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Speaker 1: This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.

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Speaker 2: I'm very interested in helping you have a conversation with

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Speaker 2: my mom. I'm not sure what kind of questions you're

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Speaker 2: looking forward, and I'll.

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Speaker 3: Be with her when we do this.

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Speaker 2: Okay, I'll put it on my cellphone.

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Speaker 4: Hey, my mom does not have a cell she refuses.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so she has an landline only, right, Well, I'll

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Speaker 1: tell you the background on how I found this story

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Speaker 1: to begin with.

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Speaker 5: That's my second question, because.

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Speaker 1: Nobody knows about this story, which is amazing. So you know,

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Speaker 1: when Dorothy died, she had been babysitting a little boy

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Speaker 1: who lived pretty close to her, named Bill Strain, and

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Speaker 1: when she died, it made a really big impression on him.

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Speaker 1: He was four or five at the time, and he

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Speaker 1: grew up hearing these stories and he remembered Dorothy as

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Speaker 1: just being very beautiful and kind. Yeah, he grew up

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Speaker 1: and became a law enforcement all officer. Later in life,

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Speaker 1: he became an artist, and when he retired at age seventy,

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Speaker 1: he became obsessed with this case. He just really dug

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Speaker 1: into the case. I have a binder full of information

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Speaker 1: that he found and he and his son took a

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Speaker 1: couple of trips down to Aransas Past to do I

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Speaker 1: get more information, and he died.

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Speaker 5: So he died.

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Speaker 1: Last year I ran across this website. He had a

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Speaker 1: very long blog about Dorothy. And the reason I wanted

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Speaker 1: to talk to your mom and you and anybody else

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Speaker 1: in the family who wants to talk about it is

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Speaker 1: not to glean any sort of new details or new research.

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Speaker 6: You know.

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Speaker 1: What I like to do is, you know, really get

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Speaker 1: the family's point of view and how this is fit

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Speaker 1: into the tapestry of a family. Every family has a narrative,

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Speaker 1: like my grandmother.

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Speaker 2: Was had a nervous breakdown. That's my understanding.

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Speaker 1: That was my first call to JB. Simons. It was

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Speaker 1: essential that I track him down because his extended family

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Speaker 1: is at the center of the story. The family members

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Speaker 1: are usually willing to help me because they're pretty far

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Speaker 1: removed from the terrible crimes in their family's history, and

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Speaker 1: that's certainly true of the Simons.

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Speaker 3: Every one I.

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Speaker 1: Contacted seemed willing to share their memories they had. The

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Speaker 1: trouble is they didn't have very many, and that surprised

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Speaker 1: me because this horrific incident was big news at the time,

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Speaker 1: yet somehow major details related to the case were buried

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Speaker 1: along with the victim. I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, a crime

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Speaker 1: historian and the author of the forthcoming book All That

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Speaker 1: Is Wicked, which is available for pre order now. I

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Speaker 1: also wrote American Sherlock and Death in the Air, and

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Speaker 1: this is our new season of tenfold more Wicked. We

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Speaker 1: were just in eighteen sixties Virginia, where a blood feud

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Speaker 1: over a terrible marriage ended in the murders of three people,

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Speaker 1: all in the same family. And now we're in a

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Speaker 1: fishing village on the coast of Texas in the nineteen thirties,

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Speaker 1: where an unforgettable crime sent shock waves through a small

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Speaker 1: town community and haunted a local family for generations. We're

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Speaker 1: calling the season the Echo of Murder. There's a lot

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Speaker 1: that stands out about this story. I've never covered anything

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Speaker 1: like this case. It's the first time that I've investigated

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Speaker 1: a crime that took place in a small town, the

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Speaker 1: kind of town where everyone knows everyone, where it's easy

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Speaker 1: to take sense of safety. For granted, it might not

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Speaker 1: be the sort of place you'd imagine is a breeding

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Speaker 1: ground for suspicion and secrets. And lies, or maybe it's

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Speaker 1: the perfect place for murder. Perhaps I can shed some

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Speaker 1: light on the mystery of why so many descendants of

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Speaker 1: the Simons seem to know so little about this story.

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Speaker 1: In a small community, you learn to protect your own

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Speaker 1: so maybe this story was meant to stay a secret.

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Speaker 1: Let me tell you a bit about Dorothy Simons. She

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Speaker 1: was a young woman with a lot of potential, but

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Speaker 1: she was also just another person struggling in a small

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Speaker 1: town during the Great Depression. She liked to break rules

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Speaker 1: every once in a while. Dorothy liked young men and

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Speaker 1: a little bit of danger, and she liked some dangerous men.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy was adored by her mother and her brothers. It

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Speaker 1: sounds like she was the center of the family, the

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Speaker 1: person who kept them sane. Because when Dorothy died, everything

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Speaker 1: went to hell. It was as if the heart of

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Speaker 1: the family had been ripped away. The ocean plays a

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Speaker 1: big role in this story, and I love the ocean.

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Speaker 1: During the day, it's sparkling and cool and sort of mysterious.

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Speaker 1: But at night it's dark and deep and who knows

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Speaker 1: what's in there as you venture out into the water.

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Speaker 1: I've never been brave enough to swim in the ocean

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Speaker 1: at night. But if you're from Ramsa's Pass and you're young,

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Speaker 1: it might be something you do just to test your

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Speaker 1: own limits, and it comes with danger. So Dorothy Simons

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Speaker 1: was loved and needed and admired, and soon she'd be dead.

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Speaker 1: I talked with Kelsey Simons, who is the victim's great niece.

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Speaker 1: So what did you know about this story before you

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Speaker 1: and I talked? Was there any conversation about the worthy story?

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Speaker 7: I don't think I had any conversations with anybody about it.

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Speaker 7: I first learned about it on ancestry about five years

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Speaker 7: ago when I started doing my family tree, and from

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Speaker 7: there I read about it. I can't remember if I

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Speaker 7: brought it up to my dad. I think I did,

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Speaker 7: and he was He talked about it briefly and then

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Speaker 7: we let it go.

