Brookhiser: "Forrest McDonald, R.I.P."

This is another good one. A taste:

Forrest could be quite perky on smaller matters, too. He was one of the first serious historians to believe that Jefferson probably fathered children by Sally Hemings — although as soon as this became the orthodox view, Forrest became skeptical. As he once said to me, Jefferson was a sexagenarian with migraines when he was supposed to have sired his slave children, and what sense did that make? (Another historian said to me, of Forrest, that he wanted to be as un-PC as possible.) Another Forrest-ism: “The trouble with Franklin is he lies all the time.” That is harsh, but as one studies Franklin, one sees what Forrest meant.