The American Century
by Harold Evans 
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Photographs, illustrations and text recount the history and people of the United States during the twentieth century.Tags
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Evans, Harold. The American Century. New York: Alfred Knopf, 1998.
Any history buff should have this sitting on his or her shelf (and have a shelf sturdy enough to support this 700+ book). Chock full of intriguing cartoons and mesmerizing photographs, American Century covers every aspect of U.S. history from 1889 to the mid 1990s. Well written with commentaries and first hand accounts, history comes alive. The people, the politics, the power, the pitiful downfalls. The 20th century is laid out and every historical moment of worth is described and detailed.
Any history buff should have this sitting on his or her shelf (and have a shelf sturdy enough to support this 700+ book). Chock full of intriguing cartoons and mesmerizing photographs, American Century covers every aspect of U.S. history from 1889 to the mid 1990s. Well written with commentaries and first hand accounts, history comes alive. The people, the politics, the power, the pitiful downfalls. The 20th century is laid out and every historical moment of worth is described and detailed.
The story of the last 100 years in the life of the United States, and that of the 20th century. In this century, America became the largest economic and military power, sent men to the moon and opened a branch of McDonalds in Moscow. Over 900 photographs, cartoons and illustrations are included.
Although most of this sprawling book is set in the 20th century, it begins on April 29, 1889, when Benjamin Harrison commemorated the first centennial of American government. This 11-year jump-start allows Harold Evans to write about the last major push to settle the Western territories, the gradual displacement of Native American societies, the rise to prominence of William Jennings Bryan and other quintessentially American moments of the 19th show more century. show less
Although most of this sprawling book is set in the 20th century, it begins on April 29, 1889, when Benjamin Harrison commemorated the first centennial of American government. This 11-year jump-start allows Harold Evans to write about the last major push to settle the Western territories, the gradual displacement of Native American societies, the rise to prominence of William Jennings Bryan and other quintessentially American moments of the 19th show more century. show less
Excellent perspective
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"Books often surprise, but rarely this happily...Evans explores his century with energy and wit...A work of history that lives and breathes and wonderfully instructs."
added by private library
"Evans employs a tolerant, skeptical, dispassionate tone that makes for consistently absorbing reading, but what elevates his book above the (also laudable) The Century, by Peter Jennings and Todd Brewster is Evans's intellectual acuity..."
added by private library
"A sumptuous memory-book of an astonishing time. Like the crowded era it chronicles, The American Century is sometimes heroic, sometimes harrowing, but always compelling and relentlessly eventful. The brisk text breathes new life into even the best-remembered episodes, and the choice of historic photographs is superb...Richly rewards close reading."
added by private library
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4,934 works; 2 members
Author Information
45+ Works 1,926 Members
From 1997 to 1999, Harold Evans was Editorial Director and Vice Chairman of U.S. News and World Report, the New York Daily News, and Fast Company. He was President and Publisher of the Random House Trade Group from 1990 to 1997. He lives in New York City. (Bowker Author Biography) Harold Evans was an American- British Journalist, author and show more publisher. He was born, Harold Matthew Evans, in Manchester, England, on June 28, 1928. He got his first job in 1944 at a weekly, The Ashton-under-Lyne Reporter, before serving in the Royal Air Force from 1946 to 1949. He studied economics and political science at the University of Durham, graduating in 1952, and then joined The Manchester Evening News as a reporter and editorial writer. He continued his studies at the University of Chicago and Stanford University on an American fellowship from 1956 to 1957. In 1961, Mr. Evans became editor of The Northern Echo, a paper in Darlington, a working-class area in northeast England. A few years later, in 1966, he was hired in 1966 by The Sunday Times, he became editor a year later and transformed the weekly into Britain's best investigative paper. In 1982, he was forced out as editor of the Times of London and reinvented himself in the United States as a publisher, author. He taught at Duke and Yale Universities, became editor of the book publisher The Atlantic Monthly Press and took up the post of editorial director of the newsmagazine U.S. News & World Report. He was the founding editor of Condé Nast Traveler, where he worked from 1986 to 1990. From 1990 to 1997, he was president and publisher of Random House. He became an American citizen in 1993. After leaving Random House in 1997, he was an executive of The Daily News in New York, U.S. News & World Report (in a second stint), The Atlantic Monthly and the business magazine Fast Company. In 2011, he was named editor at large of the Reuters news agency. He was knighted in 2004 for his services to journalism, despite having left Britain 20 years earlier and becoming an American citizen. As an author, Evans's books include The American Century (1998, with Gail Buckland and Kevin Baker); War Stories: Reporting in the Time of Conflict from the Crimea to Iraq (2003); They Made America: From the Steam Engine to the Search Engine, Two Centuries of Innovators (2004, with Gail Buckland and David Lefer); My Paper Chase: True Stories of Vanished Times (2009), his memoir; and Do I Make Myself Clear? Why Writing Well Matters (2018). Harold Matthew Evans died on September 23, 2020, at the age of 92. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Harold Evans is a LibraryThing Author, an author who lists their personal library on LibraryThing.
Awards and Honors
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- The American Century
- Dedication
- To George and Isabel, New Americans
- First words
- This book is the thanks of an immigrant to the United States, and a celebration of my becoming an American citizen. (Preface)
In the spring of 1889 a white barge rowed by 13 sea captains, one for each of the original states, nudges into a Wall Street pier. (Introduction)
Here is the American frontier, vanishing before our eyes.
Showmanship comes naturally to the American temperament. (Afterword) - Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)For this book, I like to think of the first Kodak - used to take the facing photograph - as a metaphor for America's dedication to making all men free and equal. (Preface)
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)"Trade and Government will not alone be the favored aims of mankind," he wrote, "but every useful, elegant art, every exercise of the imagination, the height of reason, the noblest affection, the purest religion, will find their home in our institutions, and write our laws for the benefit of man." (Introduction)
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Fundraising, as well as defamation, was well on the way to becoming the major activity of American candidates.
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)In the American adventure, all is possible while freedom lives. (Afterword) - Blurbers
- Schlesinger, Arthur, Jr.; Powell, Colin L.; Weinstein, Allen; Galbraith, John Kenneth; Gregorian, Vartan; Kutler, Stanley I. (show all 11); Buckley, Christopher; Foote, Shelby; Morris, Edmund; Karnow, Stanley; Sheehan, Neil
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Statistics
- Members
- 423
- Popularity
- 73,308
- Reviews
- 3
- Rating
- (3.64)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook
- ISBNs
- 7
- ASINs
- 1
