The Great American History Book Quiz

Often considered the best one-volume history of the Civil War yet published, it won the Pulitzer Prize in 1988.

The author of this work used census data, home sales records, and membership lists in the Elks, Rotary, Oddfellows, and other social societies to bring to life the neighborhood in which the subject of his book -- an African American physician who is wrongly accused of murder for defending his home against a white mob -- lived.

American Sphinx by Joseph J. Ellis won the National Book Award in 1996. Of his subject, Ellis said, "The best and worst of American history are inextricably entangled in [this person]." Who is the subject of his book?

Henry Adams was an American historian and the son of Abraham Lincoln's ambassador to England. His grandfather was President John Quincy Adams and his great-grandfather was President John Adams. His nine-volume history of the early republic has been called "a neglected masterpiece" as well as woefully inaccurate. What is this history titled?

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.'s three-volume history of the first and second administrations of Franklin D. Roosevelt is considered one of the best and most detailed (if supportive) studies of this president. The latter two volumes are The Coming of the New Deal: 1933–1935 and The Politics of Upheaval: 1935–1936. But only the first volume was an award winner (both the Bancroft Prize and the Francis Parkman Prize). What is the title of this volume?

This history of American involvement in the Vietnam War focused on a single individual and was but a partial history of that conflict. Yet, it won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. What is it?

This book received the 1996 Phi Beta Kappa Award as the most outstanding scholarly book published in the United States. It's subtitled "The Most Dangerous Man in Detroit". What is the book?

By 2001, historian Edmund Morris had written three books about American presidents. One was the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt. The other was Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan, roundly criticized. What was the third (highly praised, but not an award-winner)?

Historian David Kennedy's Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945 won the Pulitzer Prize and Francis Parkman Prize in 2000. Almost 30 years earlier, his first book won the Bancroft Prize for history writing. What was that book?

Richard Meyer won the 2003 Charles C. Eldredge Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in American Art for Outlaw Representation, his history of..... what?

Robert Caro's The Power Broker, a biography of urban planner Robert Moses, won the Pulitzer Prize and the Francis Parkman Prize, as well as a special citation from the American Institute of Architects.

But Caro says his book was deeply influence by what history of architecture?

For 30 years, Dwight D. Eisenhower was largely considered a mediocre president, a benign and indecisive man who preferred to play golf rather than denounce McCarthysim, deal with the Soviets, or handle the national crisis over race relations. But in 1981, this author's book challenged that thesis, concluding Eisenhowere was one of the most effective presidents of all time. His argument is, today, almost universally accepted -- even though, at the time this book was published, it only won the obscure Louis Brownlow Book Award from the National Academy of Public Administration. What's the book?

Fire in the American West is a controversial subject. Did American Indians burn down vast portions of the Great Plains as a means of hunting? Should natural fire be allow to burn out of control in national parks or national forests? What is the role of artificial fire?

This author won the National Book Critics Circle Award for his account of a single fire-fighting effort. What's the book?

This author is probably best known for this book about a whale, even though he's written about subjects as diverse as an island, an Indian battle, the American Revolution, a sea-going voyage of discovery, and some religious extremists. Who and what?

This book won the Bancroft Prize in 2008 for a now-forgotten event in American history in which striking coal miners were machine-gunned by the Colorado state militia and guards employed by the Rockefeller family -- an incident in which 19 to 25 people died and scores more were injured. The state National Guard then set the miners' tent city on fire, killing two women and 11 children. What's the book?