Quotes from Erik Larson

American political discourse had framed the Jewish problem as an immigration problem. Germany's persecution of Jews raised the specter of a vast influx of Jewish refugees at a time when America was reeling from the Depression.

The speech set a pattern that he would follow throughout the war, offering a sober appraisal of facts, tempered with reason for optimism. "It would be foolish to disguise the gravity of the hour," he said. "It would be still more foolish to lose heart and courage.

But one thing was quite clear.... [Sol Bloom, chief of the Midway] wrote. [B]eing broke didn't disturb me in the least. I had started with nothing, and if I now found myself with nothing, I was at least even. Actually, I was much better than even: I had had a wonderful time.

As long as there was tea, there was England.

I find it all infinitely sad, but at the same time so entrancing, that I often feel as if it would be the part of wisdom to fly at once to the woods or mountains where one can always find peace. - Dora Root in a letter to Daniel Burnham

After experiencing life in Nazi Germany, Thomas Wolfe wrote, "Here was an entire nation Ã¢â'¬Â¦ infested with the contagion of an ever-present fear. It was a kind of creeping paralysis which twisted and blighted all human relations.

No one cared what St. Louis thought, although the city got a wink for pluck.

Mowrer and his family made it safely to Tokyo. His wife, Lillian, recalled her great sorrow at having to leave Berlin. "Nowhere have I had such lovely friends as in Germany," she wrote. "Looking back on it all is like seeing someone you love go mad—and do horrible things.

In traveling about the city that day, Dodd was struck anew by the "extraordinary" German penchant for Christmas display. He saw Christmas trees everywhere, in every public square and every window. "One might think," he wrote, "the Germans believed in Jesus or practiced his teachings!

It was the loss of the books that she grieved above all. . . One keeps remembering some odd little book that one had; one can't list them all, and it is best to forget them now that they are ashes.

If I told you, you wouldn't know what I was talking about.

An artist, he paints with lakes and wooded slopes, with lawns and banks and forest-covered hills. — Daniel Burnham talking about Frederick Law Olmstead

It would be foolish to disguise the gravity of the hour," he said. "It would be still more foolish to lose heart and courage.

B]eing broke didn't disturb me in the least. I had started with nothing, and if I now found myself with nothing, I was at least even. Actually, I was much better than even: I had had a wonderful time.

This prolonging of a man's life doesn't interest me when he's done his work and has done it pretty well.

This is the story of Isaac and his time in America, the last turning of the centuries, when the hubris of men led them to believe they could disregard even nature itself.

the most likely explanation is that there was indeed a plot, however imperfect, to endanger the Lusitania in order to involve the United States in the war.

That's one trouble about the raids. . . People do nothing but make tea and expect you to drink it.

Only Poe could have dreamed the rest.

Once again no one in the U.S. government had made any public statement either supporting the trial or criticizing the Hitler regime. The question remained: what was everyone afraid of?

Never was there such a contrast of natural splendor and human vileness.

I tell you we must have bodies. You cannot make doctors without them, and the public must understand it. If we can't get them any other way we will arm the students with Winchester rifles and send them to protect the body-snatchers on their raids.

No one ever remembered a nice day. But no one ever forget the feel of paralyzed fish, the thud of walnut-sized hail against a horse's flank, or the way a superheated wind could turn your eyes to burlap.

As the light began to fade, the architects lit the library's gas jets, which hissed like mildly perturbed cats.