Presented by: Laurie Guitteau, Ted Anagnoson, Jane and David DeSelm, and Sue Mellor
Our 2024 Heroes & Rogues course will introduce us to three more interesting people who have distinguished themselves in their respective fields. The first talk (on March 11), presented by Gerry Corrigan, will be about Mungo Park, the doctor from Scotland who explored West Africa and was the first European to reach the Niger River. His success helped sow the seeds leading to the “Scramble for Africa” in 1884–85. On March 18, Laurie Guitteau will introduce you to Josephine Baker, a most complicated personality. She was born into abject poverty, seduced Paris in the early 1920s with her brazen sexuality, became one of the richest entertainers in the world, played an important role in the French Resistance during WWII, created a Rain- bow Tribe, and died a pauper. Sex, intrigue, betrayals — a sordid and fascinating story. The third presentation will be by Ted Anagnoson on March 25, when the subject is J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the FBI for almost 50 years. Hoover streamlined the FBI into an effective crime-fighting body, but it came at a huge cost, where the agency embodied the excesses of the Cold War and where Hoover used his power to harass and intimidate personal enemies. We will look at both sides of this autocrat in this presentation.