One Small Miracle, Part 2

Part 1 of this post is below, so you can scroll past this one and skim that if you like, or just let me recap for you:

My great-grandmother, Bertha Gifford, is infamous in Missouri (and online, now) because she was charged with multiple murders in 1928. Depending on your point of view, she was either a cold-hearted killer of just fewer than twenty people, or she was a misunderstood, compassionate person who wanted to help others (and who aided in raising my mother in a loving, doting way). To my knowledge, up to this point in time, only two photos of Bertha existed. (There are a couple of photos that were published in newspapers during her trial that were wrongly identified as her.) One photo of Bertha was taken on the day she went to trial and was published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the newspaper that, to this day, still owns the copyright to that photograph (see previous blog post). The other photo is one taken at intake on the day she was remanded to the Missouri State Institution for the Criminally Insane (although it is no longer called that). I have that photo because I have a copy of her file, but it has not been made public.

Last week, a descendant in the Gifford family contacted me because she had been given photos that had been passed down through Bertha's second husband's family. This woman--whom I've never met--had read my book, The Tainted Legacy of Bertha Gifford, and she wanted to give those photos to me. I assumed she would send me copies. She sent the original photos. Oh my dragons....

The package arrived (as previously noted) last Thursday night, but I didn't open it. I felt strongly that my sister should be present, so we arranged for her to come to my house on Saturday morning. We sat together at my kitchen table, and I opened the package, sifting through the many, many photos that were sent. One was a picture of our maternal grandmother, Lila (Bertha's daughter with her first husband, Henry Graham). In this photo, she is standing with Gene Gifford's sister, Margaret Morse Gifford. My grandmother, Lila, is the one on the left. The photo is dated 1914, so Lila would have been 18 years old.

This picture was just absolutely lovely to receive. But the photo that made me cry was the single photo of Bertha Gifford included with all the others. In it, she is seated on the steps of the front porch of the farmhouse in Catawissa--the same porch where I have been photographed a number of times in recent years. She's wearing the same coat she wore to trial, so I assume the photo was taken circa 1928, possibly a bit earlier.

Her husband Gene is in the picture as well, sitting beside her. Bertha is not looking toward the camera. She is looking directly into Gene's face, and she is smiling. Her hands are folded in her lap. Gene is wearing a suit and tie and hat. Neither are dressed for farm work. Was it a Sunday? Were they going to or coming from church? Or was the photo taken by a traveling photographer, so they got themselves gussied up for it, as was the custom back then? Who knows.

I do know this: Bertha looks like any other loving wife, charmed by her husband's good looks. No, she does not look like a crazed serial killer or psychopath.

And no, I'm not going to post the photo online. If I did, it would immediately be copied and exploited for the benefit of others.

So yeah, I know, these two posts are probably disappointing. Everyone wants to know what she looked like. Well... she looked a bit like her daughter in the photo above... who looked like her daughter... who looked like me.