that Pfizer had submitted false and misleading information to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and that it had colluded with five other antibiotic manufacturers to keep competitors out of the business and attempt to monopolize the market. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) mandated that Pfizer and another company grant nonexclusive licenses at specific royalty rates to any qualified American company that applied to sell tetracycline. Indeed, the entire tetracycline industry became a magnet for allegations of wrongdoing: the FTC conducted investigations in the late 1950s, and the Department of Justice investigated again ten years later. 7
Not all of Broady’s work involved advanced science and corporate intrigue. In a subsequent trial, the millionaire John Jacob Astor testified that he’d hired Broady in the early 1950s to tap the phones at his own posh apartment at 598 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Astor, whose father had perished in the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, needed evidence in his divorce from his second wife. He hired Broady to tap the phones not only in his apartmentbut also in the home of the private investigator his wife had hired during the bitter marital battle. Their divorce became final in 1954.
Broady also trolled the phone lines for juicy secrets, which he used to generate divorce clients for himself. In one case, he tapped the line of a famous burlesque dancer, Ann Corio, hoping to learn who she was sleeping with—and sell that information to the wives of the unlucky men. *
During his trial, Broady denied that he’d been a party to the wiretapping scheme. He claimed that he had used the apartment for a different purpose. He spun an elaborate tale, claiming that he’d been working on a secret investigation of a Chinese air force general who had stolen $7 million from the Republic of China. On the witness stand, Broady burst into tears, saying that he feared for his life, and that one of his employees had been killed by the Chinese.
“I didn’t want them to knock me off like they did my man,” he blurted out. “I have a wife and kids.” 8
The jury didn’t buy the story. Broady was convicted and sentenced to two to four years in a New York state prison, stripped of his private investigator’s license, and barred from practicing law. 9
I F B ROADY WAS one of the quintessential private eyes of the mid-century on the East Coast, the ultimate investigator on the West Coast was Hal Lipset, a detective based in San Francisco, who was active for several decades after Broady’s misadventures in New York. Lipset’s work has not been forgotten. One of today’s leading corporate detectives told me, “If you want to understand this industry at all, check out Hal Lipset. We’re all still copying him.”
Hal Lipset applied new technologies to the science of bugging. Now, instead of phone taps or microphones with wires attached, investigators could use transistor technology to place wireless microphones almost anywhere they wanted. Moreover, Lipset argued that secret recording wasn’t an invasion of privacy—but a way for good citizens to protect themselves against fraud and government abuse.
Lipset was an accomplished detective, a great storyteller, and something of a showman. He was purely a private detective—he had almost no interest in the outcome of his cases with regard to law enforcement. “Judgments belong in a court of law,” he told his agents. “Our job is to earn the fee.” 10 But he didn’t look the part of a hard-boiled detective at all. In his later years, his receding hairline, thick glasses, and gentle expression made him look more like a doting uncle than an aggressive investigator.
By the mid-1960s, Congress had become increasingly concerned about the rise of a private eavesdropping industry that used bugs and telephone taps on citizens across the country. Senator Edward V. Long of Missouri launched an investigation to find out if Americans’ privacy rights were
Not all of Broady’s work involved advanced science and corporate intrigue. In a subsequent trial, the millionaire John Jacob Astor testified that he’d hired Broady in the early 1950s to tap the phones at his own posh apartment at 598 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. Astor, whose father had perished in the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, needed evidence in his divorce from his second wife. He hired Broady to tap the phones not only in his apartmentbut also in the home of the private investigator his wife had hired during the bitter marital battle. Their divorce became final in 1954.
Broady also trolled the phone lines for juicy secrets, which he used to generate divorce clients for himself. In one case, he tapped the line of a famous burlesque dancer, Ann Corio, hoping to learn who she was sleeping with—and sell that information to the wives of the unlucky men. *
During his trial, Broady denied that he’d been a party to the wiretapping scheme. He claimed that he had used the apartment for a different purpose. He spun an elaborate tale, claiming that he’d been working on a secret investigation of a Chinese air force general who had stolen $7 million from the Republic of China. On the witness stand, Broady burst into tears, saying that he feared for his life, and that one of his employees had been killed by the Chinese.
“I didn’t want them to knock me off like they did my man,” he blurted out. “I have a wife and kids.” 8
The jury didn’t buy the story. Broady was convicted and sentenced to two to four years in a New York state prison, stripped of his private investigator’s license, and barred from practicing law. 9
I F B ROADY WAS one of the quintessential private eyes of the mid-century on the East Coast, the ultimate investigator on the West Coast was Hal Lipset, a detective based in San Francisco, who was active for several decades after Broady’s misadventures in New York. Lipset’s work has not been forgotten. One of today’s leading corporate detectives told me, “If you want to understand this industry at all, check out Hal Lipset. We’re all still copying him.”
Hal Lipset applied new technologies to the science of bugging. Now, instead of phone taps or microphones with wires attached, investigators could use transistor technology to place wireless microphones almost anywhere they wanted. Moreover, Lipset argued that secret recording wasn’t an invasion of privacy—but a way for good citizens to protect themselves against fraud and government abuse.
Lipset was an accomplished detective, a great storyteller, and something of a showman. He was purely a private detective—he had almost no interest in the outcome of his cases with regard to law enforcement. “Judgments belong in a court of law,” he told his agents. “Our job is to earn the fee.” 10 But he didn’t look the part of a hard-boiled detective at all. In his later years, his receding hairline, thick glasses, and gentle expression made him look more like a doting uncle than an aggressive investigator.
By the mid-1960s, Congress had become increasingly concerned about the rise of a private eavesdropping industry that used bugs and telephone taps on citizens across the country. Senator Edward V. Long of Missouri launched an investigation to find out if Americans’ privacy rights were
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