Publishers Weekly
03/15/2021
Journalist Wilkie (The Fall of the House of Zeus) delivers a tension-filled account of an FBI informant’s efforts to bring a notoriously violent chapter of the Ku Klux Klan to justice in the 1960s. Wilkie traces Tom Landrum’s decision to infiltrate the White Knights in his hometown of Laurel, Miss., back to his disgust over seeing how enthusiastically a local crowd cheered for the execution of a Black prisoner in 1951. Fourteen years later, Landrum, after serving in the U.S. Air Force, playing college football, and returning home to become a teacher and youth court counselor, was recruited by an FBI agent to go undercover with the White Knights. In 1966, Vernon Dahmer, a grocery store owner and founder of a local NAACP chapter who was leading a campaign to register Black voters, was killed when the White Knights firebombed his house. Landrum’s meticulous note-taking and insights into the inner workings of the White Knights helped bring some of those responsible for Dahmer’s murder to justice, though imperial wizard Sam Bowers wasn’t convicted for ordering the killing until 1998. Drawing on Landrum’s contemporaneous journals, FBI reports, and interviews with Landrum and his wife, Wilkie vividly conveys the turmoil of the era and the high stakes of the mission. This real-life thriller is a worthy tribute to the courage of those who put everything on the line for civil rights. (June)
Kevin Boyle
"Vivid.... [N]ow the virulent white supremacy that once coursed through Laurel has reached into the center of our embattled democracy. Maybe that evil will also be brought down and peace built on its ruins. Or maybe our current crisis should force us to see that the evil of the Knights had never really been broken at all."
Richard Ford
"When Evil Lived in Laurel is an extremely useful book, in addition to being impossible to put down. It’s about evil; terrible men doing terrible things to their fellow humans. But it’s also about convention and cowardice and hypocrisy and ignorance and public lies—and also about quiet heroism—all matters of vital concern to us in America at this very moment."
Richard Howorth
"Though the frightful history of the struggle for civil rights in Mississippi is a familiar one, Curtis Wilkie’s account of the 1966 murder of Vernon Dahmer is astonishing. Drawing on voluminous, remarkable FBI documents, court records, congressional hearings, and interviews, Wilkie paints a compelling picture of the dogged pursuit of justice by law enforcement officials, heretofore untold acts of courage by ordinary citizens, and the involvement of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan—alternately pernicious and inept. When Evil Lived in Laurel may well be the finest book on the Civil Rights era."
starred review Booklist
"Represents a landmark in the history of the Klan, how they operated in the Deep South, and the complex, often frustrating role of law enforcement. Most of all, When Evil Lived in Laurel demonstrates the continued impact of racial violence on the current political climate in America. Readers will find a wealth of historical detail in this engaging narrative."
NPR - Debbie Elliott
"Reads like a Greg Iles novel.... Rich with details."
Patrick Phillips
"When Evil Lived in Laurel is set during the civil rights movement of the 1960s, but its concerns could not be more central to our current moment: voting rights, white supremacist terror, and the ground-level mechanisms of white radicalization. With meticulous research and all the tools of a novelist, Curtis Wilkie chronicles the Klan-ordered murder of activist Vernon Dahmer, and Tom Landrum’s infiltration of the White Knights. Read this book if you want to understand how racist words and ideas turn into violent, murderous action."
Greg Iles
"I’m a longtime admirer of Curtis Wilkie’s deep and insightful work, and his chilling journey through the KKK’s murder of Vernon Dahmer will stay with you long after you close this book. This kind of violence is where tacit encouragement of extremists leads, and Wilkie shows you how."
Walter Isaacson
"Curtis Wilkie’s riveting account of the murder of Vernon Dahmer by the KKK is a window into the depths of racism and white supremacy. But it is also a beautifully written tale of courage and morality featuring a man with deep local roots that knew right from wrong. When Evil Lived in Laurel can help us understand the Civil Rights era in the South and also our country today."
Library Journal
06/01/2021
Wilkie (The Fall of the House of Zeus) narrates the downfall of the White Knights of the Mississippi Klu Klux Klan, a chapter that was active during the civil rights era in Laurel, Mississippi. In this book, the White Knights are seen primarily through the eyes of Tom Landrum, an FBI informant who infiltrated and reported on them for four years. Repelled by the White Knights' activities and worried about the potential repercussions of his membership, Landrum informed on their terrorist acts throughout southern Mississippi, which culminated in the firebombing and murder of the Black civil rights activist Vernon Dahmer. Following Dahmer's murder, the White Knights fractured, and Landrum continued to dutifully report on their infighting and power struggles. Wilkie relates all this, as well as the FBI's investigation of Dahmer's murder and use of extralegal methods to obtain confessions and cooperation. Wilkie also reports on the arrests and trials of the White Knights and briefly connects their white supremacist activities to the present day. The book relies on extensive primary sources and includes several photographs, in order to provide a complete picture of the period. VERDICT An interesting account of civil rights-era Mississippi, although it's largely focused on the perspective of white men. Recommended for readers interested in civil rights history.—Rebekah Kati, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Kirkus Reviews
2021-04-13
A retired University of Mississippi journalism professor recounts the story of a Mississippian who infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan and served as an informant for the FBI.
Wilkie has reported on civil rights for more than 50 years. In his latest book, he digs into White supremacy and voter suppression with a welcome excavation of the neglected story of Tom Landrum, a courageous Jones County youth court counselor who, at the request of the FBI, joined and provided secret reports on the organization known as the White Knights of the Mississippi Ku Klux Klan, which had murdered civil rights activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner the previous year. Landrum went undercover after growing disturbed by the racism of local officials, who kept Black residents from registering to vote in part by requiring them to answer questions such as, “How many bubbles are in a bar of soap?” The author draws on Landrum’s written FBI reports and other credible sources in this account of how prosecutors won convictions of a group of White Knights implicated in the murder of Vernon Dahmer, a longtime county NAACP president who had worked to register Black voters and died after Klansmen firebombed his house. Wilkie has reconstructed some conversations, which results at times in dialogue perhaps too neatly expository and requires him frequently to quote Klan members’ use of derogatory racial terms. (Wilkie quotes members’ use of the N-word 100+ times. It’s never used gratuitously but rather demonstrates the virulent racism.) Nonetheless, the author skillfully examines a case full of cloak-and-dagger intrigue: passwords, death threats, secret codes, clandestine meetings in wooded areas after dark, and well-maintained suspense about whether the White Knights would discover the spy in their midst. In different ways, Landrum and Dahmer risked their lives to fight appalling injustices, and anyone looking for underappreciated civil rights heroes might profitably start with either man.
A true-crime tale that offers a rare insider’s perspective on the KKK in its heyday in Mississippi.
