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A Hundred Little Hitlers: The Death of a Black Man, the Trial of a White Racist, and the Rise of the Neo-Nazi Movement in America
On November 12, 1988, a group of Portland, Oregon, skinheads known as East Side White Pride encountered three Ethiopians in a street fight, resulting in the brutal death of Mulugeta Seraw.
For award-winning journalist, Elinor Langer, the Seraw case is the launchpad for a thorough investigation of the Nazi-inspired racist movement in the United States. She vividly reconstructs the world of the skinheads: their origins in the punk scene, their basement shrines to Nazi power, their moments of glory on Oprah and Geraldo.
She examines the long-standing radical groups that encouraged the movement, tracking the progress of such powerful figures as White Aryan Resistance leader, Tom Metzger, through key bastions of the Far Right. In gripping detail, she follows civil-rights lawyer Morris Dees's efforts to prove Metzger responsible for the Portland killing - a sensational campaign to curb the growth of neo-Nazism.
Compelling, disturbing, and important, A Hundred Little Hitlers is both an epic account of racism and justice, and a close examination of social forces that loom ever more dangerously today.
For award-winning journalist, Elinor Langer, the Seraw case is the launchpad for a thorough investigation of the Nazi-inspired racist movement in the United States. She vividly reconstructs the world of the skinheads: their origins in the punk scene, their basement shrines to Nazi power, their moments of glory on Oprah and Geraldo.
She examines the long-standing radical groups that encouraged the movement, tracking the progress of such powerful figures as White Aryan Resistance leader, Tom Metzger, through key bastions of the Far Right. In gripping detail, she follows civil-rights lawyer Morris Dees's efforts to prove Metzger responsible for the Portland killing - a sensational campaign to curb the growth of neo-Nazism.
Compelling, disturbing, and important, A Hundred Little Hitlers is both an epic account of racism and justice, and a close examination of social forces that loom ever more dangerously today.
416 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
June 24, 2018
The "alt right" existed long before that moniker was adopted. This book is an exhaustive history of a senseless murder, its perpetrators, and the social forces that drove them. I guess to me it was a little too exhaustive...just way too much to process. The author is to be commended for her incredible research, even as she herself became a target of the supremacists' hatred. There is a lot of interesting background on some of the chief organizations in the battle for and against racial/religious hatred. I was pretty shocked to see the openly racist history of Portland, OR, a city that I and many others now think of as a bastion of liberal thought.
December 12, 2008
One of the few books I have seen written by someone outside the so called white nationalist scene pertaining to anything to do with it that is fair and even sided to everyone involved.
A drunken brawl breaks out between skinheads and Ethiopian immigrants late one night in Portland Oregon. One of the Ethiopians dies. A chain of events occurs where opportunistic "activists" somehow find a way to sue Tom Metzger, even though he lived in Southern California and I believe had never even spoken to anyone involved with the fight that resulted in the Ethiopians death, win the lawsuit and take everything he worked his whole life for. The whole crux of the lawsuit was Metzger was responsible because an associate of his had given the Portland skinheads some of Metzgers literature!
Langer does a good job of showing the skinhead scene for what it is, mainly people in their early 20's and teens who came from dysfunctional families going through a "stage" they will soon grow out of, having more to do with fashion, socializing and being part of a "scene" than anything else, lacking any real focus in their idealology, and with a few exceptions the worst thing they are really doing is petty street violence, ie, getting getting drunk and getting in fights, not unlike a lot of frat boys I might add. Which like another reviewer mentioned is pretty lightweight when compared to what so called minority youth gangs are involved in.
The author is very fair and sympathetic in her portrayal of Metzger. Even if you despise his ideas on race and politics its hard not to like him on the personal level from reading this book, reminding me almost of retired old men that hang out in a small town barbershops telling jokes and talking about politics.
Her portrayal of the "activist" Morris Dees is less flattering as he comes off as a sleazy opportunistic egotistical sort who exploited this whole situation for his own personal gain. Dees organization the Southern Poverty Law Center takes in millions every year, while the family of the slain Ethiopian, who Dees represented, has recieved very little in the way of compensation even though the multi-million dollar lawsuit was won by Dees.
A drunken brawl breaks out between skinheads and Ethiopian immigrants late one night in Portland Oregon. One of the Ethiopians dies. A chain of events occurs where opportunistic "activists" somehow find a way to sue Tom Metzger, even though he lived in Southern California and I believe had never even spoken to anyone involved with the fight that resulted in the Ethiopians death, win the lawsuit and take everything he worked his whole life for. The whole crux of the lawsuit was Metzger was responsible because an associate of his had given the Portland skinheads some of Metzgers literature!
