VOLUME ONE: SHAPING A NEW NATION
From 1492 to 1877
The American story begins before there was an America at all, except in
the imagination of peoples around the world, living in poverty and
yearning for freedom. From its beginnings America has been a land of
hope, a magnet for people looking for a new beginning, a new life for
themselves and their families. Out of their efforts a new nation
gradually came into being. It was a nation formed by men and women who
believed that freedom meant being able to rule themselves, rather than
being ruled over by distant kings and princes. Such a nation would be a
great experiment, a large republic unlike any other in history. Through
a brave war of independence, and wise acts of statecraft, its leaders
created a system of government that could protect the ideals of freedom
and self-rule that they cherished. It was a brilliant system. But it was
far from perfect, especially in its permitting the continued existence
of slavery. It could not prevent a bloody and wounding civil war, a
terrible contest pitting brother against brother and testing the great
experiment to the breaking point--testing, but not breaking. The nation
came out of the Civil War and postwar Reconstruction battered, but with
a future full of possibility lying ahead.