Episode 94 The Crime Tourist Slayings

Southern Mysteries Podcast

Shannon Ballard

True Crime, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 16 August 2021

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Lester Brocklehurst, Jr was a Sunday school teacher who grew bored of his life. In 1937 he and his girlfriend hit the road on a multi state crime spree that ended with dozens of armed robberies and three murders Want more Southern Mysteries? Hear the Southern Mysteries show archive and immediately access exclusive content when you become a patron of the show. Join now at patreon.com/southernmysteries Connect Website: southernmysteries.comFacebook: Southern Mysteries PodcastTwitter: @southernpod_Instagram: @explorethesouthEmail: southernmysteriespodcast@gmail.com Episode Sources Officers of Four States Hunt Pair. Anniston Star. May 9, 1937 Holdup Killer Caught in N.Y. Abilene Morning News. May 14, 1937 Three States Attempt to Get Brocklehurst. Fort Worth Star-Telegram. May 14, 1937 Killer Gives Own Story of Crime Career. The Sacramento Bee. May 14, 1937 Sanity Question Stirs Anger of Accused Slayer. The Daily Oklahoman. May 27, 1937 Brockelhurst, Ordered to Die, Falls in Faint. The Richmond Times Dispatch. June 26, 1937 Killer’s Companion Freed of Murder. The Richmond Times Dispatch. June 26, 1937 Bernice Felton Is Indicted by U.S. Fort Worth Star-Telegram. September 25, 1937 Brocklehurst Fights for Life As Child Is Born. Kenosha News. December 17, 1937 Girl Begins Time for Crime Tour. The Wichita Eagle. May 29, 1939 What’s Behind the Man Behind the Thumb? The News Tribune. July 30, 1939 Gangsters, Mobsters & Outlaws of the 20th Century. Legends of America. February 2020 Gangsters During the Depression. American Experience PBS. Bernice Felton, Half of a Serial Killer Couple – Illinois, 1937. Unknown Gender History. January 2, 2021 Episode Music Ossuary 1 The Beginning, Dark Times, Despair and Triumph, Ambient by Kevin MacLeod. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. Source: http://incompetech.com No 2 Remembering Her - Esther Abrami Licensed under Creative Commons Theme Song “Dark & Troubled” by Pantherburn. Special thanks to Phillip St Ours for permission for use.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	When you think of 1930s America, two things immediately come to mind, the Great Depression and
0:19.2	gangsters.
0:20.2	Now gangsters was a term used for any criminal who operated with a partner or group in the 1920s and 30s,
0:29.0	but there were two kinds of criminals made famous during this era. Big city mobsters who
0:36.4	belonged to organized crime rings. They were the bootlegers who helped quench
0:41.2	the American thirst for alcohol during the prohibition years.
0:45.0	They controlled liquor sales and expanded their operation into gambling and prostitution.
0:51.0	And then there were the outlaws, the small town robbers and murderers who
0:57.6	traveled from state to state committing crimes always on the run from the law.
1:03.0	The economy of the Great Depression played its parts in the rising crime rates of this era,
1:09.0	but these gangsters were driven by more than economic doom and gloom. The ability to become
1:15.9	instant celebrities thanks to the rise of radio and the expanded newswire services
1:21.6	that would quickly report these crimes and give criminals
1:25.3	the notoriety they craved often drove them. Society felt like it was falling
1:32.1	apart through the Depression era, and well into the 1930s,
1:37.0	there was a romanticized view of these gangsters as men and women who ignored the rules and became folk heroes.
1:46.0	This drove many people into a life of crime,
1:49.0	and they knew all they had to do was cause a little chaos, stir up some trouble, and their name
1:56.7	would be on the front page of newspapers across America. One little known outlaw of the 1930s was a man who claimed he became a killer because
2:08.6	he fell in love with a wrong woman.
2:15.0	Welcome to Southern Mysteries, exploring history and mysteries of the American South.
2:19.0	I'm your host, Shannon Ballard.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Shannon Ballard, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Shannon Ballard and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.