Book Description
The veteran Wall Street Journal science reporter Marilyn Chase’s fascinating account of an outbreak of bubonic plague in late Victorian San Francisco is a real-life thriller that resonates in today’s headlines.
The Barbary Plague transports us to the Gold Rush boomtown in 1900, at the end of the city’s Gilded Age. With a deep understanding of the effects on public health of politics, race, and geography, Chase shows how one city triumphed over perhaps the most frightening and deadly of all scourges.
Customer Reviews:
A pleasant surprise.......2006-02-09
Based on the title I would not have picked this book, but it was chosen by my book club. What a pleasure to read. Well written and one of the best overviews of what San Francisco was like at the turn of the century including during the 1906 earthquake. All of the members of the book club enjoyed this book and many have recommended it to friends.
Fascinating, fun, and a quick read despite flowery language.......2003-12-24
If I thought too much about the language, I tended to think "who was this person's editor, and what were they drinking?" But despite the intermittent distraction, I found it fascinating. The author tells a real non-fiction story - and it measures up to a good fiction read. I'm from San Francisco, so I had an added interest in the location if not the topic, but, come on, who isn't fascinated by The Plague? The author jumped around in time in a way that had no rhyme or reason for me, but again, I wasn't more than temporarily distracted by this. Worth the time.
Gripping and Timely.......2003-11-11
Ms. Chase has mixed a veritable cauldron of explosive subjects about which to write something fresh: politics and race in turn-of-the-century San Francisco, the just emerging discoveries about plague vectors, topped off with brand new research into the characters who stood at the center of an outbreak of plague in San Francisco's Chinatown. She recounts how the early cases were misdiagnosed or dismissed in order to prevent damage to the city's reputation, and while the descriptions of individual cases is by its nature repetitive, the story is made all the more powerful as the epidemic's toll mounts and, finally, subsides. Ms. Chase describes the anti-rat campaign and its role in beating the plague, and pinpoints the seemingly minor difference in flea types that saved us from a much worse outbreak. Ms. Chase scrupulously avoided the easy paths to sensationalism and chose to stick to the facts. For instance, she makes the point that it was evident that the number of plague victims was being undercounted due to sufferers (or bodies) being removed from the city, possibly in collusion with authorities, but steadfastly sticks only to the proven cases in proving the existence of an "epidemic". The epidemic may have been far worse than recorded. And coming just as we were avoiding travel to certain destinations because of SARS, her book is an outstanding reminder of the responsibility of public health authorities to place the public good above all else in matters of infectious disease. If you are interested in the early days of public health in the United States, or wish to draw lessons for the present, this book is a must read!
The Black Death in Early San Francisco.......2003-08-12
This book is not only a fascinating look into the origins of the bubonic plauge in early San Francisco, tracing the disease's trek from China through Hong Kong to Chinatown in Honolulu and spreading itself in the western frontier of California; it is a view of how racism and politics affected interfered with solution. When plague first appeared in San Francisco, it struck the Chinatown area the hardest, inflaming tensions between the whites and the immigrants. When Dr. Joseph Kinyoun threatened quaratine of the entire area, the businessmen and politicians rose against him, putting the city' s profitability before the public's health. His replacement, Rupert Blue, managed the plague clean-up campaign with much diplomacy and brought about sweeping changes that not only curbed the rise of the plague, but also enhanced the city's image.
This book has it all -- poitical intrigue, racism, a disease out of control, heroes and villains. Sometimes non-fiction can be better than most novels, and in this case, it makes for a great book well worth reading.
Sherlock Holmes in San Francisco.......2003-07-06
A medical history that rivals whodunnits as a page-turner. For all its scrupulous research and shocking parallels to our own day, it generates an excitement that many novelists would envy. The colorful characters - greedy businessmen, dishonest politicians, a timid medical establishment, an heroic doctor - live with growing danger from disease, earthquake, fire and even from city officials intent on a coverup. As a bonus, one reads a fascinating history of San Francisco at the turn of the 20th century.
Customer Reviews:
Back to the future?.......2003-08-14
11 years after the publication of "Painted Ladies," Elizabeth Pomada returned to San Francisco to gaze anew upon its Victorians, and found a new concern for authenticity, subtlety, and sophistication in what she now calls the "Colorist Movement." The examples she shows here, while still splendidly detailed and richly pigmented, are for the most part less gaudy than those in the first book, reflecting the emergence of yuppies onto the preservationist stage earlier occupied by hippies and radicals. Almost the best part of the book, however, is the many interiors she has included, often by houseowners with a keen interest in authentic restoration. Architecture and interior-decorating buffs alike will want to own this volume.
