John Edgar Hoover was born on January first 1895. He was the youngest child of the three surviving Hoover children born to Dickerson Naylor Hoover and his wife, Annie Marie Scheitlin Hoover. J. Edgar's only brother was Dickerson Jr., who was fifteen years older. J. Edgar's only sister was Lillian, who was thirteen years older. .
After correcting his own stuttering speech impediment, Edgar joined a debate team in high school, which turned him into a very persuasive, confident public speaker. Also, he was captain of the ROTC Company at his high school. His high school yearbook reveres him as "a gentleman of dauntless courage and stainless honor." So, from an early age Hoover developed a great deal of self-confidence and used that with initiative to take him exactly where he wanted to go.
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After Hoover completed high school, he began working at the Library of Congress and attending night classes at George Washington University Law School. In 1916, he was awarded his LL.B., and the next year he was awarded his LL.M. Shortly after finishing Law School, Hoover entered on duty with the Department of Justice on July 26, 1917. Here, he rose quickly in government service. He led the department's General Intelligence Division (GID), and in November 1918, he was named Assistant to the Attorney General, A. Mitchell Palmer. Together, Palmer and Hoover used the Espionage Act in 1917 and the Sedition Act in 1918 to launch a campaign against radicals and left-wing organizations. For example, Hoover turned the deportation of Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman into a personal crusade. Hoover branded them by saying they were "beyond doubt, two of the most dangerous anarchists in the country." Being so powerful with Palmer, Hoover compiled enough evidence to exile these people to Russia. Hoover and the FBI monitored these people's remaining lives to make sure that they were kept in exile. This time of J.
