Doctor Kills His Wife in Bessemer in 1943--or Did He?

I'm still making my way through the World War II issues of the Gadsden Times saved by paternal grandmother Rosa Mae Wright. Here's another recently found item; I've piled up a number of others and have many more issues to examine. You are in for some real treats.

This item describes the violent death of a Mrs. Laura Ball Blue at her home in Bessemer on May 23, 1943. She was almost decapitated by a "heavy charge" from a shotgun, which was found in another room. As the first article notes, her husband J. Howard Blue was about to be charged with first degree murder. 

Shortly after 9:30 the previous night the coroner received a call from the husband, a physician, and when he arrived at the house found Mrs. Blue's body  and an incoherent Dr. Blue. His wife had apparently just come into the house from the garage; car keys were still in her hand. Both of their sons were away from home at the time.

Blue was a "widely known Bessemer physician" who specialized in eye, ear, nose and throat disorders. He was freed on bond after a July 7 preliminary hearing, but finally indicted for first degree murder by a grand jury on August 6 and returned to jail without bond. The December 25, 1943, issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association picks up the story:

"Physician Sentenced on Murder Charge.—  Dr. James Howard Blue, Bessemer, was found guilty by a jury of murder in the second degree and sentenced to fifty years' imprisonment, newspapers reported November 17. Attorneys for the defense announced that motion for a new trial would be filed. At the physician's first trial last September a mistrial was declared. Dr. Blue was charged with the shooting of his wife, May 23."

I've yet to determine exactly what happened after this trial, but I've picked up the story of Dr. Blue in the early 1950s. He is listed in the 1951 Bessemer city directory under "Physicians and Surgeons" with an office at 1828 3rd Avenue, phone R207. According to Google Maps that address is in the same block as the Bright Star Restaurant. By publication of the 1953 Bessemer city directory, we find this entry: "Denzil R. Blue--ear, eye, nose & throat specialist, wife Lola M. Office at 1828 3rd Avenue, home in Lakewood Estates".

Denzil was apparently a nephew of James Howard Blue; the Blue family seems to have had several physicians. James Howard had died on March 10, 1953, and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery in Birmingham. Poor Laura Blue was also buried in Elmwood. Her husband remarried in 1950 to Vera Tucker; he was her third husband. She, too, is resting in Elmwood. 

As the second article notes, Blue contended that first wife Laura killed herself. 

That "Manasco Hits Communists" is a line inserted there in error. 

Birmingham Postcard: Jefferson Hospital

Here we have yet another entry in a series devoted to postcards from my collection. I have many that are unused, but the ones actually mailed are double snapshots of history both for the card itself and the message written on it. 

The postmark on this card is dated August 20, 1943. The front shows Jefferson Hospital in Birmingham, constructed in 1940 with the help of New Deal loans and a grant. The hospital opened in February 1941 with 575 beds, 11 operating rooms, maternity wards and an all-electric kitchen. For two years during World War II the 10th and 11th floors of Jefferson Hospital housed a secret training facility for officers and enlisted men of various armed forces units.

The facility became a center of the new Medical College of Alabama that welcomed the first students in September 1945. Renamed Jefferson Tower in 1979, the building remains a landmark on the giant University of Alabama at Birmingham campus. 

The card was printed by the Merchants Cigar and Candy Company in Birmingham. Other city cards from the company that I spotted on eBay and at Alabama Mosaic include Lake Purdy Dam, Alabama Power Company building, a rock garden pool, looking east on 20th Street at night and the Sloss-Sheffield furnace. The company seems to have operated from about 1937 until 1946, although I did not find them under either "Cigars" or "Candy" in the 1945 Birmingham Yellow Pages directory.

So what does the message side of the card tell us? The sender is Charles Troutman, a soldier stationed at Camp Sibert, a World War II chemical weapons training facility that sprawled over 36,000 acres in Etowah and St. Clair counties. The facility opened in 1942 and was named after Major General William Sibert, the first head of the Army's Chemical Warfare Service and a Gadsden native. 

Troutman is writing to his father, Charles H. Troutman, Sr., in Flagstaff, Arizona. He notes that he was up that day at 4am and began shooting practice at 6. He shot a 161 which he declared "was good but could have been better." The previous night had been cool but today was a "scorcher" although the air was "unusually dry". Troutman mentions "Kodachrome", the Eastman Kodak film introduced in 1935. Not sure what he means by "OCS" unless it refers to the 35mm slide film Kodak put on the market in 1936. At any rate, "some were very good."