Inspiring! Beautiful! A "must have" for renovators!.......1999-05-24
If ever you want to be inspired, transformed, bowled over or "wowwed" by the possibilities of an old house... Read the Pomada/Larsen series. The pictures are breathtakenly beautiful and the text is quite informative. Lots of 'pearls of wisdom' there. Before you buy that victorian, read this book for some informative information. After you buy--keep reading (like a litany) to keep the vision alive amidst the rubble and asbestos. You won't be sorry ---you will be renewed. These books were like falling in love, or the collector's itch---The fever is maddening but the end result is Oh so sweet. Get them all!! (5 titles still available)
Book Description
San Francisco is famous for its distinctive and well-preserved Victorian architecture. Victorian architectural historian and longtime SF resident Randolph Delehanty and photographer Richard Sexton provide a pictorial and historical overview of this timeless look. In the Victorian Style traces the development of Victorian architecture—influenced by both aesthetic trends and new advances in building technology—as well as the history of the city's street plan development, building trends, and parks. The book also offers a rare tour of the traditional Victorian interior, room by room, including not only grand halls, parlours, and dining rooms, but also rarely seen details such as kitchens, pantries, and bathrooms. With over 150 color photographs, this informative historical guide is a must for tourists and Victorian lovers, as well as architects, designers, and decorators.
Customer Reviews:
SAVE YOUR MONEY.......2006-11-11
I've ordered numerous books on Victorians and this one is by far the worst. The photos have a washed out look to them. Colors look faded and if you've ever seen a Victorian painted correctly, the colors are vivid and plentiful. Electric lines that ran between the Victorian and the photographer, printed out thick and dark black. Needless to say it decreased the beauty of the home.
Number of pages totals 80 and the majority of them are photos but this book isn't nearly as good as Elizabeth Pomada's other books. It will remain in my home library because I've already paid for it but I can't say it gives me much pleasure to turn it's pages.
Joyous whimsy.......2003-08-14
If Peter Maass, in "The Gingerbread Age" and "The Victorian Home in America," first made us truly aware of the glories of Victorian domestic architecture, it was Elizabeth Pomada who showed us how it could be brought to vivid life. In this, her first book about the modernizing-by-paint of 19th-Century houses, she concentrates on San Francisco, where the Painted Lady style was invented during the heyday of the hippies. The houses shown in the gorgeous full-color photographs range from the elegantly somber (like Don Parodi's many-bayed house on p. 23) to the minutely detailed (the imposing Colonial Revival mansion on p. 20 and the Bert Franklin rowhouse opposite) to the downright gaudy (Rhine & Kennedy's fire-engine-red offices on p. 29, a tiny lavender cottage on p. 50, a literally rainbow-striped confection on p. 69). If you can't make it to San Francisco in person--or if you've been, and want to relive the glories of its vintage housing--this book belongs on your shelf.
Average customer rating:
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A Gift to the Street
Olwell & Waldhorn
Manufacturer: St Martins Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 General
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Residential
| Building Types & Styles
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0312327137 |
Customer Reviews:
better with color.......1998-02-14
This book would make a spectacular production if it were to eventually be printed in color. Is there a possibly of this? The black and white photographs do not do justice to the fabulous homes from the Victorian era, with all their ornamentaion and multiple colors. Waldhorn has done a remarkable job capturing the timelessness of these structures, and locating the most spectacular models in California. Unlike most books on the Victorians, this one is divided by features-"homes with towers", "gates", "homes with gables", etc. just to name a few. This book is nearly perfect; all it needs is to be published in color.
Book Description
For more than a century the refined but playful elegance of Victorian houses has helped define the style and identity of the city by the bay. San Francisco Victorians showcases the variety and charm of the city's signature houses. This generous but portable survey features the most picturesque of the Victorians and exquisite Queen Annes, including classically restored marvels and the more fancifully decorated "painted ladies." Focusing on breathtaking exteriors and finely turned details from homes in all of the city's neighborhoods, and with a fun, informative text by noted Victorian architecture authority Randolph Delehanty, San Francisco Victorians is an enchanting and colorful look at these enduring beauties.
Customer Reviews:
A Long Stroll in the City.......2000-10-10
San Francisco Victorians is a wonderful little book, especially for the homesick like me. The book is full of great pictures reflecting the cultural heritage of Frisco, with a historian's essay telling the history along the way. Excellent companion for a long stroll in the city; for delightful discoveries.
WOW - great photos of my favorite houses.......2000-06-13
I've seen this photographers' work before and he's done another impeccable job documenting some of the most originally restored homes I've seen in twenty years.
Beautiful San Fransisco Buildings.......2000-06-12
I love this book. The pictures are beautiful and the text is very informative. If you love artful buildings and wonderful pictures of them, you will be very glad to have this book.
Average customer rating:
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A gift to the street
Carol Olwell
Manufacturer: Antelope Island Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0917946014 |
Customer Reviews:
Lots of ideas.......2004-11-05
This book has loads of pictures (my edition is B&W) with lots of ideas for street-front treatments. If you're looking to renovate an old house (who isn't, these days?), this book can give you some wonderful inspiration.
Book Description
Few cities can claim the instantaneous association with Victorian style that is enjoyed by San Francisco. Beyond the polychrome Victorian houses, there is a cumulative visual impact of all types of architecture, both exterior and interior. This beautiful book contains 260 color photos and includes sections devoted to Victorian House planning, the Edwardian Era, before and after transformations and Victorian Revival Interiors.
