One Summer by Bill Bryson

Book review. A good summer read, and not just because that's in the title. Bryson takes the summer of 1927 and puts forth all the happenings of that summer as a lens to the past and a preview to the future. Babe Ruth and the Yankees, Charles Lindbergh and the flight of the Atlantic, Sacco and Vanzetti and the anarchist movement, Al Capone and prohibition, Coolidge and Harding and American politics, and many social movements and the aspects of them are covered. For each of the subjects, which for the most part focus on an individual like Ruth or Lindbergh, they are used as a vehicle to both provide a history of their area, baseball and aviation, and as a precursor of what is to come. The author outlines how the birth of the modern celebrity kicked into high gear in 1927 with the explosion of interest, worldwide, in Charles Lindbergh. He outlines how before this their were sensational murder trials with people who were previously unknown, but they tended to be short lived sensationalized stories designed to sell newspapers. With Lindbergh, his celebrity was overnight and lasted the rest of his life. The way that celebrity came about hit a zenith in the year of 1927. Newspapers were of course widely established and the major way that people received information, but radio had become ubiquitous right at this time, and television was "invented" in 1927, according to the author. Of course, looking at all the events of 1927 knowing what is coming with the stock market crash in 1929 and the events that will lead eventually to WWII we have the luxury of hindsight. Entertaining and thought provoking, very worth the time to read this one.