My adventures in pulp fiction

One of my new readers told me that he was startled to see so many recent posts about murder, and asked if crime was a particular interest of mine.  I suppose, in a way, it is.  But then, I would argue that most of us are fascinated by dark deeds and those who commit them. 

Detective fiction and true crime books are largely a 20th century invention (albeit one for whom such earlier authors as Poe and Wilkie Collins paved the way).  An essay from Erle Stanley Gardner, pulp fiction writer extraordinaire and creator of defense attorney Perry Mason, explains that allure:

The mystery book is the answer of modern times to the problems of modern times... The busy executive can't simply forget his problems.  They are too pressing, too urgent and too intimate. The only answer is to find something else which will fully occupy the mind.  The ordinary novel simply doesn't have the power, the punch, the action. That's why the sale of sleeping tablets and of mystery stories have multiplied to astronomical proportions during the last twenty-five years.

These days most people seem to get their fix from CSI, SUV and all of those other alphabet soup investigation shows.  But the principle is the same. And I recall reading that such crime shows exploded in direct response to new standards introduced to control the amount of sex on television.  (But, following the well-established model of pulp fiction, these shows cleverly mix sex and violence to attract their huge audiences.)

As for me, I prefer reading about and sometimes even researching crimes to watching them dramatized on the small screen.  (Preview: Stay tuned for another true crime post about the James-Younger gang!)

The Mayflower Murder Mystery

The first convicted murderer in Plymouth Colony (and hence in America) was Mayflower passenger John Billington, who, for reasons now lost to history, shot a man in the woods.

Nearly four hundred years later comes news out of Seattle of a Mayflower connection to a cold case, the chilling 1991 murder of a 16 year old girl.  A forensic genealogist--who knew there even was such a thing--found that the DNA left behind by the presumed killer links him to two Mayflower passengers named Fuller. The police are quoted as saying they don't know how helpful this might be, but I imagine it could eventually lead to the killer.  Most families know if they have Mayflower ancestry and are deservedly proud of it.  If the murder suspect is in fact named Fuller, or if a family member or friend knows that he is descended from the Fullers, that could be all it takes to find him.

It's long been a sore spot in my family that we have been unable to turn up any Mayflower ancestors.  Instead, we were on the leaky companion ship that didn't make it here, the Speedwell. (Hence the title of my family memoir.) My grandmother used to sniff that the Mayflower passengers were "riffraff" and the better sort came later... conveniently forgetting that we were all supposed to arrive together. 

The murder suspect's DNA shows descent from Robert Fuller, who came over from England later, but whose uncles were on the storied ship. Samuel Fuller was a physician and church deacon.  He was accompanied on the voyage by his brother Edward.  But guess what? Samuel was originally supposed to come over on the Speedwell instead.  (Ah, maybe my grandmother was onto something, after all.)  As a doctor, he would have been considered vital to the journey, and hence was one of those former Speedwell ticket holders who crowded onto the Mayflower instead.

As for forensic genealogy, I'm intrigued.  Instead of just helping people get into fusty old societies such as the Daughters of the American Revolution, genealogists are now potential superheros fighting crime. For the sake of the young Seattle murder victim's family, I very much hope this is the case.

The girl who admired Frank Bender

This past weekend I stopped into the Mutter Museum to see a bust by renowned forensic sculptor Frank Bender.  I had just finished reading The Girl With The Crooked Nose, which describes Bender's ability to create eerily accurate faces from the skulls of nameless victims of violence.  Bender, who died last summer at the age of 70, also helped nab several fugitives from justice by making age-progression busts based on photographs. 

The bust I viewed is of a young woman later identified as Rosella Atkinson, whose skeletal remains were found on the edge of a Philadelphia football field.  Bender nicknamed her "The Girl With Hope" and depicted her almost exactly as she looks in a photograph, with her proudly raised chin.  (Long before The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo series, Bender identified his subjects with "girl" nicknames that he felt identified some key characteristic about them.  He once explained that the term "girl" wasn't dismissive, but was instead a way of acknowledging how tragically short the lives of many of the women he tried to identify were.)  Atkinson, whose killer confessed to her murder years later, was identified by family members who saw her bust on display at the museum.

The news this week that Philadelphia's unsolved murder rate is scandalously high added even more poignancy to the loss of Bender.  Fortunately, the members of the Vidocq Society, master criminologists who welcomed Bender into the fold, remain on the job. 

The Year of the Wasp

Looks like my people are back in for 2012.

