On a sweltering afternoon in 1966, Charles Whitman ascended the University of Texas Tower with enough firepower to hold off an army. For the next ninety-six minutes he methodically gunned down forty-five strangers, killing fourteen. But as shocking as the rampage that made world headlines -- and the murders of his wife and mother the night before -- was the smiling photograph on the front page: a handsome, all-American Eagle Scout and U.S. Marine. A bewildered nation asked: How could this golden boy be a mass murderer?

At last we have an answer. Sifting through the facts and firsthand research, Gary Lavergne exposes the darkness behind Whitman's "golden boy" facade, and the issues this case forced America to confront: the insanity defense, domestic violence, military indoctrination, gun control. In his minute-by-minute account of one shattering day and its aftermath, Lavergne sheds new light on the mass murderers who have followed in Whitman's bloody footsteps, and the nation changed forever by their presence.