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In one thousand, nine hundred and one Evelyn Nesbit a chorus girl in a musical floor

DORA dined alone with the architect Stanford White in his townhouse on 24th, ST in New York Nesbitt, just sixteen years old had recently moved to the city. White was forty seven in a principle in the prominent architectural, firm, Mckim, Mead and white. As the foremost architect of his day, he was a celebrity responsible for designing countless landmark buildings in Manhattan that evening, after drinking champagne, Nesbitt lost consciousness consciousness and woke to find herself naked in bed with white telltale spots of blood on the bed sheets told her that white had raped her. She told no one about the rape until several years later, she confided in Harry thaw. The millionaire playboy, who would later become her husband, thought thirsting for revenge, shot and killed white in one thousand nine hundred and six before hundreds of theater Gores during a performance in Madison Square Garden of building that White had designed. The trial was a

sensation that gripped the nation. Most Americans agreed with thought that he'd been justified in killing white, but the district attorney expected to send them to the electric chair, Evelyn Nesbitt's. Testimony was so explicit in shocking that Theodore Roosevelt himself called on the newspapers not to print it verbatim. The murder of white cast along shadow. So I later attempted suicide and Evelyn Nesbit struggle for many years to escape an addiction to cocaine the girl on the velvet swing. A tale of glamour accepts and danger is an immersive fascinating. Look at an American America dominated by men, about size fortunes and by the women who were their victims. Books were featuring this evening is the girl on the velvet swing, sex, murder and madness at the dawn of the twentieth century, with my special guest journalist and author and historian Simon Bats, welcome to the program and thank you very much for

read this interview, Simon Bats, hi Dan, it's nice to be on your program, and I look forward to talking with you about the book and you're, given a great introduction. Pricey of the of the main event. Thank you very much for this interview. Incredible book, incredible back into history and to a time that if we think some of the things that go on in today's society and media is a surprising, I think we'll find this even more surprising. Let's get right to who stand for white was we mentioned. He was an architect and he designed at Madison Square Garden, but tell us who Stanford White was how old was he around this time in

just at the turn of the century and who was the in real terms. He had the have been apprenticed to an architect code, Richard Son, who is the most famous exponent of the romanesque style in the United States and white, grew up in New York City and in eighteen. Seventy nine. He entered into a partnership with two other men, Charles Mckimm and William Rutherford, Mead and they're, all contextual, firm, Mckim, Mead and White ready K to to the wealthy. Not just of New York City, but the wealthy classes of the United States, and they became famous for designing very elaborate. It's a beautiful building, designed the large the on the side of the renaissance, the

italian Renaissance, in the spanish renaissance and in eighteen ninety white designed what many considered to be his masterpiece, which is Madison Square Garden. This is the second build being in New York that had the title, Madison Square Garden. There have been four in total and the second one stood at the new NE corner of 26Th and Madison Ave, which is right on the corner of Madison Square and that's how it gets his name, Madison Square Garden and and white designed Madison Square Garden for horse shows horses every. No, nobody drove promote a car in eighteen. Ninety and F Buddy went around in a horse and buggy, and so horses were ready ubiquitous in New York City, and this was designed for

the building was designed for horse horse shows and white persuaded the backers. The financial backers of the project, at least this included Jp Morgan White, persuaded them to build it. How are on Madison Square Garden in the tower had seven apartment and wide occupied rented out the top of these apartments in the top of the Tower and Madison Square Garden by virtue of the tower with the second tallest building in New York City? That's not saying very much by all standards because with talking about three hundred and something fee, but it was a very distinctive latin mop, which is exactly what White wanted he I want this to be a cultural center and inside the building there was a theater restaurant, the main auditorium where the whole shows would take place and then on the roof on the flat roof, which was at the base of the tower Joe

in the summer, they would have shows me usually musical comedies for an audience of about three hundred people, and this was something you could do nowadays, because there would be too much noise from the street traffic and also noise from planes and helicopters. And what have you going overhead but in those days that wasn't the case, and so you could quite reasonably have these musical comedies. These plays being done on the rooftop of Madison Square Garden. So is a spectacular achievement and weight became famous on account of it and he went on. Did it disease in many other buildings in New York City and around the United States and the firm Mckim medium white is probably the most well known, architectural firm in the history of the United States because they did such beautiful? I mean the original the original Pennsylvania station, a beautiful building before it was to Molly

that building was making me in white. The the campus of Columbia, university Uptown, with Mccain meat and White New York University, build the campus in the Bronx that they've later abandoned, but that campus also was Mccann, meet them white. So Stanford White was very much a celebrity in New York, a man about town, someone who knew everybody. Everybody knew him and he was extremely prominent in the city's various offense. You talk about his interested in his investment in various fear, fear because the optical productions, and also that he had friendships with various acts with actresses and actors. Can you talk about and

actress, name, Edna, Goodrich, well, she's, a singer in the Floradora part of the sextet and Evelyn born Christmas day near Pitts Burg or dad was a lawyer and her mother is named Florence and she has a brother named Howard. She's now on a broadway stage, but she had just been working at the department store just a couple years before that tell us how she comes to be in New York. City and and also how they come to meet her and her mother meet a Stanford White yeah. It's a it's a fascinating story just in itself, and it showed it tells you a lot about New York City in about how young girls who wanted to make their reputation would come to New York. She grew up in Pitts Burg. Have father died when she was twelve years old, with

