Dreamers and Deceivers (41 page)

• “I am very sorry I couldn’t have you join me here sooner . . .” (Arnaz, 32)

• “That’s silly, Dad. We’ll be more comfortable here.” (Arnaz, 37)

• “No way my son is going to be a musician.” (Arnaz, 43)

• “Why don’t you call me Lucille, and I’ll call you Dizzy.” (Kanfer, 75)

• “Wouldya like me to teach you? It may come in handy for your part.” (Arnaz, 109)

• “Now, Desi, I want you to sweep Lana into your arms and kiss her passionately.” (Arnaz, 141)

• “You can’t have children over the telephone.” (Desilu, 22)

• “If no one will give us a job together, then we’ll give ourselves one.” Bart Andrews, “Lucy’s ‘Favorite Husband’ for Years, She Tried Her Best to Make the Marriage Work,”
Philadelphia Inquirer,
April 27, 1989.

• “Why are they so unhappy about
Look
magazine? Who’s going to care about that?” (Arnaz, 205)

• “Five thousand an episode.” (Arnaz, 72)

• “Well, that’s no problem. Tell the ladies to be my guest.” (Arnaz, 225)

• “How ya doing, you gorgeous Cuban?” (Kanfer, 137)

• “Thank you, America.” “Lucille Ball & Desi Arnaz—Toast of the Town October 3, 1954,” YouTube.
http://bit.ly/1rqd4PN
.

• “Oh, hell. I could tell them worse than that.” (Schindehette)

• “Maybe I’m a romantic, but there was a great, great love there.” (Schindehette)

• “We certainly did have everything. Worked very hard to get it . . .” “Lucille Ball & Barbara Walters: An Interview of a LifeTime (FULL),” YouTube.
http://bit.ly/1rqdaa6
.

• “Give Lucy ninety percent of the credit—divide the other ten percent among the rest of us . . .” (Sanders, 357)

• “. . . Every evening we spend watching television, we are exposed to his influence.” (Folkart)

Notes on specific scenes, facts, and characters:

• Desi Arnaz’s initials were etched in gold paint on his black Buick Roadmaster. (Sanders, 13)

• Desi could not believe that Lucille Ball was the same woman he had spotted on set yesterday. (Arnaz, 109)

• Desi was not angry that Lucy had signed a contract with MGM; he was mad that she signed it with help from Pandro Berman—her former lover. (Harris, 322)

• Although Desi did not want any visitors, Lucy was determined to see him and insisted on being let into his room. (Harris, 322)

Some scenes in this chapter were imagined or expanded beyond the basic historical record, including:

• The details of Desi Arnaz’s childhood in Cuba, including his flight from his home, as well as some of the direct quotes, are taken from Desi’s autobiography,
A Book.

• Most of the details and conversations with Desi’s father after he arrived in America are also taken from the Arnaz autobiography, as well as from numerous articles and interviews.

• Desi and Lucy’s first meeting and their conversation are based on details in both of their autobiographies. Lucy’s was titled
Love, Lucy
and was published posthumously by their daughter. Other sources for this scene include Coyne and Gilbert,
Desilu.

• Desi’s performance at the Roney Plaza Hotel is partly imagined but based on his autobiography.

• The scene with Desi in Louis B. Mayer’s office at MGM is partially imagined, but most of the details come from Arnaz’s memoir.

• The meeting with CBS executives and Lucille Ball is largely invented, though it does reflect actual conversations that Lucille recounts in her memoir.

• Desi’s conversations with his agent are imagined.

• Lucille’s decision-making process to green-light
Star Trek
is largely imagined, but is based on details included in several sources.

• The scene where Lucy and Desi play with their grandson is based on a real home movie taken by their daughter, Lucie Arnaz.

• Desi’s deathbed conversation with his nurse is invented. The words from Desi’s speech are from the historical record. See the video at
http://bit.ly/1rq25FV
.

Chapter 6: The Muckraker: How a Lost Letter Revealed Upton Sinclair’s Deception

Most of the facts used to create this story came from the following sources:

Alexander, Michael.
Jazz Age Jews.
Princeton University Press, 2001.

Arthur, Anthony.
Radical Innocent: Upton Sinclair.
Random House, 2007.

Literary Digest Magazine.
Vol. 61, no. 11, June 14, 1919.

