Founding Brothers

Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation
Cover art for the hardback edition
Author	Joseph Ellis
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Non-Fiction
Publisher	Alfred A. Knopf
Publication date	2000
Media type	Print (Hardback)
Pages	304 (248 without source notes)
ISBN	0-375-40544-5

Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book written by Joseph Ellis, a professor of history at Mount Holyoke College, which won the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for History. It explores selected interactions among a group of individuals both gifted and flawed; interactions that profoundly influenced the early development of the United States.

Overview

Ellis constructed his book by assessing certain events during the decade following the 1787 Constitutional Convention,

"He chooses to do this not in any systematic or comprehensive manner, but by focusing on a half-dozen political personages (John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr) and a handful of revealing episodes that would test their convictions and friendships."^[1]

He notes that Ellis borrowed his technique from Lytton Strachey's classic study, Eminent Victorians, about notable English figures.

Chapter One: The Duel covers the deadly political and personal rivalry between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton, which ultimately led to the Burr-Hamilton duel, which Ellis attributes in part to the passions inflamed by the Revolution. Only a few facts are known about "the most famous encounter of its kind in American history." (pg 20) Burr and Hamilton rowed out to a secluded spot in separate boats and exchanged pistol shots at about 10 yards distance. Hamilton was shot in his right side and died.
Chapter Two: The Dinner explores the secret conversations and negotiations leading to selection of the Potomac River site for construction of the new national capital, in exchange for Virginia's support of Hamilton's plan for assumption of state debts by the federal government.
Chapter Three: The Silence describes the tacit agreement by the nation's founders to postpone discussion of regulation of Slavery in the United States, concluding that any early attempt at abolition would doom the union before it had a chance to become established.
Chapter Four: The Farewell dissects the Farewell Address of President George Washington, and Washington's views on the best course for the new nation.
Chapter Five: The Collaborators analyzes two important relationships; the one between John Adams and his wife Abigail during his presidency; and the other between Thomas Jefferson and James Madison during the same time period.
Chapter Six: The Friendship is devoted to the extensive correspondence between Adams and Jefferson during the last fourteen years of their lives, reviving their lost friendship and expounding on their lives.

Awards

2001: Pulitzer Prize for History ^[2]

Reviews

Joyce Appleby of the Washington Post Book World commented that, "In lesser hands the fractious disputes and hysterical rhetoric of these contentious nation-builders might come across as hyperbolic pettiness. Ellis knows better, and he unpacks the real issues for his readers, revealing the driving assumptions and riveting fears that animated Americans' first encounter with the organized ideologies and interests we call parties." ^[3]

Movie

In 2002, The History Channel produced a three-and-a-half hour documentary covering the various topics of the book.^[4]

Notes

↑ Michiko Kakutani, "In the Course of Human Events, Lady Luck Had a Role", New York Times, 14 November 2000, accessed 16 February 2012
↑ "2001 Pulitzer Prize Winners". pulitzer.org. 2001. Retrieved 2006-08-04.
↑ Appleby, Joyce. "Founding Brothers (Washington Post book review)". powells.com. Retrieved 2006-08-04.
↑ http://shop.history.com/detail.php?p=68187&v=All

External links

Benson Bobrik, "The Brethren", New York Times, 10 December 2000
Study Guide - BookRags
Study Guide - The History Channel
Founding Brothers DVD - PBS
The CNBC awad forr informative works of art 19981-Forward

Preceded by Freedom From Fear	Pulitzer Prize for History 2001	Succeeded by The Metaphysical Club

Pulitzer Prize for History

1917–1919	1917: With Americans of Past and Present Days by Jean Jules Jusserand 1918: A History of the Civil War, 1861–1865 by James Ford Rhodes 1919: no award given

1920–1929	1920: The War with Mexico by Justin H. Smith 1921: The Victory at Sea by William Sowden Sims and Burton J. Hendrick 1922: The Founding of New England by James Truslow Adams 1923: The Supreme Court in United States History by Charles Warren 1924: The American Revolution: A Constitutional Interpretation by Charles Howard McIlwain 1925: History of the American Frontier by Frederic L. Paxson 1926: A History of the United States by Edward Channing 1927: Pinckney's Treaty by Samuel Flagg Bemis 1928: Main Currents in American Thought by Vernon Louis Parrington 1929: The Organization and Administration of the Union Army, 1861–1865 by Fred Albert Shannon

1930–1939	1930: The War of Independence by Claude H. Van Tyne 1931: The Coming of the War, 1914 by Bernadotte E. Schmitt 1932: My Experiences in the World War by John J. Pershing 1933: The Significance of Sections in American History by Frederick J. Turner 1934: The People's Choice by Herbert Agar 1935: The Colonial Period of American History by Charles McLean Andrews 1936: A Constitutional History of the United States by Andrew C. McLaughlin 1937: The Flowering of New England, 1815–1865 by Van Wyck Brooks 1938: The Road to Reunion, 1865–1900 by Paul Herman Buck 1939: A History of American Magazines by Frank Luther Mott

