Murdering Mckinley

When President McKinley was murdered at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York on September 6, 1901, Americans were bereaved and frightened. Rumor ran rampant: A wild-eyed foreign anarchist with an unpronounceable name had killed the Commander-in-Chief. Eric Rauchway's brilliant Murdering McKinley re-creates Leon Czolgosz's hastily conducted trial and then traverses America as Dr. Vernon Briggs, a Boston alienist, sets out to discover why Czolgosz rose up to kill his President. While uncovering the answer that eluded Briggs and setting the historical record straight about Czolgosz, Rauchway also provides the finest portrait yet of Theodore Roosevelt at the moment of his sudden ascension to the White House.

For Czolgosz was neither a foreigner nor much of an anarchist. Born in Detroit, he was an American-made assassin of such inchoate political beliefs that Emma Goldman dismissed him as a police informant. Indeed, Brigg's search for answers---in the records of the Auburn New York State penitentiary where Czolgosz was electrocuted, in Cleveland where Leon's remaining family lived---only increased the mystery. Roosevelt, however, cared most for the meanings he could fix to this "crime against free government all over the world." For Roosevelt was every inch the calculating politician, his supposed boyish impulsiveness more feint than fact. At one moment encouraging the belief that Czolgosz's was a political crime, at the next that it was a deranged one, Roosevelt used the specter of McKinley's death to usher in Progressive Era America.

So why did Czolgosz do it? Only Rauchway's careful sifting of long-ignored evidence provides an answer: heart-broken, recently radicalized, and thinking he had only months to live, Leon decided to take the most powerful man in America with him.

Eric Rauchway has written for the Financial Times and the Los Angeles Times. He teaches at the University of California, Davis, and is the author of The Refuge of Affections. He lives in Northern California.

After President William McKinley was fatally shot at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York, on September 6, 1901, Americans were bereaved and frightened. Rumor ran rampant: a wild-eyed foreign anarchist with an unpronounceable name had killed the Commander-in-Chief. Eric Rauchway's brilliant Murdering McKinley re-creates Leon Czolgosz's hastily conducted trial and then traverses America as Dr. Vernon Briggs, a Boston alienist, sets out to discover why Czolgosz rose up to kill his President. While uncovering the answer that eluded Briggs and setting the historical record straight about Czolgosz, Rauchway also provides the finest portrait yet of Theodore Roosevelt at the moment of his sudden ascension to the White House.

Czolgosz was neither a foreigner nor much of an anarchist. Born in Detroit, he was an American-made assassin of such inchoate political belief that Emma Goldman dismissed him as a police informant. Indeed, Briggs's search for answersin the records of Auburn State Prison, the New York penitentiary where Czolgosz was electrocuted; in Cleveland, where Leon's remaining family livedonly increased the mystery. Roosevelt, however, was quick to affix meanings to this crime "against free government all over the world." For Roosevelt was every inch the calculating politician, his supposed boyish impulsiveness more feint than fact. At one moment encouraging the belief that Czolgosz's was a political crime, at the next that it was a deranged one, Roosevelt used the specter of McKinley's murder to usher in the Progressive Era.

So why did Czolgosz do it? Only Rauchway's careful sifting of long-ignored evidence provides an answer: heartbroken, recently radicalized, and thinking he had only months to live, Czolgosz decided to take the most powerful man in America with him.

"Rauchway's Murdering McKinley ingeniously weaves together the microhistory of a murder and a boldly innovative account of the origins of the Progressive era. Once a mere footnote in American history, the assassination of McKinley in 1901 emerges as an event as pregnant with historical significance as the assassinations of Lincoln and Kennedy. What is so marvellous about this book is that it is not only first-class history. It is also an enthralling whodunit."Niall Ferguson, author of The Cash Nexus: Money and Power in the Modern World, 1700-2000

"A fascinating trip through late-19th-century America, guided by a historian who not only knows his material but knows how to write . . . A compact masterpiece that explains more about the late 19th century than most historians know, and yet [this book is also] readable . . . An accurate, comprehensive, cutting-edge history of the period [and] a rip-roaring tale . . . Illuminating the society that inspired a cold-blooded murder, Murdering McKinley [is] brilliant."Heather Cox Richardson, Chicago Tribune

"[A] thorough new history of the assassination . . . [Rauchway has] blown the dust from forgotten documents and discovered therein some troubling truths about the economic and political aspects of American justice."Daniel Dyer, The Cleveland Plain Dealer

"[A] broad social history . . . Fascinating . . . Mr. Rauchway [mixes] the tragedy of a presidential assassination and the lonely life and death of his assassin to weave a compelling tale."Gerald J. Russello, The New York Sun