Family was plunged into property and moved first to Philadelphia and then to New York City around one thousand nine hundred. I think it was December one thousand nine hundred that they've moved to Philadelphia and then in one thousand nine hundred and one they moved to New York and I think another thing I mean when I'm a historian always tries to project himself or herself back into the past and when you do that you realize that the theater was extremely important for New York City. I mean they're worth theater houses everywhere I mean- and this makes a lot of sense, because when you think about it, one of the forms of entertainment well that there was no television. Obviously there was no internet that there's no radio. There was no cinema theater with the main entertainment of virtually everybody and, as a consequence, it played about I'm outside roll in New York City and so

for evelynn comes with her mother and younger brother to New York, she's very attractive she's, only sixteen years old fifteen when she first arrives in the city, but in one thousand nine hundred and one she's sixteen years old, she's very attractive, as I said, and her mother introduces her as an artist's model and she supports the family through the fees that she receives as and then how photograph photographs appear in magazines simply as a model. She's, modeling clothes and her photograph without even really I'd end

appears in the magazines and people began to take notice because of looks and the theatrical agent contact the family and get her a place as a chorus girl in the in the production of Florida. Dora which was a musical comedy playing at the casino Theatre and Florida. Dora was famous for the sex tent. As you said that group of six women, singers and dancers and Evelyn Nesbit never made it to that elite group. But she was always in the chorus line and Stanford White, who is forty? Seven years old, he was married. He had a son, his wife lived out on Long Island and Stanford White kept her house also in New York City. But why so her photograph and he

new people in theatrical world? He had designed the players club, which is a club for actors and producers and fear to folk on Gramercy Park. Ann and White got an introduction through one of the floor door, a thing as too Eveland Nesbitt, who was then sixteen years old and they first met in white, a town house, one of white apartment on, 24th ST and that they had lunch and with the other woman at no good rich. That you mentioned and also one of white's friends with that Reginald Ronald's and the four of them had lunch and then And then Ronalds went away and white had swing on the fourth floor of the building of velvet swing and we

all of this, because Evelyn writes about it later in Aurora, Biography and also testifies in court about the swing and it had a padded velvet seat. It had velvet cords coming down from the ceiling and in front of the swing on a separate rope, was japanese screen a paper scream and they spent the afternoon playing on this swing and dumb.

Two women would get on one each woman in turn. We get on the swing and white would push them and they would they would split the paper screen, so that was their first meeting, their first introduction and that was sometime around the summer, fall of one thousand nine hundred and one you talk about that after this meeting and she was elated to be involved with this and rubbing elbows with celebrities and people that she admired. But you say she was surprised because she really didn't get any real attention from Stanford, but more so she got attention from this ronalds so to her surprise, what did Stanford do winced and contact her about? Well, he opted this first meeting. He got in touch with affluence, mopped up introduced himself and the evidence mother with

bowled over by this gentleman, this very prominent New York and came back to report to a daughter that this was a fabulous man and he took, concerned for her for Evelyn and and then one day, and so they gradually got to know each other, that the mother, the daughter, the architect and and Florence Nesbit, the mother still had friends back in Pittsburgh, and one days mentioned mention to Stanford White that she wants to go by the Pittsburgh for a visit and he offered to pay her train fare and give us some money for expenses. And then she said what but who's going to after my daughter, my sixteen year old, daughter, very young, and Stanford White Step, tenants that don't worry I'll look after her I'll make sure she doesn't get into trouble, and that's that that and then hearing that that

time when Evelyn's mother was away Sanford Stanford White visit settling every day before she goes to the theater for her performance and one day he asked her if she wants to have a photograph taken by well known photographer, called Rudolph Actor, my and Evelyn agrees, and so they spend the day in the studio, and these photographs has survived and they're quite prominent on the internet that they show Evelyn Rick lining on a polar bear, rug and she's, dressed in a kimono and while the photographs, just after the ferocity sessions and it's time for White, said that he's having a party the next night at his apartment on twenty fourth street and the Oscars have been if she'd like to come, and she says she should love to if you'd, rather

much rather do that than spend her her evening alone or night alone in the apartment. But she had been with her mother, and so she shows up a Florida for ends about nine hundred o'clock and Evelyn comes down at a 24th ST and shows up and there's nobody. There accepts time for white and she surprised and Stanford Wade says: don't worry about it. My friends just didn't show go up and let's have dinner anyway, and so they have dinner just the two of them and then Stanford for White us. If she wants to go upstairs to see some of the paintings that he called did what he was in Europe and that's when the famous event occurs and Stanford White takes her into a small back room where there's a bed and gives her the champagne she loses consciousness,

almost immediately. She feels to say, and and when she wakes up, she finds you herself naked Stanford White, laying next to her naked or so, and she she realizes that she's been raped. While she was drugged. Unconscious it's a shocking story, a shocking episode, and we know all about this. None of this is made up. None of this is imagined but we know about this because then Evelyn testifies later about this in court and her testimony was reproduced verb. Eight hundred am by the newspapers. That was quite extraordinary because any historian who does work in period has fourteen daily newspapers being published in New York City fourteen alone in the city,

I mean, and there are hundreds thousands of other newspapers around the country, so in order these newspapers were competing with each other. So this case, when it came to trial, got enormous coverage. The the papers would literally devote three or four pages spool tight to the case and and they re printed all the testimony verbatim so, which was very fortunate for me close yes course on us. You also say you also include what exactly he said once she got up, she was screaming, and so what did he say and she confronted him about it. So what did he have to say about it when a game? When people read the conversation they have in the book, they asked the question: did you make this up and I say no,

the reason I I can faithfully give you the conversation that they had is because she repeats it in the core from and she says it in the courtroom and is reproduced in the newspapers, and this testimony was so shocking that Theodore Roosevelt, the President of the United States, asked his cabinet members. What can we do about this shocking stuff? That's being printed in the newspapers 'cause? This is one thousand nine hundred right. I mean kind of stuff didn't appear in the newspapers. It was regarded as something it should not be printed and so anyway, Stanford White Evelyn wakes up. She finds out that she been raped and she is asking Stanford White about this and he kind of reassures her and says no, this sort of thing,

and remember: Evelyn is only sixteen years old and he reassured her and she tells us. This is the sort of thing that happens all the time don't worry about it, but whatever you do, don't tell anyone and don't tell your mother and I think, what's what's what was when you think about when someone is sixteen, they can be very naive, unsuspecting and also very willing to to accept the authority of adults and my interpretation of bases. That's exactly what happened. I mean we simply have to just think about what what the revelations of twenty seventeen and two thousand and eighteen you know so many women, even in the present day,.

