The Girl in a Red Plastic Belt: The Horrific Murder of Betty Jack Stevens (Oklahoma Unsolved Case)

The girl in a red plastic belt

The horrific murder of Betty Jack Stevens

Canadian County, Oklahoma, July 29, 1952

Late July 1952 in northern Texas and Oklahoma was fairly normal. The mid to high nineties   It was the kind of weather locals called ‘leaving the door to hell open.’   Electric fans sold well and water cooler air systems were kept damp and freshening by barefoot children eager for any excuse to get wet in the soaring heat  and  humidity. In August of 1953 the victim was identified and efforts to discover her murderer were turning out to be more challenging than first supposed.

In the news was a story a of  surprise strike of Packinghouse Workers at the Oklahoma City Stockyards on July 22.  Other news included the high temperatures, news of Egypt’s King Forouk ousted, the Air Force assurances that the strange “UFO blips seen over Washington D.C. were nothing but “cold air”, and a Houston chlorine gas plant leak that sent over three hundred to treatment; all in all it looked like the month would end much on a pretty average note.

On Tuesday, July 28, 21 year old Betty Jack Stevens was hitchhiking.  She was the daughter of O.S. Stevens and had been born in Waxahachie before her family moved to the Dallas area. Her mother had died several years before but her aging father still lived in Grapevine and several siblings were in north Texas.  She had left home at age 16 for a short, and soon annulled, marriage. Ever since then she had been working the odd waitressing job and moving around in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Arizona.  She had a police record in a few locations in Texas but mostly for vagrancy and a couple for public intoxication. 

Her exact timetable on that Tuesday is hazy in spots. Witnesses placed her leaving a West Dallas motor court early morning. Later, around mid-afternoon, she would tell people in  she had been to Odessa.  What is known is that she arrived in Henrietta, Texas over the weekend. That was where she purchased some new clothes. She discarded, perhaps because of the heat, a dark skirt and blouse.  She replaced them with a new blue sweater, blue jeans, lavender shoes and a red plastic belt. The colors went well with her dark eyes and dark hair with red highlights worn in a shoulder length cut, and her brown eyes.  Her eyes were one of her best features; piercing and direct with a no nonsense bravery. 

Hitchhiking she arrived in the small town of Alvord where she stopped at the local Café. Alvord was a small community on US 81 and located northwest of the Dallas area.   The male owner spoke with her and she told him she needed to get back to a job.  Around 5 p.m. she finished a meal, as she had done so many times before,  headed out the door to find a ride.   No one ever saw her alive after that.

On Wednesday July 30, 1952 the forecast in the center of Oklahoma was more hot and sweltering.  The Stockyards section of the metropolitan area was still struggling with the effects of a strike of union workers at the Oklahoma City Armour plant. Competition from non-union Wilson Meats Company was creating some tension. With many workers off or on the picket line the yards were busy but sales were “lame.”

J.P. Brooks, of Yukon, was traveling along a minor county road (Richland Road) that Wednesday not far from the old West Point School (near SW 15^th).  Along that stretch was a small bridge over the usually dry and sandy bedded Shell Creek. As he drove down the road that day, something in the ravine caught his eye.   A nude human torso was there in the ravine on a slight incline of the bank. Oddly enough, it could be seen from the road if the driver came from the south but was not visible to vehicles coming from the north. The nearest telephone was down the road at the farm of Lee Florence and Brooks hurried there to report his find to the County Sheriff.

At this time the community of Yukon did not even have a police force.  All law enforcement came through the Canadian County Sheriff or state police in the form of the State Crime Bureau (a predecessor of the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigation).  Tiny Royse, the county sheriff, had never encountered any crime scene like that which awaited in the dry creek bed.  Local doctors seemed thrown off their game as well.  Early examination of the mutilated female body described it as belonging to a young teenager of perhaps 13-16 years.

If they were off their game, they had good cause.   The woman’s body was nude, headless, handless, and someone had attempted to cut off at least one of her feet.  There were obvious marks of beating and torture on various parts of her body and incised in the flesh of the abdomen were the letters “R-A-T”. 

Soon the small road was clogged with District Attorney’s, law officers, news hounds and the curious. One early photo clearly shows a hodge-podge of onlookers, searchers, and others wandering up and down the area where the body had been left.  
 Despite all this traffic, they did find evidence the torso had been dragged across the dirt road and thrown down into the ravine.  It was apparent that the person had then climbed over into the creek bed and pulled the body up further into the ravine. This might indicate some posing of the remains especially since it visible from one direction and not the other.  
 Did the killer want his work found? Uncertain but after that, with hands or perhaps a branch, the killer had rubbed away his foot prints. It is strange that although found along roadsides, neither portion of her body and belongings were in easy-to-see areas at the time of their finding. This causes some questions to surface about the way the body was discovered that remain unanswered to this day. Knowing how killers often like to make sure police locate the evidence of their handiwork that avenue should have been more closely explored.

