Washington: A Life
Ron Chernow
Penguin Press
10/5/2010
Audiobook
904
Despite the reverence his name inspires Washington remains a waxwork to many readers, worthy but dull, a laconic man of remarkable self-control. But in this groundbreaking work Chernow revises forever the uninspiring stereotype. He portrays Washington as a strapping, celebrated horseman, elegant dancer and tireless hunter, who guarded his emotional life with intriguing ferocity. Not only did Washington gather around himself the foremost figures of the age, including James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, he orchestrated their actions to help realise his vision for the new federal government, define the separation of powers, and establish the office of the presidency.
This book covered much of the same ground as earlier Washington biographies have done, but I feel like it dove deeper into the inner thoughts of Washington, as much as they can be known. If one thing can be said about Washington, it’s that he was well aware of the place he would hold in history and was obsessive about cultivating the right appearance for posterity. The picture of Washington portrayed here is not all positive. There is much vanity and pettiness in his writings, but if any of us were as scrutinized as Washington, I’m sure the same could be said of all of us at times.
I really enjoyed this book, even when I had to return it before I’d finished and then resume reading it several months later!
Truman
David McCullough
Simon Schuster
6/14/1993
Audiobook
1120
The life of Harry S. Truman is one of the greatest of American stories, filled with vivid characters—Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, Eleanor Roosevelt, Bess Wallace Truman, George Marshall, Joe McCarthy, and Dean Acheson—and dramatic events. In this riveting biography, acclaimed historian David McCullough not only captures the man—a more complex, informed, and determined man than ever before imagined—but also the turbulent times in which he rose, boldly, to meet unprecedented challenges. The last president to serve as a living link between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries, Truman’s story spans the raw world of the Missouri frontier, World War I, the powerful Pendergast machine of Kansas City, the legendary Whistle-Stop Campaign of 1948, and the decisions to drop the atomic bomb, confront Stalin at Potsdam, send troops to Korea, and fire General MacArthur. Drawing on newly discovered archival material and extensive interviews with Truman’s own family, friends, and Washington colleagues, McCullough tells the deeply moving story of the seemingly ordinary “man from Missouri” who was perhaps the most courageous president in our history.
John Quincy Adams
Harlow Giles Unger
Da Capo Press
9/4/2012
Audiobook
304 pages
He fought for Washington, served with Lincoln, witnessed Bunker Hill, and sounded the clarion against slavery on the eve of the Civil War. He negotiated an end to the War of 1812, engineered the annexation of Florida, and won the Supreme Court decision that freed the African captives of The Amistad. He served his nation as minister to six countries, secretary of state, senator, congressman, and president.
Half way through this book I felt like I had read it before. I’m big into US Presidential biographies, so it’s possible I was confusing it with another John Quincy book. I kept reading though because the subject matter was just too interesting. A man who was a political partner of both George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Was friends with Kings, Tszars, and diplomats throughout Europe. A man who spent over 50 years serving the US government in 8 different high level positions and kept a detailed diary for even longer.
No one person was exposed to so many leaders among the American founding fathers from an extremely early age. His own father among them. Meeting Ben Franklin at age 12 and Thomas Jefferson soon thereafter. Appointed the US Minister to the Netherlands at age 24 by George Washington, he served in four different Europe countries as US Minister or Envoy between 1794 and 1817. In between he was a US Senator for five years and then served as Secretary of State for 8 years under President Monroe. He dined with John Hancock, locked horns and partnered up with Henry Clay, and was a professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard.
This would be a lifetime of service for many, but after this he became the 6th US President, a position he seemed to have been, and in many ways was, groomed for by his parents John and Abigail Adams. Having a somewhat unapproachable intellect and failing to promote his ideas to the American public he collided with a headstrong Andrew Jackson who harassed his supporters and belittled his programs to make his single term largely uneventful.
Unlike many presidential biographies that end shortly after the presidential term is over. John Quincy’s story was not done. After 2 years in retirement, he won election to the US House of Representatives from Massachusetts. In this position he may have found his most effective role. He was a fiery opponent of slavery throughout his career in the House and fought and succeeded to remove the “gag rule” that had ended debate of the slavery issue in Congress. A powerful speaker who was matched by few, he collapsed from a stroke on the house floor and died two days later inside the Speaker of the House’s office.
This book drew heavily from John Quincy’s own diary and from the many letters sent among his family members. It provides a deep look into his thoughts and feelings throughout his life. Especially touching were the bits of poetry he wrote as he lost so many children and loved ones at early ages. Overall a great book and great man. 100% recommend.
Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President
Candice Millard
Doubleday
9/20/2011
Audiobook
339 pages
James A. Garfield was one of the most extraordinary men ever elected president. Born into abject poverty, he rose to become a wunderkind scholar, a Civil War hero, and a renowned and admired reformist congressman. Nominated for president against his will, he engaged in a fierce battle with the corrupt political establishment. But four months after his inauguration, a deranged office seeker tracked Garfield down and shot him in the back.
Three sentence summary:
Story of the assassination of James Garfield by an unlikely assassin. Not only reveals an innocence of America during this time (1881), but also the primitiveness of the medical profession. The influence that Thomas Lister and Alexander Graham Bell had on the saving lives AFTER Garfield’s is astonishing to someone in this day.
