A comprehensive biography of Greeley (1811-72), deftly analyzing
the price he paid to brook no intrusion, partisan or otherwise, on
his principles. Fresh from apprenticing as a typesetter in small
printing shops in New England and upstate New York, the 23-year-old
Greeley arrived in New York City to found the weekly opinion
journal, the New Yorker, in 1834. Seven years later, he started a
newspaper, the Herald Tribune. By hiring savvy reporters and
columnists like Samuel Clemens (even Karl Marx was a foreign
contributor) Greeley built the Trib into perhaps the world's most
widely read daily, and the most trusted in America at the time of
the Civil War. He beat the drum for an expansionist-"go
West"-America based on freedom and equal opportunity for all; free,
that is, from the institution of slavery Greeley had come to abhor.
To maintain integrity by his own standard, Williams stresses,
Greeley not only had to turn against the Republican Party he helped
found, but also to criticize the president he had anointed.
(Lincoln himself, however, never wavered in his regard for Greeley,
once a fellow Congressman who, when appointed to fill an open seat,
dared call Honest Abe to account for padding his travel expenses.)
Even after he had "committed political suicide," Williams notes, by
funding a bail bond for former Confederate president Jefferson
Davis, Greeley entered the 1872 campaign opposing U.S. Grant as the
presidential candidate of the reformist Liberal Republican party
and, without seeking it, also won the Democrats' nomination. His
former Republican cohorts promptly moved to discredit him with
vicious attacks tying him to everything from the Ku Klux Klan to
New York's ultra-corrupt Boss Tweed administration. The experience,
the author reckons, likely hastened his death. Powerful portrait of
a publisher who became the voice of Middle America during the
nation's deepest crisis. (Kirkus Reviews)
View the Table of Contents. Read the Preface.
aFrom James Patronas 1855 "Life of Horace Greeley" through
Greeleyas 1868 autobiography "Recollections of a Busy Life," and
down to the present, dozens of voices have told the story and
legend of Horace Greeley. Williamsas rich and well-presented
account of his ideological and political legacy is a welcome
addition to that chorus. It is certainly worth hearing.a
--"The Journal of American History"
aWilliamsas work is an essential one for those wanting to
understand the social and political climate in the United States
during the time between some have called the two American
revolutions- ones that was fought for liberty and one that was
pursued for freedom.a
--"Civil War Book Review"
aA splendid telling of a story that couldnat be more timely now
that we are in another difficult and controversial war.a
--"The Wall Street Journal"
"Williams gives a straightforward account . . . [and] argues
that Greeley unswervingly devoted himself to a single
ideal--American freedom--and was, in turn, crucial to its
development."
--"The New Yorker"
"In Mr. Williams' hands, Greeley comes through as a warm-hearted
eccentric whose influence was greater than that of any editor
today."
--"Washington Times"
aWe should be grateful for and even astonished by this graceful
and absorbing account of a species practically extinct, a newspaper
publisher for whom focus groups and stockholders arenat true north
on his moral compass.a
--"Harper's Magazine"
"The celebrated reformer Horace Greeley edited "The New York
Tribune," has a tiny but elegant oasis in Midtown named for him,
and may be best remembered for having memorably advisedyoung men to
go west. In Horace Greeley: Champion of American Freedom, Robert C.
Williams places this 19th-century New Yorker in a broader political
context. . . . Succeeds in portraying [Greeley] as a leading figure
in the struggle to define freedom 'as a universal good better than
the liberty that tolerated slavery.'"
--"The New York Times"
"A comprehensive biography of Greeley (1811a72), deftly
analyzing the price he paid to brook no intrusion, partisan or
otherwise, on his principles. . . . Powerful portrait of a
publisher who became the voice of Middle America during the
nation's deepest crisis."
--"Kirkus (starred review)"
aWilliams elevates Greeley to his proper place as a progressive
nineteenth-century writer/activist. An excellent companion work is
"Robert D. Richardsonas Emerson: The Mind on Fire"a
--"Choice"
"The author seeks to ennoble the erratic, odd-mannered editor,
who had a squeaky voice, wispy hair, and a white Irish linen
jacket, and advised young men to 'Go West!'...Students of the CIvil
War era will welcome the author's invesitgation of Greeley's life
and influence."
