Author: Joseph J. Ellis Publisher: Vintage ISBN: 0375705244 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 306
Book Description
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A landmark work of history explores how a group of greatly gifted but deeply flawed individuals—Hamilton, Burr, Jefferson, Franklin, Washington, Adams, and Madison—confronted the overwhelming challenges before them to set the course for our nation. “A splendid book—humane, learned, written with flair and radiant with a calm intelligence and wit.” —The New York Times Book Review The United States was more a fragile hope than a reality in 1790. During the decade that followed, the Founding Fathers—re-examined here as Founding Brothers—combined the ideals of the Declaration of Independence with the content of the Constitution to create the practical workings of our government. Through an analysis of six fascinating episodes—Hamilton and Burr’s deadly duel, Washington’s precedent-setting Farewell Address, Adams’ administration and political partnership with his wife, the debate about where to place the capital, Franklin’s attempt to force Congress to confront the issue of slavery and Madison’s attempts to block him, and Jefferson and Adams’ famous correspondence—Founding Brothers brings to life the vital issues and personalities from the most important decade in our nation’s history.
Author: Joseph J. Ellis Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company ISBN: 0393068277 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 358
Book Description
An absorbing, insightful profile of the revolutionary leader, president, husband, and father from one of our best historians, now in a beautiful new package. John Adams was unique among the nation’s founders in leaving a record of his most intimate thoughts and feelings. Instinctively candid and politically incisive, Adams offers the clearest view of the ambitions and principles that drove the revolutionary generation. Passionate Sage offers a brilliant introduction to the second president: his politics, his affinities for family and friendship even with political opponents like Jefferson, and his enduring significance. “Ellis’s palpable affection lends a pleasing glow to his profile of Adams, which is why Passionate Sage is his best book.”—Judith Shulevitz, New York Times Book Review “Impassioned and erudite. . . . A captivating portrait of this Massachusetts native as a wonderfully contrary genius possessed of an uncommon moral intelligence and farsighted political wisdom.”—Michiko Kakutani, New York Times “The best portrait of a Revolutionary-era statesman.”—Evan Thomas, Wall Street Journal
Author: Robert C. Baron Publisher: Fulcrum Publishing ISBN: 9781936218080 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
This is a book about two special men and their time. But it is also about friendship, books and libraries, reading, understanding the wisdom of the past, and acting on this knowledge. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson were among the great library builders of their age. They used the information in their books to guide them and, in their retirement, they articulated the role of books and ideas in their lives. Their lives were intertwined; they documented in letters and other writings what they felt, thought, and did. Except for the few years when they were political enemies, they were friends who shared ideas and engaged in one of the most distinguished correspondences in American history or letters. Introspective, reflective, and remarkably informed, these men tested each other's understanding of the previous half century of the nation's political, economic, and social development at the same time that they shared credit as founding fathers for much of what America had become. The year 2009 marked the bicentennial of Thomas Jefferson leaving the presidency and returning to Monticello-and also the start of the rebuilding of the friendship between Adams and Jefferson. Jefferson wrote to Adams in 1815, "I cannot live without books." And Adams wrote, "We ought not to die before we have explained ourselves to each other." And so they did in their correspondence as they reviewed the Revolution, the Constitution, and ideas on democracy from the Greeks to the Enlightenment. In June 2009, a weeklong conference called "John Adams and Thomas Jefferson: Libraries, Leadership, and Legacy" was held initially in Boston and then in Charlottesville. Thirty-two scholars presented papers on these two great Americans and the ideas they shared. Speakers came from twenty institutions in the United States, Canada, and Great Britain. The conference was sponsored by seven national organizations, including the Boston Public Library, the Massachusetts Historical Society, and the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies, Monticello. Book jacket.
