In the Shadow of Liberty: The Hidden History of Slavery, Four Presidents, and Five Black Lives

by Kenneth C. Davis

Did you know that many of America’s Founding Fathers—who fought for liberty and justice for all—were slave owners? Through the powerful stories of five enslaved people who were “owned” by four of our greatest presidents, this book helps set the record straight about the role slavery played in the founding of America. From Billy Lee, valet to George Washington, to Alfred Jackson, faithful servant of Andrew Jackson, these dramatic narratives explore our country’s great tragedy—that a nation “conceived in liberty” was also born in shackles.These stories help us know the real people who were essential to the birth of this nation but traditionally have been left out of the history books. Their stories are true—and they should be heard.This thoroughly-researched and documented book can be worked into multiple aspects of the common core curriculum.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Biography, Historical, American History, Audiobook, Biography Memoir

303 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 20, 2016

About the author

Kenneth C. Davis is the New York Times bestselling author of the Don't Know Much About® series of books and audios for adults and children. Don't Know Much About® History, the first title in the series, became a New York Times bestseller in 1991 and remained on the paperback list for 35 consecutive weeks. It has since been revised several times and now has more than 1.6 million copies in print. The 30th anniversary edition of the book was published with a new preface, "From an Era of Broken Trust to an Era of Broken Democracy."

Davis is, according to Publishers Weekly, "a go-to guy for historical insight and analysis."

AMERICA'S HIDDEN HISTORY also became a New York Times bestseller. A NATION RISING also uses dramatic narratives to tell the "stories your textbooks left out." His book, THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR (May 5, 2015) was called "searing" analysis by Publishers Weekly.

Kenneth C. Davis’s success aptly makes the case that Americans don’t hate history, just the dull version they slept through in class. Davis’s approach is to refresh us on the subjects we should have learned in school. He does it by busting myths, setting the record straight, and always remembering that fun is not a four-word letter word.

His IN THE SHADOW OF LIBERTY: THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF SLAVERY, FOUR PRESIDENTS, AND FIVE BLACK LIVES looks at the lives of five people enslaved by four of America's most famous Presidents and the role of slavery in American history and the presidency. In May 2018, MORE DEADLY THAN WAR: The Hidden History of the Spanish Flu and the First World War was published.

STRONGMAN: The Rise of Five Dictators and the Fall of Democracy was published by Holt. It was named among the best books of 2020 by Kirkus Reviews and the Washington Post.

In November 2022 GREAT SHORT BOOKS: A Year of Reading--Briefly was published by SCribner. A compendium of 58 great short works Davis read during the pandemic lock down, it is a joyous celebration of reading.

Coming in October 2024 is THE WORLD IN BOOKS: 52 WORKS OF GREAT SHORT NONFICTION. It is an accessible and comprehensive guide to some of the most influential and important works of nonfiction, from the earliest days of writing to contemporary times. Each entry includes information about the writers behind these consequential books and the time in which they lived.

Reviews

[Kelly]

This should be required reading about American history and slavery. Set well before the Civil War, this is an account of five black people who were enslaved to some of American history's "greatest men." Compelling and horrifying and frustrating lacking in complete stories, Davis offers up the lives of those who history has otherwise selected not to mention.

Davis's commentary, especially in the afterword, is particularly important. He pulls no punches in noting that while many of the enslaved people in this collection spoke of their work in pleasant enough language, the truth is that it's likely they told only the stories that the white people recording them wanted to hear. Likewise, I really appreciated how Davis took the time to not call these people "slaves," but "enslaved people" and expresses precisely why that choice in terminology matters.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although this is a YA history, I enjoyed reading the factual information in it. The lives of the enslaved people serving the four presidents is interesting, much of it new to me. I haven't read too many YA books, so I can't really speak to that part. The broader issue of slavery is also dealt with, and the timelines are helpful. All in all, I was left a satisfied reader.

