ALBANY — Thai Jones, a 1995 Albany High School graduate and former Times Union editorial assistant, scored a literary hat trick this spring.

He earned a Ph.D. in history at Columbia University, published his second book and landed a coveted teaching job at Bard College.

And, he appears to have emerged from the flood of good fortune with his typical humility intact.

"I worked on this book in total obscurity for six years, about an event that had been long forgotten. It feels very relevant to people now and I feel really lucky to be part of the cultural conversation," Jones said.

There have been strong early reviews for "More Powerful Than Dynamite: Radicals, Plutocrats, Progressives, and New York's Year of Anarchy," which is set in New York City in 1914. Critics invariably draw comparisons between Jones' historical narrative and today's Occupy Wall Street movement.

In the turbulent prelude to World War I, Manhattan was a focal point for public outrage over a rising tide of poverty, homelessness, crime, industrial filth, sweatshop labor and disease. By contrast, greedy robber barons amassing enormous wealth and Gilded Age mansions being built rubbed salt into the wounds of the have-nots.

In the spring of 1914, thousands demonstrated in Union Square and their protests, fanned by the fiery rhetoric of anarchist Alexander Berkman, grew in size and vitriol. The clash between capitalists and laborers culminated in a large explosion on July 4th, which destroyed a seven-story tenement on Lexington Avenue in East Harlem. The three young radicals who were making the bomb were killed in a premature detonation. The bomb was intended to be used in an assassination attempt on John D. Rockefeller, the world's wealthiest man, in retaliation for the Ludlow massacre.

The Rockefeller family owned coal mines in Colorado and they were implicated by labor leaders following an attack by the Colorado National Guard on a tent encampment of striking coal miners and their families at Ludlow, Colo., on April 20, 1914. More than 20 people were killed, including women and children. It was the deadliest incident in the 14-month Colorado coal strike, one of the most violent in U.S. history, which left an estimated 66 dead and dozens more wounded. The strike centered on worker demands for better wages, stronger mine safety measures and the right to organize.

Although Jones finished the book before the Occupy movement began its encampments, there are striking comparisons between 1914 and today.

"I went down to Zucotti Park many times and it felt like my research had come to life," Jones said. "It's depressing in a sense to see how many of the same problems still exist. A difference is that the anarchists in 1914 were able to identify their enemy as John D. Rockefeller and they focused their protests on one person. The Occupy protesters have no explicit goals, no explicit demands and they've had very little luck in identifying a specific person or set of people. The complexity of today's global corporations makes it much more difficult."

Jones, 34, has become a historian of anarchy. He writes with an academic's detachment, infused with personal experience.

He's the son of Jeff Jones, an environmental consultant, and Eleanor Stein, a lawyer, who live in Albany's Pine Hills. In his first book, "A Radical Line," their son "outed" his parents' radical history and involvement with 1960s militant activism as members of the Weather Underground. The family memoir traced three generations of leftist politics on his maternal and paternal sides. Researching his own family's activism led indirectly to "More Powerful Than Dynamite."

"I did an Internet search and stumbled on the story from 1914 and it reminded me so strongly of the three Weather Underground members who were killed in 1970 when their bomb went off prematurely in their New York apartment," said Jones, whose book served as his doctoral dissertation.

Protest runs in his veins.

He first attended demonstrations as a preschooler, riding on his dad's shoulders and carrying a sign he helped fashion that demanded "Dinosaur Freedom." During Jones' early childhood, his parents were fugitives from justice and used a series of aliases. They were eventually caught after his dad was busted in Hoboken, N.J., in 1979 for growing marijuana on the roof of their apartment building.

Thai Jones chose to make his mark as a chronicler of history rather than as an activist.

"When your parents are among the most notorious rebels in the nation, there's no way to out-rebel them," he said. "I located my passion in narrative and analysis."

He credits two history teachers at Albany High, Tom McGurn and Richard Robelotto, for instilling a passion for history. He's working on his next book, a study of labor struggles in a Western gold-mining town in the early 20th century.

"My work will always focus on radical dissent and how that fits into the larger story of American history," he said. "Anarchism is having a moment of flourishing interest because of Occupy. To me, American history is the story of protesters and visionaries forcing the nation to live up to its own promises. Luckily, there are lots of those stories left to tell."

pgrondahl@timesunion.com • 518-454-5623 • @PaulGrondahl