Although the decades following World War II stand out as an era of rapid growth and construction in the United States, those years were equally significant for large-scale destruction. In order to clear space for new suburban tract housing, an ambitious system of interstate highways, and extensive urban renewal development, wrecking companies demolished buildings while earthmoving contractors leveled land at an unprecedented pace and scale. In this pioneering history, Francesca Russello Ammon explores how postwar America came to equate this destruction with progress. The bulldozer functioned as both the means and the metaphor for this work. As the machine transformed from a wartime weapon into an instrument of postwar planning, it helped realize a landscape-altering “culture of clearance.” In the hands of the military, planners, politicians, engineers, construction workers, and even children’s book authors, the bulldozer became an American icon. Yet social and environmental injustices emerged as clearance projects continued unabated. This awareness spurred environmental, preservationist, and citizen participation efforts that have helped to slow, though not entirely stop, the momentum of the postwar bulldozer.

A very little bulldozer learns that taking care of kittens is a very big job in this darling follow-up to Bulldozer’s Big Day from award-winning author Candace Fleming and Caldecott Medalist Eric Rohmann. The construction site bustled. Cement Truck was stirring…stirring…stirring. Digger Truck was scooping…scooping…scooping. Crane Truck was lifting…lifting…lifting. And Bulldozer was—watching…watching…watching. Little Bulldozer wants to help, but all the bigger trucks say he is too small. So when Crane Truck says he can clear a bit of debris out of the way, Little Bulldozer is eager for the job. He can do it, yes he can. What he doesn’t expect is to find a family of newborn kittens living in the pile of debris! Can he take care of babies? Now that’s a tough job. A job that happens to be just the right size for Little Bulldozer.

Foreword / by James C. Giesen -- Introduction : a more rural metropolitan history -- Clearing the backwoods -- Cultivating the fringe -- Damming the hinterlands -- Settling the forest -- Enshrining the countryside -- Conclusion : a tale of two villages.

The first history of the bulldozer and its transformation from military weapon to essential tool for creating the post-World War II American landscape Although the decades following World War II stand out as an era of rapid growth and construction in the United States, those years were equally significant for large-scale destruction. In order to clear space for new suburban tract housing, an ambitious system of interstate highways, and extensive urban renewal development, wrecking companies demolished buildings while earthmoving contractors leveled land at an unprecedented pace and scale. In this pioneering history, Francesca Russello Ammon explores how postwar America came to equate this destruction with progress. The bulldozer functioned as both the means and the metaphor for this work. As the machine transformed from a wartime weapon into an instrument of postwar planning, it helped realize a landscape-altering "culture of clearance." In the hands of the military, planners, politicians, engineers, construction workers, and even children's book authors, the bulldozer became an American icon. Yet social and environmental injustices emerged as clearance projects continued unabated. This awareness spurred environmental, preservationist, and citizen participation efforts that have helped to slow, though not entirely stop, the momentum of the postwar bulldozer.

In this superb memoir, the bestselling author of In Country and other award-winning books tells her own story, and the story of a Kentucky farm family, the Masons of Clear Springs. Like Russell Baker's Growing Up, Jill Ker Conway's The Road from Coorain, and other classic literary memoirs, Clear Springs takes us back in time to recapture a way of life that has all but disappeared, a country culture deeply rooted in work and food and family, in common sense and music and the land. Clear Springs is also an American woman's odyssey, exploring how a misfit girl who dreamed of distant places grew up in the forties, fifties, and sixties, and fulfilled her ambition to be a writer. A multilayered narrative of three generations--Bobbie Ann Mason, her parents and grandparents--Clear Springs gracefully interlaces several different lives, decades, and locales, moving from the industrious life on a Kentucky farm to travels around the South with Mason as president of the Hilltoppers Fan Club; from the hippie lifestyle of the 1960s New York counterculture to the shock-therapy ward of a mental institution; from a farmhouse to the set of a Hollywood movie; from pop music concerts to a small rustic schoolhouse. Clear Springs depicts the changes that have come to family, to women, and to heartland America in the twentieth century, as well as to Bobbie Ann Mason herself. When the movie of Mason's bestselling novel In Country is filmed near Clear Springs, it brings the first limousines to town, even as it brings out once again the wisdom and values of Mason's remarkable parents. Her mother, especially, stands at the center of this book. Mason's journey leads her to a recognition of the drama and significance of her mother's life and to a new understanding of heritage, place, and family roots. Brilliant and evocative, Clear Springs is a stunning achievement.

When life offers you a chance to get on an adventure, just grab it with both hands. That’s what Sumathy and Vasanth, a run-of-the-mill Delhi couple did, when they bumped into an opportunity to visit Ladakh during winter. Ladakh is a different place during winters. This is the story of the eight beautiful days that they spent in Leh. Follow this metropolitan couple, who rough it out as they travel in extreme sub-zero conditions of Ladakh and witness the local life and its idiosyncrasies. The Eureka moments happen almost at the drop of a hat. Be it waiting for the TV to warm up before the audio is on, heating up a frozen fuel pipe using kerosene stove or pouring hot tea inside the radiator to melt the frozen diesel. But there is more to it than this quirky side, as they also experience life over the edge…