George Washington (1732-1799), the commander in chief of the Continental Army and first president of the United States, appears throughout History Matters as an archetype of leadership. For McCullough, Washington embodies the virtues of steadiness, courage, and character under extreme pressure. He serves as the primary example of how an individual’s integrity and sense of duty can shape the course of history.

McCullough grounds his portrait of Washington in foundational achievements, particularly his resilience during the Revolutionary War. Events like the crossing of the Delaware are presented as moments where Washington’s leadership altered an otherwise improbable trajectory. McCullough emphasizes that Washington was at his best when circumstances were at their worst. In a letter to her husband, Abigail Adams quoted poet Edward Young’s observation that “Affliction is a good man’s shining time” (73); McCullough uses this idea to Washington to show how adversity revealed what Adams described as the commander’s “hidden excellencies” (73).

McCullough stresses that Washington’s greatest act was his voluntary relinquishing of power—a decision that stunned the world. By stepping down after two terms, he set a crucial precedent for executive restraint, supporting McCullough’s claim that character fundamentally shapes political institutions. For McCullough, Washington’s resignation was not a political calculation but a moral one, demonstrating a commitment to republican ideals over personal ambition.

Washington’s legacy, as presented in the collection, is the establishment of executive norms and symbols of national unity that connect past precedent to present civic duties. He was, in McCullough’s view, the indispensable figure who held a fragile nation together through sheer force of moral character.

Harry S. Truman (1884-1972), the 33rd president of the United States, serves as one of McCullough’s primary case studies in leadership. Ascending to the presidency upon Franklin D. Roosevelt’s death in 1945, Truman navigated the onset of the Cold War and major domestic shifts, allowing McCullough to focus on his decision-making under unprecedented pressure. For McCullough, the unassuming and plainspoken Truman exemplified the virtues of character, stamina, and duty.

McCullough situates Truman’s leadership in his practical, agrarian roots on a Missouri farm and service as a World War I artillery captain. This background, McCullough argues, gave Truman empathy and pragmatism that defined his presidency. For instance, McCullough presents Truman’s decision to issue Executive Order 9981, which desegregated the armed forces, as a moment of profound moral courage, undertaken despite significant political risk. When warned that his civil rights program would cost him the 1948 election, Truman replied that losing for that reason “would be for a good cause,” demonstrating that for him, principle “mattered more than his own political hide” (87).

McCullough emphasizes Truman’s preference for decisive action over soaring rhetoric. Lacking Roosevelt’s charisma, Truman instead relied on a deep understanding of history and an unshakeable sense of responsibility. He knew he was not a “glamour boy” (79) and understood that his strengths lay in his judgment and work ethic. His leadership during the Berlin Airlift and the Korean War spoke to his ability to remain steadfast amid crisis, guided by conviction rather than public opinion.

Truman’s legacy is defined by the enduring impact of his policy choices. The architecture of the Cold War, including the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan, shaped global politics for decades, while his stand on civil rights laid crucial groundwork for the movement to come. For McCullough, Truman is the quintessential example of the “seemingly ordinary American who, when put to the test, rises to the occasion and does the extraordinary” (79).

Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896), the abolitionist and author of the groundbreaking 1852 novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin, exemplifies for McCullough how art and history can deepen moral imagination. After her novel became an international sensation, Stowe traveled to Europe, where art refined her ethical vision. McCullough focuses particularly on her experience at the Louvre to illustrate his belief in the power of careful observation.

Stowe’s profound response to Théodore Géricault’s monumental painting, The Raft of the Medusa, serves as the essay’s centerpiece. The painting, which depicts the desperate survivors of a shipwreck, resonated with her abolitionist sentiments and her understanding of human suffering. McCullough highlights her immersive reaction to show how art can transcend its medium to convey universal truths. Stowe wrote that she “gazed until all surrounding objects disappeared, and I was alone in the wide Atlantic” (65). This moment of intense connection demonstrates how aesthetic experience can sharpen one’s conscience and reinforce a commitment to social justice.

Through Stowe’s story, McCullough links creative production with civic outcomes. Her novel became a powerful political tool that galvanized antislavery sentiment and shaped public debate on both sides of the Atlantic, reinforcing the collection’s central theme: that a commitment to seeing the world clearly, whether through art, literature, or history, is fundamental to moral and civic life.

Thomas Eakins (1844-1916), an American realist painter and educator from Philadelphia, exemplifies for McCullough heroism rooted in craft and integrity. McCullough presents Eakins as an artist whose subjects—dedicated, serious practitioners—stand in stark contrast to modern celebrity culture.

