Stephen Ambrose

“Like their predecessors, the Presidents of today just throw up their hands.”

“Crazy Horse saw history as integrated in the present, incorporated into daily life.”

“There are many more want-to-be writers out there than good editors.”

“Who today is willing to say that Texas and California and the remainder of the Southwest would be better off if they were governed by Mexico?”

“To be a slaveholder meant one had to regard the African American as inferior in every way.”

“History is everything that has ever happened.”

“My first book was the book that changed my life.”

“It does you no good to see the number two or number three man in the corporation-you have to get through to number one.”

“You don't hate history, you hate the way it was taught to you in high school.”

“Custer had dead heroes. Crazy Horse had only live ones.”

“American corporations hate to give away money.”

“In America, Jefferson noted with approval, women knew their place.”

“Jefferson owned slaves. He did not believe that all were created equal. He was a racist.”

“I was too young for Korea and too old for Vietnam.”

“I thought Nixon was the worst President we had ever had, save only perhaps Andrew Johnson.”

“Immigrants do more than help us win our wars, or set up cleaning shops or ethnic restaurants.”

“Eisenhower had the clearest blue eyes. He would fix them on you. In my every interview with him, he would lock his eyes on to mine and keep them there.”

“I've always tried to be fair to my subjects. That's easy when they are as likable and admirable as Lewis and Clark, or Eisenhower.”

“Andrew Johnson was a Southerner generally who proclaimed that his native state of Tennessee was a country for white men.”

“We are part of a country that outshines those that have gone before us and most of those in existence today.”