List of autobiographies by presidents of the United States
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/ab/US_Grant_in_1885.jpg/220px-US_Grant_in_1885.jpg)
Ulysses S. Grant, working on his memoirs in 1885. His Personal Memoirs is considered by historians to be among the best by a U.S. president.
Many presidents of the United States have written autobiographies about their presidencies and/or (some periods of) their life before their time in office. Some 19th-century U.S. presidents who wrote autobiographies are James Buchanan and Ulysses S. Grant, though Grant's autobiography is about his time as general during the U.S. Civil War and not about his presidency. Presidential memoir has proved to be a lasting and popular genre—every president since Calvin Coolidge has published one after leaving office, and more recent entries have earned their authors tens of millions of dollars in royalties.[1]
Autobiographies covering the period of their presidency[]
- Note: Only publication information for the first edition is given.
Title | President | Publisher | Date | ISBN | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Martin Van Buren | U.S. Government Printing Office | 1920 | Posthumously compiled and edited from Van Buren's manuscript materials by John C. Fitzpatrick. | ||
James Buchanan | D. Appleton and Company | 1866 | |||
Theodore Roosevelt: An Autobiography | Theodore Roosevelt | Macmillan | 1913 | ||
The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge | Calvin Coolidge | Cosmopolitan Book Corporation | 1929 | Previously published serially in the periodical Cosmopolitan. | |
Herbert Hoover | Macmillan | 1951 | Published in three volumes: Volume 1: Years of Adventure 1874-1920; Volume 2: The Cabinet and the Presidency 1920-1933; Volume 3: The Great Depression 1929-1941. | ||
Harry S. Truman | Doubleday | 1955 | |||
Harry S. Truman | Doubleday | 1956 | |||
Harry S. Truman | 1980 | ISBN 978-0-870-81090-9 | Posthumously compiled and edited from Truman's manuscript materials by historian Robert Ferrell. | ||
Dwight D. Eisenhower | Doubleday | 1963 | |||
Dwight D. Eisenhower | Doubleday | 1965 | |||
Dwight D. Eisenhower | Doubleday | 1969 | ISBN 978-0-915-99204-1 | ||
Lyndon B. Johnson | Holt, Rinehart and Winston | 1971 | ISBN 978-0-030-84492-8 | ||
Richard Nixon | Grosset & Dunlap | 1978 | ISBN 978-0-448-14374-3 | ||
Richard Nixon | Simon & Schuster | 1990 | ISBN 978-0-671-70096-6 | ||
Gerald Ford | Harper & Row | 1979 | ISBN 978-0-060-11297-4 | ||
Jimmy Carter | Bantam Books | 1982 | ISBN 978-0-553-05023-3 | ||
A Full Life: Reflections at 90 | Jimmy Carter | Simon & Schuster | 2015 | ISBN 978-1-501-11563-9 | |
An American Life | Ronald Reagan | Simon & Schuster | 1990 | ISBN 978-1-451-62839-5 | |
A World Transformed | George H. W. Bush | Knopf Publishing Group | 1998 | ISBN 978-0-679-43248-7 | |
My Life | Bill Clinton | Knopf Publishing Group | 2004 | ISBN 978-0-375-41457-2 | |
Decision Points | George W. Bush | Crown Publishers | 2010 | ISBN 978-0-307-59061-9 | |
A Promised Land | Barack Obama | Crown Publishers | 2020 | ISBN 978-1-524-76316-9 |
Autobiographies not covering the period of their presidency[]
Published diaries and papers[]
Title | President | Editor | Publisher | Date | ISBN |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
James K. Polk | |||||
James A. Garfield | |||||
Dwight D. Eisenhower | Robert Ferrell | W W Norton & Co Inc | 1976 | ISBN 978-0-393-33180-6 | |
John F. Kennedy | Regnery Publishing | 1995 | ISBN 978-0-89526-459-6 | ||
John F. Kennedy | Bloomsbury Press | 2013 | ISBN 978-1-60819-271-7 | ||
Richard Nixon | Rick Perlstein | Princeton University Press | 2010 | ISBN 978-1-4008-3568-3 | |
White House Diary | Jimmy Carter | Farrar, Straus and Giroux | 2010 | ISBN 978-0-374-28099-4 | |
The Reagan Diaries | Ronald Reagan | Douglas Brinkley | Harper Collins | 2007 | ISBN 978-0-06-087600-5 |
All the Best | George H. W. Bush | Scribner | 1999 | ISBN 978-0-684-83958-5 |
See also[]
Notes[]
- ^ "Americas | Clintons' earnings exceed $100m". BBC News. 2008-04-05. Retrieved 2013-04-08.
Further reading[]
- Trex, Ethan (September 9, 2010), "A Brief History of Presidential Memoirs", mental floss
- Robinson, Joshua (November 8, 2010), "A Brief History of the Presidential Memoir", The Daily Beast
External links[]
- Thomas Jefferson's Autobiography (for free)
- James Buchanan's Autobiography (for free)
- Theodore Roosevelt's Autobiography (for free)
- Calvin Coolidge's Autobiography (for free)
- Herbert Hoover's Autobiography (for free)
- Martin Van Buren's Autobiography
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Categories:
- Lists relating to the United States presidency
- Lists of books
- American autobiographies
- Political autobiographies
- Books written by presidents of the United States