"In The Founding Fortunes, historian Tom Shachtman offers an in-depth look at a time when money became as vital as guns in securing victory on the Revolutionary War's battlefields, and how some of America's wealthiest men risked their fortunes to aid the new country even as they reaped benefits from its independence. While history teaches that successful revolutions depend on participation by the common man, the establishment of a stable and independent...

Although Robert Morris (1734-1806), "the Financier of the American Revolution," was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution, a powerful committee chairman in the Continental Congress, an important figure in Pennsylvania politics, and perhaps the most prominent businessman of his day, he is today least known of the great national leaders of the Revolutionary era. This oversight is being rectified...