Widmer wrote a biography of Martin Van Buren: "I was attracted to the idea of trying to make an obscure president a little bit less obscure. I think I succeeded in that very small goal.

Martin Van Buren was born on Dec. 5, 1782, the same day King George III announced hostilities with the United States were over and five days after the preliminary articles of the Treaty of Paris ...

Martin Van Buren was the first president to be born an American citizen. Besides that singular fact, he put his indelible stamp on our history and folklore. He left his footprint in Americana on ...

But a new biography, Martin Van Buren: America’s First Politician, by James M. Bradley sheds new light on the obscure politician perhaps best remembered today for a running joke from a 1997 ...

As president, however, Van Buren maintained Jacksonian policies that magnified an economic downturn, leading to the Panic of 1837. "Martin Van Ruin" was not re-elected... Died: July 24, 1862, in ...

Martin Van Buren in 1860. ... America’s First Politician, a lively and illuminating new biography of our eighth president—the first to be born a U.S. citizen.

When Van Buren died in 1862 after a life time of accomplishments, his will noted that he was a resident of Kinderhook, before noting that he had been president of the United States, said Justin ...

In 1987, a few months before officially declaring his candidacy, he said at a fundraiser, “The Martin Van Buren myth is going to fall in 1988.” He also said he would run on the accomplishments ...

KINDERHOOK, N.Y. - Two dozen New York Army National Guard Soldiers honored the nation's eighth president, Martin Van Buren, during a cold and blustery winter morning in his Hudson Valley hometown ...

But a new biography, Martin Van Buren: America’s First Politician, by James M. Bradley sheds new light on the obscure politician perhaps best remembered today for a running joke from a 1997 ...