Our modern-day story starts with the author, Peter Stark. While researching the most unpopulated, still-wild places of the United States for a project, he obtained a NASA satellite photo of the country at night. The abundant clusters of lights were cities. To his surprise, one of the darkest, blankest spots was Western Pennsylvania.  There, among the vast wilderness, he found young George Washington…and the subject of his next story. Two decades before Washington led America to independence, the naïve, temperamental, self-absorbed twenty-two-year-old was a flailing young soldier serving the British Empire in the remote and rugged Ohio Valley. Subzero winters, terrifying summer storms, controversial battles, military negotiations and a few emotional entanglements or two taught him resilience, self-reliance, solidarity, diplomacy and the value of relationships. From striver, to leader to legend.  This is a fascinating account of the dramatic years that shaped the man who would later shape the nation.

Eight Cousins Books, our co-host, will have copies of this book at the talk.
The book will also be available in the store at 189 Main Street in Falmouth.