Throughout the 1950s, figures of real stature around Washington—men who knew Hoover personally—began to crack under the pressure of the Lavender Scare. In one tragic incident, Washington police arrested Lester C. Hunt Jr., son of Wyoming senator Lester Hunt, for soliciting sex from a man in Lafayette Park. After his son’s humiliating trial, Senator Hunt withdrew his reelection bid, then shot himself in the head in his Senate office.[30]
