America's Hidden History: Untold Tales of the First Pilgrims, Fighting Women, and Forgotten Founders Who Shaped a Nation

I found myself telling my friends and family members tidbits from this book. Very interesting read, & well-written. I wasn't surprised to learn that George Washington wasn't quite the perfect human being he's been held out to be. Interesting supplement to traditional historical studies.

Untold tales are interesting, but the real value to me was what these tales revealed about the characters in them. Kenneth Davis did a great job of putting their lives and actions in a meaningful context.
Living not far from the Hutchinson River Parkway, I was fascinated by his take on the tale of Anne Hutchinson. I'd heard it before, of course, and knew the basics. What Davis told me, though, was that she had advised some of her male disciples not to join a militia at war with local Indians, making her an organizer of some of America's earliest conscientious objectors. He also pointed out that it was after her trial that the Puritans in Boston banned Roman Catholics, Quakers, and other sects. Her younger sister, who became a Quaker, was show more whipped for blasphemy. Another of her followers who joined the Quakers, Mary Dyer, was arrested, stripped in public, and lashed. Later, the defiant Dyer returned to Boston, refused to leave and was executed.
Davis gives us equally illuminating tales of George Washington as a headstrong and ambitious young man who committed a war crime, what Paul Revere really did during the Revolution, and how Daniel Shay stood up for his rights only to be crushed like a bug--making American stronger in the process.
America's Hidden History reads as if it were told from the inside, full of first-person accounts and other source material that give us a clear, relatively objective view of what our founding fathers (and mothers) were like. show less

Interesting stories that are not in the history books covering the periods 1469-1789 in American history. Thought it was a good book for giving "forgotten" background information for the Revolution and Pre-Revolutionary times. I'd read another by this author. But the best part is this paragraph in the intro: "The eight-hundred-pound gorilla sitting squarely in the center of this story is religion...this volatile mixture of fearful ignorance and righteous certitude allows one group to demonize and dehumanize another. And once you have accomplished that, it is much easier to hang people as heretics..." I think that should be required reading of every college student in a liberal arts intro to history class.

I read this book as part of my research on the history of New England for a book that I am working on. I just love these types of history books that tell stories not normally covered in other history books. I reminded me of the book “Lies My Teacher Told Me.” The writing was excellent and the stories were intriguing, giving me another look at the people and events you think that you already know but you do not! I recommend this book and books like this that tell the true stories not the watered down version so often recorded in school textbooks.

I'm convinced that if history teachers would assign Ken Davis' books to read instead of our current text books, we'd have a generation of students who might once again be interested in how their country started. I especially like the way he takes each section or subject, presents a time line and then fleshes out the timeline. Then he presents an 'afterward' so we aren't just left hanging, we find out for instance what consequences George Washington suffered (or didn't suffer- no spoilers here!) when he 'spun' his report about a skirmish with the french in his early days of soldiering.

This book is a little drier, and not quite as exciting as some of his others, but still quite worth suggesting to someone who thinks he/she doesn't like show more history. 3 1/2 stars. show less

Readers who "don't know much about history" might get more out of this than I did. None of the chapters are really "untold tales" as the subtitle states. However, a few probably have less familiarity, such as that of Hannah Dustan. Kenneth Davis does have a knack for presenting history from a multitude of secondary sources in a readable manner. Some information acted as a refresher for me.

I read this because it was on the National Daughters of the American Revolution Library's Book Club 2021-2022 reading list.

I much prefer this history lesson to the ones currently taught in school. More realistic, guts and glory, and some not so honorable events. By whitewashing these events, or even ignoring them, we fail to learn from history and from others mistakes. I rather have a leader with flaws that I can relate to than one who "never told a lie" and had no flaws. Definitely a good read.