[Hannah]

This is good, but I don't see it as quite as revolutionary and amazing as so many others seem to. That may be a result of the fact that, as a black person and a lifetime avid reader, even "untold" histories of black people are less astonishing (and less likely to have been unencountered) to me than they would to a white reader of any age. Davis makes a point at the beginning of the book of noting that he strove use the word "enslaved" over "slaves" in order to draw attention to the fact that these were people, not items, and to drive home how horrifying the institution of slavery was, which is all well and good, except that he's not all that consistent with it. Further, he uses "servants" indiscriminately, and while more than once he points out that white people called slaves their servants and that is incredibly problematic, but he also does so himself, so I don't think it's really going to drive the point home. We all know from the Rue problem and others that white readers need racialized things yelled at them in print a million times before they actually see them.

You can read the full review at my blog: https://mclicious.org/2017/05/10/in-t...

[Cathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't realize when I bought this book that it was written for young adults. It is a terribly interesting account of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Jackson, four presidents who were also slaveholders, and one each of their slaves. An easy read, it also is full of facts and lays out the conflicting views of our founding fathers regarding liberty and slavery. Without trying to turn our founding fathers into villains, Davis shows the conflict between what these men said, and what they practiced. Interesting read.

[Don · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am not sure why Kenneth C. Davis wrote this as a young-adult book. Maybe, perhaps, so he can appeal to any reader who hasn't already retreated into an intractable position on the conservative-progressive spectrum. That's got to be it.

OK, the short sentences get annoying, the limited vocabulary and the overexplaining at times feels condescending, but the research is first-rate and the context is everything.

The Slavery in America Timeline with each chapter is worth the price of admission. The stories of Ona Judge and Billy Lee and Paul Jennings are not new. But they are forever relegated to an occasional paragraph or anecdote in biographies of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and the rest. This book offers a very different perspective, which turns these enslaved people into REAL people.

Still, I question whether middle-school aged kids have the clarity to understand the nuance required for such complex history. It seems as though the target audience is 12-14, an age which remains rooted in concrete thinking. I'd like to think, though, that deeper thinkers of that age group will find this fascinating and find enigmas like George Washington and TJ to be flawed-but-still-brilliant.

That's certainly part of the main idea Davis gets across -- or is it, "brilliant-but-still-flawed?" Either way, this is an important book -- we don't have to be footnote-consuming historians to absorb this very human history. Each of the seven chapters tells its own story, and in fact left me wanting more. I'd love to read a similar book featuring freedom fighters like Nat Turner, Olaudah Equiano, William Harvey Carney, Joseph Cinque, and a few others.

But in a way, the ordinariness of the protagonists in this collection are what makes it special. Each one left me sad and angry ... And in awe at the same time. How in the hell did they live through this, and how did anybody -- much less our Founding Fathers -- actually think it was OK?!

Ona Judge's story of escape from the Washingtons, and George's long quest to retrieve her, is probably the most chilling. Unless, course, it's Alfred "Jackson" (even enslaved people need last names) responding late in life to the ridiculous notion that in heaven, skin color won't matter -- and he should just bide his time: "How would you like to be a slave?"

Well, I wouldn't. And neither would George Washington and the others. It brings to mind one of my favorite Lincoln quotes: "As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master." It's too bad the previous generations of Americans were unable to think and live that deeply.

[Lois · Rating 1 out of 5]

Meh.
This is chattel slavery apologist in tone.
I'd reccomend Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X Kedi, The American Slave Coast by Ned Sublette, The Half Has Never Been Told by Edward E Baptist, Master of the Mountain and An Imperfect God by Henry Wiencek.
This is really bad and I'm sick that it's being marketed to children.

[R. G. Nairam · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just wish this was better than it actually is.

Maybe I'm just not the audience--the author apparently writes a series called "don't know much about history" and I have a degree in history--but even so, I don't think any audience deserves to be this condescended to.

I mentioned in an update that it is very didactic. More than once when talking about Washington it mentions that we're taught that false story about the cherry tree but not this terrible contradiction!! It also asks tons of boring, obvious rhetorical questions. Davis frequently makes up inner thoughts for the presidents that certainly could be true but are NOT the kind of thing we can accurately guess about.

There's a disturbing richness to the difference between what these men SAID (both about liberty generally and often about slavery in particular) and their ACTIONS. THAT is what you should focus on, not making up inner thought processes that make it all obviously evil. It's a common aspect of human nature to live in contradiction, especially when the contradiction supports our way of life. Whether we realize the contradiction or not is beside the point, and is not something you can just guess about. Read their work. See their actions. That's history.

