“ordinary white lead: Millet, 708.
“the Whitewash Gang: Hall, 213.
“with the utmost vigor: Burnham to Geraldine, March (illegible) 1892, Burnham Archives, Business Correspondence, vol. 6.
On Saturday evening: McCarthy, “Should We Drink,” 8–12; Chicago Tribune, March 1, May 8, 9, 13, 20, 1892; Burnham, Final Official Report, 69– 70.
“You had better write a letter: Moore, McKim, 120.
On Wednesday, June 1: Photograph, Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building, June 1, 1892, Burnham Archives, Box 64, File 34.
Two weeks later: Photograph, Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building, June 13, 1892, Burnham Archives, Oversize Portfolio 13.
The contractor: Chicago Tribune, June 15, 1892.
“I have assumed personal control: Burnham to Olmsted, September 14, 1892, Olmsted Papers, Reel 59.
“I had no precedent: Anderson, 53.
“monstrosity: Barnes, 177.
“I was more disabled: Rybczynski, Clearing, 391.
“I am still tortured: Olmsted to John, October 11, 1892, Olmsted Papers, Reel 22.
“Of course the main work suffers: Olmsted to John, undated but received in Brookline, Mass., October 10, 1892, ibid.
The dedication had been anticipated: Schlereth, 174.
“Ninety thousand people: Wheeler, 846.
“both orators waving: Monroe, Poet’s Life, 130.
That winter she burned: Ibid., 131.
Prendergast
On November 28, 1892: Prendergast to Alfred Trude, Trude Papers; Chicago Record, December 15 and 16, 1893, in McGoorty Papers; Chicago Tribune, December 15, 16, 17, 21, 22, 1893.
“My Dear Mr. Trude: Prendergast to Alfred Trude, Trude Papers.
“I Want You at Once”
“I have on hand: Ferris to Rice, December 12, 1892, Ferris Correspondence, Miscellaneous, Ferris Papers.
that this wheel: Anderson, 55; Miller, 497.
Chappell Redux
The gift delighted: Franke, 102.
“She seemed delighted: Ibid.
“It had seemed to me: Ibid., 103.
Later there was speculation: Chicago Tribune, July 30, 1895.
“Oh, she’s gone away: Franke, 104.
“This will tell you: Ibid.
The announcement read: Ibid., 105.
“Some days after going: Mudgett, 247; see also Mudgett, 246–249.
“Oh, he is a fellow: Franke, 105.
“lady of refinement: Chicago Tribune, July 28, 1895.
“The day after: Franke, 104.
Soon afterward: Chicago Tribune, July 31, 1895; Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 31, 1895.
“This,” said Dr. B. J. Cigrand: Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 27, 1895.
“I had at last: Chicago Tribune, July 31, 1895.
That the name Phelps: Chicago Tribune, August 7, 1895.
That on January 2, 1893: Chicago Tribune, July 28, 1895.
That a few weeks later: Schechter, 51.
Somehow a footprint: Chicago Tribune, July 28, August 1, 1895.
To explain the print’s permanence: Chicago Tribune, August 1, 1895.
“The Cold-Blooded Fact”
“The winter of 1892–3: Rice, 10, 12.
George Ferris fought the cold: Anderson, 58; Untitled typescript, Ferris Papers, 4; regarding use of dynamite, see Ulrich, 24.
“No one shop: Untitled typescript, Ferris Papers, 3; Anderson, 55, 57; Meehan, 30.
Together with its fittings: “Report of Classified and Comparative Weights of Material Furnished by Detroit Bridge & Iron Works for the ‘Ferris Wheel,’” Ferris Papers.
“You will have heard: Stevenson, 416.
“It looks as if: Olmsted to John, February 17, 1893, Olmsted Papers, Reel 22.
“I have never before: Olmsted to Ulrich, March 3, 1893, ibid., Reel 41.
“This seems to be an impossibility: Bancroft, 67.
Acquiring Minnie
I base my conclusions about Holmes’s motivation on studies of psychopaths conducted throughout the twentieth century. Holmes’s behavior—his swindles, his multiple marriages, his extraordinary charm, his lack of regard for the difference between right and wrong, and his almost eerie ability to detect weakness and vulnerability in others—fits with uncanny precision descriptions of the most extreme sorts of psychopaths. (In the late twentieth century psychiatrists officially abandoned the term psychopath and its immediate successor term sociopath in favor of antisocial personality disorder, though the term psychopath remains the favored everyday description.)
For an especially lucid discussion of psychopaths see Dr. Hervey Cleckley’s pioneering The Mask of Sanity, published in 1976. On page 198 he cites “the astonishing power that nearly all psychopaths and part-psychopaths have to win and to bind forever the devotion of woman.” See also Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th ed., 645–60; Wolman, 362–68; Millon et al., throughout but especially 155, which quotes Philippe Pinel’s appraisal of psychopathic serial killers: “Though their crimes may be sickening, they are not sick in either a medical or a legal sense. Instead, the serial killer is typically a sociopathic personality who lacks internal control—guilt or conscience—to guide his own behavior, but has an excessive need to control and dominate others. He definitely knows right from wrong, definitely realizes he has committed a sinful act, but simply doesn’t care about his human prey. The sociopath has never internalized a moral code that prohibits murder. Having fun is all that counts.”
Also in Millon et al., at page 353, a contributing author describes a particular patient named Paul as having “an uncanny ability to identify naive, passive and vulnerable women—women who were ripe for being manipulated and exploited.”
For details of the Williams case I relied, once again, on an array of newspaper articles, and on Boswell and Thompson, Franke, and Schechter. See Chicago Tribune, July 20, 21, 27, 31, August 4, 7, 1895; New York Times, July 31, 1895; Philadelphia Public Ledger, November 21, 23, 26, 1894, December 22, 1894, July 22, 24, 27, 29, 1895: Boswell and