Langer does a good job of showing the skinhead scene for what it is, mainly people in their early 20's and teens who came from dysfunctional families going through a "stage" they will soon grow out of, having more to do with fashion, socializing and being part of a "scene" than anything else, lacking any real focus in their idealology, and with a few exceptions the worst thing they are really doing is petty street violence, ie, getting getting drunk and getting in fights, not unlike a lot of frat boys I might add. Which like another reviewer mentioned is pretty lightweight when compared to what so called minority youth gangs are involved in.
The author is very fair and sympathetic in her portrayal of Metzger. Even if you despise his ideas on race and politics its hard not to like him on the personal level from reading this book, reminding me almost of retired old men that hang out in a small town barbershops telling jokes and talking about politics.
Her portrayal of the "activist" Morris Dees is less flattering as he comes off as a sleazy opportunistic egotistical sort who exploited this whole situation for his own personal gain. Dees organization the Southern Poverty Law Center takes in millions every year, while the family of the slain Ethiopian, who Dees represented, has recieved very little in the way of compensation even though the multi-million dollar lawsuit was won by Dees.
July 21, 2019
This was a very wide-ranging study of the murder of Mulugeta Seraw by Ken Mieske, and all the events that led up to it. The author then moves on to cover a great deal of the aftermath as well, although she had to stop writing the book eventually and you have to read the news to find out about later developments. (The murder was in 1988 and the developments, especially with Donald Trump in the White House, are still coming.) There are many detours into history and biography. Langer appears to have talked personally to almost all the parties involved, studied a great many documents and really thought through what it all meant before putting pen to paper. The analysis seems very fair and evenhanded to me. My only quibble with the mostly-excellent writing is that Langer needs to break her sentences down smaller so the reader doesn't have to keep going back to reread and remember what her point was.
February 3, 2017
I found this book while book shopping in an op-shop in my local town. I was drawn to the title, and after I read what the book was about, I just knew I had to read it. Langer successfully illustrates the neo-nazi movement in America during the 1980s and focuses intensely on the skinhead movement in Oregon. While the entire book revolves around the investigation of Mulgeta Seraw's death (an Ethiopian immigrant that had been killed by a pack of Skinheads), Langer also provides a broader view of the racist movement in America, and even provides the reader with a few detailed biographies of prominent racists during the time (including Tom Metzger and David Duke). I appreciate Langer's illustration of the movement. She writes about the whole era with a professional perception, one of an unbiased voice, supported only by facts. I am not faulting Langer's book when I rate this 2 stars; I just didn't like the book much. It is somewhat interesting, but I did not love it for what it was. It was okay - and I respect Langer's work on the subject.
August 30, 2020
This is a bit too much like... the news.
November 12, 2018
An insightful look at the ugliest side of America, that is treated like an elephant in the room. Hate and racial bigotry is exposed in this expose' of what lies smoldering beneath the crust of the proverbial apple pie that makes up America. A murder based truly on racial differences brings to light the origins, attitudes, beliefs and ideologies of the native born terrorist wearing the brands of American Neo-Nazis, The Alt-right, Nationalists, and Skinheads.
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December 23, 2008Author of the acclaimed biography Josephine Herbst, Elinor Langer has written for The New York Review of Books , The New York Times, and The Nation, among other publications. A Hundred Little Hitlers was chosen as a finalist for the J. Anthony Lukas Award for work-in-progress. Langer lives in Portland, Oregon.
Review: "Was it a racially motivated crime, or was it a street fight? You might be surprised what side Elinor Langer, a terrifically unabashed liberal and the author of the biography Josephine Herbst, comes down on. In this probing, transfixing book, the result of a tireless decade-and-a-half of research, Langer explores the Nazi-aligned skinhead movement in Portland and the culture that created it." Adrienne Miller, Esquire
Review: "An extraordinary book, written with passion, grace, and wisdom. The murder at its center is a reflection not just of racism in the United States, but of something much more widespread. Langer has taken one act of violence, looked at it carefully and courageously, and illuminated a whole moral universe." Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost
Review: "Was it a racially motivated crime, or was it a street fight? You might be surprised what side Elinor Langer, a terrifically unabashed liberal and the author of the biography Josephine Herbst, comes down on. In this probing, transfixing book, the result of a tireless decade-and-a-half of research, Langer explores the Nazi-aligned skinhead movement in Portland and the culture that created it." Adrienne Miller, Esquire
Review: "An extraordinary book, written with passion, grace, and wisdom. The murder at its center is a reflection not just of racism in the United States, but of something much more widespread. Langer has taken one act of violence, looked at it carefully and courageously, and illuminated a whole moral universe." Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold's Ghost
January 4, 2017
Pros: learned a lot about the history of neo-nazis and white supremacy on the West Coast.