Didn't confide to their close friends to the relatives that they had been raped by Bill Cosby and that's so it would have been the taboo about discussing this would have been even stronger, would have been even more potent back in one thousand nine hundred, when Evelyn Nesbit was raped by Stanford White, so it remains very much a secret until she meets this man Harry Thor who later becomes her husband and that's when she first tells someone that this event has happened before that happens before she meets Harry thaw. You talk about the friendship. What does the friendship look like after this and his stuff?

I think a a for a lot of people that something that people can't understand, even nowadays, because what happened was that Aplin and Stanford White continued to see each other socially and she she admitted in court that she would go to his apartment alone, just being with him. She accepted money from him. He would send her a checks and free we have about, Twenty five dollars, which was quite a lot of money in those days and so the relationship? Whatever the relationship was up to the rate the relationship continued for approximately a year? They knew each other continue to seeing each other. I don't. I have no idea, and nobody can know whether or not it was a sexual relationship. Or any kind of intimacy happen between them or if it was purely put,

I think, there's no way to know that. But we do know that they continued to be socially together. And also we know that that white continued to send her money for about a year after this Cica. You also talk about an event where, one day she notices a small black book that she'd never seen before. What does she find in that? What is she conclude from that reading? Reading that black yes She finds she finds a list of defines lists of names of women that she, whose names she recognizes who are or other actresses in very- plays in New York and one of the names was hers and she saw the white written in her birthday, her birthday next to her name- and this was the case for several other of the actress- is there

and I think that you realized when she saw this, that weight was carrying on the same kind of relationship with her that he had with other women and and it's very it's- it's there's, not many of sources, because you got to remember that this was a time when all of this was to be any kind of bench. No discussion of sex was taboo. It never occurred in the press or anything unless there was some kind of sensational trial and the only at the reference I've I've come across two white behavior was in a autobiography by Diamond Jim Brady. Who is a well known bank finance here? Another man about town he wrote his autobiography and he mentioned that White would have part is where there would be young girls there and dumb, and there was actually one of the reference which is a famous case which was in eighteen. Ninety five,

the New York World, published a long article about a dinner party that whitens and any other man about twenty minute held, and it was this one of these lavish dinners, with lots of SA pain and at midnight. The waiters brought in this enormous pie related on the table and in the park There was this young girl who is about sixteen and she was specially naked and and the New York World thought this was a scandalous occurrences, said so condemned the ma'am man for doing this kind of thing and for Expo waiting young girls and- and I think the other thing that interested me about this time- was the this any kind of the New York state. Just later in one thousand, eight hundred and ninety five had raised the age of consent, which

amazingly enough had been tent ten years old, racy age of consent to eighteen and also very much expanded the penalty for rape. So that rape in one thousand eight hundred and ninety five was a twenty year prison sentence and so Stanford White By doing what he did was running at great risk, but I think he calculated that the risk was not so great because the Evelyn Nesbit, for example, was very obscure penniless that no resources she was not a member of heists Piatti and I've never come across any evidence that White ever approached or tried to molest. Anybody belong to the social elite, the economic elite of New York society, those people weren't appropriate victims

white. It was only beyond a chorus girls who had no resources and even that it was one of those. So I can't remember if found the joke and now I've I think I might have gone off on a little bit of a tangent, but that some of the background to this case now you talk about the floor door being Ashley successful and a lot of theater producers wanted to emulate that, but in terms of what it meant for Evelyn Nesbit when that show ended what happened with her career? Yes, well, that's Osuna Sting question and basically, uh didn't go very far. She got roll a think in she auditioned for a called the silver slipper. I think it was

once and she got a role in as a gypsy girl in one other production that lasted for about four months, and then she got last role was in a play called Tommy wrought about the only play for about that. The phone is a a a k and it's very difficult to say with any certainty when you're one hundred and twenty years removed from the events. But my conclusion is that Evelyn was probably not a good thing, as she probably wasn't a good dancer he didn't, have theatrical career, never took off and it kind of fizzy, about, but she was only seventeen you know. So she was very, very young, but there were other things that that kind of steered her away from the theater world and one of them was meeting John Barrymore. He was then twenty years old and the grand Father of Drewberry

more than the Barrymore family is really royalty in the acting world. They've had generation after generation of famous actors and your about John Barrymore, when he was twenty, seemed to have no future whatsoever. I had no real interest in being an actor I'm now. We know him, of course, is one of the most famous actors in the 20th century, but when he was too, he is old, he was. He was kind of we got is that men do well someone who wasn't going to make it. But he had a brief fling with Evelyn Nesbit when Evelyn with seventeen and when Barrymore's twenty Ann and then she met a young man called Harry thought. Who is thirty? One years old and Thor was the eldest son of Multi Millionaire, who had made his fortune as a vice president, the Pennsylvania Railroad and had bought thousands of acres

of landing in western Pennsylvania that tend not to have cold, and so this land and became enormously lucrative, and so Harry thought, the thirty one year old, he was worth his family was worth probably at least forty million dollars and saw him self was getting an allowance every year of eighty thousand dollars, which is the equivalent in our money of about one million dollars. So so so Harry and Evelyn take up together and they they go to Europe a couple of times. First, in one thousand nine hundred and three and the next year in one thousand nine hundred and four so so even radius,

