CA CA - Georgette Bauerdorf, 20, West Hollywood, 12 Oct 1944

[Robin Hood]

More about Lou. Left hand side, 2/3's down.
http://www.georgettebauerdorf.com/?category_name=ch-6-suspects

''since I'm going through Phoenix, Lou is going to meet me at the train, but I'm not counting on it 'cause the Army might change his mind - but I'm hoping to very much. He has written me 'gain and enclosed a wonderful picture of himself in the plane he soloed in''

Chapter 5
''She had her hair done and cashed a check for 175 dollars and bought a ticket to fly to El Paso to see a boyfriend, Jerry Brown, who was stationed at Fort Bliss. She and Jerry met each other on June 13 at the Hollywood Canteen. At that time, he was stationed at Camp Callan in San Diego County. They hadn’t seen each other since then and she was looking forward to flying to El Paso for his graduation from an army training program'

Ok, Jerry or Lou, or both?

 

[pleasestandby]

More about Lou. Left hand side, 2/3's down.
http://www.georgettebauerdorf.com/?category_name=ch-6-suspects

''since I'm going through Phoenix, Lou is going to meet me at the train, but I'm not counting on it 'cause the Army might change his mind - but I'm hoping to very much. He has written me 'gain and enclosed a wonderful picture of himself in the plane he soloed in''

Chapter 5
''She had her hair done and cashed a check for 175 dollars and bought a ticket to fly to El Paso to see a boyfriend, Jerry Brown, who was stationed at Fort Bliss. She and Jerry met each other on June 13 at the Hollywood Canteen. At that time, he was stationed at Camp Callan in San Diego County. They hadn’t seen each other since then and she was looking forward to flying to El Paso for his graduation from an army training program'

Ok, Jerry or Lou, or both?

That April 15 letter to June, in which Lou was mentioned, was a letter regarding a train trip on April 25. She wasn't murdered until October and was planning an airplane trip from LA to El Paso at that later time. There's no connection between the train trip and the plane trip. I think that letter was to give a little background to the story. It also shows a slight rivalry between her and June on dating.

http://ladailymirror.com/2014/10/21/georgette-bauerdorf-an-unsolved-murder-part-11/#more-21262

On that Wednesday, the day before Georgette was killed, she and Rose Gilbert were together until 2 p.m., according to news accounts. They went shopping, had lunch and visited the beauty parlor. At some point, Georgette cashed a check for $175 ($2,365.01 USD 2014) and spent $90 on a plane ticket to El Paso, where she was to rendezvous with Pvt. Jerome “Jerry” Brown, whom she met in June while volunteering at the Hollywood Canteen.

Hamilton Daily News Journal October 19, 1944: A few hours before she was attacked and killed, Georgette urged a companion Hollywood canteen hostess to "come home with me, as I'm afraid to be alone in the house tonight." This according to the other hostess, June Ziegler. Police expressed belief that Georgette may have been forced by someone to make a date and that she was apprehensive at the prospect of keeping it.

One would think she would also have told June WHY she was afraid. You'd think it would have come up in the conversation.

The NEW CASTLE, PA; NEWS, FRIDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1944 states:

"Miss Bauerdorf's diary and an airplane ticket found in her purse disclosed that she had been preparing secretly to fly to El Paso, Texas for "the graduation at Port Bliss on October 16 of a man identified only as "Lou." An entry in the diary read: "Lou is supposed to graduate at Bliss Field." The oil man's secretary, Mrs. Rose L. Gilbert, said Miss Bauerdorf had told her nothing of the projected trip to Texas."

If that ticket was bought while shopping with the secretary, it might call into question the secretary's statement she had no knowledge of the upcoming trip. I also think it odd that Georgette invited all these men (strangers) to her apartment over a period of time to sleep overnight and didn't expect anything to eventually happen. They didn't have a place to stay? It's not like it was part of her job/volunteer work to put these men up for the night. Plain and simple, it was unsafe.

 

[Robin Hood]

I have a few questions but I don't think anybody can answer them only LE. Did the call come through for Georgette that night from Jerry, did he speak to her?