Summation of Fred Moore for the Defense. Dedham, Mass., July 13, 1921. Court transcript available online:
http://bit.ly/1tjgPUs
.

Watson, Bruce.
Sacco and Vanzetti: The Men, The Murders, and the Judgment of Mankind.
Penguin, 2007.

Whitman, Alden. “Upton Sinclair, Author, Dead; Crusader for Social Justice, 90.”
New York Times,
November 26, 1968.

Most of the dialogue in this chapter was imagined, but the following quotations were taken in whole or in part from the historical record.

• “In the course of the arguments had in this case, attention will be directed . . .” (Moore)

• “. . . The will find two words there—’Social Justice’ for that is what I believe I fought for.” (Whitman)

• “Long live anarchy!” “Sacco and Vanzetti Put to Death Early This Morning,”
New York Times,
August 24, 1927.
http://nyti.ms/1lbXHrf
.

• “I wish to tell you that I am innocent, and that I never committed any crime but sometimes some sin. I am innocent of all crime, not only of this, but all. I am an innocent man.” (Ibid.)

• “What is your full name. . . . The fellow on the right here.” Testimony of Prosecution Witness Lewis Pelser, Courtroom Transcript.
http://bit.ly/1lbXXXc
.

• “Perhaps a thousand times as many people will read my novel as will ever look at the official record.” (Arthur)

• “To a hundred million groping, and ten times as many still in slumber, the names of Sacco and Vanzetti would be the eternal symbols of a dream, identical with civilization itself, of a human society in which wealth belongs to the producers of wealth, and the rewards of labor are to the laborers.” Upton Sinclair,
Boston: A Novel,
Scholarly Press, 1970.

Some scenes in this chapter were imagined or expanded beyond the basic historical record, including:

• The scene that takes place in Boston on August 23, 1927, is imagined. Upton Sinclair spent a great deal of time in Boston in 1926 and 1927
researching his book on Sacco and Vanzetti, but there is nothing that explicitly says he was there on the night they were executed.

• “To the workers of the whole world, it is a warning to get organized and check the bloodlust of capitalism.” Upton Sinclair as quoted in Paul Avrich,
Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background,
Princeton University Press, 1996, 161.

• “What an ironic twist of fate,” Sinclair,
Boston,
Bentley, 1978, 262.

• The scenes that occur on June 30 and August 4, 1901, are imagined, but according to Sinclair biographers, Meta Sinclair did try to abort her child. See, for example, Arthur,
Radical Innocent.

• Teddy Roosevelt and Upton Sinclair did meet in the White House, but the dialogue is imagined. The last quote summing up Roosevelt’s view of Sinclair is taken from a private letter he wrote to a friend: Roosevelt to William Allen White, July 31, 1906, in Elting E. Morison and John M. Blum, eds.,
The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt,
8 vols., Harvard University Press, 1951–54, vol. 5, 340.

• Most of the details of Carlo Valdinoci’s attack on Attorney General Palmer are taken from Alexander,
Jazz Age Jews.

• The July 13, 1921, courtroom scene is taken directly from the stenographer’s record. The court transcript is available online:
http://bit.ly/1tjgPUs
.

• Stalin was an admirer of Sacco and Vanzetti. More details are available in Watson,
Sacco and Vanzetti.

• Sinclair and Moore met in Denver in 1928, though exactly what was said is unknown. We do know from Sinclair’s letter that Moore clearly admitted to his belief that Sacco was not innocent of the murders.

Chapter 7: Alan Turing: How the Father of the Computer Saved the World for Democracy

Most of the facts used to create this story came from the following sources:

Copeland, Jack.
Turing.
Oxford University Press, 2013.

Duffus, Kevin.
War Zone: World War II Off the North Carolina Coast.
Looking Glass Productions, 2013.

Dyson, George.
Turing’s Cathedral.
Vintage, 2012.

Hodges, Andrew.
Alan Turing: The Enigma.
Centenary ed. Princeton University Press, 2012.

Hold, Jim.
Code-Breaker: The Life and Death of Alan Turing. The New Yorker,
2006.

Leavitt, David.
The Man Who Knew Too Much.
Norton, 2006.

Whitemore, Hugh.
Breaking the Code.
Fireside Theatre, 1987.

Most of the dialogue in this chapter was imagined, but the following quotations were taken in whole or in part from the historical record.

