What makes this account of the 1925 Scopes trial in Tennessee so compelling–in which a school teacher was arrested for breaking a state law forbidding the teaching of evolution–is its contemporaneity. The trial featured super-attorney Clarence Darrow for the defense versus William Jennings Bryan. Bryan was a populist presidential candidate (three times) whose belief in his own rectitude and the infallibility of the bible was unshakeable. Bryan was a powerful orator with unwavering support from southern, rural Christian nationalists.
Making the book even more insightful is the effort that Wineapple puts into contextualizing the trial. Fully, the first half of the book is setting the global and national stages. World War I had concluded in unimaginable carnage: more than 20 million dead, largely because of advances in science and technology that increased killing efficiency. Americans fought in Europe and emerged without benefits, feeding isolationism. Tech millionaires on the east coast were making money hand over fist. Elites, intellectuals, and college educated urbanites were condescending and dismissive of rural and southern Americans.
The trial was a cultural and political clash of unparalleled magnitude pitting the ruthless progress of science and capital against the book-banning, but necessary return to faith of Christians looking for meaning in a world moving beyond their grasp.
