Showing titles in Revolution & Founding

What did the Founding Fathers think about religion? And why did a group of practicing Protestants create a republic with widespread religious liberty? The 12 lectures included in this fascinating course provide multi-layered insights into the vision, philosophies, politics, and deep-seated faith of these brilliant leaders - in their own time, in their own words.

In August 1776, a little over a month after the Continental Congress had formally declared independence from Britain, the revolution was on the verge of a sudden and disastrous end. General George Washington found his troops outmanned and outmaneuvered at the Battle of Brooklyn, and it looked like there was no escape. But thanks to a series of desperate rear-guard attacks by a single heroic regiment, famously known as the Immortal 400, Washington was able to evacuate his men, and the nascent Continental Army lived to fight another day.

Today, the United States of America is one of the largest countries in the world. Comprised of 50 states, this huge nation is filled with diverse topography, as well as a variety of flora and fauna. Not only that, but the USA is also home to a huge population with diverse ethnic backgrounds. A vast number of the white population are the descendants of the European colonists and settlers who ultimately conquered the land, dominating the Native Americans who were the original inhabitants of the land. If you want to learn more about the American Indian Wars, listen to this audiobook!

In Noble Volunteers: The British Soldiers Who Fought the American Revolution, Don N. Hagist brings life to these soldiers, describing the training, experiences, and outcomes of British soldiers who fought during the Revolution. Drawing on thousands of military records and other primary sources in British, American, and Canadian archives, and the writings of dozens of officers and soldiers, Noble Volunteers shows how a peacetime army responded to the onset of war, how professional soldiers adapted quickly and effectively to become tactically dominant, and more.

Bestselling author Steven Johnson recounts—in dazzling, multidisciplinary fashion—the story of the brilliant man who embodied the relationship between science, religion, and politics for America’s Founding Fathers. The Invention of Air is a book of world-changing ideas wrapped around a...

In this instant New York Times bestseller, America’s top historians set the record straight on the most pernicious myths about our nation’s past “Outstanding… Wonderfully accessible.” —Washington Post The United States is in the grip of a crisis of bad history. Distortions of the...

Although the framers gave the president little authority, Washington knew whatever he did would set precedents for generations of his successors. To ensure their ability to defend the nation, he simply ignored the Constitution when he thought it necessary and reshaped the presidency into what James Madison called a "monarchical presidency." Modern scholars call it the "imperial presidency."

To the original text of what has become a classic of American historical literature, Bernard Bailyn adds a substantial essay, "Fulfillment", as a postscript. Here he discusses the intense nationwide debate on the ratification of the Constitution, stressing the continuities between that struggle over the foundations of the national government and the original principles of the Revolution.

Racial hatred is one of the ugliest of human emotions. And the United States not only once condoned it, it also mandated it?wove it right into the fabric of American jurisprudence. Federal and state governments legally suspended the free will of blacks for 150 years and then denied blacks equal...

From the author of the acclaimed history The Island at the Center of the World, an intimate new epic of the American Revolution that reinforces its meaning for today. With America's founding principles being debated today as never before, Russell Shorto looks back to the era in which those principles were forged. Drawing on new sources, he weaves the lives of six people into a seamless narrative that casts fresh light on the range of experience in colonial America on the cusp of revolution.

Volumes have been written about George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, but no previous work captures the intimate and vital details the way Inventing a Nation does. Vidal's consummate skill takes you into the minds and private rooms of these great men, illuminating their opinions of one another and their concerns about crafting a workable democracy.

Mercy Otis Warren (1728-1814), America’s first woman playwright and historian, was the fiery wife of a Massachusetts patriot and the mother of five sons who secretly authored influential anti-British plays that helped spark the American Revolution.

During the American Revolution and the border conflicts that followed, Simon Girty's name struck terror into the hearts of U.S. settlers in the Ohio Valley and the territory of Kentucky. Girty (1741-1818) had lived with the Natives most of his life. Scorned by his fellow white frontiersmen as an "Indian lover," Girty became an Indian agent for the British. He accompanied Native raids against Americans, spied deep into enemy territory, and was influential in convincing the tribes to fight for the British.

Like many historical events, the American Revolution is sometimes overlooked, ignored, or minimized by historians due to being shrouded in romantic myth and stubborn stereotypes. Here historian Phillip Thomas Tucker provides an in-depth look at the events of the Battle of Trenton, weeding out fiction and legend and presenting new insights and analysis.

Fifty-five men met in Philadelphia in 1787 to write a document that would create a country and change a world: the Constitution. Here is a remarkable rendering of that fateful time, told with humanity and humor. Decision in Philadelphia is the best popular history of the Constitutional Convention; in it, the life and times of 18th-century America not only come alive, but the very human qualities of the men who framed the document are brought provocatively into focus - casting many of the Founding Fathers in a new light.

Joseph Plumb Martin (1760-1850) was a soldier in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. Martin participated in the Battles of Brooklyn, the White Plains and Monmouth, and the siege of Fort Mifflin, and the Battle of Monmouth. The Adventures of a Revolutionary Soldier relates the adventures of a young private serving his country under terrible conditions. There are engaging accounts of army life, adventures, dangers, and suffering during the years 1776-1783.

This Thomas Paine Classic Collection contains three of Thomas Paine's most notable books: Common Sense, The Age of Reason, and The Rights of Man. Born during the Age of Enlightenment and one of America’s Founding Fathers, Thomas Paine wrote incredible works that continue to resonate with people in the modern world. Inside this collection, you’ll find some of Thomas Paine’s most famous and influential works, from his arguments against the Church to the nature of government and revolution.

Volume Four opens as the British abandoned Boston in March 1776. They moved their troops to Long Island and their fleet to New York Harbor. Washington, anticipating such a strategy, came out to face the Redcoats in Brooklyn, but was driven back to the city. More British troops arrived, forcing Washington to withdraw north. As the winter of 1777 approached with Redcoats occupying Philadelphia, Washington restricted the British army's supply line. But almost nobody believed the British could be defeated and few believed Washington's army could survive.

Few Americans know that the Revolutionary War did not begin with the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, but over a year earlier, in April 1775. Now historian Derek Beck draws on previously unpublished documents to tell the full story of the war before American independence - from both sides. Spanning the years 1773 to 1776, this audiobook sweeps listeners from the Boston Tea Party to the halls of Parliament - where Ben Franklin was almost run out of England for pleading on behalf of the colonies.

The New York Times bestselling author of The Year of Living Biblically chronicles his hilarious adventures in attempting to follow the original meaning of the Constitution, as he searches for answers to one of the most pressing issues of our time: How should we interpret America’s foundational...