MFDJ 12/06/24: Ill-Advised Adventure on Longs Peak

Today’s Ice-Coated Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Taking a break from studies at the end of April, four students from the University of Colorado at Boulder set off into the Rocky Mountain National Park wilderness on Monday, April 18, 1960, with the goal of reaching the summit of Longs Peak.

Prince Willmon, 23, of Fort Smith, Arkansas, was the oldest of the group. James A. Greig, 21, came from Glenview, Illinois, and David Jones, 19, had come from Webster Groves, Missouri. They were joined by their friend Jane Bendixen, 19, of Davenport, Iowa. By Tuesday morning, however, Greig felt he was coming down with something and he turned back. Willmon, Jones, and Bendixen continued down the Longs Peak trail and began their trek up the mountain.

Somehow, all four students had missed seeing the signs at the trailhead and elsewhere along the trail to the mountain, telling them that these trails were closed to all but technical climbers at this time of year. Late April is still snow season on mountains in the Front Range, so the hiking party could expect to find ice and snow at higher elevations that would make climbing without equipment and proper footwear a hazardous endeavor.

The three climbers, all of whom had substantial experience on mountain trails, made their way up Longs Peak without incident until they had nearly reached the summit. Then, in what seemed like minutes, the weather changed from a generally overcast but comfortable day into a raging blizzard. Ice coated the rocky trails, and snow gathered in deep drifts. None of the climbers were dressed for this kind of weather, so they soon began to feel the effects of exposure. Bendixen and Willmon knew that their hands, feet, and faces were starting to freeze.

By Wednesday morning, as they fought their way through the endless blizzard, Willmon felt he could not continue. Jones and Bendixen found an ice cave and left Willmon there, telling him that they would head down the mountain and go for help. Soon Bendixen found herself out in front of Jones, moving quickly in her descent. Suddenly her feet went out from under her. She fell down a rocky cliff, hit her head, and lost consciousness.

When she came to sometime later, she began calling for Jones, but she received no response. She wondered if he had fallen as well, but she didn’t see him close by, so she determined that despite her injuries and the sense that frostbite had enveloped her hands and feet, she had better move or forfeit her own life where she lay. She began walking, continuing her descent until she reached the base of the mountain and could see lights far in the distance. She walked toward the lights, finally finding herself at a mountain home in Allenspark.

When the family answered the door, they saw immediately that she was in terrible trouble. Soon Bendixen was in an ambulance on the way to a hospital, while rangers began the search for her friends.

Willmon and Jones were not so lucky. Rangers found Willmon frozen to death in the ice cave, and Jones at the base of a cliff, where he had fallen as much as one thousand feet. He did not survive the fall.

Culled from: Death in Rocky Mountain National Park

 

Vintage Crime Scene Du Jour!

No caption. Another tenement hallway victim, who has been shot or stabbed at a point probably between the collarbone and the heart. He is a strong man, a laborer, probably Jewish or Italian. The building is dingy, with cracks, hasty plastering, some kind of sub-graffiti chalk mark on the wall, and a common hallway sink.

Culled from: Evidence

 

Garretdom

SHOT BY MISTAKE.

A Husband Takes His Wife for a Burglar and Fatally Wounds Her.

DENVER, Col., Sept. 22.—A shocking affair occurred on the Whittemore rancho, near Golden, at an early hour yesterday morning. H. B. Whittemore, while in bed, shot his wife twice, thinking she was a burglar. One ball entered the left side of her neck, and the other the right shoulder, coming out below the right shoulder-blade. The story of the shooting as told by Whittemore is as follows: “When we retired I had $400, with which I had intended to pay a debt. I remember my wife said she could not bear the new flannels she had on and would change them. About one o’clock in the morning I was suddenly awakened y a noise in the room, and saw a dark form between me and the window. I immediately thought of my money, and certain that burglars were in the house, I raised myself in bed and fired. The figure came straight towards me and I fired again. We then clinched, and I discovered that it was my wife, who had got up to change her flannels, and who I had mistaken for a thief.

Mrs. Whittemore, in whose presence the story was told, was asked if it was correct. She nodded assent and tried to speak, but could not, although she made the most piteous attempts to do so. The husband is almost crazed with grief over the unfortunate affair. No arrests will be made, as everybody is convinced that the shooting was entirely accidental. The physicians say it is impossible for the woman to recover.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

MFDJ 12/04/24: Last Days of the Death March

Today’s Blood-Covered Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

On March 16, 1945, the Nazis liquidated the death camp at Spaichingen, located in southwestern Germany, about twenty miles north of the Swiss border. Joseph Freeman and thousands of other inmates began a six-week death march ordeal that ended in the city of Füssen in southern Germany. Joseph’s story is documented in the book The Road To Hell: Recollections of the Nazi Death March. The following is a brief excerpt from the book, discussing more than one month into the march.

In the weeks and days before the “Thousand Year Reich” was collapsing, we prisoners continued to agonize and to perish. As spring approached, the days grew warmer. We were barely surviving on a diet of grass, leaves and melted snow. I was dying piece by piece. The suffering of my fellow inmates was my suffering. I was not myself any longer. I was a part of a body of a hundred men, a collective body that was slowly expiring. Part of me was still living, but as inmates were dying with every passing hour, a part of me was dying too. It was a slow death. In a moment one can see the Angel of Death. This is the end. Humans die only once. I’m not human. I died a thousand times and I came back to life. Death was not an end to my suffering. I was death alive. There was no end to my agony.