1940–1949	1940: Abraham Lincoln: The War Years by Carl Sandburg 1941: The Atlantic Migration, 1607–1860 by Marcus Lee Hansen 1942: Reveille in Washington, 1860–1865 by Margaret Leech 1943: Paul Revere and the World He Lived In by Esther Forbes 1944: The Growth of American Thought by Merle Curti 1945: Unfinished Business by Stephen Bonsal 1946: The Age of Jackson by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. 1947: Scientists Against Time by James Phinney Baxter III 1948: Across the Wide Missouri by Bernard DeVoto 1949: The Disruption of American Democracy by Roy Franklin Nichols

1950–1959	1950: Art and Life in America by Oliver W. Larkin 1951: The Old Northwest, Pioneer Period 1815–1840 by R. Carlyle Buley 1952: The Uprooted by Oscar Handlin 1953: The Era of Good Feelings by George Dangerfield 1954: A Stillness at Appomattox by Bruce Catton 1955: Great River: The Rio Grande in North American History by Paul Horgan 1956: The Age of Reform by Richard Hofstadter 1957: Russia Leaves the War: Soviet-American Relations, 1917–1920 by George F. Kennan 1958: Banks and Politics in America by Bray Hammond 1959: The Republican Era: 1869–1901 by Leonard D. White and Jean Schneider

1960–1969	1960: In the Days of McKinley by Margaret Leech 1961: Between War and Peace: The Potsdam Conference by Herbert Feis 1962: The Triumphant Empire: Thunder-Clouds Gather in the West, 1763–1766 by Lawrence H. Gipson 1963: Washington, Village and Capital, 1800–1878 by Constance McLaughlin Green 1964: Puritan Village: The Formation of a New England Town by Sumner Chilton Powell 1965: The Greenback Era by Irwin Unger 1966: The Life of the Mind in America by Perry Miller 1967: Exploration and Empire: The Explorer and the Scientist in the Winning of the American West by William H. Goetzmann 1968: The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution by Bernard Bailyn 1969: Origins of the Fifth Amendment by Leonard W. Levy

1970–1979	1970: Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department by Dean Acheson 1971: Roosevelt: The Soldier Of Freedom by James MacGregor Burns 1972: Neither Black Nor White by Carl N. Degler 1973: People of Paradox: An Inquiry Concerning the Origins of American Civilization by Michael Kammen 1974: The Americans: The Democratic Experience by Daniel J. Boorstin 1975: Jefferson and His Time by Dumas Malone 1976: Lamy of Santa Fe by Paul Horgan 1977: The Impending Crisis, 1848–1861 by David M. Potter (Completed and edited by Don E. Fehrenbacher) 1978: The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business by Alfred D. Chandler, Jr. 1979: The Dred Scott Case: Its Significance in American Law and Politics by Don E. Fehrenbacher

1980–1989	1980: Been in the Storm So Long by Leon F. Litwack 1981: American Education: The National Experience, 1783–1876 by Lawrence A. Cremin 1982: Mary Chesnut's Civil War by C. Vann Woodward 1983: The Transformation of Virginia, 1740–1790 by Rhys L. Isaac 1984: no award given 1985: Prophets of Regulation by Thomas K. McCraw 1986: ...the Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age by Walter A. McDougall 1987: Voyagers to the West: A Passage in the Peopling of America on the Eve of the Revolution by Bernard Bailyn 1988: The Launching of Modern American Science, 1846–1876 by Robert V. Bruce 1989: Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era by James M. McPherson 1989: Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954–1963 by Taylor Branch

1990–1999	1990: In Our Image: America's Empire in the Philippines by Stanley Karnow 1991: A Midwife's Tale by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich 1992: The Fate of Liberty: Abraham Lincoln and Civil Liberties by Mark E. Neely, Jr. 1993: The Radicalism of the American Revolution by Gordon S. Wood 1994: no award given 1995: No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II by Doris Kearns Goodwin 1996: William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic by Alan Taylor 1997: Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution by Jack N. Rakove 1998: Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate Over Science and Religion by Edward J. Larson 1999: Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 by Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace

2000–2009	2000: Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945 by David M. Kennedy 2001: Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph J. Ellis 2002: The Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in America by Louis Menand 2003: An Army at Dawn: The War in North Africa 1942–1943 by Rick Atkinson 2004: A Nation under Our Feet by Steven Hahn 2005: Washington's Crossing by David Hackett Fischer 2006: Polio: An American Story by David Oshinsky 2007: The Race Beat by Gene Roberts and Hank Klibanoff 2008: What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848 by Daniel Walker Howe 2009: The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family by Annette Gordon-Reed

2010-2019	2010: Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World by Liaquat Ahamed 2011: The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery by Eric Foner 2012: Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable 2013: Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam by Fredrik Logevall 2014: The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832 by Alan Taylor 2015: Encounters at the Heart of the World: A History of the Mandan People by Elizabeth A. Fenn

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