Results by title

Written by longtime climber Hil Malatino, Climbing explores the why of the sport, asking what pushes him and so many others to drag themselves to the gym and the crag time and again; to restructure their intimate lives around the pursuit of a new goal; and to devote thousands of hours forging their nerves to perform physical and mental feats while dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of feet off the ground. In chapters that explore gender, class, and sizeism in climbing culture, as well as grief, addiction, queer and trans-worldmaking, and the tensions between conservation and recreation, Climbing teases out how the art of navigating across rock can help us learn how to revel in being weird, vulnerable, and radically interdependent animals temporarily gifted the complicated tragicomedy of a body. It is a story of collective obsession and transformation that tracks how holding yourself on the wall helps you learn how to hold onto the ambiguities of life on earth.

Although foster youth have college aspirations similar to their peers, fewer than one in ten ultimately complete a two-year or four-year college degree. What are the major factors that influence their chances of succeeding? Climbing a Broken Ladder advances our knowledge of what can be done to improve college outcomes for a student group that has largely remained invisible in higher education. Drawing on data from one of the most extensive studies of young people in foster care, Nathanael J. Okpych examines a wide range of factors that contribute to the chances that foster youth enroll in college, persist in college, and ultimately complete a degree. Okpych also investigates how early trauma affects later college outcomes, as well as the impact of a significant child welfare policy that extends the age limit of foster care. The book concludes with data-driven and concrete recommendations for policy and practice to get more foster youth into and through college.

Nothing about Homer G. Phillips Hospital came easily. Built to serve St. Louis’s rapidly expanding African-American population, the grand new hospital opened its doors in 1937, toward the end of the Great Depression.  “Homer G.,” as many called it, joined a burgeoning group of black hospitals amid a national period of institutional segregation and strong racial prejudice nationwide.

When the beautiful, up-to-date hospital opened, it attracted more black residents than any other such program in the United States. Patients also flocked to the hospital, as did nursing students who found there excellent training, ready employment, and a boost into the middle class. For decades, the hospital thrived; by the 1950s, three-quarters of African-American babies in St. Louis were born at Homer G.

But the 1960s and 1970s brought less need for all-black hospitals, as faculty, residents, and patients were increasingly welcome in the many newly integrated institutions. Ever-tightening city budgets meant less money for the hospital, and in 1979, despite protests from the African-American community, HGPH closed. Years later, the venerated, long-vacant building came to life again as the Homer G. Phillips Senior Living Community.

Candace O’Connor draws upon contemporary newspaper articles, institutional records, and dozens of interviews with former staff members to create the first, full history of the Homer G. Phillips Hospital. She also brings new facts and insights into the life and mysterious murder (still an unsolved case) of the hospital’s namesake, a pioneering Black attorney and civil rights activist who led the effort to build the sorely needed medical facility in the Ville neighborhood.

An inspiring story of adventure and endurance in a quest to rediscover the passions of youth.
 
At the end of 2019, Tom French retired from a four-decade career in business, determined to return to interests that had defined his youth and see what meaning they still held. One of these interests was mountaineering. Another was adventure travel, with a particular focus on Nepal. A third was cross-country ski racing. Having taken “gap years” between school and university, and again before he started work, he decided to take a gap year before settling into the expectations of retirement. One year turned into three as he rebuilt his athletic strength, competed in cross-country ski marathons, and climbed some of the world’s highest mountains, including two expeditions to Mount Everest. On the first Everest climb, a cyclone forced him to turn around high on the mountain and descend the treacherous Lhotse Face in a blizzard. On the second, he approached the mountain through the remote Makalu Barun region, the first climber ever to do so, and climbed to the summit on a moonlit night.
 
But this is a book about much more than Everest. It is about beauty and joy found in wild places, about cross-country ski racing and mountaineering more broadly, and—most of all—about a journey to find meaning in life and reconnect with the passions of youth.