David McCullough

McCullough was born in the Point Breeze neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,[4] to Ruth (née Rankin) and Christian Hax McCullough.[5] He was of Scots-Irish, German, and English descent.[6][7] He was educated at Linden Avenue Grade School and Shady Side Academy, in his hometown of Pittsburgh.[3]

One of four sons, McCullough had a "marvelous" childhood with a wide range of interests, including sports and drawing cartoons.[8] McCullough's parents and his grandmother, who read to him often, introduced him to books at an early age.[6] His parents often talked about history, a topic he said should be discussed more often.[6] McCullough "loved school, every day";[8] he contemplated many career choices, ranging from architect, actor, painter, writer, to lawyer, and considered attending medical school for a time.[8]

In 1951, McCullough began attending Yale University.[9] He said that it was a "privilege" to study English at Yale because of faculty members such as John O'Hara, John Hersey, Robert Penn Warren, and Brendan Gill.[10] McCullough occasionally ate lunch with the Pulitzer Prize–winning[11] novelist and playwright Thornton Wilder.[10] Wilder, said McCullough, taught him that a competent writer maintains "an air of freedom" in the storyline, so that a reader will not anticipate the outcome, even if the book is non-fiction.[12]

While at Yale, he became a member of Skull and Bones.[13] He served apprenticeships at Time, Life, the United States Information Agency, and American Heritage,[10] where he enjoyed research. He said: "Once I discovered the endless fascination of doing the research and of doing the writing, I knew I had found what I wanted to do in my life."[10] While attending Yale, McCullough studied Arts and earned his bachelor's degree in English, with the intention of becoming a fiction writer or playwright.[6] He graduated with honors in English literature in 1955.[14][15]

After graduation, McCullough moved to New York City, where Sports Illustrated hired him as a trainee.[8] He later worked as an editor and writer for the United States Information Agency in Washington, D.C.[4] After working for twelve years in editing and writing, including a position at American Heritage, McCullough "felt that [he] had reached the point where [he] could attempt something on [his] own."[8]

McCullough "had no anticipation that [he] was going to write history, but [he] stumbled upon a story that [he] thought was powerful, exciting, and very worth telling."[8] While working at American Heritage, McCullough wrote in his spare time for three years.[8][16] The Johnstown Flood, a chronicle of one of the worst flood disasters in United States history, was published in 1968[8] to high praise by critics.[17] John Leonard, of The New York Times, said of McCullough, "We have no better social historian."[17] Despite rough financial times,[9] he decided to become a full-time writer, encouraged by his wife Rosalee.[8]

McCullough interviews President Ronald Reagan in 1981

After the success of The Johnstown Flood, two new publishers offered him contracts, one to write about the Great Chicago Fire and another about the San Francisco earthquake.[19] Simon & Schuster, publisher of his first book, also offered McCullough a contract to write a second book.[9] Trying not to become "Bad News McCullough",[19] he decided to write about a subject showing "people were not always foolish and inept or irresponsible."[19] He remembered the words of his Yale teacher: "[Thornton] Wilder said he got the idea for a book or a play when he wanted to learn about something. Then, he'd check to see if anybody had already done it, and if they hadn't, he'd do it."[9] McCullough decided to write a history of the Brooklyn Bridge, which he had walked across many times.[9] It was published in 1972.

To me history ought to be a source of pleasure. It isn't just part of our civic responsibility. To me it's an enlargement of the experience of being alive, just the way literature or art or music is.

– David McCullough[10]

He also proposed, from a suggestion by his editor,[6] a work about the Panama Canal; both were accepted by the publisher.[9]

Five years later, The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal was released, gaining McCullough widespread recognition.[9] The book won the National Book Award in History,[20] the Samuel Eliot Morison Award,[21] the Francis Parkman Prize,[22] and the Cornelius Ryan Award.[23] Later in 1977, McCullough travelled to the White House to advise Jimmy Carter and the United States Senate on the Torrijos-Carter Treaties, which would give Panama control of the Canal.[21] Carter later said that the treaties, which were negotiated to transfer ownership of the Canal to Panama, would not have passed had it not been for the book.[21]

McCullough's fourth work was his first biography, reinforcing his belief that "history is the story of people".[24] Released in 1981, Mornings on Horseback tells the story of seventeen years in the life of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States.[25] The work ranged from Roosevelt's childhood to 1886, and tells of a "life intensely lived."[25] The book won McCullough's second National Book Award[26][lower-alpha 1] and his first Los Angeles Times Prize for Biography and New York Public Library Literary Lion Award.[27] Next, he published Brave Companions, a collection of essays that "unfold seamlessly".[28] Written over twenty years, the book[29] includes essays about Louis Agassiz, Alexander von Humboldt, John and Washington Roebling, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Conrad Richter, and Frederic Remington.[29]