The remains were taken to a local funeral home while attempts at identification were made.  Calls from several states and from Oklahoma communities (Enid, Woodward, Oklahoma City and Guyman) flooded local switchboards as worried parents, brothers and husbands attempted to find missing daughters.

Apparently there was an appalling number of missing women in this time period.  One early wrinkle in the case was the firm conviction and publication that the mutilated woman had been the 20 year old daughter of an Oklahoma City woman,  Mabel Pennington. The mother was desperately searching for her missing daughter, Tillie Mae Pennington, who was also the mother of a two year old child.  The young woman had gone missing the previous Friday (July 25) in the late afternoon.  Yet another OKC mother was also concerned it was her missing daughter, one Dorothy Moss, who had not been seen since Monday, July 27. 

Police were stumped and clearly not sure where to go with the case that left everyone so horrified and fearful.  Repeatedly the stressed that it was unclear if the individual had even been killed in Oklahoma. Unspoken was heard loudly seemed to be a prayer: please not have been done here.

On Friday August 1, at about 11 a.m., a local Oklahoma City salesman, Fuller R. Cummins, was traveling  the north-south run of U.S. 81. The road comes up out of Texas (and Alvord) through Duncan into Union City and north to El Reno.  About 4 miles south of Union City, south of the South Canadian River Bridge, he saw something bobbing in a shallow pool of stagnant river water.  His immediate thought was the headless victim found just days before.

Authorities found there the badly decomposed and battered head of a young woman with shoulder length dark hair. Nearby were two female severed hands.  Searching along the brush and in the water they found several items of women’s clothing; one a now faded blue item.

Texas authorities, near Decauter, had meanwhile discovered a man’s dead body. It had been dumped in Texas not far from U.S. 81 and so the Texas investigators entered the picture wondering if the two deaths might be related.  Local law enforcement officials in Oklahoma made hearty and hopeful statements to the press. They hoped, that through the partnership of Texas authorities, there would surely be a swift end to the sad situation.

With just a torso and no hands identification of the victim had ground to a halt.  She did not seem to match any known Oklahoma missing person reports.  Now, after the discovery of the head and the hands the case gained new impetus. Through fingerprints she was identified. At the start of the new week, the story had now grown to include the fact the woman was an out of work waitress from Dallas with a penchant for hitchhiking. 

The victim of this appalling ‘butcher-murder’ was 21 year old Betty Jack Stevens.  The autopsy would only add to the horror as it became clear she had been beaten savagely, hands bound, tortured, and she was beheaded while still alive. Blood in her lungs indicated it had been a series of attempts to complete the beheading before she succumbed. The carved letters may have been incised prior to death or just after. 

In the way of the times, the fact she was ‘known to police’ in Texas and Dallas was titillating fodder. The degree of her trouble with police ranged from a claim that charges had been only minor vacancies and drunken fines in her home state of Texas made little inroads in the salaious tone in some reports. Some  newspapers made allegations (Oklahoma newspapers) that she had also been a prostitute. Verification for her ever being a prostitute were never offered in print by any police or creditable news writers.

The letters carved into her abdomen, spelled “R-A-T”, and was seen as significant by many police investigators.   Indeed, it may offer some of the most important clues. The term was one then popular among the underworld and criminal classes for an informant.  Searching into the life of the victim it was found that just the year before she had witnessed the murder of a man  and had given testimony that put the murderer away in a Texas facility.  Despite the fact police were never able to make any connections to the prisoner or the death of Stevens this is an interesting fact.

A ghost lingered, however, in the minds of many of the law enforcement personnel.  As they stood by the side of the dry creek bed or searched among the stagnant water pools and  walked the muddy banks of the river they knew they were too close to another unsolved crime.  One that had many similarities to the one they now faced.

Just a dozen miles away was the small farm northeast of Tuttle where just that previous March 13th the bones of another dismembered woman had been found.  Had Lois Depew been a victim of this same butcher?  There were just too many parallels. As they searched in that sweltering heat of the early days of August many felt certain that a local man was responsible. Not all agreed and just as many knew deep in their bones that it had to be some out of state maniacs or criminal types. [Update: The Depew case, according to descendants, was solved closer to home with a deathbed confession of her husband].

Some were firmly convinced that the woman must have been killed in Texas.  Then, instead of disposing of the body anywhere between the state line and the many miles of lonely highway, the murderer had driven deep into central Oklahoma.  Finally discarding their kill there along obscure lonely roads few but locals would know existed.

The case was severely hampered in several important ways that would negatively impact the course of the investigation.  Convinced, as they were by the word of the local doctor that the victim was far younger, they may have missed linking her sooner with potential witnesses. The mother claiming her daughter was the victim distracted the investigation. As a result law officers became fixated on a local man who showed a lot of interest in the case. Out of left field, a Lawton woman apparently tried to pin the killing on a man with which she had some quarrel.  She gained her five minutes of fame by claiming she was friends with Betty Jack Stevens.  She claimed to be an eye witness to torture and Steven’s fearful confidences of fear about a menacing “Spanish looking man.”  Despite her written testimony, Dallas police quickly found serious holes in her claims.    Additionally, a man being held in the Oklahoma City jail “confessed” but soon proved false and officers in both Texas and Oklahoma busily searched for cars (largely non-existent) tracking down reports of blood on benders or in back seats.

