Gun Barons, John Bainbridge Jr.
Gun Barons, John Bainbridge Jr.
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Gun Barons
The Weapons That Transformed America and the Men Who Invented Them

Author: John Bainbridge Jr.

Narrator: Lee Goettl

Unabridged: 10 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 05/24/2022

Synopsis

Love them or hate them, guns are woven deeply into the American soul. Names like Colt, Smith & Wesson, Winchester, and Remington are legendary. Yet few people are aware of the roles these men played at a crucial time in United States history, from westward expansion in the 1840s, through the Civil War, and into the dawn of the Gilded Age. Through personal drive and fueled by bloodshed, they helped propel the young country into the forefront of the world's industrial powers.

Their creations helped save a nation divided, while planting seeds that would divide the country again a century later. Their inventions embodied an intoxicating thread of American individualism—part fiction, part reality—that remains the foundation of modern gun culture. They promoted guns not only for the soldier, but for the Everyman, and also made themselves wealthy beyond their most fevered dreams.

Gun Barons captures how their bold inventiveness dwelled in the psyche of an entire people, not just in the minds of men who made firearm fortunes. Whether we revere these larger-than-life men or vilify them, they helped forge the American character.

About John Bainbridge Jr.

John Bainbridge, Jr., is a freelance writer and former reporter for The Baltimore Sun and legal affairs editor for The Daily Record in Maryland. He coauthored the nonfiction book, American Gunfight: The Plot to Kill Harry Truman and the Shoot-out that Stopped It. Bainbridge has also written for magazines including Smithsonian and Audubon. He practiced law in the private sector, served as a law clerk for judges on Maryland's highest court, and worked as a Maryland Assistant Attorney General.

Reviews

Goodreads review by PamG on May 19, 2022

Gun Barons: The Weapons That Transformed America and the Men Who Invented Them by John Bainbridge Jr. is a nonfiction history book about several early American gunsmiths. Most of the book focuses on activities and people from the 1840’s through the 1870’s. Many of us have heard the names Colt, S......more

Goodreads review by Pernette on March 04, 2022

John Bainbridge Jr.'s Gun Baron's: The Weapons That Transformed America and The Men Who Invented Them Review was not what I expected. I was expecting an account of the major gun inventors and how they came about their inventions but was surprised that there was far more detail about the information......more

Goodreads review by Bonnye Reed on June 12, 2022

I received an invitation from St. Martin's Press to read and review this history via Netgalley. I thank Netgalley, John Bainbridge Jr, and St. Martins for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this work of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work. This is a prec......more

Goodreads review by Jeff on May 23, 2022

Could Be An Entertaining - And Equally Informative - History or Discovery Documentary Series. I went into this book expecting something more along the lines of Nathan Gorenstein's The Guns Of John Moses Browning or Jeff Guin's War On The Border... and got a touch of an amalgamation of the two. Like......more

Goodreads review by Daniel on September 02, 2022

The problem with books of this type, industrial revolution era inventions, is that it doesn't matter what the invention is, in fact you could just call them widgets and it wouldn't matter, as the stories are all the same. The stories end up being about capitalism how so and so sued so and so or how......more

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