Further, this book is just not really what the title suggests it is. There's still a lot of focus on the presidents' and their life histories (and the nation's history), delivered hurriedly and generically, especially if you already know about the period. I assumed that Davis had done a lot of research and found interesting things about the enslaved people he focused on. And...he didn't. I definitely believe he included all that he found, and it is unfortunate that it is so hard to see these lives. But the book is still not really about them. It's about the presidents. Ona Judge is the one person who stands out in the detail given her story.

Then there's this whole "hidden history" angle, and with the exception of a few details (for example, Washington's unrelenting attempt to retrieve Ona or Andrew Jackson's horrific newspaper ad) there's nothing here that really surprised me or I think is generally unknown to the current generation. There's a lot of awareness of the fact that the men who set up our country and talked eloquently about freedom also participated in slavery. That's not shocking on its own, but Davis expects it to be.

Is this an important thing to talk about? Absolutely, yes. The reason I kept reading this book despite finding it a poor exploration of the topic is because I wanted to learn more about the history even if the communication was poor.

But is this book a good discussion of this topic?

Ehhh

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Note: This book was selected from genre-based list, and is being reviewed as part of online course work; the review may reference other books from that genre-based list which I did not choose to read, or books read for previous weeks.
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This was a very sobering book about the often glossed-over history of some of our country's first leaders. I opted for the audiobook version because (like with It's Kind of a Funny Story), I wasn't sure if I would have the drive to finish it. I was pleasantly surprised that (unlike It's Kind of a Funny Story), this book did not feel like a chore to complete. Though the topic is heavy, the writing style makes this book feel very appropriate for junior high students, or perhaps even late elementary schoolers.

This books gives a more accurate picture of what slavery was like for persons owned by well-off Northerners (though it frequently mentions the "deep south," all personal accounts take place in Northern states/colonies) than many other texts. Two very recent picture books, A Birthday Cake for George Washington (2016) and A Fine Dessert (2015), stirred up quite a bit of controversy over the accuracy of "smiling slaves" in what could be a child's first introduction to the topic. But it's not just children's books which attempt to sugar-coat slavery, also in 2015 it was discovered that a McGraw Hill World Geography textbook being used in Texas classrooms included a caption on a "Patterns of Immigration" map which referred to slaves as "millions of workers from Africa." In the Shadow of Liberty gives some of the most authentic accounts enslavement I have read yet, and clearly it's a literary topic in desperate need of such authentic accounts.

On the audiobook, I have to note that I really enjoyed that there were several narrators, eight including the author, which made the stories of each of the five featured enslaved African Americans feel more personal, and easier to separate from one another.

[Brandy Painter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent, engaging book about four presidents and people they enslaved. It is a well sourced and documented work of non-fiction that explains necessary background details important for the targeted audience.

[Ann Smorado · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a very good read. The history was interesting. He provided enough detail without getting bogged down in details. He gave us a good look at the early presidents and their stories with the enslaved people who worked closest to them. We tend to glorify these men because they are American heroes (they still are) and, here, we see the contradiction in which they lived. He gave us that look without totally tearing them down either. Very balanced.

I thought Ona Judge's story was the most interesting. She walked away from - according to the book - was a relatively good life for an African American woman in that time to live and grow old very poor. BUT she had the one thing she wanted more than anything and that was FREEDOM. She spoke volumes with her story.

[Alicia · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is better than any textbook you'll read and digs deep into the politics of doing one thing and saying another and how founding fathers enslaved and even on deathbeds and afterward didn't free them. It's the kind of narrative nonfiction that credits the enslaved and their stories specifically in how they worked alongside these men even though they fought a larger battle in America for whether slavery should exist.

Davis details (with quite a few pictures too) the living conditions and working conditions, the work they did, the "thanks" they got if any, and truly the hidden elements of these massive estates and the games the men would play-- particularly when Jefferson was in Philadelphia and sent his slaves back and forth because if they stayed for longer than six months they would actually be considered free and *he couldn't bear that to happen* including Hercules, his head cook. It's just mind-blowing but a detailed history of these specific lives that is engaging.