moving away from a stage career, she doesn't have many opportunities in that direction. Now what is her benefactor at that same time? A good. We got to keep in mind that these a benefactor to her brother Harry, putting in a military academy and and right to the other and putting them up in an apartment. What exactly does he have to say about the relationship there we thought was, they have to say about Harry well why it takes a kind of paternal attitude towards Evelyn and. And he doesn't think it's a good idea for her to have any kind of relationship, uhm, he's kind of protective. A Harry thought, it was regarded as really a very eccentric character. I mean someone the stories about him. He had unlimited amounts of money and he would do things. For example, if he's done

restaurant and and the way didn't serve him correctly. Then he to do outrageous, things like pull the tablecloth and all the dishes would come crashing to the floor and it cause a huge commotion, but the Harry didn't matter because he would just pay whatever damage was hand over three thousand or four thousand dollars, and you know go somewhere else, but this kind of occasionally had the wreck occasionally had for drug use. These were all kind of gossip, rumors rep we had for abusing young girls. That was another thing that was kind of floating in the air Harry. I've never been able to get into the clubs, and the clubs in those days in New York were very, very important. They were kind of social, that's where the socially mingled clubs, like the metropolitan club, the you club, the Knickerbocker Club and Harry Store Connecticut

to them, and he always believed that the reason why he was excluded was because he was blackballed by Stanford White, and so that's another part of the background going on here. The other thing to remember, of course, is that New York was a much more place than it is now When I go out around New York, a almost never meet someone that I know by chance, because it's such a huge place and- and it's very rare they bump into someone in the street that I know, but in those days you gotta think about it. If you were middle class or upper class, you really wouldn't go s of 14Th ST and yes, you had a job on Wall Street. You go north of fortieth street because there was really nothing north of Fortieth Street except Central Park, and you certainly wouldn't go out to the west side of the east side, because there is a very dangerous areas as well where the talks were. I general population. The gangs hang hung

out on the dock, so the area that everybody inhabited was very kind of small area right in the center of town so Harry Thoren, Stanford, White and Evelyn Nesbit would bump into each other quite frequently. And I guess I could talk now about what happened to Madison Square Garden. Unless you have any other questions about what happened before that that meeting in the garden. Do you do we? Should we go down after the escape, but okay, the other stuff that yeah okay, so so the three of them are always bumping into each other and one evening Harry and Evelyn go to the turn. They go to Madison Square Garden and there's a comedy. A musical comedy called mammoth our champagne playing and it's the opening night 25th of June and and

they arrive a little late. They take their places. But the comedy is not so good and in Harry decide they want to leave early they're going to leave early 'cause. They rather bored by this show I and Evelyn walks towards the elevator and looks behind up her husband. Well, I say what I did omitted to mention that Appling and Harriet be married in one thousand. Nine hundred and five all right, that's important part of it and Evelyn looks behind to see where a husband is and she sees him at the front of the theater and she sees at the same moment. She see Stanford White sitting in the front row. With his elbow on the table, looking towards the stage and of the exactly the same moment, she sees Harry standing in front of Stamford White with a gun in his hand, then, for the White Sea salaries starts to get up out of his chair, but Harry five, the first shot, then a second show

Then a third shot and had very good a he was firing only from a few feet away and then white dies jet LI and p. Pull around. Think that this is part of the play. But it's only when they see blood coming out of whites body, trickling out of the floor, that they realize it for real the chorus girl stop singing. They know that it's for real, the orchestra stops play saying they know it's for real and Harry. What he does is. He holds the gun up in his hand, breaks the guns, Ann an and then the fireman on duty takes him and they walk back towards the back of the theater and his put in the custody of a police sergeant two within better and and that's the murder and you gotta think of it as the sensation which it was it. It just

played on an online, because here is Stanford White. This view very well. Well, no new Yorker here is Harry thaw. Also well known, millionaire young man- and here is Evelyn Nesbit this. Chorus girl, who's, married, the millionaire So it has all the ingredients of a sensation and plus it. Of course, it happens in front of hundreds of witnesses in theater in Madison Square Garden. In the same building, note Stanford White design- you couldn't make this stuff up. An and so Harry is took taken into custody and he spends that night in a cell in the 30th St Police station, and so that's the next, that's the first stage of the book, but it doesn't end there, of course, by any means it keeps going and keeps going and keeps going on. I was kind of amazed when I studied during the research, because I

never realize that the second half of this drama could be as complicated and as dramatic as it turned out to be. So that's the next, the next stage, so we can talk about. Excuse me, let's use this as an opportunity assignment just stop for a second to talk about our sponsor, which white stream. When do you want to start paying less interest on your credit card debt? How about today, with a credit card consolidation loan from light string, livestream rewards consumers have good credit with a great interest rate and no fees get a credit card consolidate loan from five point: forty nine percent APR with auto pay. You could save thousands of dollars in interest an applique

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did strangely enough, and then what is the ensuing Publix take on what has happened, an excellent question? It's ready right at the center of the legal defense that now Thor undertakes. First of all, his life at the first lawyer that he hires give him the advice as to go before what was known as a commission on lunacy, and this would this would be three experts and they could it. I mean whether or not Harry fill with sane or insane, and this would be a good strategy because it would avoid a trial in which the jury might decide to give you the death penalty, the side you're guilty, I mean. Obviously, yes, he committed the murder. There's no doubt about that. I mean no one hundred the witnesses. Then nobody denies that

and then the commission in lunacy would say that the within insane he would spend a few years in the asylum and then presumably he be released once said that the commotion that died down by rethought tells his lawyer. No, there is, just no way, I am going to accept that in any case, what I'm going do do. Is I'm going to argue a defense that I was justified in killing white here? Is someone who raped a young girl? Sixteen years old was Peter filed in a rapist. He did this to many other victims in New York. He did it with a clique of a well known men and I've done the world a great service by getting rid of Stanford White, that was Harry, thaw's attitude towards the player and and so they go to

