The generation that toiled through the Great Depression and won the Second World War has become known as -the greatest generation.- But not all of them qualified for that exaggerated epithet in the eyes of their own children. In this tender but unsparing memoir, Mary Cimarolli remembers a world in which the family home was lost to foreclosure, her father made his way by bootlegging, and school was a haven to hide from her brother's teasing. Her stories are about struggle and survival, making do and overcoming, and, ultimately, reconciliation. From her perspective as a child, she describes the cotton stamps and other programs of the New Deal, the yellow-dog Democrat politics and racism of East Texas, and the religious revivals and Old Settlers reunions that gave a break from working in the cotton patch. The colorful colloquialisms of rural East Texas that dot the manuscript help express both the traditionalism of the region and its changes under the impact of modernization, electrification, and the coming of war. Along with these regional and national trends, Cimarolli skillfully interweaves the personal: conflict between her parents, the death of her brother a few days before his sixteenth birthday, and her own inner tensions.

The generation that toiled through the Great Depression and won the Second World War has become known as “the greatest generation.” But not all of them qualified for that exaggerated epithet in the eyes of their own children. In this tender but unsparing memoir, Mary Cimarolli remembers a world in which the family home was lost to foreclosure, her father made his way by bootlegging, and school was a haven to hide from her brother’s teasing. Her stories are about struggle and survival, making do and overcoming, and, ultimately, reconciliation. From her perspective as a child, she describes the cotton stamps and other programs of the New Deal, the yellow-dog Democrat politics and racism of East Texas, and the religious revivals and Old Settlers reunions that gave a break from working in the cotton patch. The colorful colloquialisms of rural East Texas that dot the manuscript help express both the traditionalism of the region and its changes under the impact of modernization, electrification, and the coming of war. Along with these regional and national trends, Cimarolli skillfully interweaves the personal: conflict between her parents, the death of her brother a few days before his sixteenth birthday, and her own inner tensions.

Of all the speakeasies, in all the world… Mysterious city slicker Ty Bradshaw might have won her father's trust, but everyone knows Norma Rose is the true boss of Nightingale's resort. And it'll take more than that charming smile to shake the feeling that Ty is not all he seems… He walks into hers Ty is a federal agent on a personal mission of revenge. But he hasn't figured on falling for a bootlegger's daughter. Suddenly, flirting with headstrong Norma Rose seems far more exhilarating than chasing gangsters!

This work is an accurate, wide-ranging, and entertaining account of the illegal liquor traffic during the Prohibition Era (1920 to 1933). Based on FBI files, legal documents, old newspapers and other sources, it offers a coast-to-coast survey of Volstead crime--outrageous stories of America's most notorious liquor lords, including Al Capone and Dutch Schultz. Readers will find the lesser known Volstead outlaws to be as fascinating as their more famous counterparts. The riveting tales of Max Hassel, Waxy Gordon, Roy Olmstead, the Purple Gang, the Havre Bunch, and the Capitol Hill Bootlegger will be new to most readers. Likewise, the exploits of women bootleggers and flying bootleggers are unknown to most Americans. Books about Prohibition usually note that Canadian liquor exporters abetted the U.S. bootleggers, but they fail to go into detail. Bootleggers and Beer Barons examines the major cross-border routes for smuggling liquor from Canada into the U.S.: Quebec to Vermont and New York, Ontario to Michigan, Saskatchewan to Montana, and British Columbia to Washington.

I was raised in a café my first years of living. My father’s brother and his wife raised me on their own. There was bootlegging, gambling, police raids, and people put in jail. I didn’t get to church very much, but there were older women around who looked out for me the best they could. I was molested, burned with a cig, and drunk by the time I was eight. I picked a little cotton as time went on. I became a businesswoman, and an addict of crack cocaine and drank heavily. I had a child at fourteen, she had one at thirteen, and so I was a grandmother at twenty-eight. But I loved learning. God and books turned my life around. To me, no matter what you go through, you can overcome it. Don’t let your pride hold you back. There is a power greater than all of us, who is willing and will to help you. Keep the faith; if I did it, so can you. In reading this book, it will show you that we all go through something. Most importantly, love yourself. My title is a very true story. I hope that by reading this book, it will help you. Now we have drug dealers, then, in my day, we had booze.

From a true-life “Survivor Island” tale to the women who flew fighters and bombers for the Allies in World War II, Ed Butts invites you to meet twelve women who dared to live their lives on a tightrope. She Dared takes the reader to the Far North, where a single Native woman put an end to a ruinous war. There’s Molly Brant, who stepped out of the shadow of her famous brother Joseph to make her own mark, and Dr. “James Barry,” a prominent army physician whose true identity remained a secret until the day “he” died. These are the stories of women who took up challenges that society felt could be met only by men: Mina Hubbard’s incredible journey across Labrador; Martha Black’s adventures in the Yukon; Sara Emma Edmonds’s perilous missions as a Yankee spy in the Civil War. While some of these women achieved legitimate fame, others gained notoriety. Pearl Hart became a Wild West desperado. Cassie Chadwick fleeced bankers for a fortune in one of the most brazen con games ever played. Famous or infamous, the women in Ed Butt’s fascinating book are sure to intrigue readers.