Scott Farris
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Scott Farris

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I am drawn to write books that are not only cracking good stories but that also help explain why the world is as it is. I also seek out topics that are meaningful for me personally. I am now working on a book about Adlai Stevenson and the 1952 presidential election (hopefully with a 2024 publication date), which I will argue set the template for politics for the next 70 years. What we now term the "culture wars" had its origin in the self-consciously intellectual campaign that Stevenson ran and the (successful) self-consciously anti-intellectual campaign run by Dwight Eisenhower and his running mate, Richard Nixon. This was all done within an American society radically changed by the experience of the Second World War. The Stevenson book will put me back to writing primarily about presidential politics, though my most recently published book, "Freedom on Trial: The First Post-Civil War Battle Over Civil Rights and Voter Suppression," was a more personal project. My work began while doing some genealogical history on my own family and discovered, to my chagrin, that my great-grandfather had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan following the Civil War who was indicted for his role in the brutal assault of two Black men for the purpose of preventing the men from voting. This led to research on a little-known moment in American history that were called at the time The Great South Carolina Ku Klux Klan Trials.Courtroom dramas are often riveting and these trials boasted a remarkable cast of characters, Black and White, including some forgotten civil rights pioneers, and explain a great deal about the history of race relations in the United States, including about where we went wrong and how things may yet become right. I began my career as a journalist, including as a bureau chief for United Press international when UPI was one of the world's great news organizations, so that I eventually would turn to writing books is not a great surprise, but my first book, "Almost President: The Men Who Lost the Race But Changed the Nation," was also rooted in my personal and professional experience. While at UPI, I interviewed almost every major political figure of the 1980s and 1990s, but when UPI went into bankruptcy and I lost my job I wound up in politics, eventually running for Congress in Wyoming for the seat now held by Liz Cheney and previously held by her father. As the Democratic nominee, I lost but always wondered if my candidacy had had any meaningful impact. This rumination led to "Almost President," and a consideration of how the men who ran for president ("men" because it pre-dated Hillary Clinton's campaign) and lost still made a significant impact on history. I also focused on how important it is to democracy that losing candidates accept their defeat gracefully and how being a "sore loser" could cause American democracy to unravel. Given the events of January 6, 2021, I believe my writing was prescient and more relevant today than it was a decade ago. Having explored the place of losers in American politics, and because "Almost President" received so much attention and sold so well (thank you, readers!) I decided to look at the flip side and explore the lives of two of the greatest winners in American politics, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. "Kennedy and Reagan: Why Their Legacies Endure," is what I call a comparative biography that discovers the surprising similarities between two men who remain among our most popular presidents. It made a New York Times bestseller list, though I still think it is an overlooked book with an important message: In a time of intense political polarization, it is a reminder that there is a vital center in American politics and that the right and the left have more in common in terms of fundamental values than we will usually concede. My research on Kennedy also uncovered the subject for what is the most "fun" book I have written: "Inga: Kennedy's Great Love, Hitler's Perfect Beauty, and J. Edgar Hoover's Prime Suspect." "Inga" is a rollicking biography of the amazing Inga Arvad, who played a formative role in John F. Kennedy's life. An extraordinarily attractive woman by every definition, Inga, who had been Miss Denmark of 1931, was a dancer, an actress, an explorer who lived among a tribe of headhunters, a columnist in Washington, D.C., and a popular Hollywood gossip columnist. She was also a suspected Nazi spy because she had been a foreign correspondent in Germany, secured many interviews with leading Nazis and became a favorite of Adolf Hitler.My personal connection to Inga is that her third husband, the movie cowboy Tim McCoy, was once a real cowboy in my hometown of Lander, Wyoming. While a remarkable story of a remarkable woman, there are deeper themes at work, such as how can an innocent person "prove" they are innocent, why does the perfect relationship often not work out and how can what seems like gossip have a significant impact on history. Kennedy, for example, was nearly cashiered out of the Navy because of his romance with Inga -- and it was a genuine romance, not a fling -- which set in motion the chain of event that made him a war hero and a viable political candidate. Academy Award-winning producer Kim Magnusson purchased the film rights. Read the book and tell me: which actor ought to play Inga in a film or streaming series?
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Inga

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  • Inga cover art

    • Inga

    • Kennedy's Great Love, Hitler's Perfect Beauty, and J. Edgar Hoover's Prime Suspect
    • By: Scott Farris
    • Narrated by: Scott Farris
    • Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
    • Release date: 30-10-2016
    • Language: English
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