to trial in one thousand nine hundred and seven. I think it was February one thousand nine hundred and seven. So it's about eight months after the murder happened, and that is the claim that thaws lawyers present they say. Look, we kill someone who is a rapist and the authorities knew about whites behavior, but they did nothing all right. Who is

to get rid of white this this rapist and paedophile? But here's the here's the key thing so the justification dependes upon the rape being brought out in court, but who is going to be the witness? The only witness is Evelyn Nesbit and she's, the main witness, and so she comes in and she testified and she described in great detail how white led her to the building on a false pretext. Then drugged her then raped her and she then discribes to the court all of the details about the convo stations between her and white about all these different details. That was so important to the case. But the problem is that everything depends upon her testimony, there's no corroboration. Obviously she only twenty one years old and she's facing a district attorney. Try

is Jerome, who has enormous experience very, very clever, very smart, very cunning and wants to get Harry thought into electric chair and give him the death penalty. And this is the seriousness of this is quite clear. I mean th or face the death penalty, and the da is intend on getting into electric chair so so evening gives her testimony. The district attorney tries to destroy her destiny, tries to show that she,

actually not telling the truth, and we can go into that in detail if we have time but basically the jury in the first trial. It's a hung jury. They can't make up their minds they debate. Some people want to have a convict him on the murder charge. Other people believe that Thor in fact is insane and doesn't deserve the death penalty. Most all of the jurors did believe Evelyn Nesbit and thought she was a very good witness, but it's a hung, jury and now the district attorney decides that he's going to put Harry Thoren trial a second time so it goes to trial in one thousand nine hundred and eight and in the second trial. What happens is the lawyer and it's a different lawyer, because Thor would churn, through all the lawyers very very quickly, because inevitably they kind of disappointed him, but the second lawyer

then says: look we don't have much chance with this justifiable homicide business. We have much better chance with insanity and the family, the Thor family agree, and so what happens now is a whole stream of witnesses. Come on to the witness stand and testify as tool the centric things that Harry Thor did right up from the very time when he was a very young infant up to the present day and again, that's an amazing thing very story, because now you have all this detail about Harry Thor's life which would have not. It wouldn't have been possible for me to discuss to discover that unless the they're, all these witnesses have come forward and describe the colleges that he went to the school life he had what he was like as a young, infant and so on and so forth, so we're at the second trial. Uh

again, the jury goes out to deliberate they've heard all the testimony. Evelyn did testify a second time, but her testimony didn't have the same impact and the jury deliberates for about two or three days, and then they come back with the verdict not guilty by reason of insanity, and so the defense has worked. And Harry Thaw is now on his way to the insane asylum which was up in matter one. It's the matter and state asylum in upstate New York, so You might say he was very lucky: he strategy worked, he got to the asylum he didn't get into the electric chair, his defense, that he paid a lot of money for worked for him and- and here he is but he's very dissatisfied. He because he thinks that he did the world a great service and he's now in the asylum and it's a criminal.

Pile up all right, it's the matter. Women stay to sign him for the criminally insane. So all around him are these murderers. These rapists is Asnis. Anyone who did a crime and has been judged to be insane? is now in Madeline Status, state asylum. So it's actually a very uncomfortable experience, Barry Thorne. He wants to get out of there as quickly as we can you talk about how, even though he has this incredible defense team and he gets the result that he wanted, which again it was disconcerting to the state itself, yeah that the mother exerted influence over the head

of the asylum, but first they thought that they were going to be. He was going to be sent to a private sanatorium so that when they realize he was going to the state mental hospital with all these super criminals, what does his mother tried to do? This is one of the more fascinating aspects of the story. What is merry saws mother tried to do in right. A gay knew about the very good question she remember. She has forty at least forty million dollars, her her disposal right, and so She tries, I mean I tried many many different ways to get Harry and Harry is the apple of of her. I mean you know: Harry can do no wrong in her. In her view- and so she tries everything she can to get him out of the asylum and he also wants to get out of the asylum he's. He regards is great injustice that he's ever been sent there in the first place, an so The main strategy they have is to go back into court and argue Fabius Co.

Petition the courts for Habeas Corpus, Habeas Corpus hearing, and what that means is that the authority, the superintendent of the asylum, has to go to court and to justify by keeping Harry thought there. And if the lawyers for Thor can successfully petition for a hearing which they are able to do right, they are able to get the core to say. Yes will have the here, and the superintendent has to show up and show why he's, keeping full and under restriction a new goes on for quite awhile and its successive hearings and there's great rumblings in the state legislature that this is just ludicrous and is tying up the courts and is wasting everybody's time. But inevitably these partitions, these court hearings, they know judge ever gives Harry for his freedom and they just simply send him back to the

sign up and the the the superintendent of the asylum in the medical stuff on the asylum who come into court and give all the reasons why Harry thought should not be released and so this is kind of like the Thor family be sing my head against the wall and nothing's happening. So what what merry thought the mother does

is then try to get rid to get the superintendent of the assign am fired from his job, with the expectation that they'll be a new superintendent who will be less determined to keep Harry in the asylum. So the amazing thing is. She then pays somebody to admit to do a crime. It was as active arson and this person then goes into court and act like his insane and he's committed to the state asylum, the same asylum. In which Harry Thoris being kept he's perfectly sane and he starts reporting all these incidences of abuse and violence that the asylum attendants inflicting on the inmates, and all of this then gets into the newspapers and eventually that superintendent, whose name is Robert Lamb? He is forced to resign from his position.

And a new asylum superintendent is brought in and this new superintendent. It comes to the point where he web of the fourth or family offer him twenty five thousand dollars to release Harry thaw, and this could be done quite easily by something called a certificate of rip recovery. All the super intense It has to do, is sign this certificate and Thor would have been released an but this scheme to bribe the superintendent looks like it's on its way it's going ahead, but in fact it's publicly revealed- and this is the only point in the book in which I don't quite know how this happened- that isn't the information in the newspapers to tell me how the scheme became public the scheme to bribe the superintendent,

but it did become public as soon as it became public. There were then trials, one of the parties, the inter the jury, ended up in sing, sing, prison and, and it was all exposed and- and so. Harry Thor. Now the question becomes look. I can't spend the rest of my life in this asylum. How am I going to get out and he is always wanted to get out in a legal way because he doesn't want to live the life of a fugitive. He wants to be able to go back to Manhattan and live the high life. So And I always ask my students: will what would you do in? The only obvious thing to do now is to escape, cannot get out legally become, can't bribe the superintendent. The only thing to do is to escape, and so in nineteen thirteen,

the milk delivery is being made early in the morning. Seven hundred and thirty and the cart. The milk card comes in the back gate of the asylum and just as it passes through the gate, Harry Thor slips out and there's a black limousine waiting for him at the bottom of the hill and Harry Thor sprints across the graph jumps into the limousine, and it roars off and Harry has escaped from the asylum and the limousine now goes up to Canada and Thor gets into Canada. Now this is on the advice of his attorneys and he crosses from Vermont into Canada. Like you say what is Evelyn's reaction

an what is the media reaction to this occurring him escaping Evelyn's reaction is horror because the relationship doing Evelyn and Harry has really deteriorated and it deteriorated very quickly after he was in the asylum for different reasons. First of all, because he wanted her to move to Mattawa she wasn't going to do- that I mean Madeleine was just a small village. There was nothing had to do that. I mean what was she going to do? You know the only thing she was going to do is visit Hari Store every day in the asylum and she hated going to the asylum because it was full of these men who are and women who are very dangerous. All righty wasn't was not a pleasant experience for her, so she stays in Manhattan. The newspaper says start reporting on her movement. In Manhattan, and they describe how she's been seen with these other young men. So imagine how how is feeling he stuck in the asylum

he's reading about Evelyn going out on the town with these young men? This increases his anger and bitterness and so they really that their relationship soured very very quickly and he became very antagonistic towards everything, even so they were married. They were still married until one thousand nine hundred and sixteen or one thousand nine hundred and fifty. I think it was one thousand nine hundred and sixteen and dumb, so she was afraid that Harry gets out of the assign him he's going to come after her and kill her then media, the press, the newspapers just follow this. You know like nobody knows where Harry is gone to. They do eventually discover that he ends up in Canada, but they this kind of this kind of react night the whole case I mean, and for them it's wonderful because

They can sell more more newspapers, he's good copies, good publicity for that month, so so they send sewed so hold hordes of newspapers report reporters go up to Canada, to report on the law and but the story, discovered in Canada. The canadian authorities arrest him. They hold him for possible deportation and then thaws lawyers and psychiatrists all troop up to Canada as well. He ended up in a small town called Sherbrooke and and for Canada. They now I have a big problem on their hands because they had just passed: immigration acts in one thousand, nine hundred and six and one thousand nine hundred and ten and this immigration. The legislation was directed towards japanese immigrants coming into western Canada, but

tours lawyers in Canada now say we you're going to make we're going to take this to court. Well, basically, Canada wanted to deport Thor because he had been in an asylum and part of the legislation that passed in one thousand nine hundred and ten could deport anyone who was insane and but Thor's lawyers said we're going to fight this legislation in the courts and make it declared unconstitutional, and that was a big crisis for the canadian government, because you know that that would really torpedo their legislation and- and so so here is the in his room in show the canadian sorry to the getting ready to trying to deport him, but they fight they have to fight the lawyers. They don't want full to clog up the courts.

So they do. What probably is the only thing they could do and that is that they send in for very early strong policeman in the all of the night early morning and an immigration inspector and they grab Thor they. Grab him out of bed today, how slim down to a waiting car. They I have back cross the border back into the United States. The I came out of the car and they tell him never come back to calendar again and so there's Harry Thorne, the middle of the road, with no wallet no belt an he there's, no friends, nobody knows is there, and but he realizes that the next day with the New York authorities are going to be hunting for him, and so he he already has to get out of there and he

he ends up in New Hampshire and he is extradited eventually back to New York and that thought are interesting episode, because that reaches the United States Supreme Court, because the fight there is that one state connect goodnight, someone from another state, but you can't do it on a whim. New York can't just say to another state, bring us this absence. Oh back, you've got to have a reason for extradition and the reason is usually an indictment, a criminal indictment, so New York in date store on the charge of escaping from the asylum. They bring him back to New York and and but now New York has to prosecute him on the charge that they indicted him on, which was a scaping from the asylum, and this now has to go before a jury and so

Lloyd come in. They argue the case is before a jury. Public feeling is still overwhelmingly on full side that he has killed this. This rate base of Stanford White, and so the jury decides that he's not guilty and the sites. Also, that he's he say, and so the judge releases SAM and he's now completely free man- and this happens in nineteen fifty, your wife does not know quite end of story, but almost the end of the story. Yes, what we we will you talk about in the book was really fascinating, is again the response by the media and by the public, especially when you talk to any candy talk about these huge crowds to greet him and also celebrities visiting with him so who the mayor so maybe tell us a little bit above that incredible re

action to this case right well, Thor is brought first festival in Canada. There are so crowds just turn out to a Thor's a hero. I mean for two reasons: first, because he killed white opt to rape, this young girl and the second reason is Doris fighting against the might of New York state that a new okay he got extremely arrogant just coming into Canada and expecting to get Thor immediately and Thor fights back, but and even when he goes into New Hampshire. The crowds just turn out and is regarded as this kind of hero, and this legend we figure out who was who is maintained. His innocence and basically is is being seen as being victimized by New York, state unfairly

victimized and- and it's very interesting to think about this because the especially in the south and state it was regarded as the legitimate defense that you could go into court and say this man raped my wife. Therefore I had the right to kill him and that defense. It didn't work in hurry, thought case, but it did work in many cases in that particular in the southern states, in the 19th century, and so Thor is really kind of fated. As this as this hero, who's fighting against the might of New York state, and and the Thor family did its part in all of this, because they also pay to newspaper reporters and magazine writers to write favorable articles about Harry marry. Thor also financed the movie which has been lost. It doesn't exist anymore, but that movie

with about Harry Thaw, a kind of drum dramatic movie that was really a Stanford weighed his Rename Stanford Black and but it's all about Harry Thaw and it's even a play on Broadway. That is also financed by the full family, and that is also about the case. But all of this is very sympathetic to Harry cool and so so is regarded as this hero when he is released in nineteen fifteen for a time he he kind of thinks into obscurity but it's only two years later than in fact, his own peculiarities, his own, really abusive behavior, comes to light, and he abuse, is a young boy in New York and because of that, he is finally sent Tunis and said he sent to another in,

this item and and is only released in nineteen, twenty, four and and he lives out his life. I think Harry died in the nineteen forties, but of course he continues to have this enormous amount of money that his family has. His mother died in nineteen, twenty nine and the children get the before June. So what's and that's a needing to sorry go ahead, and I would we also need to say what happened to Evelyn she received enough thing. I mean she when you think about it. She had testified twice on Harris Behalf, first in one thousand, nine hundred and seven second, in one thousand, nine hundred and eight she'd revealed many details of her personal life, which were related with Shannon shocked the audience details theater in New York and she,

the heavy heavy price, a heavy penalty, because she really struggled in poverty for quite awhile. She wanted to border Ville but then she became a movie star for about three or four years in the silent movies. She made a lot of money, but she developed a drug habit. She became addicted morphine in nineteen nineteen and also addicted to cocaine, but she did finally break that habit she ended up as a cabaret singer in Atlantic City and in New York City. She had had a son Russell in one thousand, nine hundred and ten. She claimed that this son with Harris Child, but I found out that that could not have been the case. The father was a newspaper reporter called Jack

Francis, but it was her son Russell who then became a test pilot for the Douglas Aircraft Corporation. He supported his mother after Is she ended her cabaret career and she eventually moved to California to be with her son and his wife and children, and she lived out the rest of her days. I think she died in in nineteen 1960s sometime in the 1960s, maybe one thousand nine hundred and sixty one, but in the interim she also she was the consultant for a movie that was made about the case, which was titled the girl,

in the red velvet swing and that starred Joan Collins and was a modestly successful movie. It's worth watching it's a distance, interesting movie, but that's ready. This is the story of their lives, which we didn't mention and which is again very fascinating and probably Stanford White was rolling in his grave. Is that there was revealed in the the assault on the the the Gump young man, nineteen years old that he had whipped him. So a lot of the allegations that Stafford White had said and that eventually she had said to an attorney, I believe Name Hutton that so at least what Stanford White had said seemed to be eerily accurate later, yes, I mean you raised this whole sort of complicated back story. We

she is fascinating in itself, but I think one other things I want to take out of that back story is the question that I asked myself when I do not have any answer nobody can ever know. The answer is: did the rape actually happened all right, because we only know that it occurred from Evelyn's? Testimony in court she obviously had a very she. She was very vulnerable and I think, in previous accounts of this case, what it has annoyed me very much and still lies come across. This is the idea that somehow this was a seduction and by Stanford White, and that word implies a kind of consensus between Evelyn and stand for white that they have sex, which was not the case of door. I mean you know she was drugged unconscious. She was raped unconscious. I mean that's occur,

terrible violation. How could she possibly having coverage this, but that's that's what some people still think, I'm plus, of course she was sixteen. She was a young child. I thank the white was forty seven, but in any case. Think about it she goes to try it. It goes to trial, Harry Thor, goes to trial Evelyn twenty one years old, still very young. Could it have been the case that Harry Thors, lawyers very experienced men, put enormous pressure on Evelyn to testify, falsely to testify that the raper happened and and to then make it as graphic as possible. So the jury would sympathize with her and sympathize with Harry Thor and by this line of justifiable homicide? That's something that's possible, I mean I count that and nobody can say one way or the other, but of course, what the what happened as it left the state on Stanford White

reputation and probably many more people, know the name Stanford White right now because of the murder rather than they know he's architecture, but all things, you've told you mentioned in your question where this other complicated backstory is that Harry thought himself. It came out later that what he used to do was advertise young girls to go for an audition for the theater. He would then in if you, if he realized that they had no protector guardian, he would then attack them and whip them, and they he would then pay them off with thousands of all and what this affidavit that Evelyn supposedly side,

in one thousand nine hundred and three, I think it was on some time, then, was that in fact, Harry Thor had whipped her because she would not testify again. Stanford white and this would have been before the murder. So it's even as I'm describing all of this detailed to you, I realize how incredibly complicated the whole business isn't an how much more there is to this story than that I can even tell it in an hour. Did it quite quite amazing, in fact, so it seems that there's a good possibility that the allegations that this and made about Harry Harry thaw the allegations allegations Harry every said about Stanford in terms of luring girl,

a young girls up to their apartments. It seemed like they could be very, possibly both guilty of exactly the same thing, if that's exactly right and how? How ironic is that I mean all right here: are these two men, both kind of most middle aged Harry is about thirty six, when he married the lead stamp of white? Is fifty four fifty two when he died, so both of them are abusing young go right, let I mean that's very feasible and she, the victim of sixteen years old, is caught between the two of them Ann. And and and they're, both accusing whitened Thor, accusing each other at the most terrible behavior? She doesn't know who to believe she marries Harry because he provides some financial security,

but it's an amazing story, and none of this, of course, would have come out in like a nobody would ever have known about it unless there were these trials, unless the merger to cut, if this is old, somehow being hushed up, if Harry had not murdered Stanford White and none of this behavior, would have come out and it's it's very it's very telling because of course, we know very, I mean a year ago, eighteen months ago, we knew almost nothing of the behavior of Bill Cosby and, and that will

the man who's, his behavior, is being revealed and and the way it. I think what what what's quite extraordinary about the last two years is that once the dam broke right, one Savi Weinstein within Hughes. All these other accusations about very upstanding people. You know people who are on it. Only these accusations suddenly pour out suddenly flat out and make it with like a dam broke and, and same thing happens with with thanks to white and how we feel once the once. It became public cooled, the accusations, elected backbreaking and, and- and it's it's sad that this

couldn't and that the the the the stuff remain secret in these, these acts which a criminal act remain hidden for so long and this behavior is not more easily dealt with. All all mall openly dealt with that much at this stage. I agree with you to it. It seemed to actually startling, but I guess in urging for a lot of people. I know it's it's encouraging, overall, that people that seem like they had you know and a reputation that was entrenched, that these people were the first people to go. Like you say, wine, stain and and Matt Biondi and a couple other people. It seemed like there was a car dealers, but yes that was going on for years, so these people had to be gone, but it's like you say. I think there was a. Is this a moment that that tide turned completely asking? Why did women take so long

before they accused Bill Cosby and now we're not having that conversation anymore. We seem to understand why people take so long to come forward. I think that exactly right I mean when the first accusations were made about Bill Cosby people, I think. I kept reading and hearing so many people saying, Oh there was some. These women have in a gender, they want publicity or they want money, and that was quite frequent. But then, two years later, two years on, you do not hear that anymore. There's much more. The public opinion public sentiment has now shifted in a way to say. Yes, we believe these women who are making these accusations and yes, they are telling the truth- and I think that's a very positive thing. That's a very positive advance, just within the last two years. And I thought it was just the most fascinating thing, as well as the response by the public, especially in Canada, where they

It wasn't aware of the other side of the story per se, and yet they just treated him like a hero. You were talking to thousand two thousand people come out to CHI, here this guy on, and I could say an Ex mayor former mayor coming up and shaking his head. And wanting his autograph, it is very strange phenomena. It's almost reminded me not exactly the same, but the OJ response with people cheering Oj Anasi escaped in his bronco right and I think what what what's going on. Also is that there is a much broader I mean when we go back when you go back to nineteen thousand one hundred and nineteen, oh six hundred and nineteen, oh seven, one thousand nine hundred and ten. I'm not an expert in what's going on broadly in society, but something is clearly going on right that that huge public support for Harry Thaw, who is perceived as being the person who has avenged his wife's honor, but

What also is interesting is the way the state legislature passed this these laws in eighteen, ninety five, alright- and this according to historians the reason they raise the age of consents, the reason they greatly expanded the penalty for sexual crimes, like rape, was because of pressure from women's groups. Saying make these changes because, of course, all the member at the state legislature, were men. There were no women in the state legislature. So there's this is a much broader. So social change going on in New York and around the United States is whole and also Canada. That is much more simple medic to women than it is to the men.

Looking at the women really at victims, and- and if I can just add a little can a postscript about this in the 1950s- people began to re, discover Stanford weight as an architect, and so books began to appear that gave the history of Stanford weight as an architect and the history of Mckim, Mead and wait. Now. The authors of these books realized had a problem because it wait is a flight- is a rapist on a paedophile. How do you deal with that and I think the way they dealt with it was by describing this episode as a seduction and what gradually a happened. Was this kind of.

Introduction of Evelyn Nesbit a somehow complicit or is even the person who is responsible for these, for the rape and for the murder? Okay, and I think this happened because they wanted to rehabilitate Stanford White's reputation as an architect, and so you see so it's so common for. People to refer to this episode as a seduction- and I said to my editors- I said- look I have not use that word in the book. I've always referred to it as a rape and whenever any publicity is done about this cape, it should be referred to as a array, but we shouldn't refer to it as a seduction and and so that I made that very clear and I hope that comes across yeah. It certainly does, and and and I mean there is no hint of the what you say of seduction- no talk of that. So it's come very clear, especially when

talk about she was given a glass of champagne and, as you read in the book, she was hesitant to finish it, but he urged her to finish it and when she woke up she was unconscious and naked yeah yeah. That is the definition of rape. You know yeah. I want to thank you, Simon, for coming on and talking about the girl on the vine velvet swing, sex, murder and madness. At the dawn of the twenty century. It is been an absolute pleasure: is there a facebook page or website that people might take a look at and see rather work, well, that this very good Amazon page that the publisher Little Brown did, and I would if people want to find out more about the book there there are. Photographs are on the book on the Amazon page, there's also reviews of the book and a short synopsis on the book and, of course, people can purchase the book on Amazon quite quite easily. So so that would be my advice to

Go to that page. Absolutely, I want to say to that. I forgot to mention the incredible black and white photos of Evelyn and. Kind of other people and the architecture of the time, incredible Seattle's that are included in this book too. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Simon! Do you have a great evening and thank you very much for this interview. Well, thank you, a game from that time. You've given me to talk about the book and I'm very appreciative of the of the fact that you did so much capital reading of the book beforehand. Thank you. Thank you very much. It was my pleasure good night.

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