Film Noir Buff Style Forum / I Vie For The F.B.I (or probably the C.I.A.)

Prof Kelp · 2009-02-26 08:57:50

I've been wondering about Ivy league university students (and therefore the Ivy look) who may be recruited by law/government agencies to join them. In England tradionally MI5 and such agencies recruited from Oxbridge universities, so I would expect the CIA and such like to recruit from top Ivy league universities. Is this the case (our friends across the ocean may be able to spread more light on this for me). Certainly I have seen the blazer grey flannel conservative Ivy look (one I particularly like by the way) sported by characters playing CIA..FBI agents etc in films.

I've been looking hard for pics of genuine CIA or FBI agents from the 60's. I found a couple, only unfortunately they were of agents who died in service, so didn't think it fitting to post links. I expect this portrayal of the look came from real life??

I'd be interested on anyones views on this.

AQG · 2009-02-26 09:22:33

Can't help you out with real-life stuff for this, Prof. If you're interested in period fiction about Ivy League types in the CIA, check out William F. Buckley's Blackford Oakes novels.

boatshoe · 2009-02-26 09:28:45

Last edited by boatshoe (2009-02-26 09:38:34)

Prof Kelp · 2009-02-26 09:47:31

Tucker · 2009-02-26 10:15:13

Taylor McIntyre · 2009-02-26 10:24:26

They really ought to have me. I'm dead sneaky.

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-26 10:41:53

Prof Kelp,

WIll post a longer entry later today. In the meantime, the short answer is yes. You would do well to turn to A Legacy of Ashes, which is a brilliant history of the CIA (though, as per its title, it is less than a celebration of said organization--Tucker's comment summarizes much of the book's point in brief).

For an idea of who was picking the agents, do a wiki search on the Dulles brothers.

Again, if time allows, will try to post more later. Talk Ivy deserves a good long thread on this one.

On a side note, Buckley's time w/ the organization was something of a joke, as I remember it (both from the biography I've read of him and by his own account in his memoirs).

Best.

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-26 16:44:16

On a fictional front, you would do well to read James Ellroy's Underworld U.S.A. series, which is great modern hard-boiled stuff. It's a fictionalized take on history (think of that semi-fiction/semi-history stuff Don Delillo and Norman Mailer have been/were doing). In tracking the years from 1958 and 1973 it reviews a lot of CIA/FBI history including recruitment (jivy ivy and cold hard brutes). In his normal understated manner, Ellroy says of his series: ""There's nothing you could want to know about American crime in this century that you won't know by the time I've finished these books."

However, it's more of a jump into the world of Ellroy and all that entails (terse sentences, brutal men, and a lot of nastiness) than a close careful retelling of history, but if you think of it as more of a naturalist than a realist thing, I think you might really enjoy it, that is depending on your tolerance for Ellroy (that same writing voice that makes him so unique has become so predominant by now that a lot of people can't read his stuff).

The Village Voice called the second book in the series (third one's out this year I believe) "a great and terrible book" and they may be on to something (http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-05-01/books/ugly-america/).

Anyway, will try to find an exact quote when I get home. However, this is a great genre, both in fiction and in non-fiction, that has at least some ties to original-era ivy.

Last edited by Decline & Fall (2009-02-26 16:45:38)

AQG · 2009-02-26 17:35:20

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-27 06:08:16

Last edited by Decline & Fall (2009-02-27 07:40:41)

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-27 07:08:26

Last edited by Decline & Fall (2009-02-27 07:14:13)

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-27 07:12:39

Decline & Fall · 2009-02-27 07:17:56

tripchauncey · 2009-02-27 08:25:06

Chums,

An interesting description of the ol CIA's interviewing the Ivy Leaguers, no?

I always felt it a shame that their plans for the ol exploding cigar trick didnt work on Fidel. Perchance we should not have put all our faith in the Ivies.

http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=7&art_id=14804&sid=7177109&con_type=1&d_str=20060323&fc=10

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploding_cigar

Prof Kelp · 2009-02-27 08:49:51

Dec & Fall..I appreciate the effort you have put in for this thread. I too struggled to find some good pictures, particularly as I am thinking about the "look" in the 60's as I have seen it portrayed in films etc. You and AQG have opened up a lot of reading for me.

The recruits from Ivy universities must have been taking the look with them...esp as the Ivy look was reflective off, and reflected in the establishment, i.e. government etc as a lot of these guys would have been Ivy in earlier decades.

Tony Ventresca · 2009-02-27 11:05:35

I posted a quote from Gore Vidal talking about Howard Hunt, somewhere in another thread. I geuss the search eangine should reveal it. He (Vidal) was being his usual witty self.

#1 2009-02-26 08:57:50

I Vie For The F.B.I (or probably the C.I.A.)

#2 2009-02-26 09:22:33

Re: I Vie For The F.B.I (or probably the C.I.A.)

#3 2009-02-26 09:28:45

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#4 2009-02-26 09:47:31

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#5 2009-02-26 10:15:13

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#6 2009-02-26 10:24:26

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#7 2009-02-26 10:41:53

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#8 2009-02-26 16:44:16

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#9 2009-02-26 17:35:20

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#16 2009-02-27 11:05:35

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