Horace Greeley - by Robert C Williams (Hardcover)

About the Book

From his arrival in New York City in 1831 as a young journalist from New Hampshire to his death in 1872 after losing the presidential election to General Ulysses S. Grant, Horace Greeley (b. 1811) was a quintessential New Yorker.

Book Synopsis

From his arrival in New York City in 1831 as a young printer from New Hampshire to his death in 1872 after losing the presidential election to General Ulysses S. Grant, Horace Greeley (b. 1811) was a quintessential New Yorker. He thrived on the city's ceaseless energy, with his New York Tribune at the forefront of a national revolution in reporting and transmitting news. Greeley devoured ideas, books, fads, and current events as quickly as he developed his own interests and causes, all of which revolved around the concept of freedom. While he adored his work as a New York editor, Greeley's lifelong quest for universal freedom took him to the edge of the American frontier and beyond to Europe. A major figure in nineteenth-century American politics and reform movements, Greeley was also a key actor in a worldwide debate about the meaning of freedom that involved progressive thinkers on both sides of the Atlantic, including Margaret Fuller, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Karl Marx.
Greeley was first and foremost an ardent nationalist who devoted his life to ensuring that America live up to its promises of liberty and freedom for all of its members. Robert C. Williams places Greeley's relentless political ambitions, bold reform agenda, and complex personal life into the broader context of freedom. Horace Greeley is as rigorous and vast as Greeley himself, and as America itself in the long nineteenth century.
In the first comprehensive biography of Greeley to be published in nearly half a century, Williams captures Greeley from all sides: editor, reformer, political candidate, eccentric, and trans-Atlantic public intellectual; examining headlining news issues of the day, including slavery, westward expansion, European revolutions, the Civil War, the demise of the Whig and the birth of the Republican parties, transcendentalism, and other intellectual currents of the era.

Review Quotes

"[An] accessible study by a seasoned historian is based on an impressive collection of primary resources."-- "Library Journal"

"A comprehensive biography of the veteran journalist and intellectual."-- "Publisher's Weekly"

"A comprehensive biography of Greeley (181172), deftly analyzing the price he paid to brook no intrusion, partisan or otherwise, on his principles. . . . Powerful portrait of a publisher who became the voice of Middle America during the nation's deepest crisis."-- "Kirkus (starred review)"

"A splendid telling of a story that couldn't be more timely now that we are in another difficult and controversial war."-- "The Wall Street Journal"

"Americas most open-minded newspaper editor, Horace Greeley, promoted many a good cause in the pages of his paper, and regularly suffered the consequences of expressing what he thought. Rather than catering to public opinion, he confronted and changed it. This fine biography reintroduces him as a foremost champion of human freedom."--Donald A. Ritchie, author of Reporting from Washington: The History of the Washington Press Corps

"Biographer Williams recounts Greeley's rise from obscurity to prominence, relying for a unifying theme on Greeley's dedication to social reform and personal improvement. . . . General readers interested in the who, what, when, where, and how of Greeley have got it all in Williams stolid presentation."-- "Booklist"

"By far the most important biography of Horace Greeley to appear in the past half century."--Daniel W. Howe, author of Making the American Self: Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln and Rhodes Professor of American History, Oxford University

"From James Patrons 1855 Life of Horace Greeley through Greeley's 1868 autobiography Recollections of a Busy Life, and down to the present, dozens of voices have told the story and legend of Horace Greeley. Williamss rich and well-presented account of his ideological and political legacy is a welcome addition to that chorus. It is certainly worth hearing."-- "The Journal of American History"

"Greeleys was a remarkable life. And Robert Williams paints it in full. . . . [He] does a creditable job relating all of this, and his book is thoroughly researched and ably written. . . . [His] continuing theme of Greeley's relationship to evolving notions of liberty and freedom is solid. . . . Horace Greeley was unquestionably the dominant journalist, and one of the leading politicians, of the Civil War era. And his story has never been better told than it is here."-- "New York Sun"

"In Mr. Williams hands, Greeley comes through as a warm-hearted eccentric whose influence was greater than that of any editor today."-- "Washington Times"

"The author seeks to ennoble the erratic, odd-mannered editor, who had a squeaky voice, wispy hair, and a white Irish linen jacket, and advised young men to & Go West!...Students of the CIvil War era will welcome the author's investigation of Greeley's life and influence. invesitgation"-- "ForeWord"

"The celebrated reformer Horace Greeley edited The New York Tribune, has a tiny but elegant oasis in Midtown named for him, and may be best remembered for having memorably advised young men to go west. In Horace Greeley: Champion of American Freedom, Robert C. Williams places this 19th-century New Yorker in a broader political context. . . . Succeeds in portraying [Greeley] as a leading figure in the struggle to define freedom & as a universal good better than the liberty that tolerated slavery."-- "The New York Times"

"This new biography comes, refreshingly, from outside journalism. It was written by a veteran historian whose starting point was his interest in understanding the words 'liberty' and & freedom, and the distinctions between them. Williams found that much of the nineteenth-century discussion of these concepts flowed through a single figure, Horace Greeley. . . . Williams captures Greeley not only as the white-haired, badly dressed odd duck, but also as a formidable presenceoutspoken but not quarrelsome, ambitious but principled, fearless but not reckless. . . . Williams conveys well an era in which politics was many-hued, rather than merely red and blue."-- "Columbia Journalism Review"

"Through research involving many new primary sources, Williams opens our eyes to many unknown or unappreciated facets of this fearless editor and political strategist, as well as his influence over Abraham Lincoln, William Seward, and reforms of society of all types....[E]ssential for those wanting to understand the social and political climate in the United States during the time between what some have called the two American revolutionsone that was fought for liberty and one that was pursued for freedom."-- "Civil War Book Review"

"We should be grateful for and even astonished by this graceful and absorbing account of a species practically extinct, a newspaper publisher for whom focus groups and stockholders aren't true north on his moral compass."-- "Harper's Magazine"

"Williams describes the Civil War editor and politician Horace Greeley as a & great mind and heart. I agree. Greeley should be better known. This book may make him so."--Joy Hakim, author of the ten volume series, A History of US

"Williams elevates Greeley to his proper place as a progressive nineteenth-century writer/activist. An excellent companion work is Robert D. Richardson's Emerson: The Mind on Fire"-- "Choice"

"Williams gives a straightforward account . . . [and] argues that Greeley unswervingly devoted himself to a single idealAmerican freedomand was, in turn, crucial to its development."-- "The New Yorker"

"Williamss work is an essential one for those wanting to understand the social and political climate in the United States during the time between some have called the two American revolutions- ones that was fought for liberty and one that was pursued for freedom."-- "Civil War Book Review"