Thomas Jefferson was not as big of a jerk as Lin made him out out be

Review first published on My Blog.

Children's history of Thomas Jefferson. As with the previous one we read about George Washington, we get a more complete life picture of Thomas Jefferson from childhood through death. I like this as we are able to see more of the whole picture and place the man in his time which helps to give a better idea of who he really was rather than just the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence and then bought the Louisiana Purchase from Napoleon. He dealt with a lot of tragedy and had a lot of flaws but that only makes his accomplishments stand out that much more which is something that is lost in more traditional school history books.

I listened to this because my library got a couple of dozen of them & I wanted to see how well this series handled someone I know a bit about before tackling those I know little to nothing about. I can't say I was bowled over, but listening to more of them seems like a good way to explore. I detest 1000 page tomes that cover just one period of a person's life. No one is that interesting.

This is good for kids from 7 or 8 & up. Not bad for adults, either. It's short, but manages to capture a lot about TJ, which is tough since he was a complicated guy. It tells the good & bad, but doesn't really make sense out of his feelings about slavery, why he kept slaves, or why he didn't free his children by Hemmings. (A big reason was that it was illegal in VA & if he'd sent them across the border to MD, they stood a good chance of being captured & returned to slavery.) It does get into Hemmings & her relationship to him & his dead wife.

It also fails to mention how he was personally opposed to both the US expanding its territory & getting involved in foreign wars (The LA Purchase & the war against the Tripoli pirates.) yet he did both as president when the country needed it.

He was a practical man in many ways. The book does describe his issues with money towards the end of his life, but not his wine collection. It does mention him selling his book collection to start the Library of Congress & to help pay his debts.

All told, not bad.

Pretty nice.

Great kids biography.

Thomas Jefferson was interested in politics from a young age. As he got older he had a seat in the House of Burgesses, Congress, and he became the second Vice President of the United States and the third President of the United States. He also wrote the Declaration of Independence and made attempts to free slaves after having a relationship with one of his own slaves. He, coincidentally, died the same day as his friend John Adams on July 4, 1826 on the fifteenth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson did a lot to help make the country better and he is one of the main reasons the country is what it is today.

I found Thomas Jefferson trying to end slavery surprising because he had slaves before. Jefferson even had a relationship with one of his slaves named Sally Hemings. He ended up having ten children with her. I was surprised when he wanted to free the slaves because for a while he didn't even want to free his family.

I learned about Thomas Jefferson's personal life. I also learned about Thomas Jefferson's role in shaping the country to be what it is today, and what the country would be like without Thomas Jefferson's help.

I thought it was a great book and had a lot of information about Thomas Jefferson. I think you should read it. Lots of interesting topics.

Thomas Jefferson was a genius, my only problem with him was that he had several children with a slave woman, but only freed the mother and his children slaves in his will. That is, he used his own children as slaves and paid no paternal attention to them.

This gives a decent overview of Jefferson's life. Easy for children and adults to understand. I learned things about him I didn't know before.

This book was not boring. I love reading this book. Others just like it. I would recommend this book, I like it because it teaches you, alot. I learn more about the Declaration of Independence, when I finish book, I had conversations with my dad, and we talked about the historical context of the events of Thomas Jefferson life to make sure that I understand everything. Great book. :D

Class library

I think this is an unbiased biography of our third President. It is straightforward, and has all kinds of great illustrations, historical side notes, and timelines to guide the reader through Jefferson’s 83 years. One of the most fascinating things I learned was that he died on the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, and his friend John Adams died on the same day - July 4th, 1826. If I had read a 600-page biography about him, I feel like there wouldn’t be much difference in what I’d take away from learning about him, compared to this nifty little 100-page book.