Downloads and Free Reading Options

1Aunt Friendly's Picture Book

By Sarah S. Baker

This book includes the classic alphabet, Sing-A-Song Of Sixpence, The Frog Who Would A Wooing go, The Three LIttle Pigs, Puss In Boot, and The Ugly Duckling. Fun for all ages! (Summary by Sam Stinson)

2Stories of Old Greece and Rome

By Emilie Kip Baker

The Stories of Old Greece and Rome is an easy to read summary of all of the famous and not so famous Greek and Roman mythological stories. All of the famous Heroes are here: Theseus, Jason, Hercules, and all of the well known Deities. These stories tell the real detail of the myths, not the ones that have become sanitized (and dare I say it, 'Disneyfied') over the centuries. These are not stories for children, as the old gods and heroes were vengeful and some might say sadistic in their treatment of minor slights and misdemeanors. Putting out of eyes and ripping out of tongues is commonplace, and punishment by death is ever present. It is however fascinating to see how these tales have affected and influenced our culture and have woven themselves into our own myths and stories. (Summary by Kevin Green)

Written as a tribute to Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll after his death, by Isaac Newton Baker, his secretary of 14 years, and presented to the Ingersoll family. Later expanded and published by the family so the world could learn more about the public and private life, personality, work, thoughts and ideals of the most famous orator of the late 1800's, also dubbed "The Greatest Agnostic Of the Century". - Summary by Michele Fry

4Diary of a Suicide

By Wallace E. Baker

“Mr. B. Russell Herts, c/o International Magazine, New York City.<br /> Under separate cover I am sending you a record of a young man who is about to commit suicide. My only object is that it may help…to ease the way for some who come after…. I do not sign this, but you may verify my death by communicating with Mr. ——, whom I am writing to-day, so that he may look after my effects in New York.” <br><br> The body of a well-dressed young man was found off Manhattan Beach, Sept. 28, 1913. In his pockets a torn photograph of Strindberg and receipts for three registered letters were found. These receipts were traced to Mr. Herts and to friends in Toronto, one of whom identified the body on Oct. 2d as that of Wallace E. Baker. –From the book’s Forward.

5Friendly Road, New Adventures in Contentment

By Ray Stannard Baker

My grandmother Gertrude received a copy of The Friendly Road for Christmas in 1919. It must have been a special gift book--green leather binding, gold embossing, a sheet of tissue paper protecting the color plate facing the title page--this a painting of a solitary man enjoying a swim in a sun dappled stream with the caption "Surely it is good to be alive at a time like this."<br><br> Written in first person, pseudo autobiographical style, the “author” of The Friendly Road, David Grayson, is a writer,* living on a farm with cows to milk, and ducks and pigs to feed, and fields in need of plowing. One day he just slings a few belongings in a pack and walks off, leaving the cows unmilked and his sister Harriet standing in the doorway. <i>"My sober friend,"</i> Grayson writes, <i>"have you ever tried to do anything that the world at large considers not quite sensible, not quite sane? Try it!"</i> The rest of the book is an odd mixture of nostalgia for a gentler, kinder age; adventures, as Grayson relies on the charity of strangers to get by; with a bit of progressive politics thrown in. After bumming for several days, Grayson arrives in the "City," where a strike is in progress. He sympathizes with the workers, but he is appalled by <i>"the ill-smelling streets and dirty sidewalks and swarming human beings . . . the evidences of poverty, dirt, and ignorance."</i> And guess what? He returns home to his farm, and Harriet bakes him a rhubarb pie.<br><br> Gertrude, who had immigrated from Germany to the United States in 1892 at the age of 17, was 44 years old that Christmas. She was living on a fruit ranch in western Washington state, with her husband, a school teacher, also a German immigrant, whom she had married in 1898. She had 6 children, the oldest 20, the youngest only 2. The last few years had not been easy for this family. Gertrude's 10-year old daughter Mary, my mother, was slowly limping towards recovery from a bout of polio. Worse yet, during World War I Gertrude's husband was unjustly accused of being a "German sympathizer" despite the fact that his oldest son was a U.S. Army volunteer, and he was forced from his teaching post. His job loss meant more work for Gertrude, because, as my grandfather later explained to a journalist, after losing his job, he decided to “retire” to the country--<i>"to live calmly, read Homer and Goethe and Balzac and Emerson (and) raise fruit and chickens."**</i><br><br> Gertrude entrusted several of her favorite books to my teenage self before she died in 1958. Another was a book of poems entitled Because I Love You, inscribed to Gertrude as a birthday present in 1897 by a young man who was not my grandfather! Books. . . choices . . .<br><br> *David Grayson was a pseudonym used by the actual author of <i>The Friendly Road</i>, Ray Stannard Baker.<br> **Louis Adamic ,”A Man from the Black Forest," in <i>Two Way Passage</i> (1941).<br> ( summary by Sue Anderson)

