Letters from Laddie: Paris 1935-1936 in Bloomington, MN

The year is 1935, and Raymond A. Sprague-known to his family as "Laddie"-is 22 years old. The world is still recovering from one Great War and teetering on the brink of the next. The United States had scraped through the financial crash of 1928, yet is sinking into the Great Depression. Fear of communism has led many Americans to cast a tolerant eye on fascism, even as Hitler prepares to invade the Rhineland. Amid this turmoil, seeking independence and yearning to be a writer, Laddie becomes a young stringer for the famed Paris Edition of the
New York Herald Tribune.
Laddie sends weekly letters to his family back in the United States, painting a vivid picture of pre-war Paris: colleagues who will become household names, the social unrest rocking Paris and Europe, and celebrities of the day. As his year in Paris unfolds, Laddie also reveals his own painful internal struggle to find purpose. This is the true account of a young man searching for his role in the world, just as the world seems to be falling apart.