Thinkery & Verse present Thinkery & Verse

What does it mean to be haunted? For most people, it does not mean the strange or supernatural, but the all-too real: a scar from childhood, an opportunity missed, a wrong never righted. For the late Charlotte Mills, it was the murder of her mother on September 14th, 1922 on the outskirts of New Brunswick, New Jersey. Her mother's body lay beside that of their Episcopalian parish priest, Edward Hall. Love letters between the two were scattered about the bodies. Edward Hall had been shot once in the face. Her mother, however, had been absolutely brutalized. While the coroner failed to conduct a proper autopsy, he did, out of curiosity, cut open Eleanor to see if she was pregnant. 
Charlotte Mills, just sixteen years old, was interrogated by the police and press corps about all possible suspects to the murder: Was it her father, an impovershed groundskeeper for the church? Was it Edward's wife, the solemn (and wealthy heiress) Frances Hall? Was it Edward's brother-in-law, the eccentric Willie Stevens? Was it the KKK? Was it thieves? Immigrants? Some other scapegoat? Nothing was simple, and nothing could be proved.
Charlotte, of course, could not do the police's job for them. But that didn't mean she didn't try. 
But, by 1926 she had been driven to quit the chase when Frances Hall and her brothers were acquitted at trial. She then moved to New York City, and tried to "make it" as a clerk at a bank.  She told the press that she considered herself a "flapper," but she never had the cash to run with that crowd. 
She never felt safe after her mother's murder, and she died at the age of 45. 
So today, we will be joining Charlotte in her own mind, as she lives and relives the moments surrounding her mother’s murder.
This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society, Thinkery & Verse and Butch Mermaid Productions. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Once again, today’s play featured talented voice actor Karen Alvarado. It was written, directed, and edited by JM Meyer and you may have recognized my voice for the hymn. As always, I’m your host and engineer, Erin Bogert, and one final time, thank you for listening.

Today we’ll be taking a trip to The Edison Sanitarium, the site where Charlotte Mills, daughter of murder victim Eleanor Mills, lived out the last months of her tragic life. Today we’ll hear two stories centering Charlotte. The first explores Charlotte’s mental state whilst living and dying in the midst of a media frenzy dedicated to sensationalizing her mother’s death. The second is adapted from an article by a 1950s newspaper reporter who reflects on how and why Charlotte Mills ended up at the Sanitarium.
 This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society and Thinkery & Verse. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Today’s radio play was written by Johnny Meyer, Whitney Bolten, and Ashley Bufkin. Ashely also directed this piece and performed alongside Karen Alvarado, who was our editor for this radio play. As always, I’m your host and engineer, Erin Bogert.

For today’s radio play, we will be joined by the ghosts Frances Hall and Willy Stevens. If you ever care to visit, these siblings can be found in Brooklyn, New York, in the Greenwood Cemetery, lot 10411, section 50. They lie together in the Steven’s Family Crypt, among their other brother Henry Stevens, and the murdered Edward Hall, late husband to Frances. Although, I should note, that none of their names are to be found on the site. As you’ll recall, Mrs. Hall together with Willy and Henry, though acquitted, were all accused of Edward Hall’s murder. Yet, together they remain. For all eternity, I suppose. Let’s take a visit.
This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society, Thinkery & Verse, and Butch Mermaid Productions. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Today’s radio play featured actual excerpts from the New York Times, followed by a short scene written by Johnny Meyer. It was directed by Ania Upstill, edited by Kendall Perry, and voiced by Ania Upstill and Frank Dolce. The hymn was sung by yours truly, also your host and engineer, Erin Bogert. I’ll see you next time, until then.

Hi, I’m your host, Erin Bogert, and you’re listening to another Ghost Hunt episode. Today I’m bringing you to The Somerset Courthouse of Somerset county, New Jersey, the large, towering marble building that remains as it did when the Hall-Mills trial was held there in 1926. The Hall-Mills trial became the first media circus of the 20th century. In today’s excerpt, we really dig into that theme… you’ll see what I mean. In with the mix of zaniness, you’ll also find disturbing verbatim content. It may not give you a lot of confidence in the justice system, but it does have the virtue of being a true story. So, please join me as we travel inside to hear echoes of voices from the past, reverberating off the courthouse’s cold, hard walls.
This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society, Thinkery & Verse, and Butch Mermaid Productions. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Today’s radio play was written by Johnny Meyer, directed by Rebecca Servon, and edited by Kendall Perry and JM Meyer. Our talented voice actors include Karen Alvarado, Ashely Bufkin, Celine Dirkes, Frank Dolce, Johnny Kavanagh, Johnny Meyer, Kaitlin Ormerod Hutson, Rebecca Servon, Lazarus Simmons, Joey Sponseller, Reagan Tankersley, and Ania Upstill. I’m your host and engineer, Erin Bogert. 

Hello everybody and welcome back to another Ghost Hunt episode. I’m your host, Erin Bogert, bringing to you (you guessed it!) another radio play. In the last episode, I mentioned how Frances Hall, a prime suspect in the Hall-Mills double homicide case, took a vacation to Europe not long after the grand jury failed to indict anyone. In today’s radio play, we find Mrs. Hall, joined by her friend Sally Peters, embarking on that journey.
It’s early February, 1923, and at Manhattan’s Pier 55, a band of newspaper photographers are swarming the S.S. Mauretania (MORE-EH-TAY-NIA), an ocean liner setting out for Europe. They had been tipped off that Mrs. Frances Hall would be aboard, but when they searched the ship with the help of the passengers, no sign of her could be found. Instead, Mrs. Hall is forty blocks to the north of Pier 55, on the steam liner “America'' bound for Genoa (JEN-O-UH) and Naples in Italy. Her and Sally Peters had asked that their names be left off the guest list in order to avoid those same reporters. And so, the two are able to enjoy a peaceful departure… 
Tale as old as time, isn’t it? Money talks so the wealthy don’t have to. The murders of Eleanor and Edward happened in September of 1922. By the end of that November, the grand jury had failed to indict anyone. While the Mills, especially Eleanor’s daughter Charlotte remain desperate for answers, for justice, wealthy Frances Hall, a prime suspect, travels abroad to Europe, where she remains for months. How would this case have been different if Eleanor Mills and her family had been wealthy? If Frances Hall and hers had been poor? I wonder, I wonder…
This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society and Thinkery & Verse. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Today’s radio play was written by Ania Upstill and performed and edited by Karen Alvarado. I’m your host and engineer, Erin Bogert. 

 Hello folks, and welcome back once again to another episode of Ghost Hunt: the podcast where I, your host, Erin Bogert, bring you short and not-always-so-sweet radio plays that delve into the details surrounding the Hall-Mills murders. Today’s radio play brings us into the home of Edwin R. and Elovine Carpender. The affluent Edwin R. Carpender was the first cousin of Mrs. Frances Hall. According to Middlesexcreates.com, his wife, Elovine Carpender was one of the founders of the Urban League in New Brunswick and the first female member of the Federal Housing Authority; prominent among Republican women in New Jersey. She was elected a delegate to the convention for the repeal of the 18th Amendment to the US Constitution repealing the prohibition of alcoholic beverages. On September 16, 1922, Elovine was the family member who first informed Mrs. Hall of her husband’s death. Edwin had been the family member who identified the body of Rev. Edward Hall when it was found on DeRussey’s Lane, and was in charge of the funeral arrangements for the rector. The couple lived caddy-corner and across the street from Frances Hall and her mansion at 23 Nichol Ave. In the 1920s, the Carpenders were one of New Brunswick’s wealthiest families. Today, however, we will not be joining them in the great room for this radio play. Instead, we find ourselves in the kitchen, eavesdropping on the internal dialogue of their gossipy maid, Anne...

This episode was brought to you by the New Brunswick Historical Society and Thinkery & Verse. Grant funding has been provided by the Middlesex County board of chosen freeholders through a grant award from the Middlesex Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. Our theme music this season comes from Blimp66 of Freesound.org. Today’s radio play was written by Ania Upstill and performed and edited by Karen Alvarado. I’m your host and engineer, Erin Bogert. Thanks again for stopping by and I hope you’ll join me again soon.