With his next book, McCullough published his second biography, Truman (1993) about the 33rd president. The book won McCullough his first Pulitzer Prize, in the category of "Best Biography or Autobiography,"[1] and his second Francis Parkman Prize. Two years later, the book was adapted as Truman (1995), a television film by HBO, starring Gary Sinise as Truman.[9]

I think it's important to remember that these men are not perfect. If they were marble gods, what they did wouldn't be so admirable. The more we see the founders as humans the more we can understand them.

– David McCullough[30]

Working for the next seven years,[31] McCullough published John Adams (2001), his third biography about a United States president. One of the fastest-selling non-fiction books in history,[9] the book won McCullough's second Pulitzer Prize for "Best Biography or Autobiography" in 2002.[1] He started it as a book about the founding fathers and back-to-back presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson; but dropped Jefferson to focus on Adams.[30] HBO adapted John Adams as a seven-part miniseries by the same name.[32] Premiering in 2008, it starred Paul Giamatti in the title role.[32] The DVD version of the miniseries includes the biographical documentary, David McCullough: Painting with Words.[33]

McCullough's 1776 tells the story of the founding year of the United States, focusing on George Washington, the amateur army, and other struggles for independence.[31] Because of McCullough's popularity, its initial printing was 1.25 million copies, many more than the average history book.[3] Upon its release, the book was a number one best-seller in the United States.[31] A miniseries adaptation of 1776 was rumored.[34]

McCullough considered writing a sequel to 1776.[31] However, he signed a contract with Simon & Schuster to do a work about Americans in Paris between 1830 and 1900, The Greater Journey, which was published in 2011.[35][36] The book covers 19th-century Americans, including Mark Twain and Samuel Morse, who migrated to Paris and went on to achieve importance in culture or innovation. Other subjects include Benjamin Silliman, who had been Morse's science teacher at Yale, Elihu Washburne, the U.S. Ambassador to France during the Franco-Prussian War, and Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female doctor in the United States.[37]

McCullough's The Wright Brothers was published in 2015.[38] The Pioneers followed in 2019, the story of the first European American settlers of the Northwest Territory, a vast American wilderness to which the Ohio River was the gateway.[39]

McCullough speaking at Vassar College in 2008

In 1954, McCullough married Rosalee Barnes; the couple had first met as teenagers, and they remained together until her death on June 9, 2022.[40] They had five children.[41] In 2016, the couple moved from the Back Bay of Boston to Hingham, Massachusetts; three of his five children also lived there as of 2017.[42][43] He had a summer home in Camden, Maine.[44][45] McCullough's interests included sports, history, and visual art, including watercolor and portrait painting.[46]

His son, David Jr., an English teacher at Wellesley High School in the Boston suburbs, achieved sudden fame in 2012, when he gave a commencement speech in which he repeatedly told graduating students that they were "not special"; his speech went viral on YouTube.[47][48] Another son, Bill, is married to the daughter of former Florida governor Bob Graham.[49]

A registered independent, McCullough typically avoided publicly commenting on contemporary political issues. When asked to do so, he would repeatedly say, "My specialty is dead politicians." During the 2016 presidential election season, he broke with his custom to criticize Donald Trump, whom he called "a monstrous clown with a monstrous ego."[50]

McCullough taught a writing course at Wesleyan University and was a visiting scholar at Cornell University and Dartmouth College.[51]

McCullough speaking with Marie Arana on the National Book Festival Main Stage in 2019

After a period of failing health, McCullough died at his home in Hingham on August 7, 2022, at age 89.[52]

McCullough narrated many television shows and documentaries throughout his career.[72] In addition to narrating the 2003 film Seabiscuit, McCullough hosted PBS's American Experience from 1988 to 1999.[30] McCullough narrated numerous documentaries directed by Ken Burns, including the Emmy Award-winning The Civil War,[30] the Academy Award-nominated Brooklyn Bridge,[73] The Statue of Liberty,[74] and The Congress.[75] He served as a guest narrator for The Most Wonderful Time of the Year, a Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert special that aired on PBS in 2010.[76]

McCullough narrated, in whole or in part, numerous of his own audiobooks, including Truman, 1776, The Greater Journey, and The Wright Brothers.[77]