Singapore’s founding fathers are the stuff of legend. Much has been written about the indomitable Lee Kuan Yew who transformed a nation from mudflats into metropolis, as well as his fellow Old Guard who left their stamp on almost every aspect of Singapore’s DNA, from the economy to diplomacy to housing. But that is not the whole story.

See, the 10 larger-than-life personalities who signed the Separation Agreement in 1965 were the nation’s founding fathers. But they were also men — men who fell in love, who kept secrets, who wrote ghost stories, who played sports (not just golf). They were businessmen, bitter men, and some of the best men Singapore has ever seen. Their names are:

- Lee Kuan Yew
- Yong Nyuk Lin
- E. W. Barker
- Goh Keng Swee
- Jek Yeun Thong
- Lim Kim San
- Ong Pang Boon
- Othman Wok
- S. Rajaratnam
- Toh Chin Chye

From the authors of The Last Fools: The Eight Immortals of Lee Kuan Yew comes The First Fools: B-Sides of Lee Kuan Yew’s A-Team. Each chapter in this anthology offers readers a different slice of the same story, one that, in the case of many of the Old Guard, has largely been forgotten. Instead of Lee Kuan Yew, the leader, comes Lee Kuan Yew, the lover; instead of S. Rajaratnam, the diplomat, comes S. Rajaratnam, the fiction writer. Many of these stories are relatively unknown to the public, and yet they are gems in history that capture a softer, more intimate side of Singapore’s first-generation leaders. It is a timely read as the nation they helped build commemorates its 60th year of independence.