For the past three decades, many history professors have allowed their biases to distort the way America’s past is taught. These intellectuals have searched for instances of racism, sexism, and bigotry in our history while downplaying the greatness of America’s patriots and the achievements of “dead white men.” As a result, more emphasis is placed on Harriet Tubman than on George Washington; more about the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II than about D-Day or Iwo Jima; more on the dangers we faced from Joseph McCarthy than those we faced from Josef Stalin. A Patriot’s History of the United States corrects those doctrinaire biases. In this groundbreaking book, America’s discovery, founding, and development are reexamined with an appreciation for the elements of public virtue, personal liberty, and private property that make this nation uniquely successful. This book offers a long-overdue acknowledgment of America’s true and proud history.

Perched on the shores of the Tacoma Narrows, the community of Salmon Beach overlooks the spectacular Tacoma Narrows Bridge. Built as a series of fishing shacks on the beach, Salmon Beach took on a more permanent flavor after Henry O. Foss towed his two-story boathouse from the city to the tidelands south of Point Defiance. After electricity was introduced in 1934, more comfortable cottages were built in this fishing community. From summer beach camping to an isolated refuge in the middle of a city, a haven for rumrunners during Prohibition to the counterculture enclave of the 1960s, the community of Salmon Beach has weathered fires, evictions, landslides, and government caprice to become the unique neighborhood of Tacoma it is today.

With the same ability to make personalities and events come alive that characterizes his classic Skid Road, Murray Morgan here tells the colorful story of Tacoma, “the City of Destiny,” and southern Puget Sound, where many major events of Washington’s history took place. Drawing upon original journals and reports, Morgan builds Puget’s Sound around individuals, interweaving portraits of well-known historical figures with a raucous parade of saloonkeepers, politicians, union organizers, schemers, and swindlers. His account begins with the landing of Captain Vancouver in Puget Sound in 1792 and ends with the founding of Fort Lewis in 1916. Between are the arrival of the transcontinental railroad, the boom-and-bust of lumber mills, the anti-Chinese riots of 1885, and more distinctive Northwest history that will intrigue both new arrivals and longtime residents. With a new introduction by historian and historic preservationist Michael Sean Sullivan, this redesigned edition of Puget’s Sound brings new life to Morgan’s landmark history.