From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover

From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover

Author: Athan Theoharis

Publisher: Ivan R. Dee

Published: 1993-02-01

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13: 146171799X

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Documents uncovered from the late FBI director's secret files reveal for the first time the shocking extent of FBI activities in collecting and using derogatory information about prominent Americans and political groups. Historian Athan Theoharis charges that Hoover was an "indirect blackmailer," exploiting the FBI's resources to serve the political interests of the White House and to advance his own political and moral agenda. None of the documents in five separate secret files was intended ever to be disclosed; Mr. Theoharis procured them after intensive research in FBI files using the Freedom of Information Act. The memoranda, letters, telephone transcriptions, and other materials printed here detail a wide range of excesses and include Hoover's providing information about political adversaries to the Johnson and Nixon White Houses; John F. Kennedy's affair with Washington gossip columnist Inga Arvad; FBI monitoring of Supreme Court clerks and staff; the tracking of Adlai Stevenson by the FBI as a homosexual; Hoover's interest in the drinking and sexual habits of congressmen; an anonymous letter attacking Martin Luther King, Jr., composed and sent to Dr. King by the FBI; and much more. Mr. Theoharis describes Hoover's ingenious Do Not File system as well as the FBI's Sex Deviate program and Obscene File.


Book Synopsis From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover by : Athan Theoharis

Download or read book From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover written by Athan Theoharis and published by Ivan R. Dee. This book was released on 1993-02-01 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Documents uncovered from the late FBI director's secret files reveal for the first time the shocking extent of FBI activities in collecting and using derogatory information about prominent Americans and political groups. Historian Athan Theoharis charges that Hoover was an "indirect blackmailer," exploiting the FBI's resources to serve the political interests of the White House and to advance his own political and moral agenda. None of the documents in five separate secret files was intended ever to be disclosed; Mr. Theoharis procured them after intensive research in FBI files using the Freedom of Information Act. The memoranda, letters, telephone transcriptions, and other materials printed here detail a wide range of excesses and include Hoover's providing information about political adversaries to the Johnson and Nixon White Houses; John F. Kennedy's affair with Washington gossip columnist Inga Arvad; FBI monitoring of Supreme Court clerks and staff; the tracking of Adlai Stevenson by the FBI as a homosexual; Hoover's interest in the drinking and sexual habits of congressmen; an anonymous letter attacking Martin Luther King, Jr., composed and sent to Dr. King by the FBI; and much more. Mr. Theoharis describes Hoover's ingenious Do Not File system as well as the FBI's Sex Deviate program and Obscene File.


The Burglary

The Burglary

Author: Betty Medsger

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2014-01-07

Total Pages: 789

ISBN-13: 0307962962

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The never-before-told full story of the history-changing break-in at the FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, by a group of unlikely activists—quiet, ordinary, hardworking Americans—that made clear the shocking truth and confirmed what some had long suspected, that J. Edgar Hoover had created and was operating, in violation of the U.S. Constitution, his own shadow Bureau of Investigation. It begins in 1971 in an America being split apart by the Vietnam War . . . A small group of activists—eight men and women—the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI, inspired by Daniel Berrigan’s rebellious Catholic peace movement, set out to use a more active, but nonviolent, method of civil disobedience to provide hard evidence once and for all that the government was operating outside the laws of the land. The would-be burglars—nonpro’s—were ordinary people leading lives of purpose: a professor of religion and former freedom rider; a day-care director; a physicist; a cab driver; an antiwar activist, a lock picker; a graduate student haunted by members of her family lost to the Holocaust and the passivity of German civilians under Nazi rule. Betty Medsger's extraordinary book re-creates in resonant detail how this group of unknowing thieves, in their meticulous planning of the burglary, scouted out the low-security FBI building in a small town just west of Philadelphia, taking into consideration every possible factor, and how they planned the break-in for the night of the long-anticipated boxing match between Joe Frazier (war supporter and friend to President Nixon) and Muhammad Ali (convicted for refusing to serve in the military), knowing that all would be fixated on their televisions and radios. Medsger writes that the burglars removed all of the FBI files and, with the utmost deliberation, released them to various journalists and members of Congress, soon upending the public’s perception of the inviolate head of the Bureau and paving the way for the first overhaul of the FBI since Hoover became its director in 1924. And we see how the release of the FBI files to the press set the stage for the sensational release three months later, by Daniel Ellsberg, of the top-secret, seven-thousand-page Pentagon study on U.S. decision-making regarding the Vietnam War, which became known as the Pentagon Papers. At the heart of the heist—and the book—the contents of the FBI files revealing J. Edgar Hoover’s “secret counterintelligence program” COINTELPRO, set up in 1956 to investigate and disrupt dissident political groups in the United States in order “to enhance the paranoia endemic in these circles,” to make clear to all Americans that an FBI agent was “behind every mailbox,” a plan that would discredit, destabilize, and demoralize groups, many of them legal civil rights organizations and antiwar groups that Hoover found offensive—as well as black power groups, student activists, antidraft protestors, conscientious objectors. The author, the first reporter to receive the FBI files, began to cover this story during the three years she worked for The Washington Post and continued her investigation long after she'd left the paper, figuring out who the burglars were, and convincing them, after decades of silence, to come forward and tell their extraordinary story. The Burglary is an important and riveting book, a portrait of the potential power of non­violent resistance and the destructive power of excessive government secrecy and spying.


Book Synopsis The Burglary by : Betty Medsger

Download or read book The Burglary written by Betty Medsger and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2014-01-07 with total page 789 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The never-before-told full story of the history-changing break-in at the FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania, by a group of unlikely activists—quiet, ordinary, hardworking Americans—that made clear the shocking truth and confirmed what some had long suspected, that J. Edgar Hoover had created and was operating, in violation of the U.S. Constitution, his own shadow Bureau of Investigation. It begins in 1971 in an America being split apart by the Vietnam War . . . A small group of activists—eight men and women—the Citizens Commission to Investigate the FBI, inspired by Daniel Berrigan’s rebellious Catholic peace movement, set out to use a more active, but nonviolent, method of civil disobedience to provide hard evidence once and for all that the government was operating outside the laws of the land. The would-be burglars—nonpro’s—were ordinary people leading lives of purpose: a professor of religion and former freedom rider; a day-care director; a physicist; a cab driver; an antiwar activist, a lock picker; a graduate student haunted by members of her family lost to the Holocaust and the passivity of German civilians under Nazi rule. Betty Medsger's extraordinary book re-creates in resonant detail how this group of unknowing thieves, in their meticulous planning of the burglary, scouted out the low-security FBI building in a small town just west of Philadelphia, taking into consideration every possible factor, and how they planned the break-in for the night of the long-anticipated boxing match between Joe Frazier (war supporter and friend to President Nixon) and Muhammad Ali (convicted for refusing to serve in the military), knowing that all would be fixated on their televisions and radios. Medsger writes that the burglars removed all of the FBI files and, with the utmost deliberation, released them to various journalists and members of Congress, soon upending the public’s perception of the inviolate head of the Bureau and paving the way for the first overhaul of the FBI since Hoover became its director in 1924. And we see how the release of the FBI files to the press set the stage for the sensational release three months later, by Daniel Ellsberg, of the top-secret, seven-thousand-page Pentagon study on U.S. decision-making regarding the Vietnam War, which became known as the Pentagon Papers. At the heart of the heist—and the book—the contents of the FBI files revealing J. Edgar Hoover’s “secret counterintelligence program” COINTELPRO, set up in 1956 to investigate and disrupt dissident political groups in the United States in order “to enhance the paranoia endemic in these circles,” to make clear to all Americans that an FBI agent was “behind every mailbox,” a plan that would discredit, destabilize, and demoralize groups, many of them legal civil rights organizations and antiwar groups that Hoover found offensive—as well as black power groups, student activists, antidraft protestors, conscientious objectors. The author, the first reporter to receive the FBI files, began to cover this story during the three years she worked for The Washington Post and continued her investigation long after she'd left the paper, figuring out who the burglars were, and convincing them, after decades of silence, to come forward and tell their extraordinary story. The Burglary is an important and riveting book, a portrait of the potential power of non­violent resistance and the destructive power of excessive government secrecy and spying.


The Director

The Director

Author: Paul Letersky

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2022-07-12

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 1982164719

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The first book ever written about FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover by a member of his personal staff—his former assistant, Paul Letersky—offers unprecedented, “clear-eyed and compelling” (Mark Olshaker, coauthor of Mindhunter) insight into an American legend. The 1960s and 1970s were arguably among America’s most turbulent post-Civil War decades. While the Vietnam War continued seemingly without end, protests and riots ravaged most cities, the Kennedys and MLK were assassinated, and corruption found its way to the highest levels of politics, culminating in Watergate. In 1965, at the beginning of the chaos, twenty-two-year-old Paul Letersky was assigned to assist the legendary FBI director J. Edgar Hoover who’d just turned seventy and had, by then, led the Bureau for an incredible forty-one years. Hoover was a rare and complex man who walked confidently among the most powerful. His personal privacy was more tightly guarded than the secret “files” he carefully collected—and that were so feared by politicians and celebrities. Through Letersky’s close working relationship with Hoover, and the trust and confidence he gained from Hoover’s most loyal senior assistant, Helen Gandy, Paul became one of the few able to enter the Director’s secretive—and sometimes perilous—world. Since Hoover’s death half a century ago, millions of words have been written about the man and hundreds of hours of TV dramas and A-list Hollywood films produced. But until now, there has been virtually no account from someone who, for a period of years, spent hours with the Director on a daily basis. Balanced, honest, and keenly observed, this “vivid, foibles-and-all portrait of the fabled scourge of gangsters, Klansmen, and communists” (The Wall Street Journal) sheds new light on one of the most powerful law enforcement figures in American history.


Book Synopsis The Director by : Paul Letersky

Download or read book The Director written by Paul Letersky and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-07-12 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first book ever written about FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover by a member of his personal staff—his former assistant, Paul Letersky—offers unprecedented, “clear-eyed and compelling” (Mark Olshaker, coauthor of Mindhunter) insight into an American legend. The 1960s and 1970s were arguably among America’s most turbulent post-Civil War decades. While the Vietnam War continued seemingly without end, protests and riots ravaged most cities, the Kennedys and MLK were assassinated, and corruption found its way to the highest levels of politics, culminating in Watergate. In 1965, at the beginning of the chaos, twenty-two-year-old Paul Letersky was assigned to assist the legendary FBI director J. Edgar Hoover who’d just turned seventy and had, by then, led the Bureau for an incredible forty-one years. Hoover was a rare and complex man who walked confidently among the most powerful. His personal privacy was more tightly guarded than the secret “files” he carefully collected—and that were so feared by politicians and celebrities. Through Letersky’s close working relationship with Hoover, and the trust and confidence he gained from Hoover’s most loyal senior assistant, Helen Gandy, Paul became one of the few able to enter the Director’s secretive—and sometimes perilous—world. Since Hoover’s death half a century ago, millions of words have been written about the man and hundreds of hours of TV dramas and A-list Hollywood films produced. But until now, there has been virtually no account from someone who, for a period of years, spent hours with the Director on a daily basis. Balanced, honest, and keenly observed, this “vivid, foibles-and-all portrait of the fabled scourge of gangsters, Klansmen, and communists” (The Wall Street Journal) sheds new light on one of the most powerful law enforcement figures in American history.


The Secrets of the FBI

The Secrets of the FBI

Author: Ronald Kessler

Publisher: Forum Books

Published: 2012-08-07

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 0307719707

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New York Times bestselling author reveals the FBI’s most closely guarded secrets, with an insider look at the bureau’s inner workings and intelligence investigations. Based on inside access and hundreds of interviews with federal agents, the book presents an unprecedented, authoritative window on the FBI's unique role in American history. From White House scandals to celebrity deaths, from cult catastrophes to the investigations of terrorists, stalkers, Mafia figures, and spies, the FBI becomes involved in almost every aspect of American life. Kessler shares how the FBI caught spy Robert Hanssen in its midst as well as how the bureau breaks into homes, offices, and embassies to plant bugging devices without getting caught. With revelations about the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound, the recent Russian spy swap, Marilyn Monroe's death, Vince Foster’s suicide, and even J. Edgar Hoover, The Secrets of the FBI presents headline-making disclosures about the most important figures and events of our time.


Book Synopsis The Secrets of the FBI by : Ronald Kessler

Download or read book The Secrets of the FBI written by Ronald Kessler and published by Forum Books. This book was released on 2012-08-07 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Times bestselling author reveals the FBI’s most closely guarded secrets, with an insider look at the bureau’s inner workings and intelligence investigations. Based on inside access and hundreds of interviews with federal agents, the book presents an unprecedented, authoritative window on the FBI's unique role in American history. From White House scandals to celebrity deaths, from cult catastrophes to the investigations of terrorists, stalkers, Mafia figures, and spies, the FBI becomes involved in almost every aspect of American life. Kessler shares how the FBI caught spy Robert Hanssen in its midst as well as how the bureau breaks into homes, offices, and embassies to plant bugging devices without getting caught. With revelations about the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound, the recent Russian spy swap, Marilyn Monroe's death, Vince Foster’s suicide, and even J. Edgar Hoover, The Secrets of the FBI presents headline-making disclosures about the most important figures and events of our time.


J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets

J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets

Author: Curt Gentry

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 2001-02-17

Total Pages: 852

ISBN-13: 0393343502

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"The cumulative effect is overwhelming. Eleanor Roosevelt was right: Hoover’s FBI was an American gestapo." —Newsweek Shocking, grim, frightening, Curt Gentry’s masterful portrait of America’s top policeman is a unique political biography. From more than 300 interviews and over 100,000 pages of previously classified documents, Gentry reveals exactly how a paranoid director created the fraudulent myth of an invincible, incorruptible FBI. For almost fifty years, Hoover held virtually unchecked public power, manipulating every president from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Richard Nixon. He kept extensive blackmail files and used illegal wiretaps and hidden microphones to destroy anyone who opposed him. The book reveals how Hoover helped create McCarthyism, blackmailed the Kennedy brothers, and influenced the Supreme Court; how he retarded the civil rights movement and forged connections with mobsters; as well as insight into the Watergate scandal and what part he played in the investigations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.


Book Synopsis J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets by : Curt Gentry

Download or read book J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets written by Curt Gentry and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2001-02-17 with total page 852 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The cumulative effect is overwhelming. Eleanor Roosevelt was right: Hoover’s FBI was an American gestapo." —Newsweek Shocking, grim, frightening, Curt Gentry’s masterful portrait of America’s top policeman is a unique political biography. From more than 300 interviews and over 100,000 pages of previously classified documents, Gentry reveals exactly how a paranoid director created the fraudulent myth of an invincible, incorruptible FBI. For almost fifty years, Hoover held virtually unchecked public power, manipulating every president from Franklin D. Roosevelt to Richard Nixon. He kept extensive blackmail files and used illegal wiretaps and hidden microphones to destroy anyone who opposed him. The book reveals how Hoover helped create McCarthyism, blackmailed the Kennedy brothers, and influenced the Supreme Court; how he retarded the civil rights movement and forged connections with mobsters; as well as insight into the Watergate scandal and what part he played in the investigations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.


Official and Confidential

Official and Confidential

Author: Anthony Summers

Publisher: Open Road Media

Published: 2012-01-17

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 1453241183

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A New York Times–bestselling author’s revealing, “important” biography of the longtime FBI director (The Philadelphia Inquirer). No one exemplified paranoia and secrecy at the heart of American power better than J. Edgar Hoover, the original director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. For this consummate biography, renowned investigative journalist Anthony Summers interviewed more than eight hundred witnesses and pored through thousands of documents to get at the truth about the man who headed the FBI for fifty years, persecuted political enemies, blackmailed politicians, and lived his own surprising secret life. Ultimately, Summers paints a portrait of a fatally flawed individual who should never have held such power, and for so long.


Book Synopsis Official and Confidential by : Anthony Summers

Download or read book Official and Confidential written by Anthony Summers and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2012-01-17 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times–bestselling author’s revealing, “important” biography of the longtime FBI director (The Philadelphia Inquirer). No one exemplified paranoia and secrecy at the heart of American power better than J. Edgar Hoover, the original director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. For this consummate biography, renowned investigative journalist Anthony Summers interviewed more than eight hundred witnesses and pored through thousands of documents to get at the truth about the man who headed the FBI for fifty years, persecuted political enemies, blackmailed politicians, and lived his own surprising secret life. Ultimately, Summers paints a portrait of a fatally flawed individual who should never have held such power, and for so long.


Federal Bureau of Investigation

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Author: United States. Department of Justice

Publisher:

Published: 1941

Total Pages: 34

ISBN-13:

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Book Synopsis Federal Bureau of Investigation by : United States. Department of Justice

Download or read book Federal Bureau of Investigation written by United States. Department of Justice and published by . This book was released on 1941 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:


J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime

J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime

Author: Athan G. Theoharis

Publisher: Ivan R. Dee Publisher

Published: 1995

Total Pages: 184

ISBN-13:

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Was J. Edgar Hoover a homosexual? And did organized-crime leaders, knowing this, blackmail the FBI director into leaving them alone? These charges won almost instant popular acceptance when they were aired not long ago in a sensational biography of Hoover. But Athan Theoharis, our foremost authority on Hoover and the FBI, here shows that the accusations are spurious, and that the story of Hoover's real approach to sex and organized crime is far more intriguing. The chilling portrait that takes shape in these pages is that of a moralistic bureaucrat who would not hesitate to use sex-related information against his political enemies - but only when it could not be traced to FBI investigations. And the FBI's ineffectiveness in pursuing organized-crime leaders had nothing to do with Hoover's vulnerability; it resulted from the director's lack of accountability, his use of illegal investigative techniques, and his focus on political activities. Punctuating his narrative with case materials drawn from Hoover's secret files - on presidential candidates, senators, congressmen, artists and writers, college presidents, and others - Theoharis unravels the brilliantly devious means that Hoover used to accomplish his political ends. And he shows how they contributed to a culture of lawlessness within the FBI itself. J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime is a useful corrective to our history as well as a fascinating exploration of one of the twentieth century's most sinister minds.


Book Synopsis J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime by : Athan G. Theoharis

Download or read book J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime written by Athan G. Theoharis and published by Ivan R. Dee Publisher. This book was released on 1995 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Was J. Edgar Hoover a homosexual? And did organized-crime leaders, knowing this, blackmail the FBI director into leaving them alone? These charges won almost instant popular acceptance when they were aired not long ago in a sensational biography of Hoover. But Athan Theoharis, our foremost authority on Hoover and the FBI, here shows that the accusations are spurious, and that the story of Hoover's real approach to sex and organized crime is far more intriguing. The chilling portrait that takes shape in these pages is that of a moralistic bureaucrat who would not hesitate to use sex-related information against his political enemies - but only when it could not be traced to FBI investigations. And the FBI's ineffectiveness in pursuing organized-crime leaders had nothing to do with Hoover's vulnerability; it resulted from the director's lack of accountability, his use of illegal investigative techniques, and his focus on political activities. Punctuating his narrative with case materials drawn from Hoover's secret files - on presidential candidates, senators, congressmen, artists and writers, college presidents, and others - Theoharis unravels the brilliantly devious means that Hoover used to accomplish his political ends. And he shows how they contributed to a culture of lawlessness within the FBI itself. J. Edgar Hoover, Sex, and Crime is a useful corrective to our history as well as a fascinating exploration of one of the twentieth century's most sinister minds.


Puppetmaster

Puppetmaster

Author: Richard Hack

Publisher: Phoenix Books Incorporated

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 455

ISBN-13: 9781597775120

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While many of J. Edgar Hoover's achievements and insecurities are well-documented, the author of "Hughes" and "Clash of the Titans" reveals for the first time the most hidden secrets of Hoover's private life and exposes previously undisclosed conduct that threatened to compromise the security of the entire nation. of photos.


Book Synopsis Puppetmaster by : Richard Hack

Download or read book Puppetmaster written by Richard Hack and published by Phoenix Books Incorporated. This book was released on 2007 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While many of J. Edgar Hoover's achievements and insecurities are well-documented, the author of "Hughes" and "Clash of the Titans" reveals for the first time the most hidden secrets of Hoover's private life and exposes previously undisclosed conduct that threatened to compromise the security of the entire nation. of photos.


Chasing Spies

Chasing Spies

Author: Athan G. Theoharis

Publisher: Ivan R. Dee Publisher

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13:

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"Chasing Spies" confirms that professionalism and accountability are part of the FBI's long history. The book suggests that the FBIUs request for added powers of surveillance in a time of national emergency demands careful scrutiny.


Book Synopsis Chasing Spies by : Athan G. Theoharis

Download or read book Chasing Spies written by Athan G. Theoharis and published by Ivan R. Dee Publisher. This book was released on 2002 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Chasing Spies" confirms that professionalism and accountability are part of the FBI's long history. The book suggests that the FBIUs request for added powers of surveillance in a time of national emergency demands careful scrutiny.