Cons: learned a lot about the individual lives of particular neo-nazis on the West Coast. I understand wanting to show how upbringing doesn't necessarily dictate who will or will not become a neo-nazi, but on the other hand, I don't need to read like ten plus pages on the entire life (in detail) of Tom Metzger. I really don't need to know that he liked watching the trains roll through town as a child. That isn't a necessary part of this book. This isn't his biography. Frankly it reads like the biography of a bunch of neo-nazis more than it does an account of the murder of Mulugeta Seraw and the trial of his murderers.
Also, the writer doesn't know how to handle action sequences. They're all written as one very long, unwieldy sentence, and not only is it distracting, it also makes it more difficult to follow.
Cons: learned a lot about the individual lives of particular neo-nazis on the West Coast. I understand wanting to show how upbringing doesn't necessarily dictate who will or will not become a neo-nazi, but on the other hand, I don't need to read like ten plus pages on the entire life (in detail) of Tom Metzger. I really don't need to know that he liked watching the trains roll through town as a child. That isn't a necessary part of this book. This isn't his biography. Frankly it reads like the biography of a bunch of neo-nazis more than it does an account of the murder of Mulugeta Seraw and the trial of his murderers.
Also, the writer doesn't know how to handle action sequences. They're all written as one very long, unwieldy sentence, and not only is it distracting, it also makes it more difficult to follow.
December 30, 2021
Because my brain is broken, I decided to read this on my honeymoon. As fate would have it, I'd be rewarded for this crazy decision with what I found to be an enthralling read that I finished in about a day.
I found the book to be an extremely comprehensive look at the greater West Coast Neo-Nazi scene in the 80s and early 90s. Intentionally or not, it serves a great road map for where we are in many ways today.
Langer is open minded and fair to everyone in the book, sometimes shockingly so. She sees them as flawed human beings rather than going for an all too easy portrayal of good vs. evil.
Good info on the wildly racist history of the state of Oregon as well. Really recommend this book.
I found the book to be an extremely comprehensive look at the greater West Coast Neo-Nazi scene in the 80s and early 90s. Intentionally or not, it serves a great road map for where we are in many ways today.
Langer is open minded and fair to everyone in the book, sometimes shockingly so. She sees them as flawed human beings rather than going for an all too easy portrayal of good vs. evil.
Good info on the wildly racist history of the state of Oregon as well. Really recommend this book.
June 27, 2022
One of the most thoroughly researched book about the rise of the neo-nazi movement in Portland and how it affected the rest of the country. The author puts together such an intricate piece together of the past and murder that it becomes difficult to read. It feels like a long research paper at times and not a fluid story. The book does really pick up halfway through and the Metzger trial and does a fair job telling the whole story while not minimizing the horribleness of the main white supremicists and racist leaders.
August 24, 2020
Watching current events in Portland I'm not surprised as skinheads have been a pervasive stain in the city of Portland. This story is about the death of Mulugeta Seraw an Ethiopian immigrant and a helpful understanding of right wing groups prevalent in the United States, sadly even today.
April 30, 2020
Inside look on a crime and it's trial. But also, I had no idea the neo Nazi movement across the US in the 80s. Yikes!
August 5, 2020
Upsetting, but well-researched investigative journalism.
April 18, 2016
Very compelling story that centers around the murder of an Ethiopian man by a group of skinheads on Nov. 12 1988, right around the corner from my house in Portland...
The book does a good job at providing personal profiles for each significant character as well as addressing a few key histories. There is a fascinating summary of the history of race relations in Portland, contributing to the fact that it still currently holds the title for "whitest big city." This summary includes a retelling of the community of Vanport and its subsequent flooding, and the fact that Oregon did not ratify the 15th amendment until 1959! The other key history is that of the development of the Neo-Nazi movement centered around Tom Metzger, a former (perhaps current) resident of the city that my parents currently reside in.
I thought the author did a good job of presenting a lot of relevant arguments and material and although she never condones the ideology or actions of the skinheads, she does bring up details regarding how the cases were handled that show how the skinheads never really had a chance to defend themselves properly.
A very easy, very interesting read. My only qualm (and perhaps I'm expecting too much out of a piece of nonfiction) was that I found the writing awkward and clumsy at times, but does the job of getting information across.