Another question concerns the "OTB 01039771" at the top of the card. Does the abbreviation stand for "Operations Training Branch"?

On August 10 Charles had written his mother, using a postcard that showed climbers on Mount Washington, New Hampshire. "Getting cooler", he said. "Have a long training film tonight. Sure is tiresome here. Everyone is on edge."

As the historical marker below notes, Camp Sibert was activated on December 25, 1942, and deactivated almost exactly three years later on December 31, 1945. The camp could hold about 30,000 troops, and almost half of all the U.S.'s World War II CWS soldiers trained there. You can read more about Camp Sibert here and here. Many photos taken at Camp Sibert can be found on Alabama Mosaic. 

In 2017 Lindsey Rebekah Wilson wrote a thesis at Jacksonville State University, "Camp Sibert: Inside the Training Camp and its Significance to the Chemical Warfare Service". 

Charles H. Troutman, Jr. [1914-1990] during World War II

Found at Ancestry.com

Source: Historical Marker Database

Entrance to Camp Sibert ca. 1943

Source: Alabama Department of Archives and History

Two Shelby County Bank Robberies in the 1930s

Bank robberies in the United States have been declining now for decades. In 1992, 9540 were reported to the FBI. In 2023, the number had fallen to 1362. Why bother to rob a bank when you can sit at home with your laptop and commit all sorts of crimes?

In the 1920s and especially during the Great Depression years of the 1930s, however, bank robberies became a thing, so much so that the FBI was created and the act made a federal crime in 1934. This era produced such famous names as Bonnie and Clyde, John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd and Machine Gun Kelly.

In 2023 I posted an item on the Great Hartselle Bank Robbery of 1926. Just after midnight on Monday, March 15, 1926, eight men arrived and proceeded to cut telephone and telegraph lines, severing the town from the outside world. The Bank of Hartselle safe was dynamited and $14,000 in cash, gold and silver left town with the robbers. The crime was never solved. 

The articles below give initial descriptions of two Shelby County bank robberies. More than one criminal was involved in the first in Wilsonville in 1931; $4700 was taken. A single robber made off with $14,000 in Columbiana the following year.  Both of these banks were insured and quickly resumed business as usual.

Alabama seems to have been rich ground for bank robberies during this period. The Library of Congress' Chronicling America newspaper site pulls up some 6200 hits when searching "Alabama" and "bank robbery" during the 1920s and 1930s. How many of those events actually took place in the state would require some time to determine, however. I did not find either of these robberies when limiting the search to the towns involved. 

Shelby County Reporter 26 March 1931 via Newspapers.com 

Shelby County Reporter 10 November 1932 via Newspapers.com 

Paul Bryant Museum in Tuscaloosa

On a pleasant day in January 2023, my son Amos and I made a trip to Tuscaloosa. He especially wanted to visit the Bryant Museum, and this piece reports on that visit. We also toured the grounds of the old state capitol ruins; I've written about that experience here and here.

The Bryant Museum was our first stop. Below I've included a few of the many photographs I took during the visit. I couldn't include more; there was just too much red--er, crimson. I'm an Auburn fan.

Despite that, I enjoyed the visit. I find the early history of football in the U.S. to be very interesting, and of course, this program has played and continues to play a major role in state history. I remember my maternal grandfather and Methodist minister John Miller Shores telling stories about listening to the radio as Alabama's football teams won games in the Rose Bowl on the west coast in the 1920s and 1930s. Those wins were a source of pride for so many residents of the poor state of Alabama.

I digress. Naturally, this museum has lots of space devoted to all the teams, coaches and players of the pre- and post-Bryant eras. Every coach except Mike Price gets some coverage, and I imagine they've updated the Nick Saban portion since we visited. 

Stop by the museum if you get the chance. Even non-Alabama fans might enjoy it. 

The museum includes a rather large exhibit devoted to Crimson Tide softball. Only a portion is seen here. 

Naturally there's a gift shop.

Mailed from Montgomery in 1944

You just never know what will turn up in old newspapers. In going through our parents' house in Huntsville in 2023 and 2024, we found a large cache of World War II issues of the Gadsden Times. Our paternal grandmother had apparently saved hundreds of front pages from that publication. Thus what we found was that page and three others of each day's issue. She didn't bother to detach the front page from the larger sheet. Dad brought these papers back to Huntsville when he cleaned out his mother's home in Gadsden after her death in 1997. 