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Speaker 1: I also talked with Nancy Coppage, the victim's niece, about

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Speaker 1: her father David's explanation about Dorothy's death, or the lack

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Speaker 1: of explanation.

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Speaker 8: Back in those days, you know, you didn't talk about

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Speaker 8: the things because we've raised in the time when nobody

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Speaker 8: talked about any of these things, that like things were

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Speaker 8: swept under the rug and nothing was spoken of you know,

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Speaker 8: those were just those times. It's like everything even in

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Speaker 8: our family the whole time growing up, it was like

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Speaker 8: everything was you know, people don't need to know, they

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Speaker 8: don't need to know that very hush hush. You don't

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Speaker 8: talk other people about what's going on in your family.

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Speaker 1: I was surprised by the level of curiosity that I

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Speaker 1: created about a crime long forgotten. The relatives I interviewed

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Speaker 1: wanted to know more, even though it was family history

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Speaker 1: that seemingly disappeared. But the more I talk to them,

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Speaker 1: the more I seem to pique their interest, and I'm

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Speaker 1: glad I did. It can be a challenging task to

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Speaker 1: open people's eyes to their own family's history, just like

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Speaker 1: it's challenging to investigate a story where the questions far

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Speaker 1: outnumber the answers. John Bowers is the publisher for the

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Speaker 1: only local newspaper, the Aransas Past Progress.

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Speaker 9: When something bad happens to somebody, the story always gets

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Speaker 9: twisted by gossip people talk about on the street. And

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Speaker 9: women are not worse than men. In fact, men are

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Speaker 9: probably worse. Me and my buddy have met at the

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Speaker 9: Baker Cafe and had breakfast for twenty years. On Saturday morning. Yes,

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Speaker 9: kind of like a big gossip factory.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a story where small town gossip and

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Speaker 1: rampant rumors can quickly lead to ruin. There were whispers

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Speaker 1: about Prohibition era gangsters and kidnapping plots, roaming serial killers,

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Speaker 1: renegade pirates, jealous lovers, and unbridled obsession. But there's another

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Speaker 1: reason this story is a standout one that gave me

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Speaker 1: an unexpected sense of purpose. I talked about this with

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Speaker 1: Helen Simons, who was married to the victim's younger brother, Joe.

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Speaker 1: I was telling JB about the stories I've done before

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Speaker 1: always involve families, but I've never had a story that

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Speaker 1: impacted a family so much. There was a trickle down

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Speaker 1: effect with your family, and no one talked about it well.

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Speaker 5: When Joe and I first started going together, of course,

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Speaker 5: my dad knew Joe's dad because the families all knew

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Speaker 5: each other. They lived closer together, and so they knew

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Speaker 5: and my dad knew about Dorothy's death. He never ever

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Speaker 5: mentioned it to me, and he never talked about it

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Speaker 5: to Joe.

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Speaker 1: So while covering the story, I came to care a

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Speaker 1: lot about the Simons, this family that knew relatively little

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Speaker 1: about its own heartbreaking legacy. This is the kind of

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Speaker 1: tragic heartbreak that reverberates through a family for generations, whether

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Speaker 1: they're aware of it or not. I begin to wonder

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Speaker 1: might there be a way to help right past wrongs

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Speaker 1: and maybe even heal deep seated family wounds. Everyone I

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Speaker 1: spoke with from the family thinks so. And they all

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Speaker 1: felt shut out by the people who knew Dorothy the best.

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Speaker 1: Her death and its impact just about chattered them.

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Speaker 7: Even though this is kind of a gruesome thing, it's

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Speaker 7: nice to know because it's a traumatic event.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy's mother buried her emotions as soon as she buried

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Speaker 1: her only daughter.

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Speaker 5: She told me anything about the murder. She told me

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Speaker 5: that she she was killed. She finally said the word killed.

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Speaker 5: She beat around the bush for a couple of days

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Speaker 5: before she could even say that.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy's younger brother, Joe, became a family man as an adult,

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Speaker 1: a committed husband and father who was a protector of

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Speaker 1: his children.

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Speaker 2: I think one of the side effects her dad was

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Speaker 2: that family became everything that no matter how tough things got,

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Speaker 2: he would never ever abandon the family for any reason whatsoever,

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Speaker 2: because what he went through.

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Speaker 1: But Dorothy's other brother David internalized her death and he

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Speaker 1: became a really troubled father and husband. He was violent

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Speaker 1: and unremorseful.

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Speaker 8: I was a teenager before he ever even spoke of that.

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Speaker 8: It's like, it's like it was a deep secret in

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Speaker 8: his past and he did not speak of that.

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Speaker 2: He was scarred for life.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy's great niece says, the trauma of her death has

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Speaker 1: somehow changed the lives of all the Simons.

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Speaker 7: There's that whole thing of like how trauma can be

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Speaker 7: written into your DNA. We have a Simon's family curse.

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Speaker 1: Do you really believe that?

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Speaker 10: Yeah?

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Speaker 7: I think so.

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Speaker 1: We'll start this journey with the story of the last

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Speaker 1: person to investigate this case before me. He's actually a

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Speaker 1: really important character because he knew Dorothy Simon's she babysat

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Speaker 1: him the year that she died, and he cared about

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Speaker 1: the story, probably more than anyone else, and he knew

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Speaker 1: the most about it. This is Michael Strain, Bill's son.

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Speaker 11: My dad saw this as being really important. He had

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Speaker 11: been fascinated by this case his whole life, and I

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Speaker 11: don't think he understood why, and I don't think I

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Speaker 11: understand why.

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Speaker 1: We'll be hearing a lot from Michael Strain. Full disclosure here,

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Speaker 1: I've entered into a highly unusual collaboration this season and

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Speaker 1: with Michael's father, Bill, a man who continues to be

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Speaker 1: the primary source of information about this case even though

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Speaker 1: he's been dead for several years. As a self appointed expert,

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Speaker 1: Bill has informed my research more than anyone else. And

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Speaker 1: I should probably mention that he wasn't even related to

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Speaker 1: the Simon's family. In fact, he barely knew them at all.