The book does a good job at providing personal profiles for each significant character as well as addressing a few key histories. There is a fascinating summary of the history of race relations in Portland, contributing to the fact that it still currently holds the title for "whitest big city." This summary includes a retelling of the community of Vanport and its subsequent flooding, and the fact that Oregon did not ratify the 15th amendment until 1959! The other key history is that of the development of the Neo-Nazi movement centered around Tom Metzger, a former (perhaps current) resident of the city that my parents currently reside in.
I thought the author did a good job of presenting a lot of relevant arguments and material and although she never condones the ideology or actions of the skinheads, she does bring up details regarding how the cases were handled that show how the skinheads never really had a chance to defend themselves properly.
A very easy, very interesting read. My only qualm (and perhaps I'm expecting too much out of a piece of nonfiction) was that I found the writing awkward and clumsy at times, but does the job of getting information across.
October 5, 2010
i read this in my junior year in high school for a project in my english class. we were supposed to partner up with someone and debate on a major issue in the world. my partner and i sparred over the civil rights movement whereas i chose to negate the success of the civil rights movement, which was a shocker to everyone in class because i'm black so they automatically thought that i would choose the affirmative position. but i wanted to challenge myself. and not only that i do believe this to quite an extent.
i chose to read this book in order to get anidea of what i was up against and found that i was very much impressed by what seemed to be audacious and honest. this book caused a sure reaction i me to the point that i practically shoved its contents down my partners throat. she thought it was a terrible idea for me to reference the skin-head movement on my end of the debate. we had a major argument about this in front of the class, weeks before our project was even due. we flung many insults and ugly words at each other and by the end of class we decided to work separately though we were still partners. we literally hated each other.
in a nutshell...i lost my friend over this book.
i chose to read this book in order to get anidea of what i was up against and found that i was very much impressed by what seemed to be audacious and honest. this book caused a sure reaction i me to the point that i practically shoved its contents down my partners throat. she thought it was a terrible idea for me to reference the skin-head movement on my end of the debate. we had a major argument about this in front of the class, weeks before our project was even due. we flung many insults and ugly words at each other and by the end of class we decided to work separately though we were still partners. we literally hated each other.
in a nutshell...i lost my friend over this book.
April 10, 2012
It's been a while since I read this title, not long after it came out, and my memory may be a bit fuzzy. The memory was jogged by a reference in The Girl Who Fell from the Sky, which takes place in Portland during the same time period. What struck me most about this book was the realization of how present Neo-Nazis were in Portland during the late 80s and early 90s—my high school had a few wannabes, but to my knowledge nothing like some of the people in this book. Also, I became familiar with the Southern Law Poverty Center and Anti-Defamation League. I saw how a certain case can gain the attention of high-profile lawyers and how and why they may work on a case pro bono. And I was saddened, though not completely shocked, to learn about such things that had taken place—while I was living and breathing just a few miles away!—in southeast Portland.
I may reread this sometime.
I may reread this sometime.
February 18, 2009
An Ethiopian man was killed in Portland, Oregon by three self-proclaimed racist skinheads in 1988. A Hundred Little Hitlers is Elinor Langer's account of the murder, the trial, and the civil suit brought by the Southern Poverty Law Center against Tom Metzger of the racial separatist group White Aryan Resistance. The author brings to life the strange and violent world of racial supremecists, but keeps an admirable distance from judgements. The result is a somewhat disturbing yet satisfying ambiguity. One of the best non-fiction books of the year.
July 12, 2008
The prose in this book wasn't really compelling, but the story is fascinating. I really appreciate Langer's effort to provide a balanced look at the events and environmnet that led to the killing of Mulugeta Seraw.
July 5, 2012
What a great book to illustrate for us that racism is still alive and well despite many who believe it is not. And yet, Langer has an ability to give us a truly objective account of this story that probably has never been given even by those involved at the center of this tragedy. A must read!
March 2, 2016
A very interesting and informative read. I felt that the last couple of chapters dealing with the trial and civil suit against WAR wad the weakest part of the book. It just seemed to slow down and really got hung up on the details of the law and lawyer tactics.
March 24, 2009
So far a great book...I will write a full review once completed.
August 2, 2011
I wanted to learn more about this event, but the writing is like reading one flashback after another. Hard to keep the timeline straight in my mind. Not recommended.
September 12, 2014
I absolutely despise racist of all sorts. This book focuses on an incident in which a young black man was murdered, as well as clarify the backgrounds into the "players" the movements they started.
September 23, 2010
A Hundred Little Hitlers (2003)
April 11, 2017
Read condo bk group Sept 2016, incredible research interviewing all of those involved. Langer remained a reporter, detailing the mood, conditions for such a crime. An older book, particularly relevant in our period.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews