Leader by Destiny: George Washington, Man and Patriot

To the memory of the Man, first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen.

I suppose it was nice to get a more concrete picture of a man I've only known in the abstract. But, like most (all?) biographies, I slogged through the majority of the details and could not remember names of people from one page to the next (what were all his brothers' names again?). 

Highlights:

-  Mentions of Mt. Vernon. I went there once to visit. I could picture the rooms and the trees and the vineyards and the slaves' quarters and the gift shop . . .
- The Sally Fairfax forbidden love thing had me so curious. I kept thinking, "I don't remember the first First Lady being named Sally Washington!" I actually looked it up on Wikipedia before I got to the part where he married Martha because I was so baffled. I think the biographer played up George's infatuation with Sally according to her own fantasy, but it seems like he never did anything unchaste and I appreciated that.
- The Marquis de Lafayette. I had only heard of him in a Hamilton song (I'm not that familiar with the musical, otherwise I would probably know a lot more about him!) and was surprised to learn how close he was with George Washington and how helpful he was in the Revolution. I'm a fan.
- The Constitutional Convention. Politics and history are pretty low on my interest list, but I had this overwhelming urge to be a fly on the wall to watch as so many opinionated, well-educated, passionate men debated the basic tenets of our government. Honestly, that probably would have been pretty interesting.

Lowlights:
- Battles.

Bad news:
- I can't find any more of my old Newberys online.

Good news:
- I can take a break from old Newberys for a bit because 2020 winners were announced this week! Yay!

Recommendation:
- Nah. Go visit Mt. Vernon instead. Or ride a horse.