Pamela D. Toler, PhD

The Untold Story of an American Reporter in Nazi Germany: The Dragon From Chicago

Sigrid Schultz was the Chicago Tribune’s Berlin bureau chief from 1925 to January 1941. She was one of the first reporters—male or female—to warn American readers of the growing dangers of Nazism, and was one of the last to leave Berlin before it was too late. At a time when women reporters rarely wrote front-page stories, Schultz regularly reported the truth about Nazi Germany in the face of censorship and the threat of expulsion, internment, or death. The Nazis called Schultz “that dragon from Chicago.” One of her fellow correspondents called her “Adolph Hitler’s greatest enemy.” Her story is a powerful account of one woman standing up for truth in an era marked by the spread of disinformation and propaganda spawned by hate.