On June 15, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Espionage Act into federal law, initially as a way protect the United States from internal and external enemies during wartime. Since then, the Espionage Act of 1917 has been amended numerous times and used for different purposes. At the same time, the subject of espionage became a much buzzed-about topic in American culture, from Mad magazine’s Spy vs. Spy comic strip to the consistent stream of spy-related films coming out of Hollywood.

You can learn more about espionage in the United States with UNT Libraries.

Learn more about the Espionage Act of 1917

• Watch Documents of Destiny: The World War I Years to learn about the historical context of the Espionage Act
• Read a book about the Espionage Act of 1917 and its implications in the UNT Library Catalog
• Explore the real-time effects of the Espionage Act through newspapers available on The Portal to Texas History

Espionage in Popular Culture

• Read a book from UNT Libraries’ Monthly Books collection “Collusions of Conspiracy: Government Plots, Alien Abductions, and Opposing Viewpoints”
• Watch a spy-related movie from the UNT Media Library