A Young People's History of the United States brings to U.S. history the viewpoints of workers, slaves, immigrants, women, Native Americans, and others whose stories, and their impact, are rarely included in books for young people.

Volume 1 begins with a look at Christopher Columbus’s arrival through the eyes of the Arawak Indians, then leads the reader through the earliest struggles for workers’ rights, women’s rights, and civil rights during the 18th and 19th centuries. Zinn presents a radical new way of understanding America’s history. In so doing, he reminds readers that America’s true greatness is shaped by our dissident voices, not our military generals.