Presidential Authors – History of Great Republic & American Literature …My Best Summer Read

Summer is a brief respite in which I push the daily stuff out of the way to focus on enjoying family time, sun-swimming, too much “bad” food, writing but most especially reading.

Five books devoured this Summer at the Lake.

….Yet, the best one proved to be a sleeper that I picked up per change at my local Ocean State Job Lots for four bucks

It actually was kind of grimy—and didn’t almost buy it ?

…to a germaphobe (like me) it went through a cleansing ritual as my best favorite reading times—late afternoon on the veranda or bedtime with my wife usually coming up to shut the light off –the next morning the book somehow found itself under my pillow

…so as you can see books are very intimate if not well loved like the Velveteen Rabbit –the more used –the more real they become

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Craig Fehrman book is a tour de force

Author in Chief- the untold story if our presidents and the books they wrote

It took him ten years to research and write this piece of work.

To anyone that has ever written a book they know the extremely invested process of engaging such an effort

Craig’s book is well researched, noted in the several appendixes filled to the brim with information delightful to all historians.

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So, who were the most prolific presidential writers?

Teddy Roosevelt by far is the winner ..as he penned 18 Million words which would be an astounding achievement as an author but this was but a sideline to his day job as Commander In Chief of the Nation

Both John Adams and his son Quincy along with Thomas Jefferson jump-started the authenticity of American literature that prior was view by our former British overlords with some aspect of suspicion

Madison was also prodigious in promoting a specific form of writing that became the avenue of presidential aspiration.

My wife for years tells me that I deserved to make more money on the sixteen books I’ve penned.

Fuhrman points out most books do not make huge amounts of money but serve as a vehicle that promotes concepts, aspirations and ensconces legacy.

There is a certain notoriety in being an author for it something not everyone can do

……. but for our presidents it was the upward spiral path to the Oval Office

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With Quincy Adams we find the start of what the Fuhrman rightly calls the Campaign Book which at a time were reading was the only manner of disseminating information

Such penned efforts was way of getting your name out there for people to “talk you up”

Next was the Political Book which Jefferson, Adams, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Wilson employed to further foster their position to covey buy-in from the public to support of their own political agendas

Finally, the Legacy Book the joint efforts of the infamous ghostwriters that as the saying goes—those that write history define it.

As these various books were being composed an American Publishing Industry grew up that supported the likes of Hawthorne, Melville, Whitman, Irving, Emerson, Thoreau to name a few.

In the 19th Century the discussion of slavery was a preeminent topic which after the Civil War was further debated intensely for the next fifty years.

The American Public was highly literate in the 19th Century with a tradition of reading that created super successful bookstore, peddlers that cross the Fruited Plain, public libraries.

A Literary Culture that fostered the founding of colleges across the nation that morphed from places that once only educated ministers, doctors and lawyers to an interdisciplinary array of topics

….. that sparked the huge societal evolution in America for the 1880’s to 1920’s

--- first glimpse of a Global Super Power

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What is noted here is the scholarship or more precisely the love of learning and the high value placed on open debate.

Such polemical skills were essential if you wanted to ascend the Leadership Ladder

Yes, some president made huge amount of money on their writing and that is before the Blockbuster Era of the 1980’s

Grant and Coolidge (of all people) garnered staggering amounts

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The book also highlights how these written works crafted an image that did not reflect any form of reality.

JFK is a perfect example

Kennedy never typed one paper at Harvard but had a private secretary not to mention a stenographer

His campaign book which helped get him elected to WDC as senator was at least a concept he thought up himself.

Jack’s famous Profiles in Courage that got him to the Oval Office was so ghostwritten that he had only the fatigue of idea what it was all about.

The only person even more disinterested was Ronald Reagan who at one point the ghostwriter held up the book asking him

..have you seen this book?

Then having him hold the book—asking the same question again.

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These were more innocent times where the heavy hand of the media was not looking under every rock and if they did

---they gently put the stone back in place.

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In the 20th century was see the rise of some great American Historical Writers McCullough ..whose Truman novel was a masterpiece

…Kerns—LBJ work was a classic

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As we enter the 1990’s our current culture of Celebrity and Entertainment exhausted so much of the intellectualism that was once the core American Literature

……to arrive at our present point with not only declining reading by the public

..sadly declining literacy –the dumbing down of American Society

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I was left with the impression of the richness of American History but even more of its literary tradition

In our times of instant gratification such hard won work appears to be becoming segmented to a very thin level of American Society that possess the resources and time to invest in such a deeply personal process.

The WOKE Revolution can pride itself in being one that has discredited the rich American Literary Tradition by defining it with their Presentism standards to debase something that we all should instead be so proud to call collectively something of our own that brings us together

These Cultural Barbarians have inflicted great harm in degrading a luminous civilization that did not enslave but quite literally liberated the entire world

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My best hope is that we are engaging new readers that love books and most especially American Literature in many of these non-public schools that reject the reductionism of Woke Culture which offers no positive alternative

From my lips to God’s ears, my wish is that we are turning the page on this misguided chapter in American History

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One of my new efforts will be to promote to our youngest generations the wonderous world of books as transformative vehicles ?

..that can take you from this small town in New Hampshire to times, places and spaces far far away

This remarkable adventure of the mind that never grows old

Summer is a time to connect with our Best Self aspiring to recapture the joy of our youth

Reawakening that Child within Us is the healing answer to the cynicism of our times

Unplug from the noise to enter this realm of wonder that you

….. and you alone are solely the author to create

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Crave out a moment for yourself—Go Read a Book

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Happy Summer 2024

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