To America: Personal Reflections of an Historian

Completed shortly before Ambrose's untimely death, To America is a very personal look at our nation's history through the eyes of one of the twentieth century's most influential historians.

Ambrose roams the country's history, praising the men and women who made it exceptional. He considers Jefferson and Washington, who were progressive thinkers (while living a contradiction as slaveholders), and celebrates Lincoln and Roosevelt. He recounts Andrew Jackson's stunning defeat of a superior British force in the battle of New Orleans with a ragtag army in the War of 1812. He brings to life Lewis and Clark's grueling journey across the wilderness and the building of the railroad that joined the nation coast to coast. Taking swings at political correctness, as well as his own early biases, Ambrose grapples with the country's historic sins of racism; its ill treatment of Native Americans; and its tragic errors such as the war in Vietnam, which he ardently opposed. He contrasts the modern presidencies of Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, and Johnson. He considers women's and civil rights, immigration, philanthropy, and nation building. Most powerfully, in this final volume, Ambrose offers an accolade to the historian's mighty calling.

Now in paperback--the "New York Times" bestseller on the history of America and the pioneering men and women who made the nation what it is today.

Stephen E. Ambrose wrote more than twenty-five works of history, including Undaunted Courage, D-Day, Citizen Soldiers, Nothing Like It in the World, and Band of Brothers as well as multivolume biographies of Presidents Eisenhower and Nixon. He was founder of the Eisenhower Center, president of the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans, and recipient of a National Humanities Award in 1999 as well as the Distinguished Civilian Service Medal from the Department of Defense in 2000. He died in 2002.

Table of Contents

Preface: Storytelling

One: The Founding Fathers

Two: The Battle of New Orleans

Three: The Indian Country

Four: The Transcontinental Railroad

Five: Grant and Reconstruction

Six: Theodore Roosevelt and the Beginning of the American Century

Seven: Democracy, Eisenhower, and the War in Europe

Eight: The War in the Pacific

Nine: The Legacy of World War II

Ten: Vietnam

Eleven: Writing in and About America

Twelve: War Stories: Crazy Horse and Custer and Pegasus Bridge

Thirteen: Writing About Nixon

Fourteen: Writing About Men in Action, 1992-2001

Fifteen: The National D-Day Museum

Sixteen: American Racism

Seventeen: Women's Rights and Immigration

Eighteen: The United States and Nation Building

Nineteen: Nothing Like It in the World

Acknowledgments Index Copyright © 2002 by Ambrose and Ambrose, Inc.