Eakins tied his artistic method to a deep respect for truth, insisting on the study of anatomy and painting from live models. This rigor is reflected in his choice of portrait sitters: physicians, musicians, scientists, and athletes captured at the peak of their craft. McCullough notes that these were not the wealthy or socially prominent figures of the day but rather people defined by their commitment to excellence: “The qualities they had in common were self-discipline, high purpose, and high performance achieved through rigorous training, hard work, and continued study” (53). By painting these unsung champions, Eakins modeled a form of achievement and highlighted what he saw as worthy heroes.

After obscurity during his lifetime, Eakins’s influence on American realism and art education exploded posthumously, underscoring McCullough’s theme that true standards of excellence have lasting power. For McCullough, Eakins represents an ideal of purposeful work and quiet dignity.

Ezra Stiles (1727-1795), the theologian and seventh president of Yale College, appears in History Matters as a model of the scholar-citizen. An Enlightenment figure with an omnivorous curiosity, Stiles guided the newly established Yale through the American Revolution and into the early years of the new nation. McCullough praises him for his humane and broad-minded approach to education, which included promoting the study of languages and sciences.

For McCullough, Stiles’s leadership during a period of national fragility demonstrates the vital connection between learning and civic resilience. As a public intellectual and institution-builder, he embodied the ideal that a liberal education was essential for a healthy republic. Stiles was, in McCullough’s estimation, “the most learned man in America,” yet he was always “more interested in what he did not know than in what he did” (102).

Stiles’s legacy, which shaped both Yale’s institutional identity and the broader ethos of American higher education, reinforces one of the book’s core themes: Great institutions are molded by the character and vision of the people who lead them. Stiles stands as an exemplar of the intellectual and civic virtues McCullough most admires.

John Trumbull (1756-1843), the renowned painter of the American Revolution, represents the power of art to shape public history and national memory. A Harvard graduate and veteran of the war, Trumbull dedicated his career to documenting its pivotal moments and figures. In McCullough’s account, Trumbull’s work functions as a civic archive, preserving the faces and events of the founding for future generations with eyewitness rigor.

McCullough highlights Trumbull’s founding of the Trumbull Gallery at Yale in 1832, creating the first college art museum in the United States. By donating his works to create this institution, Trumbull treated art as essential educational infrastructure. This act aligns with McCullough’s belief in the importance of institutions that preserve and transmit cultural and historical knowledge.

Trumbull’s legacy is the set of iconic images, including his famous painting Declaration of Independence, that have come to define how Americans visualize the Revolution. His work demonstrates the immense reach of visual history and its crucial role in creating a shared national story. For McCullough, Trumbull is the quintessential patriot-artist who understood that art is a powerful and enduring form of civic education.

Manasseh Cutler (1742-1823), a Congregational minister, scientist, and land advocate, personifies for McCullough the energetic and learned citizenship that built America’s foundational institutions. A Yale graduate and polymath, Cutler was a key figure in the Ohio Company of Associates and played an instrumental role in shaping the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which established the framework for governance, including banning slavery, in the territory that would become five Midwestern states.

McCullough also highlights Cutler’s successful lobbying efforts to include provisions for public education in the ordinance. Cutler insisted that land be set aside “perpetually for the purpose of a university” (107), which led to the founding of Ohio University, tying the nation’s physical growth to its intellectual and moral development. Cutler’s story exemplifies McCullough’s belief that personal commitment to the public good can create durable institutions.

Vincent Scully (1920-2017), a legendary professor of architectural history at Yale, appears in History Matters as an exemplar of transformative teaching. As a public intellectual, Scully shaped generations of students’ understanding of architecture, urbanism, and cultural history. For McCullough, who was one of those students, Scully’s power lay in his ability to reveal the deep connections between the built environment and civic values.

McCullough praises Scully’s method of connecting buildings to landscape and public meaning—an approach that aligns with his own preservationist belief that history should be felt as well as understood. He recalls Scully’s ability to make his students truly see the world around them, a gift that McCullough considers the essence of great teaching. He credits his professor with showing him how architects build with light, a lesson that informed his own descriptive writing.

McCullough concludes that Scully’s teaching was profound because he shared his passion and perspective so generously: “He makes us think, and with the heart no less than the mind” (113). Scully stands as a model for the idea that pedagogy, at its best, is a vital public service.