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Speaker 2: I guess I'll.

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Speaker 1: Start reading in here because I think it'll be interesting.

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Speaker 1: I kind of broke these up in the paragraphs, so

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Speaker 1: this is to me some of the most powerful stuff,

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Speaker 1: just because it's in your dad's words. So you can

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Speaker 1: just read.

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Speaker 11: Maybe this is a love story. It might be a

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Speaker 11: story of obsession, or perhaps it's even a story of possession.

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Speaker 11: I'm not sure i'll ever know for sure, because Dorothy's

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Speaker 11: been stalking me for almost seventy one years now. Dorothy

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Speaker 11: is an enigma. Dorothy's only eighteen years old and I'm

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Speaker 11: seventy four. To enhance the paradox, let me tell you

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Speaker 11: that Dorothy was my babysitter.

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Speaker 1: You've probably heard of a ghostwriter. It's a secret author

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Speaker 1: behind a book that's credited to someone else. Well, I

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Speaker 1: guess you could say that Bill Strain has been my

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Speaker 1: ghost investigator. Honestly, I can't remember how I even found him,

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Speaker 1: Probably just lots of googling. Back in twenty eighteen, Bill

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Speaker 1: started a website detailing almost every angle of this particular crime.

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Speaker 1: His blog immediately intrigued me, because, well, I got the

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Speaker 1: feeling that Bill wasn't your typical armchair detective. I've been

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Speaker 1: finding it hard to paint a clear picture of Bill.

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Speaker 1: He's a tough guy to pin down. He had an

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Speaker 1: eclectic personal history. He worked for the Boy Scouts, He

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Speaker 1: attended art school. He went from self styled ladies man

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Speaker 1: to devoted husband and father. He was also a World

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Speaker 1: War Two veteran. He lied about his age to join

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Speaker 1: the Merchant Marines at just seventeen, and he eventually became

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Speaker 1: a policeman. There's no doubt Bill was multitalented. His widow, Sherry,

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Speaker 1: remembers fondly.

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Speaker 10: Bill was a watercolor artist and made art shows all

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Speaker 10: around South Texas especially. He taught art classes and often

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Speaker 10: went out on the weekends to sketch. Some of his

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Speaker 10: favorite places. His favorite subjects were old rundown barns and

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Speaker 10: windmills and cars. It was like the kind of things

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Speaker 10: that he grew up with, you know, when he was

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Speaker 10: a child. These were the This is what the cars

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Speaker 10: looked like, and this is what the windmills looked like.

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Speaker 1: Bill loved Rantis Pass and he enjoyed combining his art

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Speaker 1: with his past.

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Speaker 10: He'd find them alongside the road and stop them, sketch

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Speaker 10: and take pictures. And that was just his favorite subject matter,

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Speaker 10: along with the boats and the activities along the channels,

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Speaker 10: especially in that area of Corpus Christie in Ransis Pass.

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Speaker 3: So he had a.

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Speaker 10: Varied interest and talked about them frequently. I just found

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Speaker 10: him quite fascinating. I just love to hear him talk.

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Speaker 1: As he neared retirement, Bill realized he'd need an interesting

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Speaker 1: way to occupy his time, so he started researching and

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Speaker 1: writing about this story to the point of obsession. Honestly,

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Speaker 1: the remnants of all his hard work are now left

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Speaker 1: in his blog and in the hands of his son Michael.

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Speaker 11: I found it to be a really compelling story. Apparently

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Speaker 11: it was all the scuttle but when he was a kid.

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Speaker 11: He tells a story about reading one of the detective

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Speaker 11: magazines and reading the story of that and remembering everything

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Speaker 11: about it.

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Speaker 1: How long did he do this? How long was he researching?

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Speaker 1: Do you think decades?

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Speaker 11: You know, I'm not sure he may have. I mean

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Speaker 11: it sounds like he was a little bit researching all

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Speaker 11: his life.

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Speaker 1: We're moving into an unconventional direction this season. I like

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Speaker 1: to think of us as tag team detectives, each of

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Speaker 1: us seeking the truth. Bill started the investigation, and I'll

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Speaker 1: pick up where he left off. I'm looking for scraps

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Speaker 1: of evidence that might have fallen through the cracks, evidence

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Speaker 1: that Bill, despite his perseverance, might have missed. This story

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Speaker 1: is less about discovering what happened to Dorothy Simons and

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Speaker 1: more about discovering what happened to her family. In many ways,

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Speaker 1: even though we're decades apart, Bill and I have mirrored

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Speaker 1: each other's movements, and we definitely have one thing in common,

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Speaker 1: a personal connection to the location of the crime. Ransas Pass.

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Speaker 1: I love this part of coastal Texas. It's just four

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Speaker 1: hours from my home in Austin, and my family and

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Speaker 1: I vacation here every year. We actually rent a condo

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Speaker 1: in Port Aransas, which is a popular beach town nearby

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Speaker 1: we take the fifteen minute trip by ferry from Aransas

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Speaker 1: Pass to the Barrier Island. Bill was an a Arransas

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Speaker 1: Pass native. When you read his story of growing up,

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Speaker 1: it's obvious that he had a real affinity for his hometown.

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Speaker 1: Here's a great line from his blog. If Mark Twain

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Speaker 1: had been a shrimp boat captain instead of a riverboat captain,

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Speaker 1: Ransa's Pass would be forever deeply engraved into American literature.

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Speaker 1: I also love Bill's description of people living on the

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Speaker 1: beach back when he was just a child. He really

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Speaker 1: captured the community spirit of Aransas Pass and the kindness

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Speaker 1: that neighbors shared with one another. He wrote in nineteen

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Speaker 1: thirty one, most of the people in the country were unemployed.