In the last week of the death march we met a group of SS men escorting other inmates. We had no idea of where they came from. The SS from our group were engaged in an animated conversation with the SS escorting the other group. Then, after a while, the new group joined our column. As the two groups merged, we saw three trucks on the side of the road loaded with sacks of food. This was the price they had to pay to join our group. The SS from our group had made a good deal. They received a lot of food in exchange for a handful of new inmates to oversee. These new prisoners would be dead in a few days anyway. It looked as though the new group had been on the road for a long time. The new SS wore heavy, warm clothes: boots, fur coats, and raincoats with head covers. But their charges were poorly dressed and had no covers on their heads. Their faces were yellow. True, we looked repulsive, but the newcomers did not look any better, and the only difference being they did not smell as bad as we did.

That night the same scene repeated itself. We rested on frozen ground in an open field, surrounded by the well-fed SS. The smoke from their cigarettes and the smell of the vodka and pieces of salami drove some of the starving inmates crazy. Some could not take it anymore. They started to run and the SS sent the dogs after them. In just a few minutes we could hear the cries of the runaway prisoners. The barking of the dogs and the shouting of the SS still ring in my ears. Shouts rang out and then the silence. The SS returned with the dogs, who were covered in blood. Some of us quietly said Kaddish for those who had been killed. We could not sleep. I did not know how much longer we could go on.

The end was approaching for the last surviving inmates from Spaichingen. People were dying every day and night. The new SS men behaved more brutally than the former ones. If an inmate could not walk or fell down, he was immediately pulled from the line and shot. I felt I had reached my end. The pain and the inhumane conditions were catching up with me. I had lost so much weight I was reduced to skin and bones. When I received my ration it was very hard for me to reach my hand to my mouth to eat the little piece of bread. My hands were shaking uncontrollably. Inmates were lying and rolling on the ground with blood oozing from their mouths. The SS shot those who were laying down. This living Hell was an eternity.

A day later the new group joined us, the Unterscharfuehrer changed the routine. We rested during the day and marched in the evening. It appeared to me that we were avoiding villages and cities. Only one hundred and fifty inmates from Spaichingen Death Camp remained alive. During the four weeks of our forced march the SS had killed more than one thousand three hundred people.


Clandestine snapshot of a Nazi death march

Culled from: The Road To Hell

 

Malady Du Jour!

The Dr. Ikkaku Ochi Collection is a fascinating cluster of medical photographs from the late 19th and early 20th century that had been collected by Dr. Ikkaku Ochi in Japan and were found in a box many years later.  There was no detailed information available for most of the photos, but the images are compelling because they show composed portraits of people suffering through intense pain caused by conditions that in most cases would be resolved through treatment today. There’s a sense of overwhelming sadness that comes through in these pictures, but also dignity and strength.


Looks like tertiary syphilis to me…  

 

Garretdom: Sausage Poison Edition

A FAMILY POISONED.

Seven Persons Made Seriously Ill By Eating Impure Sausage.

The selling of impure meats resulted in the family of Thomas Fahy, living in the rear of 804 north Front street [Philadelphia], being made seriously ill yesterday afternoon by partaking of Bologna sausage purchased at a neighboring store. The housewife had prepared the noonday meal, and to make it more complete went to Whartman’s store, at Beach and Poplar streets, and bought a couple of pounds of Bologna sausage. Thomas Fahy, the head of the family, which consisted of himself, wife and four little Fahys, besides Margaret Cohen, who is stopping at the house, returned to his work after eating a hearty dinner, but complained of feeling unwell and went home. He had arrived but a few minutes when he was attacked with a violent fit of vomiting and retching pains in the stomach. Mrs. Fahy was taken sick with symptoms similar to those of her husband and Margaret Cohen, aged eighteen years, began vomiting up the poisonous substance, her condition becoming serious and exciting alarm. Thomas, aged seven years; Mamie, aged eight; Michael, aged ten, and Winnie, the youngest of the children, were all attacked with nausea and violent pains, but their condition is not considered as serious as the elder members of the family, they partaking but lightly of the impure sausage. The condition of the entire seven began to assume such alarming proportions that a messenger was sent to the office of Dr. Emil H. Herwig, at Third and Brown streets, who at once administered an antidote which afforded some relief to the sufferers. An investigation revealed the fact that the sudden illness was caused by “sausage poison,” induced by eating liberally of the meat which had become almost putrid. The children are recovering as rapidly as could be expected, and Mr. and Mrs. Fahy’s illness, thought serious, is not likely to result fatally. Margaret Cohen, who partook more liberally of the poisonous sausage than the others, is lying in a critical condition, and considerable apprehensions is felt regarding her recovery.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

I tried to find out if the Fahys (and poor Margaret) all survived but struck out in my research.

MFDJ 11/29/24: Incineration in Nanking

Today’s Blazing Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

The torture that the Japanese inflicted upon the native population at Nanking, China in December, 1937 almost surpasses the limits of human comprehension.  Here is one example:

The Japanese subjected large crowds of victims to mass incineration. In Hsiakan a Japanese soldier bound Chinese captives together, ten at a time, and pushed them into a pit, where they were sprayed with gasoline and ignited. On Taiping Road, the Japanese ordered a large number of shop clerks to extinguish a fire, then bound them together with rope and threw them into the blaze. Japanese soldiers even devised games with fire. One method of entertainment was to drive mobs of Chinese to the top stories or roofs of buildings, tear down the stairs, and set the bottom floors on fire. Many such victims committed suicide by jumping out windows or off rooftops. Another form of amusement involved dousing victims with fuel, shooting them, and watching them explode into flame. In one infamous incident, Japanese soldiers forced hundreds of men, women, and children into a square, soaked them with gasoline, and then fired on them with machine guns.