The war news day-by-day is fascinating, but a lot of interesting local and state items pop up as well. This post has one of them, from the Times issue of January 25, 1944. That headline grabbed me right away. Apparently postal authorities in Memphis on January 18 opened an unclaimed parcel post package mailed from Montgomery on January 8. Inside was the infant's body, wrapped in a January 7 Montgomery newspaper, a towel from a hotel in the city and some brown wrapping paper. 

Two women in Montgomery were being questioned by Temple Seibels, Circuit Solicitor. No charges have been brought as yet, but Seibels vowed to prosecute if evidence from the state toxicologist indicated murder or "birth by unnatural means". 

Seibels is the only person named in this article. His Find-A-Grave entry identifies him as William Temple Seibels [1873-1960]. He apparently held the office a long time; the 1923 Alabama official register lists him as the Solicitor of the 15th Judicial Circuit in Montgomery County. A circuit solicitor was responsible for the prosecution of criminal cases within a judicial circuit. 

I wonder how this event played out. In 1989 I published a book entitled Criminal Activity in the Deep South, 1700-1930: An Annotated Bibliography. In putting that book together I came across some really bizarre crimes and criminals, but I don't remember anything quite like this one--assuming a crime was indeed committed. Further research in Montgomery newspapers or court records might give an answer. 

That 25 cents seen on the lower right was the cost of a weekly subscription delivered by carrier, not a daily issue. 

Source: Find-A-Grave

A 1940 Socialist Union Party Flyer in Gadsden

As brother Richard and I cleaned out Mom and Dad's house in Huntsville during 2023 and 2024, we found lots of interesting family memorabilia and a few really unexpected items. This flyer falls into the latter category.

We found it in material Dad brought from Gadsden after his mother Rosa Mae Wright died in 1993. My grandfather Amos J. Wright, Sr., worked for the L&N Railroad there for many years, most of them as a yard foreman. One of his duties included checking boxcars to make sure they were completely empty. Perhaps he found it in one of those. If so, why he kept it is a mystery. Perhaps it came into their family papers some other way.

The Socialist Union Party was one of several small groups spun out of the Socialist Labor Party in the 1930s. These organizations were known as De Leonist after Daniel De Leon, an early leader in the SLP, which was the first socialist political party in America and founded in 1876. In the mid-1930s Abraham Ziegler was expelled from the SLP and joined another De Leonist group that soon faded. Then he and a few others started the SUP in 1939; it lasted until 1941. 

This anti-conscription flyer is dated August 1940. An address is given for the Socialist Union Party, 140 Fourth Avenue, Brooklyn. As far as I could determine from Google Maps, the building still exists, located between Luna's Tire Shop and a Papa John's Pizza. According to the Wikipedia article on "Conscription in the United States", support for compulsory military service for young men was building in the country in the summer of 1940 as the war in Europe heated up.

Given the Scottsboro Boys trials and labor organization/unrest history in the state, the American Communist Party was very active in Alabama in the 1930s and beyond. For detailed information see Robin D. Kelley's Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists during the Great Depression [2015] and Mary Stanton’s book Red, Black, White: The Alabama Communist Party, 1930–1950 [2020]. I would imagine other political groups beyond Republicans and Democrats were also present in the state to one degree or another. This flyer would seem to be evidence about one little known socialist group at least.  

Random Alabama (1)

I've been wanting to start a new series on the blog featuring photos I have that are related to Alabama in some way but not really needing a long post. I decided to start with this item. 

Mom and Dad met at Auburn University back in the Alabama Polytechnic Institute days--but everybody called it Auburn even then, she used to tell me.  They acquired or were given a fair amount of "Auburnalia" over the years. These materials included books, DVDs, etc and some objets d'art such as this character. 

So what can we say? Here's a cowrie shell glued to a slice of a small tree limb and featuring AU's orange and blue colors and a beanie and pennant. Does this look like a frog to you?

I remember this piece sat on a shelf in Dad's basement study for many years. Maybe one day I'll share a few more of the Auburn oddities and memorabilia I have. In the meantime, the university's licensing people need to get this one into mass production. Bound to be a hit.....isn't retro cool now??