The Boys in the Boat

Why it’s on the list: Daniel James Brown on the University of Washington eight at the 1936 Berlin Olympics — Depression-era rowers, a boatbuilder’s craft, and Nazi Germany staging itself for the world.

Where I heard about it

• Spotted at Amazon Books at Washington Square, Tigard — December 2018 (Books photo album)

• Spotted at Barnes & Noble, San Bruno — February 2019 (Books photo album)

• Spotted at Amazon Books at Washington Square, Tigard — November 2021 (Books photo album)

• A crowd-sourced X thread — in the replies to @typesfast’s question “What’s the best history book you’ve read?” (the thread, June 2025).

Connections

• What’s the best history book… (tweet) — the saved thread this recommendation came from.
• History · Culture — where this sits in the corpus.