This is the experieince of Edmund Starling, on the detail of the Secret Service from Presidents Wilson through FDR (although he gave his notice when FDR was elected). Starling tells us of the romantic side of Woodrow Wilson, the humor of "Silent" Calvin Coolidge, and the soft side of Herbert Hoover; all things that the history books don't mention. The only downside of this book is the first 1-2 chapters in which Starling tells us of his days working for different sheriffs in Texas---a real snoozer. This is a keeper in my library and I have read it twice. ( )

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Starling was recruited to the Secret Service in 1914, and guarded in turn Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt. There is little here about the last two, but his portrayal of work at very close quarters with the first three is vivid, entertaining and at times moving; Starling was obviously much more than a guard, and seems to have had a genuine and deep friendship with both Wilson and Coolidge. (I was moved to tears by the death of Calvin Coolidge - and that's a sentence I never dreamed I would write.) One can't, of course, be sure how much of this is Starling himself and how much is his ghost-writer; in the first few chapters, describing Starling's early life and pre-White House career, you can almost hear the Kentucky twang in his voice, but that seems to fall off as the book goes on. One of the glades at the foot of Mount Rushmore is named after Starling, which seems a fitting tribute. ( )

The story of the man whose secret service detail guarded five presidents from Woodrow Wilson to Franklin D. Roosevelt, as told to Thomas Sugrue by Colonel Edmund W. Starling