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.

Drawing on reports of the period and on revisionist histories, Davis concisely shows the humanity in American icons known only by one name: Lincoln's views on race relations, Washington's at times bawdy sense of humor, Franklin Roosevelt's thirst for power and gift for political (and apparently, personal) compromise, Ford and Lindbergh's disquieting bigotry and animosity. (Robert E. Lee's quote on slavery's positive effects show him, despite honors afforded him in the Civil War's losing cause, very much a man of his time.) Davis also provides short biographies of historic's outstanding black voices, from Frederick Douglass and W.E.B. DuBois' passion to the Mohammad Ali's athletic urban poetry.

Davis also shows a refreshing desire not to be objective, a rarity in books like this. He attacks the nation's great shames (treatment of Native and African Americans, Japanese-American internment during World War II), targeting history's cynics and opportunists whose names still ring of American royalty: Vanderbilt, JP Morgan, Rockefeller, even the Kennedys. (Davis' coverage of the reasons and results of 1898's Spanish-American War will disturb those always thinking Americans fought defensively and for the right causes.) Davis also explains the interlocking events which started WWI, which (should you choose to read the book cover to cover) pour into every other tragic conflict which followed up to and including September 11.

Davis misses some steps covering the last 30 years. He covers Watergate in depth, including an events timeline, which he does for every war covered in the book. But he glosses over Richard Nixon's historic trip to China and for that matter, much of the Ford-Carter years. He again retells Monica Lewinsky's affair with President Bill Clinton but fails to capture (in fact, hardly mentions) the Whitewater and Travelgate scandals inspiring Ken Starr's investigation and staining Clinton's administration and legacy.

Davis` summary of American tragedies tying into September 11's horror is heartfelt but forced. But he also explains Electoral College and US Constitution, charts the US presidents, and provides an exhaustive list of referred readings to complete an exceptionally exciting retelling of history. "Don't Know Much About History" is a title only true until the book is completed; it is exceptionally helpful as a primer and essential as a supplementary history book.


Informative, but biased   March 2, 2000
 51 out of 53 found this review helpful

This book isn't quite "everything" you need to know about American history, but its very close. In DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY, Kenneth Davis successfully identifies and desribes many of the key people and pivotal events of American history. He provides a brief synopsis of each, detailing basic information necessary for at least a rudimentary understanding of that slice of history: the who, what, and when. Most important, he provides the "why;" that is, "why is this event/person significant?" This is a critical difference between Davis' book and most textbooks: Davis explains why this person/event was significant then and how it still affects us today. And its highly readable, too. For the most part, the book is written in a light and entertaining style.

A cautionary note to any parent thinking that this book could fill the gaps in junior's education. This is not a neutral examination of American history. Davis rarely misses an opportunity to lecture and sermonize from his own perspective, which is decidedly liberal. As with any book, its not so much what you say, but the way you say it. Davis presents his own opinions as fact and offers no citations for his assertions and conclusions. In a dozen different entries, Davis asserts that America's history is the story of bigoted, patriarchal, imperialistic, white Anglo-Saxon males, hell bent on Indian killing, Negro hating, war profiteering, female domination, labor bashing, and red baiting their way to world domination. Its not quite what some call "revisionist history," but it is rather slanted.

This is not to say that DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY is a bad book: it isn't. But it should be read purely for entertainment, not for serious study and certainly not used for academic reference. Serious conservatives will need to take this book with a big grain of salt.


Don't Know Much About History? You'll LOVE This Book!   April 17, 2001
 47 out of 57 found this review helpful

Unfortunately for Kenneth Davis, I DO know something about history. I have entire walls of boooks on historical subjects at home, particularly on the art of war and high level decision-making. For this reason, I am not overly enamored of Davis's book.

It's not bad in a simplified-overview sense. Davis does give the reader (who is presumed to be a teen with no interest in the subject, that he wants to interest in the subject) a sense of history as having been made by real people. However, he has a love-me-I'm-a-liberal slant to his writing that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. That, I can forgive; I do not demand that every writer be moderate or conservative.

