Friends of the Library at the College of Charleston presents Christopher Dickey - Tonight at 6 PM - College of Charleston Libraries
Friends of the Library at the College of Charleston presents Christopher Dickey
- Tuesday, February 28, 2017, 6 pm
- Addlestone Library Room 227
Christopher Dickey will discuss “Gertie” and her family Spying in the Blood: Gertrude Sanford Legendre’s Privilege, Patriotism, and Espionage
Gertrude “Gertie” Sanford Legendre was an American socialite who served as a spy during World War II and managed to outmaneuver the Nazis after being captured. She was also a noted explorer, big-game hunter, environmentalist, and owner of Medway plantation in South Carolina. She was born into a very wealthy and well-connected New York family in 1903. She was the quintessence of WASPdom, as most of the American elite was in those days. A true heroine who hated being underestimated because she was a woman, she traveled the globe in search of big game, wild landscapes and exotic cultures.
Legendre’s grandson, Pierre Manigault, chairman of the board of Evening Post industries and co-founder of Garden & Gun Magazine describes her as “…tough as she could be. But, also a very social, very gregarious person, and she charmed everybody. She was very good at making people feel at ease.” (Dickey, the Daily Beast)
Christopher Dickey is a war correspondent, historian, and thriller writer, an authority on terrorism, and a memoirist. He is the Paris-based foreign editor of The Daily Beast, and is a contributor to NBC/MSNBC News. Chris also has been a frequent commentator on CNN, the BBC, and NPR. He was formerly a bureau chief for Newsweek in Paris and Cairo, and for The Washington Post in Central America and the Middle East.
Chris’s most recent work of non-fiction “Our Man in Charleston: Britain’s Secret Agent in the Civil War South,” offers startling insights into the grim narrative of slavery, the matter of states’ rights, and the foundations of racism in the United States as viewed by an outsider in the heart of the Southern “slavocracy.” A compelling true story, deeply researched and thoroughly documented.
Two of his earlier works include “Securing the City: Inside America’s Best Counterterror Force—The NYPD,” chronicles the effectiveness and resources of the high-tech intelligence operation of the New York Police Department and “Summer of Deliverance,” a powerful and moving memoir of anger, love, and reconciliation between a son and his father.
Book Signing after his talk
Christopher Dickey’s three latest books will be available for purchase and he will sign books after his talk.