Review:
This book kept me interested the entire time. Despite feeling terribly sorry for the suffering of Garfield after he was shot, the book revealed a good man who likely could have gone on to make a good President. It does a great job of weaving the stories of Garfield, Lister, Bell and Guiteau into a connected story. While there are times when I felt sympathy for Guiteau, I mostly saw him as a man who could not take control of himself and was routinely looking for a way out to ease his own conscience. Perhaps he was in fact insane, but troubled doesn’t begin to tell it. Lister and Bell were both ahead of their time, and both were not as respected as they should have been for their foresight.
A Country of Vast Designs: James K. Polk, the Mexican War and the Conquest of the American Continent
Robert W. Merry
Simon Schuster
11/3/2009
Audiobook
575 pages
When James K. Polk was elected president in 1844, the United States was locked in a bitter diplomatic struggle with Britain over the rich lands of the Oregon Territory, which included what is now Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Texas, not yet part of the Union, was threatened by a more powerful Mexico. And the territories north and west of Texas -- what would become California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and part of Colorado -- belonged to Mexico. When Polk relinquished office four years later, the country had grown by more than a third as all these lands were added. The continental United States, as we know it today, was established -- facing two oceans and positioned to dominate both.
I basically knew nothing about James Polk before reading this book beyond that he came after Tyler and before Taylor. I found the story of his presidency immediately relateable to modern politics. The trials that he went through are amazing and the success he had in both completing the tasks he laid out for himself and sticking to his promise of only one term are impressive. The book was well written and kept my interest the entire time. I listened to the audio book, so I’d imagine that a second reading would help me pick up more tidbits.
I found the information about the Mexican-American War especially fascinating. I knew very little about this war, let alone the machinations that went into it’s development and ultimate settlement. The time restraints on communication alone bring such a different element to diplomacy from today’s immediate notification that it almost becomes unbelievable.
Overall, a very good book that I found highly entertaining and informative.
Calvin Coolidge, who served as president from 1923 to 1929, never rated highly in polls. The shy Vermonter, nicknamed "Silent Cal," has long been dismissed as quiet and passive. History has remembered the decade in which he served as a frivolous, extravagant period predating the Great Depression. Now Amity Shlaes, the author known for her riveting, unexpected portrait of the 1930s, provides a similarly fresh look at the 1920s and its elusive president. Shlaes shows that the mid-1920s was, in fact, a triumphant period that established our modern way of life: the nation electrified, Americans drove their first cars, and the federal deficit was replaced with a surplus. Coolidge is an eye-opening biography of the little-known president behind that era of remarkable growth and national optimism.
I had not read anything about President Coolidge before, and honestly didn’t know much about him at all. I found in Coolidge a no nonsense rural man who I related to on many levels. He was a man of great ambition, though he was portrayed as being a reluctant vice presidential candidate, but I think he was only disappointing because he didn’t get the Presidential nod. Warren Harding was a fascinating character, and seems to have been a direct opposite to Coolidge in social circles. In a day when every politician seems to be independently wealthy, it’s nice to see Coolidge struggle with and conquer his own personal finances, the White House’s domestic budget, and the national budget. I appreciate the taxation policies that Coolidge enacted and was glad to find they had the desired effect, though I’m not sure you can take away too much from that scenario since the tax rates he inherited were so high to begin with.
Taking over for Harding, continuing his programs, and not seeking a second full term, are signs of the true man that is Collidge. In the end, Coolidge was a decent and fair man who did the best that he could. His frankness in dealing with problems is something that politicians today could learn from, though I’m not sure the people of today would respect them for it.
Fraternity: A Journey in Search of Five Presidents
Bob Greene
Three Rivers Press
10/25/2005
Audiobook
304 pages
What if you set off on a vacation trip in search of history—and your destination was the men who had been president? Asking himself that tantalizing question, bestselling author Bob Greene embarked on a long journey across the nation, hoping to spend time with Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, George Bush and Ronald Reagan. The result of his odyssey is Fraternity.
I had hoped that this book would have some deep insights into the lives of Presidents and show the behind the scenes story of the presidency. But, instead it answered questions on how the President gets his groceries, and what name his friends call him by. I think the most annoying thing was listening to the inane questions the author asked. When I found that I had mistakenly returned the last disk before I listened to it, I didn’t feel any loss and gladly set it aside.
The Ascent of George Washington: The Hidden Political Genius of an American Icon
John Ferling
Bloomsbury Press
June 2009
438
Even compared to his fellow founders, George Washington stands tall. Our first president has long been considered a stoic hero, holding himself above the rough-and-tumble politics of his day. Now John Ferling peers behind that image, carefully burnished by Washington himself, to show us a leader who was not only not above politics, but a canny infighter—a master of persuasion, manipulation, and deniability.
Ferling argues that not only was Washington one of America’s most adroit politicians—the proof of his genius is that he is no longer thought of as a politician at all.
John Adams
David McCullough
Simon & Schuster
5/22/2001
Audiobook
751
In this powerful, epic biography, David McCullough unfolds the adventurous life-journey of John Adams, the brilliant, fiercely independent, often irascible, always honest Yankee patriot -- "the colossus of independence," as Thomas Jefferson called him -- who spared nothing in his zeal for the American Revolution; who rose to become the second President of the United States and saved the country from blundering into an unnecessary war; who was learned beyond all but a few and regarded by some as "out of his senses"; and whose marriage to the wise and valiant Abigail Adams is one of the moving love stories in American history.
Washington: A Life
