I had to do it, Elizabeth was haunting me. This past weekend I spent a lot of time and emotional energy digging into the story I spent most of my life avoiding for some reason. I think I figured out why. Behind those eyes were intense pain and getting a summary of what was published it felt like I knew her, and always had. Her story had elements the whispered my own, from my childhood where I was ill, and in spite of it worked with more trauma being placed on daily. I felt that ache. Maybe I've always have and that is why I turned away the first time I learned about around the age of 8 or 9.
I was an old movie fiend even back then in the 70s - I loved film noir, Cary Grant (my first love), old Hitchcock movies, even the Ziegfeld Follies - Esther Williams with her water ballet of synchronized dancing - to a little girl, as a toddler when living in Hollywood land and had no problem taking my 18 month old legs and running towards an ocean and the waves - well, it was magical to me. Old movies felt natural to me so when one came on my mom started telling me about Elizabeth Short. Discussing murder in the house was no big deal either. Mom was a ferocious reader and some of those book covers most woul call traumatizing. I've explained before about Helter Skelter and mom going on and on about knowing Jay, the hairstylist. So, yes, for me it was normal. Even then I didn't understand why Elizabeth's story bothered me so much, but it did, and I turned it off and avoided it, somewhat, since.
Those eyes this weekend wouldn't allow me to turn away. Couple that magnetic pull along with all the research I have been doing into mid-century American and fringe groups with interesting human beings, well -it called out to me that all is not as it seems - actually none of it.
I started seeing a young man in pain in those eyes and that photo -deep pain that had nowhere to go, and they didn't understand it all. I felt their soul feeling like a ping-pong bounced around trying to find home. But that young man felt like a child crying - and I had to.
At first I had AI remove make up, female accessories and give Elizabeth a haircut, timely for the era - but then I wanted to be sure there were no alterations in bone structure - lip placement, so I went old school and just took the original photo, erased what I could myself, and place that face on top of the AI version with the short hair and it started making sense -all of it. The short relationships, the comments from people at the time that they were a tease, aka -wouldn't put out. There were mentions that they were unable to have sex, and that Elizabeth just used people. I saw a medical condition society still makes jokes about and from ignorance -which is something I know about even if not the same thing - mine deals with connective tissue within my body, Elizabeth's dealt with the essence of their being's expression of gender.
I saw someone trying to survive in a constant state of hypervigilance in a world of men returning from war,hyped up on surges of adrenaline and pain, their own PTSD. No doubt that during those days, in that era.
How does one navigate then. How could they cover it up? How could they find others who would understand? That's mind boggling to think about because back then being intersexed doctors chose your path before you ate solid foods. Furthermore, in Germany Hitler's mad scientists were obsessed with topics like these, they made for painful experimentations and death. We were doing our own, and it wasn't just the Kinsey Report.
I realize there is not actual proof and the autopsy may negate this, but I also know how records can be manipulated, altered or just flat out lied in, my medical records have fallen victim to such things and our documented history is filled with it, and especially with some of the massive covert operations of the time and since - Jeffrey Epstein and that circus is a prime example. So, if anything allow this theory to prove - the answers are not as simple or blatant as it may seem.
For instance did you know that Chicago was an epicenter of the LGBT movement for civil rights? I had no idea and I grew up in the area, I didn't know until I started down this mid-century trek. The person who started was Henry Gerber-
In 1924 Henry Gerber formed Chicago’s Society for Human Rights. He had arrived in America only a decade prior. He was born in Bavaria as Joseph Henry Dittmar on June 29, 1892. According to the Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame: "From 1920 to 1923 he served with the U.S. Army of Occupation of Germany and during this time, he came into contact with the German homosexual emancipation movement. He subscribed to German homophile magazines and was in contact with Magnus Hirschfeld’s Scientific-Humanitarian Community in Berlin. In 1924, Gerber returned to Chicago and was hired by the post office. Gerber’s return to Chicago was amidst a backdrop of urbanization and an emerging gay subculture.
Following what Gerber had seen in Germany, he felt the need to establish an organization to protect the rights of gays and lesbians. With several friends, Gerber formed an organization which was later incorporated as The Society for Human Rights, a nonprofit corporation in the State of Illinois. The organization published a newsletter, Friendship and Freedom, which was distributed to its small membership."
I never knew- until this week and for some reason when I read it I was reminded that I had also read about Short spending time in Chicago more than once. At least this is what is said when Steve Hodel and his interview with Paul Veglia in 2017 as published on the website The Black Dahlia in Hollywood.
"She purchased a bus ticket to Indianapolis, and then it was on to Chicago, where she stayed at the Park Row Hotel from June 24 until July 12. She also stayed at the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago with Jack Chernau.
While in Chicago, Elizabeth became interested in the Suzanne Degnan murder. William Heirens, a young man from the area, was accused of killing the young girl and dismembering her body. The Los Angeles Examiner reported: “In Chicago, Freddie Woods, 23, who described himself as a “friend” of the slain girl, revealed that she was “fascinated” with the brutal slaying of six year-old Suzanne Degnan, which took place in Chicago a year ago. Woods said he met Miss Short last August when she was in Chicago for 10 days. She told him she was a Massachusetts reporter covering the trial of William Heirens, who was convicted of the Degnan kidnaping and slaying.”
It almost sounds like Short was undercover, or pretending to be, why - I don't know but is it surprising considering the time, and all that was swirling, or a sign of someone trying to fit in or start again. Who knows, but it's interesting.