Chinese man burned to death by the Japanese

Culled from: The Rape of Nanking

 

Suicide Du Jour!

One of my favorite books is Death Scenes: A Homicide Detective’s Scrapbook.  It is exactly what it says it is: a bizarre and oft-disturbing scrapbook collected over the years by Los Angeles area police detective Jack Huddleston, whose career spanned from 1921 to the early 1950’s. Here’s an entry that may have inspired a Hüsker Dü song!

 

Garretdom: Olde News!

Killed in an Elevator.

CHICAGO, Sept. 23.—As the employees in Mayer, Engles & Co.’s wholesale clothing house were leaving the store last evening, the elevator, containing Samuel Mayer, Samuel Herman and Louis Nochman, fell from the fourth floor to the basement. The accident was caused by the breaking of the cable. Herman’s chest was crushed in, producing internal injuries from which he died. Mayer had his skull seriously fractured and will probably die. Nochman, who was taken to the Michael Reese hospital, had an arm broken and a shoulder dislocated.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

Here’s a follow-up from the Thursday, September 30, 1886 issue of the Chicago Tribune:

That Elevator Accident.

The inquest on Samuel Mayer and Samuel Harmon, the two men who lost their lives in the elevator accident at the corner of Fifth avenue and Adams street about ten days ago, was continued yesterday at the Michael Reese Hospital. Louis Nachman, the elevator-boy, who is suffering from a broken arm, testified that the two men, Mayer and Harmon, got on the elevator on the fifth floor, and that at noon as he closed the gate and started down Mayer and Harman began sparring. The elevator had only gone a few feet when he was struck and knocked down, the heel of his right shoe becoming wedged between the floor of the elevator and the wall of the elevator-chute. This brought the elevator to a stop, but for what length of time he could not say, as he lost consciousness at the moment his foot was caught and the elevator stopped, and did not regain it for over twenty-four hours. The verdict of the jury was that the heel of the shoe caught between the platform and the shaft, holding the elevator still although the throttle had been pulled for a down trip; that the cable unwound rapidly and that when the heel was torn from the shoe the elevator shot down to the basement, a distance of thirty feet.

MFDJ 11/27/24: The Dreadful Boot

Today’s Immoveable Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Persuasion by means of pressing usually ended in death — hardly desirable in court cases where confessions and names of accomplices were required. However, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, particularly in Scotland and France, a device was used which, while not endangering life in any way, positively encouraged the unfortunate victim to reveal everything he knew, whether true or imagined. The instrument was known as the Boot.

There were several versions of this device, the variations probably owing to the fact that in those times descriptions were passed by word of mouth rather than by detailed drawings and blueprints. So torture-instrument manufacturers at one end of the country were given a different idea of how the machine functioned than was actually the case. But as long as all the machines caused excruciating agony, there was obviously no need for any standardization by the authorities.

As its name implies, the boot was designed to torture a prisoner’s legs and feet, and the device was so effective that even the early stages of its application caused injuries sufficient to induce a hasty confession.

The most common form of the boot required the victim to sit on a bench, to which he was securely tied. An upright board was then placed on either side of each leg, splinting them from knee to ankle; the boards were held together by ropes or iron rings within a frame.

With the legs now immoveable, the torture started with wooden wedges hammered between the two inner boards and then between the outer boards and their surrounding frame, compressing and crushing the trapped flesh.


The Boot

An alternative method dispensed with the frame. Instead the boards on each side of the legs were bound tightly together. For the ‘ordinary’ torture, four wedges were driven between the two inner boards. For the extra-ordinary torture, eight wedges were used, bursting flesh and bone, and permanently crippling the victim. It was described by a seventeenth-century visitor to Scotland as ‘four pieces of narrow board nailed together, of a competent length for the leg, not unlike the short cases we use to guard young trees from the rabbits, which they wedge so tightly on all sides that, not being ably to bear the pain, they promise confession to get rid of it.’

Culled from: Rack, Rope and Red-hot Pincers

 

Dissection Photo Du Jour!

School unknown, ca. 1900. Bucket for waste is visible in the foreground beneath table at left. Private collection.

Culled from: Dissection: Photographs of a Rite of Passage in American Medicine: 1880-1930

 

Garretdom: Olde News

They had quite a thunderstorm in Lima, Ohio in 1886!  And who knew that they had an oil boom in Ohio?  

STRUCK BY LIGHTNING.

Oil Tanks in a Blaze, and a Woman Killed by a Stray Bolt.

LIMA, Ohio, Sept. 23.—This morning at seven o’clock this city was startled by a terrific clash of thunder. In a few moments, black clouds of smoke were seen rolling up from one of the oil wells on the Brotherton land. The fire at once communicated with the tank, and in a few minutes all was on fire. At the same time the gas in the tank three hundred yards west ignited. The wells, all machinery, tanks and about 2400 barrels of oil were consumed. At one o’clock the derrick at the gas works oil well was struck, consuming the entire structure, machinery and tanks and 1200 barrels of oil. This well is adjoining the gas-works, which at one time was in great danger; but the gas-works and all the machinery connected therewith are saved. The railroad bridge was on fire several times, caused by oil running down, but was saved without much damage. About that time high columns of black smoke were seen southeast from the city. Five wells are reported to have been struck by lightning and destroyed: The Hogle No. 2, Shockey, McLain, Holmes and Bowman. Rain ahs been falling in torrents. The thunder and lightning has exceeded anything of the kind known here.

Mrs. Henderson, standing in the doorway of her home near the first well struck, was struck by a stray bolt and killed.

