Omaha Books

Just want to say that this is really a fantastic book.
Carl Jennings did a really great job. I have gave several
copys to friends for Christmas. I new Carl at the old Peony Park
and I wish him all the best at his new Peony Park in Wahoo Nebraska. The many pictures cover Peony Parks history in 1919
to the present. Just learned the book is now in it's second
addition, and a movie is being made,"Peony Park an American Legend" this year. Great!

Love ya,

Barb

This is a fantastic book on Peony Park!
I had no idea how famous it was. The author did
such a nice job with all the pictures.
So happy to see there will be a new Peony Park soon.

Sincerely,

Barb Berg

The book is so cool, really neat story.
Peony Park has such a neat place in history!
I look forward to going to the new Peony Park
this summer.

This is an excellent book for steak lover's. I had been looking for a book with different and exciting steak recipes. This was definitely it.

I have been on the protein diet for nearly 4 years now and have been successful, however you do get so sick of plain old steaks. This book is a godsend. The first recipe in the book is from Emeril Lagasse and looks wonderful. That's the next one I am going to make.

I made the Strip steaks stuffed with Garlic and Creamy Chard. This recipe is phenomenal. This book is definitely worth every penny.

This must be one of the most detailed historys ever written of a city streetcar system. Richard makes it very readable.

Valuable also to historians of the labor problems of the streetcar systems, which were dramatic and violent.

'O&CB: Streetcars of Omaha and Council Bluffs' is a complete history of streetcar operations in Omaha, Nebraska and Council Bluffs, Iowa. Author Richard Orr takes great care in making the book detailed and interesting, with lots of anecdotes, photographs and maps adding to the experience. A must have for all fans of streetcars anywhere.

In this digital age there are occasions when nothing can replace holding a physical book in your hand. This is one of them.The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records. Stamford (1641-1852)contains an amazing amount of information. When you consider the immense amount of effort required to translate (from old handwriting) and organize it,the book becomes awe inspiring.

The Battle of Gettysburg and the landings on Omaha Beach are two of the most covered subjects in American military history, and readers should approach any new books on these subjects with a great deal of caution. ... As usual, Zaloga does not disappoint and he is able to present a few facets of a well-known operation that are ignored in other accounts. In fact, Zaloga did considerable research at the National Archives and the Army War College library, which enabled him to do far more than merely summarize secondary sources.

Omaha Beach starts with a well-written introduction and chronology, followed by sections on opposing commanders (much better than in previous Zaloga volumes), and a 16-page section on opposing plans that is very interesting. The 6-page section on opposing armies is decent, although perhaps not as in-depth as some readers would like. The 45-page campaign narrative is well written and focuses primarily on the events on D-Day itself, devoting only a few pages to the expansion of the beachhead in the week after the invasion. Zaloga also includes a section on the battlefield today and an annotated bibliography. The maps are quite good in this volume and include four 2-D maps (German forces around Omaha, the assault landing plan, V Corps D-Day objectives, and V Corps D-Day operations) and three 3-D Bird's Eye View maps (the 16th RCT sector, the 116th RCT sector and Point du Hoc). The three color battle scenes by Howard Gerrard are: landings on Easy Red Beach, Dog Red Beach and Rangers at Point du Hoc. In addition, Zaloga has combed the NARA archives for some photographs that go beyond the standard D-Day images. Indeed, Zaloga consistently demonstrates that a good author can make even a well-worn topic seem fresh.

Zaloga clarifies a number of interesting but obscure points about D-Day. While several sources note Major General Corlett's suggestion to use amtracs as in the Pacific invasions, few follow this tantalizing lead. Zaloga notes that, "in fact, the US Army had shipped over 300 amtracs to Europe in 1944, but the lack of demand for their use in the Overlord plan meant that they were reserved for Operation Swordhilt, a contingency operation in which Patton's uncommitted Third Army was intended to reinforce Overlord in the event of failure at one of the beaches." Zaloga, the armor expert, also adds a great deal of clarity to the role of US tanks on Omaha Beach. Most sources tend to suggest that the majority of the armor foundered in the English Channel and thus the role of tanks was negligible. Zaloga points out that both DD and tanks with wading trunks were used, as well as Sherman dozer tanks. Although many of the DD tanks sank, enough of the tanks with wading trunks made it ashore to play a decisive role in silencing the German resistance nests. Furthermore, the popular idea that arrogant American commanders spurned the use of Britain's specialized armored engineer tanks is disputed by Zaloga; the V Corps did in fact request over 100 British "funnies," but British industry could not meet the demand in time for D-Day. Zaloga also does a fine job pointing out just how crucial naval support was in suppressing enemy defenses and making up for the lack of heavy weapons ashore. On the other hand, Zaloga notes that the Americans had not trained to employ close air support and had included no air liaison teams in the invasion force.

