Showing results by narrator "Allen" in All Categories

In 1940, America was still staggering its way out of the Great Depression and war clouds were rolling in from Europe. The upcoming Presidential campaign spotlight turned to perhaps the unlikeliest, but certainly the most entertaining, candidate of all - Gracie Allen. Politics was perfect for Gracie's particular brand of logical illogic. Join the hilarity, and the throngs of supporters, as George Burns, Gracie, and their entire cast embark on a whistle-stop tour all the way to the Surprise Party's national convention in Omaha, Nebraska.

Groundbreaking, compelling, and poignant, The Slaves' War delivers an unprecedented vision of the nation's bloodiest conflict. An acclaimed historian of 19th-century and African American history, Andrew Ward gives us the first narrative of the Civil War told from the perspective of those whose destiny it decided.

Among radio comedy's most enduring features were its running gags - and few gags ran longer, or more hilariously, than the legendary feud between two of its great masters: Jack Benny and Fred Allen. For nearly 20 years the mere mention of Benny on an Allen program was guaranteed to produce an escalating laugh - just as bringing Allen up with Benny had listener in stitches at the mere anticipation of a response. This collection brings together the classic episodes that started it all, to the showdown that was supposed to end it once and for all.

Late one night, a teenage couple drives up to the big white clapboard home on the Blessing estate and leaves a box. In that instant, the lives of those who live and work there are changed forever. Skip Cuddy, the caretaker, finds a baby girl asleep in that box and decides he wants to keep the...

Slave narratives are extremely rare. Of the one hundred or so of these testimonies that survive, a mere handful are first-person accounts by slaves who ran away and freed themselves. Now two newly uncovered narratives, and the biographies of the men who wrote them, join that exclusive group...

When all is said and done, killing my mother came easily. A woman steps over the line into the unthinkable in this brilliant, powerful and unforgettable novel by the author of The Lovely Bones . For years, Helen Knightly has given her life to others: to her haunted mother, to her enigmatic...

Married to a soldier who has returned from Afghanistan injured in body and mind, Stella Carey leaves the house every evening. During her nursing shifts, Stella writes letters for her patients to their loved ones - some full of humour, love and practical advice, others steeped in regret or pain - promising to post them after their deaths. Until one night Stella writes the letter that could give her patient one last chance at redemption, if she delivers it in time....

"First thought, best thought." This was the phrase that poet Allen Ginsberg used to describe spontaneous and fearless writing, a way of telling the truth that arises from naked and authentic experience. For more than 30 years, groundbreaking teachers at Naropa University such as Ginsberg and his...

Born in Africa to a Nigerian princess, Precious Williams was less than one year old when her mother put an ad in Nursery World: "Pretty Nigerian baby girl needs new home." Precious's mother had flown to London in search of a new life - a life in which there was no space for a daughter. The first response came rom a 60-year-old white woman, Nan, who prided herself for being "color blind." Correspondence were exchanged, no questions asked, and Precious left her mother for Nan's home in rural England.

Jack and Laurel have been married for 39 years. They've lived a good life and appear to have had the perfect marriage. With his wife cradled in his arms, and before Jack takes his last breath, he scribbles his last “Wednesday Letter.” When their adult children arrive to arrange the funeral, they discover boxes and boxes full of love letters that their father wrote to their mother each week on Wednesday. As they begin to open and read the letters, the children begin to uncover the shocking truth about the past.

Managers and other employees spend more than 40 percent of their time listening to other people but often do it so poorly that the result is millions of dollars' worth of mistakes, just because most people don't know how to listen. In this new edition of her classic guide to the art of effective listening, Madelyn Burley-Allen tells you how to acquire active, productive listening skills and put them to work for you professionally, socially, and personally.

W. E. B. Du Bois was the foremost Black intellectual of his time. The Souls of Black Folk, his most influential work, is a collection of 14 beautifully written essays, by turns lyrical, historical, and autobiographical. Here, Du Bois records the cruelties of racism, celebrates the strength and pride of black America, and explores the paradoxical "double-consciousness" of African American life.

Five days after Abraham Lincoln was buried in Springfield, Illinois, John Locke Scripps, who had convinced Lincoln to write his first campaign autobiography, asserted that the 16th president had become "the Great American Man-the grand central figure in American (perhaps the World's) History." Historians still find it hard to quibble with Scripps's opinion."

The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass was Douglass' third autobiography. In it he was able to go into greater detail about his life as a slave and his escape from slavery, as he and his family were no longer in any danger from the reception of his work. In this engrossing narrative he recounts early years of abuse; his dramatic escape to the North and eventual freedom, abolitionist campaigns, and his crusade for full civil rights for former slaves.

A squabble - touched off by Fred Allen's remark comparing Jack Benny unfavorably to a 10-year-old violinist - soon escalated to epic proportions. The pair set radio ablaze with their famous feud. Here are Jack, Fred, Mary Livingstone, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, Dennis Day, Phil Harris, Portland Hoffa, Minerva Pious, Alan Reed, Jack Smart, Parker Fennelly, Kenny Delmar, and all the rest of their regulars carrying on through the 1940s in 10 hilarious on-air conflagrations!

When Garnet finds a silver thimble in the sand by the river, she is sure it’s magical. But is it magical enough to help her pig, Timmy, win a blue ribbon on Fair Day?...

A wonderful collection of classic children's tales, all narrated with heart-warming delight. Featuring "Sleeping Beauty", "The King's Son", "The Travels of Tom Thumb", and "The Story of Hickory, Dickory, Dock".

Every successful business is based on a vision. In this presentation, Marc Allen shares his secrets for envisioning and creating success. He helps you to understand how to build a truly visionary business - one which supports its employees, its community, and the environment. This engaging guide presents 25 practical, concrete principles for creating your visionary business. Visionary Business will teach you how to manage by goals rather than by crisis, use your business plan and mission statement as visionary tools, recognize the benefits within adversity, plan your work and work your plan, and much more.

As a young manager at an airline catering facility, Kevin had to find out why silverware was disappearing at a rapid clip. The route to solving this mystery of The Case of the Missing Cutlery results in Kevin learning to rise to the occasion, to become a leader who inspires followers and is able to rely on their hard work and support. For those who might find listening about leadership success at the Fortune 50 level inspiring but too far removed from their experience, the author offers up this down-to-earth story of an everyday employee turned rising star.

He is a record collector and a connoisseur of vinyl, hunting out rare and elusive LPs. His business card describes him as the Vinyl Detective, and some people take this more literally than others. For example, the beautiful, mysterious woman who wants to pay him a large sum of money to find a priceless lost recording on behalf of an extremely wealthy yet shadowy client. And so begins a painful and dangerous odyssey in search of the rarest jazz record of them all....