Comedienne Alexandra ('Just call me Ali') Wentworth has a memoir coming out that promises to be as zany and entertaining as she is.  I own—and cherish--her WASP Cookbook, a blue velvet-clad homage to preppy culinary classics.  (And I just saw that, much like a blue chip stock, the book has appreciated nicely in value since I bought it years ago, with the cheapest used copy going for $42 on Amazon. )

I’m also excited to see the forthcoming film Damsels in Distress by Whit Stillman, the Woody Allen of the Wasp set.  Stillman is famed for 1990's Metropolitan, about the lives of privileged Upper East Siders attending deb balls over the winter holidays.  He will be live chatting during a screening of the film on Constellation.com on January 12.

I just finished the second memoir by an actress who made her debut (so to speak) in that film, Isabel Gillies, better known for her role as Detective Stabler’s wife Kathy on Law & Order: SVU.  In A Year and Six Seconds, Gillies describes how she moved back to New York to rebuild her life following a devastating divorce.  Gillies writes easily and candidly about her fairly cushy upbringing, which in many ways mirrored that of her Metropolitan character.

Could a Waspy reality TV show be far behind?  I’m envisioning an elderly couple clad in 40-year old matching tweed suits (bought in London, but of course) getting ready for a cocktail party; they learn that they don’t have enough Goldfish to fill all of the little engraved silver bowls.  Imagine the drama!

Occupy this space...

I read that the most common blog post was something along the lines of "I haven't posted in a while..."

Well, I haven't posted in a while.  (Obviously.)  I've had my hands full with another writing project, and I'm happy to report that it's going quite well. 

I could also and quite conveniently blame the holidays.  All those family members vying for attention.

Speaking of family, I learned that, in addition to inventing the telegraph, my busy Vail ancestors also created the original bathroom indicator.  Amazing, right?

Hmm.  Maybe we could manufacture an "Occupied" indicator for Wall Street?

Fall at the house of Poe

I finally stopped by the Edgar Allan Poe house this past weekend.  Run by the National Park Service, the house was inhabited by Poe and his wife (and cousin) Virginia, along with Virginia's mother (also known as Poe's aunt) for six years, during which he wrote many of his most famous stories.

The Poe house is located in what, according to the Park Service, is the “now defunct” neighborhood of Spring Garden. The Spring Garden Civic Association might tend to disagree. I just attended a meeting of the association two weeks ago, where I was reliably informed that I live in Spring Garden, not--as I have been claiming for the past many months--Fairmount.

Whatever the neighborhood is called, it is still a bit edgy down Poe's way, as perhaps befits the author of chilling tales. The house itself is almost barren other than the front rooms. But I spied a stuffed orangutan in one room. The tour guide asked if we knew why our cuddly simian friend was there.  Little Miss English Major promptly answered, “Because he was the murderer in 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue'!” (This really isn’t a spoiler since the orangutan isn’t the point of the tale, which is known as the first detective story.)

Downstairs in the creepy basement was a stuffed black cat.  Apparently Poe wrote the tale of the same name while living in the house, using the basement for inspiration.  (Actual spoiler - the cat drops a dime on the killer.  This is why I don't trust felines.)

Over the River (and through the turnstile)

Here's a little trivia to start your Turkey Day.  Which beloved holiday is celebrated in these famous lines?

Over the river and through the wood,
To grandfather's house we'll go;
The horse knows the way
To carry the sleigh
Through the white and drifted snow.

Over the river and through the wood,
Oh, how the wind does blow!
It stings the nose
And bites the toes
As over the ground we go.

Over the river and through the wood,
[I understand, you know this part, but just wait.]
To have a first-rate play,
Hear the bells ring,
Ting-a-ling-ding,
Hurrah for Thanksgiving Day!

Huh.  I was kind of stumped, too.  I swear we always sang "Christmas Day."  And for that matter, it's always been "grandmother's" house.  Who is this "grandfather" guy?  He doesn't sound as though he would make very good pies. 

You know me, I had to do some research.  Lydia Marie Child was an abolitionist, women's rights pioneer, and friend of Sarah Josepha Hale, who is credited with establishing Thanksgiving as a national holiday.  Child wrote the lines in 1844.  (Turns out her grandfather's house still stands, and it's a beauty.)  And I'm not crazy (regarding this, anyway); the poem was later adapted into the more familiar Christmas carol version. 

As for me, no sleigh today, just a SEPTA train.  But I'm pretty sure some good pie awaits at the end of the line.

Happy Thanksgiving!