Worst of all was the assumption, one made so frequently in the time, that such mutilation was solely the attempt of the killer to disguise the identity of the victim.  A simple and logical assumption that would prove to be less than comprehensive in all cases.  Repeat offenders who killed in the same manner or location were called “chain killers.” The era of understanding the “sadist killer” was just dawning. 

There are logical fallacies in assuming the mutilation was an attempt to send a message to ‘underworld informers’ about the dangers of ‘ratting out’.  The most obvious problem in the assumption is the message depends on being found and understood. The body was left in a low traffic area and dragged further back into a ravine. Investigators noted it could only been seen traveling from one direction. Unless the message was directed at someone a third party knew would be coming down that road, at the right time, and understand its meaning, it was risky.

Then, there is the obvious fact that letters carved into flesh in late July are not going to survive long as a readable message anyway.  Decomposition and the work of natural scavengers would see to that in a short time.  The assumption the head and hands were similarly removed to retard identification is then made a mote point when they are discarded, and found, together.  Again, they are tossed off a bridge into a shallow pool of water in an otherwise drought stricken waterway along the most traveled highway of that area.  These points all tend to present a killer who wanted his work found and knew enough about travel routes to know the chances of it being found were high. An argument emerges for a local man or men or someone familiar with the area due to their job.

The case provided so little information and generated so many unanswered questions.
Where, for example, was she killed?  There was no blood on her or around her when her body was found. To kill, drain the blood, and dismember a human body would require some privacy, access to running water and drainage, and some degree of being recognized as it being normal for the killer(s) to be in that location so as to not raise alarm.  This could be, as police suggested at the time, a house or farm.  It might also include access to a slaughterhouse, a butcher shop, a veterinary clinic or office, or some similar location allowing the necessary privacy and tools.

Interestingly enough, the location of where her torso was found, that Richland Road and SW 15^th area may provide a significant clue. Although SW 15^th does not go straight through due to the North Canadian River, the street is picked up again in south Oklahoma City, running right past the old Packingtown District. This was an area where slaughterhouses and meat processing plants once thrived.

Along the journey of this dramatic story,  a lot about the young girl who changed into a cheerful blue outfit with a bright red belt and fun lavender shoes became lost.  As this victim of human inhumanity was reduced to a collection of body parts her essential personhood was forgotten.  As this object of fragments she is distanced from her context as daughter, sister, and a girl too much like someone we know for own peace of mind. 

These crimes make us uncomfortable and so they should. They should make us so uncomfortable we do not stop until they are solved and the person, or persons, responsible is revealed. 

Until then remember Betty Jack Stevens not as the “nude, headless torso”, the “mutilated” victim of a “mad-butcher”, not the girl with a few run-ins with police for not having a place to sleep or drinking a little too much,  but on the life that should have been for the girl with the red plastic belt.

--Marilyn A. Hudson c2015

Original news article: https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc920084/m1/1/zoom/?resolution=4&lat=5072&lon=2848

MERRY MYSTERY CHRISTMAS: WHO WAS VIVIA THOMAS?

A Christmas gift to readers, excerpts from 'Into Oblivion' by Marilyn A. Hudson (Whorl Books, 2015).

Fort Gibson, Indian Territory

January 1870

One of the longest and most intriguing tales of the Sooner state involves a woman who masqueraded as a man.  Various versions have been shared but all have the same basic tale with no explanations as to the source of the many intriguing details and motivations provided. It is in many ways one of the most firmly entrenched legends of the American frontier in Oklahoma. Her name was Vivia Thomas and she was buried on 7 January 1870 in the Fort Gibson Military Cemetery in what was then Indian Territory (Plot OC 0 2120).  For decades, stories of a slim weeping figure at her grave have been reported and her tale has taken on the cautionary veneer of the cost and regret of personal vengeance.

Fort Gibson in what was Indian Territory was established in 1824. In 1868 one of the first national cemeteries was organized nearby.  The fort operated for only about 60 years but in that time it saw a tremendous amount of history.

With some minor variations, creative additions and rearrangement of events, the following is the accepted tale of Vivia Thomas.

"One of the most interesting stories associated with Fort Gibson National Cemetery is the tale of Vivia Thomas. Legend has it this high-spirited daughter of a wealthy Boston family met and fell in love with a handsome young lieutenant at a ball following the Civil War.

After several months of courtship, they announced their engagement, but shortly before the wedding he left, leaving only a note that he desired to go West in search of adventure. Broken-hearted and bitter over the abandonment, Thomas went in search of her lover. After learning that he was stationed at Fort Gibson, she set off on a journey of revenge. She cut her hair, dressed in men’s clothing and joined the Army. The disguise worked, as the former fiancé did not recognize her.

