by Ron Unz, The Unz Review:

Although I’d never had much interest in American history when I was young, the name of Charles A. Lindbergh was certainly known to me, with the story of that early pioneering aviator always rating at least a few sentences in my introductory textbooks.
I’d vaguely known that Lindbergh had been the first to cross the Atlantic on a solo flight from New York City to Paris, becoming world famous for that daring exploit. A few years later, his story had turned tragic when the kidnapping of his infant son became one of our most infamous crimes, with the entire nation mourning when the young child’s body was found, and the Lindbergh Case prompted changes in federal law. Matters took another dark turn in the early 1940s as Lindbergh became one of America’s leading isolationists, fiercely opposing our entry in World War II, with some of his antisemitic public statements permanently shattering his once-heroic image and leading to accusations that he was a supporter of Nazi Germany.