Audiobook9 hours
Terror in the City of Champions: Murder, Baseball, and the Secret Society that Shocked Depression-era Detroit
Written by Tom Stanton
Narrated by Johnny Heller
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
4/5
()
About this audiobook
Detroit, mid-1930s: In a city abuzz over its unrivaled sports success, gun-loving baseball fan Dayton Dean became ensnared in the nefarious and deadly Black Legion. The secretive, Klan-like group was executing a wicked plan of terror, murdering enemies, flogging associates, and contemplating armed rebellion. The Legion boasted tens of thousands of members across the Midwest, among them politicians and prominent citizens-even, possibly, a beloved athlete.
Terror in the City of Champions opens with the arrival of Mickey Cochrane, a fiery baseball star who roused the Great Depression's hardest-hit city by leading the Tigers to the 1934 pennant. A year later he guided the team to its first championship. Within seven months the Lions and Red Wings follow in football and hockey-all while Joe Louis chased boxing's heavyweight crown.
Amidst such glory, the Legion's dreadful toll grew unchecked: staged “suicides,” bodies dumped along roadsides, high-profile assassination plots. Talkative Dayton Dean's involvement would deepen as heroic Mickey Cochrane's reputation would rise. But the ballplayer had his own demons, including a close friendship with Harry Bennett, Henry Ford's brutal union buster.
Terror in the City of Champions opens with the arrival of Mickey Cochrane, a fiery baseball star who roused the Great Depression's hardest-hit city by leading the Tigers to the 1934 pennant. A year later he guided the team to its first championship. Within seven months the Lions and Red Wings follow in football and hockey-all while Joe Louis chased boxing's heavyweight crown.
Amidst such glory, the Legion's dreadful toll grew unchecked: staged “suicides,” bodies dumped along roadsides, high-profile assassination plots. Talkative Dayton Dean's involvement would deepen as heroic Mickey Cochrane's reputation would rise. But the ballplayer had his own demons, including a close friendship with Harry Bennett, Henry Ford's brutal union buster.
Related to Terror in the City of Champions
Related audiobooks
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning: 1977, Baseball, Politics, and the Battle for the Soul of a City Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Blue Monday: The Expos, the Dodgers, and the Home Run That Changed Everything Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tough Luck: Sid Luckman, Murder, Inc., and the Rise of the Modern NFL Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Willie Mays: The Life, The Legend Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Whispers of the Gods: Tales from Baseball's Golden Age, Told by the Men Who Played It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Presidents and the Pastime: The History of Baseball and the White House Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Opening Day: The Story of Jackie Robinson's First Season Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gods at Play: An Eyewitness Account of Great Moments in American Sports Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Last Innocents: The Collision of the Turbulent Sixties and the Los Angeles Dodgers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Glory Days: The Summer of 1984 and the 90 Days That Changed Sports and Culture Forever Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Their Life's Work: The Brotherhood of the 1970s Pittsburgh Steelers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5One Shot at Forever: A Small Town, an Unlikely Coach, and a Magical Baseball Season Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Grinders: Baseball's Intrepid Infantry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Big Fella: Babe Ruth and the World He Created Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Chicago Cubs: Story of a Curse Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Baseball in the Garden of Eden: The Secret History of the Early Game Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Fall from Grace: The Truth and Tragedy of “Shoeless Joe” Jackson Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Year of the Pitcher: Bob Gibson, Denny McLain, and the End of Baseball's Golden Age Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Best Team Money Can Buy: The Los Angeles Dodgers' Wild Struggle to Build a Baseball Powerhouse Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Billy Ball: Billy Martin and the Resurrection of the Oakland A's Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5City of Champions: A History of Triumph and Defeat in Detroit Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Arm: Inside the Billion-Dollar Mystery of the Most Valuable Commodity in Sports Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Branch Rickey Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Soul of Baseball: A Road Trip Through Buck O'Neil's America Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Yucks: Two Years in Tampa with the Losingest Team in NFL History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Called Shot: Babe Ruth, the Chicago Cubs, and the Unforgettable Major League Baseball Season of 1932 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
United States History For You
The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Killing the Witches: The Horror of Salem, Massachusetts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Waco: David Koresh, the Branch Davidians, and A Legacy of Rage Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5John Adams Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ghosts of Honolulu: A Japanese Spy, A Japanese American Spy Hunter, and the Untold Story of Pearl Harbor Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Fourth Turning Is Here: What the Seasons of History Tell Us about How and When This Crisis Will End Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The House of Hidden Meanings: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Untold History of the United States Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bowling Alone: Revised and Updated: The Collapse and Revival of American Community Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Master Slave Husband Wife: An Epic Journey from Slavery to Freedom Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation’s Largest Home Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/51776 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road to Jonestown: Jim Jones and Peoples Temple Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lies My Teacher Told Me: 2nd Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Killing the Guys Who Killed the Guy Who Killed Lincoln: A Nutty Story About Edwin Booth and Boston Corbett Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Valiant Women: The Extraordinary American Servicewomen Who Helped Win World War II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Wright Brothers Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of September 11, 2001 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for Terror in the City of Champions
Rating: 3.928571464285714 out of 5 stars
4/5
28 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5In 1935 Detroit teams won the World Series, the Stanley Cup, and the NFL championship. This won the city the nickname of City of Champions. At the same time a shadowy organization called the Black Legion was gaining members in Southeast Michigan. Similar to the Klan, the Black Legion was anti-immigrant, anti-labor union, and also opposed to Blacks and Jews in the area. They intimidated people into joining the Legion once they had attended a first meeting and taken an oath. This is a very interesting look at Detroit in the middle 1930s.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5If you are into history of the depression years, sports and crime this is the riveting book for you. I am into two of those, history and crime though not sports and it was still riveting for me. Terror in the City of Champions opens with the arrival of Mickey Cochrane, a baseball star who roused the Great Depression’s hardest-hit city by leading the Tigers to the 1934 pennant. Not something the Tigers have become accustomed to. A year later he guided the team to its first championship. Within seven months the Lions and Red Wings follow in football and hockey—all while Joe Louis chased boxing’s heavyweight crown.Amidst such glory, the Legion’s dreadful toll grew unchecked: staged “suicides,” bodies dumped along roadsides, high-profile assassination plots. Talkative Dayton Dean’s involvement would deepen as heroic Mickey’s Cochrane’s reputation would rise. But the ballplayer had his own demons, including a close friendship with Harry Bennett, Henry Ford’s brutal union buster. Award-winning author Tom Stanton weaves a stunning tale of history, crime, and sports. Richly portraying 1930s America, Terror in the City of Champions features a pageant of colorful figures: iconic athletes, sanctimonious criminals, scheming industrial titans, a bigoted radio priest, a love-smitten celebrity couple, J. Edgar Hoover, and two future presidents, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan. It is a riveting true story set at the confluence of hard luck, hope, victory, and violence..