The Bear Went Over The Mountain: Presidents, Vice Presidents, and the American Road

by Carll Tucker

After reaching age 50, author and publisher Carll Tucker knew he needed to make some changes. To figure out his new life, he took to the American road alone in an RV for nine months. His plan was to locate all the graves of our presidents and vice presidents and find his own new self and direction. Join Tucker as he uncovers fascinating new information about famous and forgotten leaders. Who knew that one of our vice presidents was an American Indian or that another was believed to be African-American? Why were we never taught that a president and vice president were gay? From Wal-Mart to Disneyworld to Mount Rushmore to the Grand Ole Opry to RV parks, Tucker experiences an America both familiar and unexpected and revels in a treasure trove of intriguing information. At the same time, he achieves his goal of self discovery, which has enabled him to make meaningful changes and set him on a new road for his own future. Hilarious, poignant, and provocative, this is history as joyride, and a provocative personal journey that will resonate with travel aficionados as well as those who want to make positive, though difficult, changes in their lives.

281 pages, Paperback

First published February 19, 2008

Reviews

[Loren]

I really wanted to like this book. The author goes on a quest to visit the graves of all the American Presidents and Vice Presidents. Unfortunately, I would have put the emphasis on graves and not on the author's discovery of himself.

Mr. Tucker starts the book by announcing to his wife of 25 years that he is buying an RV and leaving her for months to go walkabout. He does not allow any discussion. He can't really justify the trip to her or to his friends (or the reader), not even by calling it a midlife crisis. Whenever he gets lonely on the road, he visits a Wall-Mart to gawk at the rampant consumerism and desperate unhappiness of Americans outside of the privileged enclave where he was born to money. As narrators go, he is not someone I wanted to snuggle up to for 300 pages.

The book unfolds in map-order, following the author as he travels outward from New York. Since I only have a tenuous grasp on the order of American presidents (and no idea whatsoever about the vice presidents), I needed a whole lot more history to understand the chronology. I'm not sure how he could have assembled the book differently, but I was often lost.

The final straw, though, was that I wanted to know about the monuments to the fallen men, as well as the graveyards in which they lay. I wanted a guidebook and not a memoir. If you have a whole lot more historical knowledge than I brought to the book -- and you're interested in midlife quests -- you will enjoy the book more than I did.

[Kirsten]

Because I am (stubbornly) optimistic, I kept reading this book book to the end, hoping it would get better. It didn't. But I picked up a few America fun facts along the way

[Carol Hall]

this was much better than i thought it would be. if you are a u.s. history buff or pres. ,veep buff you should read this. also pointed out how facts or fiction were glorified or hidden, and now the truth is out there.the truth can change your opinion of these men. and in the life of politics every thing old is new aagain.

[Shorewalker]

Interesting!

[John]

Some interesting historical tidbits amidst the bloviation and bombast.