes the Right's biggest and most outrageous myths about the economy. Taxes kill growth. Labor unions hurt their members. Government regulation destroys jobs. These are just a few of the biggest lies in the web of misinformation spun by conservatives and the chamber of commerce. Holland's book dissects each malicious fiction to show how the Right is just plain wrong on the economy, wrong on jobs, wrong on the deficit, wrong on taxes, wrong on trade.

She was born in 1920 on the east coast of China, the daughter of an American missionary doctor in the midst of civil war. He was born the son of a dairy farmer in 1918 in Charlotte, North Carolina, where milking cows was a daily chore. Together they would live a life of influence neither could have imagined on their own. No one has preached the gospel to more people than evangelist Billy Graham. But behind this exceptional man is an equally exceptional woman who made his global ministry possible.

With almost 20 million listeners on more than six hundred stations, Rush Limbaugh is the leading and most dangerous figure in the conservative movement today. John K. Wilson uses the most effective strategy of all—Rush’s own words—to show how Limbaugh’s flagrant disregard for the truth and penchant for savage personal attacks laced with racist, sexist, and homophobic slurs have held the political arena hostage.