The New York Press & The Headless Torso Mystery

Dark Histories

New York journalism in 1897 was in a pretty technicolor space. Newspapers, so long the grey, stolid, medium of the merchants and businessman, were instead being filled with lurid stories of murder, scandal and drunken debauchery and the public were loving it. As papers fought for readers in the streets, sometimes quite literally, the stories that filled the pages and the methods utilised on order to write the stories grew more and more sensational by the day. It all came to something of a boiling point in the high temperatures of Summer, when a body washed up in the East River, carved up and lacking a head. The investigation that followed was carried out just as much by the journalists as it was the police, as the lines between who was who became increasingly blurred. SOURCES Collins, Paul (2011) Murder of the Century: The Gilded Age Crime That Scandalized a City and Sparked the Tabloid Wars. Broadway Books, NY, USA. Reagan, L. J. (1995). Linking Midwives and Abortion in the Progressive Era. Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 69(4), 569–598. John Hopkins University Press, USA The World (1897) Boys Ghastly Find. 27 June 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) The Fragments of a Body Make a Mystery. 28 June 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) World Men Find A Clue. 28 June 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) The Murder Mystery is a Mystery Still. 01 July 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) Murder Will Out. 03 July 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) Mrs Nack’s Confession. 04 July 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) Supposed Thorn is Captured. 07 July 1897, p1, NY, USA The World (1897) Thorn’s Friend Betrays Him. 08 July 1897, p3, NY, USA The World (1897) Mrs Nack Talk Freely to The World. 06 August 1897, p1, NY, USA The Journal (1897) Mrs Nack: Murderess! 01 July 1897, p1, NY, USA Buffalo Evening News (1897) Says He Bought Corpses. 14 January 1897, p1, NY, USA

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The Dark Histories Butterfly was drawn by Courtney, who you can find on Instagram @bewildereye

Music was recorded by me © Ben Cutmore 2017

Other Outro music was Paul Whiteman & his orchestra with Mildred Bailey - All of me (1931). It's out of copyright now, but if you're interested, that was that.