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Speaker 1: There was very little cash flow. Every day in Aransas Pass,

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Speaker 1: hoboes would knock on the back door asking for a meal.

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Speaker 1: My mother always had a bowl of beans and a

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Speaker 1: glass of tea for them to enjoy while sitting on

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Speaker 1: the back porch. Some of the hoboes would pull weeds

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Speaker 1: in the yard for a while to pay something for

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Speaker 1: their meals. We are in the heart of the Great

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Speaker 1: Depression here, an extremely difficult period in American history. After

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Speaker 1: the big stock market crash in nineteen twenty nine. The

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Speaker 1: entire country was suffering. The nation was plagued by a

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Speaker 1: high unemployment, low wages, high crime rates, and political turmoil.

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Speaker 1: In the midst of the Great Depression. Parts of Texas

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Speaker 1: were hit particularly hard. The state's economy was largely driven

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Speaker 1: by the agricultural industry. Livestock dominated the western part of

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Speaker 1: the state, while cotton was big business up north. Inland

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Speaker 1: areas struggled with a shaky oil market, bank foreclosures mounted,

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Speaker 1: and poverty and breadlines increased. I spoke to University of

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Speaker 1: Texas history professor Walter Banger. He's an expert on Texas

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Speaker 1: during the Great Depression.

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Speaker 6: We think of Texas as a place of oil and cattle, right,

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Speaker 6: that's sort of the mythology. But the reality of Texas

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Speaker 6: in the twenties and thirties was that it was one

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Speaker 6: of the major cotton producers in the entire world.

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Speaker 1: And so as the price of cotton went, so went

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Speaker 1: the Texas economy, and the price of cotton collapsed in

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Speaker 1: the nineteen twenties and early nineteen thirties.

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Speaker 6: The collapse of the cotton prices obviously hurt farmers and

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Speaker 6: tenant farmers and farm laborers. But it also hurt bankers,

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Speaker 6: grocery store owners, insurance agents, dealers who bought and sold cotton,

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Speaker 6: and so on.

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Speaker 1: But things weren't quite the same in coastal areas. Cliff

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Speaker 1: Strain is a local historian in Portoransis. He's of no

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Speaker 1: relation to Michael and Bill Strain.

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Speaker 3: It didn't hit the fishing industry quite as hard, you know,

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Speaker 3: because people still had I think the fishing boat still

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Speaker 3: went out. I think there was a fairly big flow

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Speaker 3: of people trying to go to the coast. People kind

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Speaker 3: of moving around the country, trying to find a place

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Speaker 3: where they could get work and get food.

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Speaker 1: It looked as though fishing village is fared a bit

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Speaker 1: better than landlocked parts of the state to a degree.

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Speaker 1: So it makes sense that more people began to migrate

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Speaker 1: toward coasts in the early nineteen thirties. But there was

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Speaker 1: no escaping the blight of the devastated US economy, So

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Speaker 1: it seems fair to guess that most of the new

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Speaker 1: arrivals were living paycheck to paycheck. They brought with them

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Speaker 1: a kind of desperation that could easily turn dangerous, So

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Speaker 1: there were actually shanty towns in Ramsa's Pass, just like

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Speaker 1: everywhere else in the country.

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Speaker 6: Yes, they called them Hoovervilles, made out of cardboard oftentimes

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Speaker 6: or our scrap blumber.

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Speaker 1: Hooverville's were named after President Herbert Hoover, who held office

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Speaker 1: from nineteen twenty nine through nineteen thirty three. So poverty

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Speaker 1: and the search for better work brought a lot of

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Speaker 1: people to the Texas coast, and among those was the

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Speaker 1: Simon family. They were outsiders too. In nineteen twenty three,

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Speaker 1: Agnes Simons left her home state of Indiana with her

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Speaker 1: young daughter and her second husband, Howard. Apparently the move

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Speaker 1: was Howard's idea. Having worked in the Midwest, he felt

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Speaker 1: there was better money to be made in the oil

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Speaker 1: fields down south. Howard's grandson JB. Simons tells me more

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Speaker 1: about the family's moves.

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Speaker 2: So he decided to go to Yaleo, Kohama too. I

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Speaker 2: don't know why at all as to why he chose

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Speaker 2: that particular town, but it was I know that there

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Speaker 2: was there were hiring people for the oil fields there.

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Speaker 2: My grandmother, Agnes was ten years older than my grandpa

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Speaker 2: Simon's but they met and she had money and he

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Speaker 2: wanted to use them wildcatting. Basically, they ended up sinking

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Speaker 2: seventeen dry wells from Oklahoma into Texas, and she said,

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Speaker 2: we we didn't have any luck with the oil, but

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Speaker 2: they ended up in a Randa's Pass area.

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Speaker 1: The adjustment to life in Texas sounds like a difficult one.

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Speaker 1: Helen Simon's was Dorothy's much younger sister in law. They

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Speaker 1: never actually met because she only married Dorothy's younger brother Joe,

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Speaker 1: long after Dorothy died.

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Speaker 5: Well, they were from the north, and anybody from the

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Speaker 5: north was not quite as good as those from the South.

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Speaker 5: I don't know whether you've ever faced that or not,

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Speaker 5: but Agnes said she did, and said she just realized

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Speaker 5: that's the way it was. And if they wanted to

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Speaker 5: be friends, okay, if they didn't, okay, they said. She

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Speaker 5: had some good friends after that.

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Speaker 2: My grandmother said to me one time, we were interlopers.

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Speaker 2: We had only been in Randa's Pass a few years.

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Speaker 2: We were a second class citizens. I remember her clearly

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Speaker 2: saying that.

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Speaker 1: The Simons eventually found their social circle. Agnes began working

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Speaker 1: as a seamstress, and she became active in her local church.

