US Presidents
April 30, 1789, when George Washington took the oath of office as the first president of the United States to the present — 46 presidencies have led the nation from its violent beginning through turbulent times, near-extinction, world triumph, and long domestic and international challenges. I realized how steadily I sold biographies and histories dealing with the US Presidents, and I thought I would begin on the ambitious project of all the books related to the subject that I stock. Here is the beginning of an ongoing work. I am including the necessary topics of spouses and general administration (not just the individual). Endlessly fascinating to the reader — and apparently inspiring to our best historians.
The listing is chronological, most recent to George Washington top to bottom of the page, with some books on leadership and so forth at the bottom. The most recent President, Donald Trump, is having many books published with political or polemical edges to them. The political books are listed on the Politics & Current Events page. For this page I will strive to select books on Trump that have a historical framework or methodology.
Leadership in Turbulent Times
Leadership in Turbulent Times
The New York Times bestselling book about the early development, growth, and exercise of leadership from Pulitzer Prize-winning author Doris Kearns Goodwin “should help us raise our expectations of our national leaders, our country, and ourselves” (The Washington Post).
“After five decades of magisterial output, Doris Kearns Goodwin leads the league of presidential historians” (USA TODAY). In her “inspiring” (The Christian Science Monitor) Leadership, Doris Kearns Goodwin draws upon the four presidents she has studied most closely—Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson (in civil rights)—to show how they recognized leadership qualities within themselves and were recognized as leaders by others. By looking back to their first entries into public life, we encounter them at a time when their paths were filled with confusion, fear, and hope.
Leadership tells the story of how they all collided with dramatic reversals that disrupted their lives and threatened to shatter forever their ambitions. Nonetheless, they all emerged fitted to confront the contours and dilemmas of their times. At their best, all four were guided by a sense of moral purpose. At moments of great challenge, they were able to summon their talents to enlarge the opportunities and lives of others. Does the leader make the times or do the times make the leader?
“If ever our nation needed a short course on presidential leadership, it is now” (The Seattle Times). This seminal work provides an accessible and essential road map for aspiring and established leaders in every field. In today’s polarized world, these stories of authentic leadership in times of apprehension and fracture take on a singular urgency. “Goodwin’s volume deserves much praise—it is insightful, readable, compelling: Her book arrives just in time” (The Boston Globe).