The two things that I can't forgive are his political-correctness and his inaccuracies with reported, verifiable facts. I have no use for political correctness. I would much prefer information presented objectively, allowing the reader to make up his/her own mind. However, gross misrepresentation of fact by someone purporting to write history is a crime against the impressionable teen audience for this book. I'm not talking about minor mis-statements, such as his implication that the USS Yorktown survived the Battle of Midway with damage (Davis clearly has confused Midway and the earlier Battle of the Coral Sea) or his statement that the US Army Air Force (NOT Corps, stupid - that designation had long since changed) was solely responsible for the bombing of Dresden (the operation was British-inspired and RAF Bomber Command did most of the bombing). I am talking about things like his blatant misrepresentation of: Edith Wilson's role following Woodrow's stroke; Grant's tactics in the Petersburg/Richmond campaign and why he chose them; and the reasoning behind Truman's decision to employ the atomic bomb to end the war in the Pacific. And these are just some of the ones that caused me to slap the book down in disgust and pick it up again later. The facts on these examples are available IN THE WORDS OF THE PARTICIPANTS. Davis simply didn't want the facts contradicting his political-correctly written views.

Catching Davis out in both major and minor errors like the ones cited make me wonder what else is incorrect, that I did not catch because I am not as well read in areas such as economics and the history of the civil-rights and suffrage movements as in the art of war and how inventions have impacted the nation. As those I mentioned aren't the only ones, I presume there are many more.

Bottom line: Don't Know Much About History is entertaining, but is like cotton candy; it looks impressive but there's little substance. I would not use it as a teaching tool. Its most valuable part is its bibliography. When the kids get interested in history, they can read the pros and find out what really happened, not Davis's version of what happened.


Informative and entertaining, yet it lacks full objectivity   April 6, 2003
 39 out of 43 found this review helpful

History is one of those topics that can make the eyes glaze over or appreciably brighten. Too many, alas, get their first and only taste of history in the classroom in either a grade school or high school classroom, where more immediate concerns, such as lunch or awakening hormones, often take precedence in learning what British general surrendered at Yorktown. Every once in a while, a teacher will come along and instill some relevance into the subject matter, demonstrating, for example, why everyone in New Orleans talks funny as the result of the Louisiana Purchase. But, for the most part, history class is where a young mind feels its mortality ticking away for the first time.

It is Kenneth C. Davis's intention to correct this state of affairs with DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY. The original volume of this work was published in 1990. This new one is, in the words of the author, completely revised and updated. It retains the strengths and the weaknesses of the original.

The format of DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY is very simple and straightforward. The book proceeds chronologically with each chapter divided into subheadings in the form of questions, which Davis proceeds to answer. Accordingly, the first chapter, "Brave New World," begins with the question "Who Really 'Discovered' America?" It is thus relatively easy to go directly to an event of interest. The book has an excellent and in-depth index --- which is nearly 20 pages long --- and lends itself well to picking up and reading at random.

Davis has a breezy and entertaining style that makes DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY hard to put down. If you open it in search of one topic, you'll undoubtedly read at least five or six before putting it down again. Davis also, as a general rule (with some lapses), takes pains to present all available facts regarding an issue and does so quite effectively when dealing with such topics as Alger Hiss, the secession of Southern states and the Thomas Jefferson-Sally Hemmings controversy.

Where DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY breaks down is when Davis treats his subject matter as a vehicle for his own editorials. He is capable of being evenhanded, such as when he deals with the impeachment of Bill Clinton or the Second Amendment. That is why it is all the more glaring when he takes off on such topics as Iran-Contra and Oliver North, Plessy v. Ferguson, or what he refers to as "Contract with America." While he is certainly entitled to take umbrage at historical events, selectively or not, Davis's intermittent lapses of objectivity unfortunately result in turning DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY into a subjective treatise and casts doubt on the accuracy of what he presents.

While DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY is worthwhile as informative entertainment, it is not necessarily a work one would want to wholly rely on as a reference. If its intent is to make history interesting and relevant, it does so quite handily. However, one seeking an objective, more scholarly work would be better served looking elsewhere.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub