First published 2021
Gary Ginsberg explores how personal friendships influenced the most powerful leaders in American history. He examines the bond between Abraham Lincoln and Joshua Speed, who lived together for four years and later collaborated to preserve the Union. He reveals how Harry Truman's longtime friend Eddie Jacobson convinced the president to recognize Israel in 1948. The book uncovers Daisy Suckley's role as Franklin Roosevelt's closest confidant during the Great Depression and World War II. Ginsberg shows how John Kennedy relied on David Ormsby-Gore during the Cuban Missile Crisis, drawing on a friendship that began in prewar London. The author also examines relationships between Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, Franklin Pierce and Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Bill Clinton and Vernon Jordan. Ginsberg provides new insights into presidential decision making by focusing on the trusted friends who supported these leaders through their most challenging moments.
Genres: history, 20th-century, non-fiction, biography-memoir, 21st-century, american-history
Vibes: intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family
Period: Great Depression, Cuban Missile Crisis
416 pages · Hardcover · Twelve