
Francis Scott Key
The Life and Legacy of the Man Who Wrote America's National Anthem
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $6.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Kenneth Ray
About this listen
These words elicit strong emotions in the hearts of Americans more than 200 years after they were written. "The Star Spangled Banner" is still sung at sporting events, political rallies, and even church services around the nation on a daily basis, and for decades, they were considered mandatory memory work for every kid in grade school. Today, some find the song disturbing for various reasons, ranging from its martial words to its high notes, and others believe that the national anthem should not be sung because of the character of the man who wrote them: Francis Scott Key.
And what of this man, this brilliant lawyer who was born into slave-holding Maryland and himself held slaves even as he wrote of "the land of the free"? He was, to say the least, complex, as he at times fought in court both for and against slaves seeking their freedom. He was a founding member of an organization seeking to return captured slaves to their homelands, yet he also fought abolition tooth and claw. He seems to have been, like many men of his age, torn nearly to pieces by these contradictions, even as he wrote in one of the song's later verses:
"A home and a Country should leave us no more? Their blood has wash'd out their foul footstep's pollution. No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave."On the one hand he considered the law of the land the highest authority on earth, but he saw little difference between faith in God and faith in America, as he wrote in the song's rarely sung final verse: "Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our motto - 'In God is our trust.'" He was a well-known and well-connected Washington, DC attorney who was always in debt, even as he lived and worked among the most powerful people in the nation. In fact, he died a poor man even though he owned the rights to one of the most popular songs in American history.
Francis Scott Key's personal life was somewhat less confusing, if more tragic. He came from a closely knit family and was especially influenced by his mother and grandmother. He was happily married for more than 40 years to a woman who never quite lived up to his standards of piety. He was a devoted and devout father of 11 children who suffered the pangs of burying several before their time. As a result, there was always a conflict between his desire to rejoice in all he had and his often melancholic state of mind.
©2017 Charles River Editors (P)2017 Charles River EditorsListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Sons of Liberty: The Lives and Legacies of John Adams, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere and John Hancock
- By: Charles River Editors
- Narrated by: Chris Brinkley
- Length: 4 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For over 200 years, Americans have been fascinated by the Revolutionary period and the patriots who led the growing resistance movement against British authority. In particular, the clandestine activities of Boston's Sons of Liberty in the decade before the war continue to be a source of both intrigue and mystery. The Sons of Liberty chronicles the amazing lives and careers of the four most famous members of the Sons of Liberty, examines their relationships before and during the Revolution, and analyzes their lasting legacies. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about Samuel Adams, John Adams, Paul Revere and John Hancock like you never have before.
-
-
it should be required reading in our high schools.
- By Amazon Customer on 04-05-17
-
Alexander Hamilton
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 35 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Historians have long told the story of America’s birth as the triumph of Jefferson’s democratic ideals over the aristocratic intentions of Hamilton. Chernow presents an entirely different man, whose legendary ambitions were motivated not merely by self-interest but by passionate patriotism and a stubborn will to build the foundations of American prosperity and power.
-
-
An Outstanding & Riveting Book!
- By Kevin on 03-04-05
By: Ron Chernow
-
Washington
- A Life
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 41 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Washington: A Life celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation. This crisply paced narrative carries the reader through his troubled boyhood, his precocious feats in the French and Indian War, his creation of Mount Vernon, his heroic exploits with the Continental Army, his presiding over the Constitutional Convention, and his magnificent performance as America's first president.
-
-
A sad day when my book was done!
- By ButterLegume on 12-13-10
By: Ron Chernow
-
Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann, Jon Meacham
- Length: 18 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this magnificent biography, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Lion and Franklin and Winston brings vividly to life an extraordinary man and his remarkable times. Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power gives us Jefferson the politician and president, a great and complex human being forever engaged in the wars of his era.
-
-
A Man and Biography Relevant to Our Day
- By Darwin8u on 11-14-12
By: Jon Meacham
-
Bill O'Reilly's Legends and Lies: The Patriots
- By: Bill O'Reilly, David Fisher
- Narrated by: Holter Graham, Bill O'Reilly
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The must-have companion to Bill O'Reilly's historical docudrama Legends and Lies: The Patriots, an exciting and eye-opening look at the Revolutionary War through the lives of its leaders. The American Revolution was neither inevitable nor a unanimous cause. It pitted neighbors against each other as loyalists and colonial rebels faced off for their lives and futures. These were the times that tried men's souls: No one was on stable ground, and few could be trusted.
-
-
Couldn't stop listening!
- By Erin on 08-05-16
By: Bill O'Reilly, and others
-
American Lion
- Andrew Jackson in the White House
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Richard McGonagle
- Length: 17 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Beloved and hated, venerated and reviled, Andrew Jackson was an orphan who fought his way to the pinnacle of power, bending the nation to his will in the cause of democracy. Jackson's election in 1828 ushered in a new and lasting era in which the people, not distant elites, were the guiding force in American politics. Democracy made its stand in the Jackson years, and he gave voice to the hopes and the fears of a restless, changing nation facing challenging times at home and threats abroad.
