The Lunatic Fringe.

by Gerald W. Johnson

Short biographies of nonconformists.
*Table of Contents*
As you like it
Theodore Roosevelt
Thomas Paine
Sarah and Angelina Grimké
Horace Greeley
Victoria Claflin Woodhull
Henry George
Ignatius Donnelly
Sockless Jerry Simpson
Mary Elizabeth Clyens Lease
Coin Harvey
John Peter Altgeld
Carry Nation
Tom Watson
Conclusion.

258 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1957

About the author

Gerald White Johnson, often credited as Gerald W. Johnson, was a journalist, historian, and an advocate of liberal causes. He wrote many nonfiction books on history, biography, and commentary on American politics and culture.

Johnson was an editorial writer for the Baltimore Sunpupers from 1926 to 1943, and a contributing editor of the New Republic from 1954 until his death in 1980.

Reviews

[Cheryl A.]

I cannot get into the 'voice' of Johnson at all. Slangy, avuncular, but with big words and long sentences.... Moreover, he's writing directly to his contemporaries, assuming they know the same history and the same current affairs that he is immersed in. I will look up the names unfamiliar here... already did so with the sisters Grimke and am mightily impressed, would love to read a lucidly written history of them.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The mere example of non-conformity is itself a service. Precisely because the tyranny of opinion is such as to make eccentricity a reproach, it is desirable, in order to break through that tyranny, that people should be eccentric.” - John Stuart Mill

In his autobiography, Teddy Roosevelt coined the phrase “lunatic fringe” to describe those people who buck the trend of the current popular beliefs of an era. He saw this as a positive, just as Mill did, as a sort of “correction” for what we today call “groupthink.”

Johnson gives us the stories of some of these people. He describes 12 people whose thinking and actions may not have changed anything in their generations but influenced, even if that influence was not recognized and not direct, generations after. Most of the people are unknown to most of us – Henry George, Sockless Jerry Simpson, Coin Harvey. But just the fact that these people have been forgotten, even though they were well-known in their time, makes you stop to think that one person can indeed make a difference.

The book was written in 1957 and Johnson has no qualms about expressing his disdain for the Communist and nuclear threats of those days. In fact, he has no qualms about expressing his opinion about nearly everything he writes about. That, however, is part of the charm and interest of the book. The people he describes are not paragons but real people and Johnson is not shy about showing us their negative sides as well.

The book is delightful, well-written and easy (and fun!) to read. If you can get your hands on a copy, I’d suggest you read it.