One night as he was returning from a visit with his Native American girlfriend, she ambushed and killed him. Despite an intense investigation, the murder went undiscovered. However, Thomas grew remorseful and began to visit his grave late at night. Eventually she contracted pneumonia from the continued exposure to the cold and collapsed near his grave, dying a few days later. Rather than condemning her actions, her army colleagues were so impressed with her courage in coming alone to the frontier and carrying out a successful disguise that they awarded her a place of honor for burial in the officer’s circle." (http://www.cem.va.gov/cems/nchp/ftgibson.asp) 

Some authors have called the whole story “far-fetched” and many dismiss the tale of a woman dressing as a man as mere fiction. There is historic precedent and these could have been the stories that gave the young woman the idea to travel west as a man, first for safety and then later for other reasons.  In the American Revolution, Mexican and Civil Wars women fought sometimes in disguise.  Deborah Samson Gannett enlisted using her dead brother’s name and even pulled a musket ball from her own thigh to maintain her disguise.  In 1782, she enlisted under the name of her deceased brother, Robert Shurtleff Samson.  Margaret Corbin helped defend Fort Washington, New York.  Elizabeth C. Newcume in the Mexican War dressed as a man and joined at Fort Leavenworth in eastern Kansas. In 1847 she fought Native Americans in the area of Dodge City, Kansas. Sometimes they died as well such as Sarah Rosetta Wakeman who enlisted as Private Lyons Wakeman. She died during the war in New Orleans at the Marine General Hospital. At the time of her death, her true gender was not known. In fact, her headstone reads Lyons Wakeman.  Sarah Seelye who would become the only female member of the GAR. So women disguising themselves as men and serving in the military was not a new or “far-fetched” idea at all. So even in the gender restrictive Victorian era it was not unknown.  It probably says more about the biases and prejudices of the males who label it as such than about the idea itself.

Strangely, the final resting place of the mysterious Vivia is also home to many notables. Medal of Honor Recipients such as Private First Class John N. Reese Jr., (World War II), U.S. Army, Company B, 148th Infantry, 37th Infantry Division. Paco Railroad Station, Manila, Philippine Islands, Feb. 9, 1945 (Section 2, Grave 1259-E);  First Lieutenant Jack C. Montgomery, (World War II), U.S. Army, 45th Division. Padiglione, Italy, Feb. 22, 1944 (Section 20, Grave 963);  Talahina Diana Rogers - Cherokee wife of General Sam Houston - Section OC, Grave 2467 and others.

All of which makes the question of who she was in more mysterious.  The only apparent documentation found is her name in her tombstone and post records. She is listed in the Post Cemetery Records for Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, showing a death on January 7, 1870  (“Burial Registers for Military Posts, Camps, and Stations, 1768-1921” ; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M2014, 1 roll); Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, Record Group 92; National Archives, Washington, D.C.)  No other identifying or biographical information is indicated in the record.  

If there was no stone in the cemetery most would have disregarded the story long ago as mere myth and an example of the tall tale told to entertain on long, cold winter nights. In a cemetery with some 2,000 graves of ‘unknowns’ there are stories still waiting to be told and so she is not alone as to scarcity of information. No doubt some of those unnamed graves would be significant to local, military or national history of only known.  So that leaves her place of burial, within the so-called ‘circle of honor’ graves, to offer clues to the truth of the basic story.

In recent years there has been a suggestion by some genealogical researchers that the grave refers to a grandchild of the Fort Superintendent, William Thomas who had married the daughter of Dr. John Westerfield (who is also buried at the cemetery).  Some claim this tombstone for “Vivia Thomas” in the honor circle is for an infant of Westerfield’s daughter Jennie. No documentary evidence is presented to substantiate this claim. However, and there are internal inconsistencies in accepting this theory.

The story of Vivia has been repeated in a dozen or more books and magazine articles.  The original story is filled with rich detail and motivational explanations that give it a first person texture.  All together the story seems to be based on some set of established facts.

Some of the most telling facts are found in the prosaic military records themselves.  From its earliest years the military has operated on the swift and unending flow of paperwork.  Reports about reports are regularly reported and in most cases this wealth of records has been preserved.  Some gaps do exist but just examining a couple of documents sheds some significant light on the story of Vivia Thomas. It also suggests the burial was not that of an infant child.

Item# 1 – Vivia Thomas’ name in all records stands alone accompanied only by the date of her death or burial.  Yet, on those same record pages will be notations “infant child of”, “Mexican soldier”, “wife and child of”, “unknown” and similar labels.   On the line where her name is listed it is starkly brief.  Her name, the date, and burial record number. 

Item#2 – Vivia is listed amid a sequence of deaths #2117 “Unknown”; #2118 “Alice Rockwell”; “2119 “Vivia Thomas”; “2120 David McWilliams” Sept 12, 1869.  Only Thomas and McWilliam’s have a date associated with their entries.

