Sad Lizzie Borden News From Salem

Contact
Leonard Pickel
40 Whacks Museum
[email protected]
972-951-5100

For Immediate Release:
Salem’s Lizzie Borden Museum Closes

Leonard Pickel of the 40 Whacks Museum announced today that the Salem museum will not open for the 2011 season. “We are heartbroken,” stated Pickel who has been working on his dream of a Lizzie museum since 1992, after thousands of people descended on Fall River for the 100 year anniversary of the murders to find little more about the famous case than a small display at the historical society and the Borden gravesite. “It was just the struggling economy,” explains Pickel who touts two years of economic downturn and lack of investment capital as the reason for the museum’s closure.

The Museum and gift shop opened in August of 2008 to nationwide debate over a Borden museum in Salem. “We chose the Essex street location because we could reach more people with Lizzie’s story than we could have in Fall River, where the murders took place,” explains Pickel who was surprised by the controversy. “After all, Lizzie is part of Massachusetts history and the Borden murder mystery is a fascinating unsolved true crime!”

The 40 Whacks Museum detailed the life and times of the Lizzie Borden, a Fall River spinster arrested, tried and acquitted for the gruesome murders of her father and stepmother. “So many books on Lizzie Borden try to solve the murders by inventing facts or leaving them out to support their position.” explains Pickel who is in the process of writing his own book on Lizzie Borden from research done for the museum. “We cut through the spin, presenting the true story of Lizzie Borden and let the people decide if she did, or she didn’t commit two ghastly murders. What we will miss most is watching people leave the gift shop arguing over Lizzie’s guilt or innocence as they walked down Essex Street”