For the Germans, Zaloga notes that the shortage of artillery ammunition was a critical deficiency - by the evening of D-Day most of the nearby guns had exhausted their basic loads. Zaloga also does a great job detailing just how thick the fog of war was on Omaha on June 6, 1944 and how this greatly affected the command of control of both sides. One of the most interesting tidbits that Zaloga presents is a post-invasion study by the British that notes that the Germans had four times as many machineguns and three times as many anti-tank guns covering the Omaha Beach area compared to the defenses on the other beaches. The tidal conditions were also worse and the prepatory bombardment was much shorter than the British beaches. Finally, Zaloga notes that there has been a recent tendency to exaggerate the casualties on Omaha Beach - about 2,000 - and he places it in perspective by noting that the US Army suffered about 1,200 casualties every day in the weeks of hedgerow fighting that followed D-Day.

This (1890)is one of two large collections of Omaha and Ponca texts prepared by the Rev. James O. Dorsey for the Bureau of American Ethnology (now incorporated in the Smithsonian Institution). The other is Omaha and Ponka Letters (1891), which is a supplement to this. Two or three texts remain in the National Anthropological Archives unpublished. One referred to a Congressman of the time in disparaging terms, and the others were obscene.

This material was part of a slated series, to include also a grammar and a lexicon. These were never published, due to Dorsey's untimely death. The manuscript(s) for the grammar, based loosely on the Riggs Dakota (Santee) grammar can be consulted at the NAA, which also holds the estimated 20,000 slips of Dorsey's Omaha-Ponca lexical files, and numerous other documents accumulated by him in the course of his Siouan work.

The Cegiha language consists of two volumes bound together with a common introduction. The volumes are indexed. Each volume consists of a series of texts in Dorsey's Government Printing Office version of his orthigraphy for Omaha-Ponca. Traditional literary texts come first, then more recent stories shading into historical texts and culminating in letters. Dorsey apparently kept copies of letters of the Omaha-Ponca text of letters that he wrote for members of the two tribes.

The details of the arrangements he made in connection with the letters are unknown, but as Dorsey seems to have been scrupulous in his dealings with the Omaha and Ponca and neither his colleague Francis LaFlesche (an Omaha) or any others at the time or soon after ever made any complaints on this score, I assume this keeping and publication was done with the knowledge of the authors and did not concern them. The letters are especially valuable as historical records, besides presenting contexts for linguistic constructions that might not otherwise be as well exemplified.

Apart from the numerous individual letter dictators (and in one case, writer) with whom Dorsey worked, he worked with a series of Ponca and Omaha individuals, mainly members of or associates of the LaFlesche families. Several Omaha individuals also assisted him in editing the material, and their useful comments, sometimes attributed, are listed in the notes.

Each text is presented in interlinear literal word (or phrase) by word translation, followed by a free translation. Each text has individual end notes and there are also end note series for the two volumes.

The texts have various faults that are due to the technology for recording them (rapid ink pencil handwriting on wrapping paper) or the early state of investigation of Omaha-Ponca and other Siouan languages, and they are not without some printing errors or mistranslations, but they are a priceless linguistic, literary, and historical testament to the Omaha and Ponca people of the 1880s and their neighbors.

In addition, even without Dorsey's numerous other publications, and the large body of fieldnotes, notes, and manuscripts in progress that Dorsey left behind at his death, this volume and its companion would establish Dorsey as scholar of stature, and through Franz Boas, who used this material in seminars with his students, as a seminal influence on American anthropology and linguistics. Student after student of Boas compiled grammars and collected texts in the original on Dorsey's model as a preface to their anthropological investigations, not always willingly, but to the continuing benefit of both the Native American groups involved and subsequent generations of anthropologists and linguists.

Collected and organized into a book, these photos give an overall impression of the big engines of railroad history. I wanted to get a feel for the work my grandfather did as brakeman in Minneapolis. This book includes two spectacular wrecks and some precious human group photos, so it fulfills my purpose very well.

This is one of the most comprehensive collections of postcards depicting architecture, scenes, and events in Omaha from the 1890s through the 1980s. I even got to see the hospital I was born in for the first time. Many of the buildings and areas shown in the postcards have been torn down or have been eliminated forever. I believe that this may be the only source for some historical items. It was published by the Omaha World Herald. A must for the history buff!

Excellent book with top notch photos and location of photos listed. Highly recommend this book to any current or past resident of Omaha or person intestested in Omaha history.

The author succeeded in using a narrow topic to teach a broader lesson on the plight of thousands of Native Americans during the last century. Every American should understand our government's policies toward Native Americans and its effect both pro and con. Mr. Scherer succeeded by telling the story of the Omahas without prejudice and by allowing the facts to paint the picture. Imperfect Victories is a brilliant introduction to these issues and the resultant human consequences. Mr. Scherer does not portend to give policy insight, but he gives the reader the facts necessary to understand the decisions made by elected officials and bureaucrats that have lasting and real effects on living human beings long after these policymakers have faded from the public scene. I'm looking forward to more books in this series on Law in the American West. I hope other authors take Mr. Scherer's lead and tackle vital policy and judicial issues with clarity and his concise writing style. Though an avid history reader I gained more insight in the 200 pages of Imperfect Victories than from much larger and better-known volumes.