American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century
- ISBN-10
- 0307410269
- ISBN-13
- 9780307410269
- Category
- History
- Pages
- 352
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2008-09-16
- Publisher
- Crown
- Author
- Howard Blum
Description
It was an explosion that reverberated across the country—and into the very heart of early-twentieth-century America. On the morning of October 1, 1910, the walls of the Los Angeles Times Building buckled as a thunderous detonation sent men, machinery, and mortar rocketing into the night air. When at last the wreckage had been sifted and the hospital triage units consulted, twenty-one people were declared dead and dozens more injured. But as it turned out, this was just a prelude to the devastation that was to come. In American Lightning, acclaimed author Howard Blum masterfully evokes the incredible circumstances that led to the original “crime of the century”—and an aftermath more dramatic than even the crime itself. With smoke still wafting up from the charred ruins, the city’s mayor reacts with undisguised excitement when he learns of the arrival, only that morning, of America’s greatest detective, William J. Burns, a former Secret Service man who has been likened to Sherlock Holmes. Surely Burns, already world famous for cracking unsolvable crimes and for his elaborate disguises, can run the perpetrators to ground. Through the work of many months, snowbound stakeouts, and brilliant forensic sleuthing, the great investigator finally identifies the men he believes are responsible for so much destruction. Stunningly, Burns accuses the men—labor activists with an apparent grudge against the Los Angeles Times’s fiercely anti-union owner—of not just one heinous deed but of being part of a terror wave involving hundreds of bombings. While preparation is laid for America’s highest profile trial ever—and the forces of labor and capital wage hand-to-hand combat in the streets—two other notable figures are swept into the drama: industry-shaping filmmaker D.W. Griffith, who perceives in these events the possibility of great art and who will go on to alchemize his observations into the landmark film The Birth of a Nation; and crusading lawyer Clarence Darrow, committed to lend his eloquence to the defendants, though he will be driven to thoughts of suicide before events have fully played out. Simultaneously offering the absorbing reading experience of a can’t-put-it-down thriller and the perception-altering resonance of a story whose reverberations continue even today, American Lightning is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction.
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 2009-10-06
- 362 pages
- Paperback
- Crown
-
- 2008
- 339 pages
- Paperback
- Crown
Similar books
-
American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, The Birth Of Hollywood, And The Crime Of The Century
By Howard BlumAmerican Lightning: Terror, Mystery, The Birth Of Hollywood, And The Crime Of The Century
-
Where the Lightning Strikes: The Lives of American Indian Sacred Places
By Peter NabokovIn this important book, respected scholar and anthropologist Peter Nabokov writes of a wide range of sacred places in Native America.
-
Autumn Lightning: The Education of an American Samurai
By Dave LowryDave Lowry juxtaposes his singular experience as an adept student of kenjutsu (the art of swordsmanship) under a Japanese teacher in St. Louis with a riveting account of the samurai tradition in Japan.
-
Sister Revolutions: French Lightning, American Light
By Susan Dunn... and Richard K. Matthews all generously offered constructive criticism of portions of this manuscript . ... in the Faculty Secretarial Office as well as Phyllis Cutler , Alison O'Grady , and Walter Komorowski at the Williams College ...
-
Trail of Lightning
By Rebecca RoanhorseOne of the Time 100 Best Fantasy Books Of All Time 2019 LOCUS AWARD WINNER, BEST FIRST NOVEL 2019 HUGO AWARD FINALIST, BEST NOVEL Nebula Award Finalist for Best Novel One of Bustle’s Top 20 “landmark sci-fi and fantasy novels” of the ...
-
Swords of Lightning: Green Beret Horse Soldiers and America's Response to 9/11
By Jim DeFelice, Mark Nutsch, Bob PenningtonThe first-person account of how a small band of Green Berets used horses and laser-guided missiles to overthrow the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan after 9/11.
-
Writing History with Lightning: Cinematic Representations of Nineteenth-Century America
By John C. Inscoe, Matthew Christopher HulbertInstead of just separating fact from fiction, the essays contemplate the extent to which movies generate and promulgate collective memories of American history.
-
Stealing God's Thunder: Benjamin Franklin's Lightning Rod and the Invention of America
By Philip DrayPulitzer Prize finalist Philip Dray uses the evolution of Franklin’s scientific curiosity and empirical thinking as a metaphor for America’s struggle to establish its fundamental values.
-
To Catch the Lightning: A Novel of American Dreaming
By Alan CheuseHe looked at me as though I were a stupid block of wood. 'Do you mean,' he said, 'we cannot have two ways of looking at it? ... Muir coughed and pointed his pipe at the dark. “Of, how many? A hundred? Two hundred? Five hundred tribes?
-
Heat Lightning
By John SandfordSummoned by Lucas Davenport to investigate a pair of murders in which the victims are found with lemons in their mouths, Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension investigator Virgil Flowers struggles to find a connection that could prevent ...