Her autopsy says she had eaten a considerable meal that evening of meat and string beans, only an empty tin of string beans and melon rind were in the waste bin. Some speculate she had eaten out but nobody came forward to say they had seen her. So did she eat out and dash back for the call? There appears to be no signs of meal prep in her apartment.

 

[Robin Hood]

Quoting Pleasestandyby

''One would think she would also have told June WHY she was afraid. You'd think it would have come up in the conversation''

Yeah, I agree, that would be the first thing you would ask.

 

[pleasestandby]

http://ladailymirror.com/2014/10/22/georgette-bauerdorf-an-unsolved-murder-part-12/#more-21280

Most curiously, Aadland said that after Georgette dropped him off, she turned right on Laurel Canyon, a main thoroughfare into the Hollywood Hills and the San Fernando Valley, rather than heading back to her apartment. (Examiner, Oct. 20, 1944).

I think she was rendezvousing with someone and went to get him using the above route. I doubt she went that way just to get a meal. Possibly she brought him back to her place. Maybe she was going to tell him that she was dumping him and flying down to see Jerry Brown.

That was why she wanted her friend to stay with her. She was worried about his reaction and what he might do. She probably knew him long enough to know that he was very strong and had a jealous temper, but, like a moth to the flame, she couldn't stay away. It was possibly a sexual one with a soldier she met at the canteen (which was very against the rules), which might explain why she wouldn't tell her friend why she wanted her to stay over that night. Rendezvousing with Jerry down at Bliss Field was also a no-no, which is why she didn't tell her father's secretary that she had bought a plane ticket.

She either told him or somehow he found out, saw the ticket and got angry. The two ashtrays by the bed show an intimate relationship, with the two of them sitting on the floor, talking and smoking cigarettes. Since he had been brought to the apartment by Georgette, he had no way to get back home. He had to steal her car.

In any event, Georgette’s attire at the time of her death strongly suggests that she did not answer the door to admit a man who then attacked and killed her.

 

[Robin Hood]

I'm still trying to make sense of the evening. Meat in stomach but no cooking, 2 ashtrays on the bedroom floor, Georgette was wearing lipstick, yet no lipstick on the butts. I'm thinking one ashtray on the floor was being used, another was somewhere else in the room, even, maybe downstairs. Possibly the murderer was elsewhere and carried the second ash tray over not knowing there was one already on the floor.
I wonder if she applied the lipstick just before getting killed and didn't get time to smoke a cigarette while wearing it, if she smoked at all. So many questions.

 

[Robin Hood]

http://www.georgettebauerdorf.com/?s=aadland

Gordon Aadland.

''When I wrote the letter to the police, I probably said two things that misled them. I said she dropped me off on Sunset and then turned right. That is because at that place, the only turn was right. The probable truth is that further along is a left turn off Sunset, which she probably took to get to her apartment''

More confusion.

 

[jonponder]

I've been researching the Bauerdorf case. The meal in her stomach was a mystery. Investigators found an empty can of string beans and cantaloupe rinds in her kitchen, indicating she made a snack when she got home. But she'd also eaten meat. The timeline doesn't allow time for her to have stopped for dinner after she left the Hollywood Canteen at 11:15 and picked up the hitchhiker at 11:30 and then was home by midnight, when the janitor and his wife, who lived in the basement, heard her making the snack in the kitchen. One thing does make sense, though -- that she had a quick meal before she left the Canteen. It had a full kitchen. Here's a list of the foodstuff the Canteen went through in a typical month: Each month the soldiers consumed an estimated 4000 loaves of bread, 400 pounds of butter, 1500 pounds of coffee, 50,000 half-pints of milk, 30,000 gallons of punch, 1000 pounds of three varieties of cheeses, 2500 pounds of assorted meats, 20,000 oranges, 100,000 pieces of cake, more than 150,000 sandwiches and hot dogs, 800 pounds of potato chips, 300 dozen doughnuts, 300 gallons of ice cream (for Sundays only), thousands of boxes of raisins, plus cases of jellies, relishes, pickles, mustard, ketchup and mayonnaise.