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Speaker 1: Howard worked for the humble oil and refinery company. Ramsa's

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Speaker 1: Pass was now home to the family of five. They

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Speaker 1: had two little boys named Joe and David. From stories

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Speaker 1: handed down to Joe's son, Jab, it sounds like they

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Speaker 1: were typically pretty rambunctious kids.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, they played hide and seek a lot and of

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Speaker 2: course tag. Other than that, a four or five six

390
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Speaker 2: year old is not going to get a lot of

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Speaker 2: activity and no baseball.

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Speaker 12: Now.

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Speaker 2: Later on, Uncle Dave and Dad raised hell a lot.

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Speaker 2: They set fire to the prairie. The entire town came

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Speaker 2: out to put the fire out. It was a big fire.

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Speaker 1: And then there was Dorothy. Eighteen year old Dorothy Simons

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Speaker 1: was the oldest of the children. She was Agnes's daughter

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Speaker 1: from a previous marriage. By all accounts, Dorothy was a

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Speaker 1: delightful young woman. She was smart and friendly and athletic.

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Speaker 1: She had a beautiful singing voice, and she was in

401
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Speaker 1: the church choir. Everyone I talked to echoed positive descriptions

402
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Speaker 1: of the attractive young girl, but no one's adoration came

403
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:51,680
Speaker 1: close to that of her mother's. That certainly did get

404
00:24:51,720 --> 00:24:55,320
Speaker 1: passed down through the family. Joe's wife, Helen Simons, was

405
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Speaker 1: Agnes's daughter in law, so.

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Speaker 4: What did she ever say to you? Or I guess

407
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Speaker 4: start with Agnes. What did what did Agnes say about Dorothy?

408
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Speaker 5: She was perfect? She was really really pretty. I've seen

409
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Speaker 5: pictures of hers, and she thought she was perfect as

410
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Speaker 5: far as her personality was because she was good in

411
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Speaker 5: school and nobody could believe that this had happened to her.

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Speaker 2: Did she say she was a good singer? And also

413
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Speaker 2: the paper that says she.

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Speaker 5: Was choir singer, well she's hanging the choir like everybody

415
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Speaker 5: else that went to church. And kid, did remember when

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Speaker 5: you used to sing in the choir.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy's younger siblings absolutely adored their big sister.

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Speaker 4: Did he talk about what she was like? I know

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Speaker 4: that Agnes said that she was perfect, But did Joe

420
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Speaker 4: say anything about what she was like with him?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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Speaker 5: Yes, she treated him really really nice, and he thought

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Speaker 5: she was about like Agnes, about perfect.

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Speaker 1: Dorothy was as responsible as she was kind to her

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Speaker 1: youngest brother, Joe. Dorothy was a life saver.

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Speaker 5: Literally, he fell in a tub of more or less

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00:26:17,960 --> 00:26:23,960
Speaker 5: boiling water when he was probably two or three. He

428
00:26:24,000 --> 00:26:27,240
Speaker 5: was just running around good in the house and Agnes

429
00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:30,040
Speaker 5: was getting ready to wash and she'd put this boiling

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Speaker 5: water in this tub for some reason. I don't know

431
00:26:32,800 --> 00:26:36,200
Speaker 5: what the deal was, but she says, I saw him

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00:26:36,520 --> 00:26:40,840
Speaker 5: running towards the water, and said I reached out and

433
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:43,399
Speaker 5: grabbed him by the arm, and says it's probably the

434
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Speaker 5: only thing that saved him, because as I did, I

435
00:26:46,600 --> 00:26:50,320
Speaker 5: turned him around and he fell backwards into this tub

436
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Speaker 5: of water, and the ambulance came and got him. And

437
00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:56,560
Speaker 5: he was on the way to the hospital in the

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00:26:56,640 --> 00:26:59,359
Speaker 5: ambulance and a taxi cab hit the ambulance.

439
00:27:00,160 --> 00:27:04,480
Speaker 1: Oh my god.

440
00:27:04,880 --> 00:27:07,680
Speaker 5: And Agnes told me herself, she said, the last thing

441
00:27:07,760 --> 00:27:11,760
Speaker 5: I heard I heard out of Joe as he said, Mom,

442
00:27:13,320 --> 00:27:15,760
Speaker 5: and said, he rolled up one side of the ambance

443
00:27:15,880 --> 00:27:18,280
Speaker 5: and back down and then rolled up the other side

444
00:27:18,320 --> 00:27:21,560
Speaker 5: because it evidently went a complete circle when it rolled over.

445
00:27:22,119 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 2: He had second and third degree burns from the back

446
00:27:26,320 --> 00:27:28,440
Speaker 2: of his knees all the way up about a third

447
00:27:28,480 --> 00:27:32,960
Speaker 2: the way up his back. That he was scarred for life.

448
00:27:33,359 --> 00:27:36,960
Speaker 2: I saw those. He wouldn't go swimming very much in

449
00:27:37,040 --> 00:27:40,120
Speaker 2: public because he was ashamed of those scars.

450
00:27:40,720 --> 00:27:43,119
Speaker 5: Wow, he said, if it hadn't been for Dorothy, I

451
00:27:43,160 --> 00:27:46,359
Speaker 5: probably never would have walked. And I said, what do

452
00:27:46,440 --> 00:27:48,879
Speaker 5: you mean by Dorothy whoever was your mom, Well, I

453
00:27:48,880 --> 00:27:52,080
Speaker 5: don't know. She just kind of took over and she

454
00:27:52,320 --> 00:27:55,960
Speaker 5: had to whip up egg whites and put him on

455
00:27:56,040 --> 00:27:58,800
Speaker 5: him at night as healing.

456
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:02,120
Speaker 1: That must have been really tough on Dorothy and really

457
00:28:02,119 --> 00:28:04,880
Speaker 1: impactful on Joe because she saved him.