[Tonya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just in time for the beginning of Black History Month to begin tomorrow, I finished this. I’d wholeheartedly recommend it to ANYONE. It’s easy to follow as it’s written aimed at the YA audience. The author has done extensive research yet keeps the topic at the forefront and explains things plainly. The subject matter of this book is something that should be included in all American history studies... and my hope is that one day it will be. I know that I, for one, was definitely taught the “white side” of our country’s history, with just a few mentions to the African American history side. It’s actually baffling how one could justify only telling that part of history when the enslaved population once took up such a large percentage of our entire population. Anyway, as I said, I’d fully recommend this book to anyone. Take it as a quick read as a favor to yourself at the start of this coming month. I own it and I’m happy to loan it out! :)

[Rodney M. Jones Jr. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although many want to turn a blind eye to history, this book highlights why its so important to acknowledge it. I wish this was in the school systems because it would shatter the myth of this was so long ago and we are better now.

There is no soft side to slavery and as brutal and harsh as it was, it is a part of our American history. Black America built this nation but has only gotten very minimal recognition.

This book provides insight to the founding fathers who were instrumental in writing American history but shows another side of them that is never highlighted. Should we really honor these men of history and considered them great people? I'll let you decide.

[Stephanie Livingston · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! This book had me talking about it to my whole family!
Growing up, I was never into History. I thought it was boring and not really a point to it. Once I got into college, I was put in a few History classes making me more interested in History. I chose to read this book to get more knowledge about slavery. I liked how in the beginning of the book, Davis makes it clear slaves were people, not items. I agreed strongly about what he had stated. I believe this book is important to people who have different opinions about slavery because Davis does a spectacular job at making his statements strong. I also liked the way he used the narratives, it helped me get more information about the presidents as well. Lastly, I enjoyed this book because Davis did not give too much information to where the reading was boring, but just enough detail to make the reading interesting.
I would recommend this book to high school or middle school students. I remember starting to talk about slavery around high school so this book could be given to students to read before giving a lesson just so they have a little information going into the lesson. I also recommend this book to middle school students because Davis made the story easy to read.

[Laurel Newsom · Rating 4 out of 5]

I most definitely did not know that Washington signed the fugitive slave act. This book did eat at me from the inside because I want to believe that these men (with the exception of Andrew Jackson) were good because they wanted to get rid of slavery but they also worried about themselves. I really liked the other snippets of history, but over all followed the slaves story. The ending to each story left me with mixed feelings and unsatisfied because there is really not much of a record for these people while their masters were documented in every minute of their life! Overall, a great book to really shed light on those who we perceive as perfect, but just hid their flaws.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

OUTSTANDING!! Let's add this to the list of "false narratives" I perpetuated as a young teacher, along with Columbus and Thanksgiving. This narrative nonfiction text looks at the founding fathers and how enslaved persons played a major role in their presidencies. Davis doesn't sugarcoat the facts here...it's not always pretty.

[Edward Sullivan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the American history ignored in textbooks and the classroom, but everyone should know. Accessible, compelling, and important.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every morning in fifth grade, my classmates and I would stand to pledge our allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. Then, we would remain standing a for a patriotic singalong (participation required.) One of the oft repeated songs had a chorus that went, “George Washington was a very good/brave/wise man, a very good/brave/wise man indeed!” Only looking back now do I realize how weird this was! I mean, replace George Washington with Kim Jung Un and scrap the pledge allegiance to the Christian flag and the Bible, and we’ve arrived in North Korea... Anyway, when you grow up literally singing about how how amazing George Washington is, it’s kind of like a punch in the gut when you realize this very good/brave/wise man owned slaves... And not only did he own slaves, but when Pennsylvania passed a law that said any enslaved person would be free after 6 months of living within the state, our venerable Georgey Peorgey decided his slaves really wouldn’t like freedom and he needed to prevent them from being freed. For their own good, this wise man tells us (barf). Anyway, as soon as one of his enslaved persons had been living in Pennsylvania for nearly six months, he would send them back to Mt Vernon, then retrieve them at a later date. “But wait,” fifth-grade Emily says. “Wasn’t he a good/brave/wise man? That doesn’t sound good or brave or wise!” Exactly, fifth-grade, Emily. Exactly.

At one point while listening to this book, I literally quoted Father Brah in my mind: “Can I be honest? I think you’re acting like a little b*tch right now.” Only worse than a little b*tch.

