1. "A Different Murder Mystery"
Posted by Edisto on Jun-27th-03 at 10:38 AM

I found this passage quoted in a book I'm currently reading.  It's from Will Fowler's "Reporter: Memoirs of a Young Newspaperman":

  "(The) slaying might be solved in the distant future. but I
  sincerely hope not.  It's like an unopened present.  The present
  always remains a wondrous thing, as long as it remains unopened."
 

Isn't that all too true of the Borden mystery?  The book I'm  reading is about another unsolved case, the so-called "Black Dahlia" murder in Los Angeles in 1947.  This is "Black Dahlia Avenger," by Steve Hodel, who claims his father, Dr. George Hodel, was the Dahlia slayer.  Most reviewers have panned the book, and I have to agree, because I think Hodel's case against his father is transparently thin.  However, there's a great book in there somewhere, if Steve Hodel had just left out the stuff about the Black Dahlia.  His father, and indeed his whole family, was totally bizarre and provided the makings of a riveting story.

(Message last edited Jun-27th-03  10:40 AM.)

I think that should be our creed:  "The present always remains a wonderous thing, as long as the present is unopened".   So true to those of devoted Bordenites...so true.

BobCookBobCook

But no one was ever tried for that crime!!!
You may read a reference to it in "Killing Time" by D Freed and R Briggs. "The murderer confessed, but was freed by the police chief and then disappeared" if I remember right.
This book was the subject on a TV show. I glanced at it. So his Doctor father had important connections, and then quicly left the country? Doesn't that sound like some sort of CIA connection?
His popularity among important people implies (to me) that he did abortions on the side to help the rich and famous. About 40 years ago I read of a case in NY, where the Dr got rid of his mistake by cutting up the dead patient and putting body parts into the sewer.
Most people don't know that there are screens and such to catch and filter large objects. Better to bury in the back woods or the deep ocean, like that Maryland case of a few years ago (another book?).
...
Wasn't there a movie about 20 years ago ("True Detective"?) that used this case as the background? Was it just fiction?

(Message last edited Jun-27th-03  3:28 PM.)

Stef is reading that book right now, "Avenger".
She said it was getting *better* every day.
I think she was getting used to some oddity in the writing, or suspending her disbelief or something.  I'm next to read it.

Great minds...I might have known somebody else here was reading the same thing.  Y'all gotta tell me what you think of it when you're through with it.  Dr. Hodel strikes me as being lots worse than a plain 'ol garden variety abortionist, even of the illegal variety.  He seemed to think he was above the law and other people's morals. I personally doubt that he ever met Elizabeth Short, though. 

Perfect Murder, Perfect Town (2000)   
------------------------------------------------------------------------

CBS
Jun 29   9:00pm  

Movies, 120 Mins.

** (Rated NR) (Y)

Detectives search for the murderer of JonBenet Ramsey, a 6-year-old killed Christmastime 1996 in her parents' home.

Cast: Kris Kristofferson, Marg Helgenberger, Ronny Cox, Ken Howard, John Heard, Peter Friedman, Scott Cohen, Deirdre Lovejoy, Sean Whalen, John Rubinstein, Jane Powell, Dennis Boutsikaris, J.C. MacKenzie, Murphy Guyer, Margo Martindale, John Benjamin Hickey, Patrick Tovatt, Juan Hernandez, R.E. Rogers, Tim Hopper.
Director(s): Lawrence Schiller.
Producer(s): Lawrence Schiller, Richard Waltzer.
Writer(s): Tom Topor.

Another fascinating murder story is the Chester Gillette--Grace Brown murder story which took place in 1906 in Upstate New York.

The remarkable novel, An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser is based on this true story.  Chester Gillette was a 16 year old boy from a poor family of itinerant midwest street preachers.  He was sent to live in Cortland, NY (just south of Syracuse) where he worked in his uncle's garment factory.  His wealthy and inflential uncle placed him in a position in the packaging department.  There, he met a young woman from Otselic, NY named Grace Brown.  They eventually fell in love and over time, Grace became pregnant.  Both were only 18 years of age and they panicked and tried every possible route to end the pregnancy--all to no avail.  As Grace's pregnancy became more evident, she returned home as still managed to hide the truth from her family.  In the meantime, Chester was promoted and earned much more money.  He had proven his worth in his uncle's viewpoint.  As he circulated in more socially prominent circles, he was noticed by a young woman from a well-to-do family.  As this new romance blossomed, Chester grew more and more estranged from Grace who sent him long and pitiable letters pleading that Chester come and rescue her and marry her at once.

Chester agreed to wed Grace but on his terms.  They travelled to Big Moose Lake in the Adirondack Mountains of New York.  There, on a summer evening in 1906, while on the lake in an Adirondack Guide Boat, Grace drowned.  Chester admitted he had a plan to kill Grace but, in the end, could not do it.  He claimed he agreed he should marry her and in her joy, she attempted to embrace him and overturned the boat.  She drowned and he swam to shore and never reported what had happened.

Chester was tried and convicted for the murder and was electrocuted in Auburn Prison when he was 21.

There are some powerful unanswered questions in this story and much of what was used against Chester would never stand up in court today.

Two recent books, Adirondack Tragedy and Murder In The Adirondacks both chronicle the actual events of the case and clearly, there is evidence which calls into question Chester's guilt.

