Many a biography has made its subject carry the weight of the “American Century,” Time publisher Henry Luce’s phrase for the nation’s ascendancy in the middle decades of the 20th century. Among recent examples, William McKinley was said to have been its architect and Richard Holbrooke to have ended it, while George C. Marshall and Dorothy Day and countless others embodied it. But none can truly be said to have lived it, reflected it, and shaped it as thoroughly as did J. Edgar Hoover.
Hoover’s longevity as America’s policeman-inchief is the most remarkable fact of his life. In the aftermath of World War I, he was present at the creation of what later would be known—and thanks to his imprint, celebrated and feared—as the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He was the unquestioned