458
00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:09,439
Speaker 5: And he said, I can still see that there was

459
00:28:09,480 --> 00:28:12,760
Speaker 5: a single light bulb in my bedroom or in the

460
00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:17,720
Speaker 5: room where I was anyway, he said, and she'd come

461
00:28:17,760 --> 00:28:21,520
Speaker 5: in and turned that light on and then whip up

462
00:28:21,560 --> 00:28:26,040
Speaker 5: the eggs and put him on her burn marks. They

463
00:28:26,040 --> 00:28:28,120
Speaker 5: probably would have been a lot worse, but hadn't been

464
00:28:28,119 --> 00:28:31,800
Speaker 5: for that, That's what he said. And she exercised his

465
00:28:31,920 --> 00:28:35,320
Speaker 5: legs each time that she did that because they were

466
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:37,360
Speaker 5: drawing up so from a scarring.

467
00:28:37,840 --> 00:28:39,080
Speaker 1: How old was he when this happened.

468
00:28:39,760 --> 00:28:42,680
Speaker 5: I would say something between two and three because he

469
00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:45,600
Speaker 5: was just running through the house, so she.

470
00:28:45,560 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 1: Would have been like fifteen or something like that. That's

471
00:28:48,040 --> 00:28:50,080
Speaker 1: a lot of responsibility for a young lady.

472
00:28:50,480 --> 00:28:54,960
Speaker 5: Yes, because she was fifteen I think No, she was

473
00:28:55,000 --> 00:28:59,360
Speaker 5: sixteen and she got excused. That was one thing he said.

474
00:28:59,440 --> 00:29:04,080
Speaker 5: She got from going to the Catholic church taking some

475
00:29:04,240 --> 00:29:08,479
Speaker 5: of those classes they had to take because she always

476
00:29:08,520 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 5: went home ever so many hours to put these egg

477
00:29:12,160 --> 00:29:12,680
Speaker 5: whites on.

478
00:29:13,920 --> 00:29:17,719
Speaker 2: Dead absolutely adored her. She doted on him, and also

479
00:29:17,960 --> 00:29:21,480
Speaker 2: my uncle Dave took in different places and just she

480
00:29:21,680 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 2: was a good older sister twelve years older.

481
00:29:27,000 --> 00:29:30,640
Speaker 1: Dorothy wasn't just the family's beloved eldest child. She was

482
00:29:30,720 --> 00:29:34,240
Speaker 1: highly regarded throughout the community, and she frequently babysat for

483
00:29:34,320 --> 00:29:36,920
Speaker 1: other children in the neighborhood. One of the children she

484
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:40,120
Speaker 1: looked after was a quiet young boy with a difficult

485
00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:45,600
Speaker 1: home life. That was Bill Strain. I asked Bill's widow, Sherry,

486
00:29:45,840 --> 00:29:49,560
Speaker 1: how much she knew about his earlier life. What was

487
00:29:49,600 --> 00:29:51,920
Speaker 1: your understanding? What did he say about his childhood?

488
00:29:52,560 --> 00:29:57,920
Speaker 10: His mother was I think very strict. His father was

489
00:29:58,000 --> 00:30:05,200
Speaker 10: certainly less strict, and I think did some recreational drinking

490
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:09,000
Speaker 10: and visiting along the way, but we didn't talk about

491
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:12,440
Speaker 10: that very much. But I think he as a young

492
00:30:12,600 --> 00:30:17,480
Speaker 10: child saw kind of both sides upbringing from two completely

493
00:30:17,520 --> 00:30:19,360
Speaker 10: different directions.

494
00:30:19,880 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 1: With that kind of upbringing, it's no wonder a kid

495
00:30:22,880 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 1: might look to his caretaker for comforts. Bill. So Michael

496
00:30:26,720 --> 00:30:29,280
Speaker 1: shared with me more of his father's notes about his

497
00:30:29,360 --> 00:30:32,600
Speaker 1: time with Dorothy. Did you shoe this part, Dorothy did

498
00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:33,480
Speaker 1: mostly housework.

499
00:30:34,120 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 11: Dorothy did mostly housework in babysitting. It's amazing that I

500
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:40,800
Speaker 11: still have memories of Dorothy because I wasn't quite four

501
00:30:40,880 --> 00:30:44,080
Speaker 11: years old when she was killed. I remember liking her

502
00:30:44,160 --> 00:30:47,000
Speaker 11: because she was pretty and small, which made her not

503
00:30:47,080 --> 00:30:49,480
Speaker 11: as threatening as some of the larger women who worked

504
00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:52,480
Speaker 11: for my mother. I also liked her because she laughed

505
00:30:52,480 --> 00:30:55,040
Speaker 11: a lot. I think my mother felt this might be

506
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:55,920
Speaker 11: her only fault.

507
00:30:56,080 --> 00:30:57,479
Speaker 1: So your grandmother loved Dorothy.

508
00:30:57,520 --> 00:31:01,040
Speaker 11: It sounds like, yeah, my grandma, you know, liked a

509
00:31:01,080 --> 00:31:03,840
Speaker 11: lot of people, but she could be a little judgmental.

510
00:31:03,960 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 11: Told you she was a little like Granny on the

511
00:31:06,040 --> 00:31:08,400
Speaker 11: Beverly Hillbilly. She was also a little bit like the

512
00:31:08,480 --> 00:31:11,400
Speaker 11: church lady. I'm sadday not to that extreme, but she

513
00:31:11,440 --> 00:31:14,120
Speaker 11: had a deal. She'd go well, you know, you know,

514
00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:18,480
Speaker 11: she wouldn't say judgmental things about people, but that well

515
00:31:18,640 --> 00:31:20,760
Speaker 11: had a judgmental tone to it.

516
00:31:21,280 --> 00:31:24,440
Speaker 1: From what Bill Strain told his son Michael, it seems

517
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:27,920
Speaker 1: like it was more than that. She was responsible and kind,

518
00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:31,560
Speaker 1: but there was more to her allure. So it sounds

519
00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:34,200
Speaker 1: like your dad really liked Dorothy at the very beginning

520
00:31:34,280 --> 00:31:38,800
Speaker 1: because she just was someone who was engaging and lively

521
00:31:38,960 --> 00:31:40,320
Speaker 1: and god good.

