Housewives hung wet sheets and blankets over windows, struggling to seal every crack with gummed paper strips. A man avoided shaking hands, lest the static electricity gathered from a dust storm knock his greeter flat. Children's tears turned to mud. Horses chewed feed filled with dust particles that sandpapered their gums raw. Dead cattle, when pried open, were filled with pounds of gut-clogging dirt. The simplest thing in life, taking a breath, became life-threatening. The Dust Bowl conditions during the 'Dirty Thirties' were no blind stroke of nature, but had their origins in human error and in the misuse of the land. "The Dust Bowl" recounts the factors that led to the Dust Bowl conditions, how those affected coped, and what can be learned from the tragedy, considered by many to be America's worst prolonged environmental disaster....

Based in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Trade Organization is the successor to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which was founded following the Second World War. Established in January 1995, the WTO aims to improve the welfare of the people of its member states by lowering trade barriers and providing a platform for negotiation of trade. Specifically, it sets rules for trade on a global level to ensure that trade flows as smoothly, predictably, and freely as possible. With 151 member nations and 32 observers, the WTO serves as a multilateral negotiating forum to set trade rules and settle disputes among nations. "The World Trade Organization" details the history and mission of this international body....

Growing up in small-town, Depression-era Oklahoma, Mickey Mantle heard the same plea day in and day out from his parents: "Get out of the house and play some baseball!" Sooner than anyone expected, Mantle was a New York Yankee in 1951. Five years later, the switch-hitting phenomenon was on his way to stardom, completing the season with a Triple Crown for the highest batting average and most home runs and RBIs. Hailed as the successor to the great Joe DiMaggio, Mantle felt the pressure of success, and faced difficulties stemming from physical infirmity and, later, alcohol abuse. In "Mickey Mantle", discover how this baseball great came to grips with his addiction, becoming a role model for the clean and sober life, and is now remembered as an American baseball hero....

This title presents the life and times of Lou Gehrig - a true baseball great. Like a powerful locomotive, Lou Gehrig slugged his way through 14 years as the pride of the Yankees. Never missing a game, the six-time All-Star set the American League record with 184 RBI in 1931, hit a record 23 grand slams, earned two Most Valuable Player awards, and won the 1934 Triple Crown. Refusing to see himself as a natural, Gehrig achieved greatness through an unwavering dedication to practice. Then, suddenly, the Iron Man began to rust. The home runs ceased. The hits became misses. Gehrig had contracted amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS. Yet harnessing the strength he had displayed on the baseball diamond, Lou Gehrig struggled onward with dignity and purpose. Though the disease that now bears his name ultimately took Lou Gehrig's life, it did not extinguish his spirit or his legacy."Lou Gehrig" is an engrossing new biography that celebrates a man who was not only a baseball great, but also a true American hero....

As a 19-year-old heading east to play for the Boston Red Sox, Ted Williams could be heard muttering over and over again, "All I want out of life is when I walk down the street, folks will say, 'There goes the greatest hitter who ever lived.'" Through a tumultuous, boisterous career that touched four decades, Williams worked tirelessly to perfect the science of hitting and accomplish his goal. Two-time winner of the Triple Crown, Williams hit an astonishing.406 in his 1941 season, a record that stands to this day. During his last ballpark appearance at the 1999 All-Star game, 80-year-old "Teddy Ballgame" achieved his childhood dream. In "Ted Williams", discover how this Red Sox slugger was not only a superb ballplayer, but also a world-class fisherman and a fighter pilot in World War II and the Korean War....

It was to be a structure like no other - the largest and tallest skyscraper in the world. Initial plans for the Empire State Building called for an Art Deco masterwork to rise 1,000 feet, with 80 stories of rental space. The high-rise was to completely fill the 84,000-square-foot site of the former Waldorf-Astoria, then New York's most opulent hotel. The Empire State Building would, hopefully, accelerate Midtown's stride toward commercial prominence, pulling more business uptown. Built in the early years of the Great Depression, during which one out of four New Yorkers was out of work, the Empire State Building's construction was thought by many to be a foolish undertaking. Yet, it was completed under budget and ahead of schedule, and the new commercial colossus would stand to see a new day dawning - for New York, for America, and for the world....

Teeming with a population of 3.5 million at the end of the 19th century, the island of Manhattan couldn't meet the city's demand for rapid transit with its horse-drawn trolleys and elevated train lines. New York City needed a subway system. After four years of digging and diverting miles of utilities and tunneling under the Harlem River, the city's residents celebrated a new era in mass transit on October 27, 1904, with the opening of a nine-mile subway route. In the century to come, the New York subway would grow and expand to a system that runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with 6,400 cars, 468 stations, a daily ridership of 4.5 million, and 842 miles of track - longer than the distance from New York to Chicago. Politics, graffiti, and unbelievable construction challenges combined to make the building and running of the New York subway system one of the America's greatest civic undertakings....