In this newsletter:

• Our Alaska Adventure
• Mark Twain
• FREE eBook Giveaway - Alaska-themed!

Hello! We are just a couple of days into our second 10-day cruise of Alaska. We've generally had very nice weather and are so excited to today return to Glacier Bay. It's one of our favorites!

Glacier Bay was popularized by the travels and writings of naturalist John Muir. He wrote:

We'll be sharing more photos and highlights of our Alaska adventures on our Patreon Member Supporter website, but will unlock several free samples for you to enjoy... or, join to support our work and access all our curated history exploration! CLICK HERE.​

MARK TWAIN AND THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER

For the past couple of weeks we have explored how the Mississippi River system provided the transportation network to expand the nation westward. No one captured that era better than a former Mississippi riverboat pilot named Samuel Clemens. Long before the world knew him as Mark Twain, Clemens trained as a steamboat pilot, learning to recognize every bend, crossing, sandbar, snag, and subtle change in the current. Piloting was a demanding and respected profession, and those years gave him an intimate knowledge of the Mississippi that would remain with him for the rest of his life.

The river also gave Mark Twain something even more valuable: stories. He encountered pilots, passengers, gamblers, laborers, enslaved people, merchants, adventurers, and an endless assortment of characters moving through the Mississippi Valley. Years later, those experiences helped shape Life on the Mississippi, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Through humor, exaggeration, observation, and an extraordinary ear for the way people actually spoke, Twain turned the Mississippi into more than a setting. He made it one of the defining landscapes of American literature.

That’s the world I explore in Mark Twain and the Mississippi River. The book follows Samuel Clemens from his boyhood beside the river in Hannibal, Missouri, through his years in the pilothouse and his eventual emergence as Mark Twain, while exploring how the Mississippi continued to flow through his life and writing. If Steamboats Changed America tells how the steamboat transformed the nation, this book introduces one remarkable man who experienced that world firsthand—and then helped turn it into legend. My Mark Twain book is available in eBook, paperback, and audiobook editions. To learn more or order your copy, CLICK HERE.​

Next week, we'll shift to a new but related region's stories. As New Orleans grew as the ocean port connecting to the vast Mississippi River system, the United States grew more concerned about protecting that trade and the region's shipping. But, Spain still claimed and controlled the lands stretching from the Mississippi River across the Gulf coast to Florida. The U.S. acquisition of that region is fascinating. More next week!

FREE eBook GIVEAWAY

This weekend's free eBook giveaway continues our celebration of our time in Alaska with Invaded: Alaska in World War II. CLICK HERE. Here's an Amazon review:

PLEASE REVIEW any of my books quickly and easily here: CLICK HERE.

We are so grateful for you to share our journey of discovery through United States history. Have a wonderful day!

All the best,
Bill and Laura