For the American people, of course, the funeral train was just that
- the train bearing the body of deceased FDR.
It passed with darkened windows; few gave thought to what might be happening aboard.
A closer look inside the train, however, would reveal a Soviet spy about to leak a state secret, a newly widowed Eleanor Roosevelt who just found out that her husband's mistress was in the room when he died, and the entire family of incoming president Harry S. Truman.
The thrilling story of what took place behind the Pullman shades,
where women whispered and men tossed back highballs,
has never been told.
On the occasion of the sixty-fifth anniversary of FDR's death,
Klara chronicles the action-packed three-day train ride during which, among other things, Truman hammered out the policies that would galvanize a country in mourning and win the Second World War.
272 pages.