Grant

The History Channel, mostly known for crappy videos about aliens from outer space, is currently running "Grant," a three-part series on Ulysses S. Grant, America's most innovative general. 

A poor dirt-farmer, Grant was given an enslaved black man by his father-in-law. Grant drew criticism because he worked in the field alongside the black man. And after one year Grant went into town and legally freed him. 

Grant started the Civil War as Mr. Nobody. At the end, with Lincoln murdered, Grant may have been the most famous man on the planet. Eventually he was forgotten, smothered by praise for the slave-whipping Robert E. Lee, a leader Grant beat like an iron monger processing metals. To Grant, Lee was just another opponent and not the best one, either. 

I've seen the first two hours of the History Channel, and it seems guided by interesting recent research.

Grant excelled as an unflappable general in the field, directing events; and he excelled as a strategist, working with Lincoln and Sherman on a plan to win that was fool proof. 

Grant excelled as a horseman, as an artist and as a writer. Where Lee issued written orders that could be interpreted several ways (and were), Grant's orders were simple, clear and direct. That mattered. His autobiography is taught in literature classes--he wrote it while dying of cancer so his wife would have an income. (I'll stop--I could go on.)