“In the 1930s, Studs Terkel applied to the FBI to be a fingerprint guy — maybe if he’d gotten the job, we would have had “CSI: Studs Terkel.” But the FBI turned him away and in 1945 began surveillance that would last for more than four decades.”

At Jacket Copy, Carolynn Kellogg reports that the legendary oral historian’s concern for poor people made him a target of the Feds.