This book is something I would encourage anyone to read. It’s written for young adults, so it’s pretty engaging and easy to follow. It’s truly eye-opening, as it very clearly points out the hypocrisy in many of our founding fathers who declared all men created equal, yet continued to enslave the African Americans. (But not all of our founding fathers- looking at you, Alexander Hamilton! I’d die for you, man.)

I think the main weakness of this book isn’t really something that can be helped, and that’s mainly that we have so little knowledge of these men and women who worked in the “shadow of liberty.” Can we even trust the writings of these people when they say master treats them kindly, seeing as they would be punished if they were caught disparaging their master? Because of this, the book contains a lot of perhapses and maybes and it-could-bes, which aren’t as compelling as cold hard facts, though the facts that it did include were very compelling, very compelling indeed. There’s also, unfortunately, a larger focus on the founding fathers than there is on the enslaved people themselves, which, again, has to do with the limited information we have.

Perhaps the thing I liked most about this book is the way the author painted the founding fathers in a very human light. He didn’t make them out to be near deities or near devils. He simply gave a very thorough picture of what these men were really like, which was human and sinful and sometimes doing good things and sometimes doing bad things and constantly falling short of the ideals they touted- kinda like the rest of us, eh? And I think it’s okay for our fifth graders to know that George Washington was a mixed bag of a man, a mixed bag of a man indeed.

Audiobook comments: I would recommend the audiobook. There is a different narrator for each chapter, so don’t get discouraged when the guy who says “hwhite” starts reading- his pages are numbered!

[Carolyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this aloud as part of our United States history unit for 5th grade homeschool. These are stories of people who had been enslaved by some of the US founding fathers. I really had no idea how many of our early presidents were slaveowners. In fact, thirteen presidents either owned enslaved people or were raised in slaveholding households. In particular, this book goes through the story of five enslaved people who were all slaves in US presidents' households: Billy Lee, Ona Judge, Isaac Granger, Paul Jennings, and Alfred Jackson. Also including chapters about the early years of slavery in the book, and with timelines of American slavery after every chapter, this was an excellent source to give more depth to slavery by learning about a few of the people who were enslaved by US Presidents during America's chattel slavery.

My son commented several times about what he had learned about slavery in public school, and that it was inadequate to really get you to understand its horrors. While this isn't a book that really goes into depth about some of the worst parts of slavery (it touches on some of those points but it's not the book's main focus), it does put names and faces to some of the people who were enslaved, which is another important part of having a deeper understanding of slavery in the United States.

[Jake Lubin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Can you believe that such well known people had such great flaws? Well today we will be discussing this on another episode of book reviews with Jake Lubin. America is a nation founded upon the great ideals of freedom and equality. Many men known as founding fathers created these ideals. These men are considered great heroes in our society, yet they had their flaws. This is highlighted in the book In The Shadow Of Liberty by Kenneth C. Davis. Founding fathers mentioned in this book are George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Andrew Jackson is also mentioned, he was a famous war hero and politician. Ever since the founding of the British colonies in America, slaves from Africa were captured and sold, to work on large plantations. Most of this slavery occured in the southern regions of America, and many southerners rejected freedom of African Americans completely. Conditions of slaves were awful and inhumane. These early American heroes were some of many of these slaveholding southerners. In this book there are five slaves mentioned Billy Lee, Ona Judge, Isaac Granger, Paul Jennings and Alfred Jackson. All of these people had very similar yet different experiences as slaves. All of them were very highly regarded for a slave by their owners, and often went through everything with them. Also for a slave living in this time period of America most of their lives ended better than other slaves. Although they are treated better than other slaves the evils of slavery are still exposed in this book. In all, this book exposes the flaws of many old American heros to the world. It demonstrates the evil of slavery, but it shows how these meaningless slaves, in others eyes, were able to make a large impact on history. All of these slaves were amazing people who deserved better in their lives but were able to make the best of their horrible lives. I have learned from reading this book that there is always hope and there is always an opportunity to do the right thing. If I were to rate this book out of ten I would give it an eight and half. I say this because for the intended audience of history lovers it is very good. However I felt that it was too factual, and felt like you were just reading a textbook rather than a story. This book was not necessarily the best I have ever read, but I liked it very much. I would recommend this for anyone looking for a quick easy read that likes history. Well that was a wrap to another addition of book reviews with Jake Lubin, but I would like to leave you with one question. How would you feel if you were born into a life of bondage?

