This feature story is primarily drawn from four excellent books and from the Washington Post.  The Crime Library recommends two of these books as Hoover biographies, Richard Gid Powers' Secrecy and Power: The Life of J. Edgar Hoover (The Free Press, 1987) and Curt Gentry's J. Edgar Hoover; The Man and the Secrets (Penguin Books, 1991).  Another recommended book, J. Edgar Hoover; As They Knew Him by Ovid Demaris (Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1975) gives a view of Hoover through interviews of the people who knew him over his long career.  A fourth book that is recommended for those wishing to do research into Hoover's career is Athan Theoharis's From the Secret Files of J. Edgar Hoover (Ivan R. Dee Publishers, Chicago, 1993) which contains excerpts from some of the most controversial files that Hoover kept on individuals and organizations.

Other books used in the development of this feature story are:

Belknap, Michael R., Cold War Political Justice:  The Smith Act, the Communist Party, and American Civil Liberties.  Greenwood, 1977.

Collins, Frederick L., The FBI in Peace and War. Putnam's, 1943.

Hoover, J. Edgar, Masters of Deceit.  Henry Holt, 1958.

Hoover, J. Edgar, A Study of Communism.  Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1962

Hoover, J. Edgar, J. Edgar Hoover on Communism.  Random House, 1969.

Lamphere, Robert J. and Tom Shachtman, FBI-KGB War; A Special Agent's Story; A Special Agent's Story  Random House, 1986.

Meeropol, Robert and Michael, We Are Your Sons; The Legacy of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg.   Houghton Mifflin, 1975.

Rhodes, Richard Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb Touchstone, 1995.

Theoharis, Athan J. Edgar Hoover, Sex and Crime: An Historical Antidote