My Goal- To read one biography and /memoirs of each American President. A “grown up “book not a children’s bio. That
would take me a week.
So far this year I've read 141 books for my Goodreads challenge. It included mostly adult and YA novels, as well
as graphic novels. I didn’t include picture books or short chapter books because
then again I would have completed my challenge too soon. I also didn’t count the mad skimming/reading
of several dozen pregnancy/breastfeeding/child care books I devoured last year
in preparation for the birth of my daughter. Even with my busy schedule, I
always find time for books.
But why the Presidents? Why would I want to read about a bunch
of (mostly) dead white men when there are realms of fiction and fantasy to explore?
Well...I’ve never found an exact reason. I love history which
plays a part. But I guess it all started way back in college. I had an acquaintance
who prided herself in knowing all sorts of bizarre facts about the presidents.
She would challenge anyone to name any president and she would spout out a factoid.
I had a pretty similar thought “Who in their right mind studied the presidents?”
I will state that we were both theater major and American History was nowhere
on our required course studies. Also the person in question was bluntly; a
hippie. When she wasn’t talking about dead presidents she was foaming at the
mouth about her displeasure at the current commander in chief at the time:
George W. Bush.
Later a year after college working in my first theater job, somehow
I was challenge to learn the names of the presidents in order. Which I did,
studying over the course of an evening between set changes and reciting the
list the next day with great success. Soon this became my “parlor trick”.
Reciting the list while doing chores and even correctly stating it after 8
drinks in one very foolish Cinco de Mayo.
But really, what is so special about
learning 44 names in order? We can
recite lyrics to our favorite songs, and even sometimes entire movies and
musicals, but we can’t be bothered to learn the names of our former leaders.
Right now there are hot-headed true-blooded “’Mericans’” who couldn’t name ten
presidents much less all of them.
And what of those presidents? Besides the big names –Washington,
Lincoln , Roosevelt- can the majority of our citizens even recall the
historical contributions of our presidents. I’ve known college bound teenage
patrons, bright kids, who couldn’t tell me who was president during the major
wars in our history. I’m talking The Revolution and the Civil War, much less
who in command during the War of 1812 or the Spanish American War. I challenged some of our teen age volunteers
to list as many presidents as they could in two minutes as a way to keep them
busy at the desk. I think the most they got was 6…and they didn’t even include the
current president.