Reports of damage by lightning at several places in this vicinity have been received. At Bluffton the Eastern and Western Narrow Gauge Railroad depot was struck by lightning and totally destroyed. At Beaver Dam the Lake Erie and Western Railroad depot was badly damaged. At Spicerville Charles Hoover’s barn was destroyed, and many barns and outhouses are reported to have been destroyed in the vicinity of Lima.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

MFDJ 10/24/24: An Impulsive Prospector

Today’s Reckless Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Perhaps the earliest witnessed fatal fall of a prospector in Grand Canyon was that of Daniel W. Mooney. Formerly a sailor, and then a rancher in the Williamson Valley near Prescott, Arizona, Mooney had been bitten by the lure of mineral riches. Bitten hard. Mooney and four other miners filed one of the earliest claims in Havasu (a.k.a. Cataract) Canyon. They found lead and silver, fairly common in Havasu but economically challenging to extract. Mooney and a few others among the dozen associated miners who prospected Havasu’s canyon system felt teased by the mystery of what might lay below the biggest falls along the last seven miles or so to the Colorado. This mystery tortured Mooney.

The Havasupai people apparently never traveled downstream of this point, and for good reason: the falls dropped 196 feet and offered only the most hellishly exposed, expert-only climbing route.

Finally, in 1880, Mooney decided he could pull off a descent. As Billingsley, Spamer, and Mankes tell it:

On a fateful last trip, Mooney took a rope down into the canyon and, trusting his sailor’s experience with ropes and rope climbing, let himself down over the falls. Once he was over the falls, the others in the party lost sight of him and the roar of water precluded any verbal communication. Soon they felt the rope slacken and, running around to the side of the falls, they saw the rope dangling nearly half way down. Mooney lay on the rocks below. Unable to reach him, all they could do was leave.

A prospecting associate, Edward I. Doheny, described Mooney as red-headed, red-bearded, and possessing a violent temper. Mooney was also the spokesman with the Havasupai Indians for the dozen prospectors allied in combing their canyons for paydirt. “Mooney,” Doheny said, “was very reckless and did not exercise the caution that 100 percent sanity would dictate. His fall from the place where he had started to go down over a bluff on a very small rope, was not altogether unexpected by those of us who constituted the party.”

A few years later, in 1883, Matthew Humphreys would blast out a descending tunnel along the creek’s left side. Mooney’s friends then buried him almost exactly where he fell. In less than four years, however, the thin sands atop Mooney washed away, as prospector William Wallace Bass noted, to reveal his “grinning teeth and eye sockets.”


It’s now called “Mooney Falls” which is appropriate in multiple ways!

Culled from: Over the Edge: Death in Grand Canyon

 

Ohio State Penitentiary Prisoner Du Jour

Arthur J. Grover

Arthur J. Grover was executed at forty-five minutes past twelve on the night of May 14, 1886. He met his death bravely, declaring his innocence to the very last moment of his life, but justice knew best, and he suffered death for the murder of an aged lady said to possess a small fortune, residing in Wood county. The people of that county were so indignant over the cowardly murder that they would not allow his remains to be buried in the county, and his body was given to the students of one of the medical colleges of this city.

Culled from: The Ohio Penitentiary – 1899

 

Garretdom: Olde News

Disastrous Explosion of Natural Gas.

PEKIN, Ill., Sept. 23.—The explosion of a gas stove in the summer kitchen of T. Hainline, a wealthy farmer living near Hopedale, this county, Sunday evening, resulted in the death of Mrs. Hainline and serious injury to Miss Ling, a teacher stopping with the family. Some time ago Hainline discovered a natural gas well on his farm and connected it with the house in order to utilize the gas. When Mrs. Hainline went to prepare supper she touched a match to the stove, as usual, when an explosion immediately followed, demolishing the kitchen and burning her so severely that she died in great agony last night. It is feared that Miss Ling will not recover.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

I found another article with additional details from the Friday, September 24, 1886 issue of The Weekly Pantagraph:

A HORRIBLE AFFAIR.

Mrs. Sylvester Hainline, Jr., of Minier, Burned to Death by a Natural Gas Explosion.

—THE PANTAGRAPH’S Minier correspondent writes as follows: We promised the PANTAGRAPH a more complete account of the gas well explosion as soon as we could learn it. From an authentic source we learn the following: Miss Ruie Ling, of Minier, was to commence school in the Hainline district last Monday, and during the term was to board at the home of Sylvester Hainline, Jr. Mr. Hainline some time ago, in boring for a well, struck a vein of gas. He built a shed over the well and, by means of a pipe from well to stove, was utilizing the gas as fuel. Miss Ling had heard of the well and on Sunday, when she went to Mr. Hainline’s to commence boarding, she expressed a desire to see the gas burn, and see the “thing in running order.” Mrs. Hainline explained it to her, and then was to light it to show it in working order. During the afternoon when there was no fire the gas had collected and, when she struck the match there was an explosion heard nearly a mile. Mrs. Hainline’s clothes took fire at the bottom, and everything but her corset and shoes was burned from her body. Miss Ling was badly burned about her neck and head, and in her efforts to put out the fire on Mrs. Hainline she had her hands and arms severely burned. The report and shock soon brought neighbors, and a doctor was sent for, but Mrs. Hainline died on Tuesday in great agony. Miss Ling is slowly improving, but will show marks of the fire as long as she lives. Too much praise can not be said of the actions of Miss Ruie Ling. At the critical moment, when Mrs. Hainline’s clothes were burning and Miss Ling using every endeavor to put the fire out, the family dog, seeing Mrs. Hainline down and Miss Ling struggling over her thought that she was injuring Mrs. Hainline, and attacked Mrs. Ling, thus placing her in a trying situation. She fought both the fire and the dog with heroic courage, and, to a certain extent, successfully. Miss Ling was reported yesterday as being somewhat better, but is still in a precarious situation.

