
In "Thunderstruck," Erik Larson masterfully intertwines Marconi's wireless revolution with Dr. Crippen's notorious murder case. This New York Times bestseller spans London to Nova Scotia, showcasing how emerging technology caught history's most famous fugitive. "An edge-of-the-seat read" - People Magazine.
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In the summer of 1910, a mild-mannered doctor and his disguised mistress boarded a ship bound for Canada, unaware they were making history. As the SS Montrose sailed across the Atlantic, Captain Henry Kendall noticed something peculiar about the father and son duo traveling as "the Robinsons." The "son" had feminine mannerisms, while the "father" had recently shaved his mustache. Suspicious, Kendall composed a message and sent it crackling through the ether via his ship's wireless telegraph: "Have strong suspicions that Crippen London Cellar Murderer and accomplice are amongst saloon passengers." This message-traveling invisibly through the air at the speed of light-would transform Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen from an ordinary murderer into the first criminal caught by wireless technology. For the first time in human history, a fugitive couldn't simply disappear across an ocean. The world had suddenly become smaller, more connected, and infinitely more difficult to hide in. What makes this story so compelling isn't just the gruesome murder that triggered the manhunt, but how it intersected with one of humanity's greatest technological leaps-wireless communication. The pursuit of Crippen became a global sensation precisely because it demonstrated how dramatically science was reshaping society. In that moment, criminals everywhere realized with horror that the very air around them could be "quivering with accusatory messages."