Keith Pruitt has been studying Presidents literally since he was in elementary school when the librarian could get the young student only to read about Presidents. Through time the study of the Presidents' lives grew to be a fasination and then an obsession. Beginning this book's research in earnest in 1980 while in college, Pruitt has become a talented historian having visited hundreds of sites including all but four deceased Presidential graves. In this volume, Pruitt seeks to examine the times in which each man lived and the more holistic picture of their lives not just their time in office. What made them the person they became? What influences molded them? These are the greater questions the author attempts to answer. Through times of jubulation and defeat, mistakes and great achievements, Pruitt parts the curtain so that the reader can discover the real person.