Category: History: U.S.: 19th Century

Copyright/published Year: 2004 by Vintage Books

ISBN: 0375725601

Binding: Trade pap

Description: Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, ì embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized ì America's rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was ì Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair's brilliant director of works and ì the builder of many of the country's most important structures, ì including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in ì Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor ì who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his "World's ì Fair Hotel" just west of the fairgrounds-a torture palace ì complete with dissection table, gas chamber, and 3,000-degree ì crematorium.

Burnham overcame tremendous obstacles and tragedies as he ì organized the talents of Frederick Law Olmsted, Charles McKim, ì Louis Sullivan, and others to transform swampy Jackson Park into ì the White City, while Holmes used the attraction of the great ì fair and his own satanic charms to lure scores of young women to ì their deaths. What makes the story all the more chilling is that ì Holmes really lived, walking the grounds of that dream city by ì the lake.

The Devil in the White City draws the reader into the ì enchantment of the Guilded Age, made all the more appealing by a ì supporting cast of real-life characters, including Buffalo Bill, ì Theodore Dreiser, Susan B. Anthony, Thomas Edison, Archduke ì Francis Ferdinand, and others. Erik Larson's gifts as a ì storyteller are magnificently displayed in this rich narrative of ì the master builder, the killer, and the great fair that obsessed ì them both.

Condition Information

This is a used book and is in Good condition.

Additional condition description

Typical used condition. Sound binding. Clean, unmarked copy