The Bathing Beauty's New Hammer

True Crime Historian

Richard O Jones

True Crime, Performing Arts, Documentary, Arts, Society & Culture

4.5 • 720 Ratings

🗓️ 21 May 2025

⏱️ 97 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Brutal Murder Of Alberta Meadows

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Once upon a time, 1922 to be precise, Clara Phillips, a former Hollywood bathing beauty and chorus girl, decided she wanted to have a chat with a young lady she suspected of canoodling with her husband. She stopped at the dime store and bought a brand new hammer on the way. Yeah. That's not going to end well. This episode is filled with a lot of poignant stories of the incident from a variety of points of view, including from the alleged murderer herself, and a daring escape from justice.

More Murders With AXES & HAMMERS

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Popular.com
0:03.0	Clara Phillips.
0:04.0	Clara Phillips,
0:15.0	Former chorus beauty of stage and films
0:19.0	waited for her asserted victim from 11 a.m. until a few minutes after
0:24.3	4 p.m. in the lobby of the bank on the day of the murder. Does Mrs. Alberta Meadows work here?
0:32.6	Mrs. Phillips, who was alone, asked Molly Swain, information clerk of the First National Bank at 11 a.m. Wednesday.
0:42.6	About what time does Mrs. Meadows get off work? Mrs. Phillips continued.
0:47.4	About 4.30 p.m., Mrs. Swain answered. Don't tell Mrs. Meadows I called for, Mrs. Phillips insisted to Mrs. Swain. I'm an old friend
0:58.1	from Arizona, and I haven't seen her in a long time, and I want to give her a surprise. While
1:04.5	Mrs. Phillips was talking to the information clerk, asking numerous questions pertaining to the girl she's accused of killing,
1:13.1	two girl employees of the bank walked by the information desk.
1:18.1	Stopping the girls, Mrs. Phillips asked if they knew Alberta Meadows.
1:23.0	Yes, she's downstairs in the currency department.
1:26.0	We saw her only a few moments ago, the girls replied.
1:29.9	And then Mrs. Phillips repeated her old friend from Arizona story to the girls.
1:35.7	Don't tell her, the accused woman urged. Immediately after the conversation with the information
1:42.3	clerk and the two bank employees, Mrs. Phillips walked to the writing room, which is in the lobby of the bank on the west side.
1:50.0	There she remained until a few minutes after 4 p.m., according to Carrie v. Colley, the maid.
1:58.0	Mrs. Phillips passed the time reading a magazine, asking the main questions pertaining to employees
2:06.0	in the currency department and powdering her nose, according to Mrs. Colley.
2:12.6	Both Mrs. Swain and Mrs. Colley identified pictures of Mrs. Phillips as having been the woman who waited in the
	...

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