Opening Hours
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Rare Books
A graveyard for lunatics : another tale of two cities
Image not available
Rare Books
Image not available
Daily: 10 A.M.–5 P.M.
Closed on Tuesdays
1151 Oxford Road
San Marino, CA 91108
Image not available
Rare Books
"In 1946, after many years' absence, John Weather returns to Blue City to find his father--the one-time Mayor--had been murdered on the street two years before. For political reasons among the conflicting forces which now rule the place, the murder has been hushed up and the murderer never found. The City as Weather finds it on his return, is one of evil and corruption, and corruption, as he also discovers, is something which once injected into a political organism is bound to spread. And this is what has happened in Blue City which is rotting from the top. It is an ugly City now, too ugly even for the men and women who have made it that way, and its corruption revolts John Weather into action on its own terms. Kenneth Millar writes with uncompromising toughness and spares us no reality. His world is one of brutal values; his people without pity or remorse. But this is not toughness for the sake of toughness. It is a harsh and vivid picture of a brutal side of life, focused before us with pitiless clarity like a sudden light in a shameful room. And in the nakedness of its tearing reality and in a manner which is not easily forgotten, we are faced with the fearful implications of these people's lives, and a lingering disturbance for some sort of truth which they contain"--Dust jacket.
636026
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Manuscripts
Portion of a diary kept by Mary Ann Storrs McCarty as she traveled overland from Nebraska to Nevada. The diary opens with the McCartys' departure from Omaha on May 6, traveling with a company that would eventually come under the leadership of J. Marvin. They forded the Loup Fork at Council Bluffs, and Mary Ann describes the difficulty of getting wagons and supplies over the various bluffs and hills they had to climb. While in Nebraska on May 14, Mary Ann observed "a very singular phenomenon" above the evening horizon, which first had the shape of a "rod" before taking on a "snaky appearance, [which] appeared to crawl up from the horizon...[and] lasted about half an hour." By the end of May they had reached Chimney Rock, and shortly after had the first of two broken wagons that had to be left behind, both ultimately replaced by "a Mormon...who was going after emigrants." Mary Ann writes of Pawnee Indians visiting the wagon camp, and although they were peaceful the emigrants were "all frightened" about their presence. In early June the party arrived at Fort Laramie and camped near La Bonte Creek and Deer Creek, usually close to outpost stations of soldiers. On June 12 the McCartys' were left behind when their wagon broke, and when P.V. went to look for the rest of the party Mary Ann stayed behind. It was dark and she wrote that "[there is] no person near me for miles...all around is hills and rocks. Where will the end be?" (June 12). Two days later they had rejoined the wagon train and camped near Devil's Gate, where Mary Ann described the scenery as "strangely, wildly beautiful." While camped near the Sweetwater River on June 18, Mary Ann wrote of her exasperation with her traveling companions, stating that "I am so very tired of the company, they are all so dreadfully profane...My heart years for quietude and the society of Christians." Mary Ann got her wish to be separated from the party when the McCartys' wagon was irreparably broken near the Sweetwater Station and they were left behind to find a new one. After being aided to the Green River Crossing, the McCartys joined a new emigrant train from Missouri. They passed through Echo Canyon and came within sight of Salt Lake City on July 1. Mary Ann described with some admiration the homes, agriculture, and irrigation systems of the Mormon homesteads she could see. She often walked on alone without the rest of the company, occasionally causing a panic when they thought she had been lost. By July 4 they reached Camp Floyd, and in mid-July crossed 23 miles of desert to the Nevada border. After passing the Diamond Station the McCartys left the wagon train to take a cut-off, which turned out to be a "terrible road." In Nevada they traveled through Clifton, along the Carson River, Fort Churchill, and Dayton before arriving in Carson City on August 12. Mary Ann's diary ends with an account of a fire that broke out shortly after their arrival. Also includes a typed transcript of the diary made by Mary Louise Warren, a letter to Mary Ann from Helen L. Taylor (1899), and photographs of P.V. McCarty and an unidentified daughter.
mssHM 79952-79956