Of course, everyone began to reassess that very quickly after he took power. But some of the Americans were much more prescient -- for instance, Edgar Mowrer, the Chicago Daily News correspondent, kept frantically trying to warn readers and the world, "What he's saying about the Jews is serious. Don't underestimate him."

How hard did these writers work to find out what was really going on? Did they take risks to get to the real story, or were they mostly content to stay in their comfortable bubble?

When you're a foreign correspondent, there's always the possibility of staying in your own little world. You all go over to each other's houses, you entertain each other, you have expense accounts. And the American correspondents and diplomats in Berlin were living in relative luxury. Even so, the good correspondents and diplomats did go out and seek information, even when it became progressively more difficult -- and more dangerous -- to get it.

That's what I found really interesting in a case like Edgar Mowrer, how he'd get information from a German-Jewish doctor. He'd make appointments to see him very often. The doctor would make sure his assistant was out of the room, and then he'd slip a note into Mowrer's shirt with information about who had been arrested, what had happened. When even that became too dangerous, Mowrer started a ritual of meeting the doctor at a public toilet once a week. They'd stand at neighboring urinals, and before each of them left, the doctor would drop that little sheet of paper, which Mowrer would pick up. Then they'd leave through separate exits.

Some journalists and diplomats took those kinds of risks and really pushed to get everything. Others held back -- after all, Germany really was a very prestigious reporting assignment. They felt constrained and didn't want to jeopardize their situation.

Was there an appetite for this news back home?

On the part of the newspaper editors, there was some skepticism about the early stories. In World War I, American newspapers had published a lot of stories about German atrocities -- about how they were bayoneting babies in Belgium -- and those proved to be fabrications. So I think the editors were open to some of these first reports about the Nazis, but they were wary.

Even the reporters were sometimes slow to write about the things they witnessed firsthand. I tell the story of Hans Kaltenborn, a famous radio broadcaster of that era. He was of German descent, but had grown up in the United States. Right after Hitler took power, there were attacks on Americans who failed to give the Hitler salute. Kaltenborn went over with the attitude that these reports were greatly exaggerated. Then his teenage son got beaten up for exactly the same reason. The Nazis apologized profusely and said, "I hope you won't write about this." And Kaltenborn replied, "No, I don't insert anything personal in my stories." Even after this happened to his own son, he was reluctant to write about it.