THE DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY - Page 5 of 6 - book summaries and study materials

Summary and Analysis Part I: Chapter 4 – Becomingness

Summary Six months after Chicago wins the bid for the fair, the exposition company unofficially asks Burnham to scope out sites. Burnham sends a friend, Ellsworth, to Maine to solicit 68-year-old and sickly Frederick Olmsted for help with site selection and building of the fair. Olmsted, a world-renowned landscape architect, […]

Summary and Analysis Part I: Chapter 3 – The Necessary Supply

Erik Larson

Summary Chapter 3 begins in August 1886, when H.H. Holmes takes a train to Englewood, Illinois, a community near Jackson Park, future site of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. Holmes enters E. S. Holton Drugs and convinces store owner Mrs. Holton to hire him. In serious need of help because […]

Summary and Analysis Part I: Chapter 2 – The Trouble Is Just Begun

Erik Larson

Summary Chapter 2 begins in February 1890 with Chicago citizens, many outside the office of the Tribune, eagerly awaiting official word on the future location of the 1893 World’s Fair. New York, Washington, and St. Louis also have put in bids for the fair, and the scent of competition is […]

Summary and Analysis Part I: Chapter 1 – The Black City

Erik Larson

Summary This brief chapter gives an overview of the moral climate of Chicago in the late 1800s, describing the influx of people, particularly single young women. Chicago’s declining moral fabric is established through portrayal of the mass of nightclubs and brothels, along with changing social norms. Chapter 1 also notes […]

Summary and Analysis Prologue – Aboard the Olympic

Erik Larson

Summary The book begins aboard the RMS Olympic on April 14, 1912, the day its sister ship, the Titanic sinks. On the Europe-bound Olympic are famous architect Daniel Burnham, his wife Margaret, and his daughter and her husband. Burnham is not in good health and is suffering from a foot […]

Character List and Analysis Minor Characters: Holmes Plot Characters

Erik Larson

Clara A. Lovering The first wife of H.H. Holmes, then known by his birth name Herman Mudgett, Clara A. Lovering marries Holmes in their home state of New Hampshire, only to be left by Holmes shortly thereafter. Myrna Z. Belknap Holmes’s second wife, Myrna Z. Belknap is a voluptuous blonde […]

Character List and Analysis Minor Characters: Burnham Plot Characters

Erik Larson

Margaret Sherman Burnham Devoted wife of Daniel Burnham, Margaret Burnham has five children with Burnham and cares for them in their Evanston, Illinois, home while Burnham stays on site of the fair for three years, all the while writing Burnham letters on almost a daily basis. Richard Hunt Elitist New […]

Character List and Analysis Frank Geyer (Holmes Plot)

Erik Larson

Frank Geyer is the Philadelphia detective who is assigned the job of investigating the Holmes case while Holmes sits in a Philadelphia prison for insurance fraud. Suspecting Holmes has committed several crimes, including the murder of three children of one of his associates, Geyer investigates. Motivated to understand what makes […]

Character List and Analysis H.H. Holmes (Holmes Plot)

Erik Larson

The antagonist of the novel, H.H. Holmes, is a psychopathic doctor, pharmacist, and serial killer from New Hampshire who comes to Chicago a few years before construction of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. In Chicago, Holmes uses his skills of manipulation, charm, and deceit to commit several crimes, including theft, […]

Character List and Analysis Frederick Law Olmsted (Burnham Plot)

Erik Larson

Frederick Law Olmsted is a distinguished landscape architect whom Burnham and Root hire for the creation of the fair. Being well established in his profession and credited with his contributions to Central Park in New York, Olmsted is driven to work on the fair by a desire to validate his […]