The Crime of the Century

Among the many spectacular crimes of the twentieth century—the assassination of President Kennedy, the serial murders of John Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy, the trial of O. J. Simpson—none was more mysterious and riveting than the 1932 kidnapping and murder of the infant son of Charles A. Lindbergh. Its cast of characters would delight any author of detective novels: the father, an American aviator hero, the first to fly solo over the Atlantic; his lovely wife, the daughter of an ambassador and mother of the first-born son Charlie; an illegal immigrant from Germany charged with the kidnapping; a Bronx schoolteacher designated to carry on ransom negotiations; various underworld characters enlisted to try to find the kidnapped child; a gruff Irish detective dissatisfied with the investigation of the case; a young and aggressive FBI director interested in self-publicity; a prosecutor who may not have believed that one man alone could have done the kidnapping; and a variety of household staff who had peculiar stories to tell. In the end, as a captivated nation followed the details, a sensational trial and conviction settled the affair—but to almost no one’s satisfaction. Lloyd Gardner tells the story of the Lindbergh kidnapping and why it remains the Crime of the Century, as much a mystery as it ever was.