First published 2008
Steven Johnson tells the story of Joseph Priestley, an eighteenth-century figure who combined science, religion, and politics in ways that shaped America's founding. Johnson shows how Priestley discovered oxygen, helped establish ecosystem science, founded the Unitarian church, and maintained close friendships with Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. The book follows Priestley from his rise as one of Europe's most celebrated scientists and controversial thinkers to his exile from England when violent mobs destroyed his Birmingham home. Johnson traces Priestley's journey to Pennsylvania, where he sought freedom to pursue his varied interests. The author demonstrates how Priestley's relationships with the Founding Fathers, particularly Jefferson, influenced major debates in early American history. Jefferson credited Priestley with preventing him from abandoning Christianity entirely. Johnson uses Priestley's story to examine how new ideas emerge and spread, challenging common assumptions about the intellectual foundations of the United States and revealing the complex religious and scientific currents that shaped the nation's early development.
Genres: biography, academic, history-of-science, american-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: friendship, intellectual-history
Setting: Birmingham, England, Pennsylvania
Period: 18th-century, Early American History
254 pages · Hardcover · Riverhead Books