New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

Recent Books About New York State

Authors and publishers of new books related to New York State can have their books noticed on the New York Almanack by following the submission guidelines HERE.

New Book About Politics, Gambling and Horse Racing History

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Horse Racing the Chicago WayChicago in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was second only to New York as a center of both thoroughbred racing and off-track gambling. Its complicated history is one of political influence and class; the business of racing; the cultural and social significance of racing; and the impact widespread opposition to gambling in Illinois had on the sport.

A new book considers these topics and looks at the nexus between horse racing, politics, and syndicate crime, as well as the emergence of neighborhood bookmaking, and the role of the national racing wire in Chicago. [Read more…] about New Book About Politics, Gambling and Horse Racing History

The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison

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The Women's House of DetentionThe Women’s House of Detention, a landmark that ushered in the modern era of women’s imprisonment, is now largely forgotten. But when it stood in New York City’s Greenwich Village, from 1929 to 1974, it was a nexus for the tens of thousands of women, transgender men, and gender-nonconforming people who inhabited its crowded cells.

Some of these inmates — Angela Davis, Andrea Dworkin, Afeni Shakur — were famous, but the vast majority were incarcerated for the crimes of being poor and improperly feminine. Today, approximately 40 percent of the people in women’s prisons identify as queer; in earlier decades, that percentage was almost certainly higher. [Read more…] about The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison

Long Island’s Gold Coast & The First World War

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Long Island’s Gold Coast Warriors and the First World WarRichard F. Welch book Long Island’s Gold Coast Elite and The Great War (History Press, 2021) looks at how Long Island’s leading North Shore families supported the Allies at the outbreak of war in Europe in 1914. Welch considers the Morgan bankers, movie producers, society glitterati, government officials, politically connected lawyers, and a former U.S. president who arranged massive loans and supplies for the Allies, while agitating for militarization and intervention.

This undercut the Wilson Administration’s official policy of neutrality and led the United States on a course, which led us inexorably to war with Germany in 1917. [Read more…] about Long Island’s Gold Coast & The First World War

A Queer History of the Women’s Suffrage Movement

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Public Faces Secret Lives by Wendy RouseIn the new book Public Faces, Secret Lives: A Queer History of the Women’s Suffrage Movement (NYU Press, 2022) Wendy L. Rouse of San Jose State University reveals that the suffrage movement included individuals who represented a range of genders and sexualities. However, owing to the constant pressure to present a “respectable” public image, suffrage leaders publicly conformed to gendered views of ideal womanhood in order to make women’s suffrage more palatable to the public. [Read more…] about A Queer History of the Women’s Suffrage Movement

Adirondack Cabin & Mountain Poems

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adirondack cabinThe new book Adirondack Cabin & Mountain Poems (Subjudica House Press, 2022) by Edward Zahniser features mountain and wilderness poetry, written from the Adirondack cabin Zahniser has visited since the 1940s.

Here is the mountain experience rendered by the poet’s words. A harvest of wilderness after-thoughts by Zahniser who is a regular contributor to New York Almanack of poetry and essays about wilderness, his youth in the Adirondacks, and his father Howard Zahniser, author of the national Wilderness Act and friend of Adirondack conservationist Paul Shaefer. [Read more…] about Adirondack Cabin & Mountain Poems

Spaces of Enslavement: A History of Slavery and Resistance in Dutch New York

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Spaces of Enslavement and Resistance in Dutch New YorkSpaces of Enslavement: A History of Slavery and Resistance in Dutch New York (Cornell University Press, 2021) by Dr. Andrea Mosterman explores the history of slavery and resistance in Dutch New York. [Read more…] about Spaces of Enslavement: A History of Slavery and Resistance in Dutch New York

A New History of Ilion, Herkimer County, Published

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ilion coverThe book Our Town – Ilion, New York: A Selective Look at 300 Years of History (self-published, 2022) by Joseph D. Collea, Jr. tells the story of the founding, growth, and development of a small but vibrant Herkimer County community that ultimately gained world-wide recognition and acclaim for the quality of its manufactured products — most notably rifles and typewriters. [Read more…] about A New History of Ilion, Herkimer County, Published

1813: Fall of Fort Niagara & Burning the Niagara Frontier

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new yorks war of 1812In December 1813, during the War of 1812, there was a human catastrophe as a result of the burning of the Niagara Frontier. Only one home was spared along the 37-mile-long border and upwards of 6,000 refugees fled into the snowy forests heading for the Genesee River and safety.

Richard V. Barbuto’s book New York’s War of 1812: Politics Society and Combat (University of Oklahoma Press, 2021), looks back to the War of 1812, from the beleaguered Fort McHenry to the burning White House to an embattled New Orleans. [Read more…] about 1813: Fall of Fort Niagara & Burning the Niagara Frontier

North Country Prisons Talk On ‘Empire State Engagements’

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A Prison In the Woods - Environment and Incarceration in New York's North CountyOn this episode of Empire State Engagements, Dr. Clarence Jefferson Hall, Jr., talks about his book A Prison in the Woods: Environment and Incarceration in New York’s North Country (UMass Press, 2020). [Read more…] about North Country Prisons Talk On ‘Empire State Engagements’