2019.04.11 Throw Back Thursday
THROW BACK THURSDAY - MURDER IN HILLCREST EPISODE 6 plus Class News
Blood on the Piano...
Murder In the Insane Asylum’s Shadows
For those still following this episodic journey - which began with a harmless piano lesson in Little Rock in May of 1958, and lapsed into 21 stabs of a hunting knife into the body of an elderly piano teacher by a twelve year-old - this episode will begin to describe the parties involved. Would the twelve year-old end up locked up for life in the state insane asylum which was a couple hundred yards out back of the home where blood was left on the piano? A man named Frank Holt, the Pulaski County Prosecuting Attorney in 1958, would in large part decide that.
George Fisher, a famous Arkansas artist and political satirist of the mid-twentieth century, stereotyped Arkansas politicians for his cartoons in the Arkansas Gazette. Either he depicted them as “bad guys”, who had long noses, wore overalls, and twirled toothpicks in their mouth; or as “good guys” who usually were dressed in business suits with a semblence of normalcy to their appearance. The good guys generally were well-educated, honest, and interested in helping our state improve its reputation nation-wide and shed its perception of being slow to accept racial and gender equality. Frank Holt was a good guy. He was an intelligence officer during World War 2, was educated in Fayetteville and Geneva, Switzerland, and was later elected both Arkansas Attorney General and Supreme Court Judge. His wife ran a Heights institution called the “Clothes Horse” for decades, and his daughter, Lyda Holt Samuel, was founder of another beloved Heights landmark, a business called “Et Cetera”. Frank Holt could be counted on to be fair and reasonable, yet scrupulous in meeting his mandate to protect public safety.
The way the law was described in the Arkansas newspapers following the stabbing of piano teacher Kirke Killian, children under the age of 12 would not face prosecution; children over the age of 14 could face prosecution; and those between the age of 12 and 14 (Joey had turned 12 a month before) “are considered incapable of distinguishing good from evil until the contrary is shown.” Thus, it would put the burden of proof on Holt whether to prosecute and prove the boy’s mental capabilities.
Mrs. Killian’s tudor brick bungalow sat silent on Cedar Street just south of Markham Street. No more music flowed from its windows. The state insane asylum (then known as Arkansas State Hospital) loomed just behind the bloody scene.
Frank Holt’s first public announcement was that Joey Grabher would undergo a mental examination. Instead of being on the ball field that summer, Joey would spend an undetermined amount of time behind those scary walls at the State Hospital. The Arkansas Legislature was about a year away from authorizing the architectural firm of Wittenberg Delony and Davidson to design a $300,000 modern facilty called Fullerton Cottage, to separately house children in the mental institution. In 1958, Joey would have entered the darkened hallways for his evaluations, where the children’s unit was merely a wing of that old Victorian monster of an asylum - where echoes of shrill screams could be heard by passers-by. It is likely that Frank Holt, humanitarian that he was, exerted a maximum of control over the safety and well being of twelve year-old Joey Grabher. The few public comments about Joey’s whereabouts left open whether he spent nights at the county juvenile lock-up, or in the insane asylum.
Next episode: The menta exam results and accusations against Mrs. Killian.
CLASS NEWS
Lydia Lincoln is in Stage 3, Bladder cancer, and I'm sure would love some encouraging cards.
Let me know if you need her home address.
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