The Browns of California, Miriam Pawel
The Browns of California, Miriam Pawel
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The Browns of California
The Family Dynasty that Transformed a State and Shaped a Nation

Author: Miriam Pawel

Narrator: Christina Delaine

Unabridged: 18 hr 53 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/18/2019


Synopsis

A Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist's panoramic history of California and its impact on the nation, from the Gold Rush to Silicon Valley—told through the lens of the family dynasty that led the state for nearly a quarter century.

In The Browns of California, journalist and scholar Miriam Pawel weaves a narrative history that spans four generations, from August Schuckman, the Prussian immigrant who crossed the Plains in 1852 and settled on a northern California ranch, to his great-grandson Jerry Brown, who reclaimed the family homestead one hundred forty years later. Through the prism of their lives, we gain an essential understanding of California and an appreciation of its importance.

This book gives new insights to those steeped in California history, offers a corrective for those who confuse stereotypes and legend for fact, and opens new vistas for listeners familiar with only the sketchiest outlines of a place habitually viewed from afar with a mix of envy and awe, disdain, and fascination.

About Miriam Pawel

Miriam Pawel is the author of The Crusades of Cesar Chavez: A Biography, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and California Book Award winner, and The Union of Their Dreams: Power, Hope, and Struggle in Cesar Chavez's Farm Worker Movement. She is a Pulitzer Prize-winning editor and reporter who spent twenty-five years at Newsday and the Los Angeles Times. She lives in Southern California.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Karen

This is a beautifully written, well-researched book. And... I particularly appreciated the amazing research and information the author included which gave us readers an inside view into the family history that brought the Brown's to California politics. Also... For anybody interested in the history of......more

Goodreads review by Janet

I loved this book! Pat Brown was the governor of California most of my childhood, and my parents, especially my dad, were ardent supporters. His vision of the UCs and State Universities was free education for all Californians. He also recognized such a huge state needed a master plan for distributin......more

Goodreads review by Jason

For anybody interested in the history of California, this is a must-read, because the history of the Brown family IS the history of California. I have always found Jerry Brown to be a fascinating character, but there was so much I didn't know about the rest of the family. Pawel has done an extraordi......more