Walking the Ground

Edwin Bearss' Government career created National Parks and Presidential Historic Parks, including his direct relationships with President Lyndon B. Johnson and President Jimmy Carter. He created and improved many parks, and thus, made the history that Americans see and read when they experience these important American lands, battlefields and buildings. Ed Bearss has made indelible marks on the American landscape, and in so doing, defined much of the historical culture of the United States. His contribution to our understanding of American history is immense. He is the author of 140 National Park Service reports, more than any other person to work for the National Park Service. The quality and popularity of his tours and books are rare among present-day historians. He has mentored generations of younger historians who now teach American history, and continue along the path he has pioneered. He has frequently testified before Congress, was interviewed by television reporters and guided senior-level Government officials in critical events in American history. Ed Bearss became a television celebrity following his appearance to mass television audiences who watched the Ken Burns Civil War Series on PBS, leading to great demand in Bearss-led battlefield history tours. For those many U.S. history adventurers who have experienced his history tours, Ed Bearss' words and mannerisms leap from the page as we follow him walking Pickett's Charge at the Gettysburg; track John Wilkes Booth's escape route after assassinating President Abraham Lincoln; recount George Armstrong Custer's battlefield defeat by Native Americans whose families he had attacked along the Little Big Horn River; and words describing the WWI American sacrifice at Belleau Wood of U.S. Marine mythology. This book will explain Ed Bearss' unsurpassed contribution to the making of American history and the strengthening our collective culture.