[Jeremy Schaefer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I chose to read this book because I have always been a history nut; especially with American history. For whatever reason, Black history and the history of slavery in America has always peaked my interest. The hypocrisy of living as a slave in a "free" nation as well as the struggles people went through to free slaves is especially interesting to me. I knew after reading the title that I would enjoy this book. One thing about this book that I really enjoyed was the debate of whether or not slaves were people, and the author squashed that debate early on. Slaves are people, not objects. Also, the narratives helped acquiring information about the presidents easy. Being able to see what life was like for slaves living under the ownership of our country's first presidents allows for a unique and debatable experience. I believe that this book would be more geared towards middle school levels, and feeds nicely into lesson plans about slavery in America. The author provides solid research (there are source notes and bibliographies for each chapter), accessible prose, and determination to make these stories known, and this allows young readers an important alternative to textbook representations of colonial life. Definitely recommend to others.

[Sarah Bee · Rating 5 out of 5]

This took me a long time to get through, especially since I “read” it as an audiobook, but I did find it super factual and fascinating. I regret that I probably didn’t pay as much attention to it because I was listening rather than reading, but it did keep me engaged more so than I would have been otherwise (I tend to fall asleep when I read nonfiction). I really appreciated the reframing of the narrative we’ve become so accustomed to in US schools. I firmly believe that these stories need to be a part of curriculum as so many people integral to the building of society as we know it are erased from texts, art, and other “historical” documents. I was recommended this book by a friend and will continue recommending it to others as I have found more than once since starting it, the book has come up in conversations. Highly, HIGHLY recommend.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very well-researched and eye-opening book about five enslaved people - Billy Lee, Ona Judge, Isaac Granger, Paul Jennings and Alfred Jackson, and the men who enslaved them (George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and Andrew Jackson). Davis tells their tales in a mostly linear fashion, starting with Billy Lee and concluding with Alfred Jackson.

This is a crucial book that all high school history classes should read. Davis' inclusion of illustrated reproductions of paintings, photos, detailed timeline, as well as in-depth backmatter add to this powerful book. Not to be missed.

[Roxanne Guillory · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every middle and high school classroom library needs this book. It’s brilliantly composed to reveal the history of slavery in America to young readers who likely don’t fully understand that history because of our country’s refusal to face it honestly. By focusing on the lives of five enslaved people who served five founding fathers, the grand hypocrisy of America is writ large, and the daily abuses of slavery are revealed in a personal way that will absolutely open readers’ eyes to our complicated past and perhaps help them see the countless tragic ways that history lingers in our culture and our psyches.

[Yael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like others who reviewed, I feel this should be required reading for all high schoolers. A fascinating, heartbreaking, disgusting and inspiring look at the relationships of slavery to the beginnings of our nation; of some of America’s most well-known founders to their enslaved men and women. A much more well-rounded exploration of a topic that we normally get in very single-dimensional presentation.

[GoBeIt · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book definitely designed for younger readers, but it helped me think through and learn more about the legacy of slavery that the founders left behind. The remarkable people whose lives are shared in this book also deserve to be celebrated, and because the book is easy to read, I think a lot of people might be more willing to engage this part of history through this book.

[Liz · Rating 4 out of 5]

As I read this book, I couldn't help but think of all the ways I could use it in middle and high school history courses. I appreciated the use of visual media throughout the book, as well as the explanations of why it is so challenging to learn about the lives of individual slaves. While I now find myself really wanting a more in-depth adult version of this book, it's a good read for any age.

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good YA reflection of the early presidents’ experiences with slavery.

[Erica · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this because it was on my boss's "suggested reading" list and it is a quick read but very informative, especially if you like history. I especially enjoyed the chapter on Thomas Jefferson since I have spent ample time in Charlottesville, VA. Definitely a good and important book to read.

[Jackie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This Children's Non-fiction book is written simple enough for it's target age but also fascinating enough to engage adults. I think this is an important book that everyone should read.