Freedom Lost, Freedom Won

Trace 200 years of America’s complex racial history through a deeply moving family legacy with Freedom Lost, Freedom Won: A Personal History of America by Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Eugene Robinson!

About the Book: On March 27, 1829, a wealthy white planter in Charleston, South Carolina, purchased four enslaved individuals from a woman named Isabella Perman. Among them was a young boy named Harry—Pulitzer Prize–winning former Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson’s great-great-grandfather. Given the formal name Henry Fordham and put to work as a blacksmith, Harry achieved his own freedom a decade before the Civil War and witnessed Union troops march into Charleston in 1865.

In Freedom Lost, Freedom Won, Robinson brings two centuries of America's turbulent history to life through the remarkable lineage that Harry founded. Tracing the repeated, cyclical struggle in which African Americans have fought upward toward liberty and opportunity only to be forced back down, Robinson weaves personal memoir with national history. Reaching all the way to the Black Lives Matter movement, this powerful book asks a vital, urgent question: Will this time be different?

Key Features & Benefits:

• Pulitzer Prize–Winning Author: Written by esteemed journalist and former Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson.

• Intimate Personal History: Combines meticulous historical research with a gripping, multi-generational family memoir spanning from slavery to the modern era.

• Profound National Reflection: Examines the recurring cycles of racial progress and backlash in America, offering critical insight into contemporary social movements.

• The Perfect Gift: An essential, deeply moving read for history buffs, political science scholars, and anyone passionate about civil rights and American history.