Calvin Coolidge never rated high in polls, and history has remembered the decade in which he served as an extravagant period predating the Great Depression. Amity Shlaes provides a fresh look at the 1920s --- triumphant years in which the nation electrified, Americans drove their first cars, and the federal deficit was replaced with a surplus --- and the little-known president behind them. Perhaps more than any other president, Coolidge understood that doing less could yield more, reducing the federal budget even as the economy grew, wages rose, taxes fell, and unemployment dropped.

In this illuminating, magisterial biography, Amity Shlaes captures the remarkable story of Calvin Coolidge and the decade of extraordinary prosperity that grew from his leadership.