See America First: Travel Histories in the United States

Originally coined around 1906 the phrase "See America First" was meant to inspire Americans to travel the nation before boating and later jetting off to Europe. Seeing America first became a slogan for some rail lines that intentionally located stops outside of the emerging National Parks at the end of the 19th century. Moving into the 20th century with the advent of the car, the classic American road trip was born; though not all Americans are able to fully enjoy this new form of recreation as the realities of a segregated nation. This list collects titles that highlight some of that evolution in American recreational life and other tales from the American road. Also included are links to historic national parks brochures and New York Public Library's digitzed collection of Green Books

Updated June 4, 2025
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Fond du Lac Public Library
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50 true tales from our great national parks
Pearson, Stephanie
Paper Book
Immerse yourself in the wonder and diversity of America's great outdoors with 50 true stories inspired by some of its most iconic national parks.   This gift treasury collection gathers real-life stories from parks across the USA, including Great Smoky Mountains,...
Driving while black : African American travel and the road to civil rights
Sorin, Gretchen Sullivan
Paper Book
The basis of a major PBS documentary by Gretchen Sorin and Ric Burns (first airing: October 13, 2020 at 9PM ET), this revelatory history shows how the automobile fundamentally changed African American life. It's hardly a secret that mobility has always been limited, if not impossible...
Traveling Black : a story of race and resistance
Bay, Mia
Paper Book
Winner of the Bancroft Prize Winner of the David J. Langum Prize Winner of the Lillian Smith Book Award Winner of the Order of the Coif Book Award Winner of the OAH Liberty Legacy Foundation Award A New York Times Critics' Top Book of the Year
The national parks : America's best idea : an illustrated history
Duncan, Dayton.
Paper Book
The companion volume to the twelve-hour PBS series from the acclaimed filmmaker behind The Civil War, Baseball, and The War. America's national parks spring from an idea as radical as the Declaration of Independence: that the nation's most magnificent and sacred...
The national parks America's best idea
Duncan, Dayton.
DVD
Walking home ground in the footsteps of Muir, Leopold, and Derleth
Root, Robert L.
Ebook
When longtime author Robert Root moves to a small town in southeast Wisconsin, he gets to know his new home by walking the same terrain traveled by three Wisconsin luminaries who were deeply rooted in place--John Muir, Aldo Leopold, and August Derleth. Root walks with Muir at John Muir...
On the road
Kerouac, Jack
Paper Book
The classic novel of freedom and the search for authenticity that defined a generation--made into a 2012 film by Walter Salles, director of The Motorcycle Diaries September 5th, 2017 marks the 60th anniversary of the publication of On the Road ...
The journal, 1837-1861
Thoreau, Henry David
Ebook
The largest one-volume edition of Thoreau's 25-year journal, with "some of the most vigorous and original prose in English" and insights on Walden and other works (Washington Post). Henry David Thoreau's Journal was his life's work: the daily practice of...
Rival rails : the race to build America's greatest transcontinental railroad
Borneman, Walter R.
Audiobook
The driving of the golden spike at Promontory Summit, which marked the completion of the country's first transcontinental railroad, was only the beginning of the race for railroad dominance. In the aftermath of this building feat, dozens of railroads, each with aggressive empire builders at their...
The edge of anarchy : the railroad barons, the Gilded Age, and the greatest labor uprising in America
Kelly, Jack
Paper Book
"Timely and urgent...The core of The Edge of Anarchy is a thrilling description of the boycott of Pullman cars and equipment by Eugene Debs's fledgling American Railway Union..." --The New York Times "During the summer of 1894, the stubborn and irascible Pullman...
https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/9ea5d5b0-1117-0132-7932-58d385a7b928

New York Public Library\'s collection of the Motorists Greenbook. The Green Book was a travel guide that aimed to provide African Americans information about reliable businesses around the country between 1936 and 1967.

NYPL\'s Digital Collections is a living database featuring prints, photographs, maps, manuscripts, video, and more unique research materials.

https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/brochures/index.htm

A digital collection of brochures from the National Parks Service with travel information going back to 1912 for the National Parks in the United States. Collection not fully online. More complete digital coverage for guides dating to the 1920s and 1940s.


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