Heir to the Empire City

"The historian Edward P. Kohn returns with a primer that corrects the 'Western image' of the Manhattan-born former police commissioner and governor."

"Kohn's prose is snappy and engaging, and his portrayal of the city, from the economic slump of the 1850s, through the Civil War, and growth of the avenues of corruption that it would be TR's charge to cleans, is as vivid as his evocation of the man himself.... [T]his is a tight and well-argued thesis."

"An intriguing portrait of Roosevelt's ascendance to power."

"Kohn provides a concise account of Roosevelt's early career and presents a convincing case that he should be remembered as a gentleman of the East, not a cowboy of the West."

"Theodore Roosevelt has come down in history as the 'cowboy president,' a man whose persona was shaped by the period he spent in the Dakota badlands as a young man, riding, hunting, even owning two sizable ranches.... This claim--created in large part by Roosevelt himself--draws a healthy snort of disagreement from historian Edward Kohn.... The truth is, Mr. Kohn writes, Roosevelt is far more a product of New York City than the West."

"Kohn shows us the ways Roosevelt both shaped and was shaped by the city.... He was not a cowboy after all, but an adroit politician who 'carefully calculated what was practicable,' and Kohn persuades us that New York was Roosevelt's prep school for the presidency."

"Heir to the Empire City recasts America's 26th president as what its author believes he truly was: a politician shaped mainly by his upbringing in New York City and public service in the Empire State, who in turn shaped the city at a time when it was undergoing tremendous--and tremendously rapid--change."

"Focused and concise, this book is a solid choice for general readers of history not sufficiently aware of TR's cosmopolitan background in contrast to his adopted cowboy persona. It details another side of a consequential, transformative rather than transitional president."