<p>American Pageant felt all right to me. Like everyone mentioned, it’s not the best for time-saving, but it didn’t get boring and I guess I just never got mired in the metaphors for some reason. It definitely teaches you what you need to know, that’s the only book I used for my 5.</p>
<p>“Boss Tweed, 230 pounds of rascality.”</p>
<p>“Mustachioed Mark Twain.”</p>
<p>The picture of Sam Adams/Jack Black.</p>
<p>What’s not to love? :)</p>
<p>I found the American Pageant to be very effective as a textbook for AP US History. But, of course, I had to rely on supplementary materials to fully cover everything to be found on the exam.</p>
<p>Moreover, I had to read it very closely since we had 123-question exams on about four chapters of material - so skimming the material was not an option. Consequently, I believe that I learned much from the book.</p>
<p>hmm my APUSH class uses Out of Many: A History of the American People.
does anyone else’s?</p>
<p>We use a People’s History too… as well as pageant… I hate them both at the moment cause this is the last week of the trimester and we have to read 50 pages of Pageant AND 30 pages of Zinn… blahh… I can’t do it! I will definitely be looking at apnotes.net… thank you for enlightening me jobbin :D</p>
<p>Do I really care about how tall each president was? To be honest, no. But I have read good things in the book.</p>
<p>So I’m just perusing the ol’ test prep forums (this is where I started as a CC’er!), and I ran across this thread, and I want to throw in my two cents. My graduating class was the last at my high school to use American Pageant, and I must say, that is one memorable text. I’m a 2nd year in college, and I still remember how the Deere’s innovations “plowed the virgin soil,” and how Americans “drank deeply from the gilded goblet.” And I think it was chapter 16 or 18 that talked about how the transcontinental railroads grew (on the left page, in the right column, in the top half of the page) which took me a good 3 hours to understand. Ah, good times…</p>
<p>We use Pageant too… I guess I see its entertainment value but honestly I read it for the facts, which is what we get tested on in class. Having all that stuff that’s supposed to make it interesting is just a waste of time. Don’t get me wrong, I love history. But if I want to read history for fun, on my own time, I’ll choose an actual history book, not Pageant.</p>
<p>I use the pageant and it’s a great book but I have to agree with Jobbin.</p>
<p>I find the book is entertaining but it really narrows it scope on the political side of American history. Which is why some classes also put Howard Zinn’s book into their reading as well. Unfortunately, my class doesn’t do that 
Also, this book doesn’t teach to a thesis, which leads to each chapter being some what disorganized in my head.</p>
<p>But AMSCO + Pageant = awesome.
Oh, those who are in APWH, try Traditions and Encounters by Bentley & Ziegler. It’s an amazing book. Straightforward yet it reads like a story. Much more clear than the prose used in the American Pageant.</p>
<p>The American Pagent was not designed to prep for an AP exam (most aren’t), but it was designed to provide useful or fun or good history. </p>
<p>For interesting? I felt it was pretty biased in a way, and sometimes it was hard to read because I’m a pretty emotional person (as in, I was po’d when I read about black suppression in the south, and I had to stop reading and do something else). Other times, (I believe it was only the first chapter for me), it was really interesting, such as the native Americans being screwed over, and I couldn’t stop reading.</p>
<p>But generally, I thought it was a better than an AP government book I read, which, I read 20 pages and absorbed that framers were the founding fathers.</p>
<p>And even though I only received a 3, I think I learned quite a bit of USH. (Got a 680 on the subject test? I think it was the essays that killed me because I suck at writing, because I think I owned at the multiple choice. Or something screwed up, which is why I probably want a re score.)</p>
<p>Look up Admiral George Dewey and the corresponding poem/song. My favorite part of that book. Read it last summer, but still remember it quite vividly.</p>
<p>Context: Admiral George Dewey took Manila Bay from the Spanish with only one of his men dead (poor fellow died of heat stroke, not combat). Attained rank of Admiral of the Navy, the only person ever to do so (highest Navy rank, equivalent of 5-star General in Army). After his famous victory, a poet wrote this bit (I like it better as a song):</p>
<p>“Oh, Dewey was the morning, upon the first of May,
And Dewey was the Admiral, down in Manila Bay,
And Dewey were the Spaniards’ eyes, them orbs of black and blue,
And Dewey feel discouraged? I Dew not think we Dew.”</p>
<p>I hated this textbook, I felt like reading it was a big waste of time. I think I read and outlined the first couple of chapters (outlines were our main assignments for APUSH) and then I stopped reading it and just used course-notes. Somehow I still managed to get a 5 on the AP test.</p>
<p>I read the first chapter that we had a test on. After that, for chapter tests I would just skim through it before the school day started. I mean it’s beautifully-written with all its metaphors and flowery language, but that’s not exactly what I’m look for in a history textbook. Maybe if I had more time and it wasn’t so long I would have enjoyed it more.</p>
<p>Nation of Nations ftw</p>
<p>I hated American Pageant for actually learning so I ignored it all year, luckily REA is perfectly sufficient</p>
<p>The APUSH classes and the teacher loved The Pageant at my school. My APUSH teacher is obsessed with Thomas Bailey, yes the man who originally wrote the book and who has been dead for like 20 years lol, it got to the point where all of us APUSH students called the Am. Pageant the Bailey book. I thought it was a wonderful book , but I do agree that some of the extra non-useful info and metaphors etc. was not really needed but it made for an interesting read.</p>
<p>American Pageant was NOT written with the APUSH exam in mind. With that being said, have fun reading through all the superfluous non-sense in there. Lots of people say APUSH is lots of reading but in reality it isn’t. The only reason people say that is because they have textbooks that teach entire history of the USA, literally. For the APUSH exam you don’t need to know the ENTIRE history of the USA.</p>
<p>I love all the sexual metaphors. There’s a facebook group dedicated to them.</p>
<p>Besides that, I hate it. It beats around the bush so much, and does not differentiate in any way the crap from the actual useful information.</p>
<p>It was an interesting book to read, but it had too much excessive info</p>