MasterClass Review: Doris Kearns Goodwin Teaches U.S. Presidential History and Leadership

In her MasterClass, U.S. Presidential History and Leadership, award-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin discussed topics surrounding leadership, such as whether leaders are born or made, how emotional intelligence factors into leadership decisions, the ability to help rivals work together, and ways to relax from work. With each topic, she related stories from the lives of her four favorite presidents: Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt (TR), Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), and Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBR). The course is based on her book, Leadership in Turbulent Times, published by Simon & Schuster in 2018, which followed the lives of these four presidents, while she won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1995 for her biography of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt. Additionally, the 2012 Steven Spielberg film Lincoln was based on her biography, and she conducted a popular “exit interview” of president Barak Obama for Vanity Fair in 2016.

I appreciated how Goodwin wove the story of her life and career into her historical knowledge and advice. Goodwin’s love of stories and history started when she was young, since her mother had severe health issues and would talk about the days when she was healthy, while her father taught her to record baseball games, a different type of history. Goodwin became a White House fellow while a graduate student at Harvard when she was twenty-four years old as one of three women in a cohort of sixteen. LBJ took a liking to her, even though she had written an article on how to remove him from office. During this time, she met her husband, speechwriter Richard Goodwin, who passed away in 2018. Among my favorite moments in the class was Goodwin talking about her husband’s career, as their relationship was built upon love and mutual respect.

As a “history buff”, I knew many of the facts shared by Goodwin, so I was extra impressed when she described stories that I never heard before. Lincoln wrote “hot letters” when he was frustrated, pouring his complaints into letters that he never sent, although he saved them. FDR promoted General George Marshall during World War II specifically because the general would tell him when his ideas were bad, while other military leaders were hesitant. TR once led French ambassador Jules Jusserand on a hike in a rural area near Washington, D.C., at one point taking off his clothes to cross a river. Jusserand reported feeling obligated to take off his own clothes, although he kept on his lavender kid gloves. LBJ had difficulty not working, so he put memo pads and phones on floaties whenever he went in the pool. Goodwin also shared the stories of important historical women, especially first lady Elanor Roosevelt and Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins.

Goodwin emphasized the importance of using primary sources to create a fresh story from a well-known narratives, as she relies on diaries and letters for much of her research. She believes future researchers will need to take a different approach, as modern people do not send lengthy, handwritten letters or keep detailed diaries. Instead, future historians may rely on blogs and email, if any of these communications are saved. She lamented that, “People learned to write so much better than they learn to do today… [and] really had a skill for writing”, although I wondered if her data set was biased by including mostly people with political power who had an education, whether they went to elite schools or were self-taught.

Besides excellent advice and historical facts, I enjoyed the atmosphere of the class. Every lesson opened to the sound of gentle orchestral music, beautiful typography on the title cards, and a thoughtful quote. Goodwin sat in her office filled with books wearing a brightly colored floral outfit with a cute little teacup and matching saucer set on a table beside her. She conveyed a sense of wisdom and intelligence as she spoke with calmness, confidence, and empathy. My one complaint was with the editing style, which sometimes felt jumpy, as the video cut to Goodwin describing different biographies and political events interspersed with images or video footage from the time period. The run time is 2 hours and 56 minutes across 15 lessons, slightly longer than the average modern movie; I watched the class in three, hour-long sessions. Closed captioning was available, although audio description is not offered at this time. The class is ideal both for a young, civically-minded person interested in learning more about political history from a liberal-leaning but generally nonpartisan source, and for the historical expert interested in expanding their knowledge with research from one of the best biographers of American history. 

Abby Epplett’s Rating System

Experience: 9/10

Accessibility: 7/10