Picture a boat approaching the Ferry Building on a warm night in November 1870. A well- dressed man is seated on the deck talking lovingly to his wife.  All of a sudden, a beautiful woman, dressed in black and wearing a veil approaches.  The man stands up.  The woman pulls out a gun and shoots him in the heart. “I killed him”, she said.  “He ruined my life and my daughters.”
The woman was Laura Fair.  And if there was a theme to her life it was bad taste in men

Laura was first married in New Orleans at the age of 16. Her first husband drank himself to death, her second husband threatened to shoot her.  Laura and her mother fled to San Francisco where she met her third husband, an attorney. They had a baby girl together but his practice was not successful. Two years later, heavily in debt, he committed suicide.

She sold her husband’s law books and purchased a boarding house in Virginia City, a prosperous silver town.  Her good looks and charm soon made her a celebrated hostess and her place, The Comstock House, flourished.  Everything was going well.  Then she met Alexander Crittenden.  Alexander was a successful attorney and politician who came to stay at Laura’s boardinghouse.  Before long they were lovers.  Laura asked him to marry her and he agreed, telling her that he was a widower. Then Laura learned that he had lied and that his wife Clara and their children were coming to visit him.  Alexander used his considerable rhetorical skills to assure Laura that he would soon get a divorce and marry her. He installed his family in a residence located close to Laura’s boarding house and shuttled between his mistress and his wife deceiving both of them.  He told Laura that he would stay in a rooming house during his wife’s visit and he told his wife that his room in the Comstock House was used only for business.

For the next five years he stalled and lied, creating imaginary barriers to divorce so that he could continue his passionate affair with Laura. He flaunted the affair, installing both Laura and his family in San Francisco’s Occidental Hotel, telling his wife that Laura was just an old friend who he was helping out. Finally Laura gave him an ultimatum. “Divorce your wife or we are through.” 

Alexander promised to meet his wife, who was returning from a trip to the East Coast, at the ferry and tell her it was all over between them.  Laura bought a pistol and secretly followed him aboard.  She realized that he had lied to her once more.  And that’s where our story began. Crittenden’s funeral was majestic and all federal, state, and city courts were closed in his honor. 

Laura’s trial was the most sensational San Francisco had ever seen. It was headline news, not just in San Francisco, but also all over the country. It had everything; politics, murder, scandal, sex and feminism.   Suffragette leaders Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton attended the trial and pointed out the double standard that excused men but vilified women for sexual relations.  

The most sensational evidence were the letters that Laura and Alexander sent to each other. Crittenden’s letters were described by the San Francisco Chronicle as a “rich feast of gushing sentimentality.” “My love for you has been and is the one passion of my life.  It is my whole life and will never cease but with death.”

Laura’s letters were more erotic.” You shall kiss me in every corner of the room, hold me in your arms in each chair, lie by me on the sofa, hang over me at the piano, and sleep with me in the bed.” The prosecutor called her a “bold, bad, vicious, malignant passionate woman” who had seduced an otherwise honorable man.

There was no question that Laura had shot Alexander Crittenden.  But would a jury of men convict her of first-degree murder?   The answer was yes. After only 40 minutes of deliberation the jury came back with a guilty verdict and she was sentenced to death. Immediately, public opinion then changed from outrage to sympathy. First her lawyers won a stay of execution and then a new trial. This time, the jury found the defendant not guilty, by reason of temporary insanity.   

San Francisco papers called the verdict “an outrage on humanity.” The New York World opined “How many men this wretched woman has beguiled into breaking their vows and wrecking their manhood with her gross seductions we cannot know.”
​
After the trial Laura was shunned by polite society in San Francisco. She stayed in the news for a while, lecturing on the stage and having legal battles with her doctor, lawyer and mother.  Soon she faded into the background, until another tragic death occurred.  Her daughter Lillian grew up to be a gorgeous woman and was selected “The California Venus”  in California’s first beauty contest.  Lillian moved to New York to become an actress and died there of starvation in a tiny furnished room in 1913. Upon hearing this news Laura tried to commit suicide but failed.  Laura died in a small Market Street apartment in 1920 at the age of 82.

​In 1925, 16-year-old Dorothy Ellingson shot her mother, created a new disease and inspired world literature.

The Crime
Dorothy lived at 256 Third Ave. in the Inner Richmond, with her father, a tailor, her mother and an older brother. She was a tall girl with flaming red hair and a temperament to match. “There is something in my heart that makes me hate rules and regular hours. I like to do things when I feel like doing them or I don’t want to do them at all,” said Dorothy, after her arrest. From the age of 14, Dorothy cut school during the day and snuck out to jazz clubs at night. Her ticket in was a fake ID showing her age as 19.
 
For months her mother, Anna, tried to keep Dorothy home at night. Finally, on Jan. 13, 1925, Anna threatened to send her daughter back to reform school if she went out dancing that night. Furious, Dorothy found her brother’s gun and shot her mother in the back. Then she took $45, hurriedly packed a suitcase, went to the party and danced the night away.
Her brother discovered the body and called police. The next day the murder was splashed across the headlines and a huge girl hunt began. The case was a nationwide sensation.
“Not in the history of California crime have I found a case where a daughter killed her mother,” said District Attorney Mathew Brady. “I know of no case where a minor has been guilty of this crime.”
It was the heyday of Front Page journalism and William Randolph Hearst’s San Francisco Examiner, which had close ties with the police department, led the pack. The Examiner printed pages from Dorothy’s diary, which revealed frequent trips to the New Shanghai Cafe in Chinatown and her crowd of girlfriends and jazz musicians.
“I went to Joe’s party and met an amazing musician. He knows how to use all of his instruments,” was one of the entries. The press called her the red-headed, bobbed-hair “jazzmania” addict, “soon shortened to “jazzmaniac.”
Dorothy was arrested the next day. This case was an international sensation and dominated the news for months. From Paris, F. Scott Fitzgerald followed the case closely and Dorothy’s story became the inspiration for the first draft of his book, “Tender is the Night.”

The Explanation
“The trouble is he’s crazy,
The trouble is he drinks,
The trouble is he’s lazy,
The trouble is he stinks,”
— “Gee Officer Krupke,” from “West Side Story”
There was no shortage of explanations for Dorothy’s actions.
“She is the product of her environment,” said UC psychologist Olga Bridgman.
“Sound religious training should take the place of dancehalls,” said the Federation of Women’s Clubs.
The nation’s Episcopal bishops claimed that jazz-induced madness was responsible for rising rates of divorce, suicide and crime among young people. “Jazz goes back to the African jungle and its effect is to make you … want to go on all-fours and whisk your tail around a tree,” asserted an Episcopal minister.
The Examiner scored another scoop, getting a three-part confession written by Dorothy Ellingson herself, entitled “Gun Wielder Bares Secret of Jazz Soul.” Next to this article was one by their star journalist Annie Laurie, entitled “Dorothy Ellingson Egoist Who Thinks Only about Herself.”
At first the jazzmania explanation held sway. Against Dorothy’s strong objections a jury ruled 11-1 that she had an irresistible impulse and was insane. Dorothy fainted after the verdict was read. She was sent to Napa State Hospital, but after 30 days the hospital’s psychiatrists declared her to be sane and sent her back.

The Trial
During the trial a new Dorothy appeared. She fainted numerous times, screamed at both the prosecuting attorney and her own lawyers. At other times she became catatonic and had to be carried from the courtroom.
Dorothy’s lawyers wisely did not put her on the stand.
In the end she was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to one to 10 years. She was released in 1932 and tried to slip into obscurity. But this was not to be.
She was arrested in 1933, under the name of Dorothy Jentoff, for stealing $600 worth of cash, clothes and jewelry from her roommate. In 1955, as Diane Stafford, she was arrested for stealing $2,000 worth of cash, clothes and jewelry from a former employer. She was lodged in the same jail as her 17-year-old son, who had been arrested for burglary. She died on Sept. 16, 1968 at the age of 59.
Forty-three years earlier, on the floor next to her mother’s body, was this verse:
Let the old life be covered by the new
The old past so full of bad mistakes
Let it be wholly hidden by the new
By deeds as white as silent flakes

If “holding grudges” was an Olympic event, Isabella Martin would have won the gold medal.  For 15 years she was the bane of the Northern California legal fraternity. Just the sight of her in a courtroom was enough to send seasoned attorneys screaming into the night.  But her extra legal activities were even more frightening.
In 1890 Isabella, a 28 year old divorcee came to Weaverville California, then a gold mining town, and married 58 year old John Martin, a wealthy mine owner.  When John Martin died, in 1892, Isabella reached out to John’s brother Henry, claiming that the people of Weaverville were conspiring against her and her two year-old son, “Baby John” Martin.
Henry Martin, however, wanted nothing to do with her.  He suspected Isabella of killing his brother John and didn’t believe that John was the father of Isabella’s son. But when Henry died, in 1893, Isabella sued his estate on behalf of her son.   According to Isabella, she and Henry had a very close secret relationship.   She produced some letters he had written to her along with a second will which she claimed that Henry had written just before he died.  In this will Henry gave his beloved nephew, “Baby John” Martin, one third of his estate. The sensational three-month battle over Henry’s estate became the Bay Area’s hottest ticket.  Isabella added a note of glamour by wearing a fashionable new dress each day of the trial.
Arthur Rodgers, the opposing attorney, shredded Isabella’s reputation.  He showed extortion letters that Isabella had written to wealthy Andrew Crawford claiming that Crawford was the father of her child.  Witnesses testified that Henry Martin was too sick to have written the will, and handwriting experts testified that her letters and Henry’s second will were forgeries.  Rodgers even cast doubt on Isabella’s maternal claim by showing that she was betting at the racetrack just the day before she allegedly gave birth.   
The jury ruled against Isabella.  Although Isabella lost the case she gained a new enemy, attorney Rodgers, and immediately set about to make his life miserable.  She threatened his fiancé  and sued him numerous times. 
Isabella was in court almost continually over the next twelve years. She was arrested for threatening an actor’s life and for trying to evict her tenants with an ax.  She was sued for non-payment by numerous hotels, grocers, lumber dealers and the Bay District Race Track. She also initiated many lawsuits, often acting as her own attorney. 
In 1901 two of Isabella’s Oakland cottages burned down, followed by a number of suspicious fires in the area. The Westchester Fire Insurance Company refused her claim on the grounds that the fire was arson.  Isabella sued and the case was assigned to Judge Ogden.  The case went on for years and was dismissed in 1905.  Dissatisfied, Isabella went east and threatened the life of the president of the insurance company.  In 1907 Judge Ogden’s home was partially destroyed by a mysterious dynamite blast.
The next year the mystery was solved.  Sixteen-year-old “Baby John” was arrested in Weaverville for setting fire to a barn.  While in jail, John made a horrifying confession to his jailor.  Under his mother’s orders he had burned Isabella’s cottages for the insurance and bombed Judge Ogden’s house.  In addition he and his mother had constructed bombs to blow up the houses of the head of the Contra Costa water company, and a police judge.  They had dynamited an irrigation ditch, burned a barn, poisoned a sugar barrel in a grocery story and attempted to kill the inhabitants of Weaverville boy poisoning their water supply.
For six years, “Baby John”, under constant beatings and death threats from his mother, had become the instrument for settling her many grudges.  He showed authorities numerous caches of explosives that he and his mother had hidden.
Isabella was arrested and put on trial for the bombing of Judge Ogden’s house. She admitted that her son was adopted, blamed all the crimes on her son’s heredity, and called him a “degenerate.” “John has never had anything but good advice from me,” claimed Isabella.  “He has been insane from his early youth”, she added.
 Isabella conducted her defense with her usual fury while her court appointed lawyers competed to see who could sit furthest away from their client.  Despite days of fierce cross-examination John’s story remained intact. Other witnesses testified to Isabella’s mistreatment of John, including breaking his nose.
It took the jury only six minutes to declare her guilty and she was sentenced to life imprisonment.  Freed of his mother’s domination, John returned to Weaverville and emerged as a popular honor student.   Upon graduation he became a miner and managed what was left of his mother’s properties
Isabella managed to get a new trial, but the verdict was the same. Her time in prison did nothing to soften her temper.   She threw hot soup on one matron and kicked another into unconsciousness.  She filed constant appeals to the courts.  In 1914 she was committed to Napa State mental hospital where she died in 1929. 


