Betsy Ross and the Making of America

Book 6 of my 2018 Reading Challenge

Betsy Ross and the Making of America by Marla R. Miller

Summary (via Goodreads)

Betsy Ross and the Making of America is the first comprehensively researched and elegantly written biography of one of America's most captivating figures of the Revolutionary War. Drawing on new sources and bringing a fresh, keen eye to the fabled creation of "the first flag," Marla R. Miller thoroughly reconstructs the life behind the legend. This authoritative work provides a close look at the famous seamstress while shedding new light on the lives of the artisan families who peopled the young nation and crafted its tools, ships, and homes.

Betsy Ross occupies a sacred place in the American consciousness, and Miller's winning narrative finally does her justice. This history of the ordinary craftspeople of the Revolutionary War and their most famous representative will be the definitive volume for years to come.

My Opinion

This was very thorough and just as much about the time period as about one specific person.  I was surprised to discover that as I was reading because of the title but as I'm preparing this review I realize that observation is right there in the description.  I didn't look at what it was about before I bought it because it cost $1 brand-new.  I couldn't read many pages at a time because of the depth and detail but it was a good one to carry in my bag for the times where I had a few minutes to read.

Although there is no definitive answer on how instrumental Betsy Ross was to the creation and/or design of the flag, the author did a good job both of explaining why we want there to be one figure to hold above others when inventions are almost always a collaborative process and why Ross deserves her place in history even if it was a group effort.  To quote from the book, "Congress knew then what we must understand now: there was no single maker and no one prototype. That subsequent generations have tried to bring order to these chaotic circumstances - to strive to identify a single moment and a single maker for the first United States flag - is an artifact of the way we have come to think about the Revolution itself, as the result of orderly deliberations by larger-than-life statesmen, rather than a desperate, ad hoc scramble to defeat the greatest military force in the world."

I love the expression "He takes out his words and looks at 'em, 'fore he speaks." to describe a quiet, thoughtful talker.