Michelle Obama's family saga is a remarkable, quintessentially American story--a journey from slavery to the White House in five generations. In this prodigiously researched epic, New York Times correspondent Rachel L. Swarns traces that complex and fascinating tale--from the men who fought in the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, to the mothers and fathers who endured the horrors of slavery and the indignities of segregation to build a better future for their children--uncovering details about Mrs. Obama's black, white, and multiracial forebears that even the First Lady herself did not know.

Though an intimate family history, American Tapestry is also the collective chronicle of our changing nation, a beautifully rendered and singularly inspiring story with resonance for us all.

In February 2016, Rachel Swarms, Darcy Eveleigh, Damien Cave, and Dana Canedy discovered dozens of photographs--and explored the history behind them--and chronicled them in the popular blog series Unpublished Black History. The month-long series was overwhelmingly well-received and garnered 1.7 million views and thousands of comments from readers. This book dives even deeper in the Times photo archives--known as the Morgue--to showcase 120 more photographs and their untold stories. The never-before-published photographs include a 27-year-old Jesse Jackson leading a rally of 4,000 people in Chicago, Rosa Parks arriving at a Montgomery Courthouse, and a candid behind-the-scenes shot of Aretha Franklin backstage at the Apollo Theater. Were the photos--or the people in them--not deemed newsworthy enough? Did the images not arrive in time for publication? Were they pushed aside by words at an institution long known as the Gray Lady? Swarms, Eveleigh, Cave, and Canedy explore all these questions and more in this one-of-a-kind book.