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Long characterized as an exceptional country within Latin America, Costa Rica has been hailed as a democratic oasis in a continent scorched by dictatorship and revolution; the ecological mecca of a biosphere laid waste by deforestation and urban blight; and an egalitarian, middle-class society blissfully immune to the violent class and racial conflicts that have haunted the region. Arguing that conceptions of Costa Rica as a happy anomaly downplay its rich heritage and diverse population, The Costa Rica Reader brings together texts and artwork that reveal the complexity of the country’s past and present. It characterizes Costa Rica as a site of alternatives and possibilities that undermine stereotypes about the region’s history and challenge the idea that current dilemmas facing Latin America are inevitable or insoluble.This essential introduction to Costa Rica includes more than fifty texts related to the country’s history, culture, politics, and natural environment. Most of these newspaper accounts, histories, petitions, memoirs, poems, and essays are written by Costa Ricans. Many appear here in English for the first time. The authors are men and women, young and old, scholars, farmers, workers, and activists. The Costa Rica Reader presents a panoply of voices: eloquent working-class raconteurs from San Jos ’s poorest barrios, English-speaking Afro-Antilleans of the Lim n province, Nicaraguan immigrants, factory workers, dissident members of the intelligentsia, and indigenous people struggling to preserve their culture. With more than forty images, the collection showcases sculptures, photographs, maps, cartoons, and fliers. From the time before the arrival of the Spanish, through the rise of the coffee plantations and the Civil War of 1948, up to participation in today’s globalized world, Costa Rica’s remarkable history comes alive. The Costa Rica Reader is a necessary resource for schola

Introduces the history, languages, geography, education, and culture of Costa Rica.

Offers comprehensive information about Costa Rica, with an emphasis on its geography, culture, history, economy, and government.

“The most prolific and successful historical novelist in the world today.” —Wall Street Journal“Readers who haven’t discovered Bernard Cornwell don’t know what they are missing.” —New York Times bestselling author Vince FlynnFrom the New York Times bestselling author of Agincourt, the Saxon Tales, and the beloved Richard Sharpe series, Bernard Cornwell’s The Fort plunges prow-first into the largest naval clash of the Revolutionary War. Fans of the Nathaniel Starbuck Chronicles and The Burning Land will thrill to Cornwell’s triumphant return to American historical fiction in this gripping story of courage, strength and patriotism.

This 1965 western from Lesley Selander (BORDER PATROL) follows an ex-cavalry sergeant who investigates a brutal massacre at Fort Courageous.

Fort Wayne is the hometown of Lt. Paul Baer, who flew with the French forces in World War I and was the first US pilot to achieve ace status. Fort Wayne is also the hometown of Arthur "Art" Roy Smith, who was one of the pioneer acrobatic fliers in the pre-World War I era. Smith made several trips to Japan and is credited with inspiring the Japanese to develop their own aircraft in the period between the two world wars. Prior to the onset of World War II, the US Army Air Corps purchased over 600 acres southwest of Fort Wayne and built Paul Baer Army Air Field. Today, Fort Wayne International Airport covers about 3,500 acres and has the second-longest runway in Indiana, almost 12,000 feet in length.