Tom Paine's Iron Bridge Building a United States [Hardcover]

Fascinating and important: Gray gives us Paine as we have never seen him before&as committed to building a new order as he was to tearing down the old.Ed Gray deftly reveals Paine as a polymath who designed innovative bridges as well as radical politics. Vividly written and rich with insight,If you thought nothing more could be said of Thomas Paine, you were wrong. Ed Grays new book is a game-changer. An iron bridge, a unified economy, a legislative heart of the union: Ed Gray demonstrates as never before Paines greater vision.In his engaging new book, Edward Gray introduces us to Thomas Paine, the visionary nation-builder. Paines design for an iron bridge to transcend the new nations divisions was in its way as revolutionary as his call for an independent American republic in Common Sense.Americans want to see the nations adolescence as a time of infinite possibility, and so did Thomas Paine. But Edward Grays engrossing account of Paines lifelong fixation on bridge-building reminds us that a host of human vices, from religious bigotry to political and sectional bias, were always there, waiting as patiently as the wolf at the door.Another gem from one of America's most imaginative historians.The little-known story of the architectural project that lay at the heart of Tom Paines political blueprint for the United States.