--"ForeWord"
aBiographer Williams recounts Greeleyas rise from obscurity to
prominence, relying for a unifying theme on Greeleyas dedication to
social reform and personal improvement. . . . General readers
interested in the who, what, when, where, and how of Greeley have
got it all in Williamsa stolid presentation.a
--"Booklist"
"Greeleyas was a remarkable life. And Robert Williams paints it
in full. . . . [He] does a creditable job relating all of this, and
his book is thoroughly researched and ably written. . . . [His]
continuing theme of Greeleyas relationship toevolving notions of
liberty and freedom is solid. . . . Horace Greeley was
unquestionably the dominant journalist, and one of the leading
politicians, of the Civil War era. And his story has never been
better told than it is here."
--"New York Sun"
aThrough research involving many new primary sources, Williams
opens our eyes to many unknown or unappreciated facets of this
fearless editor and political strategist, as well as his influence
over Abraham Lincoln, William Seward, and reforms of society of all
typesa].[E]ssential for those wanting to understand the social and
political climate in the United States during the time between what
some have called the two American revolutions a one that was fought
for liberty and one that was pursued for freedom.a
--"Civil War Book Review"
"By far the most important biography of Horace Greeley to appear
in the past half century."
--Daniel W. Howe, author of "Making the American Self: Jonathan
Edwards to Abraham Lincoln" and Rhodes Professor of American
History, Oxford University
aThis new biography comes, refreshingly, from outside
journalism. It was written by a veteran historian whose starting
point was his interest in understanding the words alibertya and
afreedom, a and the distinctions between them. Williams found that
much of the nineteenth-century discussion of these concepts flowed
through a single figure, Horace Greeley. . . . Williams captures
Greeley not only as the white-haired, badly dressed odd duck, but
also as a formidable presence--outspoken but not quarrelsome,
ambitious but principled, fearless but not reckless. . . . Williams
conveys well an era in which politics was many-hued, rather than
merely red and blue.a
--"Columbia Journalism Review"
"America's most open-minded newspaper editor, Horace Greeley,
promoted many a good cause in the pages of his paper, and regularly
suffered the consequences of expressing what he thought. Rather
than catering to public opinion, he confronted and changed it. This
fine biography reintroduces him as a foremost champion of human
freedom."
--Donald A. Ritchie, author of "Reporting from Washington: The
History of the Washington Press Corps"
"Williams describes the Civil War editor and politician Horace
Greeley as a 'great mind and heart.' I agree. Greeley should be
better known. This book may make him so."
--Joy Hakim, author of the ten volume series, "A History of US"
"[An] accessible study by a seasoned historian is based on an
impressive collection of primary resources."
--"Library Journal"
"A comprehensive biography of the veteran journalist and
intellectual."
--"Publisher's Weekly"
From his arrival in New York City in 1831 as a young printer
from New Hampshire to his death in 1872 after losing the
presidential election to General Ulysses S. Grant, Horace Greeley
(b. 1811) was a quintessential New Yorker. He thrived on the cityas
ceaseless energy, with his "New York Tribune" at the forefront of a
national revolution in reporting and transmitting news. Greeley
devoured ideas, books, fads, and current events as quickly as he
developed his own interests and causes, all of which revolved
around the concept of freedom. While he adored his work as a New
York editor, Greeleyas lifelong quest for universal freedom took
him to the edge of the American frontier and beyond to Europe. A
major figure in nineteenth-century American politics and reform
movements, Greeley was also a key actor in a worldwide debate about
the meaning of freedom that involved progressive thinkers on both
sides of the Atlantic, including Margaret Fuller, Ralph Waldo
Emerson, and Karl Marx.
Greeley was first and foremost an ardent nationalist who devoted
his life to ensuring that America live up to its promises of
liberty and freedom for all of its members. Robert C. Williams
places Greeleyas relentless political ambitions, bold reform
agenda, and complex personal life into the broader context of
freedom. Horace Greeley is as rigorous and vast as Greeley himself,
and as America itself in the long nineteenth century.
In the first comprehensive biography of Greeley to be published
in nearly half a century, Williams captures Greeley from all sides:
editor, reformer, political candidate, eccentric, and
trans-Atlantic public intellectual; examining headlining news
issues of the day, including slavery, westward expansion, European
revolutions, the Civil War, the demise of the Whig and the birth of
the Republican parties, transcendentalism, and other intellectual
currents of the era.
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