Pioneering newspaperman and passionate crusader, Horace Greeley was one of the most influential characters of nineteenth-century America. Not only did his New York Tribune chart a vital new course for American journalism, but his fervent idealism and intense public zeal made him a towering force in national political and social life.

From a poverty stricken boyhood in New Hampshire he rose to build the most important newspaper of his day, overcoming all obstacles. He stepped from total obscurity to become a name known the entire nation over. He was the man who was instrumental in winning Abraham Lincoln the nomination for President, and his personal pressure helped bring about such historic milestones as the Emancipation Proclamation and the restoration of political rights to the defeated South after the Civil War.

Success, however, is only part of the story. For the life of Horace Greeley is one of failure, too, from his unsuccessful opposition to American involvement in the Mexican War to his foredoomed campaign for the Presidency against Ulysses S. Grant. His radical social views, his championship of the rights of workingmen, and other advanced views brought him ridicule and scorn, while his ungainly manner, his eccentric dress and his impractical nature provided added ammunition for his enemies. Yet no defeat could alter his sense of high purpose. No discouragement could swerve him from his self-imposed task of informing his fellow countrymen, prodding them, at times lambasting them, as he stirred them to create the future in which he so wholeheartedly believed. Determined to serve the cause of right as he saw it, despite all opposition and disregarding all costs, Horace Greeley won a place of honor in American history as a man who, for over thirty years, came to represent the very conscience of his country.

From the dust jacket