Item# 3 – According to most versions of the legend, Vivia shot the man who had jilted her “just weeks” before her death.  Some specifically name December but with the lack of much documentary information that may be simply a writer’s imagination at work.   According to several military documents, of internments at the Fort in 1868-1870, there was only one death prior to Vivia’s.  That was the death of Daniel McWilliams on 12 September 1869.

Item # 5 - According to the work by George Alexander Otis A Report of Surgical Cases Treated in the Army of the United States (1871), McWilliams was identified as a patient who was thought to have been shot by a “drunken Cherokee without apparent provocation” on the evening of 11 Sept. 1869. His wound was described as a “perforating gunshot wound of the thorax.”   He was shot with a Navy Revolver. He was immediately sent to the fort’s hospital nearby and treated by Assistant Surgeon Alfred Delany but died a day later and is buried in plot 4 0 2120 at the Fort. All of which meshes with the legend’s basic components.

Item # 6 – Vivia was buried in the Circle of Honor at Fort Gibson and it is generally understood this was a place where special individuals were buried.  These were people notable for service, historic significance and similar achievements. 

Item # 7 – Were Vivia the daughter of the superintendent William Thomas and wife Jennie Westerfield Thomas, it would be expected that the standard system of labeling and identifying persons would have been employed.  The father of Jennie Westerfield, Dr. John Westerfield, is buried in 1872 at the same cemetery with a clear notation, “father-in-law of superintendent”.

A DNA test might eventually prove a link to the Westerfield-Thomas line but, for now, the preponderance of evidence suggests that this was an adult woman. 

The story also underscores the reality of how history can “fall between the cracks” intentionally as people try to hide their own identities for a fresh start, to escape legal problems, or hide from those they do not wish to find them.  Add to this the occasional less than stellar ethics of a community, a police force, or newspapers and the truth can sometimes fall into a bottomless pit that makes uncovering the truth next to impossible.

 

 

What Will I Wear?

One of the recognized lures for young women to enter a life of shame in the Edwardian era was a familiar one. Clothes. In 1859 when Dr. William Sanger asked some 2,000 prostitutes what had launched them into their life the answers were surprising. The majority had been lured not by seduction, violation, or bad company but by destitution, inclination and seduction/abandonment topped the list.  The fact that inclination came in second must have been a hard pill for Victorians to take given their predispositions about the role of virtue in a woman's life and general beliefs about sex in general.

So, in 1904 Police Chief Brown and Matron Bond had their hands full with a young miss who had run from her grandmother in Perry, had been sent to the Guthrie Rescue Home and had left there to go to Oklahoma City. She was being seriously wooed by someone on West Second Street , i.e., "Harlot's Lane", to enter full time into the sporting life through clothes: silk skirt, drop stitch stockings, new undervest, new corset and the 'inevitable' high heeled slippers.  She was  taken by Police Matron Bond and Mrs. Matthews to the local Rescue Home. So, as the headlines put it, she was "Rescued from a Life of Shame."  

In its historical context, Oklahoma had since about 1895 through the early years of 1900 been in a financial decline. The Cherokee Strip had opened in 1893 and some wandering and adventurous types had set out to stake their claim. Vast numbers of the downtown offices, houses, and businesses were vacant and anyone who wanted to rent space was welcome.  As is often the case, vice survives in the toughest times.

On the home front this might have meant less money for frills, even if your family believed in such things on social or moral grounds, and so the lure for a dreamy girl might have been too much.  The same thing, unfortunately, can still happen to today. Hopefully, we can learn from the lessons already learned by women of an earlier age.

For the Period of the War

Digging around in old newspapers, dusty records, and listening to random comments I learn a lot.  I find all types of wonderful treasures that others have forgotten about or simply did not think were important. 

 

In August of 1918 in Hughes County, Oklahoma a commissioned deputy sheriff enlisted in the army.  The local Sheriff Sam Turner offered the position to the man's wife.  She was duly commissioned as a deputy sheriff and securing the rare place of being the only active woman deputy at the time.  She had accepted the position with a simple: "for the period of the war."

 

Hughes County was a rough and tumble town and just ten years before a Deputy Sheriff, John Tabor, had been shot and killed in the line of duty.

 

She is listed only as "Mrs. Beaty Templeton" but she raises many questions.  Who was she? What happened to her? What were her experiences in that role?  A local paper had the teasing headline "Wife Wears Pistol."  I suspect she had some interesting stories. I wonder if anyone ever asked what they were?

Into Oblivion: A Pillow(case) for My Head , part 5

In December 1948,  along US 277 northeast of Lawton and southwest of Chickasha a head was found in a pillowcase. The spot was near the Comanche-Caddo County line. 

Local authorities determined it had been intentionally placed in the spot off the road.  The distance was too far and the undergrowth too thick for it to have haphazardly ended up in that area.  It had been there a few weeks or months, the bottom of the case was just beginning to show signs of decay when the head was found. 

