Public Enemies_ America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI - Bryan Burrough [1]
—News-Times (Forest Grove, Oregon)
“Public Enemies is a fascinating retelling of the FBI’s famous ‘War on Crime,’ weaving the stories of these outlaw gangs with the inner workings of the FBI, the men who were determined to stop them. Thanks to thousands of pages of recently declassified government files, it is exhaustively researched but as entertaining as any page-turning crime novel. . . . Must surely rank among the definitive works on the era and its crimes.”
—Daily Southtown (Chicago)
“A 10-strike for the true crime fan.”
—Booklist
“A rollicking, rat-a-tat ride . . . Iconoclastic and fascinating. A genuine treat for true-crime buffs.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“The definitive account of the 1930s crime wave that brought notorious criminals like John Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde to America’s front pages. . . . [Burrough] successfully translates years of dogged research . . . into a graceful narrative. . . . This book compellingly brings back to life people and times distorted in popular imagination by hagiographic bureau memoirs and Hollywood.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
PENGUIN BOOKS
PUBLIC ENEMIES
Bryan Burrough is a special correspondent at Vanity Fair and the author of numerous bestselling books, including Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco (with John Helyar), Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34, and The Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Texas Oil Fortunes. A former reporter for The Wall Street Journal, he is a three-time winner of the Gerald Loeb Award for Excellence in Financial Journalism. He lives in Summit, New Jersey, with his wife Marla and their two sons.
AMERICA’S
GREATEST
CRIME WAVE
and the
BIRTH of
the FBI ,
1933 - 34
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
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First published in the United States of America by The Penguin Press,
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. 2004
Published in Penguin Books 2005
This edition published in Penguin Books 2009
Copyright © Bryan Burrough, 2004
All rights reserved
Photograph Credits
AP/Wide World Photos: Insert pages 1, 2, 3 (top and bottom right), 6 (bottom),
7 (top), 8 (bottom), 9 (top), 10, 11, 12 (top and bottom), 16 (bottom).
Mansell/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images: Insert page 3 (bottom left).
Bowersock Collection, Kansas City Museum/Union Station, Kansas City, Missouri:
Insert pages 4 (top), 14 (top).
© Bettmann/Corbis: Insert pages 4 (bottom), 6 (top), 9 (bottom), 13, 15.
Texas/Dallas History and Archives Division, Dallas Public Library: Insert page 5 (top and bottom).
New York Daily News: Insert page 7 (bottom right).
Minneapolis Historical society: Insert page 8 (top).
Federal Bureau of Investigation: Insert pages 7 (bottom left), 14 (bottom), 16 (top).
eISBN : 978-1-101-03274-9
eISBN : 978-1-101-03274-9
1. Crime—United States—History—20th century. 2. Criminals—United States—History—20th century.
3. United States. Federal Bureau