Description:
Finalist for the 2018 National Book Award for Nonfiction
A New York Times Editors' Choice Selection
The untold story of Hamilton's--and Burr's--personal physician, whose dream to build America's first botanical garden inspired the young Republic.Brief description: Victoria Johnson, a former Cullman Fellow, is currently an associate professor of urban policy and planning at Hunter College (City University of New York), where she teaches on the history of nonprofits, philanthropy, and New York City.
Review Quotes: If Rockefeller Center is haunted, a likely candidate for the ghost is David Hosack, the doctor-botanist who assembled a major plant collection on the site starting in 1801.... Victoria Johnson's American Eden unearths Hosack, who was lauded in his lifetime but largely forgotten since. Hosack's Columbia lectures were, as one student said, "as good as the theater," and so is Johnson's storytelling. She weaves his biography with threads of history -- political, medical and scientific -- and the tale of an up-and-coming New York City. An innovative medical practitioner, he was the friend and doctor Hamilton and Burr had in attendance on that July morning along the Weehawken cliffs for their ill-starred duel. Did Lin-Manuel Miranda's Hamilton leave you with an appetite for more? American Eden will not disappoint.... In her ambitious and entertaining book Johnson connects past to present. David Hosack's garden may have been short-lived, but in our parks, gardens, medical practices and pharmacology, his efforts continue to bear fruit.--Marta McDowell, New York Times Book Review