The Making and Influence of "I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang"

by Scott Allen Nollen

McFarland & Company (series)

Robert E. Burns, a World War I veteran coerced into taking part in a petty crime in Atlanta, Georgia, was sentenced to hard labor on a chain gang in 1922. Twice escaping and on the lam for decades, he was aided only by his minister-poet brother, Vincent G. Burns. Their collaborative work, I Am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang! was the basis for Darryl F. Zanuck's and Mervyn Leroy's hard-hitting 1932 film adaptation from Warner Bros. This book traces the making and influence of the film--which launched a string of imitators--and the Burns brothers' efforts to obtain a pardon for Robert, which never came.