| | 1917 Julia Ward Howe by Laura E. Richards and Maude Howe Elliott assisted by Florence Howe Hall (Houghton) |
| | 1918 Benjamin Franklin, Self-Revealed by William Cabell Bruce (Putnam) |
| | 1919 The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams (Houghton) |
| | 1920 The Life of John Marshall, 4 vols. by Albert J. Beveridge (Houghton) |
| | 1921 The Americanization of Edward Bok by Edward Bok (Scribner) |
| | 1922 A Daughter of the Middle Border by Hamlin Garland (Macmillan) |
| | 1923 The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page by Burton J. Hendrick (Houghton) |
| | 1924 From Immigrant to Inventor by Michael Idvorsky Pupin (Scribner) |
| | 1925 Barrett Wendell and His Letters by M. A. Dewolfe Howe (Little) |
| | 1926 The Life of Sir William Osler, 2 vols. by Harvey Cushing (Oxford Univ. Press) |
| | 1927 Whitman by Emory Holloway (Knopf) |
| | 1928 The American Orchestra and Theodore Thomas by Charles Edward Russell (Doubleday) |
| | 1929 The Training of an American: The Earlier Life and Letters of Walter H. Page by Burton J. Hendrick (Houghton) |
| | 1930 The Raven by Marquis James (Bobbs) |
| | 1931 Charles W. Eliot by Henry James (Houghton) |
| | 1932 Theodore Roosevelt by Henry F. Pringle (Harcourt) |
| | 1933 Grover Cleveland by Allan Nevins (Dodd) |
| | 1934 John Hay by Tyler Dennett (Dodd) |
| | 1935 R. E. Lee by Douglas S. Freeman (Scribner) |
| | 1936 The Thought and Character of William James by Ralph Barton Perry (Little) |
| | 1937 Hamilton Fish by Allan Nevins (Dodd) |
| | 1938 Pedlar's Progress by Odell Shepard (Little) |
| | 1938 Andrew Jackson, 2 vols. by Marquis James (Bobbs) |
| | 1939 Benjamin Franklin by Carl Van Doren (Viking) |
| | 1940 Woodrow Wilson, Life and Letters. Vols. VII and VIII by Ray Stannard Baker (Doubleday) |
| | 1941 Jonathan Edward by Ola Elizabeth Winslow (Macmillan) |
| | 1942 Crusader in Crinoline by Forrest Wilson (Lippincott) |
| | 1943 Admiral of the Ocean Sea by Samuel Eliot Morison (Little) |
| | 1944 The American Leonardo: The Life of Samuel F B. Morse by Carleton Mabee (Knopf) |
| | 1945 George Bancroft: Brahmin Rebel by Russell Blaine Nye (Knopf) |
| | 1946 Son of the Wilderness by Linnie Marsh Wolfe (Knopf) |
| | 1947 The Autobiography of William Allen White by William Allen White (Macmillan) |
| | 1948 Forgotten First Citizen: John Bigelow by Margaret Clapp (Little) |
| | 1949 Roosevelt and Hopkins by Robert E. Sherwood (Harper) |
| | 1950 John Quincy Adams and the Foundations of American Foreign Policy by Samuel Flagg Bemis (Knopf) |
| | 1951 John C. Calhoun: American Portrait by Margaret Louise Coit (Houghton) |
| | 1952 Charles Evans Hughes by Merlo J. Pusey (Macmillan) |
| | 1953 Edmund Pendleton 1721-1803 by David J. Mays (Harvard Univ. Press) |
| | 1954 The Spirit of St. Louis by Charles A. Lindbergh (Scribner) |
| | 1955 The Taft Story by William S. White (Harper) |
| | 1956 Benjamin Henry Latrobe by Talbot Faulkner Hamlin (Oxford Univ. Press) |
| | 1957 Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy (Harper) |
| | 1958 George Washington, Volumes I-VI by Douglas Southall Freeman, and Volume VII, written by John Alexander Carroll and Mary Wells Ashworth after Dr. Freeman's Death in 1953 (Scribner) |
| | 1959 Woodrow Wilson, American Prophet by Arthur Walworth (Longmans) |
| | 1960 John Paul Jones by Samuel Eliot Morison (Little) |
| | 1961 Charles Sumner and the Coming of the Civil War by David Donald (Knopf) |
| | 1962 (No Award) |
| | 1963 Henry James by Leon Edel (Lippincott) |