• “White man’s burden.” (Hodges, 23)

• “From cover to cover, it made science approachable . . .” (Hodges, 12)

• “The life of any creature—man, animal, or plant—is . . .” (Hodges, 17)

• “The body is a machine.” (Hodges, 13)

• “Look at the skin: a symbol of what lies within . . .” (Leavitt, 140)

• “When she breaks the tender peel . . .” (Leavitt, 140)

• “The life of any creature, is one long fight” (Hodges, 17)

• “The victim of the sleeping death . . .” (Leavitt, 280)

• “Dip the apple in the brew. Let the sleeping death seep through.” (Leavitt, 140)

• “The British Ambassador in Berlin handed . . .” The transcript of Neville Chamberlain’s declaration of war is at
http://bbc.in/1tjkRwn
.

• “I have to tell you now that no such undertaking . . .” (Chamberlain)

• “You can imagine what a bitter blow it is to me . . .” (Chamberlain)

• “You may be taking your part in the fighting services . . .” (Chamberlain)

• “Now may God bless you all . . .” (Chamberlain)

• “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” Walter Isaacson,
Steve Jobs,
A&C Black, 2012, 90.

• “There were 17,576 possible states of rotors.” (Hodges, 167)

• “There were 150,738,274,937,250 possible ways of connecting ten pairs of letters.” (Hodges, 178)

• “Hitler’s fate was sealed.” “Arsenal of Democracy—Chicago’s Industrial Might Quickly Mobilized for WWII,”
Chicago Tribune,
March 24, 2013,
http://trib.in/1tjldTF
.

• “Communications Supplementary Activities . . .” (Hodges, 243)

• “You are about to embark upon a great crusade . . .” Messages from General Dwight D. Eisenhower prior to Normandy invasion,
http://bit.ly/1tjloy7
.

Some scenes in this chapter were imagined or expanded beyond the basic historical record, including:

• The scene that takes place on April 9, 1919, is imagined. It does, however, incorporate elements of Turing’s childhood that are in the historical record, including examining the flight paths of bees.

• Details included in the scene that takes place on December 25, 1924, are imagined. It does, however, incorporate documented elements
from Turing’s childhood, like Brewster’s book and Turing’s receiving a chemistry set for Christmas.

• Details included in the scene that takes place on March 15, 1935, are all imagined.

• Details of the scene that takes place on October 28, 1938, are imagined, although Turing did see, and become a huge fan of,
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

• Turing’s listening to Chamberlain’s speech in the scene on September 3, 1939, is imagined, although Chamberlain’s words are from the historical record.

• In the scene on September 4, 1939, the dialogue and some details are imagined.

• The scene that takes place on October 26, 1940, is imagined, including the dialogue. It is known that Turing and Denniston did not always see eye to eye, but it is unknown if they had the substantive disagreement described in this scene. Accounts conflict, but it is possible that Denniston’s beliefs do not perfectly align with the way we’ve described them.

• The scene on January 7, 1941, is imagined, including the dialogue. Many of the dates in this chapter are educated guesses. It is possible that, by this date, Turing would have already been using cribs, and it is also possible that Denniston would have been familiar with the concept of cribs.

• In the scene from November 13, 1942, to March 23, 1943, Alan’s first day at Bell Labs is imagined, including the dialogue. Frank Cohen is not a person from the historical record.

• In the scene on February 7, 1952, the dialogue is imagined.

• The scene on June 7, 1954, describes Turing’s suicide. There were no witnesses, so details and his internal monologue are imagined, as are his final words. In his play
Breaking the Code,
Hugh Whitemore imagines Turing saying the same words when he eats the poisonous apple. In the biography of Turing by David Leavitt, Leavitt also quotes this couplet from
Snow White
on the last page of the biography, which discusses what Turing was thinking when he bit into the poisoned apple. The historical record shows that these words were among Turing’s favorite from
Snow White,
and he frequently recited them after seeing the movie.

• There is plenty of debate about whether the Apple logo has anything to do with Alan Turing. Apple itself has never officially denied or confirmed it, but the man who drew the original logo says he was unfamiliar with Turing at the time. See, for example,
http://cnn.it/1qxJ6mm
.

Chapter 8: The Spy Who Turned to a Pumpkin: Alger Hiss and the Liberal Establishment That Defended a Traitor

Most of the facts used to create this story came from the following sources: