|
 |
 |
|
|
|
| Author |
Message |
    
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Chief Inspector
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 577
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Monday, March 15, 2004 - 11:10 am: |       |
Hello All
Does anyone have any information on the new book coming out shortly by Shirley Harrison? I was told by a bookseller that the book would be out shortly in the U.S. and details the 'American connection to the diary'-whatever that may mean.
All The Best
Gary
|
Paul Butler
Sergeant
Username: Paul
Post Number: 15
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Monday, March 15, 2004 - 11:33 am: | |
Hi Gary
Have a look at the "Maybrick and the American connection" thread. Its a decent enough book, and a good read on the Whitechapel murders, but the connection with the Austin Texas Killings is a wee bit tenuous in my view.
Regards
Paul |
Gary Alan Weatherhead
Chief Inspector
Username: Garyw
Post Number: 578
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Monday, March 15, 2004 - 1:15 pm: | |
Hi Paul
Thanks for the information on the book. If Jack was involved in the Austin Texas murders he changed his choice of victim markedly. From (primarily) middle aged white women prostitutes, to younger black or mulatto servant girls and perhaps two white women. He also changed his M.O. by attacking with an axe and engaging in sexual violation of the victims.
It strikes me we are dealing with a different type of victim and M.O., hence a different psychological profile for the killer. But who knows?
Thanks Again
Gary |
Paul Butler
Sergeant
Username: Paul
Post Number: 16
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Monday, March 15, 2004 - 2:05 pm: | |
Hi Gary.
Yeah. I was being generous with the "wee bit tenuous" comment.
As has been quite rightly pointed out elsewhere, the Maybrick of the diary would hardly have needed to start practicing his killing techniques in Manchester, if he'd already got going quite nicely thankyou with the girls in Austin!
Don't let me put you off getting the book though. Its a good update on the Maybrick diary story.
Regards
Paul |
Thomas C. Wescott
Sergeant
Username: Tom_wescott
Post Number: 27
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Monday, March 15, 2004 - 9:58 pm: | |
Hello,
The book's been in stores for a while now. I bought mine online. Having already read the other pro-Diary book that just preceeded it, I felt I was reading a rehash. The 'American Connection' portion was sparse and utterly unconvincing. In fact, it weakens her whole argument in that it is in no way supported by the text of the Diary. I refuse to discuss the Diary business on here as blood boils too quickly and the subject just isn't worth it. But as for the book, it was a bit disappointing, though I do enjoy Mrs. Harrison's writing. She even took Stewart Evans and Paul Gainey totally out of context and accused them of contradicting themselves, which never happened. She should recheck her sources and offer them a public apology.
Yours truly,
Tom Wescott |
John V. Omlor
Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 196
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, March 16, 2004 - 7:44 am: | |
Tom writes,
"She even took Stewart Evans and Paul Gainey totally out of context..."
Yeah, and me too.
--John (returning from a lovely Spring Break to find nothing much new)
PS: On the other hand, it must be remembered that the claims about Maybrick killing people in America are no more or less evidenced in any real way and no more or less preposterous than the claims for the diary's authenticity. |
Thomas C. Wescott
Sergeant
Username: Tom_wescott
Post Number: 29
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, March 16, 2004 - 10:55 pm: | |
John,
Hello there! Good to see you're still around. I've been gone from here a long time. So many new names, so few old ones.
Shirly took you out of context as well? Please explain as I'm curious.
And I agree with your assessment of the Diary. But that's ALL I'll say about it. Ha ha.
Yours truly,
Tom Wescott |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 872
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 5:15 am: | |
Hi Tom,
Which other pro-Diary book that just preceded Shirley's latest edition are you talking about?
David Canter's Mapping Murder, which came out around the same time, and has three chapters on the diary?
Arguments can always be weakened, but the facts can't be changed. If the Maybrick watch markings were made long ago, as is becoming increasingly obvious, the diary simpy isn't a modern hoax, however embarrassing this would be to those who thought they knew better.
If I were to argue for Tumblety being the ripper, and I tried to suggest he had also killed those Austin women, would you say my whole argument was weakened, or would you concede that it made no difference whatsoever to whether or not Tumblety could have killed in Whitechapel?
Love,
Caz |
Chris Phillips
Inspector
Username: Cgp100
Post Number: 250
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 6:09 am: | |
Caroline Anne Morris wrote:
If the Maybrick watch markings were made long ago, as is becoming increasingly obvious ...
I think that remains to be seen, when the reports that this is based on become public. So far they haven't been made public, and from the snippets that have been posted so far, they raise an awful lot of questions.
As I've said before, any scientific evidence "proving" the Maybrick scratches on the watch to be old will have to be pretty watertight if it's going to convince people that the diary is old, and that these two artefacts, by chance, surfaced at the same time decades after they were produced.
Chris Phillips
|
John V. Omlor
Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 197
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 7:09 am: | |
Hi Tom,
You're a smart man, knowing when to say no more.
And, as we know, no "facts" are becoming "increasingly obvious" at all. The facts, in fact, haven't changed a bit. And the diary is still a fake.
Anyway, send me e-mail and I'll send you the story about the passage in question.
All the best,
--John |
Robert Smith
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 11:46 am: | |
John Omlor
While you were away from the boards for your “Spring Break”, there were, in fact, quite a number of valuable contributions, offering new information on the diary and the watch. Rest assured, I am not aware of anyone making “claims for the diary’s authenticity” during this period, “preposterous” or otherwise.
John, I logged on to your Profile and saw, that you give your occupation as “Professor of Literature and Philosophy”. Would I be correct in assuming from this description, that you are a Professor of English Literature?
|
John V. Omlor
Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 198
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 3:38 pm: | |
Robert,
I've read what's taken place since I've been gone, and I see no new information on the diary around here at all.
I'm not sure why you are asking me for personal information here on the boards, but in my courses I regularly teach 19th and 20th century British, American, and European literature, 20th Century French and American philosophy, film, and critical theory. My MA and PhD are officially listed as being in "English." At least that's what it says on my transcripts. On my current contract, it says I am an "Adjunct Professor of English" since that is the department that originally hired me.
Since I received my final degree, I've taught at two fully accredited four year institutions, once as an "Associate Professor of Literature" (where I taught 19th and 20th Century British and American lit. courses, including the Romantics, Victorians, Moderns, and Postmoderns) and now under a full-time joint appointment from the English Department and the Honors College at the school where I did part of my graduate work (where I teach the same as well as an epistemology course, film and aesthetics courses, and sometimes even direct Honors theses on all these subjects).
But this is not the place to pimp my record or detail my syllabi. If you have any further such questions, please send them to me via e-mail so that neither of us incur Stephen's wrath for getting personal on the boards.
Why do I think your question to me was more important to you than your perfunctory comment about "new information?"
--John |
John V. Omlor
Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 200
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 5:22 pm: | |
Oh yeah, and in case you were going to ask:
I own a condo on a small island near the beach (the Gulf of Mexico) which I've decorated all in black and white Modern; I drive a 2004 Mercedes SLK convertible; I play golf to a five handicap and am a member of the local Country Club and Yacht Club; I'm single and my eyes are brown. I like good food, nights out listening to jazz, snuggling with popcorn and watching old movies and the occasional pint of Guinness.
I think that's about everything.
Do you want my number?
--John
(Sorry, I couldn't resist.) |
Thomas C. Wescott
Sergeant
Username: Tom_wescott
Post Number: 31
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, March 17, 2004 - 9:47 pm: | |
Caroline,
Allow me to say that I greatly admire the talent that went into the narrative of your book. To put all those twists and turns and characters into a readable narrative and keep it from getting utterly confusing must have been a monumental task. But you pulled it off like an old pro. I wish such talent came naturally to me! On the other matters you mentioned, as I already stated I'm stearing clear of the Diary debate. I just wanted to express my opinion on Shirley's book and the "new information" that took my dollars but turned out not to be either new nor information. I have not read David Canter's book.
John,
You've got an e-mail on the way. 
Yours truly,
Tom Wescott |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 887
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 12:26 pm: | |
Hi Tom, or may I still call you Red Demon? 
Very many thanks for your kind comments, but there were three authors involved in our diary book (so we must have all been pulling it off together like old pros - quite a thought. It's a wonder we found time to write anything  ).
Our book, as you know, concentrates on the facts and other people's documented testimony, but not on the authors' own individual opinions. Neither do we reach any conclusions about the diary's status - simply because there are none to reach at this stage.
I am therefore amazed that you would refer to our book as 'pro-diary'. We could only put in the facts we had, and had the facts pointed to a modern hoax, you would presumably now be referring to it as 'anti-diary'.
As for Shirley's latest edition, I was very disappointed to find no index. It meant I had to read it through very carefully to track down all the revised bits of the diary and watch stories.
Love,
Caz
|
Ally
Inspector
Username: Ally
Post Number: 368
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 5:12 pm: | |
Everyone knows that facts can be slanted to provide the author's opinion. I believe Melvin Harris was slammed and even received a very nasty write up for it in the A-Z. The facts in the Inside Story were clearly slanted against the idea of a modern hoax.
 |
Robert Smith
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Thursday, March 18, 2004 - 1:08 pm: | |
John
I did not ask you for “personal information”, but specifically about your professional qualifications.
On the boards, you often rely on your professional expertise and credentials, and it is perfectly proper to ask for some further details on them. Thanks for the full statement.
I hope you don’t think I am being pedantic, but do you intend us to understand, that “Adjunct Professor of English” is synonymous with the title of “Professor of Literature”?
Incidentally, you don’t mention being a “Professor of Philosophy” in the description of your work. Is that an omission?
Re the “new information”, because you don’t see it, it doesn’t follow that it isn’t there.
Robert
|
John V. Omlor
Inspector
Username: Omlor
Post Number: 204
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 9:45 am: | |
Oh, Robert.
Has it come to this?
The profile form asked me for my occupation, not my official title at work. And where I work now, as at many large public American universities -- there is no such thing as "Professor of Literature." We are all professors of "English." We teach literature. We work in "English departments." In the profile I listed what I taught as a professor here.
And I did my graduate work in Philosophy before I did my graduate work in literature, but yes, I teach both subjects here. Just next term I'll be teaching an Honors course on Plato, Descartes, Hume and Kant.
Is this what part of your life has actually become, Robert?
Frankly, it's embarrassing.
And now I feel like I need a shower.
If anyone has any doubts or questions about my credentials or what I do for a living, feel free to write me and I'll be happy to send you my syllabi and whatever other info you'd like. Hell, I'll even give you a website where you can go and download and read my doctoral dissertation.
This is just sad.
But par for the course.
--John
(Message edited by omlor on March 19, 2004) |
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 893
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 10:23 am: | |
Hi John,
You'll be glad to know I have no questions for you whatsoever.
Hi Ally,
How would you have 'neutralised' the facts?
Or would you have slanted them towards an opinion that the diary and watch are the result of two modern hoax conspiracies?
And if so, how exactly would you have done that, given the available facts?
Love,
Caz
|
Ally
Inspector
Username: Ally
Post Number: 376
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Friday, March 19, 2004 - 4:51 pm: | |
Well I might have avoided judgements like "vintage Harris style" when describing those facts, quite a revealing opinion don't you think?
Here' another one: "Anne had worries enough without this new identity scare". Aww poor Anne. That sentences could have been entirely avoided but it is put there to shade the reader towards sympathy for Anne. Or it could have been written without the totally leading "worries" and "scare". How is it really an identity scare? Was there ever a time she didn't know who she was? If not then why should she have been worried?
"For Michael and Anne Barrett whose lives had been turned upside down by the events of the past eighteen months, it would ratchet up still further the huge degree of pressure they faced".
This sentence presumed them innocent victims of circumstance and it's grammatically awkward.
Then there's the emphasis on how Anne doesn't want to make money off the Diary itself yet she does accept money from Harrison's book and that's rather glossed over. That's convenient. Make money off a fraud and you go to jail, make money off of a book about another book and that's clear money....but that's not really discussed. Instead what is emphasized over and over is how Anne doesn't want to make money off the Diary itself.
The fact of the matter is there are loads of nice little shadings like that which show Anne in a subtly favorable light and Melvin in a bad one.
Everyone's health on the Diary camp is gone over, Johnson's scoliosis (relevant how?), Barret's health, Anne's nerves and stress, her father's illness, Kane's illness, we have pity party mania.. But the anti-diary people are never shown as anything other than flat blurbs..their lives are never gone into, their deeper motivations, etc. They merely act and react as foils to the poooor put upon Diary camp.
It was not a neutral book.
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 896
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 4:48 am: | |
Hi Ally,
So using the word 'fraud' a bit more, despite no evidence that anyone has committed it, and going into abstract and utterly unconfirmable concepts like the 'deeper motivations' of the various theorists, would have helped us towards greater objectivity and a sense of neutrality.
You learn something new every day on this site.
Judging by recent posts on the watch board, it makes me wonder just what does drive the antis on, since it doesn't appear to be a genuine search for the truth. They criticise the investigators for not doing this right, and doing that wrong; asking the wrong questions, and not asking the right ones; not doing enough of the right sort of tests, and not asking the right sort of experts to examine the artefacts (having jumped to all sorts of hasty conclusions about who has been asked to do what and why).
And then, whatever results the experts come up with, they are criticised for being inadequate, misleading, misinterpreted by the investigators, unsatisfactory in one way or another, or just plain wrong.
The only satisfactory result would be one confirming the antis' beliefs in their modern hoax theories. The watch board posts show this as clear as day.
If everyone involved had just said to Albert in 1993, "We don't believe this, take your dodgy timepiece away with you and forget it, don't even bother getting it tested, it is a recent fake and we have no curiosity about you or your artefact", I suggest the anti-diary people would not have had nearly as many problems as they currently have with the way the whole investigation has been handled.
Is this really about a genuine concern for the truth? Sometimes I think it is more about how individuals (along with their posting history) are going to look if it is established that the Johnsons (and by implication the Barretts et al) are entirely innocent of fakery because the scratches were put in many decades ago.
Could they handle it? Let's hope so.
Love,
Caz
|
Ally
Inspector
Username: Ally
Post Number: 386
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Monday, March 22, 2004 - 6:29 am: | |
Caz,
Get a grip. You are starting to be as irrational in defense of your pet theory as every other author who was mocked on this board for being all twitty and unable to see any reasonable argument against their precious work.
Did I say you should have used Fraud more often? No I did not. What I said and what is irrefutable (at least it seems to be as you didn't bother trying but just went off on some midirecting rant about the watch boards) is that your supposedly neutral book slanted opinion favorably towards Anne Graham and insinuated little digs against Melvin Harris.
Therefore, not a neutral book.
|
Caroline Anne Morris
Chief Inspector
Username: Caz
Post Number: 908
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, March 23, 2004 - 9:03 am: | |
Hi Ally,
There's no denying that Mike Barrett brought worry and stress to his own door when he brought the dodgy diary to London to flog.
Yes, Mike and Anne were understandably worried and under a lot of stress, considering the allegations about the diary being a recent hoax; the police knocking on their door to investigate; Feldman's penchant for putting on the pressure and leaving no stone unturned, no private life sacred, no skeletons in cupboards. I defy anyone not to have been a wee bit rattled under similar circumstances.
But tell me, Ally. Would you be more worried and stressed up about the above happening to you and a partner if you believed you had done nothing wrong and had absolutely nothing to hide, or if you had both lied your socks off, and done things you knew could land yourselves in a shi*load of trouble?
Actually, no, don't bother telling me. Just think about it for a second, and then come back and accuse us again of slanting opinion favourably towards Anne, or implying her total innocence and honesty by emphasising how worried and stressed up she was about the whole affair.
Having read the book, you will have noticed the inclusion of many verbatim statements made by the main personalities involved in the diary and watch investigations, from suspected forgers and their friends and family members, to researchers and forensic examiners and so on.
We let the available facts speak for themselves, and where they lent support or confirmed an individual's statement, so much the better. But I'm afraid it was just too bad if the facts conflicted with certain statements, or showed them to be either misleading or false. It follows that the more instances of this that you choose to describe as 'insinuated little digs', specifically against Melvin Harris, the more of his statements you presumably stumbled across that failed to correspond with the available facts.
I'm sure Melvin would have thanked you profoundly if he could, for pointing this fact out to the readers more clearly and emphatically than the authors of Inside Story did, or ever intended to do.
Statements are statements and facts are facts. But as you have ably demonstrated, the former are not always compatible with the latter.
Dig?
Love,
Caz
(Message edited by Caz on March 23, 2004) |
Ally
Inspector
Username: Ally
Post Number: 403
Registered: 4-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, March 23, 2004 - 9:19 am: | |
Hi there Caz,
I am sorry that it took you so long to come up with this non-answer. And you are still dodging the point. I have not made one references to the verbatim quotes that were made by any of the principals. I have focused on the words of the authors which slanted the readers towards or away from principal players. You did not allow the facts to speak for themselves, you shaded them with your own words and subtle insinuations.
And what a crock of crap to say that by my pointing out how you dissed Melvin in your supposedly neutral book, I am doing a disservice to Melvin. That was a pathetically low attempt at wiggling but about par with what I have come to expect.
Readers can judge for themselves and anytime an author shades the "facts" to their convenience, then one always has to wonder what facts were excluded that might have presented a more balanced picture?
|
Stuart Balaam
Unregistered guest
| | Posted on Tuesday, March 23, 2004 - 10:06 am: | |
Hi Guys
I've been an observer of this site for sometime and regularly read the message boards with interest and now I have been inspired to write my first post, as I am very confused
As I am currently reading Caz's book this thread has particularly caught my attention and as such the exchanges between Caz and Ally have been very enjoyable albeit a little scary (my wife never gives anything in an argument either). From the little I have read I have noticed that the authors have pointed out changes in ‘stories’ from Anne and Michael Barrett that do not shed a good light on either of them – that’s not to say they are or are not the authors of the diary.
. I am not going to lay down my views on this document but wouldn’t it be easier to get everybody who is interested in the Ripper to put £10 in a kitty and get this thing tested conclusively rather than argue for the sake of arguing that one book is slanted this way and another the other way. I personally would pay much more to know one way or the other but I get a feeling that this has become more about making money and pride than anything else.
Stuart
|
|
Use of these
message boards implies agreement and consent to our Terms of Use.
The views expressed here in no way reflect the views of the owners and
operators of Casebook: Jack the Ripper.
Our old message board content (45,000+ messages) is no longer available online, but a complete archive
is available on the Casebook At Home Edition, for 19.99 (US) plus shipping.
The "At Home" Edition works just like the real web site, but with absolutely no advertisements.
You can browse it anywhere - in the car, on the plane, on your front porch - without ever needing to hook up to
an internet connection. Click here to buy the Casebook At Home Edition.
|
|
|
|
