Potomac Books: 562 books

No person involved in so much history received so little attention as the late Robert C. Byrd, the longest-serving U.S. senator. In The Last Great Senator, David A. Corbin examines ByrdÆs complex and fascinating relationships with eleven presidents of the United States, from Eisenhower to Obama. Furthermore,...

The Greater Middle East poses major challenges for the United States. Yet despite decades of intense involvement in Middle Eastern affairs, most Americans still know little about the cultures of the region. Simple Gestures describes one American's efforts over forty years to better understand the society...

Few people have garnered so much enduring interest as Sir Richard Burton. A true polymath, Burton is best known today for his translations of the Kama Sutra and Arabian Nights. Yet, Africa stood at the center of his adult life. The Burton-Speke expedition (1856–59) that put Lake Tanganyika on the map...

Kristian GustafsonÆs Hostile Intent reexamines one of the most controversial chapters in U.S. intelligence history, the Central Intelligence Agency's covert operations in Chile from 1964 to 1974. At the request of successive U.S. presidents, the CIA in conjunction with the State Department and the Defense...

In 1924, the last caliphate—an Islamic state as envisioned by the Koran—was dismantled in Turkey. With no state in existence that matches the radical Islamic ideal since, al Qaeda, which sees itself as a government in exile, along with its hundreds of affiliate organizations, has failed to achieve...

On July 22, 2011, a bomb went off outside government buildings in Oslo, Norway, killing eight people and injuring more than two hundred. Less than two hours later, a gunman claimed sixty-nine lives in a shooting spree at a summer camp on the island of Ut?ya, while terrified and desperate youths tried...

Nineteen sixty-two—it's been called “the end of innocence,” as America witnessed the Cuban Missile Crisis and the following year saw the Kennedy assassination and the early stirrings of Vietnam.In baseball, 1962 was a thrilling season. Five years prior the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants had...

Dramatic changes have taken place in the last decade with respect to the views of the American Jewish community toward Israel and Zionism. Since the beginning of the Second Intifada in 2000, the involvement of the Israel lobby in precipitating the Iraq War and promoting war on Iran, and Israel's widely...

Revered as the most prestigious tournament in golf, the Masters commands international attention, even among nongolfers. The first edition of The Masters: A Hole-by-Hole History of America's Golf Classic took the unique approach of tackling Augusta National hole by hole. Each hole had its own chapter,...

The Ohio State Buckeyes have been a powerhouse in college football for decades, with numerous national championships and NFL draftees to their credit. With such a successful history, it's no wonder that the passion for Ohio State football has reached a level of devotion that has religious overtones....

The Deadball Era (1901û1920) is a baseball fanÆs dream. Hope and despair, innocence and cynicism, and levity and hostility blended then to create an air of excitement, anticipation, and concern for all who entered the confines of a major league ballpark. Cheating for the sake of victory earned respect,...

All over the world, soccer is known as “the Beautiful Game” and is the most popular sport. But in the United States, professional soccer still has a hard time catching on.It has had some successes here. The American Soccer League of the 1920s, Pélé and other international stars in the North American...

Olympic history is filled with the unusual, the bizarre, and the unbelievable. The Olympic's Most Wanted™ chronicles 700 of the most outlandish competitors in the history of the winter and summer Olympics. Its seventy lists describe in humorous detail the Olympics’ most inept athletes, strangest...

A century before Lance Armstrong captured headlines around the world by winning a record seventh consecutive Tour de France, another American dominated the world of competitive cycling. His name was Bobby Walthour, and in the early 1900s he was one of the world's most famous and highly paid athletes.Life...