Hero or villain? Author Reeve Lindbergh on the double life of Charles Lindbergh

In 1927, at the age of 25, aviator Charles Lindbergh made the first solo transatlantic flight. He won a $25,000 prize, and was immortalized. Lindbergh and his wife, author Anne Morrow Lindbergh, soon became known as “the most famous family of the twentieth century.” Five years after his famous flight, Lindbergh suffered a tragedy: his 20-month old son Charles was kidnapped and murdered in what became known as the “crime of the century.” During World War II, Lindbergh was a leader of the America First movement that opposed going to war with Germany and espoused anti-Semitic and pro-Nazi policies. President Franklin Roosevelt accused Lindbergh of being a Nazi. Lindbergh died in 1974, but in 2003, it was revealed that he had three German mistresses and had fathered seven children.

Vermont author Reeve Lindbergh is the daughter of Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh. She is a noted author of more than two dozen books for children and adults. In her newest book, Two Lives, Reeve Lindbergh writes about growing up in this famous household and how she navigates between her public family while leading a “quiet existence in rural Vermont.” In this interview, Lindbergh discusses her father’s controversial politics, her brother’s murder, the discovery of her father’s secret lives and her German half-siblings, Pres. Trump’s embrace of a new America First policy, and her life as a writer in Vermont.

Reeve Lindbergh, author