I did additional research, and Ruie Ling was married three times and died in 1939 at the age of 74.

MFDJ 10/21/24: Dangerous Photo Ops

Today’s Perfect Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Scrambling around the lip of a fall in Yosemite Park in search of a more “perfect” spot from which to see the water falling has been lethal at least six times. On July 27, 1970, 19-year-old Nicholas Michael Cordil from Los Angeles hiked with Donald Echenberg to the top of Upper Yosemite Fall. They arrived together but Cordil soon separated from his buddy to hoke toward the world-famous scene. Over his shoulder he told Echenberg he was “going to look at the fall.”

Cordil too never came back. Echenberg searched but could not find him. Three days later a hiker found parts of Cordil’s badly damaged body in the deep pools below the base of the waterfall.

How easily these fatal slips occur is often hard to believe. On August 13, 1989, 20-year-old John Eric Ofner from Santa Barbara, California hiked with Gretchen Rose and Celia Denig to the top of Upper Yosemite Fall. The weather was hot. All three hikers went swimming in Yosemite Creek. Now cooled off, Ofner walked to the edge of the waterfall for a better look. He tried to peer downward. He edged a little closer, looked again, and then realized that this was the best view he was going to get. He turned around to head back upstream to Rose and Denig.

Abruptly he lost his footing on the sloping rock and fell facedown into the creek. Even though the water was flowing fairly low, it instantly swept him over the brink. Ofner fell more than 1,400 feet onto granite and was decapitated upon impact.


“Maybe I can get just a little bit closer…”

Culled from: Off the Wall: Death in Yosemite

Sing Sing Death House Prisoner Du Jour!

NAME: Anthony Papa
NUMBER: 106-433
AGE: 27
OCCUPATION: Button Maker
MARITAL: Married, 1 child
PHYSICAL: 5’8″, 183 lbs.
CRIME: Saw 5-year-old girl at his wedding, was attracted to her, struck and killed her, night, premises, Mineola, 4-19-47
CLAIMS: Doesn’t remember doing it (if he did it)
JUDGE: Collins, Nassau County Court
SENTENCED: 10-22-47
RECEIVED: 10-22-47
EXECUTED: 7-1-48

Date May 29, 1945

I, ANTHONY R. PAPA, hereby request that, in the event that I am executed, my eyes be immediately removed and given to the New York Eye Bank, for whatever disposition and use they may wish.

Anthony R. Papa

I approve of the above gift.

Frances Papa
Wife

I think there’s a song by The Adverts about that…  – DeSpair

I found additional information on the crime in the newspaper archive:

Former Service Man Held In Girl’s Death

MINEOLA, N. Y., April 21—AP—Anthony Papa, 27, was held today on a first degree murder charge in the death of six-year-old Rosemary Fusco, who was found dead in her home Saturday night, her throat slashes from ear to ear.

District Attorney James N. Gehrig of Nassau county said that Papa, who had been dishonorably discharged by both the army and the navy, was arrested after police followed a trail of blood from the Fusco home to the Papa home.

Gehrig said that papa, while confessing the slaying yesterday afternoon, asserted that, “I loved her like she was my own child.”

The trail of blood leading to the Papa residence resulted from Papa’s cutting his hand on the window of the Fusco home, Gehrig said.

(Belleville Daily Advocate, Monday April 21, 1947)

Child Slayer Dies In Electric Chair

OSSINING, N.Y., July 2 (AP)—Anthony Papa, 28-year-old child slayer, died in the electric chair at Sing Sing prison last night.

Papa was silent at the end. Yesterday, he had complained about the heat, saying “It’s awful hot along with my other troubles.”

He was convicted of first degree murder on Oct. 12, 1947 for slashing to death six-year-old Rose Marie Fusco in her Mineaola, N. Y., home the preceding April.

(Bangor Commercial, Friday, July 2, 1948)

 

Garretdom: Olde News

Why a Saloon-Keeper Was Murdered.

CLEVELAND, Ohio, Sept. 23.—The Coroner’s inquest in the murder case at Melmore, Ohio, develops the fact that Lewis C. Leidy, a saloon-keeper, was murdered by Charles Gains and Nathaniel Echelberry. The men entered Leidy’s saloon Monday morning and asked for some whisky. Leidy refused to sell to them because their wives had requested him not to do so. The men left the saloon, returning in a few minutes armed with stones. The quarrel was renewed, and Echelberry struck Leidy on the head with one of the missiles, fracturing his skull. Both men then jumped upon their victim and beat and kicked him in a most brutal manner until life was entirely extinct.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

MFDJ 10/19/24: Charnel Houses of London

Today’s Fleshless Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

As the distinguished historian Dr. Vanessa Harding has observed, the dead were everywhere in mediaeval London, ‘neither out of sight, nor out of mind’.  The Romans had feared their dead, and banished them to distant cemeteries; by the Middle Ages, Christians buried their dead close to home. Londoners were born, baptized, married and buried in the Church. Literally, in many instances, as burial within the walls and vaults was considered the most distinguished form of interment.

Although St John Chrysostom had directed Christians to continue the Roman practice in the fourth century AD, warning them that burial in the church was analogous to placing a rotting cadaver near the limbs of Christ, his caution was ignored. The custom of burying within the church derived from the concept of martyrdom. Christians revered those who had died for their faith, turning their tombs into shrines. The faithful clamoured to be buried alongside the martyrs, as close as possible to the venerable remains, a custom which, in anthropological terms, recalls Neolithic beliefs that certain human remains possessed supernatural properties. It was believed that canonized saints did not rot, like lesser mortals, but that their corpses were miraculously preserved and emanated an odour of sanctity, a sweet floral smell, for years after death. In forensic terms, such preservation is likely to be a result of natural mummification in hot, dry conditions.

The tradition of martyrdom informed a different attitude towards human remains. Corpses per se were not regarded as objects of fear. Nowhere was this more evident than in the charnel house of St. Paul’s. Built over a shrine to St Erkenwald, an Anglo-Saxon bishop of London, following a great fire, beneath its soil lay the graves of Britons, Saxons and Romans. St Paul’s was London’s principal church after Westminster Abbey. Weddings were celebrated here, sermons preached, plays enacted and burials conducted.

The institution of the charnel house was a particularly gruesome aspect of mediaeval burial. Christians then had little concept of one man, one grave, and many, of course, could not afford an elaborate burial. Fees consisted of payments to the gravedigger for breaking the ground, to the priest and to the parish church, and to the sexton who tolled the passing bell. Those who could not pay were buried “on the parish”, in pits, wrapped in shrouds. When one pit was full, it was covered in earth, and  previous one reopened. The bones were dug up, and taken to the charnel house for safekeeping. The term derives from the French charnier: flesh. In France and Italy, skeletal remains were used to create artistic displays, including chandeliers, which were exhibited in the ossuary—a gallery above a charnel house.


The bone crypt at St. George’s Church in Doncaster, depicted before the fire of 1853. 

Eventually, even the bodies of the wealthy, buried under the stone flags of the church, submitted to this fate. But it was not regarded as violation. The French historian Philippe Aries has observed that the significant thing was to be buried in or near the church. What actually happened to your body after that was immaterial. Tombs and headstones were reserved for the nobility. Although the faithful visited the shrines of saints, the concepts of returning to the grave of a loved one, and communing with their memory, was unknown.

The dead were also at the heart of the city. Saturated with Christian theology, the attitude of the average Londoner was, in the words of Aries, ‘et moriemur — and we shall all die’. With land at a premium, churchyards were communal spaces as the core of parish life, more like street markets than parks. Laundry fluttered above the graves; chickens and pigs jostled for scraps. Bands of travelling players enacted dramas, and desecration was inevitable, with ‘boisterous churls’ playing football, dancing, drinking and fighting on the hallowed ground. Just how rough these activities got is indicated by entries in parish registers of deaths resulting from participation in such pastimes. Church services were frequently disturbed, and the erection of booths for the sale of food and drink caused serious damage to the graves. Before condemning such irreverence, we should remember that the bond between the living and the dead was very different from today. It was an extension of the mediaeval belief that the dead were, in some sense, still close by, and probably grateful to hear the merrymaking.

Culled from: Necropolis: London and Its Dead

 

Car Crash Du Jour!

One of my favorite books is Car Crashes and Other Sad Stories by Anaheim photographer Mell Kilpatrick. It’s a collection of car crash photos from the 40’s and 50’s, often with corpses still strewn across the enormous interior (or out of it, since there were no seat belts in those days). It combines my love of old cars with my love of morbidity and is the perfect ambulance chaser book!


1/4 mile north of Katella Ave.

 

Garretdom: Olde News

An Italian Murders Another.

NEW YORK, Sept. 23.—Frank Pieren and Antonio Fiero, Italian junk dealers, of South Brooklyn, between whom a bitter feud has existed for some time past, met this morning opposite No. 465 Carroll street, South Brooklyn. A quarrel followed, which culminated in Pieren’s death. After a war of words Pieren, it seems, snatched an iron bar, with which he struck his adversary in the face. Fiero wrenched the weapon away, whereupon Pieren seized a stick. Michaelo Daly, a brother-in-law of Piero, seeing his relative getting the worst of the battle, interfered, and with a broad-bladed sheath-knife stabbed Pieren in the abdomen, a breast, left arm and left side. He died in a little while. Daly was arrested.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

 

MFDJ 10/15/24: Boys Will Be Monsters

Today’s Exciting Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

This was written by John Marr in his wonderful 1990’s era zine “Murder Can Be Fun“.  I’d like to shout out what a splendid bit of writing it is! – DeSpair

The classic recreational drowning occurred in Lowell, Massachusetts in 1925. A fine spring afternoon found 9-year-old Johnny Veres and his little pal Milt, who was only 6, goofing off on the bands of the Merrimac River. Undoubtedly, by the time they answered the summons of history, the two young scamps had already run through the complete retinue of childish riverside amusements. Bare toes had wiggled in mud, stones had skipped across the water, fish had evaded improvised hooks. The lads itched for something new, something different. As they later told police, they were ready “for excitement.”

They found it by adding a new, original twist to an ancient game. For thousands of years, small boys [and girls!  – DeSpair] have whiled away many a seaside hour by constructing small crude crafts of flotsam and jetsam. After setting them adrift, the youthful rascals gleefully pelt the products of their labors with stones. The game ends when the target has been smashed to kindling, or, better yet, sunk to the accompaniment of children reveling in the joy of destruction.

Johnny and Milt’s innovation was simple: a living target. Aquatic birds were out; they have an unsporting habit of flying out of range after the first volley. Adult swimmers and mariners are prone to retaliation. This left them but one obvious option.

