Last summer marked the seventy-fifth anniversary of the crimes, and Director Ora Abrams organized a historical society fundraiser to commemorate the occasion. Her goal: to eventually move the non-profit museum into larger quarters.
“We just don’t have room to permanently display most of what we have in the archives,” she told the Tribune from her tiny, windowless office. “But the library board agreed to let us use the upstairs conference rooms to create a special convention exhibit. We weren’t certain it would draw attendance beyond our little village, but it did.”
Well beyond.
Last July’s daylong event was a success. Several weeks later, in a confluence of events, an ABC News producer happened to be visiting friends at their summer home outside Mundy’s Landing around the same time serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was arrested in Milwaukee. Through her friends, the producer learned of the Sleeping Beauty case and visited the exhibit, where she met Ms. Abrams.
“She was absolutely fascinated by the story,” Ms. Abrams remembers, “and I wound up showing her some items from the private collection.”
While she wouldn’t elaborate, those items are rumored to have included bloodstained clothing and a number of other artifacts deemed too sensitive or too gruesome for the permanent exhibit.
The producer later returned to the village with a correspondent and television crew from the newsmagazine program 20/20. The Sleeping Beauty murders were included alongside Jack the Ripper and the Zodiac Killer in an unsolved crimes segment last fall.
According to Ms. Abrams, the resulting groundswell of interest has resulted in a drastic uptick in daily visitors at the historical society, leading her to make the fundraiser an annual event. “We see everyone from historians to detectives to even a true crime author researching a book about the case. We’ve given the public an unprecedented opportunity to try their hand at solving it.”
On New Year’s Day, she issued a press release bearing the headline: CAN YOU SOLVE THE SLEEPING BEAUTY MURDERS?
Whether that’s even possible remains to be seen, but providing access to relevant artifacts might shed additional light on the case and, at the very least, raise sorely needed funds.
Local residents who belong to Friends of the Museum can preview the special exhibit directly following the Independence Day parade and ceremonies in the Common on Thursday, July 2. It will be open to the general public July 3 through 5. Tickets can be purchased at the historical society beginning this week.
Chapter 8
Last night at Marrana’s, when Rowan somehow got it into her head that Jake was looking at her strangely, she’d almost believed he sent the box of burnt cookies himself.
What if he’d snuck into the house unexpectedly on that snowy afternoon while she was with Rick?
He wouldn’t sneak in, though. He’d have no reason to think he might be interrupting a clandestine tryst . . . or would he?
Even if he did, he couldn’t possibly have anticipated that would be the day, the moment when Rick would finally make a move.
Anyway, if he had walked in on them, he’d have burst into the room throwing punches at Rick. That’s the kind of guy Jake is; always has been—even--keeled temperament until something drastic sets him off, and then look out. He wouldn’t have waited fourteen years to mail an anonymous package.
Still, it had a Manhattan postmark. Jake’s regional sales job occasionally takes him there. It hasn’t lately, though . . .
As far as you know.
She’s too well aware just how easy it is to make the two--hour drive to the city and later claim to have been elsewhere.
As she takes her medication, brushes her teeth, combs her hair, and throws on jeans and a sweatshirt—-her own this time, not Jake’s—-she tries to convince herself that the man she married would never be capable of doing something so sneaky or hurtful.
Just like he believes you’d never do anything sneaky or hurtful?