EISENHOWER: A Centennial Life in Pictures

To be published on the 100th anniversary of rice's birth, this is indeed a life in pictures: over 200 b&w photographs--many drawn from American, British, French, and Soviet archives and the majority never before published--showing the former President in candid shots from his boyhood in Abilene, Kan., through his WW II exploits, his White House years, and his retirement. But this work is a life in words as well, featuring an extensive text by top historian Beschloss (Kennedy and Roosevelt, 1980; Mayday: Eisenhower, Khrushehevand the U-2 Affair, 1986) that sympathetically recasts Eisenhower from the kindly, rather dull statesman portrayed by the media during his presidency, into a wily, emotional, highly intelligent military-political leader with a caustic wit (according to Beschioss, Eisenhower ""privately referred to his successor [JFK] as 'the Boy.' "") A handsome, thoughtful volume.