Don't Know Much About History
Who really discovered America? What was “the shot heard ‘round the world”? Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: Did he or didn’t he?
From the arrival of Columbus through the bizarre election of 2000 and beyond, Davis carries readers on a rollicking ride through more than 500 years of American history. In this updated edition of the classic anti-textbook, he debunks, recounts, and serves up the real story behind the myths and fallacies of American history.
A new, completely revised, expanded and updated edition of the million-selling New York Times bestseller that launched the entire Don’t Know Much About® series
Buy it: Paperback $13.95 ISBN: 0060083824 | Hardcover $26.95 ISBN: 0060083816
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Did You Know?
The Marquis de Lafayette came to America to volunteer his services during the Revolutionary War. (p. 73)
World War I cost America 130,174 lives and $32 billion. (p. 317)
The 1800 presidential election between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr was tied at 73 electoral votes each. (p. 625)
Theodore Roosevelt won a Nobel Prize for mediating an end to the Russo-Japanese war. (p. 296)
The linking of East and West by rail was completed on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Point, Utah. (p. 265)
As a defense against Indians, the Dutch erected a wall in lower Manhattan from which Wall Street gets its name. (p. 38)
"Yankee Doodle Dandy" was once sung by the British to taunt the Americans.
(p. 88)
Richard Nixon used more than $10 million in government funds for improvements on his private homes. (p. 505)
In 1915, the German Embassy published newspaper ads warning Americans not to sail on British ships in the Atlantic. (p. 306)
Brewer Samuel Adams was the chief political architect behind the events that led to the Boston Tea Party. (p. 79)
America entered World War I in April 1917 when it was already in its closing stages. (p. 307)
George Bush was the first Vice President elected President since Martin Van Buren in 1836. (p. 536)
U.S. Steel, financed by Andrew Carnegie in 1900, was the first billion-dollar corporation. (p. 267)
After the Revolutionary War, national foreign debt was estimated at $11,710,379. (p. 103)
In March 1961, during his first 100 days in office, John F. Kennedy established the Peace Corps. (p. 444)
The 18th Amendment prohibited "the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors" in the U.S. (p. 329)
The Battle of Bunker Hill was actually fought on Breed's Hill. (p. 71)
The U.S. population was 3,929,625 in 1790 (Pg. 134) and 9,638,453 in 1820. (p. 164)
Explorer Henry Hudson's crew mutinied in 1611 and left him in an open boat in Hudson Bay. (p. 22)
Under the direction of J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI tried to prove that Martin Luther King was a Communist. (p. 461)
One day after President Roosevelt appealed to Emperor Hirohito to avert war, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. (p. 373)
In 1963, America was buzzing with talk about Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique. (p. 450)
German subs destroyed nearly 4.5 million tons of Allied ships in the first two months of 1940. (p. 370)
The first Continental Congress was made up of 56 delegates from every colony except Georgia. (p. 69)