 

[STANDREID]

A fascinating case and I had never heard of it until 1998 when I read about the killing in Gilmore's book about the Dahlia murder. Odd that the fingerprints on the light bulb were never matched. It makes me wonder if the killer wasn't a serviceman who was killed in the war before he had a chance to commit another crime. I could be wrong but believe the G.I.'s were fingerprinted when they entered the service however I doubt that these prints were routinely reviewed in connection with criminal investigations.

 

[scriptgirl]

Well, the man who killed her, it was thought he was hiding in her apartment waiting for her, because her porch light was out. Are there photos of the exterior of her residence or the building?

 

[Sutton]

Truly a fascinating case, this thread is the first I've heard of it. Chapter 7: Suspects, on this website, http://www.georgettebauerdorf.com
states,
"One newspaper article said, “Miss Bauerdorf’s duplex apartment was a ‘little overnight hospitality center’ for service men who, in town on leave, had no other place to sleep. Of this sheriff’s investigators [were] convinced after piecing together the stories of a score of persons who knew her habits and after leafing through large bundles of ‘thank you’ letters from soldiers, sailors, Marines or Coast Guardsmen, most of whom are now in various combat zones, who had slept in the downstairs living room of the suite.”
I tend to believe Georgette was naive, and had invited a serviceman to stay on the sofa bed the night she was killed. Her friend, June, said that Georgette had asked her to stay the night because she was afraid to be in the apartment alone. Maybe Georgette knew she'd made a mistake in extending the invitation to this particular serviceman, but did not know how to get herself out of the predicament.
No telling where the offender went next. He could have been deployed and died in combat, or went on to commit other sexual offenses. Really, how would LE connect Georgette's rape and murder with future offenses in other jurisdictions? It's not as if he mutilated her body or left her exposed in public (like the Betty Short's murder or like Otto Wilson, as described here http://derangedlacrimes.com/?tag=georgette-bauerdorf). Although, I do see where an opposing argument was made by scriptgirl, citing John Douglas and others...but given the details we've read this was a straightforward rape, murder, leave, no dissection or torture or overt humiliation is evident.
As a side note, I really loved reading the details of the war effort, the letters from the Georgette, and about the Hollywood Cantina. I'm not a history buff, but these type of details are touching. Thanks to the posters who linked the websites!

Well, the man who killed her, it was thought he was hiding in her apartment waiting for her, because her porch light was out. Are there photos of the exterior of her residence or the building?

Kind of...at http://www.georgettebauerdorf.com there are some pictures to the far right, you have to scroll close to the bottom of the page to see them. One shows a reporter reaching up to the entry light.

 

[scriptgirl]

I am willing to bet this man killed again and that he also killed before Georgette.

 

[ModMaiden]

Such an interesting case.

Was it ever reported why the companion Hollywood canteen hostess that she asked to come home with her didn't? I understand that they may not had been able to but I am curious what was the response. Too bad the person who her screaming didn't call the police or the other hostess had Georgette go home with her instead.

 

[Donamena]

I cannot provide the links because I'm a Luddite, but Ms Bauerdorf reminded me of the young woman in Steve Hodel's book about his father as the Black Dahlia killer. There's a photo from his father's files/paperwork/collection?? & I thought I saw a similarity. If anyone has the book, would you look? I may be far off, thanks

 

[charminglane]

Wow, Dona!
The nose is so similar.
I will try and post pics.
I am looking at Exquisite Corpse. Can't find my Hodel books.

 

[Donamena]

Wow, Dona!
The nose is so similar.
I will try and post pics.
I am looking at Exquisite Corpse. Can't find my Hodel books.

That's it, sha, the nose!! Thanks, couldn't remember. Merci, 'ti fille...

 

[charminglane]

The first two are of the heiress.
The booklet photos are the pictures from George Hodel's files/wallet/collection.

That turned out all right! Proud of myself.
Ask and you shall receive, my Donamena.

 

[STANDREID]

Hodel has Bauerdorf listed in his book Most Evil about his father's supposed murders.

 

[ModMaiden]

What about Mark Hanson? Was there any connection with him to Georgette?

 

[scriptgirl]

Who is Mark Hanson and I don't believe a word from Hodel's mouth.