6Following the Color Line

By Ray Stannard Baker

Subtitled "An Account of Negro Citizenship in the American Democracy", we are presented an in-depth and essentially non-opinionated open view of race relations as they existed in the U.S. in 1908, more than 40 years following the end of the Civil War.<br><br>The book is in three parts: The Negro in the South; The Negro in the North; and the Negro in the Nation. We are presented both rural and urban points of view, struggles for survival, varying district relationships, the effect of lynching, power struggles, and political repercussions, among many other topics. - Summary by Roger Melin

7Shasta Of The Wolves

By Olaf Baker

She-wolf Nitka finds an abandoned Native American baby and raises him with her cubs. Shasta learns the wolf ways and meets his kin, where he learns his true history. Eventually he can walk with the wolves and his human kin, which leads to more adventures. (Kirk Ziegler)

8Art of Conversation: Twelve Golden Rules

By Josephine Turck Baker

Many of us find it challenging to speak to other people, for various reasons. Some of us are afraid of being called a bore. Others are worried that we will be accused of hogging attention. Many of us simply don't know what to talk about. This book is an entertaining and enlightening manual that may be able to help. Through a series of twelve dialogues between a man and a woman, we are introduced to twelve "golden rules" that will help us navigate the waters of interpersonal communication. <br>(Summary by Devorah Allen) <br><br> He: Read by <a href="https://librivox.org/reader/13278">KevinS</a> <br>She: Read by <a href="https://librivox.org/reader/11084">Devorah Allen</a>

9In the Heart of Africa

By Samuel White Baker

A wonderfully readable condensation of two of Baker's earlier, longer works recounting his self-sponsored expeditions into the Dark Continent to discover the sources of the Nile: <i>The Albert N'Yanza</i>, <i>Great Basin Of The Nile (1866)</i> and <i>The Nile Tributaries Of Abyssinia (1867)</i>. And, of course, to bag a few elephants along the way. (Summary by Steven Seitel)

George P. Baker, popular British historian of the 1920s and 30s, covers the life and career of ancient Rome's most formidable opponent, Hannibal of Carthage. Beginning with an overview of the rise of Carthage and Rome's first conflict with that power, he describes Hannibal's life and his campaign in the Second Punic War. After crossing the Alps and invading Italy from the north, Hannibal masterminded several massive victories on the Italian peninsula which came close to crippling Rome. Through the foresight and skills of Quintus Fabius Maximus, and later Publius Scipio, Hannibal and Carthage were forced to capitulate after the Battle of Zama in northern Africa. The Second Punic War helped push Rome from a small city in central Italy to world power controling much of the Mediterranean. The book follows Hannibal through his death in Bithynia c. 181 BC. - Summary by Mark Harrington

Welcome fellow travelers to another exciting issue of The Thrill Book! Herein lies all manner of stories for the discerning fan of pulp fiction. We have the chilling science fiction tale of a demented inventor wreaking havoc upon the world in Murray Leinster's "A Thousand Degrees Below Zero". Explore the lost civilization of the Sargasso Sea in the first installment of "The Lost Empire"! We also get the next part of the sea-faring serial "The Opium Ship" as well as the concluding section of the spy story "Strasbourg Rose"! And that's only scratching the surface! So much more lies inside. We dare you to give The Thrill Book a listen. You'll be hooked! - Summary by Ben Tucker