Many of the landmarks of this case remain:  Grace's Cortland apartment, Chester's Cortland apartment, the factory building, the Brown family farm, The Big Moose Lodge, and a number of other sites where the two met.

The 1950's film, A Place In The Sun, (Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift) is based on this murder although the names, location and time period of the case are altered for the movie.  It is not a particularly good film and does not begin to capture the suspense and mystery of the actual event.

That included my favorite Shelly Winters!

Oh, I remember that movie!!!  That was such a sad story!  That scene in the boat really got to me, its ingrained in my memory forever. 

I remember seeing something on that crinms on the TV show, Unsolved Mysteries.  It did sound like an interesting case.

Great synopsis, Jim.  Elizabeth Taylor, of course, played the rich girl who sets her cap for the "Chester" character.  While the movie was mediocre, I agree, I enjoyed Shelley Winters in the "Grace Brown" role.  Always thought she was the best thing in the movie.  Interestingly, her character's name was "Alice Tripp."  Doesn't that sound like something from the Borden case?  

The 1971? film "Love Story" also repeated this happening, albeit with a benign death. The morale, as ever, is that when somebody poor falls in love with somebody rich, the poor person comes to an unhappy end. Exceptions to this rule, of course! Or think of "Titanic".
You may remember similar happening from your real life?

I did watch the Ramsey Case movie Sunday night.
It's to be continued on Wednesday.
I can't tell if it's a repeat?  I have not ever seen it, anyway.
I had read the Schiller book and he directed and produced this movie, so he's putting his money where his book was.

Marge H. is from CSI.  She is a very weepy Patsy.

We have similar elements to our case.
The family has not much to say before lawyering up and hires an investigator of their own, body found in situ in the home, too many people compromising the crime scene.. etc.

It is a rerun.  I recall seeing it the first time around.  I missed the first episode this time, but I may watch Wednesday.

Hi Edisto,

Here is a coincidence.  I live in a small town south of Syracuse and not far from the Grace Brown farm.  The local newspaper carried a story today which focused on a group of people who visited the Brown farm (now owned by another family).  They all gathered in Grace Brown's bedroom and read some of her letters to Chester.  Most likely, that would have been the room where Grace would have written the letters.  Then they drove several miles to the cemetery where Grace is buried and read several more letters.

I have a neighbor who turns 80 this year.  He showed me the article I just mentioned.  He grew up several miles from the Brown farm and he informed me that his mother was a friend of Grace Brown.  They often visited each other as young girls and may have attended school together for a year or two.  I find this to be absolutely amazing.  We are not far from events we generally assume were so long ago.

I remember Shelley Winters in that role.  I suspect she captured some of Grace's desperation and I, too, believe she did an excellent job in that role.  Theodore Dreiser certainly captures Grace's sense of panic in his novel.  It is an absolute classic.

I had a similar experience some years back, although it didn't involve a well-known case.  I was visiting my aunt in rural North Carolina, not far from Raleigh, the state capital.  When the Sunday newspaper came, there was a long, fascinating story in it about an unsolved murder that had taken place around 1930 in my aunt's community (an area called Gold Sand).  As I read the story, I realized my aunt, a long-time teacher at the local school, might know something about the case.  When I asked her, she turned out to be an absolute fount of information.  According to her, this "unsolved" murder wasn't unsolved at all. The victim had been a young schoolgirl, who attended the school where my aunt taught. "Everyone" in the community knew the girl had a boyfriend of whom her father disapproved.  It was generally believed that the girl's father had waylaid her on the path to a tryst in a wooded area and had killed her.  My aunt had attended the funeral and described the father as looking "guilty as sin."  None of this came out in the article.

It's too bad some of the people who were close to the Borden family (other than Hiram Harrington) didn't submit to interviews, even long after the fact, because we might have a much better picture of what actually went on in the Borden household before the murders.

We've got potentially (if believed), Mr. Fish, Mr. Howe, Morse's cousins (2 ladies), townsfolk in Iowa, 'Lil Abby Potter, Mrs. Gifford, and those ladies of Dance Of Death: Jennings- Waring, Kelly- Betz, Knowlton- Lewis, oh and Victoria Lincoln, and Emma Borden.

Do they count?  I hadn't reaized we had quite so many until I attempted to figure out whose statements we really had.
Anyway, I don't think these people gave us a much better view of the Borden family....though they are interesting.

Do you suppose most statements years later might be skewed?

(Message last edited Jul-1st-03  8:34 PM.)

Jim, thanks for that excellent synopsis of the Chester Gillette case.  There's a very good site outlining the major trial issues at:
http://www.courts.state.ny.us/history/gillette.htm

I've found more mention of those 2 ladies, cousins of JVM.

Perusing Rebello's tome, they are mentioned pg. 280.
Emma is  discharged from the Executor's duties with no accounting or inventory of Andrew's estate necessary, and Lizzie signs she is satisfied with the outcome, which papers were *executed in the presence of Henrietta & Elizabeth Morse*--February 2, 1894 (stated as headlines of "yesterday", Feb. 3, 1894).

Then it is cited that these ladies gave an interview (to which I referred), Aug. 11, 1892, Fall River Daily Herald.