Author: Gordon S. Wood Publisher: Penguin ISBN: 0735224714 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 530
Book Description
A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of 2017 A Wall Street Journal Best Book of 2017 From the great historian of the American Revolution, New York Times-bestselling and Pulitzer-winning Gordon Wood, comes a majestic dual biography of two of America's most enduringly fascinating figures, whose partnership helped birth a nation, and whose subsequent falling out did much to fix its course. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams could scarcely have come from more different worlds, or been more different in temperament. Jefferson, the optimist with enough faith in the innate goodness of his fellow man to be democracy's champion, was an aristocratic Southern slaveowner, while Adams, the overachiever from New England's rising middling classes, painfully aware he was no aristocrat, was a skeptic about popular rule and a defender of a more elitist view of government. They worked closely in the crucible of revolution, crafting the Declaration of Independence and leading, with Franklin, the diplomatic effort that brought France into the fight. But ultimately, their profound differences would lead to a fundamental crisis, in their friendship and in the nation writ large, as they became the figureheads of two entirely new forces, the first American political parties. It was a bitter breach, lasting through the presidential administrations of both men, and beyond. But late in life, something remarkable happened: these two men were nudged into reconciliation. What started as a grudging trickle of correspondence became a great flood, and a friendship was rekindled, over the course of hundreds of letters. In their final years they were the last surviving founding fathers and cherished their role in this mighty young republic as it approached the half century mark in 1826. At last, on the afternoon of July 4th, 50 years to the day after the signing of the Declaration, Adams let out a sigh and said, At least Jefferson still lives. He died soon thereafter. In fact, a few hours earlier on that same day, far to the south in his home in Monticello, Jefferson died as well. Arguably no relationship in this country's history carries as much freight as that of John Adams of Massachusetts and Thomas Jefferson of Virginia. Gordon Wood has more than done justice to these entwined lives and their meaning; he has written a magnificent new addition to America's collective story.
Author: Annette Gordon-Reed Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company ISBN: 0393337766 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 800
Book Description
Historian and legal scholar Gordon-Reed presents this epic work that tells the story of the Hemingses, an American slave family and their close blood ties to Thomas Jefferson.
Author: John E. Ferling Publisher: Pivotal Moments in American Hi ISBN: 9780195189063 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 294
Book Description
A history of the presidential campaign follows the clash between the two candidates, Adams and Jefferson, and their different visions of the future of America, the machinations that led to Jefferson's victory, and the repercussions of the campaign.
Author: David McCullough Publisher: Simon and Schuster ISBN: 141657588X Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 18
Book Description
Profiles John Adams, an influential patriot during the American Revolution who became the nation's first vice president and second president.
Author: Joseph J. Ellis Publisher: Vintage ISBN: 0375727469 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 463
Book Description
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER Following Thomas Jefferson from the drafting of the Declaration of Independence to his retirement in Monticello, Joseph J. Ellis unravels the contradictions of the Jeffersonian character. He gives us the slaveholding libertarian who was capable of decrying mescegenation while maintaing an intimate relationship with his slave, Sally Hemmings; the enemy of government power who exercisdd it audaciously as president; the visionarty who remained curiously blind to the inconsistencies in his nature. American Sphinx is a marvel of scholarship, a delight to read, and an essential gloss on the Jeffersonian legacy.
Author: John E. Ferling Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA ISBN: 9780195150841 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 430
Book Description
Setting the World Ablaze tells the story of the American Revolution and of three Founders who played crucial roles in winning the War of Independence and creating a new nation: George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson. A leading historian of the Revolutionary era, Ferling draws upon an unsurpassed command of the primary sources and a talent for swiftly moving narrative to give us intimate views of each of these men. He provides both an overarching historical picture of the era and a gripping sense of how these conservative men--successful members of the colonial elite--were transformed into radical revolutionaries.
Author: John Ferling Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA ISBN: 1608195430 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 465
Book Description
One of America's foremost historians brilliantly brings to life the fierce struggle - both public and, ultimately, bitterly personal - between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton - two rivals whose opposing visions of what the United States should be continue to shape our country to this day.
Author: Joseph J. Ellis
Author: Joseph J. Ellis
Author: Robert C. Baron
Author: Gordon S. Wood
Author: Annette Gordon-Reed
Author: John E. Ferling
Author: David McCullough
Author: Joseph J. Ellis
Author: John E. Ferling
Author: John Ferling