Woodrow Wilson and His Work

What it is

Woodrow Wilson and His Work is a book by William E. Dodd, published in 1920 by Doubleday, Page and Company in Garden City, New York. Dodd was a professor of American history at the University of Chicago. The book is about xiv and 369 pages long, includes maps in the text, and has chapters on Wilson's youth, his road to leadership, his time at Princeton, his move to the presidency, and his reforms.

Why it matters

Written while Wilson was still in office and only a year after the end of the First World War, the book is an early historian's view of the man who led the United States through that period. It helps show how Americans of the time understood Wilson's politics, including the domestic reforms and the problems he faced as president.

Look closer

• What does Dodd choose to emphasize in Wilson's early life and career, and why might a historian of 1920 make that choice?
• Dodd was writing close to the events. What kinds of evidence might he have had, and what might he have missed?
• How does the chapter list show the book's view of Wilson's career as a story of rising leadership?