Books

Reveals the history and death of the Soviet Union’s peaceful use of nuclear power through exploration of both the projects and the technocratic and political elite who were dedicated to increasing state power through technology. Paul Josephson illuminates the problems that can befall any society heavily invested in large-scale technology.

A study of twenty wealthy upper-class families during Pittsburgh’s growth into an important commerical and industrial center. It shows how they succeeded in creating the institutions needed to sustain a local aristocracy and possessed the ability to adapt its accumulated advantages to social and economic changes.

A special reissue commemorating the 250th anniversary of the French and Indian War, Guns at the Forks tells about the dramatic parts five successive forts, particularly Fort Duquesne and Fort Pitt, play in the war between 1750 and 1760. O’Meara’s narrative also relates the larger story of the French and Indian War and its role in the global conflict that altered the course of world events.

Joel Tarr presents a collection of essays examining the tortured environmental history of Pittsburgh, a region blessed with an abundance of natural resources as well as a history of intensive industrial development.

Awarded the 2005 Certificate of Commendation by Choice Magazine

This text examines the history of the Great Lakes Basin in relation to its importance as a place of social, economic, and political interaction between the United States and Canada.

Winner of the 2006 Albert B. Corey Prize from the American Historical Association.

Available in Canada through University of Calgary Press

An examination of the relationship between African Americans and the environment in U.S. history, “To Love the Wind and the Rain” contains essays covering topics such as slavery, religion, the turpentine industry, gardening, outdoor recreation, women and politics.

Examines debates over women’s rights in the first half of the twentieth century, to show how Czechs gradually turned away from democracy and established the separation of state and domestic issues, at the expense of personal freedoms.

The book assesses how Pittsburgh deindustrialization over the past decades has posed both opportunities and challenges for the city and surrounding tri-state area.

Mayan rebels killed an American plantation manager in 1875, but no one has ever unravelled why this murder took place. Paul Sullivan’s fascinating and skillful telling of this story reads like a mystery novel.

Examines a half-century epoch when planners, public officials, and civic leaders engaged in a dialogue about the meaning of planning and its application for improving life in Pittsburgh. Defines Pittsburgh’s key role in the national urban planning movement.

Examines the natural and economic resource competition between Phoenix and Tucson and the other factors contributing to the divergent growth of the two cities.

Centered around mostly ordinary people, Harry, Tom, and Father Rice relates the story of the author’s uncle Harry Davenport, union leader Tom Quinn, and Father Charles Owen Rice to the great conflict between anti-Communist and Communist forces in the American labor movement.

Intimate Enemies examines the transformation of Bolshevik Party ideology, language, and power relations during the crucial period leading up to Stalin’s seizure of power. Igal Halfin uncovers this evolution in the language of Bolshevism. This language defined the methods for judging true party loyalty-in what Halfin describes as an examination of the ‘hermeneutics of the soul,’ and became the basis for prosecuting the Party’s enemies, particularly the “intimate enemies” within the Party itself.

A comprehensive history of the development of Houston, examining the factors that have facilitated unprecedented growth—and the environmental cost of that development. Examines the steps Houston has taken to overcome laissez-faire politics, indiscriminate expansion, and infrastructural overload. An analysis of the environmental consequences of large-scale energy production and unchecked growth.

Myths of Harmony examines a foundational moment for Latin American racial constructs. While most contemporary scholarship has focused the explanation for racial tolerance in the colonial period, Marixa Lasso argues that the origins of modern race relations are to be found later, in the Age of Revolution. Lasso’s work brings much-needed attention to the important role of the anticolonial struggles in shaping the nature of contemporary race relations and racial identities in Latin America.