The FBI were called in to determine what they could but, to date, no follow up story has been found.

Who was  the individual whose head was tossed away like that?  Was he, or she, ever identified? Were the killers ever found? 

It was not the first time, or the last, that heads would be found in the state.  Many of them would remain mysteries from the pages of history.

 

The Woman in White Motif

It is only a matter of weeks until it is Halloween. Here is a discussion to begin to set the mood for that fun autumn holiday.  It is a time for horror marathons, trick or treat events, and dress up.  It is also a time for storyelling (folk, historic, or urban tales).

Some tales are merely that - tales.  They have no true paranormal aspect to them, other than the ability to live forever as each new generation comes of age and the tale is retold.  One of the most prevalent themes in all of paranormal research and literature is the 'lady in white', 'the woman in white', and other similar descriptors.

Wilkie Collins in 1859 published what is considered to the the first mystery novel, The Woman in White.  It ranks as an  important book for that reason, along with the 1764 The Castle of Otranto, considered by many as the first Gothic horror novel.  Both are quick reads and full of the language and values of their respective time periods. They set the stage for decades of  high literary and popular strangeness.  

He no doubt drew inspiration from tales through out the British Isles of such women dating from medieval times.  The Irish Banshee may be a version that dates further back and reflect an older tradition still.  Other tales and legend of sightings of ghosts can easily fall into the category of this classic woman in white tale and include often a women wronged or harmed who restlessly wanders around in perpetual grief or remorse

Hispanic cultures may reflect the motif in their weeping mother or similar tales associated with the violation of innocence.  The La Llorna story pool with its versions of the woman who kills her children to join  a younger lover (harlot motif) and the mother whose children are robbed from her (the saint) may reflect the dichotomy of woman in a patriarchal society.  Although she is sometimes seen and reported as more sound than body, some legends suggest a pale waxen creature mourning and searching.

The famed "resurrection Mary' version from Chicago, and its many locale variants, may be inspired by ancient tales, Collins ,or be a manifestation of some ofter process at work in society.  The resurrection Mary story emerged at a time when young ladies were first gaining freedom to go out without chaperons and in wild automobiles to dance to hot music and drink cold liqueur.  There may be a tinge of a morality tale created to keep them 'down on the farm'.  She is often reported in a white dress, although some versions in Chicago and elsewhere will have the girl in a blue or red dress.  These, however, appear as mere attempts to separate their particular and regional version from the older Chicago story.

One local version of this woman in white motif in Oklahoma is set near Conners College, near Warner, Oklahoma.    There is supposedly (I have not verified any of this in the tradition of sharing a good story....) a College road that runs past the institution and passes a cemetery.  There, a 'white woman' has been seen by generations of people....

The informant told me the story "has been told for many years."

Marilyn A. Hudson, Historian and Storyteller....

Mystery Locale: Can You Identify? -UPDATED

I have been contacted to help identify a location. All the person has is a photo from about  1950 the building reads "Libbey Hall" and "Children's Home".   The children are brother and sister and your help would be appreciated.  Leave a comment if you have information.

 "My brothers and I were in a children's home in Oklahoma between 1949-1952.  Can you confirm if we were at St. Joseph's.  Wesley John Stevens; Sharon Lynn Stevens, Edward Price Stevens.  The two older children would have been there in 1949; the youngest would have joined us in Jan 1952.  Attached is a picture of the two older children on the steps of what I've always believed to be the home.  I have checked with the Baptist's Childrens home and they have no record of us."

We have a message from the woman who had the photos saving she had identified the location. It is the  "Methodist Children's Home" est. in 1927 in Newton, KS.  It associated with two new works which grow out of that early facility. One is Ember Hope and another reader informed us that the Children's Home , in 1960, become Methodist Youthville.

Youthville is a large service helping children and families. Libby Hall (pictured above) was constructed in 1929.

Boy Scouts in OKC: Some History

"On my honor I promise that I will do my best..."

In 1909 possibly the first Oklahoma scout troop was formed in Pawhuska. The Oklahoma City Division of the Boy Scouts of America started in early summer of 1910. The first and oldest Troop 1 was at an event at St.John's Methodist Episcopal Church (Oldest Troop Reviews History, Oklahoman, 11 June 1934, pg. 4). In 1912, newspapers meentioned troops in Claremore, Vinita, Bartlesville, Broken Arrow, Skiatook, Nowata, Okmulgee, Pawhuska, Guthrie, Wagoner among "many others." ("Boy Scouts Now are at Claremore", Oklahoman, Aug.27, 1912, pg.2).   

Troop growth appears to have plateued until the start of WW1 when a new interest developed. 

Troop #8 met at Wesley Church in 1918 as they launched plans for an agricultural garden ("Boys Want Disc for War Garden Work", Oklahoman, March 15, 1918, pg. 8). By war's end and early 1920's new troops were once more developing.

