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Finalists have been announced since 1980.
Winners
A balanced, deeply researched history of how, as French colonial rule faltered, a succession of American leaders moved step by step down a road toward full-blown war.
An exploration of the legendary life and provocative views of one of the most significant African-Americans in U.S. history, a work that separates fact from fiction and blends the heroic and tragic.
For “The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery,” (W.W. Norton & Company), a well orchestrated examination of Lincoln’s changing views of slavery, bringing unforeseeable twists and a fresh sense of improbability to a familiar story.
“Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World,” by Liaquat Ahamed (The Penguin Press), a compelling account of how four powerful bankers played crucial roles in triggering the Great Depression and ultimately transforming the United States into the world’s financial leader.
A painstaking exploration of a sprawling multi-generation slave family that casts provocative new light on the relationship between Sally Hemings and her master, Thomas Jefferson.
Finalists
A luminous account of how the British colonies took root amid raw brutality, often with terrible consequences for the settlers as well as the native population.
A striking work examining how orders issued by President Lincoln to govern conduct on battlefields and in prisons during the Civil War have shaped modern laws of armed conflict.
A fresh work tracing how people created families and conducted business in a vast, fur-trading region newly part of an expanding United States.
A painstaking look at a catastrophic act of terrorism and the nagging questions that have swirled around it.
A myth-shattering book that shows how reckless but influential railroad corporations in the late 19th century often profited by failure as well as success.
An insightful work analyzing the experience of disenfranchised white women and black slaves who were left when Confederate soldiers headed for the battlefield.
An impressive selection of case studies that reveal how Boston helped shape the remarkable growth of American cities in the 19th century.
An evocative, heavily researched examination of an industrial giant’s grandiose scheme to create a model rubber plantation deep in the Amazon forest.
A lucid exploration of a turbulent era when a profoundly changing America, despite the sin of slavery, came to see itself as a beacon to the world, demonstrating human capacity for self-government.
A deeply researched, gracefully written examination of how a divided nation struggled to comprehend the meaning and practical consequences of unprecedented human carnage.
An elegantly written account of a brief period in American history that left a profoundly altered national landscape.
