Legends, Lies & Cherished Myths of American History - by Richard Shenkman (Paperback)

About the Book

In seventeen brief, well-documented chapters, this bestselling book sheds light on America's most believed legends. The record is set straight on subjects such as our founding fathers, presidents, education, holidays, and sex in American history.

From the Back Cover

The truth and nothing but the truth--Richard Shenkman sheds light on America's most believed legends.

The story of Columbus discovering the world was round was invented by Washington Irving.

The pilgrims never lived in log cabins.

In Concord, Massachusetts, a third of all babies born in the twenty years before the Revolution were conceived out of wedlock.

Washington may have never told a lie, but he loved to drink and dance, and he fell in love with his best friend's wife.

Independence wasn't declared on July 4th.

There's no evidence that anyone died in a frontier shootout at high noon.

After World War II, the U.S. government concluded that Japan would have surrendered within months, even if we had not bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Review Quotes

A gold-mine for bar bettors....Shenkman's jam-packed grab-bag of topsy turvy Americana amuses and shocks." - Kirkus Reviews
"Facts go only skin-deep, but they can prickle memorably, which is why books like this, disabusing us of our cherished bunk, are useful and fun." - New York Times Book Review
"This entertaining look at the myths Americans live by debunks everything from the sanctity of the Founding Fathers to the notion that concern for defendants' rights is a recent development. He goes on to a multitude of subjects, including sex, war, the frontier, education, art, pointing out along the way that prostitution flourished in the Victorian era, that the defenders of the Alamo did not all perish in the battle and that in the antebellum South not all whites backed slavery. The book is occasionally eye-opening and always fun." - Publishers Weekly
"Mr. Shenkman leaves no hero untouched, no American value unsullied." - Wall Street Journal
"A treasure trove....Shenkman shows the many ways myths have a rose-tinted past." - Los Angeles Times