| | 1964 John Keats by Walter Jackson Bate (Harvard Univ. Press) |
| | 1965 Henry Adams, three volumes by Ernest Samuels (Harvard Univ. Press) |
| | 1966 A Thousand Days by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (Houghton) |
| | 1967 Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain by Justin Kaplan (Simon & Schuster) |
| | 1968 Memoirs by George F. Kennan (Little) |
| | 1969 The Man From New York: John Quinn and His Friends by Benjamin Lawrence Reid (Oxford Univ. Press) |
| | 1970 Huey Long by T. Harry Williams (Knopf) |
| | 1971 Robert Frost: The Years of Triumph, 1915 -1938 by Lawrance Thompson (Holt) |
| | 1972 Eleanor and Franklin by Joseph P. Lash (Norton) |
| | 1973 Luce and His Empire by W. A. Swanberg (Scribner) |
| | 1974 O'Neill, Son and Artist by Louis Sheaffer (Little) |
| | 1975 The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro (Knopf) |
| | 1976 Edith Wharton: A Biography by R. W. B. Lewis (Harper) |
| | 1977 A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T E. Lawrence by John E. Mack (Little, Brown) |
| | 1978 Samuel Johnson by Walter Jackson Bate (Harcourt) |
| | 1979 Days of Sorrow and Pain: Leo Baeck and the Berlin Jews by Leonard Baker (Macmillan) |
| | 1980 The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt by Edmund Morris (Coward, McCann) |
| | 1981 Peter the Great: His Life and World by Robert K. Massie (Knopf) |
| | 1982 Grant: A Biography by William McFeely (Norton) |
| | 1983 Growing Up by Russell Baker (Congdon & Weed) |
| | 1984 Booker T. Washington: The Wizard of Tuskegee, 1901-1915 by Louis R. Harlan (Oxford U. Press) |
| | 1985 The Life and Times of Cotton Mather by Kenneth Silverman (Harper & Row) |
| | 1986 Louise Bogan: A Portrait by Elizabeth Frank (Alfred A. Knopf) |
| | 1987 Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference by David J. Garrow (William Morrow) |
| | 1988 Look Homeward: A Life of Thomas Wolfe by David Herbert Donald (Little, Brown and Company) |
| | 1989 Oscar Wilde by the late Richard Ellmann (Alfred A. Knopf) |
| | 1990 Machiavelli in Hell by Sebastian de Grazia (Princeton University Press) |
| | 1991 Jackson Pollock by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith (Clarkson N. Potter) |
| | 1992 Fortunate Son: The Healing of a Vietnam Vet by Lewis B. Puller, Jr. (Grove Weidenfeld) |
| | 1993 Truman by David McCullough (Simon & Schuster) |
| | 1994 W.E.B. Du Bois: Biography of a Race 1868-1919 by David Levering Lewis (Henry Holt) |
| | 1995 Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Life by Joan D. Hedrick (Oxford University Press) |
| | 1996 God: A Biography by Jack Miles (Alfred A. Knopf) |
| | 1997 Angela's Ashes: A Memoir by Frank McCourt (Scribner) |
| | 1998 Personal History by Katharine Graham (Alfred A. Knopf) |
| | 1999 Lindbergh by A. Scott Berg (G.P. Putnam's Sons) |
| | 2000 Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) by Stacy Schiff (Random House) |
| | 2001 W.E.B. Du Bois: The Fight for Equality and the American Century, 1919-1963 by David Levering Lewis (Henry Holt and Company |
| | 2002 John Adams by David McCullough (Simon & Schuster) |
| | 2003 Master of the Senate by Robert A. Caro (Alfred A. Knopf) |
| | 2004 Khrushchev: The Man and His Era by William Taubman (W.W. Norton) |
| | 2005 de Kooning: An American Master by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan (Alfred A. Knopf). |
| | 2006 American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin (Alfred A. Knopf) |