Rating: 
Summary: Collectable, Entertaining and Educational
Review: To celebrate the first 100 days of our new president, I thought I would review a new book I found on the nation's previous forty-one chief executives. It is quite an impressive book and is filled with essays focusing on the main theme and achievement of each president. The forty-one essays are written by members of the prestigious Society of American Historians. The society was founded in 1939 to promote literary distinction in historical writing. These essays offer thoughtful analyses and reveal the very human side of each president, while honoring their service. The pages are beautifully illustrated with pictures of personal effects, mementos, paintings and photographs. Pictures of first ladies and a dash of romantic details, makes this interesting for even those who are not interested in politics. You will be surprised to see a picture of Abraham Lincoln without a beard or to see a picture of the bath tub the 27th President had to have made and installed. What made this collection so fascinating is the details of the lives of each president, Sidebars tell where each president was born, their birthplace, where they died, their party affiliation, how many children they had and the major events in their lives. The quotes included capture the essence of their presidency and the pictures capture the time period. Each president's signature is included under their name, at the beginning of each essay. It is quite intimidating to write a review for a book so all-encompassing and prestigious. I was very impressed with the second half of this book as it contains the full text of each "Inaugural Address" and the campaign statistics from 1789-1996. Someone once said: "It is good to be king, but you have to keep working like a slave." America's presidents sure work hard to make America one of the most stable countries in the world. This is an incisive, interpretive history of their time in office.
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