522
00:31:40,800 --> 00:31:43,400
Speaker 11: My dad laughed a lot, but not much around the house.

523
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,280
Speaker 11: My mother was a very serious person who felt that

524
00:31:46,320 --> 00:31:48,640
Speaker 11: too much laughter must be the work of the devil.

525
00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:51,640
Speaker 11: I'm sure Dorothy was clever enough not to laugh too

526
00:31:51,720 --> 00:31:55,120
Speaker 11: much when my mother was around. Dorothy was a great tease,

527
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:58,360
Speaker 11: which wasn't much fun. She knew how to draw faces,

528
00:31:58,360 --> 00:32:00,960
Speaker 11: but she would always draw them without chins, like the

529
00:32:01,040 --> 00:32:04,440
Speaker 11: andy gumps in the funny papers. She would be drawn

530
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:06,640
Speaker 11: from me and I would watch the pencil go over

531
00:32:06,680 --> 00:32:09,160
Speaker 11: the oval that made the top of the head, then

532
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:11,560
Speaker 11: down to about the eye level and move out to

533
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 11: make the nose, and then back in to make the mouth.

534
00:32:14,600 --> 00:32:18,160
Speaker 11: And then no, no, Dorothy, it has to have a chin.

535
00:32:18,240 --> 00:32:20,720
Speaker 11: It has to have a chin. And she would laugh

536
00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:22,800
Speaker 11: and go back up and put a chin on the face.

537
00:32:23,240 --> 00:32:25,880
Speaker 11: I can remember crying because she didn't draw the chin on.

538
00:32:27,480 --> 00:32:30,520
Speaker 1: So maybe Dorothy had a bit of a mischievous spirit.

539
00:32:30,960 --> 00:32:34,200
Speaker 1: Most teenage girls do, and maybe this rebellious streak was

540
00:32:34,240 --> 00:32:37,160
Speaker 1: something she felt she had to hide. It makes sense

541
00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:40,680
Speaker 1: her mother's endless fawning might have put a tremendous amount

542
00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:43,720
Speaker 1: of pressure on her daughter to give a pious impression.

543
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:46,800
Speaker 1: If that were the case, I wonder how hard that

544
00:32:46,880 --> 00:32:50,000
Speaker 1: might have been on Dorothy, especially when her surroundings were

545
00:32:50,200 --> 00:32:56,240
Speaker 1: likely full of temptation. I mentioned earlier that economically some

546
00:32:56,400 --> 00:32:59,600
Speaker 1: coastal areas fared a bit better during the depression, but

547
00:32:59,680 --> 00:33:02,600
Speaker 1: they weren't spared the hardships of one of the nation's

548
00:33:02,800 --> 00:33:06,680
Speaker 1: most restrictive laws, a ban on the production of alcohol.

549
00:33:07,360 --> 00:33:11,000
Speaker 1: Prohibition began in nineteen twenty a product of a religious

550
00:33:11,040 --> 00:33:15,720
Speaker 1: temperance movement. At the time, reformers coined the term demon rum.

551
00:33:16,240 --> 00:33:18,479
Speaker 1: They cited in an a array of reasons that liquor

552
00:33:18,520 --> 00:33:22,040
Speaker 1: posed a threat to American society. It caused insanity, led

553
00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:28,120
Speaker 1: to poverty, increased immoral behavior. Not surprisingly, it wasn't an

554
00:33:28,200 --> 00:33:32,320
Speaker 1: easy law to enforce, and criminal activity surged as a pushback.

555
00:33:32,680 --> 00:33:36,640
Speaker 1: Illegal trafficking and bootlegging, and arise in organized crime became

556
00:33:36,760 --> 00:33:39,880
Speaker 1: the norm. I doubt that came as a shock to anyone.

557
00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:44,320
Speaker 1: Historian Cliff Strain tells me how prohibition impacted a small

558
00:33:44,360 --> 00:33:48,840
Speaker 1: town like Aransis pass Certainly prohibition and the organized crime

559
00:33:48,960 --> 00:33:52,040
Speaker 1: quote unquote, is kind of what dominated that time period.

560
00:33:52,160 --> 00:33:53,280
Speaker 1: In Aranti's pass.

561
00:33:53,120 --> 00:33:56,160
Speaker 3: Is that right. I think it was definitely an opportunity

562
00:33:56,200 --> 00:33:59,240
Speaker 3: for lawlessness to kind of run rampant, But I don't

563
00:33:59,280 --> 00:34:01,680
Speaker 3: know how organized it was. I think it was organized

564
00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,080
Speaker 3: as far as having the lookouts and being able to

565
00:34:04,120 --> 00:34:07,480
Speaker 3: clean up, but it was really small operations that were

566
00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:11,040
Speaker 3: autonomous of each other and not connected with the mob

567
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:12,799
Speaker 3: or syndicate from further up.

568
00:34:14,040 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 1: I wanted a better picture of just how out of

569
00:34:16,280 --> 00:34:19,520
Speaker 1: control things might have been, so I interviewed John Bowers,

570
00:34:19,600 --> 00:34:22,520
Speaker 1: who was the longtime publisher of the local newspaper, the

571
00:34:22,680 --> 00:34:24,400
Speaker 1: Aransas Pass Progress.

572
00:34:24,719 --> 00:34:28,120
Speaker 12: If you were a fishing village, what does that mean?

573
00:34:28,239 --> 00:34:31,239
Speaker 12: Besides that the majority of the people who work and

574
00:34:31,360 --> 00:34:34,160
Speaker 12: live here are involved in the fishing issue, A lot

575
00:34:34,200 --> 00:34:35,600
Speaker 12: of drinking.

576
00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,680
Speaker 13: The shrippers drank a lot. They would shrimp, they would

577
00:34:39,719 --> 00:34:42,120
Speaker 13: get off. The bars around here opened at seven.

578
00:34:41,920 --> 00:34:43,480
Speaker 9: In the morning and they closed at.

579
00:34:43,520 --> 00:34:44,200
Speaker 5: Two in the morning.