"Rauchway's Murdering McKinley ingeniously weaves together the microhistory of a murder and a boldly innovative account of the origins of the Progressive era. Once a mere footnote in American history, the assassination of McKinley in 1901 emerges as an event as pregnant with historical significance as the assassinations of Lincoln and Kennedy. What is so marvellous about this book is that it is not only first-class history. It is also an enthralling whodunnit."Niall Ferguson, author of The Cash Nexus: Money and Power in the Modern World, 1700-2000

"Rauchway is that rare historian who is also a first-rate storyteller. Murdering McKinley is almost as impressive a literary feat as it is a scholarly one; a

cf0fascinating window on a turbulent time in our untold history and a damn good read to boot."Eric Alterman, author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News

"Rauchway's fascinating book deftly weaves together social, cultural, and political history. This is truly a pathbreaking work, and a wonderful read for all of us who are intrigued by the emergence of the radically new progressive era."Elizabeth Sanders, Cornell University

"With a 'You Are There' style that makes us practically smell people we usually see in static photos and flickering silent film clips, Murdering McKinley places an anonymous oddball assassinating a non-entity of a President at the center of the cataclysmic events roiling America at turn-of-century. Erudition harnessed to an addictive tale told in butter-smooth prosehistory writing at its best."John H. McWhorter, author of Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America

"A gripping detective story, Murdering McKinley packs an astonishing amount of historyabout law, medicine, technology, race, immigration, and political reforminto its tale of why Leon Czolgosz, professed anarchist and suspected lunatic, murdered his president. One could not ask for a m

--Rosalind Rosenberg, Professor of History, Barnard College

"Eric Rauchway is that rare historian who is also a first-rate storyteller. Murdering McKinley is almost as impressive a literary feat as it is a scholarly one; a fascinating window on a turbulent time in our untold history and a damn good read to boot."

--Eric Alterman, author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News

"With a "You Are There" style that makes us practically smell people we usually see in static photos and flickering silent film clips, Murdering McKinley places an anonymous oddball assassinating a nonentity of a President at the center of the cataclysmic events roiling America at turn-of-century. Erudition harnessed to an addictive tale told in butter-smooth prose -- history writing at its best."

--John H. McWhorter, author of Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America

"Eric Rauchway's fascinating book deftly weaves together social, cultural and political history. This is truly a pathbreaking work, and a wonderful read for all of us who are intrigued by the emergence of the radically new progressive era."

--Elizabeth Sanders, Cornell University

"Eric Rauchway's Murdering McKinley ingeniously weaves together the microhistory of a murder and a boldly innovative account of the origins of the Progressive era. Once a mere footnote in American history, the assassination of McKinley in 1901 emerges as an event as pregnant with historical significance as the assassinations of Lincoln and Kennedy. What is so marvellous about this book is that it is not only first-class history. It is also an enthralling whodunnit."

--Niall Ferguson, author of The Cash Nexus: Money and Power in the Modern World, 1700-2000

"A fascinating story of America at a crossroads . . . Murdering McKinley stands out as a well-reasoned and well-told chronicle about the dawn of modern America." ---Bob Hoover, Post-Gazette

"A compact masterpiece that explains more about the late 19th Century than most historians know and yet is readable enough to take on an airplane . . . Accurate, comprehensive and cutting-edge history, it is also a rip-roaring tale...a book that holds high the standard for popular history. Illuminating the society that inspired a coldblooded murder, Rauchway's Murdering McKinley is a brilliant trip through the heart of the 19th Century." -Heather Cox Richardson, Chicago Tribune

"Eric Rauchway is that rare historian who is also a first-rate storyteller. Murdering McKinley is almost as impressive a literary feat as it is a scholarly one; a fascinating window on a turbulent time in our untold history and a damn good read to boot."

Eric Alterman, author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News

"Before Lee Harvey Oswald there was Leon Czolgosz (chol-gosh), the anarchist who shot and killed President William McKinley in 1901. Murdering McKinley tells the story of this assassin and the push he gave to progressivism by making Teddy Roosevelt president of the United States." ---Bruce Ramsey, The Seattle Times

For Czolgosz was neither a foreigner nor much of an anarchist. Born in Detroit, he was an American-made assassin of such inchoate political beliefs that Emma Goldman dismissed him as a police informant. Indeed, Brigg's search for answers---in the records of the Auburn New York State penitentiary where Czolgosz was electrocuted, in Cleveland where Leon's remaining family lived---only increased the mystery. Roosevelt, however, cared most for the meanings he could fix to this "crime against free government all over the world." For Roosevelt was every inch the calculating politician, his supposed boyish impulsiveness more feint than fact. At one moment encouraging the belief that Czolgosz's was a political crime, at the next that it was a deranged one, Roosevelt used the specter of McKinley's death to usher in Progressive Era America.

So why did Czolgosz do it? Only Rauchway's careful sifting of long-ignored evidence provides an answer: heart-broken, recently radicalized, and thinking he had only months to live, Leon decided to take the most powerful man in America with him.