Audiobooks by Michael Beschloss

From a preeminent presidential historian comes a groundbreaking and often surprising saga of America's wartime chief executives Ten years in the research and writing, Presidents of War is a fresh, magisterial, intimate look at a procession of American leaders as they took the nation into conflict and mobilized their country for victory. It brings us into the room as they make the most difficult decisions that face any President, at times sending hundreds of thousands of American men and women to their deaths. From James Madison and the War of 1812 to recent times, we see them struggling with Congress, the courts, the press, their own advisors and antiwar protesters; seeking comfort from their spouses, families and friends; and dropping to their knees in prayer. We come to understand how these Presidents were able to withstand the pressures of war-both physically and emotionally-or were broken by them. Beschloss's interviews with surviving participants in the drama and his findings in original letters, diaries, once-classified national security documents, and other sources help him to tell this story in a way it has not been told before. Presidents of War combines the sense of being there with the overarching context of two centuries of American history. This important book shows how far we have traveled from the time of our Founders, who tried to constrain presidential power, to our modern day, when a single leader has the potential to launch nuclear weapons that can destroy much of the human race.

Michael Beschloss (Author), Fred Sanders (Narrator)

Audiobook

American Heritage History of the Presidents

From George Washington's reluctant oath-taking through George W. Bush's leadership challenges after September 11, 2001, we view ambitious and fallible men through the new lens of the twenty-first century. Where did they succeed? Where did they fail? And what do we know now that we could not have known at the time?

Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Author), Mike Chamberlain (Narrator)

Audiobook

Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America 1789-1989

Michael Beschloss's dramatic and inspiring saga explores crucial times when a courageous President changed the history of the United States. With surprising new sources and a dazzling command of history and human character, Beschloss brings these flawed, complex men -- and their wives, families, friends and foes -- to life as if in a gripping novel. Never have we had a more intimate, behind-the-scenes view of Presidents coping with the supreme dilemmas of their lives. In Presidential Courage you will witness George Washington braving threats of impeachment and assassination to make peace with England; John Adams, incurring his party's "unrelenting hatred" by refusing to fight France and warning, "Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war;" Andrew Jackson, in a death struggle against the corrupt Bank of the United States; Abraham Lincoln, risking his Presidency to insist that slaves be freed, as well as the crushing ordeals faced by Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan. As Beschloss shows, none of these Presidents was eager to incur ridicule, vilification or threats of political destruction and even assassination. But in the end, each ultimately proved himself to be, in Andrew Jackson's words, "born for the storm."

Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Author), Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman and the Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1941-1945

Michael Beschloss has been called by Newsweek "the nation's leading Presidential historian." Author of six previous books on the history of American Presidents and global affairs, including Mayday (1986), The Crisis Years (1991) and the first two volumes of a trilogy on the Lyndon Johnson tapes, he is a frequent lecturer and regular commentator on ABC News and PBS's The Newshour with Jim Lehrer. Born in Chicago, he is a trustee of the White House Historical Association, the National Archives Foundation, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation and the University of Virginia's Miller Center of Public Affairs. He lives with his wife and their two sons in Washington, D.C..

Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Author), Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Narrator)

Audiobook

Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret White House Tapes, 1964-1965

Michael Beschloss has been called by Newsweek "the nation's leading presidential historian." Author of five previous books on American Presidents, he is a frequent lecturer and a regular commentator on ABC News and PBS's The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. Born in Chicago, he is a trustee of the White House Historical Association, the National Archives Foundation, and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Author), Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Narrator)

Audiobook

Taking Charge: The Johnson White House Tapes 1963 1964

Taking Charge brings you into the room with an American political legend, still hated and revered a quarter century after his death. We hear Lyndon Johnson as he schemes and blusters, rewards and punishes, and reveals a bedrock core of unshakable political beliefs. The only President to record his private conversations from his first day in office, LBJ ordered these tapes locked in a vault until at least the year 2023. But now they have been unsealed, providing a close-up look at a President taking power such as we have never had before -- from John F. Kennedy's murder in November 1963 to Johnson's campaign for a landslide victory. Taking Charge is filled with revelations about the full-blooded Texan behind the public image. You will hear LBJ: * Revealing his self-doubts and personal anguish over the responsibilities of the presidency * Receiving the frank criticism of his wife, Lady Bird Johnson * Staking his presidency on a revolutionaly civil rights bill * Scuttling Robert Kennedy's drive to be his Vice President * Using the Tonkin Gulf attack to expand the American beachhead in Southeast Asia * Unveiling his private, tortured early doubts that we could ever win a war in Vietnam Taking Charge gives us an unprecedented look into a crucial presidency that continues to shape our lives today. In LBJ's own words, it is history "with the bark off."

Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Author), Michael Beschloss, Michael R. Beschloss (Narrator)

Audiobook