Category: National Parks
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Road Trip Recap: Perry’s Victory at Put-in-Bay
The War of 1812 always strikes me as America’s forgotten war of the 19th century. It’s the reason I know the word “impressment,” and I remember a child’s biography of Dolley Madison recounting the story of how she saved a portrait of George Washington as the British burned the White House. Beyond that, the war…
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Weekly Wanderings: October 26, 2025
Thanks for joining me this week. Recommendations China Stories Chris Buckley, “In China, a Forbidden Question Looms: Who Leads After Xi?” Control over history has been exercised to an even greater degree in the Hong Kong case than others. As in other territories, colonial officials maintained the administration based partly on the extensive information they…
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Weekly Wanderings: October 5, 2025
Thanks for joining me this week. Recommendations China Stories Associated Press, “Overseas Hong Kong pro-democracy activist Nathan Law denied entry to Singapore” Chris Buckley and Adam Goldman, “How China’s Secretive Spy Agency Became a Cyber Powerhouse” Leslie T. Chang, “At the Chinese Table” Yet, the accolades the film has received are not so much an…
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Wanderings: Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone isn’t a place conducive to following a strict itinerary. Parking lots fill, traffic stops unexpectedly to wait out animals crossing the road, and geysers don’t always erupt on schedule. It’s possible, I learned, to make a general plan, but there’s a good chance it will be altered in response to circumstances. I realized after…
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Bookshelf: Yellowstone and the West
I am (a) a huge nerd and (b) attempting to be more intentional with my reading. Rather than grabbing whatever looks most appealing on any given day, I’m picking through my shelves and library loans to select the volumes that fit in with what’s going on in my life: travel, author talks in Ann Arbor,…
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Weekly Wanderings: September 11, 2024
I’m heading home from Montana today after more than a week of vacation in the Gallatin Valley and Yellowstone National Park. I’ve posted some photos on Instagram and am working on a write-up of my trip to share here at some point. For the moment, here’s a snippet that I wrote while taking a rest…
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Wanderings: Fort Monroe
In October, my parents and I spent a week in Williamsburg, Virginia. We’ve been there before, and have already seen the Colonial Williamsburg sights, toured the battlefield at Yorktown, and visited the reconstructed Jamestown settlement. Looking for something else to check out, I turned to the map in my National Parks passport and located Fort…
Maura Elizabeth Cunningham 