Gifts of history

Oakland Tribune, Nov 20, 2003 by Kathleen Grant Geib, STAFF WRITER

ALBANY photographer David Sanger's images in "San Francisco Bay: Portrait of an Estuary" (University of California Press, $34.95) are so stunningly beautiful, it's hard to believe they portray our own back yard.

A Forster's tern and snowy egret are white and black against an expanse of silky blue, fog at Lands End is golden amidst a setting sun, Angel Island's Ayala Cove lies serene, the South Tower of the Golden Gate Bridge is dramatically red and the famous Tracy windmills sparkle white against pale green hills. These images are Sanger's tribute to this amazing land and the changes it has undergone.

Accompanied by San Raphael author John Hart's elegant text, this book -- a combination of Bay Area history, environmental victories and cozy travelogue -- makes a classic gift. It is not only a treat for the eyes, but a reward for the mind.

As the holidays approach, remember your ancestors and the freedoms they fought to achieve and consider giving history books as gifts. These books are not the dry volumes you remember, but fascinating glimpses into worlds that used to be -- worlds that still hold valuable lessons.

Female warriors

Say the names Molly Pitcher, Phillis Wheatley and Abigail Adams and most of us remember high school history classes that described these women as battlefield angel, poet and wife of the second U.S. president, John Adams. While these terms describe the

women minimally, they fail to portray their bravery or illustrate their historical impact.

Melissa Lukeman Bohrer's "Glory, Passion and Principle: The Story of Eight Remarkable Women at the Core of the American Revolution" (Atria Books, $24) shines a spotlight on the past and brings to life the heroines who fought valiantly for freedom from the British in the late 1700s.

Bohrer's energetic prose and well-researched details capture the reader's imagination from the beginning. Bohrer recounts Sybil Ludington's desperate ride to Stormville to alert colonists of Danbury's capture and the need to join arms. Ludington rides more than 40 miles that night, shouting her warning to the folk in each house she passes.

Daylight finds Ludington safely home and her father, Col. Ludington, able to march against the British with 400 men. Bohrer says this victorious battle, with Ludington's men joined by others, is one of the first to use guerrilla tactics.

Molly Pitcher is another woman Bohrer describes as stepping in at a crucial moment. During the Battle of Monmouth, Pitcher revives those around her with buckets of creek water and when her husband falls, Pitcher takes his place at the cannon.

Bohrer quotes an eyewitness account that describes Pitcher's humor as well as her valor. When a cannonball whizzes between Pitcher's legs and tears her petticoat, she comments that it's lucky the ball didn't fly higher.

If Pitcher's rough humor works on the battlefield, Mercy Otis Warren's sarcasm finds its place in the plays and propaganda she writes to stir fellow patriots against the British.

Bohrer says Warren's intellectual and political brilliance are reasons she is admired by men including Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Adams and George Washington. These leaders accept Warren as an equal and correspond with her regularly, according to Bohrer.

Abigail Adams and Phillis Wheatley are politically influential, as well. Adams is known for her sage and constant advice to her husband, John, particularly concerning the rights of women.

Wheatley, although a slave, is recognized early for her keen intellect and educated as a result. Her first poem is published in 1767, making Wheatley the first published black female poet, according to Bohrer. Wheatley's writing is sympathetic to the colonists and offered with particular poignance, as she is also a captive.

The last of Bohrer's histories include Lydia Darragh's spy work, Deborah Sampson's battle experience and Nancy Ward's pleas for peace between colonists and Cherokees.

Whether slave or free, Bohrer talks continually about her heroines' fierce desire to learn and to have the advantages of men. These women are not content only to cook and sew, but patriots who yearn to be an active part of the history surrounding them.

Early Americans

If Bohrer describes the patriot mothers, John Ferling writes about the patriot fathers in "A Leap in the Dark: The Struggle to Create the American Republic" (Oxford University Press, $30). Ferling casts a scholarly eye on Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, John and Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry, as well as the lesser-known Abraham Yates and Theodore Sedgwick.

Writing about events from 1754 to 1801, Ferling talks about the development of the Constitution, the beginnings of the Republican and Democratic parties and early secession ideas in the North. The author also includes details of anti-revolutionaries, Joseph Galloway and Andrew Oliver.

Before the colonists even consider fighting the British, Native Americans have made their home in North America for thousands of years. Their story is told in William Brandon's "The Rise and Fall of North American Indians: From Prehistory through Geronimo" (Roberts Rinehart, $34.95).