History / History by country / United States / Historical period / Revolutionary Period (1775-1800)

Common Sense

by Thomas Paine & Diana Gabaldon

In 1776, America was a hotbed of enlightenment and revolution. Thomas Paine not only spurred his fellow Americans to action but soon came to symbolize the spirit of the Revolution. His elegantly persuasive pieces...

The Constitutional Convention: A Narrative History from the Notes of James Madison

by James Madison, Michael P. Winship & Edward J. Larson

In 1787, the American union was in disarray. The incompatible demands of the separate states threatened its existence; some states were even in danger of turning into the kind of tyranny they had so recently...

Revolutionary Founders: Rebels, Radicals, and Reformers in the Making of the Nation

by Alfred F. Young, Ray Raphael & Gary Nash

In twenty-two original essays, leading historians reveal the radical impulses at the founding of the American Republic. Here is a fresh new reading of the American Revolution that gives voice and recognition...

Founding Gardeners

by Andrea Wulf

From the bestselling author of The Invention of Nature, a fascinating look at the Founding Fathers like none you've seen before.

For the Founding Fathers, gardening, agriculture, and botany were elemental passions:...

A Struggle for Power: The American Revolution

by Theodore Draper

rom one of the great political journalists of our time comes a boldly argued reinterpretation of the central event in our collective past--a book that portrays the American Revolution not as a clash of ideologies...

Patriotism and Piety: Federalist Politics and Religious Struggle in the New American Nation

by Jonathan J. Den Hartog

In Patriotism and Piety, Jonathan Den Hartog argues that the question of how religion would function in American society was decided in the decades after the Constitution and First Amendment established a legal...

Nathan Hale: The Life and Death of America's First Spy

by M. William Phelps

Now in paperback, the New York Times best-selling biography—the first in nearly a century—of the legendary Revolutionary War patriot and our country’s first spy

Blood of Tyrants: George Washington & the Forging of the Presidency

by Logan Beirne

Blood of Tyrants reveals the surprising details of our Founding Fathers’ approach to government and this history’s impact on today. Delving into forgotten—and often lurid—facts of the Revolutionary War,...

The History of American Higher Education: Learning and Culture from the Founding to World War II

by Roger L. Geiger

This book tells the compelling saga of American higher education from the founding of Harvard College in 1636 to the outbreak of World War II. The most in-depth and authoritative history of the subject available,...

Benjamin Franklin: American Founder, Atlantic Citizen

by Nathan R. Kozuskanich

Known for his influential role in the debates that established the founding documents of the United States, Benjamin Franklin was not only an astute politician, but also an Atlantic citizen whose commitment...

George Whitefield: America's Spiritual Founding Father

by Thomas S. Kidd

In the years prior to the American Revolution, George Whitefield was the most famous man in the colonies. Thomas Kidd's fascinating new biography explores the extraordinary career of the most influential figure...

Literature, Intertextuality, and the American Revolution: From Common Sense to Rip Van Winkle

by Steven Blakemore

Dealing with five significant works of the American-Revolution era (1776-1820), the book crystallizes strategies of subversion in an intertextual war by authors reformulating the histories of other revolutions...

Amelioration and Empire: Progress and Slavery in the Plantation Americas

by Christa Dierksheide

Christa Dierksheide argues that "enlightened" slaveowners in the British Caribbean and the American South, neither backward reactionaries nor freedom-loving hypocrites, thought of themselves as modern, cosmopolitan...

Common Sense and Selected Works of Thomas Paine

by Thomas Paine

Thomas Paine is one of history’s most renowned thinkers and was indispensible to both the American and French revolutions. The three works included, Common Sense, The Rights of Man, and The Age of Reason,...

Founders as Fathers: The Private Lives and Politics of the American Revolutionaries

by Lorri Glover

Surprisingly, no previous book has ever explored how family life shaped the political careers of America's great Founding Fathers-men like George Mason, Patrick Henry, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and...

An Empire on the Edge: How Britain Came to Fight America

by Nick Bunker

Written from a strikingly fresh perspective, this new account of the Boston Tea Party and the origins of the American Revolution shows how a lethal blend of politics, personalities, and economics led to a war...

The Idea of America: Reflections on the Birth of the United States

by Gordon S. Wood

The preeminent historian of the American Revolution explains why it remains the most significant event in our history.

More than almost any other nation in the world, the United States began as an idea. For...

Victory at Yorktown

by Richard M. Ketchum

From "the finest historian of the American Revolution" comes the definitive account of the battle and unlikely triumph that led to American independence (Douglas Brinkley)

In 1780, during the Revolutionary War,...

The American Revolution of 1800: How Jefferson Rescued Democracy from Tyranny and Faction-and What This Means Today

by Dan Sisson & Thom Hartmann

In this brilliant historical classic, Dan Sisson provides the definitive window into key concepts that have formed the backdrop of our democracy: the nature of revolution, stewardship of power, liberty, and...

Divided Loyalties

by Richard M. Ketchum

Before the Civil War splintered the young country, there was another conflict that divided friends and family--the Revolutionary War

Prior to the French and Indian War, the British government had taken little...