President’s Club: James Garfield
Monday, February 9 from 3:15 – 4:15 PM
February Selection:
Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard – an Edgar Award Winner in 2012.
Registration required for In-Person. Visit our website
Zoom link active on our website the day of event.
“Crisp, concise and revealing history. . . . A fresh narrative that plumbs some of the most dramatic days in U.S. presidential history.”
—The Washington Post
James Abram Garfield was one of the most extraordinary men ever elected president. Born into abject poverty, he rose to become a wunderkind scholar, a Civil War hero, a renowned congressman, and a reluctant presidential candidate who took on the nation’s corrupt political establishment. But four months after Garfield’s inauguration in 1881, he was shot in the back by a deranged office-seeker named Charles Guiteau. Garfield survived the attack, but became the object of bitter, behind-the-scenes struggles for power—over his administration, over the nation’s future, and, hauntingly, over his medical care.
Meticulously researched, epic in scope, and pulsating with an intimate human focus and high-velocity narrative drive, The Destiny of the Republic brings alive a forgotten chapter of U.S. history.
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Oliver Wolcott Library
160 South Street
Litchfield CT 06759
2026-02-09