At one point, the local OKC paper carried a column of BSA news in and around the city and state. In 1920, Oklahoma City scouts Fontaine Freeman and T.T. Johnson Jr. attended a global "Jamboree" in England and France.("City Scouts on Way Home from England", Oklahoman, Aug. 25, 1920, pg.1).

On June 7,1933. Wesley Methodist records indicated Scouting committe leaders of Mr. Mathis, Clyde Reneau, H. J. Scott and L. J. Holt, that 32 boys had reported for Troop 23 meeting at Wesley Methodist Church. 

A directory from this church for the years 1935-1936, indicates the troop committee was comprised of J.A. Slater, Joe Barker, Harold D. Clark, J.D. Adam and E.B. Scott. Scoutmaster was Aiden E. Allen, assistant Scoutmaster was Art Sumstine, Jr. Assistant Bill Hunter, Troop Instructor was Adrian Hunter and Senior Patrol leader was Lawrence Holt. The Patrols and their leaders were the "Panther" and James McNulty; "Lion" with Robert Coffey; "Flying Eagle" under Thornton Chamberlain; "Comanche" under leadership of Marvin Chapman. This information indicates that the BSA were much alive during the depression.

During the 1940's-1980's nearly every school and church sponsored some form of scouts - Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts or both. Along the way girls organized and alternative youth groups formed but the Boy Scouts emerged at a time when many feared young boys would lose the skills that had helped people survive as urban life took over, lose the inner compass ingrained in earlier generations, and lose the sense of honor and ethics gained from personal struggle and achievement. 

Generations of youth gained positive outlets for abounding energy, gained direction in personal discipline and accomplishment, learned new skills, and the value of helping others. For over a century....they have achieved personal merit, aided their communities, and provided youth with skills to be people of integrity and honor.

Oklahoma Orphanage Plans Reunion

Here is an invitation for all Former Residents and Staff of St. Joseph’s Orphanage in Bethany, Oklahoma

"Did you hear about the reunion...?"

and St. Joseph’s Children’s Home in Oklahoma City. 

REUNION - SAVE THE DATE - SPEAD THE WORD

A reunion of former residents and staff members of St. Joseph’s Orphanage in Bethany, Oklahoma, and St. Joseph’s Children’s Home in Oklahoma City is being planned for Saturday, June 1, 2013.  Arrangements are pending. 

If you ever lived or worked at the orphanage or children’s home and would like to receive information about this reunion, please mail, e-mail or phone your contact information to Jane Moon, Catholic Charities, 1501 N. Classen Blvd., Oklahoma City, OK 73106, jmoon@catholiccharitiesok.org, 405-526-2308.

The home was opened in 1912 in Bethany, Oklahoma and later moved to Oklahoma City.

SW HAD SOME CRAZY CULTS

In 1904 Oklahoma City there was a strange sight that  met residents and visitors looked down South Broadway one chilly spring day. Marching casually up from Reno street, yet with a destination in mind, were two men, John Aiken and James Sharp, a woman, Melissa Sharp, and a 12 year old boy, Lee Sharp. 

Declaring himself "Adam God" Sharp would prove an interesting character. What was really unusual about this incident was they were all stark naked.

Arrested, charged with lunacy, and ordered out of the state, they were back in 1906 in a cult community, Eden, in south Oklahoma county.

A few years later, 1908, the group (which now included a second in command, Louis Pratt) had gone to Kansas City.  There, they had caused a riot where five people died.   Sharp, and possibly his wife and others, were ordered to prison for his role in the riot.

The group have been a part of the Morman faith or confiscated some of the terms and teachings of the "Adam God" doctrine of Brigham Young, mixed in some extreme evangelical elements and bits and pieces of a lot of things. Not much has been found explaining the doctrinal aspects of this strange cult but it is clear that they were considered bizarre and out of the ordinary.  For most people in the Edwardian era, amusements were where they could be found and a group marching naked down a main city street had to have been worth a chuckle or two.  

Sources:
Oklahoman
NY Times
NY Times

BIGFOOT KIDS?: AN INTERESTING STORY

A few years ago at an event a local woman approached me and shared a story of her own which was indeed strange.  She lived in southeast Oklahoma where the hills grow steep and thickly wooded.  She was of Native American descent and so shared many of her own beliefs about the more unusual things encountered in life and through history.  Then she shared a story from her small corner of the world. 

It was the early 1960's and there was a small gas station hugging a small narrow road amid hairpin turns and surrounded by the thick forests and steep shadowed hillsides.  The woman and her new husband stopped one day for gas and the elderly woman came out and filled the tank until the younger man stepped in to do it.  The woman struck up a conversation with the younger woman as she sat in the old pickup. 

The conversation went something like this:

'You got any kids? I got me a boy and a girl inside. They have to stay in there. They can't come out. Not safe for them at all. You wanna come see?'

