5+ questions for Howard Brown

[Debbie D]

Time for a little payback for the third degree a couple weeks ago... ha ha!


1. Briefly, could you describe your history & interest in JtR? (years involved, and why you're interest? )

2. Besides the obvious (Jack's true identity), what one mystery or personal nuance surrounding the case would you like to have definitively answered once and for all?

3. If you could go back in time to Victorian London during the WTM, and ask 3 people of your choice, one question each, who and what would you ask? (police, witnesses, suspects?)

4. One more time travel question... If you could go back in time to any one location and be a "fly on the wall" for 10 minutes (crime scenes, street corners, inquest, interviews etc.) where would you go and why?:cool:

5. If the case were solved today to the majority's satisfaction, yet he turned out to be YOUR least likely suspect, who would that least likely suspect be that would surprise the heck out of you personally?

6. What steps or hurdles would you like to see taken to bring NEW clues & information to ripperology studies?

7. And finally, do you think you will ever take first place in the caption contest?

[Howard Brown]

Q & A for Howard Brown (Just for jolly of course)
Time for a little payback for the third degree a couple weeks ago... ha ha!

No problem,Debbie...I appreciate you asking me.

1. Briefly, could you describe your history & interest in JtR? (years involved, and why you're interest? )

I've been seriously interested in the WM ever since seeing the MJK photo in Harrison's book on Maybrick....then after asking a co-worker to download material written by Melvin Harris countering the Maybrick Diary,became intrigued and lurked around Casebook for a while...and now,I'm here with you Deb. I guess I've been pretty serious for about 4 and 1/2 years.

I've always liked that period of time ( knowing it wasn't glamorous,of course,to the average working Brit)....the ambience and the writers from that period specifically. I admire the positive achievements of the British Empire and actually wish it was still in force as it was. Sue me...I'm an Anglophile.


2. Besides the obvious (Jack's true identity), what one mystery or personal nuance surrounding the case would you like to have definitively answered once and for all?

Well....right now,but subject to change....I'd like to know why Stephenson's declaration of his liason with Lytton in 1863 in Borderland has been declared in literature on the subject as having occurred 3 years prior to what RDS himself declares. To me,right now,thats my little project

Everything else mentioned by Stephenson,date wise and achievement wise, has been dealt with little or no scrutiny,except this one important ( the most important,to me ) date/achievement.



3. If you could go back in time to Victorian London during the WTM, and ask 3 people of your choice, one question each, who and what would you ask? (police, witnesses, suspects?)

I'd like to have given Eddowes the rest of the night in jail.

I'd like to have been Cadosch ( without his pains,of course) the night of September 8th,1888 on the loo.

I'd like to have been Israel Schwartz,when someone was allegedly mishandling Stride on Sept.29th. and talked trash to Schwartz. Hungarians don't normally let bad mouthing slide.

4. One more time travel question... If you could go back in time to any one location and be a "fly on the wall" for 10 minutes (crime scenes, street corners, inquest, interviews etc.) where would you go and why?:cool:

I think, at present,I'd like to have been in Det. Halse's position over on Goulston Street. Its just the one that came to mind first.

5. If the case were solved today to the majority's satisfaction, yet he turned out to be YOUR least likely suspect, who would that least likely suspect be that would surprise the heck out of you personally?

Probably a toss up between ALL the suspects mentioned in the 1988 "Secret Identity of Jack The Ripper" broadcast.. I used to think Druitt was a victim of circumstance and that the McNaghten Memoranda was a thinly veiled attempt to appear "on the job" by Sir Melville. I still cannot understand,not that I doubt its provenance,since I can't prove its a fake,why he wrote that down where he did. As much as I do not think Kosminski was capable ( just an opinion,of course ) of pulling 4,5, or 6 murders off, he might be the best of that lot.....

Its too hard to pick one specific one out of the 150 or so people listed over the last 118 years....but for the ones I know a little about,I'd say Ostrog. Cream,Jill,Carroll,et al....are really non-starters,but I still like reading what others write about them in the context of that period and the WM.

6. What steps or hurdles would you like to see taken to bring NEW clues & information to ripperology studies?

Keep checkin' those attics over in Great Britain AND....re-check other police files of officers who were NOT involved in the WM.

Sometimes,my work folder is examined by a fellow supervisor at work and taken to make labels or add technical data for the consumer/customer on jobs requiring multiple steps to process.

At times,they put my work "load" for my people who work under me in their folders and they forget and they put my work orders in their folder. This sort of misappropriation could have happened ( as Andy Aliffe mentioned to me ) in the Ripper case. A curious officer reads Abberline's report on "something" and puts it away in HIS file and it got stored and is still there over 100 years later.

7. And finally, do you think you will ever take first place in the caption contest?

When gasoline comes back down to 50 cents a gallon....I get good-looking....and Robert doesn't answer a cryptogram correctly ( as well as correct my speling). In short,no ma'am.

[Chris G.]

Hi Howard

An interesting set of answers on how you came to the case, how you view the evidence and the suspects, etc.

In terms of documents that might still turn up, at the Tenth National War of 1812 Symposium on October 7 here in Baltimore, we had a gentleman named William C. Cook who addressed the meeting and who has founded what he calls the "War of 1812 in the South Collection." Bill was able to show us images of letters from Andrew Jackson and other manuscripts that have been added to his collection, a photograph of a British powderhorn that has engraved upon it a view of the Battle of New Orleans, etc.

It would be nice to think that a similar collection could be built up on the Whitechapel murders and that pertinent documents still in private hands, and possibly in the hands of people who don't know what they have, could be purchased and held for posterity. Obviously, Stewart P. Evans comes to mind as a counterpart to Mr. Cook, in this particular field.

All the best

Chris

[Debbie D]

I appreciate your answers How. I especially agree with checking those old attics for documents. There's got to be so much still out there.