LA LA - Belle Chasse, WhtMale 16-17, UP88342, hanged, suicide note, Feb'75

[Tony1902]

@inmyhumbleopinion

Thanks for the link. I emailed faces to ask if there was ever a coroner or ME to verify approximate age of this John Doe.

On another note, I went to grammar school in the French Quarter. Read Tennessee Williams and you will see that it was open and tolerant. We had the only integrated school then, with transvestites, burlesque dancers, emcee at the My-Oh-My Club on Lake Ponchartrain (transvestites and cross dressers, called drag queens in my youth) and a madame who ran a brothel on Burgundy street. All their children were welcome and the PTA meetings were colorful and amazing. If he needed to find tolerant people, all he had to do was go there, e.g., Lafitte's in Exile and many others. There are some preservationists who would argue that the French Quarter was saved from being a gigantic parking due to the heroic efforts of the gay community to preserve it and restore as much as possible.

As I continue to hog this thread, how did he get there barefoot? Highway 23 runs N-S and the farm road was parallel to the levee.

 

[carbuff]

My own theory: With the clothes he was wearing, I would expect him to be wearing loafers or topsiders or something like that, which come off easily. I am told that people dying from hanging tend to jerk and kick. If he kicked the shoes off, animals would have quickly gone for the leather.

 

[azure]

My own theory: With the clothes he was wearing, I would expect him to be wearing loafers or topsiders or something like that, which come off easily. I am told that people dying from hanging tend to jerk and kick. If he kicked the shoes off, animals would have quickly gone for the leather.

I don't know if that's true. What animal other than a domestic dog would go for what amounts to chemically treated skin?

 

[carbuff]

I don't know if that's true. What animal other than a domestic dog would go for what amounts to chemically treated skin?

It gets sweaty from your body. Sweat is salty. Small rodents are very fond of salty leather. I lost a pair of hiking boots that way--something gnawed through the toe of one boot while it was sitting outside my tent.

 

[Sweetluv]

I have mentioned this in the past, but thinking about how this young man got to where he was found....hitchhiking, bus, walked...IMO, wearing mismatched clothes and socks, no shoes, carrying a blanket and glass jar makes me scratch my head.....thoughts??

 

[Tony1902]

Sorry for the dupe
I just got an email back from FACES. They have no information other than the death certificate.

I suppose, given the lack of a decent investigation, LE didn’t bother to look for any shoes. No GPS coordinates either. I’ll try a map. I’m not that great with google earth.

 

[Springrain]

IMO, wearing mismatched clothes and socks, no shoes, carrying a blanket and glass jar makes me scratch my head.....thoughts??

The jar could've been for pee if he knew he was going to be somewhere rural with no bathroom access, maybe?

 

[Sweetluv]

To me, he took some time and thought into writing the note.
Maybe stored it in the jar, wanting it to be found and safe from the outside elements.
But from what he was wearing, carrying this jar and blanket, I would think if he was hitchhiking or walking, he would have stood out...
No abandoned car found in area, tent/campsite, or backpack that I came across.
Mystery indeed!

 

[Tony1902]

To me, he took some time and thought into writing the note.
Maybe stored it in the jar, wanting it to be found and safe from the outside elements.
But from what he was wearing, carrying this jar and blanket, I would think if he was hitchhiking or walking, he would have stood out...
No abandoned car found in area, tent/campsite, or backpack that I came across.
Mystery indeed!

Louisiana hot thread
Public transit was good and available then. When I was in high school, in late 60s I caught 3 buses to to my high school job at the Naval Base. Coming from Basin street that was a trek. New Orleans has had good transportation to to to all banks of the Mississippi River. AFAIK there were only small market farms in that area. The LSU ag station in Belle Chasse produced the great Creole tomato, no longer available, but the farm would have been a small cash crop—which we can do, in coastal south 3-4 seasons.

 

[carbuff]

To me, he took some time and thought into writing the note.
Maybe stored it in the jar, wanting it to be found and safe from the outside elements.
But from what he was wearing, carrying this jar and blanket, I would think if he was hitchhiking or walking, he would have stood out...
No abandoned car found in area, tent/campsite, or backpack that I came across.
Mystery indeed!

The first post in this thread says that the note was in the jar.

 

[Tony1902]

I must be destined to hog this thread.
I just spoke to someone at the Belle Chasse Gazette, a 90 year old still running newspaper. I looked at the first post for this thread and @Marilynpa is no longer posting. I wondered why a Wisconsin paper would have this more detailed information, so I decided to try a Belle Chasse paper, if one existed from that time, to see if anything was noted about the UID then. On to the Times-Picayune archives next. Then LSU archives and NOLA public library archives.

I still have questions:
1) Was he never reported missing by his family?
2) Plaquemine parish is still, as @Teche said, rural. What affinity or memories did he have to go to the back of beyond to hang himself in such an ironic way?
3) Did he attend prep school in NOLA?
4) Did he or his family live on the West Bank? It's quite a way to go to commit suicide, I'm guessing he had to have known the area. It's not an easy place to navigate unless you had lived there. Mr Tony and I get lost every year we used to go there to get Creole tomatoes.
Will send whatever I can get. @Baudelaire, I think the naval base might hold most of the clues.

 

[carbuff]

I don't have a direct answer to any of your questions, but from other unidentified suicide cases I've seen on Websleuths, it doesn't appear to be uncommon for people wanting to kill themselves to travel long distances and seek out isolated places. In some cases when the person is identified it appears they wanted to try to avoid the family finding them (or even being found at all), while in other cases they seem to have been looking for a place that meant something to them, or symbolized something. For instance, returning to the back forty of a beloved grandparent's farm, or outdoor people going to the top of a hill or bluff where they have a view.

I don't think he would have left that lengthy note if he didn't think he would be found.

 

[Tony1902]

@carbuff

That particular area was not heavily populated and difficult to navigate unless you truly know or are aware of it. All you can see is the road and the levee. The choice of the tree is utterly poignant to me. I would have chosen an ancient oak in City Park or Audubon Park, but it's MOO that he chose that tree in that parish for a specific reason.

NOLA public library is sending what they have. Still waiting on LSU Hill library. Will hog the thread again when I get more information. Thanks to all of y'all. This case is staying with me..I was just 5 years older than he, and anthropologists also read Durkheim, along with philosophy majors. Since he quoted that writer, either he was college age and majoring in of those fields, or he went to Jesuit Prep or somewhere in NOLA before leaving. If, indeed he left.

 

[Tony1902]

Hogging the thread

I just got a few articles from the old Plaquemines Gazetteer.
@MadMcGoo i am too much of a Luddite to figure out how to post. May I send the PDF to you with my email address? It’s something that’s never been on the thread. It may not help, but it’s another insight. Merci
Tony

 

[Tony1902]

Waiting on LSU and it’s a distant cousin hope that helps.
@MadMcGoo please send me a pm as soon as you can. I’m a Luddite crone and cannot bring this into the thread.

 

[Diavola]

Hopefully him getting a NamUs page means someone's looking into this case.

 

[Baudelaire]

Hogging the thread

I just got a few articles from the old Plaquemines Gazetteer.
@MadMcGoo i am too much of a Luddite to figure out how to post. May I send the PDF to you with my email address? It’s something that’s never been on the thread. It may not help, but it’s another insight. Merci
Tony

Look at the thumbnail Tony. It says post reply and next to it, it says upload file. Click on upload file, it will ask you where do you want to upload from, chose the files option (there's, camera, gallery and files) look for the pdf, click on it and a thumbnail will appear on this page, click load thumbnail and then click upload file and then post reply.

 

[Sweetluv]

Baudelaire..thank you.
That was helpful for me too

 

[Sweetluv]

All around sad circumstances..this individual was suffering from such inner turmoil with, in his eyes, no other way out. To write such a lengthy in depth note with intellect and honesty...and sadness.
He writes that he is dead inside and doesnt want his parents to know what became of him.
Yet, he addressed the note to mom and dad and his raw feelings speak of someone who does care and takes things to heart. IMO, he was confused about his sexuality or did something that he found unacceptable and could not forgive himself.
It was planned and thought out...but how he got there and why that area is just as much a mystery as his identity!

 

[Sweetluv]

Maybe this wasn't a suicide note, but more of him journaling as to what he wished he could have verbally said out loud but didnt, out of fear.