Books like Prelude to Greatness — picked by fans

Donald’s one-volume biography of Lincoln remains the standard in the field. I knew David Donald and found him always generous. From his perch at Harvard, Donald dominated the Lincoln field for many decades. His biography of Lincoln stands head and shoulders above a host of more recent studies. In fact, it surprises me people keep writing biographies of Lincoln that go over the same ground repeatedly. Donald brings Lincoln alive with the authority that comes from a lifetime of reflection and writing on the Civil War and our greatest president.

Beautifully written masterwork on one of the most important wars of the 19th century. It takes the reader from the experience of ordinary soldiers in battle to key debates around the cabinet table, in a rare display of dexterity and understanding of all levels of war. You will enter Grant’s HQ from where he ran the critical Western theater of operations and sit across from Lincoln as he makes the key decision for a hard war that let the Union maximize its resources and win. And you will walk into Lee’s HQ where the Confederacy lost the war in bursts of Southern hubris that led to two ill-conceived invasions of the North that provoked the final crushing.  

Mary Todd Lincoln has been seriously misunderstood by most observers (including her most recent biographer). She was in fact a smart, lively, well-educated woman whom Lincoln loved and to whom he was emotionally drawn. Her troubled personality led to some distance between her and her husband in the 1850s, and her post-assassination despair grew in large part from the unrelenting criticism she endured. This definitive collection of her letters, interspersed with excellent biographical information, contextualizes the documents in a highly readable volume. Mary Todd Lincoln deserves our close and sympathetic attention.

William Herndon was Lincoln’s law partner and knew and worked with him from the early 1840s until 1861 when Lincoln left for Washington. After Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865, Herndon tirelessly interviewed many of Lincoln’s family and neighbors from his childhood and youth. As I noted many years ago, Herndon’s project was the first oral history in American literature. His vast collection was long disdained by scholars. I used the records extensively myself and in the 1980s and 1990s those in the Lincoln field realized the letters and interviews were a priceless source. Doug Wilson and his colleagues did an excellent job in editing the Herndon material that is both invaluable for understanding Lincoln and providing a social history of the frontier in the early part of the 19th century.

I first encountered Lincoln as an Oxford undergraduate, spellbound by his public jousting with the “Little Giant,” Stephen Douglas, his Democratic opponent in the US Senate race of 1858. The campaign crisscrossed the plains of Illinois and brought the Republican Lincoln to national attention. Guelzo, a Lincoln Prize-winner, writes stylishly, capturing the feel of the prairies, and above all gets to the heart of the issues that divided the candidates: race and slavery. An unapologetic white supremacist, Douglas was neutral on slavery; Lincoln argued against it and its westward spread. He declared slavery wrong and at odds with the principles of the Declaration of Independence. Douglas was elected but Lincoln’s raised profile would help elect him to the presidency two years later.

Most people don’t realize that Lincoln lived most of his adult life without a beard and that he grew his beard during the presidential campaign in 1860 after an 11-year-old girl wrote to him and suggested that he grow whiskers.

This book tells the story of how Grace Bedell encouraged him to grow a beard, how her brother teased her for writing to him, and how Lincoln stopped at her hometown in 1861 to meet her and show her his new whiskers.

This is a great story for kids to see how a young girl helped shape the image of Lincoln, an image that is recognizable to all Americans today.

If Abraham Lincoln had survived the war, the country might have followed an entirely different track. Rather than send carpetbaggers to rule the southern states, Lincoln planned on working with the existing rebel governments to transition them back into the Union. However, his policy toward the newly freed blacks was uncertain. Lincoln’s hope was that blacks and whites would learn to live together given time. He just hadn’t figured out how to make that happen.

What’s certain is that Andrew Johnson’s ascendancy to power derailed many of Lincoln’s plans and reversed many of the gains African-Americans had won. Johnson favored quick restoration of the southern states. At the same time, he refused to educate the freedmen and work them into society. His hope was that things would go back to the way they were before the war. Blacks would no longer be slaves but still be dependent on their former… show more.

Write about Abraham Lincoln’s intimate life? I wouldn’t dare, but I’m thrilled Louis Bayard did. Courting Mr. Lincoln catches America’s icon at his pivot from aw-shucks buffoon to fast-track politician. Joshua Speed, Lincoln’s roommate who’s in love with him, applies social veneer, teaching him to dress and dance, and where to rest those spidery arms during dinner. The friends’ touching love never crosses into sexual on the page. Yet, intimacy flows through Bayard’s extraordinary writing. We, too, inhabit Lincoln’s long torso, flailing elbows, and head crammed in a too-small top hat. Alas, a society matron pushes Lincoln “toward destiny,” requiring marriage with Mary Todd. Melancholy Lincoln, snared in grasping love, moves on to save our nation. Because of this book, I’ll always consider Abraham Lincoln a beautiful man.

Richard Hart, a prominent, civic-minded Springfield lawyer and an exceptionally kind and generous friend, was also an avid local historian who tirelessly examined original sources in search of information about Springfield during Lincoln’s time.

In 1999, he published a seminal article demonstrating that African Americans “were a significant part not only of the town’s life, but of Abraham Lincoln’s life and environment.” He then elaborated on that point in this book, written with the assistance of Bonnie Paull, a retired professor of English.

I dedicated one of my books to Hart, paying tribute to him as the author “who pioneered the way,” showing that Lincoln’s interaction with African American neighbors, friends, clients, and employees in the Illinois capital profoundly shaped his racial egalitarianism.

This book has captured my interest and my heart for a long time. You may wonder what a book about a great president is doing in a list of the best small “L” leadership books. Here is the reason: I get many powerful principles and practices of small “L” leadership–things I can use in my family, at church, and in my professional life–every time I read this book (and I have read it three times!).

It doesn’t hurt that the writing is beautiful! I love the writing, and I love to see how Lincoln created an effective team in his cabinet composed of all of his rivals for the presidential nomination with small and simple things. Amazing!