Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America’s Empire by Jonathan M. Katz
Smedley Butler (1881 – 1940) was the most celebrated warfighter of his time. This Chester County native, who came from a Quaker background, was the subject of bestselling books and other popular culture. He served in nearly every major overseas conflict from the Spanish War of 1898 until the eve of World War II. Katz shows how the consequences of the Marines’ actions are still very much alive: talking politics with a Sandinista commander in Nicaragua, getting a martial arts lesson from a devotee of the Boxer Rebellion in China, and getting cast as a P.O.W. extra in a Filipino movie about their American War. Tracing a path from the first wave of U.S. overseas expansionism to the rise of fascism in the 1930s to the crises of democracy in our own time, Gangsters of Capitalism tells an urgent story about a formative era most Americans have never learned about, but that the rest of the world cannot forget. – Excerpt from Amazon.com
Thursday, July 21, 10 a.m.
Free admission. Donations accepted in support of CCHC programs.
This hybrid discussion will be available via Zoom and in-person at Chester County History Center, 225 N. High Street. Details available to registrants several days before the gathering.
225 N. High Street, West Chester, PA 19380 | 610-692-4800
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