The Plot Against America

In May of 1942, Herman receives a letter from his company saying that he has been selected—as a senior employee—to be relocated as part of an initiative called Homestead 42. At the government’s expense, his family will be moved:

[I]n order to strike roots in an inspiring region of America previously inaccessible to them. Homestead 42 will provide a challenging environment steeped in our country’s oldest traditions where parents and children can enrich their Americanness over the generations (204). 

Days later, Herman shows Bess the letter and shares the news that he is being transferred to Danville, Kentucky. He says that men from his office are being sent to worse places that have fewer Jews, and that he almost feels lucky. Sandy is happy because Danville is fourteen miles away from the Mawhinney farm. Philip goes out into the street and stands in the rain. He does not want to leave his neighborhood. He feels that he is the only one left who can protect the family. 

The next day, Philip takes a bus to the building where Evelyn has an office. He asks her what it was like to eat dinner with the president. She tells him that it was a special night and that she danced with von Ribbentrop. When he tells her that he doesn’t want to move to Kentucky, she asks who sent him here. He tells her that he is there of his own will. She says that he will love Kentucky in the same way that Sandy did. He asks if Seldon Wishnow could go to Kentucky in his place. She gives him an after-dinner chocolate she saved from the White House dinner. Days later, Mrs. Wishnow receives a letter saying that her family is relocating to Danville. 

Herman holds a meeting with other people who are being relocated: Shepsie and Estelle Tirschwell, Mrs. Wishnow, and Monroe Silverman. Seldon and Philip are upstairs. Philip does not like him, but since news of the relocation, Seldon has followed him everywhere, which “registered as an unendurable ordeal and accelerated the urge to rebel” (221). He begins to steal Seldon’s clothes. One day, he puts them on and pretends to be Seldon. Bess asks Philip to loan Seldon some of his clothes. Philips gives him his least favorite pants and tells him to stop following him around. 

Life returns to normal, but Philip thinks often about how he does not know what decisions his parents are making about the future. One Sunday evening, they listen to Walter Winchell, expecting him to speak against Homestead 42. He doesn’t mention it, and Herman writes him a letter explaining that it is a Nazi experiment to see how much they can get away with. Bess tells he can’t send it because it will wind up in the hands of the authorities. He asks, “Should I just sit here waiting for the worst to happen?” (226). She tells him that she wants to go to Canada and he refuses. Sandy tells Philip that his parents are paranoid “ghetto Jews” (28). 

Walter Winchell returns and makes the expected, damming speech against Homestead 42. As he goes to a commercial, Sandy shouts “You filthy liar! You lying prick!” (230). The family phone rings several times that night, with friends calling to ask if they heard the broadcast. When everyone is asleep, Philip goes to the cellar and opens the storage bin. He takes out Seldon’s clothes and puts them on. He takes his stamp collection and leaves the house, walking towards the orphanage. 

Philip’s next memory is waking in the hospital; he was found bleeding and unconscious in the street. He has a concussion and a laceration that requires eighteen stitches. He is discharged the next morning. He learns that Seldon had seen him leave in the night and had followed him. Philip had stumbled into one of the orphanage’s horses and it had kicked him. Seldon is thrilled that Philip was wearing his clothes: it established “a value to his own existence that had previously escaped his attention” (234). Philip is devastated that his stamp collection is gone. He imagines orphans finding the album and destroying it. His mother looks for it, but it is gone. She tells Philip that he is a strange child, and that she had no idea.