DOROTHY ELLINGSON: THE JAZZMANIA MURDERER
In 1925, 16-year-old Dorothy Ellingson shot her mother, created a new disease and inspired world literature.

The Crime
Dorothy lived at 256 Third Ave. in the Inner Richmond, with her father, a tailor, her mother and an older brother. She was a tall girl with flaming red hair and a temperament to match. 

“There is something in my heart that makes me hate rules and regular hours. I like to do things when I feel like doing them or I don’t want to do them at all,” said Dorothy, after her arrest.
From the age of 14, Dorothy cut school during the day and snuck out to jazz clubs at night. Her ticket in was a fake ID showing her age as 19. For months her mother, Anna, tried to keep Dorothy home at night. Finally, on Jan. 13, 1925, Anna threatened to send her daughter back to reform school if she went out dancing that night. Furious, Dorothy found her brother’s gun and shot her mother in the back. Then she took $45, hurriedly packed a suitcase, went to the party and danced the night away.
Her brother discovered the body and called police. The next day the murder was splashed across the headlines and a huge girl hunt began. The case was a nationwide sensation. 
“Not in the history of California crime have I found a case where a daughter killed her mother,” said District Attorney Mathew Brady. “I know of no case where a minor has been guilty of this crime.”
It was the heyday of Front Page journalism and William Randolph Hearst’s San Francisco Examiner, which had close ties with the police department, led the pack. The Examiner printed pages from Dorothy’s diary, which revealed frequent trips to the New Shanghai Cafe in Chinatown and her crowd of girlfriends and jazz musicians. 
“I went to Joe’s party and met an amazing musician. He knows how to use all of his instruments,” was one of the entries. The press called her the red-headed, bobbed-hair “jazzmania” addict, “soon shortened to “jazzmaniac.”
Dorothy was arrested the next day. This case was an international sensation and dominated the news for months. From Paris, F. Scott Fitzgerald followed the case closely and Dorothy’s story became the inspiration for the first draft of his book, “Tender is the Night.”

The Explanation
“The trouble is he’s crazy,
The trouble is he drinks,
The trouble is he’s lazy,
The trouble is he stinks,”
— “Gee Officer Krupke,” from “West Side Story”
There was no shortage of explanations for Dorothy’s actions.
“She is the product of her environment,” said UC psychologist Olga Bridgman.
“Sound religious training should take the place of dancehalls,” said the Federation of Women’s Clubs.
The nation’s Episcopal bishops claimed that jazz-induced madness was responsible for rising rates of divorce, suicide and crime among young people. “Jazz goes back to the African jungle and its effect is to make you … want to go on all-fours and whisk your tail around a tree,” asserted an Episcopal minister.
The Examiner scored another scoop, getting a three-part confession written by Dorothy Ellingson herself, entitled “Gun Wielder Bares Secret of Jazz Soul.” Next to this article was one by their star journalist Annie Laurie, entitled “Dorothy Ellingson Egoist Who Thinks Only about Herself.”
At first the jazzmania explanation held sway. Against Dorothy’s strong objections a jury ruled 11-1 that she had an irresistible impulse and was insane. Dorothy fainted after the verdict was read. She was sent to Napa State Hospital, but after 30 days the hospital’s psychiatrists declared her to be sane and sent her back. 

The Trial 
During the trial a new Dorothy appeared. She fainted numerous times, screamed at both the prosecuting attorney and her own lawyers. At other times she became catatonic and had to be carried from the courtroom.
Dorothy’s lawyers wisely did not put her on the stand.
In the end she was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to one to 10 years. She was released in 1932 and tried to slip into obscurity. But this was not to be.
She was arrested in 1933, under the name of Dorothy Jentoff, for stealing $600 worth of cash, clothes and jewelry from her roommate. In 1955, as Diane Stafford, she was arrested for stealing $2,000 worth of cash, clothes and jewelry from a former employer. She was lodged in the same jail as her 17-year-old son, who had been arrested for burglary. She died on Sept. 16, 1968 at the age of 59.
Forty-three years earlier, on the floor next to her mother’s body, was this verse:
Let the old life be covered by the new
The old past so full of bad mistakes
Let it be wholly hidden by the new
By deeds as white as silent flakes