The younger woman stepped out to be polite and followed as the woman tottered over to the door into the house at the side of the station.  The smell caught her attention first. It was strong and smelled like wet dog and worse.  Sorry she had gotten out she tried to excuse herself but the old woman dragged her forward. Inside, there was a cage in a corner of the room with a small creature sitting in it covered with hair.  A similar creature sat in front of a small screened television showing a grainy cartoon.  This one was wearing a t-shirt and jeans too short in the legs.  His big hairy feet were without shoes.

"I found 'em in the trees up yonder a winter ago. I'd seen them before in the forests and down by the river. The mama, well she was a human but the daddy was just like them.  He disappeared. The mama was dead and they were starving. So, I brought 'em home. I expect I'll send them back there pretty soon; I'm getting pretty old you know..."

The couple drove off after that.  Sure enough, the old woman did die soon and the house, according to people the young woman asked, was found empty of any other living creatures...just an empty cage in the corner of the room and a pile of old children's clothing.

I thought of that story when watching a documentary on History that suggested what we call Bigfoot might be a lingering species of something similar to a Homo Hidelbergensis - a species known to have been still in Asia when the crossing of the Bering Strait were made.  Thus, making it possible they too make that trek into North America.  This opened up the possibility of widespread native tales of interbreeding with the creatures might be based on real events.  Closer to humans, mating could happen with those incredibly tall humanoids. 

Although the tale may be a tall one crafted by a woman pulling the leg of a visiting author of the arcane, it might be mis-identification of someone suffering from a medical condition known to produce long hair over the body or it might - just maybe - have a kernel of truth in it hinting at something truly amazing and incredibly strange.

JOAN CRAWFORD - TEMPORARY OKLAHOMAN

From the "who knew?" files:  Lucille Leseur, who would become the famous Joan Crawford, was born in San Antonio, Texas.  Briefly, however, she actually lived in the southwest Oklahoma community of Lawton, Oklahoma. She is listed on the 1910 census there with her mother and step-father, Henry J. Cassin.  Cassin ran a movie theater in the Comanche County community.  Their residence on April 20, 1910 showed Henry, Anna, Lucille, and Hal all labeled as "Casson".   They were living at 910 "D" Street in Lawton.

Most published accounts locate the family in Lawton through 1917 and within just a few years in Kansas City.  Soon, however, Lucille's acting career would take off by the 1930's Joan Crawford was a full fledged Hollywood Star.

THE UBIQUITOUS WINDMILL GETS FACELIFT

The ubiquitous windmill, featured in the early painting of nearly every would be artist of the west, is a haunting image often set in lonely desolation.  A rusting vestige, even if still in use, of simpler and harder times.  Odd, near anomalous skeletons of a dead past - like this image of a windmill bumping up to a road - a holdover of a time when the road was much more narrow and further to the south.  Now, however, as the 21st century dawns a new type of wind power is being seen in structures surely to be as iconic as the old wind wills pumping water from deep in the earth. These mills seek to capture the power of the wind - that constant and powerful force so loved and hated by inhabitants of the plains.  They are already providing new sources of power, income, and visions of a renewed future booming with potential and hope.

RAILROADS, VIOLENCE, AND GRUESOME DEATH

WELLINGTON, KS., Nov. 22---Last evening, Levi Meeker, his wife and 8-year-old daughter were found dead on the Southern Kansas railroad track by his son. It is supposed they were struck while crossing the track in a wagon by a passenger train.(reported in the Wisconsin State Journal ~ November 23, 1888). 

In my book, WHEN DEATH RODE THE RAILS: STRANGE DEATHS IN OKLAHOMA, 1900-1920, I explored cases like this. I had found some suspicious cases in northern Texas and theorized there might be more in surrounding states.


Exactly how did a steam locomotive - stealthy they were not - sneak up to kill this family? No one on the wagon (pulled by one or more horses, walking or at most trotting) was aware of the oncoming train? None could hold the team and run it across the tracks in time?   One source indicates express passenger trains on that line were to travel at between 25-35 and mail trains 15 mph.     Were they, like some in Oklahoma, killed and then placed there to cover the crime? Are there similar deaths along that particular line?

NEW PLAN TO MOVE COLUMNS

The lovely and majestic columns on the old Phillips campus in Enid, Oklahoma will be moved according to a new plan to open a Smithsonian quality museum addition in Enid adjacent to the Chisholm Trail Conference Center.

The current location, beside a peaceful pond with arching trees is lovely and in there place would be a destination for tourists, students, and community. The current plans show them moved to the new downtown addition and named for donors. In the fading golden sun of a peaceful November afternoon the thought of these gracious and classic structures being surrounded by traffic seems too harsh and cruel. They are mythic art so at home in their natural setting. Times change, places are forgotten or torn down. Another page of history is turned and what will the result of this urban renewal ultimately reveal? Only the future can tell if this will be a good thing or if , like so many other victims of urban renewals have learned, the realization will be that sometimes, stories and things, should remain.