Freedom's Finest Hour

The cynical among you may wonder what Freedom's Finest Hour is. Perhaps the Iran-Contra affair? The Oval Office naps? Star Wars? The sly, off-the-cuff wit, epitomized by his crack about bombing the USSR? James Watts? Ed Meese? Decades after its release and the ensuing Reagan Revolution, there are all sorts of cheap jokes to be made about Freedom's Finest Hour, an album released on Decca Records in 1967. An adaptation from the "Academy Award Winning Documentary Film" of the same name, Freedom's Finest Hour finds Reagan recounting the American Revolution in the voice of an ordinary Boston colonist. To some listeners, this will be inspiring, to others it will be plain cornball, but there's no denying that the album is an interesting artifact from the beginnings of Reagan's political career. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide