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It is through history that we learn who we are and how we got that way, why and how we changed, why the good sometimes prevailed and sometimes did not.

Stephen Ambrose

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Stephen Ambrose
Age: 66 †
Born: 1936
Born: January 10
Died: 2002
Died: October 13
Biographer
Essayist
Historian
University Teacher
Decatur
Illinois
Stephen Edward Ambrose
Prevailed
Changed
Learn
History
Sometimes
Way
Good

More quotes by Stephen Ambrose

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It would not be possible to praises nurses too highly.
Stephen Ambrose
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I thought Nixon was the worst President we had ever had, save only perhaps Andrew Johnson.
Stephen Ambrose
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Eisenhower had the clearest blue eyes. He would fix them on you. In my every interview with him, he would lock his eyes on to mine and keep them there.
Stephen Ambrose
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When Hitler declared war on the United States, he was betting that German soldiers, raised up in the Hitler Youth, would always out fight American soldiers, brought up in the Boy Scouts. He lost that bet. The Boy Scouts had been taught how to figure their way out of their own problems.
Stephen Ambrose
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Nothing is inevitable in life. People make choices, and those choices have results, and we all live with the results.
Stephen Ambrose
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Eisenhower is my choice as the American of the 20th Century. Of all the men I've studied and written about, he is the brightest and the best.
Stephen Ambrose
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There are many rules of good writing, but the best way to find them is to be a good reader.
Stephen Ambrose
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Washington and Jefferson were both rich Virginia planters, but they were never friends.
Stephen Ambrose
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I've always tried to be fair to my subjects. That's easy when they are as likable and admirable as Lewis and Clark, or Eisenhower.
Stephen Ambrose
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The American Constitution is the greatest governing document, and at some 7,000 words, just about the shortest.
Stephen Ambrose
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Crazy Horse saw history as integrated in the present, incorporated into daily life.
Stephen Ambrose
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Immigrants do more than help us win our wars, or set up cleaning shops or ethnic restaurants.
Stephen Ambrose
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The Canadians have managed to live peacefully with their Indians. It is disgrace that the United States has not done the same.
Stephen Ambrose
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During the Second World War, the Germans took four years to build the Atlantic Wall. On four beaches it held up the Allies for about an hour at Omaha it held up the U.S. for less than one day. The Atlantic Wall must therefore be regarded as one of the greatest blunders in military history.
Stephen Ambrose
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History is everything that has ever happened.
Stephen Ambrose
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Washington's character was rock solid. He came to stand for the new nation and its republican virtues, which was why he became our first President by unanimous choice.
Stephen Ambrose
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I think it's just that the private lives of our public leaders are so much more exposed today that if you're sensitive to protecting your family, it's much harder to not get defensive when somebody asks you those really rude questions about what your wife and your children are thinking and feeling at that exact moment.
Stephen Ambrose
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I was too young for Korea and too old for Vietnam.
Stephen Ambrose
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I think that the opportunity to improve race relations in the United States has been put off temporarily.
Stephen Ambrose
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I was taught by professors who had done their schooling in the 1930s. Most of them were scornful of, even hated, big business.
Stephen Ambrose