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Size: 6x1x10; In Very Good+ condition and Very Good+ dustjacket. Signed

Size: 6x1x10; In Very Good+ condition and Very Good+ dustjacket. Signed "William R. Polk" on half title page. The grand saga of American history told through the story of one remarkable family--a chronicle of pioneers and generals, presidents and scoundrels, cowboys and killers, Southern belles and civil rights heroes. And what a history. In these pages one finds drafters of an early Declaration of Independence, oft-wounded soldiers of the Revolutionary War, women taken hostage by Indians, land speculators, slaveholding aristocrats and populist crusaders, one of our greatest presidents, Civil War generals and foot soldiers from North and South, a grandfather who shot the sheriff of Laredo and became a cattle baron, the founders of the powerful Wall Street firm Davis, Polk, Patton's lead tank commander, Martin Luther King, Jr. 's lawyer, and the author's amazing brother, a Navy pilot and journalist who was the first casualty of the Cold War. The saga of this family is the story of the United States. It is both epic in scope and intimate in detail--a unique book for an age obsessed with the past. William Roe Polk (1929-2020) was a veteran foreign policy consultant, author, and relation of president James K. Polk. He was a professor of history at Harvard University and the University of Chicago, and was President of the latter's Adlai Stevenson Institute of International Affairs.

512 pages. Illustrations. Endpaper maps. Genealogy table. Notes. Index.

512 pages. Illustrations. Endpaper maps. Genealogy table. Notes. Index. Signed by the author on the title page. DJ has minor sticker residue. Fep has minor scuff. William Roe Polk (born 1929 in Fort Worth, Texas) is a veteran foreign policy consultant, author, and relation of president James K. Polk. He is a former professor of history at Harvard University and the University of Chicago. Polk was appointed by President Kennedy to the State Department's Policy Planning Council focusing on the Middle East and North Africa. While there he served as a member of the Cuban Missile Crisis management team. In 1961 Polk was a Guggenheim Fellow in Near Eastern Studies. Polk resigned from the federal government to join the University of Chicago as Professor of History in 1965. Polk became president of the Adlai Stevenson Institute of International Affairs, which hosted the 20th Pugwash Conference on nuclear weapons problems, and contributed to planning the United Nations Environmental Program. During the 1967 Six-Day War he wrote a draft peace treaty and to serve as an advisor to McGeorge Bundy, who was President Johnson's representative during that crisis. Polk was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He has lectured at the Canadian Institute of International Relations, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, and the Institute of World Economy and International Affairs of the Soviet (now Russian) Academy of Sciences, as well at over a hundred universities and colleges. William Polk was also the foreign policy adviser for Democratic candidate Dennis Kucinich's presidential campaign. The grand saga of American history told through the story of one remarkable family--a chronicle of pioneers and generals, presidents and scoundrels, cowboys and killers, Southern belles and civil rights heroes. In 1680, a Scots-Irish mercenary named Robert Pollok fled war-torn Ireland with his family, in search of safe haven and a better life in the New World. When Robert (now using the name "Polk") arrived in Maryland, the only land available was a wretched piece of swampfront the locals derisively dubbed "Polk's Folly." From this desperate and hardscrabble beginning, the Polk clan would flourish, and generate some of the most fascinating and colorful characters in American history. When William Polk was a boy in Texas, he sat rapt as his grandmother Molly spun tales of family lore, of Civil War heroes and rascals, presidents and slaves, Indian traders and fighters. Polk would go on to have a long and prestigious career as a historian and diplomat, but he kept his grandmother's stories alive for his children, and when he retired, decided to research the truth behind the family history. In these pages one finds drafters of an early Declaration of Independence, oft-wounded soldiers of the Revolutionary War, women taken hostage by Indians, land speculators, aristocrats and populist crusaders, one of our greatest presidents, Civil War generals and foot soldiers from North and South, a grandfather who shot the sheriff of Laredo and became a cattle baron, the founders of the Wall Street firm Davis Polk, Patton's lead tank commander, Martin Luther King's lawyer, and the author's amazing brother, a World War II Navy pilot and journalist who was the first casualty of the Cold War. The saga of this family is the story of the United States. Polk's Folly is both epic in scope and intimate in detail--a unique book about our shared past. It is both epic in scope and intimate in detail--a unique book for an age obsessed with the past. Full of stunning detail and based on primary historical documents, Polk's Folly is a grand American chronicle that allows history to include the lives that made it happen.