“J. Edgar Hoover is the man of the hour ….. All that he needs is just a little more power”* ..... today and all week on the wireless

 Now I first came across J. Edgar Hoover, sometime in 1964.

J. Edgar Hoover, 1961

I was just 15 years old and embracing all that American folk music could throw at me, starting with Bob Dylan and moving through Peter Seeger, Tom Paxton and Phil Ochs.

It was a journey which would continue on to traditional British folk music, and despite the odd transgressions is a place I always return.

And that is how I came across J. Edgar Hoover, who was at the heart of U.S. crime busting, and political chicanery for a great chunk of the last century. For some he was a hero, and for others a sinister and malevolent force eating away at American democracy.

In Tom Paxton’s Daily News, written in 1964 “J. Edgar Hoover is the man of the hour, All that he needs is just a little more power”*.

So, I tuned in with interest to The People Vs J Edgar Hooveron BBC Radio 4, and was hooked.

“Emily Maitlis on the ascent to power of the man who made presidents wait.

J Edgar Hoover built then ran the FBI for almost five decades. He turned it from a bureaucratic backwater into a premier crime fighting and counterintelligence force. In the process, he arguably became America’s most powerful man. 

J. Edgar Hoover, 1930

He’s been dead 50 years and still his shadow looms over the US. Today’s fears of a ‘deep state’ - of unaccountable government officials working against the public in their own interest – can be traced back to him. In the first of an 8-part series, Emily shows how though his job was to enforce the law...he would not always be bound by it.

Producer: Neal Razzell

Research: Louise Byrne

Editor: Hugh Levinson

Production Coordinator: Janet Staples

Sound: Tom Brignell**

Location; The USA

Pictures, J. Edgar Hoover, 1961, Library of Congress, and in 1930, from the FBI collection, http://www.fbi.gov/multimedia/images/history/hoover.jpg

*Daily News, Tom Paxton, from the LP, Ramblin’ Boy, 1964

**The People Vs J Edgar Hoover, BBC Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00187g5