At the turn of the 20th century, Sharon's very existence was threatened by the collapse of the local iron industry as the town's economy and population began to decline. However, the popularity of automobile transportation and Sharon's accessible distance from New York attracted a class of wealthy visitors who fell in love with the rolling hills and quiet valleys. This new weekend population purchased land and built stately country homes, reigniting interest in the area. Steady growth in construction provided much-needed work, and commerce began to thrive again. Early businesses expanded, and new operations opened. Local residents could shop at stores run by the Gillette brothers and A.R. Woodward, fill their tanks at Herman Middlebrook's gas station, and have their health care needs attended to by doctors at the state-of-the-art Sharon Hospital, built in 1916. Eastern Europeans became the town's newest residents, taking advantage of the affordable, cleared land to fuel a large number of highly successful farms. Sharon's residents thrived as they reshaped their town, welcoming newcomers and nurturing a community of inclusion that lasts to the present day.
This is a rich source of eyewitness history, and Sharon Nicholson had the vision to capture it before it disappeared. WWII experiences that spanned the globe, some are told with painful pathos, some with painstakingly objectivity, some with humor, all with honesty and sincerity. Nicholson has faithfully captured the voices of these men and women to produce an engaging read--history from the perspective of those who lived it.
The Lenni Lenape called this place gueno-sheiki-hacki-ing, meaning "beautiful or peaceful valley." Incorporated in 1850, Conshohocken's colorful history had its beginnings as Native American territory prior to 1684, when William Penn purchased the land from the Tammany people. Soon Quakers purchased land, built homes, and opened mills. Conshohocken begins with tales and images of early history and continues with rare views that capture some of the majestic mansions built by the founding fathers, the tree-lined avenues with trolleys and horse-drawn carriages, the firehouses and train station and schools, and the many families and faces that have brought Conshohocken to life.
In Medieval Boundaries, Sharon Kinoshita examines the role of cross-cultural contact in twelfth- and early thirteenth-century French literature. Starting from the observation that many of the earliest and best-known works of the French literary tradition are set on or beyond the borders of the French-speaking world, she reads the Chanson de Roland, the lais of Marie de France, and a variety of other texts in an expanded geographical frame that includes the Iberian peninsula, the Welsh marches, and the eastern Mediterranean. In Kinoshita's reconceptualization of the geographical and cultural boundaries of the medieval West, such places become significant not only as sites of conflict but also as spaces of intense political, economic, and cultural negotiation. An important contribution to the emerging field of medieval postcolonialism, Kinoshita's work explores the limitations of reading the literature of the French Middle Ages as an inevitable link in the historical construction of modern discourses of Orientalism, colonialism, race, and Christian-Muslim conflict. Rather, drawing on recent historical and art historical scholarship, Kinoshita uncovers a vernacular culture at odds with official discourses of crusade and conquest. Situating each work in its specific context, she brings to light the lived experiences of the knights and nobles for whom this literature was first composed and—in a series of close readings informed by postcolonial and feminist theory—demonstrates that literary representations of cultural encounters often provided the pretext for questioning the most basic categories of medieval identity. Awarded honorable mention for the 2007 Modern Language Association Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for French and Francophone Studies
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