But then in the sidebar on the same site you will see another statement that has been reported elsewhere:
"James Neemo was an usher that worked at the CBS studios in Columbia Square on Sunset Boulevard near Vine Street. He worked directly under head usher John Egger. Egger said he saw Beth “at least twenty times” at the radio studio. She always came alone, except once when she was with a man who identified himself with his badge as a Chicago police officer. Beth usually waited in line to see a broadcast, but this time she was allowed in with the man through a side door as a courtesy to the officer. He said she came to see the Jack Carson show on either January 2 or January 8."
Now it gets interesting, doesn't it? Chicago at the time was a hub for many things, military wise, and otherwise. Project Paperclip was taking off and German scientists, many from Hitler's regime, were either one their way or here in America to make a switch and use their expertise for our efforts (I know, weird) and then Chicago was also in the middle of a pulp science fiction scene growing rapidly with Ziff Davis and then also with William and Frances Hamling and their Greenleaf Publishing in Evanston. The infamous child pornographer and abuser John David Norman was at Northwestern (according to his draft card) pumping up those radio skills - and Northwestern was bursting at the seams with returning service members utilizing their GI Bills - oh, and then we also have a young Hugh Hefner doing his own self publishing from an home in Chicago. Interestingly enough, the Hamlings, Norman, and Hefner would land west in California, in areas like San Diego, Los Angeles and Palm Springs - Already over that way was Chicago born Walt Disney with his empire growing and Sidney Sheldon getting his mind prepared to write novels we wouldn't be able to put down. This doesn't even include all those science fiction writers and then artists like Edmond Teske. Some of the largest names heard the call to "Go West" - and they did. Furthermore, they did with their eclectic mix of lifestyles, some considered on the far end of fringe.
In the land of sunshine the Chicago creatives often moved in the same circles or at least ones that easily connected to others. Elizabeth moved in the same circles, or did their damndest to do so as they reached for the stars. One person Elizabeth knew well, at least well enough to say in his home for a bit, was theater owner Mark Hansen. Actually many of those former Chicagoans also knew him and moved in the same circles. There they would meet up with the like minded such as avante garde artist Man Ray and one of the main suspect in her murder, Dr. George Hodel. Hodel owned that house that has become eeirly a visual symbol of her story even though we don't know what happened there, and if anything did.
The house is known as the Sowden House after its original owners. What I found interesting in researching this is who built that home, Frank LLoyd Wright, Jr. -just call him LLoyd. Lloyd was very good friends with Teske. Teske had actually spent time at his father's place in Spring Green, Wisconsin, Taliesin. There the talented artist documented the building of minds happening before him and became good friends with LLoyd. Teske had actually stayed at he Sowden House and Lloyd's other and first building there. the Taggart House.
Rumors have been flying that Elizabeth possibly sat for Teske, but there's no evidence of that, yet. It's also worthy to note that Jack Parson and L.Ron Hubbard were known to run in some of the very circles, the year prior the pair conducted a series of rituals in which Parsons believed he was attempting to invoke or manifest “Babalon,” a divine feminine figure from Aleister Crowley’s Thelema system. Central to the working was the concept of the “Scarlet Woman,” a human counterpart meant to embody that force. Parsons believed the ritual could call forth such a figure in the physical world , what he later interpreted as the arrival of Marjorie Cameron-and ultimately lead to the creation of a transformative or “magical” child.
Now enter Man Ray's art- no doubt bondage and more was a highlight.
Google image search result on Man Ray
Can you imagine all these minds coming together? Science fiction, erotica, surrealism, in an air of suspicion where everyone back then was spying on one another? Sidney Sheldon sitting back and taking it all in, organizing thoughts and creativity, mixing it up? The Wright's and their organic ways and openness for all walks of life? The military and slurry of alphabet agencies - not to mention movie stars like Cary Grant, a very good friend of Sheldon's and who was known to spy for England.
It's a lot. I know. My head is still swirling from taking it all in and trying to understand it all and how they came together, all of them. As it is, anything I suggest in this is fluid and theory but you have to admit, it's one hell of a story. I want to make sure all understand that as I know how things get twisted along with motivations, we all do but when you add on things like L Ron Hubbard and Scientology we know that a few decades later they had their own project, Operation Snow White, where they infiltrated government offices and it was reported they altered, changed, or destroyed records. What could a group with such intent do in today's world? Especially one of wealth and are our techno wizards? We'd never be able to trust documented history if they decided for the rest of us to delete history. Are they? Have they? Will they? Do you trust the answer?
I guess it's up to each one of us what we decide is important enough to care about and use our best judgement. For me, right now -Elizabeth pain IS important and always has been - because no matter who Elizabeth was -what happened to that life we've been told was literally ripped into two pieces, blood drained - despite that -when I look into the eyes of that picture, I see duality, hidden. I see a young man, and I know in my gut there is more to all of this than meets my eyes.
For instance, out in those sands surrounding California and beyond, Parsons along with Hubbard and also Frank Malina, that had been working on their own projects, together, to take mankind into outer space. Those efforts caused heartaches, loss friendships, and hurt feelings. Parsons would end up accusing Hubbard in a bad financial deal and Parsons losing his life managed by perfectionism, every aspect, blown to bits from supposedly dropping some chemicals. As for Malina, he and Parsons had it out as it is said Parsons turned him in for communism, and Malina ended up leaving the country -
The story is far from over - Elizabeth's and even the connections to those highly intelligent swirls controlling the vibe of society - Malina reaches us today but this time through Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell and her sister. The sister is married to his son.............
And Elizabeth's eyes -both of them- holds a chapter in the story of US.
It's late - there may be typos fixed after initial publishing - feel free to contact me if you see anything glaring.
Comments