Little Lindy Is Kidnapped

With scrupulous research and thrilling insight, Little Lindy Is Kidnapped reveals that the news coverage surrounding the kidnapping of Little Lindy is just as historically significant as the crime itself. * Los Angeles Review of Books * Lindbergh kidnapping buffs, media scholars, and those interested in media history will be intrigued. * Library Journal * Little Lindy Is Kidnapped takes the famous baby's abduction as a case study in the reach of journalism, radio, and newsreels in the mid-twentieth century. In genial, erudite prose, Doherty explains the mechanics of contemporary news production and dissemination and reveals how this heartbreaking affair reached the American public. In doing so, he highlights the work of beat reporters, pressmen, radio broadcasters, and newsreel cameramen that kept the country mesmerized by the police investigation and the trial that followed. Little Lindy Is Kidnapped is a gripping account of the story behind the story. -- Mikita Brottman, author of <i>An Unexplained Death: The True Story of a Body at the Belvedere</i> Doherty locates, summarizes, and critiques an impressive array of long-forgotten and fascinating media. His writing style is fluid and almost conversational, making Little Lindy Is Kidnapped both rigorous scholarship and an enjoyable read. Doherty's book teaches us that 'ripped from the headlines' media and twenty-four hour broadcast news started a long time before Law and Order and CNN. -- Michael J. Socolow, author of <i>Six Minutes in Berlin: Broadcast Spectacle and Rowing Gold at the Nazi Olympics</i> Little Lindy Is Kidnapped is a spellbinding rollercoaster of a read. It adds significantly to our understanding of how commercial media developed in the United States, exploring the roles of technological change, cultural imperatives, petty rivalries, coincidence, capitalism, and the things we most fear. -- Kathryn Fuller-Seeley, author of <i>Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy</i>