Author: Gordon S. Wood
Genre: Non-Fiction
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group, 2007
Pages: 336
Rating: Recommend
Synopsis: An illuminating group portrait of the men who came to be known as the Founding Fathers, this book asks, what made these men great, and shows us, among other things, just how much character did in fact matter.
The life of each - Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Madison, Paine, and Burr - is presented individually as well as collectively, but the thread that binds these portraits together is the idea of character as a lived reality. They were members of the first generation in history that was self-consciously self-made men who understood the arc of lives, as of nations, is one of moral progress.
Review: I found this book so interesting. Wood humanizes the Founding Fathers in the context of their time, the men who have become more mythical characters in the long ago past of American History. No matter how well you think you know history, there is always something new to takeaway from a book like this.
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