Joseph Ellis

Joseph Ellis is one of the nation’s leading scholars of American history. The author of twelve books, Ellis was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation and won the National Book Award for American Sphinx, a biography of Thomas Jefferson.

Joseph’s latest work, The Cause, is an epic account of the origins and clashing ideologies of America’s revolutionary. A landmark work of narrative history, The Cause challenges the story we have long told ourselves about our origins as a people, and as a nation.

In addition to frequent public lectures, Joseph’s commentaries have been featured on CSPAN, CNN, and PBS’s Lehrer News Hour, and he has appeared in several documentaries on early America. A professor of history, Joseph has taught in the Leadership Studies program at Williams College, the Commonwealth Honors College at the University of Massachusetts, Mount Holyoke College, and the United States Military Academy at West Point.

He lives in Western Massachusetts with his wife Eillen Wilkins Ellis and two dogs.