580
00:34:44,320 --> 00:34:47,160
Speaker 13: So when the shrimpers got off, they got paid cash money.

581
00:34:47,200 --> 00:34:49,560
Speaker 13: But I'm talking about the deckhands, not the guys that

582
00:34:49,640 --> 00:34:52,040
Speaker 13: on the boats. They would take that money and they

583
00:34:52,080 --> 00:34:55,720
Speaker 13: would come in the town by whatever they needed, socks

584
00:34:55,760 --> 00:34:58,279
Speaker 13: under where the whole everything they needed, and then the

585
00:34:58,280 --> 00:34:59,960
Speaker 13: rest of them might have taken drink it out.

586
00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:04,279
Speaker 1: As I was researching this story, I ran across a

587
00:35:04,320 --> 00:35:08,719
Speaker 1: documentary about the effect Depression era struggles had on teenagers.

588
00:35:09,320 --> 00:35:13,680
Speaker 1: America's drastic economic downturn forced some to work both inside

589
00:35:13,760 --> 00:35:17,000
Speaker 1: and outside the home, taking side jobs like house cleaning

590
00:35:17,080 --> 00:35:24,480
Speaker 1: and shoe shining. Teenagers also left their hometowns because of poverty.

591
00:35:25,040 --> 00:35:28,200
Speaker 1: Hopping freight trains was really dangerous, but it became a

592
00:35:28,239 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 1: common way to travel for a lot of teens, and

593
00:35:31,280 --> 00:35:34,279
Speaker 1: estimated two hundred and fifty thousand were living on the

594
00:35:34,360 --> 00:35:38,960
Speaker 1: road searching for better opportunities. But Dorothy Simon seemed like

595
00:35:39,080 --> 00:35:41,920
Speaker 1: she led a very different life, with a stable home,

596
00:35:42,120 --> 00:35:45,359
Speaker 1: a loving family, and a well respected place within her

597
00:35:45,400 --> 00:35:48,919
Speaker 1: tight knit community. Dorothy was hardly the kind of girl

598
00:35:49,040 --> 00:35:52,399
Speaker 1: you'd expect to get into trouble or go looking for it.

599
00:35:54,200 --> 00:35:54,439
Speaker 3: JB.

600
00:35:54,560 --> 00:35:58,080
Speaker 1: Simon says that his father, Joe idolized his older sister

601
00:35:58,520 --> 00:36:02,319
Speaker 1: and then one day, just like that, Dorothy was gone.

602
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:09,719
Speaker 2: He was sitting he was just almost six years old.

603
00:36:09,840 --> 00:36:11,840
Speaker 2: He was sitting on the porch. He tells me. He

604
00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:15,040
Speaker 2: was playing with the dog and Dorothy came by and

605
00:36:15,360 --> 00:36:16,880
Speaker 2: she said, where are you going? He says, well, I'm

606
00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:19,160
Speaker 2: going to go swimming with some friends. That's what she

607
00:36:19,280 --> 00:36:21,680
Speaker 2: told him. He said, that's the last time I saw.

608
00:36:21,520 --> 00:36:32,600
Speaker 1: Her on this season of tenfold war Wicked on exactly right.

609
00:36:34,160 --> 00:36:36,120
Speaker 1: I mean, is this something this kind of case? Is

610
00:36:36,120 --> 00:36:38,920
Speaker 1: this something people would have gossiped about or not want.

611
00:36:38,760 --> 00:36:39,560
Speaker 6: To talk about.

612
00:36:39,719 --> 00:36:44,200
Speaker 13: Well, it stayed in the paper for a couple of years, so.

613
00:36:44,520 --> 00:36:47,200
Speaker 9: That means it was big news.

614
00:36:47,840 --> 00:36:49,640
Speaker 8: The way he told the story, I thought it was

615
00:36:49,760 --> 00:36:52,240
Speaker 8: she was swimming in a pond with someone, but obviously

616
00:36:52,280 --> 00:36:53,160
Speaker 8: that wasn't the case.

617
00:36:54,560 --> 00:36:57,440
Speaker 11: You know, there's an old country thing about Texas that

618
00:36:57,800 --> 00:36:59,640
Speaker 11: you know, in a murder case, you want to prove

619
00:36:59,680 --> 00:37:02,440
Speaker 11: the person needed killing. That's the kind of thing where

620
00:37:02,600 --> 00:37:05,160
Speaker 11: it isn't a movie and it isn't a story.

621
00:37:05,719 --> 00:37:08,400
Speaker 13: This is really happening to this girl.

622
00:37:14,320 --> 00:37:16,719
Speaker 1: My new book All That Is Wicked is available for

623
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Speaker 1: pre order now, including the audiobook. All That Is Wicked

624
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Speaker 1: is based on our first season of tenfold More Wicked.

625
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Speaker 1: You might think you know the whole story of killer

626
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Speaker 1: Edward Ruloff's crimes, but there's so much more. My book

627
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Speaker 1: American Sherlock is also available. This has been an exactly

628
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Speaker 1: right Tenfold More Media Production producers Jason Whaling, Laura Soble

629
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Speaker 1: and Alexis m Rossi. Co writers Laura Soble and Kate

630
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Speaker 1: Winkler Dawson, sound designer Eric Friend, composer Curtis Heath, artwork

631
00:37:47,360 --> 00:37:52,760
Speaker 1: Nick Toga. Executive producers Georgia Hartstark, Karen Kilgarriff and Daniel Kramer.

632
00:37:54,560 --> 00:37:57,800
Speaker 1: Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at tenfold more Wicked

633
00:37:57,880 --> 00:38:00,719
Speaker 1: and on Twitter at tenfold more and if you know

634
00:38:00,800 --> 00:38:03,880
Speaker 1: of a historical crime that could use some attention, email

635
00:38:03,960 --> 00:38:09,040
Speaker 1: us at info at Tenfoldmoorwicked dot com. Listen, subscribe and

636
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