The Founders at Home

Reviews / Votes

"The Founders at Home is rich in insight, wit, and wisdom about the men who created America. It's superb-a pleasure to read on every page." -- Thomas Fleming, author of The Intimate Lives of the Founding Fathers "Myron Magnet has produced an excellent book from this excellent idea: We can better understand the Founders, who shaped how we live, if we better understand how they lived in the homes they designed and social circles that radiated from those homes. The American Revolution, he argues, was a success because of its moderation, and this virtue suffused the Founders' lives." -- George F. Will, author of One Man's America: The Pleasures and Provocations of Our Singular Nation "Americans have long admired our Founders from a respectful distance. Now author Myron Magnet pulls us closer, into the framers' homes and minds, so that we suddenly see not only what drove them but also how very much we share with those first Americans. Accurate, skillful, and utterly charming." -- Amity Shlaes, author of The Forgotten Man "The Founders of the American Revolution avoided the excesses of other major revolutions, not just because of their seminal ideas but also because they were practical, good men, both at work and at home. Myron Magnet, in this strikingly original thesis, shows how the protection of liberty and property were natural extensions of the way the Founders organized their families and homes. We owe him thanks for this timely reminder that how we live and what we think should not be antithetical, but properly complementary." -- Victor Davis Hanson, author of A War Like No Other "The Founders at Home is a fascinating exploration of America's Founding Fathers at the most intimate level. Highly original and intensely absorbing-Myron Magnet has produced an outstanding work of historical research." -- Amanda Foreman, author of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire "Masterful...a work of scholarship and a labor of love." -- Michael Goodwin - The New York Post "Does the world need yet another book on the American Founders? Yes, indeed: this one.... Mr. Magnet is an accomplished member of the cast of amateurs who have picked up the popular-history franchise that the American academic community tossed away...his book is a labor of love." -- James Grant - The Wall Street Journal "An excellent and fluid writer, Magnet succeeds in proving his point that these were more than residences; they were an expression of the personalities of their remarkable owners. The Founders at Home provides an interesting, entertaining, and informative way of looking at their lives and their world." -- John Steele Gordon - Commentary "Delightful... The Founders at Home gives the pleasures of biography, while putting us back in the texture and complexity of a world." -- Richard Brookhiser - National Review "Entertaining and illuminating... Myron Magnet has done an exemplary job of portraying our fascinating founders both as remarkable individuals and as members of a flawed and quarrelsome team that still somehow managed to give life and meaning to the America we are blessed with today." -- Aram Bakshian Jr. - The American Spectator "The Founders at Home is subtitled "The Building of America, 1735-1817." "Building" is a pun: All the men he writes about left homes that, centuries later, are still intact and visitable. But, by a shrewd selection of subjects, Magnet also covers the construction of a country, from first thoughts to finishing touches-from the Zenger trial to the Battle of New Orleans. His cast of characters allows him to erase the dichotomy between overexposure and obscurity. The heavyweights are well represented: Washington, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison. But joining them are Founders most of us have barely or never heard of: William Livingston, the Lees of Stratford Hall, sober John Jay. The Founders at Home gives the pleasures of biography, while putting us back in the texture and complexity of a world." -- Richard Brookhiser - National Review "His exceedingly well-written and richly documented narrative builds excitement like the best of tales told around a campfire... Magnet masterfully conveys the often halting steps the founders took as they moved toward the creation of our democracy by tapping lavishly into their own recorded words, a reminder both of what very good writers some of them were, and how lucky we were as a nation to have been born in the high noon of the Enlightenment... With The Founders at Home, he has deepened our understanding of the worldview of our most esteemed political ancestors." -- Rosemary Michaud - Charleston Post and Courier