Customer Reviews:
If only I had the money . . ........2003-10-10
I attended college in the Bay Area in the early `60s and have been nostalgically in love with San Francisco and Marin ever since. I spent many, many hours hiking around the city with a couple of friends, climbing the hills, exploring narrow passages between buildings, and generally gawking at the 19th century architecture. I also knew a girl whose grandmother (or aunt, or something) lived in one of the "Painted Ladies" on Alamo Square, the strip now known as "Postcard Row," so I actually got to see the inside of one of the gorgeous homes detailed and depicted in this book. If you're not from there, you likely lump together all of San Francisco's historic domestic architecture as "Victorian" -- but you would be wrong. There's Gothic Revival, Italianate, Second Empire, Stick Style, Shingle Style, Queen Anne, and Colonial Revival, plus various hybrids among and later additions to all of those. Duchscherer is a longtime resident of the city and a highly regarded architectural historian and he leads the reader through the art and business behind these homes, while Keister's lush photography of busy (and occasionally overdone) Victorian interiors will have you drooling on the page. One of my personal favorites is the Westerfeld House in the Western Addition, built in 1889, which includes a fifth floor (!) tower room with an amazing view. Another is Falkirk (originally the Robert Dollar Mansion), built in San Rafael in 1888, a much more rambling Tudor extravaganza filled with a king's ransom in paneling and wainscotting; it was saved from demolition and entirely renovated (thank God) after I left the area, and I shall have to go and visit it the next time I get out there. What a book!
From architectural roots to hybrid styles.......2001-12-14
This survey of Victorian beauties of California's San Francisco Bay Area provides a blend of regional history and architectural insights, surveying the changing Victorian house styles of the region and featuring a wealth of fine color examples. From architectural roots to hybrid styles, Book Of The Courtesans is packed with detail.
Average customer rating:
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The Travelling Painter: A Companion, Tutor, and Guide
Paul Millichip
Manufacturer: B T Batsford Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Instructional & How-To
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Painting
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0713464518 |
Average customer rating:
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Akron Art Museum Art Since 1850: An Introduction to the Collection
Mitchell Douglas Kahan , and
Jeffrey D. Grove
Manufacturer: Akron Art Museum
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Library Binding
Schools, Periods & Styles
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
| Abstract Expressionism
| Ancient & Classical
| Art Deco
| Art Nouveau
| Baroque
| Byzantine
| Constructivism
| Contemporary Art
| Cubism
| Dadaism
| Expressionism
| Fauvism
| Folk Art
| Futurism
| German Expressionism
| Gothic
| Impressionism
| Mannerism
| Medieval
| Modern
| Neoclassical
| Pop
| Post-Impressionism
| Pre-Raphaelite
| Prehistoric & Primitive
| Realism
| Renaissance
| Rococo
| Romanesque
| Romantic
| Surrealism
United States
| Regional
| History & Criticism
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Museums & Collections
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Museums
| Museums & Collections
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Exhibition Catalogs
| Museums
| Museums & Collections
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Painting
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Sculpture
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Ohio
| State & Local
| United States
| Americas
| History
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0940665050 |
Book Description
One hundred paintings, sculptures and photographs from the collection of the Akron Art Museum are lavishly reproduced and thoughtfully discussed in this volume. A provocative essay on the changing nature of the collection since the Museum's founding introduces the volume. This is followed by one hundred full-page illustrations, each with a brief essay written by either a member of the Museum staff or one of 16 guest authors. The selection of work stresses the collection's three areas of special strength-- turn-of-the-century American painting, painting and sculpture since 1960, and twentieth-century photography. Artists featured include William Merritt Chase, Thomas Wilmer Dewing, Philip Guston, Nancy Graves, Chuck Close, Claes Oldenburg, Lewis Hine, Lee Friedlander, Gilbert & George, Carrie Mae Weems, and Lari Pittman. AUTHORBIO Barbara Tannenbaum is Chief Curator and Head of Public Programs at the Akron Art Museum; Mitchell D. Kahan is its Director.
Average customer rating:
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Fishin' & Huntin' Cartoons
R. Stubler
Manufacturer: Rosie Wells Enterprises Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Comic Strips
| Comics & Graphic Novels
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Comics & Graphic Novels
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Graphic Novels
| Comics & Graphic Novels
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Humor
| Entertainment
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 1886812055 |
Books:
- The Beauty of the Cross: The Passion of Christ in Theology and the Arts from the Catacombs to the Eve of the Renaissance
- The Essential Kitchen Design Guide
- The Genius in the Design : Bernini, Borromini, and the Rivalry That Transformed Rome
- The Hamptons: Long Island's East End
- The House That Jill Built: A Woman's Guide to Home Building
- The Houses of Martha's Vineyard
- The Laws of Lifetime Growth: Always Make Your Future Bigger Than Your Past
- The Mathematics of Turfgrass Maintenance, 3rd Edition
- The Nantucket Restaurants Cookbook: Menus and Recipes from the Faraway Isle
- The Power of Place: Urban Landscapes as Public History
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