Launching Liberty: The Epic Race to Build the Ships That Took America to War- AUTOGRAPHEDThis enduring book tells the heroic, gripping, yet overlooked story of one of World War II's monumental achievementsthe building of America's fleet of Liberty ships. . With the shadow of war looming large over American life in 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew it wasn't a matter of if the United States would be pulled into battle, but when. He foresaw a "new kind of war," one that would demand the nation be prepared in ways like never before.