-
-
Unlikable Old Hickory
- By John M on 01-05-09
By: Jon Meacham
-
The Sons of Liberty: The Lives and Legacies of John Adams, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere and John Hancock
- By: Charles River Editors
- Narrated by: Chris Brinkley
- Length: 4 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For over 200 years, Americans have been fascinated by the Revolutionary period and the patriots who led the growing resistance movement against British authority. In particular, the clandestine activities of Boston's Sons of Liberty in the decade before the war continue to be a source of both intrigue and mystery. The Sons of Liberty chronicles the amazing lives and careers of the four most famous members of the Sons of Liberty, examines their relationships before and during the Revolution, and analyzes their lasting legacies. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about Samuel Adams, John Adams, Paul Revere and John Hancock like you never have before.
-
-
it should be required reading in our high schools.
- By Amazon Customer on 04-05-17
-
Alexander Hamilton
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 35 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Historians have long told the story of America’s birth as the triumph of Jefferson’s democratic ideals over the aristocratic intentions of Hamilton. Chernow presents an entirely different man, whose legendary ambitions were motivated not merely by self-interest but by passionate patriotism and a stubborn will to build the foundations of American prosperity and power.
-
-
An Outstanding & Riveting Book!
- By Kevin on 03-04-05
By: Ron Chernow
-
Washington
- A Life
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 41 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Washington: A Life celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation. This crisply paced narrative carries the reader through his troubled boyhood, his precocious feats in the French and Indian War, his creation of Mount Vernon, his heroic exploits with the Continental Army, his presiding over the Constitutional Convention, and his magnificent performance as America's first president.
-
-
A sad day when my book was done!
- By ButterLegume on 12-13-10
By: Ron Chernow
-
Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann, Jon Meacham
- Length: 18 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this magnificent biography, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of American Lion and Franklin and Winston brings vividly to life an extraordinary man and his remarkable times. Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power gives us Jefferson the politician and president, a great and complex human being forever engaged in the wars of his era.
-
-
A Man and Biography Relevant to Our Day
- By Darwin8u on 11-14-12
By: Jon Meacham
-
Bill O'Reilly's Legends and Lies: The Patriots
- By: Bill O'Reilly, David Fisher
- Narrated by: Holter Graham, Bill O'Reilly
- Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The must-have companion to Bill O'Reilly's historical docudrama Legends and Lies: The Patriots, an exciting and eye-opening look at the Revolutionary War through the lives of its leaders. The American Revolution was neither inevitable nor a unanimous cause. It pitted neighbors against each other as loyalists and colonial rebels faced off for their lives and futures. These were the times that tried men's souls: No one was on stable ground, and few could be trusted.
-
-
Couldn't stop listening!
- By Erin on 08-05-16
By: Bill O'Reilly, and others
-
American Lion
- Andrew Jackson in the White House
- By: Jon Meacham
- Narrated by: Richard McGonagle
- Length: 17 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Beloved and hated, venerated and reviled, Andrew Jackson was an orphan who fought his way to the pinnacle of power, bending the nation to his will in the cause of democracy. Jackson's election in 1828 ushered in a new and lasting era in which the people, not distant elites, were the guiding force in American politics. Democracy made its stand in the Jackson years, and he gave voice to the hopes and the fears of a restless, changing nation facing challenging times at home and threats abroad.
-
-
Unlikable Old Hickory
- By John M on 01-05-09
By: Jon Meacham
-
The Black Count
- Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo
- By: Tom Reiss
- Narrated by: Paul Michael
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
General Alex Dumas is a man almost unknown today, yet his story is strikingly familiar—because his son, the novelist Alexandre Dumas, used his larger-than-life feats as inspiration for such classics as The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers.
-
-
The story behind the greatest novelist of all time
- By Melinda on 01-13-13
By: Tom Reiss
-
John Quincy Adams
- By: Harlow Giles Unger
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
He fought for Washington, served with Lincoln, witnessed Bunker Hill, and sounded the clarion against slavery on the eve of the Civil War. He negotiated an end to the War of 1812, engineered the annexation of Florida, and won the Supreme Court decision that freed the African captives of La Amistad. He served his nation as minister to six countries, secretary of state, senator, congressman, and president. John Quincy Adams was all of these things and more. In this masterful biography, award-winning author Harlow Giles Unger reveals Adams as a towering figure in the nation’s formative years.
-
-
Informative and well written.
- By Gotta Tellya on 08-20-14
-
The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass
- Written by Himself
- By: Frederick Douglass
- Narrated by: Richard Allen
- Length: 21 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass was Douglass' third autobiography. In it he was able to go into greater detail about his life as a slave and his escape from slavery, as he and his family were no longer in any danger from the reception of his work. In this engrossing narrative he recounts early years of abuse; his dramatic escape to the North and eventual freedom, abolitionist campaigns, and his crusade for full civil rights for former slaves.
