The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
This book caught my eye a number of times in various bookstores before I ever purchased it. At first I thought it would be a book following the veins of film noir, and the one time I briefly turned it over, I hastily scanned the back until I got to the word Chicago. Unless the book was a racist diatribe on Michael Jordan’s ascendancy as the greatest basketball player ever within the fabled Windy City (which I highly doubted), I did not think Chicago or this book had anything to offer. But I eventually succumbed to the lure of the eerie cover. The cover was too intriguing, so I picked it up and quickly became engrossed in one of the most interesting true stories I’ve ever read.
Unbeknown to me, Chicago hosted the World’s Fair in 1893. To Chicago, this was a victory over other great cities in the United States, including New York, St. Louis and San Francisco. It was a bitter fight to the finish and when it finally came down to the final vote, men and women crowded the streets awaiting the outcome. Competition between the cities became so intense that a prominent New Yorker pledged himself to be vivisected by Jack the Ripper were Chicago to win. Residents of Chicago promptly telegrammed him the good news.
Chicago was a city in turmoil. Far from being united, the city was a mess of civil servants jockeying for power, unions wielding a heavy hammer, and an inordinate amount of criminals patrolling the streets looking for victims. Once the announcement had sunk in, committees needed to be formed, architects reined in, and a plan had to be hatched. Paris had held the last great World’s Fair and unveiled their crowning achievement, the Eiffel Tower. Chicago wanted to not only rival the Parisian fair but outdo it. The task was enormous.
Amidst the frantic preparations, backstabbing, bribes, problems, confusions, and general political debauchery that accompanied this undertaking, a more sinister note was being struck. A serial killer was running loose in the streets of Chicago and preying on the young, single women who were coming in droves to find work in the rapidly expanding urban area.
Larson intertwines two stories that are equally as engrossing as they are different. In one he explores the architects and engineers of the World’s Fair as they work to do the impossible. Their vision of a White City built along the waterfront of the great lake encountered setback after setback. The shocking number of people that had to work together to create one vision in of itself creates a memorable read. But Larson pairs that with the story of Herman Mudgett, who changed his name to Holmes once he moved to Chicago and proceeded to embark upon one of the most shocking series of killings imaginable. Handsome, personable and uncannily intelligent, Holmes immerses himself and his prey in a web of lies that is nearly untraceable. While the world turns its eyes to Chicago and the development of the World’s Fair, Holmes proceeds to stalk those same streets and leaves the charred bones of his victims behind.
Well written, suspenseful and utterly engrossing, Erik Larson brings 1893 Chicago and, perhaps fortunately and unfortunately, its fascinating and frightening characters to life.
Larson, Erik. The Devil in the White City. New York: Vintage Books, 2003.