Provides a maritime history of the United States, from Viking and Native American activities to today's enterprises Compiled by six eminent marine historians in conjunction with Mystic Seaport (CT), this unique history of the United States from the waterfront aims to enhance understanding of the sea's influence on American life. Most historians ignore or are ignorant of the influence of the sea. These experts masterfully cover the complex subject of how the sea, lakes, and canals have been intimately involved in all of U.S. history. They tell a complex tale of early explorers, fishermen, merchant sailors, the navy, coastal trade, the steamboats, canals, industry, and commerce allied to the sea. This very detailed and beautifully written book can be understood by any adult with an interest in American history. Abundantly illustrated with photos, graphs, and full-color maps, this is essential for all libraries.?Stanley Itkin, Hillside P.L., New Hyde Park, NY Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. This hefty work, the collaborative effort of six leading maritime historians, covers seafaring Americans from colonial times to the late 1990s in a combination of narrative text, vignettes, quotations from primary sources, and extensive and well-chosen illustrations. Historiographically up to date, it notes the roles of women and minorities, the role of American maritime activity in developing American industry and vice versa, and much more, including the traditional repertoire of the romantic teller of sea stories. The authors' grasp of their subject and the book's relative paucity of academic jargon help convey the excitement of seafaring and its history, if not always its romance. Whether intended as such, the book amounts to the best textbook on American maritime history within memory. It has something of value for every kind of reader, from those who own half the books in its excellent bibliography to those whose interest in ships and the sea dates from their first viewing of a certain recent motion-picture maritime disaster. Roland Green A collaborative history of the profound influence of the sea on America's identity and its national imagination. The six authors (including William Fowler Jr., Andrew German, John Hattendorf, Jefrey Safford, and Edward Sloan, in addition to Labaree), all historians associated with the Munson Institute at Mystic Seaport, trace both the development of distinctive American industries dependent on the seafisheries, boat building, merchant serviceas well as the emergence, over the course of two centuries, of the US Navy, culminating with WWII, when the country fielded both the largest navy and the largest merchant marine service the world had ever witnessed. A considerable amount of material on the impact of a sea-based economy on the rise of eastern and western cities, and on the influence of the sea on American society, carries the narrative far beyond the precincts of economic history. There's also an astute summary of three centuries of marine art in America, and a survey of the presence of the sea in American literature and folklore. Some 300 illustrations further enliven the text. A model of popular scholarship, and clearly the definitive work on the subject. (71 color 287 b&w illustrations, 10 maps)(History Book Club selection) -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. A model of popular scholarship, and clearly the definitive work on the subject. -- Kirkus Reviews Written by six prominent maritime-history scholars whose individual areas of research and teaching range from labor to technology, from the fisheries to the U.S. Navy. Used Book in Good Condition