-
-
Excellent in so many ways...
- By Your Old Pal Sisco on 06-24-14
-
The American Miracle
- Divine Providence in the Rise of the Republic
- By: Michael Medved
- Narrated by: Michael Medved
- Length: 15 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The history of the United States displays an uncanny pattern: At moments of crisis, when the odds against success seem overwhelming and disaster looks imminent, fate intervenes to provide deliverance and progress. Historians may categorize these incidents as happy accidents, callous crimes, or the products of brilliant leadership, but the most notable leaders of the past 400 years have identified this good fortune as something else - a reflection of divine providence.
-
-
Amazing Book
- By Larry on 12-01-16
By: Michael Medved
-
John Quincy Adams
- Militant Spirit
- By: James Traub
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 25 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
John Quincy Adams was the last of his kind - a Puritan from the age of the Founders who despised party and compromise yet dedicated himself to politics and government. The son of John Adams, he was a brilliant ambassador and secretary of state, a frustrated president at a historic turning point in American politics, and a dedicated congressman who literally died in office - at the age of 80, in the House of Representatives, in the midst of an impassioned political debate.
-
-
Best narrator of all the audio books I've listened
- By grimm79 on 12-12-17
By: James Traub
-
Andrew Jackson
- His Life and Times
- By: H.W. Brands
- Narrated by: John H. Mayer
- Length: 25 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The extraordinary story of Andrew Jackson—the colorful, dynamic, and forceful president who ushered in the Age of Democracy and set a still young America on its path to greatness—told by the bestselling author of The First American.
-
-
Very Thorough
- By Eric on 02-07-06
By: H.W. Brands
-
Harriet Tubman
- The Road to Freedom
- By: Catherine Clinton
- Narrated by: Shayna Small
- Length: 8 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Celebrated for her courageous exploits as a conductor on the Underground Railroad, Harriet Tubman has entered history as one of 19th-century America's most enduring and important figures. But just who was this remarkable woman?
-
-
Returning this book
- By KMS on 07-11-18
-
The Modern Scholar
- The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin
- By: Professor H.W. Brands
- Narrated by: H.W. Brands
- Length: 7 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This course examines the life of Benjamin Franklin and his influence on both American and world history. He remains the model of the American thinker - a man who was interested in nearly everything, and who pursued those interests with an admirable and contagious passion. To study Franklin's life is to learn not only the history of a single man, but to understand some of the most monumental changes in all of human history.
-
-
Love it
- By Holly on 02-20-16
-
The Loyal Son
- The War in Ben Franklin's House
- By: Daniel Mark Epstein
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 16 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ben Franklin is the most lovable of America's founding fathers. His wit, his charm, his inventiveness - even his grandfatherly appearance - are legendary. But this image obscures the scandals that dogged him throughout his life. In The Loyal Son, award-winning historian Daniel Mark Epstein throws the spotlight on one of the more enigmatic aspects of Franklin's biography: his complex and confounding relationship with his illegitimate son, William.
-
-
Gripping Narrative
- By Jean on 08-07-17
-
American Emperor
- Aaron Burr's Challenge to Jefferson's America
- By: David O. Stewart
- Narrated by: Andrew Garman
- Length: 11 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A spellbinding storyteller, historian David O. Stewart traces the canny and charismatic Aaron Burr from the threshold of the presidency in 1800 to his duel with Alexander Hamilton. Stewart recounts Burr’s efforts to carve out an empire, taking listeners across the American West as the renegade vice president schemes with foreign ambassadors, the U.S. general-in-chief, and future presidents.
-
-
Aaron Burr history
- By Gerald on 01-06-13
By: David O. Stewart
-
Samuel Adams
- A Life
- By: Ira Stoll
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ira Stoll's fascinating biography not only restores this figure to his rightful place in history but portrays him as a man of God whose skepticism of a powerful central government, uncompromising support for freedom of the press, concern about the influence of money on elections, voluble love of liberty, and selfless endurance in a war for freedom has enormous relevance to Americans today.
-
-
Not just a biography. Must-read American History!
- By scott bowlby on 01-15-11
By: Ira Stoll
-
Revolution Song
- A Story of American Freedom
- By: Russell Shorto
- Narrated by: Russell Shorto
- Length: 18 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the author of the acclaimed history The Island at the Center of the World, an intimate new epic of the American Revolution that reinforces its meaning for today. With America's founding principles being debated today as never before, Russell Shorto looks back to the era in which those principles were forged. Drawing on new sources, he weaves the lives of six people into a seamless narrative that casts fresh light on the range of experience in colonial America on the cusp of revolution.
-
-
An inspiring book
- By Frank on 08-27-18
By: Russell Shorto
Not accurate
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Just what I needed for my History Project
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.