My Father's American Century

A Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist chronicles his father’s remarkable life spanning and reflecting the American Century in this deeply moving, page-turning father-son memoir.

Born in Kentucky in 1892, Joshua Bryant Powers— "Bryant" to all who knew him— was old enough to ride a bicycle and shout huzzah! in 1900 in a parade through the streets of Memphis  celebrating a hero of the Spanish-American War, and was still reading the New York Times with a magnifying glass line by line in the first months of 1989 as the Cold War came to an end. In this gripping, expansive memoir, his youngest child Thomas—a Pulitzer-Prize-winning journalist and celebrated and bestselling author—charts the extraordinary journey of his father’s life through The American Century and the many notable historical figures he interacted with along the way.

Powers recounts his father’s many astonishing adventures, from going down the Mississippi River with his 10-year-old brother rowing a skiff of their own making in his teens, to Bryant’s later work helping the CIA counter Russian influence during the Cold War. While never a public figure himself, Bryant interacted often with individuals directly involved in undertakings of historical importance—including cultural icons like Buffalo Bill Cody and Cold Warriors such as Hans Tofte and David Atlee Philips.

Blending deeply researched history with transportive storytelling, Powers crafts the story of an irrepressible citizen who believed in the potential and opportunities his country had to offer, and a love, loyalty and admiration between father and son that transcend differences.