Maurice Duke and Daniel P. Jordan vividly describe the colorful life and times of one of the South's—and America's—most important businesses and provide insight into how luck, management practices, and personalities helped the company rise to international prominence. Universal Leaf Tobacco Company, the world's largest independent leaf tobacco dealer, is one of the major buying arms for tobacco manufacturers worldwide, selecting, purchasing, processing, and storing leaf tobacco. The story opens during the aftermath of the Civil War when Southerners realized once again the worldwide potential of their native crop. The authors follow the company from its incorporation 1918 through one of the first hostile takeover attempts in American business, to its evolution in 1993 into Universal Corporation, a worldwide conglomerate with a number of products including tobacco. Based on scholarly research and over two hundred interviews with past and present Universal employees, this objective saga reveals much about American business and economic history.

The chapters in this book were originally published weekly, as individual columns in Clay Today, a local, county-wide newspaper in northeast Florida. In the writing of these columns, Reverend Bill Register has drawn on his extensive experience as a pastor, family man and successful businessman, to offer the reader an eclectic variety of thought-provoking, inspirational, and challenging messages.

Whether switching on the TV, picking up a newspaper or simply logging on to the internet, one is constantly faced with images of natural disasters, conflict and human suffering. Humanity has experienced these problems throughout time and we have evolved methods and mechanisms for alleviating suffering, from trauma care following a traffic accident to international pacts and the Millennium Development Goals. In exploring such diverse cases of aid intervention, Disaster Medicine: A Case Based Approach provides interesting, easily accessible content and context for understanding disaster medicine and global health. In each case the reader will be put in the position of the decision maker and as in real life some of the cases will portray success and some will show failure. It is hoped the reader will consider the issues and problems for themselves and perhaps consider things they would choose to do differently. Written by a team of experts with extensive experience in the field and a progressive perspective Disaster Medicine: A Case Based Approach is a valuable text for students and professionals of disaster medicine.