LA golden Era mystery complete with time capsule

[Miss Neecerie]

gross but fascinating story from the LA times...

Who was Jean M. Barrie, the woman whose steamer trunk stored for decades in the basement of a Los Angeles apartment building contained the mummified remains of two babies?

That's the question investigators were mulling Thursday, two days after the babies — wrapped in newspapers from the 1930s — were discovered when the basement was being cleared out. As the county coroner began an autopsy on the bodies Thursday, Los Angeles Police Department detectives were left to sift through a crime scene that also is a time capsule.

Inside the trunk, police found a fur wrap, a flapper dress, a beaded purse and a bundle of blank medical test forms.







http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-basement-babies-20100820,0,7978167.story

 

[Puzzicato]

Fascinating! I wonder if they will ever find out what happened?

 

[Story]

Also got hidden in this thread http://www.thefedoralounge.com/showpost.php?p=1067790&postcount=105
but I'd agree, the tale deserves it's own stage. Someone will follow up on this and the end result will probably be another crime noir movie.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

In Europe, it's depressingly common to find ancient skeletons of newborns hidden in the walls of medieval convents. Yes, convents: the homes of nuns.


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[LocktownDog]

Well that's an uplifting image to take into the weekend. Gee, thanks.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Blame the monks, not me.


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[AmateisGal]

Wow. Completely fascinating. And I had no idea about mummified babies in convent walls. Morbid, yet equally fascinating.

 

[Fletch]

John Medford, a resident at the building, also thinks the bodies may be linked to illegal abortions.

"It was kept secret for 74 years and my theory is that this rolls back the cover on a cruel, tragic and unjust time in America for women," Medford said. "Ending pregnancies this way would have been commonplace. This was business as usual in all social strata."

Not to say 1930s society couldn't be cruel to women, but this guy comes off a bit of a drama queen.

 

[Story]

Not to say 1930s society couldn't be cruel to women, but this guy comes off a bit of a drama queen.

Wonder what his usual screenname is.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

And I had no idea about mummified babies in convent walls.

More often skeletal than mummified.

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[ScionPI2005]

Very strange. Thanks for posting.

 

[Widebrim]

In Europe, it's depressingly common to find ancient skeletons of newborns hidden in the walls of medieval convents. Yes, convents: the homes of nuns.


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Yes, and very tragic. Hard to understand how a person would resort to such action in order to follow the dictates of her/his church...

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Yes, and very tragic. Hard to understand how a person would resort to such action in order to follow the dictates of her/his church...

Yes. To be fair, we should acknowledge that some of those babies may have been stillborn.

.

 

[Widebrim]

Not to say 1930s society couldn't be cruel to women, but this guy comes off a bit of a drama queen.

I would say cruel to these children, judging by what was done to them.

 

[Story]

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Investigators have identified the owner of a trunk in which the mummified remains of two babies were found, bringing them a step closer to solving the intriguing international mystery.

The owner of the steamer trunk, abandoned for decades in the basement of an apartment building, was Janet M. Barrie, a Scottish immigrant who was born in 1897 and worked as a nurse in Los Angeles before moving to Vancouver, where she died, officials said Thursday.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_INFANT_SKELETONS?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=US

Investigators are working on a number of theories about why someone would put the babies in a trunk.

Barrie worked as a private nurse in the home of dentist George Knapp, mainly looking after his wife Mary Downs Knapp. After the wife died of breast cancer in 1964, Barrie married George Knapp and stayed with him until his death in 1968.

After her husband's death, Barrie moved to Vancouver, where she died of natural causes in 1995, the law enforcement official said. Her remains were returned to Los Angeles and were interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, along with those of George and Mary Knapp.

Among the theories being explored is that Barrie had children with Knapp but they did not survive or were aborted. Or perhaps they were babies she helped deliver in the apartment building that died.

 

[Jack Armstrong]

I would say cruel to these children, judging by what was done to them.

I'm glad someone noticed that.

 

[dhermann1]

Another possibility: Maybe Knapp performed abortions as a side line. Tho if that was the case one would expect to find more skeletons in the closet, or wherever.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Another possibility: Maybe Knapp performed abortions as a side line. Tho if that was the case one would expect to find more skeletons in the closet, or wherever.

It's also possible that Mrs. Knapp was incapacitated in some way -- if she required a private nurse thirty years before her death, it's pretty obvious there were problems of some kind, physical or mental. Perhaps she herself was the one who resorted to the abortions, and Barrie was the one who saw to the necessary arrangements.

 

[Puzzicato]

It's also possible that Mrs. Knapp was incapacitated in some way -- if she required a private nurse thirty years before her death, it's pretty obvious there were problems of some kind, physical or mental. Perhaps she herself was the one who resorted to the abortions, and Barrie was the one who saw to the necessary arrangements.

That crossed my mind too. It sounds like she was ill for a very long time.