Somehow or other, they got their hands on an 18-month-old baby. After stripping the squirming infant of her clothes, they threw her into the river and jovially pelted her with rocks as the current bore her away. Unlike their previous floating targets, it wasn’t necessary for them to score too many direct hits to sink the screaming infant. As she went down, they probably thought exultantly, This is excitement! The quick response of the police, summoned by horrified onlookers, was just an added thrill. However, it was too late for the baby. By the time her body was recovered from the river, she was dead.

In custody, Johnny and Milt corroborated each other’s stories, save for one small detail. Each admitted to his part in the kidnapping, and they had no compunction about describing how they threw the stones. But when it came to throwing the baby in the river in the first place, it was a plain case of, “He started it first!”

Milt was eligible to get away with it by virtue of his age; Massachusetts law at the time presumed that a child under the age of seven was unable to understand the nature of their act. No charges were brought against him, although he was held as a material witness. The picture for little Johnny was far grimmer. He was indicated for manslaughter. At his hearing, he put on a show worthy of his spiritual ancestor, Hannah Ocuish. As the judge, visibly moved, read the indictment that threatened to incarcerate the little boy for the remainder of his childhood, Johnny, with all the carefree innocence of his years, amused himself by playing with a handful of pennies a kindly deputy sheriff had given him. As they led the little killer away from the courtroom, he playfully ran away from the sheriff, but was quickly caught. Security was poor as there wasn’t a set of handcuffs in town small enough for his tiny wrists. When confronted with a jail cell and asked what it was for, he announced, “That’s where they put the bad men.” Obviously, not the kind of place a small boy who was only playing expected to end up. At last word, the court shipped Johnny to a local psychiatric hospital for sanity observation.


Oddly, I couldn’t find a photo of the older boy, John Veres, but I did find this photo of little Milt.

And here are a few headlines related to the murder:


Culled from: Murder Can Be Fun #17 by John Marr

Post-Mortem Portrait Du Jour!


The Twins
circa 1852
sixth-plate daguerreotype
3.75″ x 3.25″

In this highly unusual scene, a woman holds two infants, one living and the other deceased and complete hidden from the viewer in a shroud-like wrapping. The most probably explanation is that this was done in order to conceal signs of advanced decomposition, injury, or illness.

Culled from: Beyond the Dark Veil: Post-Mortem and Mourning Photography

Garretdom!

The Scaffolding Gave Way.

LEWISTOWN, Pa., Sept. 26.—While James Banks and James Barr, two painters, were engaged in painting the cornice of the Presbyterian Church yesterday morning the scaffolding on which they were standing gave way and the men were precipitated to the ground below, a distance of fifty feet. Banks was instantly killed, his head striking on a large stone, crushing in the whole top portion of the skull. Barr’s back was hurt and his injuries are pronounced fatal. Banks was thirty-five years old and leaves a wife and three children.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

MFDJ 10/10/24: Working at the Asylum

Today’s Highly Therapeutic Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

The Kirkbride philosophy in mental health treatment regarding employees (as illustrated at the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum), accepted only kind and gentle people who would not be keepers but attendants. The doctors and nurses were instructed to be supportive at all times, to encourage patients to take responsibility for their behavior, to suppress destructive thoughts, and, most importantly, be reassured that they were not doomed forever.

Throughout its history, thousands of people have been employed at the Asylum; some spent their entire working career there, although the majority did not. Typically, the attendants had no training in caring for the mentally ill. For many, the job was overwhelming, making the turnover rate very high. Most employees resided at the hospital. On a typical day the attendants arose at 5:45 AM, and opened the patients’ rooms at 6:00 AM. They got them up and dressed for breakfast, then acted as waiters in the dining room where they could keep a close watch while the patients ate. After everyone was fed all the knives and forks had to be collected and counted, to be certain that any potential weapons were returned before the patients were allowed to leave the dining room. Those that were physically able were then sent to work on the farm. The less able were allowed to read or take classes in sewing, knitting, and other forms of arts and crafts.

Therapy in the form of entertainment was provided in the auditorium. Concerts and plays were staged, sometimes by guest artists, but more often by patients and staff. Plays with scripts encouraging good behavior and wholesome activity were performed often, and regarded as highly therapeutic. It was thought that playing a role would stimulate a sense of normal society in a patient and would withdraw him or her from the antisocial thoughts and deeds that had landed them in an insane asylum.

Dancing as therapy was encouraged despite the irony that, in the Victorian Era, social dancing, like the stage acting, was considered by many to be immoral, and thought to induce mania and dissipation. In the Asylum such diversions were considered healthy and curative. Reverend D. S. Welling, an Asylum chaplain, believed that there was no exercise more helpful to stimulate a sedentary patient than dancing, stating, “It is very proper for lunatics in an asylum to engage in it” but also warned the sane world that “none but lunatics and sick persons should resort to it.”

Attendants were also expected to keep the patients under control at all times without the use of profanity or violence, except in extreme cases requiring self-defense. The rules made it very clear that mechanical restraints and/or isolation techniques could be employed only with a physician’s approval. However, the rules could not always be observed. Sudden violent outbursts amongst the patients occurred so often that expecting the attendants to seek out a doctor for permission to restrain or isolate was not realistic. The unruly patient had to be dealt with immediately, before the situation became dangerous.

Confinement cribs, chair cages, and isolation cells, were still an unfortunate necessity at the Asylum until the day it closed. The rusted rings to which the most violent were chained can still be seen in the isolation cells on the third floor. Attendants had to make sure that their charges bathed regularly, if able, and if not, to assist them. Bedding and clothing were changed and cleaned once a week. The wards and dining rooms were cleaned every day. At least one attendant was to be stationed wherever the patients were gathered at all times. After the patients were put to bed, employees were expected to retire to their rooms up on the fourth floor no later than 10:00 PM, unless given a special pass to be out later.

