David McCullough (1933–2022)

The Definitive Biography of an Underrated Founding Father

Biography of John Adams (1735-1826), the ideological force behind the Declaration of Independence, the first vice president of the United States and second president, whose contributions to the founding of our nation and the isms which defined it are too often understated in biographies of his headliner fellow Founding Fathers Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. David McCullough excels at show more giving novel-character-like life to long-dead luminaries, which is especially difficult for Adams, because he was not what we now call a "complicated" historical figure. His ideas didn't "evolve" for the most part, and he would live by more or less the same beliefs and morals from his years as a student at Harvard through his semi-retirement from public life in 1801 to his death 25 years later. McCullough humanizes Adams by relating in detail the story of the most well-known fact about him - his romance with his wife of 54 years, née Abigail Smith. But he also establishes the world - both geographical and intellectual - in which Adams lived. When Americans think of the Revolution and the nation-building which succeeded it, we frequently believe the outcome to be inevitable, even preordained. Our cause was just, and the definition of phrases like "three coequal branches of government" and "freedom of speech" are self-evident. In reality, these results were often far from certain. McCullough's equally excellent military history 1776 (2005) describes the moments of heavy indeterminacy on the battlefield, but it is with this biography, through the eyes of a resolute "old oak," as Abigail describes him, where McCullough explores the often heated philosophical debates which made "the American experiment" such an experiment. It is a truly definitive biography which has resonance today and will no doubt continue to resonate in the U.S. and other nations as-yet-unfounded 200 years from now. show less

Summary: A collection of addresses given by the author articulating some of the defining and distinctive qualities that define America at its best.

David McCullough has been one of those authors whose books I always make a point to pick up whenever a new one comes out. I was tempted to make an exception with this one, not usually being drawn to read transcripts of speeches. When I found it at a good discount, I took the plunge and I am glad I did.

The thread that links these speeches, given show more between 1989 and 2016 is what truly makes America great. McCullough would contend that it is the people and the democratic ideas and ideals and the working out of these, that have defined our greatness. He assembled this collection during the contentious presidential race of 2016, and it is striking that he bookends the collection with speeches discussing the history of congress, and the Capitol building where it does its work. He highlights the distinguished figures who inhabited those halls from John Quincy Adams, former president and ardent anti-slavery advocate to Margaret Chase Smith, who in her first term stood up to Joseph McCarthy, and landmark legislation including the Morrill Land Grant Act establishing public tertiary education in the growing post-Civil War nation. McCullough highlights the collaboration across the political aisle that marked great legislative accomplishments, a challenge to both of our political parties.

A number of the speeches are college commencement addresses. A common theme here was McCullough's affirmation of the aspirations of his listeners, and his encouragements that they become life long readers, including readers of our nation's history. To Boston College grads in a speech titled "The Love of Learning" he writes:

"Read. Read, read! Read the classics of American literature that you've never opened. Read your country's history. How can we profess to love our country and take no interest in its history? Read into the history of Greece and Rome. Read about the great turning points in the history of science and medicine and ideas.

Read for pleasure to be sure. I adore a good thriller or a first rate murder mystery. But take seriously--read closely--books that have stood the test of time. Study a masterpiece, take it apart, study its architecture, its vocabulary, its intent. Underline, make notes in the margins, and after a few years, go back and read it again (pp. 147-148)."

Couldn't have said it better!

In every address, it is plain that McCullough has taken some time to look into the history of the place where he is speaking. Given my Ohio roots, I found it fascinating to read his speech at Ohio University and his sketch of the life of Manasseh Cutler, who was instrumental in the founding of Ohio University in 1804. Cutler was a minister, doctor, and lawyer wrapped up in one. Most significantly, perhaps, he was instrumental in lobbying Congress in the creation of the Northwest Ordinance, creating the Ohio company to sell the land and setting aside significant tracts to create universities, including Ohio University. In the end, the ordinance declared:

"Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and means of education shall be forever encouraged."

A number of the addresses reflect the high estimation in which McCullough holds John Adams. He recounts two sentences of a letter Adams wrote on his first night in the White House, that are now inscribed in the mantelpiece of the State Dining Room:

"I pray heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house, and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof."

While McCullough refrains from overt criticism either of Congress or the White House, his narrative of the people and ideas that have "made America great" stands as an implicit challenge both to our leaders and to us as citizens, first to understand the ideas and ideals that have distinguished us at our best, and then to live up to them rather than depart from them.

This pithy collection of speeches, accompanied by a number of striking photo of people and places serves well to whet the appetite to read more into our history, both to learn from and be inspired by it. show less

Summary: Vignettes of the waves of Americans who came to Paris as writers, artists, medical students, musicians, politicians, diplomats, and members of the cultured elite, and the profound impact the "City of Light" had on their lives.

Before An American in Paris was a George Gershwin composition, it was a reality for generations of Americans who played culture-shaping roles on both sides of the Atlantic. Historian and biographer David McCullough combines these two genres in a history of the show more Americans who took the risky journey to Europe, and a "greater journey" culturally and intellectually during their time in Paris.

The book is organized chronologically beginning in the 1820's and the journeys of James Fenimore Cooper, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., lawyer and later abolitionist Charles Sumner up through the 1890's with Henry Adams and sculptor Augustus Saint Gaudens. Some lived in Paris just a few years, some, like artist George A.P. Healey for most of their adult lives. All were profoundly touched by Paris. Sumner, living among students from Africa while pursuing studies in the Sorbonne, came to realize these people were his intellectual equals, and became an abolitionist. Later, after being caned by southern congressman Preston Brooks following a fiery anti-slavery speech, Sumner found Paris the one place that could calm his shattered nerves and restore his physical well-being.

Many came to study medicine in Paris including Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. and Henry Bowditch. Most determined of all was Elizabeth Blackwell, who became the first women physician in America. Americans braved the dangers of a typhoid epidemic and learned the most advanced, and yet by modern standards, primitive methods of surgery.

The artists found special inspiration, studying with masters and reproducing the masterpieces they found in the Louvre. Most striking is the story of Samuel F. B. Morse, who painted a giant painting of a room in the Louvre with selected masterpieces. This is the same Morse who eventually invented the telegraph. In a later period, we read the story of Mary Cassatt, who joins the impressionists, and paints striking works of domestic scenes with family members as her subjects. The works of John Singer Sargent won acclaim in Paris, culminating in the controversial Madame X, a life-size portrait of Madame Gautreau, a striking woman with dark hair and deathly white skin. It was in Paris where Augustus Saint Gaudens executed statues of David Farragut and William Sherman and many others that are the most distinctive public sculptures in New York and other cities (including a statue of Lincoln in Lincoln Park, Chicago.

Perhaps most striking for me was the narrative of the courageous efforts of American ambassador Elihu Washburne during the seige of Paris. Washburne stayed throughout, and because of the diary he kept, provided a narrative of his efforts to secret refugees as well as Americans out of the country, intercede on behalf of prisoners, and provide food and other assistance in an increasingly famine-ridden city. One short entry typifies his exertions:

"December 15. 89th day of the siege....Went to the Legation this P.M. at two o'clock. The ante room was filled with poor German women asking aid. I am now giving succor to more than six hundred women and children."

His presence throughout the siege and fall of Paris, and his diary mark him as one of the very greatest of American ambassadors, and a more than worthy successor to Franklin, John Adams, and Jefferson.

I've read some reviews of this book that criticize it for its multitude of characters and problems of continuity. I did not find this a problem because the common theme that runs through was the profound impact Paris had on all of these figures and how so many of their culture-shaping and making contributions trace back to the unique milieu of Paris. In addition, McCullough's skill in sketching out the unique character of each of these individuals as well as the community they often formed with each other as well as Parisian friends and mentor. One thinks of similar places like New York at certain times, and the artistic communities as diverse as those in Harlem and Greenwich Village. What McCullough does here is trace an influential artistic and intellectual community over the course of nearly a century, through vicissitudes of plague and political upheaval continuing to be a "City of Light" to so many who came to her. I don't think McCullough answers the question of why, but perhaps that is the mystique of Paris. show less

Typical of David McCullough's other books that I have read (John Adams, 1776, The Johnstown Flood, and The Great Bridge) this one includes volumes of careful research and first hand accounts jam-packed into a fully realized examination of the subject.

Sometimes this amounts to a bit too much information to the detriment of energetic storytelling, but in this case, I believe the story is SO complex that it deserves to have all its many layered facets exposed and examined. While I always "knew" show more that the building of the Panama Canal had been a complicated and often daunting undertaking, I never realized how close to disaster the project remained throughout most of its planning and construction. The story behind the original French effort to build the canal was completely unknown to me marking the first half of the book as "new history". For me there is always a thrill in discovering new information and hearing new stories, especially those that have simply been outside of my radar. Ah! to have the time to read all the fascinating stories that have made up our human history would be paradise, but then of course one would need to time to read them again just to savor the experience.

Path Between the Seas is sometimes hard to read only because it is disquieting to follow along with faulty decision making with the full advantage of hindsight. It gives one pause to consider what generations of the future will pick out as the follies within our own decisions as a society, a people, an individual (if we should even make it into future stories!). What seems so reasonable in the present, often becomes slightly ridiculous in hindsight. It's a lesson for us all.

My favorite quote comes from John Stevens, the railroad construction engineer ultimately given the task of actually building the canal for the United States. He told his new division head, "You won't get fired if you do something, you will if you don't do anything. Do something and if it is wrong you can correct that, but there is no way to correct nothing." show less