The Atheist: Madalyn Murray O'Hair.

(New York, New York: University Press, 2003); 387 pp; $29.95 cloth

This review of Bryan E. Le Beau's biography The Atheist is a testament to the influence the subject of his book--Madalyn Murray O'Hair--has had on my life. O'Hair and her son Jon Garth Murray wrote the first book I ever read on atheism entitled All the Questions You Ever Wanted to Ask American Atheists with All the Answers. O'Hair helped to lay the groundwork for my eventual involvement with Humanism. This biography dives into the life of "Mad Mad Madalyn" and describes how she fought against religion and her inner demons.

Le Beau sketches out O'Hair's formative years in which her family suffered from financial hardship. Though he does an adequate job in giving the reader a sense of her early life, more details would provide greater insight into what helped shape her as she grew up. Fortunately, he was able to gain access to and publish O'Hair's diaries that cover her life from 1953--at the age of thirty-four--until her disappearance and murder in August 1995, with the exception of a few gaps. In these entries we no longer see the bombastic woman whose only goal is to destroy what others hold sacred. Instead, we see an entry from 1976, which reads:

  Please: somebody, somewhere,
   love me.
   Please: someone else, somewhere,
   share a dream with me.

The book jumps around, taking early events in a slightly random order, but readers soon find themselves at the Murray v. Curlett Supreme Court case, which springboarded O'Hair to fame (or infamy) and pinned her as "the most hated woman in America," according to Life magazine. Though the Court case was consolidated with a similar lawsuit, Abington Township v. Schempp, O'Hair wasn't shy about taking all the credit for removing mandatory Bible reading and prayer recitation from U.S. public schools. Le Beau shows, in fact, that O'Hair's main involvement with the Supreme Court decision was to seize "the opportunity to attain national notoriety as the leader of the American atheist movement."

Along with help from the media, O'Hair was able to perpetrate the myth of her expanded role in this 1963 case. Later that year, the Maryland Committee for State/Church Separation--the organization that eventually morphed into American Atheists--was founded. The book then traces several intertwined themes, including O'Hair's strong critique of religion and of theistic belief and the rise of her notoriety in the public eye and eventual fall as a sad spectacle. It also discusses the United States' cultural shift from the 1960s to the early 1990s, the many lawsuits and court cases O'Hair fought to separate religion from government, and struggles in O'Hair's personal life-including the "defection" of her son William Murray who became a Christian in 1980. The book ends with the ill-fated circumstances of her death, along with that of her son, Jon Garth Murray, and her granddaughter, Robin Murray.

Considering some of O'Hair's public antics, it probably isn't surprising to most that she fought several personal battles while leading American Atheists. The book touches upon her conflicts with supporters and chapter leaders and her use of "excommunication" against those she disagreed with. Undoubtedly, if Le Beau had wanted to dig further, he could have filled several more chapters with stories of the clashes that surrounded O'Hair.

The airing of this dirty laundry is essential not only for assessing her legacy but also to provide a cathartic release so we can all move beyond that history. The history of atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, Humanists, rationalists, and other brights in the United States is surely as rocky as that of any other social movement. The personal and professional conflicts have, in part, both hindered and propelled the movement. They are pieces of the intricate tapestry that have overshadowed the past and will, most unfortunately, play a role in the future.

In retrospect, many of the conflicts O'Hair faced were petty, unnecessary, and divisive, caused mainly by her autocratic leadership style, her demands of unquestioning loyalty, and the fact that she was a self-acknowledged "purist." These traits have some small advantages when attempting to organize. However, they eventually turn detrimental as a leader becomes obsessed about who is for and against her or him and as the focus turns to carving out a specific ideological niche at the expense of working with individuals and organizations which have a common identity and goal.

Not enough time has passed for us to fully judge the legacy O'Hair leaves. But she will always be the first atheist whose confidence and strength in what she believed and disbelieved gave me the encouragement to keep searching for the truth. Le Beau quotes O'Hair as saying that she wanted the words Woman, atheist, anarchist on her tombstone. That's a good start but certainly not the final word on the life of a remarkably multifaceted individual.

Jende Huang is the field assistant for the American Humanist Association.