Michael Richard Beschloss (born November 30, 1955) is an American historian specializing in the United States presidency. He is the author of nine books on the presidency. He majored in political science, studying under James MacGregor Burns at Williams College from which he graduated with Highest Honors, and earned an MBA at Harvard Business School, originally intending to write about history while he held a position as an executive at a foundation.

Career

Beschloss has been a frequent commentator on the PBS NewsHour and is an NBC News presidential historian. He is a trustee of the White House Historical Association and the National Archives Foundation. He sits on the board of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History and has been a trustee of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation (Monticello), the Urban Institute, the University of Virginia's Miller Center of Public Affairs and the PEN/Faulkner Foundation.

He also sat on the advisory board to the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and was a member of the President's Commission on White House Fellowships. He held appointments in history at the Smithsonian Institution, as a senior associate member at St. Antony's College (University of Oxford),

Beschloss has had a X account, @BeschlossDC, since October 2012. Time included his account in their "Best Twitter Feeds of 2013". He has contributed columns on history with the title HistorySource to The New York Times. He is also the editor of Washington by Meg Greenfield (2001) and Essays in Honor of James MacGregor Burns (with Thomas Cronin) in 1988.

Awards

Beschloss received a 2005 News and Documentary Emmy Award for being the host of Discovery Channel's Decisions That Shook the World, the category was "Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Research". He has received the Williams College Bicentennial Medal, Illinois' Order of Lincoln (the state's highest honor), the Harry S. Truman Public Service Award, the Ambassador Book Award, the Rutgers University Living History Award, the New York State Archives History Award, the Founders Award of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and the Phillips Academy Andover Alumni Award of Distinction. He has received honorary doctorates from Lafayette College, Williams College, St. Mary's College of Maryland, Saint Peter's College, Governors State University and Allegheny College. In October 2022, Beschloss received the National Archives' annual Records of Achievement Award. In 2019, he received The Lincoln Forum's Richard Nelson Current Award of Achievement.

Personal life

He has two sons with his Iranian-born wife Afsaneh Mashayekhi Beschloss. Beschloss' brother Steven is also a writer and journalist.

Bibliography

  • Kennedy and Roosevelt: The Uneasy Alliance (1980); started as Beschloss's senior honors thesis at Williams College
  • Mayday: Eisenhower, Khrushchev and the U-2 Affair (1986)
  • Eisenhower: A Centennial Life (1990)
  • The Crisis Years: Kennedy and Khrushchev, 1960–1963 (1991)
  • The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman and the Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1941–1945 (2002)
  • Presidential Courage: Brave Leaders and How They Changed America, 1789–1989 (2007)
  • Presidents of War: The Epic Story, from 1807 to Modern Times (2018)

Co-authored books

  • At the Highest Levels: The Inside Story of the End of the Cold War (1993); with Strobe Talbott.

Edited Books

  • Taking Charge: The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963–1964 (1997)
  • Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret White House Tapes, 1964–1965 (2001),

Edited transcriptions of Lyndon B. Johnson's conversations, as captured by his taping system, with historical annotation and commentary. A third Johnson volume is forthcoming.

  • Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy (2011)

Reception

President Bill Clinton told People in December 1997 that the first audiobook he ever listened to was Taking Charge by Michael Beschloss. In Bob Woodward's Plan of Attack, President George W. Bush is quoted as telling the author Elie Wiesel in February 2003, "I read your views on Auschwitz in Michael Beschloss' book", referring to The Conquerors. Bush refers to Beschloss' book Presidential Courage in his 2010 memoir Decision Points.

John Frankenheimer's last film, Path to War (HBO, 2002), starring Donald Sutherland and Michael Gambon, was based in part on Beschloss' two books about Lyndon B. Johnson.

References

  • Michael Beschloss on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, May 9, 2007
  • Booknotes: Interview with Beschloss on The Crisis Years: Kennedy and Khrushchev, 1960–1963, July 14, 1991
  • C-SPAN, In Depth: Interview with Beschloss, September 2, 2012