272 INDIANA MAGAZINE OF HISTORY owes much to the quiet workings of itors to Purdue’s College of Agricul- these individuals. Yet if Latta had any ture will find it a useful introduction shortcomings, no reader will learn to a man who helped the university about them here. to become a center of agricultural Long block quotes and itemized research and education. lists of various sorts give this book a style and format that most historians R. DOUGLASHURT is head of the no longer use. Still, anyone interest- Department of History at Purdue Uni- ed in learning about the history of versity. Among his books are Ameri- agriculture at Purdue will find the can Agriculture: A Brief History (rev. book useful. Agricultural historians ed., 2002) and Problems ofplenty: The may find it helpful for some matters American Farmer in the Twentieth Cen- of detail, particularly in relation to the tury (2003). operation of Farmers’ Institutes. Vis- William Dudley Pelley A Life in Right-Wing Extremism and the Occult By Scott Beekman (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 2005. Pp. xvi, 269. Notes, bibliography, index. $34.95.) On December 7, 1940, the Noblesville blood” (p. 2). His first success came [Indiana] Ledger announced that a in one of his father’s failed careers, new business was coming to town. journalism. After several years spent Only later did townspeople learn that editing newspapers, Pelley became a the firm, a printing plant, was asso- short-story writer and novelist, win- ciated with William Dudley Pelley, a ning two 0. Henry Awards for his sto- controversial figure known as the ries. This led him to Hollywood, “High Priest of American Fascism.” where he wrote screenplays, includ- Pelley’s path to Indiana was a ing some for Lon Chaney, Sr., who snaking one, along which he had became a friend. It was in California seemingly reinvented himself sever- that Pelley underwent a conversion al times. Scott Beekman expertly experience that was the dividing line unravels the twists in Pelley’s life in in his life. His so-called “Seven Min- William Dudley Pelley: A Life in Right- utes in Eternity” and what the author Wing Extremism and the Occult. describes as “his ego and overarching Born in Massachusetts, Pelley’s desire for public recognition” (p. xv) father was variously a Methodist min- would move him to the outermost ister, cobbler, businessman and jour- fringes of American society. nalist. The younger Pelley was One day in May 1928, believing intensely proud of his “pure English that he was dying, Pelley (as he later REVIEWS 273 recounted) felt himself pulled into a he published “anti-Rooseveltand pro- blue mist. He awakened on a slab, Axis material” in his new religious where he was attended by two kind- publication Galilean. Ultimately this ly figures, one of whom, “William,” led to his arrest and conviction for explained to Pelley that “everyone sedition in trials in both Indianapo- . lived hundreds of times before” lis and Washington, D. C. and that “earth was a classroom” for Pelley was sentenced to a term at souls moving up the hierarchy. From the Federal Prison in Terre Haute, the experience, Pelley developed a Indiana. Released in 1950, he metaphysical, pseudo-religious phi- returned to Hamilton County (as a losophy known as “Liberation doc- condition of his parole) and contin- trine,” which the author characterizes ued to promote his metaphysical as “mixing spiritualism, Theosophy, ideas, with a dash of UFO interests Christianity and pyramidism into a thrown in. He called his new philos- potent concoction” that earned him phy Soulcraft, and his Soulcraft Press adherents in both anti-Semitic and published his numerous writings, metaphysical circles (pp. xii-xiii). which found few adherents. Pelley Pelley’s anti-Semitism led him to faded from the public gaze and died form a group called the Silver Shirts in Noblesville in 1965. The night in 1933. He used the group to enter before his burial a cross was burned politics, pushing his anti-Semitic and in front of the funeral home. anti-Communist agendas (both of Beekman has written a coherent, which had been fermenting since his readable study. His epilogue, in par- travels through Russia in 1918-1919). ticular, offers an excellent overview Like similar extremist groups, the Sil- of the life and legacy of a man now ver Shirts were more sound and fury seen as a hero by some current than substance, but they brought Pel- extremist groups. ley recognition, even among the many detractors who viewed him as a Hitler TIMOTHYCRUMRIN is associate direc- wannabe. During the same decade, tor for research and historian at Con- Pelley also formed the Christian Party ner Prairie Museum, Noblesville, of America, running for president in Indiana. He is currently researching 1936. All the while, he was eyed sus- Pelley’s life in Indiana. piciously by a public and government (particularly the Dies Committee) wary of extremists. By the time he arrived in Indiana, Pelley had disbanded the Silver Shirts, claiming that he wanted to concen- trate on publishing his philosophical ideas. But unable to eschew politics, .