This book chronicles American history through the stories of the individuals and movements that dreamed of a better future and then took action to make that dream a reality, arguing that the much heralded American spirit was not born as a gift of our founding, but was forged through our adversity and triumphs. From colonial revolutionaries to abolitionists, labor organizers to suffragists, progressives to civil rights activists, it was individuals and movements who dared to go against the American majority that both guarded and created our best national self.