`Pride' wins praise, gains top recognition
Already highly praised by literary critics, "Pride of the Inland Seas" has now earned top recognition by regional book organizations.
Subtitled "An Illustrated History of the Port of Duluth-Superior," the book has been nominated for a 2005 Midwest Book Award by the Midwest Booksellers Association. Winners will be announced by June 30 and awards are to be presented in September at the MBA Trade Show in Minneapolis.
The
book, written by Bill Beck and C. Patrick Labadie and published in the
fall of 2004 by the Afton Historical Society Press, was one of two 2005
Northeastern Minnesota Book Awards winners for nonfiction, art and scholarship.
It was second to "Minne-sota's Iron Country: Rich Ore, Rich Lives,"
written by Marvin Lamppa and published by Lake Superior Port Cities, Inc.
The NEMBA program is conducted annually by the University of Minnesota Duluth and Friends of the Duluth Public Library "to recognize books that best represent northeastern Minnesota's history, heritage, culture and lifestyle."
Reviews of "Pride" have been universally positive. Some excerpts:
"Exhaustively
researched and illustrated, with around 200 rare, historic photos, this
is a truly outstanding effort. This book, clearly a labor of love by its
authors, is one of those volumes that belongs on the shelves of every
Great Lakes aficionado." —Great Lakes Seaway Review/Great
Laker.
"Superbly
enhanced with a profusion of photography, authors Beck and Labadie lace
this unique history with the personal stories of the entrepreneurs who
were to forge the Great Lakes commerce into the fabric of American economic
and westward expansion history." — Midwest Book Review, Wisconsin
Bookwatch.
"The
format of this book — its mixture of panoramic photos and detailed,
thoroughly researched text — makes it something that could be of
interest to anyone from earnest historians to people who simply love to
visit Duluth-Superior and watch the big ships glide beneath the Aerial
Bridge and out into the lake." — The Corresponder, Department
of English, Minnesota State University, Mankato.
"Set
against a backdrop of the key industries that helped build North America
— iron and steel, forest products, grain, and coal — this beautiful
book explores and celebrates three centuries of economic, technological,
political and social change." — Books, A Reader's Catalog,
Upper Midwest Booksellers Association [now Midwest Booksellers Association].
To
order the book:
Afton Historical Society Press
P.O. Box 100
Afton
MN 55001
(800)
436-8433