LONGTIME FBI DIRECTOR, J. EDGAR HOOVER, DIES AT 77
Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) On May 2, 1972, J. Edgar Hoover*, longtime director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, died as a result of complications of heart disease. The Director was 77 years old.
J. Edgar Hoover became director of the Bureau of Investigation in 1924. The bureau was rechristened the FBI in 1935.
Under Hoover's direction, the bureau set up an index card file system of 450,000 files on every radical leader, organization and publication in the United States.
In the 1930s, a fingerprint file, crime laboratory and training academy for agents were set up. Burton Hersh writes...
"It may be that Hoover's finest performances came during the thirties and early forties, when much of American society was close to dissolution and powerful totalitarian movements...threatened...to upend our shaky constitutional arrangements.
Hoover managed to penetrate extremist groups...rendering them harmless to the vulnerable New Deal."
*John Edgar Hoover (1895-1972) was born in Washington, D.C. where he lived his entire life. JEH earned his Bachelor of Laws degree & his LLM (1916-1917) from The George Washington University Law School.JEH was hired in 1917 by the Justice Department to work in the War Emergency Division.
SOURCE
"Bobby and J. Edgar: The Historic Face-Off Between The Kennedys And J. Edgar Hoover That Transformed America," by Burton Hersh, Carroll and Graf Publishers, New York, 2007.
