All the King's Men

All the King's Men Summary | Chapter 1 Summary

One hot day in 1936, Governor Willie Stark, also known as "The Boss," is visiting Mason City, his home town. Sugar Boy is driving the Cadillac." The Boss" is in the passenger seat, and the narrator, Jack Burden, Tiny Duffy (a large overweight man), and Lucy, Stark's wife, are in the back seat. They stop at the drug store for soft drinks, and people gather and demand that the Governor make a speech. After the speech, the little group of visitors gets back into the Cadillac for the ride to the farm of Willie Stark's father.

The story flashes back to 1922 when the narrator, Jack Burden, at the time a reporter for The Chronicle, first met Willie Stark, who was then county treasurer of Mason County and was married to Lucy, a school teacher. They are in the back room at Slade's Pool Hall. Willie is described as being "five feet eleven inches tall and heavyish in the chest and shortish in the leg." On that day in 1922, he is wearing a cheap seersucker suit and a "sweated-out" old felt hat. Tiny Duffy, tax assessor for the state, is also there that day. Everyone orders beer, except Willie orders an "orange pop." Willie Stark has come to town to see about a bond issue for a school.

Fast-forward to 1936 with the little entourage visiting Willie's father at the farm. A second car is following the Cadillac with photographers and equipment so they can take publicity pictures of Willie on the front steps of the farmhouse. The narrator, Jack Burden, carries a whiskey flask in his hip pocket, and he and "The Boss" share a quiet time at the back fence drinking and talking about Willie's childhood. Willie says his father doesn't approve of drinking, nor does his wife, Lucy.

Sadie Burke, who works for Willie, approaches and tells him, "Judge Irwin has come for Callahan." Willie reacts to that information by having Sadie clear everyone out. Jack Burden and Willie have supper with his father and then with Sugar-Boy at the wheel of the Cadillac, the two drive 130 miles to Burden's Landing, Jack Burden's family's home, to see Judge Irwin.

Jack's childhood friends had been Adam and Anne Stanton, who lived with their widowed father, Governor Stanton. The Judge had been like a second father to Jack after his father left. He is elderly now and is glad to see Jack, but not Willie Stark, who confronts him about supporting a man Willie has chosen for a senate nomination. The Judge will not budge, so Jack and Willie get in the car and go back to the farm in Mason City. On the way, Stark tells Burden to find something on Irwin he can use to blackmail him. Jack tells him he doesn't think he'll find anything, but Willie's says, "You find it."