Tag: Steve Oney

In the early part of the last century, at Christmastime, the Atlanta Journal customarily encouraged children of its readers to write Santa Claus short letters and entrust the newspaper with their safe delivery to the North Pole. No suspicions were raised, apparently, when the Journal printed many of those letters a few days before the holiday. And so it came to pass that the endearing, sometimes humorous wish lists of almost 300 kids filled two full pages in the edition published on December 23, 1908. In the middle of all that gray type, hidden in plain sight and forgotten for well over a century, was one that’s historically noteworthy.

Steve Oney is the author of And The Dead Shall Rise: The Murder of Mary Phagan and the Lynching of Leo Frank, the definitive account of the Frank case. We chatted with him about the lingering resonance of the Frank case and parallels between the social and political climate of Georgia in 1915 compared to today.

Throughout the rain-threatened spring morning, pilgrims kept arriving at the Marietta City Cemetery. High school kids researching a history project. A Darlington, South Carolina, lawyer who’d been planning his trip for months. A curious college student.