Check nearby libraries
Buy this book
![Loading indicator](/images/ajax-loader-bar.gif)
Big Trouble begins on a snowy evening at Christmastime 1905 in the little town of Caldwell, Idaho, to which the state's former governor, Frank Steunenberg, had returned to head his family bank while contemplating his political future.
As he walked home that night, he sensed all about him the bold, exuberant, unashamedly acquisitive spirit of Caldwell's young entrepreneurs, who - as his brother had written - were "here for the money." Like so many in the West at that time, these brothers believed their prospects for enriching themselves were limitless, that the future opened wide before them.
And yet the governor suffered premonitions that he and his neighbors weren't fully in control of their own destiny, that something malign threatened their well-being. Now, as he followed the plume of his frozen breath, his boots crunching eight inches of freshly fallen snow, he turned through his garden gate and a bomb attached to the gatepost blew him "into eternity.".
Authorities threw a dragnet around the town, and soon the state placed the investigation in the hands of America's most renowned detective, James McParland of the Pinkerton Agency. Now sixty-two, McParland hankered after one more coup to top off his glittering career.
Before long, he extracted an astonishing confession from an itinerant "sheep dealer" named Harry Orchard, who admitted setting the bomb that killed the governor and said the murder had been commissioned by "Big Bill" Haywood of the Western Federation of Miners in retaliation for the harsh tactics that Steunenberg had used to put down a miners' "insurrection" in northern Idaho six years before.
In the summer of 1907 Haywood went on trial for his life in Boise, defended by Clarence Darrow, the country's most famous defense attorney, and prosecuted by William Borah, a golden-throated orator just elected Idaho's junior senator. For three months they did combat with lofty rhetoric and sly espionage.
Big Trouble is both a narrative of a sensational murder case and a social tapestry. It is richly peopled with vivid characters: Operative 21, Pinkerton's daring undercover agent who penetrated to the heart of Darrow's defense team; E. H.
Harriman, the icy railroad magnate; William Howard Taft, the gargantuan secretary of war; Jacob Fillius, the Denver mining lawyer who secretly bankrolled the prosecution on behalf of Colorado's mine owners; Eugene Debs, the fiery Socialist leader; the fearsome gunslingers Charlie Siringo and Bob Meldrum.
At times the book seems like a nonfiction Ragtime, for some most unlikely figures found their way to the trial or its environs that summer: among them, Ethel Barrymore, the most glamorous young actress of her day; Walter Johnson, perhaps the greatest pitcher who ever threw a baseball; Hugo Munsterberg, director of the Harvard Psychology Laboratory; and Gifford Pinchot, the lanky chief forester of the United States and confidant of President Roosevelt.
Check nearby libraries
Buy this book
![Loading indicator](/images/ajax-loader-bar.gif)
Previews available in: English
Subjects
Assassination, History, Politics and government, Social conditions, Social conflict, Moorden, Strafprocessen, New York Times reviewed, Idaho, history, United states, social conditions, 1865-1945, Idaho, politics and government, United states, history, 20th century, United states, politics and government, 1901-1913Places
Caldwell (Idaho), Idaho, United StatesTimes
1865-1918, 1901-1909, 20th centuryShowing 5 featured editions. View all 5 editions?
Edition | Availability |
---|---|
1
Big Trouble: A Murder in a Small Western Town Sets off a Strugg
2012, Simon & Schuster
in English
1439128103 9781439128107
|
zzzz
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
2
Big Trouble: A Murder in a Small Western Town Sets Off a Struggle for the Soul of America
July 6, 1998, Simon & Schuster
Paperback
in English
0684846179 9780684846170
|
eeee
|
3
Big Trouble
September 1, 1997, Audioworks
Audio Cassette
in English
- Abridged edition
0671576267 9780671576264
|
aaaa
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
4
Big trouble: a murder in a small western town sets off a struggle for the soul of America
1997, Simon & Schuster
in English
0684808587 9780684808581
|
eeee
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
5
Big Trouble a Murder In a Small Western
Publish date unknown, Simon Schuster
Paperback
096508356X 9780965083560
|
zzzz
Libraries near you:
WorldCat
|
Book Details
Edition Notes
AUDIO CASSETTE
The Physical Object
ID Numbers
Links outside Open Library
Community Reviews (0)
Feedback?History
- Created April 30, 2008
- 9 revisions
Wikipedia citation
×CloseCopy and paste this code into your Wikipedia page. Need help?
November 25, 2022 | Edited by dcapillae | Merge works (MRID: 29052) |
May 30, 2012 | Edited by AMillarBot | remove edition notes from title (AUDIO CASSETTE) |
April 22, 2011 | Edited by OCLC Bot | Added OCLC numbers. |
August 12, 2010 | Edited by IdentifierBot | added LibraryThing ID |
April 30, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | Imported from amazon.com record |