Dementia Americana | Criminal Podcast | Forensic Files

this episode picks up from our last episode episode 91 The It Girl if you haven't listened to that one yet you may
want to go back and listen to them in order this story contains references to sexual
violence and may not be appropriate for everyone please use discretion for a brief time it seemed like maybe
this was going to be okay and then of course he starts coming into her room at night and saying tell me again what
Stanford white did to you tell me just and she realized that part of the reason why he married her was because he wanted
to relive this experience over and over again about white he was so obsessed with him
Harry thaw was having Stanford white followed and Sanford white knew he was being followed
each man collected incriminating materials about the other but the truth is both men had committed
rape against a minor punishable by a minimum sentence of 10 years if one were to come forward to accuse
the other who would potentially incriminate himself it was a standoff Harry thaw encouraged Anthony Comstock
and his Society for the suppression of Vice to look closely at Stanford White's relationships with young chorus girls
Harry claimed that he personally had approached many many mothers and warned them to keep their daughters away from
Stanford White it was becoming clear that his obsession with bringing down Stanford white wasn't
just about protecting The Virginity of young girls we continue the story with Hofstra
Professor Paula uriburu Harry wanted to be you know a member of the clubs that white had built and
designed and was a member of and because he had been sort of blackballed from all
of them he blamed white you know for that and New York City Manhattan was whites town you know so the second best
thing he could do was to marry this woman who had who had such an intimate relationship with white and then he
could sort of keep feeding this Obsession of his which was so so dark and so crazy
because Stanford White had paid to have Evelyn's teeth fixed to make them perfect Harry thaw sent her back to a
dentist to undo it and make them imperfect again he made Evelyn promise that if she ever
saw Stanford white even by coincidence in passing that she would report it to him he told her to call him the Beast or
just the bee Evelyn had imagined that she and Harry would travel and she'd get to see the
world but in reality they spent most nights at home with his family in Pittsburgh who she described as in
artistic one year into their marriage Harry announced that he and Evelyn would go to
Europe on June 25th 1906 they traveled from Pittsburgh to New York where they would
spend the night before boarding a ship to cross the ocean Harry says oh guess what uh we're going
to dinner tonight and we're going to the theater he wanted to see a musical called Mademoiselle champagne which was
showing at Madison Square Garden Stanford white Madison Square Garden they had dinner first Harry was behaving
strangely he was wearing a long black overcoat he was drinking a lot and quickly just as they were finishing
their meal who comes walking in with Stanford white with his son Evelyn saw him right away but somehow Harry did not
she tried to act completely normal and keep Harry from turning around Stanford white and his son went outside
to the restaurant's Terrace and then Evelyn realized that she might get in trouble if she didn't tell Harry
she wrote on a piece of paper the bee was here but has left Harry read the note and then he ordered
champagne left a large tip and he and Evelyn went to Madison Square Garden when they first get there before the
show starts Evelyn looks and much to her uh relief Stanford white is not in his usual seat because he was the designer
the creator of the garden and so he had his own special seat but he was not there which he was happy about because
she imagined some sort of really ugly confrontation between the two of them if it ever happened and she really didn't
didn't want that experience so the show starts and and uh it was extremely hard it was ridiculously unseasonably hot and
Harry was wearing this big heavy black overcoat and Evelyn said to him aren't you hot and he said no I'm fine I'm fine
the show was almost over and Stanford White's table was still empty sadly the elevator doors open in the garden which
is this beautiful rooftop theater and suddenly who gets out of the elevator but Stanford White
some people in the audience applauded for him as he crossed the theater and took his seat near the stage
he was there to see a young chorus girl he had been pursuing she was new to New York and he described her as looking
like a little Peach Evelyn asked Harry and their friends if they could leave so Evelyn gets up and
then she and the two friends and Harry ostensibly are walking towards the elevator when she turns and sees that
Harry is not with her she she's trying to see where he could possibly be and Harry was you know a few
hundred yards away walked up to White and Point Blank shoots him from about a foot away three bullets one in the teeth
one behind his left eye and one in the shoulder in front of 900 people he died instantly in the building he
designed and put on the map in the middle of a song called I could love a million girls
people thought it was part of the show some members of the orchestra were confused and continued to play their
instruments Harry reportedly said I did it because he ruined my wife and a New York fireman actually stepped
forward and asked him to give up the gun which he did and smiling and uh was taken away then to the police station in
the tenderloin area um and Evelyn says my God Harry what have you done and he says I've saved you
and I've saved the girls you know the young women of New York and Harry thought he was doing some sort of you
know he thought he was a knight in shining armor the New York Tribune quoted a cab driver is saying I always
thought that fella would be killed sooner or later but I thought it would be a father that would do it not a
husband I'm Phoebe judge this is Criminal [Music] [Music] Harry thaw was arrested and held without
bail the district attorney told the New York Times I have no hesitation in saying I
never knew of a more deliberate murder Evelyn was mostly described by the papers as just very pretty
one paper described her as looking like a baby deer another said her head quote sat on her faultless throat as a lily on
its stem and that her mouth was made of rumpled rose petals I don't think Evelyn ever thought that
Harry had the courage or whatever term you want to use to to do anything that drastic with white I think she might
have worried that there was going to be some sort of you know ugly scene some sort of you know verbal uh scene but I
don't think she ever thought that he would have the nerve to shoot white but he did
after that night mom was all champagne was a huge hit not because people wanted to watch the show which was apparently
quite bad but because they wanted to see the scene of the crime you had Thomas Edison rushes to get a version of the
murder the rooftop murder into the Nickelodeon's like two weeks later there's you could go to the Nickelodeon
and see the reenactment of this murder it's uh in this Edison film and then the thaw family
commissions their own film and then you had the newspapers there were something like 28 newspapers in New York alone The
Herald the journal The Daily News you know the the list of newspapers goes on and it was front page news for two years
and of course despite the fact that fog was the Killer and white was the victim the face of the murder trial was Evelyn
because she was going to be a witness a star witness and she was you know she was the center of it all
Harry thaw and his mother made her testify their defense strategy was unusual the
lawyers wanted to argue Not Guilty by reason of insanity but the family was adamantly against that
and so they came up with a compromise Harry's attorney described it as the quote species of insanity which makes
every American man believe the honor of his wife is sacred he called it dementia
Americana for it to work the jury had to be able to put themselves in Harry's shoes and
to be disgusted by Stanford white for that to happen Evelyn had to take the stand and testify that Stanford white
raped her she didn't have a choice Mrs thaw controlled her finances put a roof over her head and warned her that
if she didn't do this Harry would die in the electric chair Evelyn testified for several days
speaking in excruciating detail the district attorney William Travers Jerome bragged to reporters that he
couldn't wait to cross-examine her that he would quote tear her limb from limb and exhibit the interesting remains
triumphantly he showed the jury a photo of Evelyn on a Bearskin rug wearing a kimono he asked
why she'd accepted so much money and so many gifts from Stanford white he asked why she attended his notoriously wild
parties if he was such a monster the trial testimony was printed in newspapers it was so shocking that
President Roosevelt tried to have it suppressed he said the full disgusting particulars were preventing people from
concentrating at work keep in mind this is still this is 1906 1907 and uh people are not talking about
sex much less getting on the stand and talking about riding naked on a swing and riding naked on Stanford White's
shoulders and and photo shoots and having to wake up in this mirrored bed so all this was just incredibly
incredibly salacious no one had ever heard anything like this before and the thought strategy was it didn't even
matter if what they said what was said was true or not it was just the fact that Evelyn said it to Harry and that
made him crazy so they called it a brainstorm Harry's mother paid several alienists
the precursors to psychiatrists exorbitant sums of money to explain to the jury how it was possible for Harry
to be perfectly sane before and after this temporary brainstorm that compelled him to defend his wife's honor so that
was their strategy and it worked because amazingly even though he shot white and cold blood in front of
a 900 plus people uh with Witnesses and everything else it was a hung jury the district attorney couldn't believe
it and vowed to have a second trial which happened a year later in the course of you know a year between that
trial and the second one where they have to go with the insanity plea it's almost
like everything broke open and suddenly it's the modern world people are the the
public are not going to be fooled by this mask of you know the knight in shining armor or any of that any of that
old stuff you know the old Victorian morality clearly is out the window and so uh was really quite amazing
[Music] in the first trial Harry thaw's defense attorney had created a picture of Evelyn
Nesbitt being rescued from the predatory Stanford white by her honorable and doting husband Harry thaw a story about
chivalry not murder but by the second trial reporters had gotten their hands on all kinds of
personal details and so the narrative wasn't so simple it was clear at that point because of the incredible media
coverage that it was very clear that um none of the people in the in the in the center of this tragedy neither Evelyn
nor white nor thaw was exactly what they had been initially depicted as and as more and more details came out about the
various relationships and particularly about Harry's Behavior his defense attorneys approached Harry's mother and
said listen unless you want your son to die in the electric chair you're going to we're gonna have to let us go with
the insanity defense because that was what the first lawyers wanted to do and Mrs mother thought said absolutely not
even though Insanity she had a brother who was institutionalized and there was some evidence of other mental problems
in the family she did not want that coming out so too much has come out about Harry's Behavior if you don't let
us go with this defense he will go to the electric chair and so they went with the insanity defense and he was
acquitted by reason of insanity and sent up to Matawan to the state Institution for the criminally insane in Upstate New
York and that's how the second trial ended while Harry was at Matawan he paid people to follow Evelyn his mother
helped with this collecting the reports about what she did and who she saw and briefing Harry
in 1910 Evelyn got pregnant she said the pregnancy was the result of a conjugal visit she'd had with Harry he
said that wasn't true she wrote I'd been through Flames to save the life of the man who is now
repudiated me I'm sure that the thaw family promised her that they would take care of her but mother thought had no
love for Evelyn in fact she hated the fact that her son had married so beneath him having married this chorus girl and
so once Harry is incarcerated he's no longer in charge of his finances mother thought is and she put Evelyn on a very
short leash in fact according to everything that Evelyn said she had to keep going up to Matawan to beg Harry to
beg his mother to give her even just enough money to pay for the rent for the apartment she was living in and so she
sort of stuck it out as the devoted wife I guess you could say for a couple of years and then it became clear that the
whole family that this nothing she was never going to get any money nor were they going to give her anything to
even help her to live so Harry in the meantime is stuck in the insane asylum who's ranting and raving
about that he's not insane and he's trying to figure out a way out of this Evelyn
began to testify against Harry at his sanity hearings saying he was too dangerous to be let out Harry filed for
divorce he was eventually released from Matawan and in 1917 the New York Times reported
that he'd been arrested again this time for kidnapping and whipping a teenage boy nearly to death
Harry thaw had groomed the boy for almost a year writing him letters promising him a job and then one night
he rented a suite in a hotel in Philadelphia and all the rooms around it to make sure that no one could hear the
boy shouting for help while he was beaten and whipped the boy managed to escape and told his
parents Harry was sent to a Pennsylvania Asylum he was released seven years later and
continued to be accused of beating and whipping Showgirls until he died after their divorce Evelyn with her
young son tried to go back to work she now is looking at herself and her reputation in Ruins she's known as the
girl in the red velvet swing which he still is she decides to try to have a career in
Vaudeville she was criticized for performing papers reported that she was capitalizing on her Fame from the murder
trials she performed in cabarets in Greenwich Village she walked around with a pet boa
constrictor named baby in the 30s at the lowest point in her life she said that the tragedy wasn't that Stanford white
died it was that I lived but then if you fast forward to the point where she becomes in the 1955 she's the consultant
for the film version of her life the girl on the red velvet swing with Joan Collins cinemascope lays bear the most
scandalous true life love drama of the century a story unique in the annals of crime and passion
so now she's sort of again resurrected and becomes the feature in Life magazine and there's pictures of her posing with
the Charles Dana Gibson image of her so um it's a really really interesting multifaceted story and I think the
legacy is it's the first really great True Crime of the certainly of the 20th century I mean every every decade has
its crime of the century but this was really the first modern one in terms of the media coverage in terms of the press
in terms of the what the rich and the powerful were doing behind closed doors in terms of exploitation of the young
girls and the just young people working trying to work coming into the city from
the rural areas I mean it really covers every aspect of of American culture and illuminated all the dark corners and uh
which sadly uh still exists nothing has changed in terms of the currencies of power that were in play Then in terms of
the rich and the powerful the people with money a who can pay off people and keep their secrets and so it's just it's
just a fascinating cultural Moment In addition to the fact that Evelyn herself was really the first
to me she was the first modern woman [Music] Evelyn Nesbitt spent the rest of her
life in California with her son and his family and finally after a life of being the
Muse for so many other artists she became a working artist in her own right a Sculptor
[Music] foreign [Music] Spore Nadia Wilson and me audio mix by Rob Byers Matilda urfelino is our intern
Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal you can see them at this
criminal.com where you can learn more about Evelyn Nesbitt and Paula uribiru's Book American Eve
and we've got some very rare photographs from Harry thaw's trial there a trial that was closed to cameras but Boston
Globe photographer E.E Bond snuck a special camera into the courtroom no one could see it because it was hidden in
his vest and operated with a Watch chain thanks to our friends at the Boston Public Library for allowing us to share
them you can find all of that at this iscriminal.com criminal is recorded in the studios of
North Carolina public radio wunc we're a proud member of radiotopia from PRX a collection of the best
podcasts around special thanks to adzerk for providing their ad serving platform to radiotopia
I'm Phoebe judge this is Criminal [Music] radio [Music]

This episode picks up where Episode 91 left off. We suggest you listen to them in order: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IfKaCyeU18

The early 20th century’s biggest murder trial, and a particular brand of “madness.”

For more information, check out Paula Uruburu’s book, American Eve.

Cameras were not allowed in the courtroom during Harry Thaw’s trial, but Boston Globe photographer E.E. Bond snuck in a special camera, hidden in his vest and operated with a watch chain. Thanks to our friends at the Boston Public Library for allowing us to share these rare photos.

Music in the episode “Ash and Mirage” by Blue Dot Sessions “Downhill Racer” by Blue Dot Sessions “Skeptic” by Podington Bear “4 Point Path” by Blue Dot Sessions “In My Head” by Podington Bear

Criminal is a show about people who’ve done wrong, been wronged, or gotten caught somewhere in the middle. Hosted by Phoebe Judge. Part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. https://link.chtbl.com/n33u0HsA

Say hello on Twitter (@CriminalShow), Instagram (@criminal_podcast), and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/ThisIsCriminal/.

Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice https://bit.ly/accomplicenewsletter.

We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery.

Artwork by Julienne Alexander http://www.yssrs.com/.

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Episode transcripts are posted on our website https://thisiscriminal.com/.

Episode 92 originally published 6/1/2018 https://thisiscriminal.com/episode-92-dementia-americana-06-01-2018

Brief Summary

Harry Thaw murders Stanford White over obsession with his wife, Evelyn Nesbitt, leading to a sensational trial and cultural impact.

Key points

The Murder of Stanford White. In a shocking turn of events, Harry Thaw shoots Stanford White in front of a theater audience, claiming he did it to save his wife.
The Insanity Defense. Harry Thaw's defense team argues for insanity, claiming his actions were driven by a temporary 'brainstorm' over his wife's honor.
Evelyn's Testimony. Evelyn Nesbitt is forced to testify against her husband's sanity, revealing shocking details of her past with Stanford White.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I've saved you and I've saved the girls.

Harry's justification after the murder of Stanford White.

6:28WatchJan 12, 2023

Tension

80/ 100High tension

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