Biography-Memoir – Scott J. Pearson’s Book Review

The Last Founding Father: James Monroe & a Nation’s Call to Greatness

By Scott J. Pearson | December 10, 2024December 10, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Virginians seem to dominate the early pantheon of American presidents. Four of the first five presidents were Virginians by birth. The last of these four – and the last president from the generation of founding fathers – is James Monroe. Most American high school students learn to associate his name with the “Monroe Doctrine” – the contention that Europe should not further colonize the Americas. While this position is perhaps his most lasting legacy, this…

Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint

By Scott J. Pearson | October 27, 2024October 27, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Because of its followers, Christianity has gotten a bad wrap. Perhaps that’s just in recent years, but I know enough to suspect that it’s always been so. To put people in the pews, many pastors have appealed to minor parts of the Bible while omitting parts that would make its followers uncomfortable. Like the fact that Jesus hung out with prostitutes. Or that God’s loving forgiveness of humanity is absolute. Or that the first Christian…

Biography-Memoir History

An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s

By Scott J. Pearson | October 24, 2024October 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

The 1960s shaped the unfolding of American history. A new generation born after American triumph in World War II seized the national narrative with the election of John F. Kennedy (JFK). Even after his assassination, Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) implemented many of those ideals through Civil Rights Acts and the Great Society. But the Vietnam War, internal fighting, more assassinations, and the troubled Democratic convention of 1968 halted a progressive course and haunted liberals for…

Biography-Memoir Leadership Science

Breaking Through: My Life in Science

By Scott J. Pearson | August 30, 2024September 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

First, who is Katalin Karikó? She is the primary scientist who showed how mRNA can be synthesized to create a vaccine. Why is that important? This technology enabled the COVID19 vaccines, which recently carried the world out of a pandemic. So Karikó’s impact and legacy are tremendous. What’s more is that she has a meaningful, inspiring life story that overcame the odds both in her native Hungary and in the halls of academe in America’s…

Biography-Memoir Healthcare HIV/AIDS

My Own Country: A Doctor’s Story

By Scott J. Pearson | August 26, 2024August 26, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Stories about HIV and AIDS fascinate me. They speak of our common humanity and our tragically all-too-common inhumanity towards each other. In fear, so many in power sought to sweep this disease and its victims under the rug, yet it pervaded to impact human life in almost every sphere. When AZT first showed promise and HAART later showed effectiveness, many breathed sighs of collective relief. Today, we live in an era of PEPFAR, where the…

Biography-Memoir History Leadership

William McKinley

By Scott J. Pearson | August 23, 2024September 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

William McKinley is generally known to history as the US president before Teddy Roosevelt (TR). He was assassinated early in his second term, and as his vice president, TR assumed office. Most historians view TR as proper founder marking the beginning of the American century. In this book, Kevin Phillips says, not so fast. He contends that much of TR’s administrative foundation was laid by his predecessor and that had he lived, McKinley, not TR,…

Biography-Memoir

John Lewis: A Life by David Greenberg

By Scott J. Pearson | August 10, 2024August 10, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Like many Americans, John Lewis’ casket coming across the Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, in 2020 evoked tears in me. He was one of the last great leaders of the 1960s civil rights movement to die. With the Black Lives Matter movement in the streets, the baton had been passed to a new generation. I grew up a white Republican in conservative South Carolina and did not knew who John Lewis was until much later…

Biography-Memoir Politics

Madam Secretary: A Memoir by Madeleine Albright

By Scott J. Pearson | August 2, 2024August 2, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Madeleine Albright served in Bill Clinton’s administration as UN Ambassador and Secretary of State – the first female ever in that role. Since Clinton was especially active in international diplomacy, she held a front-row seat and observed many international characters and diplomatic ventures. Further, her career broke the glass ceiling for women in government, and she did it while being a doting mother, grandmother, and even a divorcee. Finally, along with her birth family, she…

Biography-Memoir Leadership Religion-Philosophy

Reading Through Rachel Held Evans’ Last Book Published in Her Lifetime

By Scott J. Pearson | June 3, 2024September 24, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Setting: The 1925 Scopes Trial in East Tennessee Ninety-nine years ago in 1925, the famous Scopes trial occurred in Dayton, Tennessee, in the state’s eastern part, halfway between Chattanooga and Knoxville. The state legislature had recently made it illegal to teach human evolution in public schools. The rediscovery of Gregor Mendel’s genetic mechanism for evolution had brought these concepts to the front of the American mind. At the ACLU’s encouragement, one teacher John Scopes deliberately…

Biography-Memoir Science

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! Adventures of a Curious Character

By Scott J. Pearson | May 7, 2024May 7, 2024 by Scott J. Pearson

Dick Feynman was a Nobel laureate and professor of theoretical physics at Cornell and Cal Tech. Like many accomplished people, he had a unique reputation and a magnanimous spirit. In the classroom, his students revered him for his interesting stories. This memoir, written towards the end of his life, records his reflections on his life with the same zeal that won his students’ hearts. To be frank, some of his stories tend towards the anti-feminist…