Book Pick: In The Garden of Beasts, by Erik Larson
Erik Larson got me again.
Back in 2003 he penned 'The Devil In White City' a dual history of the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Jackson Park, and H.H. Holmes, the serial killer who stalked the Fair for victims to be entombed in the Murder Castle he built at 62nd and Wallace in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood, bordering the Fair. Being a south sider familiar with both sites I was entranced by Larson's prose and fascinated how he seamlessly interweaved these two riveting narratives.
I finally got around to reading his 2011 history 'In The Garden of Beasts' which also has a Chicago South Side origin. William E. Dodd was a renowned history professor and Woodrow Wilson biographer at the University of Chicago for a quarter century when he got the call from FDR himself to serve as first Ambassador to Germany under new Chancellor Adolph Hitler in July, 1933. Dodd wasn't first choice. FDR couldn't convince any of his top candidates to take on the near impossible task of dealing with a madman and his equally crazed posse of murderous gangsters. FDR got so frustrated he jokingly considered sending one his Jewish associates to torment the Fuhrer as Ambassador. Dodd drew the short straw and what a magnificent selection he was. He was a diplomatic misfit in every sense except the only one which counted: a brilliant, learned, humanitarian who shunned all diplomatic pretense to look Hitler and Goring and Goebbels in the eye and tell them they were wrong and self destructive in their totalitarianism and anti-Semitism. The State Department establishment hated Dodd because he wasn't a rich, Eastern Establishment WASP who would suck up to Hitler to persuade him to repay Great War debts owed American financiers. Dodd's focus on democratic principles and ethnic inclusion drove them to undermine his tenure throughout his four and a half years at the post. He soldiered on largely because FDR supported and encouraged his liberal bent. One Dodd speech, presented just three months into his tenure on October 12, 1933, put the Nazi's on notice he knew their unfolding game: "In times of great stress, men are apt to abandon too much of their past social devices and venture too far upon uncharted courses. And the consequence has always been...disaster. One may safely say that it would be no sin if statesmen learned enough of history to realize no system which implies control over society by privilege seekers has ever ended in any other way than collapse...another war and chaos." The Nazis didn't forget Dodd's history lesson and had this to say as Dodd lay near death in July, 1939: "The 70 year old man, one of the strangest diplomats who ever existed, is now back among those whom he served for 20 years - the activist war-mongering Jews. After returning to the United States, Dodd expressed himself in the most irresponsible and shameless fashion over the German Reich, whose officials had for four years, with almost super human generosity, overlooked his and his family's scandalous affairs, faux pas and political indiscretions."
The title 'In The Garden of Beasts' ostensibly refers to Tiergarden, Berlin's Central Park, which literally means 'animal garden' reflecting the preserve where old German royalty hunted wild game. Ironically, in Dodd's Germany, cruelty to animals could land a citizen in jail. The symbolic meaning refers to Nazis, who hunted their fellow man due to their ethnicity or some imagined offense against the state. William E. Dodd jousted with the beasts at the very beginning of their descent into barbarism. His neglected story made me proud of both his valiant service and his connection to my alma mater, which instilled in me a life long quest for political and social justice.
Back in 2003 he penned 'The Devil In White City' a dual history of the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Jackson Park, and H.H. Holmes, the serial killer who stalked the Fair for victims to be entombed in the Murder Castle he built at 62nd and Wallace in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood, bordering the Fair. Being a south sider familiar with both sites I was entranced by Larson's prose and fascinated how he seamlessly interweaved these two riveting narratives.
I finally got around to reading his 2011 history 'In The Garden of Beasts' which also has a Chicago South Side origin. William E. Dodd was a renowned history professor and Woodrow Wilson biographer at the University of Chicago for a quarter century when he got the call from FDR himself to serve as first Ambassador to Germany under new Chancellor Adolph Hitler in July, 1933. Dodd wasn't first choice. FDR couldn't convince any of his top candidates to take on the near impossible task of dealing with a madman and his equally crazed posse of murderous gangsters. FDR got so frustrated he jokingly considered sending one his Jewish associates to torment the Fuhrer as Ambassador. Dodd drew the short straw and what a magnificent selection he was. He was a diplomatic misfit in every sense except the only one which counted: a brilliant, learned, humanitarian who shunned all diplomatic pretense to look Hitler and Goring and Goebbels in the eye and tell them they were wrong and self destructive in their totalitarianism and anti-Semitism. The State Department establishment hated Dodd because he wasn't a rich, Eastern Establishment WASP who would suck up to Hitler to persuade him to repay Great War debts owed American financiers. Dodd's focus on democratic principles and ethnic inclusion drove them to undermine his tenure throughout his four and a half years at the post. He soldiered on largely because FDR supported and encouraged his liberal bent. One Dodd speech, presented just three months into his tenure on October 12, 1933, put the Nazi's on notice he knew their unfolding game: "In times of great stress, men are apt to abandon too much of their past social devices and venture too far upon uncharted courses. And the consequence has always been...disaster. One may safely say that it would be no sin if statesmen learned enough of history to realize no system which implies control over society by privilege seekers has ever ended in any other way than collapse...another war and chaos." The Nazis didn't forget Dodd's history lesson and had this to say as Dodd lay near death in July, 1939: "The 70 year old man, one of the strangest diplomats who ever existed, is now back among those whom he served for 20 years - the activist war-mongering Jews. After returning to the United States, Dodd expressed himself in the most irresponsible and shameless fashion over the German Reich, whose officials had for four years, with almost super human generosity, overlooked his and his family's scandalous affairs, faux pas and political indiscretions."
The title 'In The Garden of Beasts' ostensibly refers to Tiergarden, Berlin's Central Park, which literally means 'animal garden' reflecting the preserve where old German royalty hunted wild game. Ironically, in Dodd's Germany, cruelty to animals could land a citizen in jail. The symbolic meaning refers to Nazis, who hunted their fellow man due to their ethnicity or some imagined offense against the state. William E. Dodd jousted with the beasts at the very beginning of their descent into barbarism. His neglected story made me proud of both his valiant service and his connection to my alma mater, which instilled in me a life long quest for political and social justice.
posted by Walt Zlotow at 4:09 AM
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