Examine the many sides of George Washington’s life and legacy
Enslaver and revolutionary, destroyer of Native American communities and father of American liberty, Washington filled numerous roles in the Founding Era.
Following his death in December 1799, writers, artists, and eulogists hailed George Washington as if he were a god. It was all too much for Abigail Adams, who contended that "Simple Truth is his best, his greatest Eulogy."
The plea sounds easy enough, but capturing the truth about Washington has never been straightforward. Since his death, individuals and groups have projected their values and aspirations for the United States onto Washington's memory--a process that has obscured the actual person. George Washington and His World takes simple truth as its charge.
In this compelling, fresh portrait of America's indispensable founder, the canvas is broadened to include not only Washington, but his world and surroundings, so readers might better understand his legacy. Combining the latest historical findings with original primary research, award-winning historian Denver Brunsman provides new understanding of Washington's rise and influence by focusing on the people and society who made the first president's accomplishments possible.
Enslaver and revolutionary, destroyer of Native American communities and father of American liberty, Washington filled numerous roles in the Founding Era. Rather than shy away from these contradictions, Brunsman embraces them to explain Washington to a twenty-first century audience. What emerges is a study in human complexity that neither celebrates nor vilifies but aims to better understand this remarkable American life.
About the Author
Denver Brunsman is Associate Professor and Chair of the History Department at George Washington University, where his courses include “George Washington and His World,” taught annually at Mount Vernon. His book, The Evil Necessity: British Naval Impressment in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World (2013), received the Walker Cowen Memorial Prize for an outstanding work in eighteenth-century studies in the Americas and Atlantic world. He is also a coauthor of a leading college and AP U.S. History textbook, Liberty, Equality, Power: A History of the American People (2016; 2020) as well as the e-books, Leading Change: George Washington and Establishing the Presidency (2017) and George Washington and the Establishment of the Federal Government (2020). A retired Staff Sergeant in the U.S. Army Reserves, his honors include membership in 2014-15 fellow class at the George Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon, induction into the George Washington University Academy of Distinguished Teachers (2016), and selection to the College Board AP U.S. History Development Committee (2018).
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