The attendants’ duties were extremely demanding considering their pay which at the end of the century came to a mere $25.00 a month [about $800 today]. Living at the hospital certainly cut costs, but it must have been quite unnerving with the constant noise, and unsettling strains of laughing and crying down the hallways.

The attendants’ lives were made somewhat easier in 1890 when electricity was installed as well as, in 1892, elevators.

Culled from: Lunatic: The Rise and Fall of an American Asylum

 

And Now Some Words From The Good Book!

My favorite book is Wisconsin Death Trip, a collection of 19th century newspaper articles from Black River Falls, Wisconsin accompanied by glass plate negatives taken by the town photographer in the same era.  Here are some excerpts from the book, accompanied by a photo of a mother caring for a probably doomed child.  Most of them were, it seems.

“Marie Sweeny, who ran away from her husband at St. Paul and has been creating trouble at Ashland with her wild mania for breaking windows, has finally been captured. Reports from St. Paul say that she was a model wife and mother, but some injury to her brain entirely changed her character. She ran away from home 2 years ago, and since then… has been in more than 100 different jails, serving short sentences for indulging in her wild sport.” [10/6/1892, Badger State Banner]

“Curtis Ricks, the ossified man, died at his home in Racine. Mr. Hicks since 1879 [has] been a helpless invalid. About 8 years ago his joints began to stiffen and his flesh turned to bone… For the past 2 years he has been traveling as a ‘freak.’ Hicks was formerly a well-known engineer on the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul road. He leaves a wife and 7 children.” [10/27/1892, Badger State Banner]

“James McDonald, a drayman, went to his barn in Eau Claire to feed his horses and found 2 of them dead with their throats cut. On the barn door was pinned a note saying that there were too many horses around and that 15 more would have to be killed. McDonald has no enemies. It is believed to be the deed of an insane man. McDonald is a poor man and had to mortgage his home to buy the horses.” [11/24/1892, Badger State Banner]

 

Garretdom!

And here’s another sad olde story:

Driven to Death by Family Troubles.

Mrs. Lizzie Kramer, thirty-five years old, the wife of George Kramer, a grocer, living at Mascher and Huntingdon streets [Philadelphia, PA], committed suicide yesterday at her home by taking laudanum. The woman is said to have been low-spirited for some time, caused by frequent quarrels between herself and her husband, and early yesterday morning she sent her son to a neighboring drug store and secured a bottle of laudanum. She went at once to her room, and when her mother visited her shortly after she was found lying on the bed in a semi-conscious condition, and the empty bottle was on the floor. She told her mother what she had done. Dr. Bebe was hastily summoned, but it was too late, and although everything possible was done to counteract the effect of the drug, she died soon after the doctor’s arrival. She leaves three children , the oldest being twelve years of age.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook

MFDJ 09/04/24: Doubling the Last Meal

Today’s Fulfilling Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

If the condemned wins a stay of execution after he has eaten his last meal, does he get to choose another meal when his next execution date rolls around?

Absolutely! This has happened many times. The trick is to make sure that you actually have the meal in front of you before the stay is issued. For example, Dobie Gillis Williams (Louisiana) received a stay while he was dining on his last meal. He just continued eating. However, Thomas Thompson (California) received his stay of execution after he had ordered his final meal, but before he had actually received it. The order was canceled.


I’m not sure if Dobie’s first meal was the same as his last meal, but this is an artistic depiction by Teresa Kelly of his last meal prior to his actual execution on January 8, 1999. 

Culled from: Last Suppers: Famous Final Meals from Death Row

 

WEEGEE Du Jour!

Weegee was the pseudonym of Arthur Fellig (June 12, 1899 – December 26, 1968), a photographer and photojournalist, known for his stark black and white street photography. Weegee worked in Manhattan, New York City’s Lower East Side as a press photographer during the 1930s and ’40s, and he developed his signature style by following the city’s emergency services and documenting their activity. Much of his work depicted unflinchingly realistic scenes of urban life, crime, injury and death.

Here’s a photo from the book Weegee’s New York: Photographs, 1935-1960:


Murder suspect Alan Downs is led to jail after confessing to killing his wife, circa 1940, in New York City. 

(I couldn’t find any additional information about this guy – anyone want to see if you can track the story down?)

 

Garretdom: Olde News!

SHOT IN HIS TRACKS.

A German Burglar Fatally Wounded While Attempting to  Run Away.

During the past ten days a number of small robberies were perpetrated in the Eighth district [Philadelphia]. It was evident from the fact that the houses were all opened from the rear by the same implement, that one man or a single gang was doing the work, and the police were instructed to keep a particularly careful lookout for suspicious characters. Early on Saturday morning Policeman Ritchie saw a man in the act of scaling a fence in rear of 444 north Eighth street. He placed him under arrest, when the prisoner knocked him down and ran. The officer recovered his feet and fired after the fugitive, brining him down at the second shot.

Assistance was secured and the wounded man was taken to the station-house, where he gave the name of Frederick Glass and his residence as 910 Spring Garden street. The wound was found to be a dangerous one and he was sent to the Pennsylvania Hospital, where he died a short time after his admission.

A large chisel found in the man’s pocket was found to fit the marks on the houses which had been robbed or where attempts to force doors and shutters had been made and articles found in his room were identified as having been stolen.

Glass came to this country from Germany a short time ago and took up his lodgings at 910 Sprint Garden street with Mr. Voss. The proprietor of the house says the man had no visible means of support, and frequently remained out all night and slept during the day. The Coroner will investigate the case today.

Culled from the collection of The Comtesse DeSpair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook