Brooke Hart

For the American journalist, see Brooke Hart (journalist).
Brooke Leopold Hart
Born (1911-06-11)June 11, 1911
Died November 9, 1933(1933-11-09) (aged 22)
Education Bellarmine College Preparatory
Alma mater Santa Clara University (BS, 1933)
Occupation Businessman
Known for Family department store; his kidnapping and subsequent murder

Brooke Hart (June 11, 1911 – November 9, 1933) was the oldest son of Alexander Hart, the owner of Leopold Hart and Son Department Store at the southeast corner of Market and Santa Clara Street in downtown San Jose, California.[1][2] His kidnapping and murder were reported throughout the United States, and the lynching[3] of his alleged murderers, Thomas Harold Thurmond and John M. Holmes, sparked political debate. This incident is sometimes referred to as "the last lynching in California",[4][5][6] though the last California lynching is said to have occurred on January 6, 1947 in Callahan, California but the name of the victim has never been released and the lynching cannot be confirmed in any printed news publications.[7][8]

When Hart's body was discovered in San Francisco Bay on the morning of November 26, 1933, word of a lynch mob spread quickly throughout northern California. On the evening of Sunday, November 26, 1933, four days before Thanksgiving, a crowd gathered in St. James Park across from the Santa Clara County Courthouse. The lynching was broadcast as a 'live' event by a Los Angeles radio station.[9] Scores of reporters, photographers, and news camera operators, along with an estimated 3,000 to 10,000 men, women, and children, were witness to the lynching. When newspapers published photos of the lynching, identifiable faces were deliberately smudged so that they remained anonymous; the following Monday, local newspapers published 1.2 million copies, twice the normal daily production.[10][11]

Hart had worked in his family's department store during much of his youth and was well-known and liked by the local community. After he graduated from Santa Clara University, his father made him a junior vice president[12] in the store and began grooming him to take over when his father retired.[13]

Harts Department Store, San Jose, California 1926

Kidnapping and murder

Just before 6:00 p.m. on Thursday, November 9, 1933,[14] the 22-year-old Hart was kidnapped while retrieving his 1933 Studebaker President roadster, a graduation president from his parents, from a downtown San Jose garage.[15] According to later confessions, two men had plotted to kidnap Hart: John Holmes and Thomas (Harold) Thurmond. When Hart stopped his car near the exit of the parking lot, Thurmond slipped into the passenger seat and forced Hart to drive, at gunpoint, to what is now Milpitas, about seven miles north of San Jose.[16] There they abandoned the Studebaker for another waiting car, which had been driven to the rendezvous point by Holmes, and the group of three drove to the San Mateo Bridge.[16]

On the bridge, Hart was ordered out of the car, and one of the kidnappers struck Hart twice from behind on the head with a concrete block until he was unconscious.[17] The kidnappers bound his arms with baling wire before dumping him into San Francisco Bay.[17] At the time, the tide was out and there was only a few feet of water at the base of the bridge, so the kidnappers shot Hart, killing him.[16][17] A few hours later, the kidnappers placed a telephone call to the Hart family demanding $40,000 for Hart's return, with further instructions to follow.

Witness accounts

Hart had been kidnapped at the exit of the parking lot behind the family department store. A half-hour later, a mother and daughter on a farm immediately south of Milpitas watched as a dark, long-hooded sedan with three men in it stopped near their barn.[18] A few minutes later, a convertible (presumably the Studebaker President roadster) with three men (two on the running boards and one driving) stopped near the sedan.[18] Their description of the man driving the convertible, slender with light colored hair, matched the description of Hart, as did the Studebaker as his car. Hart was placed in the larger car and driven off. One of the group followed in the Studebaker.[19] The mother did not report the events until the following Monday (November 13) when she was visiting relatives and learned about the kidnapping.[20] The investigators did not agree on the veracity of the story, which did not agree with the number of kidnappers from the recorded confessions.[21]

Separately, after midnight, a man living in Milpitas spotted an abandoned convertible left with its lights on outside their home; his wife reported that it had been there since 7 P.M. the night of November 9.[22] The car was confirmed to be Hart's by Sheriff Emig and a deputy.[23]

Two wood gatherers said they heard cries for help from the bridge near the shore of Alameda on the night of November 9,[24] but they did not find anyone after a search, nor did they hear any shots that night.[25]

Ransom demands

At 9:30 the night of November 9, Aleese Hart, the older of Hart's two younger sisters, answered the telephone and was informed by a "soft-spoken man" that Hart had been kidnapped and that instructions for his return would be provided later.[26] At 10:30, what sounded like the same man called and informed Miriam that her brother would be returned upon payment of US$40,000 (equivalent to $732,000 in 2015). Delivery instructions would be provided the next day.[27]

The San Jose Police, the Santa Clara County Sheriffs office, and the U.S. Division of Investigation (the forerunner of the FBI) were quickly brought into the case. The phone calls on the night of November 9 had been traced to locations in San Francisco.[28] Hart's wallet had already been discovered in San Francisco, on the guard rail of a tanker which had been refueling the Matson Lines passenger liner SS Lurline, and it was assumed the wallet had been tossed from a porthole on the liner.[29] Lurline was stopped and searched in Los Angeles upon arrival on November 11, but nothing was found.[29] Police then advanced an alternative theory: since Pier 32, from which Lurline had departed, was close to the sewer outfall, the heavily-laden tanker may have dipped below the surface and picked up the wallet from where it had been discharged from the sewer, lifting it from the Bay once a sufficient amount of fuel had been offloaded.[29] One of the passengers detained during the three-hour search was Babe Ruth, traveling to Los Angeles watch a football game between Southern California and Stanford.[29]

A "compromise ransom" telegram from Sacramento arrived on November 12, suggesting that US$20,000 (equivalent to $366,000 in 2015) would be sufficient.[30][31] However, the family was not contacted again until the following Monday, November 13, when a letter, postmarked in Sacramento, arrived in the mail at the family department store.[32] It instructed Hart's father, Alex Hart, to have a radio installed in the Studebaker (which already had a radio), because the ransom instructions would be broadcast over NBC radio station KPO.[33] The kidnapper also instructed Alex Hart to be ready to drive the Studebaker to deliver the ransom, but Alex Hart had never learned to drive.

On Tuesday, November 14, a second ransom note arrived, this time postmarked in San Francisco.[34] It instructed Alex Hart to place the ransom in a black satchel and drive to Los Angeles. That night, Alex Hart took a call from a man claiming to be his son's kidnapper who instructed him to take the night train to Los Angeles. The FBI staked out the train station and mistakenly arrested a bank teller out for an evening stroll. The next day, a sign was placed in a window of the Hart store stating that Alex Hart did not drive. A call was received that night again demanding that Alex Hart drive to deliver the ransom. Hart demanded proof that his son was with the caller. The caller stated that Brooke Hart was being held at a safe location. Because a phone tap had been placed on the Hart telephone, the call was traced to a garage in downtown San Jose, but the caller was gone by the time the authorities arrived.

Arrests and confessions

Another ransom demand arrived the following day, November 15, again ordering Alex Hart to drive with the ransom. That night, another call was received and the demand that Alex Hart drive was repeated. The sheriff arrested Thomas Harold Thurmond near a pay phone in a parking garage 150 feet (46 m) from the San Jose Police station at about 8 p.m.[17] At 3:00 a.m., Thurmond, after hours of questioning, signed a confession in which he claimed to have bound Brooke Hart with wire and tossed him off the San Mateo Bridge into San Francisco Bay some time between 7:00 and 7:30 on the night of the kidnapping.[17][35] He identified a recently unemployed salesman, John Holmes, separated from his wife and two children[35] as his accomplice. Holmes was arrested in his SRO room at the California Hotel near the San Jose Police station at 3:30 a.m.[17] In Thurmond's confession, Holmes approached him with the scheme six weeks prior, after he had separated from his family.[35]

At 1 o'clock in the afternoon of November 17, Holmes signed a confession admitting that he and Thurmond kidnapped Hart and threw him into San Francisco Bay. Later, the Santa Clara County District Attorney advised the press that, unless corroborated by independent evidence of the crime, confessions by Thurmond and Holmes in which each blamed the other for the crime were not admissible in a court of law.

Meanwhile, local newspapers reported that Holmes and Thurmond had met with psychiatrists and would attempt to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. Thurmond claimed he had been "crazy" for more than a year, since his sweetheart married another man,[35] and Holmes planned to repudiate his confession, which his attorney claimed had been "forced from him by third-degree methods,"[36] including threats to "turn him over to the mob for lynching if he did not confess."[37] Upon learning of rumors of a possible insanity plea on the part of Thurmond, law enforcement authorities directed two psychiatrists from Agnews State Mental Hospital in Santa Clara, California to examine both Thurmond and Holmes to preclude such a defense. Following cursory examinations in their cells at the Santa Clara County jail in San Jose, with a mob outside in the jail courtyard, both men were declared sane.[38]

Search for the body

Police officers from Santa Clara County, San Mateo County, and Alameda County began searching the bay around the bridge, hoping to find Hart's body. Trace evidence, including stains on the bridge, "blonde hair on a brick" and other markings convinced authorities the confessors had truthfully described the sequence of events, including dumping Hart.[39]

The first physical clues were unearthed on November 18. Two 22-pound (10.0 kg) bricks and apparent bloodstains were found at the San Mateo Bridge.[24][25] The pillowcase used to mask Hart during the car ride to the San Mateo Bridge was discovered, along with Hart's hat by November 20.[40] The discovery of the hat broke the last hope of the family that Hart would be found alive.[41] A hook-studded apparatus was used to drag the Bay, with no body recovered. A weighted dummy was planned to be dropped from the bridge on November 21 in an attempt to see where it would float.[36] Workers constructing a pier of the Bay Bridge reported seeing a body floating in the water during the night of November 22, prompting a search by Oakland and San Francisco police boats, including the shores of nearby Goat Island.[39] Alex Hart announced a US$500 (equivalent to $9,200 in 2015) reward on November 24, hoping to "enlist the aid of the public in the search."[42] By that time, the search for the body involved a blimp from Sunnyvale, police boats from Oakland and San Francisco, United States Marines and a hydraulic pump to dredge the mud from underneath the San Mateo Bridge.[42]

The official search for Hart's body ended on November 25.[38] The next day, November 26, two duck hunters from Redwood City[43][44] discovered a badly decayed and crab-eaten body approximately 0.5 miles (0.80 km) south of the bridge.[44] Hart's body was identified by the coroner and Hart's friends and employees later that day, with several personal effects with the body matched to Hart's known possessions.[44][45][46]

Lynching of Thurmond and Holmes

Warning signs

Because of lynch threats, Santa Clara County Sheriff Emig moved Thurmond and Holmes to the Potrero Hill police station in San Francisco for safekeeping soon after their arrest.[17] A San Jose newspaper ran a front-page editorial branding Holmes and Thurmond "human devils" and called for "mob violence."[35] Upon their return to the San Francisco Jail from questioning, cries of "lynch them" were heard from the crowd surrounding that jail.[24] On November 21, Holmes and Thurmond remained in the San Francisco jail, and fear of vigilantism led authorities to announce they would be held "indefinitely." Reportedly, "20 influential friends of the socially prominent Hart family" had formed a committee to "insist on immediate and drastic punishment for the prisoners." Prosecutors declined to seek grand jury hearings in the fear that an indictment would incite vigilantes.[36] Despite these fears, the pair were indicted on charges of extortion, using the mails for extortion, and conspiracy, and were returned to the San Jose jail the night of November 22.[39] On November 23, Rolph announced to shocked reporters that he would refuse to dispatch the Guard to protect Thurmond and Holmes.[39]

Let the sheriff handle the matter. He can appoint as many deputies as he wants; he has the power. I am not going to call the guard to protect the kidnapers who wilfully killed a fine boy like that. Let the law take its course.
— Governor James "Sunny Jim" Rolph, 23 Nov 1933 comments to reporters in Los Angeles[39]

Upon payment of $10,000 cash—an astonishing sum in 1933—by the father of Jack Holmes, San Francisco attorney Vincent Hallinan agreed to represent his son. Thurmond was being defended by J. Oscar Goldstein of Chico.[42] With a volatile mob increasing day and night outside the jail on Saturday, November 24,[42] Hallinan called Rolph and asked that he call out the National Guard should an effort be made to lynch his client. Rolph retorted that he would "pardon the lynchers".

Overnight lynching 26-27 November

Authorities "expected trouble if and when the missing body was found."[38] After the discovery of Hart's body on Sunday, November 26, word went out immediately throughout northern California. All day Sunday and into the evening, radio stations issued inflammatory announcements that a lynching would occur that night in St. James Park in San Jose.[47] By 9:00 p.m., a mob estimated by the press to range anywhere from 5,000 to 15,000 men, women, and children were jammed into the park, with an estimated 3,000 abandoned vehicles left on streets nearby. Governor Rolph was in regular telephonic communication with Raymond Cato, whom he had appointed to head the California Highway Patrol. Cato was ensconced in the home of a Rolph political ally and neighbor in the mountains west of San Jose with an open phone line to the jail.[48] Although the crowd was characterized as "good natured" earlier in the day, there was an ominous chanting of "Eleven o'clock!" periodically.[49]

At approximately 9:00 p.m., Governor Rolph canceled a planned trip to the Western Governors' conference in Boise, Idaho,[50] to prevent his chief political rival, Lieutenant Governor Frank Merriam, from calling out the National Guard to stop the lynchings.[48][51] Sheriff William Emig contacted Governor James Rolph at 10:30 p.m., asking that the National Guard be deployed to protect the prisoners. Rolph refused.[43][50] The assault on the jail commenced at approximately 11 p.m.

By midnight, November 27, thousands had gathered outside the jail, while the sheriff's deputies fired tear gas into the crowd in an attempt to disperse them.[43] However, the crowd became angrier and larger. The nearby construction site at the post office (intended to replace the previous post office, which is now the San Jose Museum of Art) was raided for materials to make a battering ram.[52] Emig ordered his officers to abandon the bottom two floors of the jail, where Thurmond and Holmes were being held. It was later noted that both cells had been occupied by other notorious murderers: Thurmond's cell on the third floor had been occupied by David Lamson, and Holmes's cell on the second floor had been occupied by Douglas Templeton.[52][53][54] The mob, by this time estimated at 6,000-10,000 (other reports are of 3,000-5,000), stormed the jail, took Holmes and Thurmond across the street to St. James Park, and hanged them.[43][49] Some women in the mob were alleged to have encouraged the violence, seemingly forgetting their prior advice to let the law "take its course."[55] Child movie star Jackie Coogan, a friend of Brooke Hart from Santa Clara University, was reported to be one of the mob that prepared and held the rope for lynching.[56]

Immediate aftermath

Thurmond was buried in an unmarked plot in Oak Hill Memorial Park on November 29, the same cemetery where Brooke Hart had been buried on November 27.[57] Holmes was cremated at Oak Hill on November 29.[57]

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, on December 2, after a special meeting of the city council heard testimony in support of leaving the tree as a monument and warning to evil doers, the council approved the cutting down of the cork elm by city workers. Police were required to keep off a crowd of souvenir hunters seeking a twig or branch of the infamous "gallows tree", the bark and lower branches having been hacked and stripped for mementos.[58]

Impact of the case

The lynching was unique in American political and criminal justice history because it marked the first time that a lynching was a media event. It was also unique because of the political involvement of a state governor and the eagerness by civic and business leaders and law enforcement (including the FBI) to do the popular will and lynch two men who had not been indicted, arraigned, tried, or sentenced for the crime in a court of law. Many modern historians conclude that the two men were indeed guilty.[59]

Royce Brier, a staff writer for the Chronicle, would later go on to win the Pulitzer Prize for reporting in 1934 for his account of the lynching. According to the prize citation, Brier worked for 16 hours along with several assistants mingling with the lynch mob and telephoning running updates from a garage across the street from the jail before composing the story in three hours starting at 12:30 a.m. on the morning of November 27.[60]

Prosecution of lynch mob

Governor Rolph praised the action, stating that California had sent a message to future kidnappers, and promised to pardon anyone involved in the lynching.[50][61] However, Rolph died on June 2, 1934, before any charges had been filed in the case.

Alameda County District Attorney Earl Warren was the strongest supporter of prosecution for the lynching. Santa Clara County Assistant District Attorney Herbert Bridges was quoted as saying he was "not sorry [the lynching] happened in San Jose."[37] Santa Clara County District Attorney Fred Thomas doubted anyone could be found to bear witness against the leaders of the lynching, characterizing the stories being told by local youths as "boastful" but uncorroborated.[57] The American Civil Liberties Union stated they had found eyewitnesses ready to identify members of the lynch mob by December 1933,[62] but San Jose citizens were outspoken in their opposition to "outsider" interference.[63] Eventually seven people were arrested for the lynchings, but none were convicted.

One young man was charged with the lynching after he publicly claimed credit for leading the mob,[63][64] but the charges were dropped. The Santa Clara County Grand Jury met the following year, but despite literally thousands of witnesses, sources of reporters, and hundreds of photographs, the grand jury found that no witnesses could identify anyone from the lynching, so no charges were filed.[65][66]

Public criticism

In the aftermath of the lynching, Governor Rolph was publicly condemned by former President Herbert Hoover, then at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. Rolph struck back instantly, accusing Hoover of calling out the U.S. Army against the World War I "Bonus Marchers" who had gathered in Washington, D.C. in 1932 to protest lack of assistance to the veterans of that war. President Roosevelt also condemned the lynching, although subsequent Congressional attempts to outlaw lynching were defeated, and lynching remained legal.

Civil suits

Holmes's parents sued Governor Rolph for his role in the lynching of their son,[37][57] along with radio station KQW and several other persons,[67] but the suit was dropped when the governor died of a heart attack in 1934. Holmes's widow sued Sheriff Emig and several deputies, citing their carelessness and negligence in failing to protect him.[68] Thurmond's family took no action on his behalf and reportedly never again spoke about the matter amongst themselves.

Modern coverage

Harry Farrell, a columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, wrote about the lynching in a two-part series in that newspaper in 1983,[69] following up with a book on the same subject after he retired, Swift Justice, published in 1992.[70] Swift Justice was praised by Walter Cronkite and won a Edgar Award in 1993, beating out the expected winner, Ann Rule.[69]

John Murphy criticized Farrell's approach, noting that by accepting the confessions as the baseline truth and hewing to the "conventional" history that led to mob justice, Farrell had invented conversations and created motivations that were impossible to corroborate and glossed over inconsistencies.[71] Murphy points out the later phone calls placed to make ransom demands came from payphones physically close together, culminating in the arrest of Thurmond at a payphone only 150 feet (46 m) from San Jose Police Headquarters.[72] Murphy would go on to write a book, Jury Rigging in the Court of Public Opinion (published in 2007),[73] and write and produce a movie, Valley of the Hearts Delight regarding the 1933 case.[74]

Family background

Hart had three sisters, Jeanette, Miriam, and Aleese, and a brother named Alexander Joseph Jr.[75]

The Hart family home was at 1717 The Alameda, in a large white 2 story home with expansive lawns and iron gate. It was sold to the city in 1950 to be used as a museum, gallery and library. It was later razed when the YMCA was built in 1959. However, the original sundial[76] from the garden is still there.

In popular media

The lynching inspired local punk band Executioner to write the song St. James Park.[77] The song was not released until 2011, when one of the founders of Executioner, Dave Burks, gathered available recordings from the band's active years of 1982–83.[78]

At least four films have been made loosely based on this story:

The 1933 lynching also inspired two short stories from John Steinbeck:

Former San Jose mayor Tom McEnery wrote a play based on Farrell's 1992 book.[91][92] The play, produced in early 2016 by the San Jose-based Tabard Theatre Company,[93] shares the book's name, Swift Justice. A review criticized the "weak script" and said it had "[too many] shallowly developed scenes."[94]

References

  1. ↑ "Old Courthouse history". The Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara. 2016. Archived from the original on 10 August 2012. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  2. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 24.
  3. ↑ Nolte, Carl (November 23, 2008). "Bay Area mob lynched kidnappers 75 years ago". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  4. ↑ ""The Last Lynching in California" (slideshow gallery)". SFGate.com. 2008-11-19. Retrieved 2014-03-13.
  5. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 300.
  6. ↑ Adams (2005). p. 199.
  7. ↑ Kulczyk (2008). p. 115.
  8. ↑ "Since You Asked: Man recalls Sikiyou County Lynching". Mail Tribune. Medford, Oregon. 10 November 2015. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  9. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 203.
  10. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 243.
  11. ↑ Murphy (2007). p. 3.
  12. ↑ Santo, Leonardo Ricardo (31 August 2010). "ALEX HART: "He was a philanthropist, a businessman, a civic and community leader, a social arbiter, a charming host, a gentleman and a friend...". Blogspot [blog]. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  13. ↑ Adams (2005). p. 200.
  14. ↑ Murphy (2007). p. 16.
  15. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 3.
  16. 1 2 3 Adams (2005). p. 207.
  17. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Hart's body filled with bullets". Healdsburg Tribune. Tribune Service. 17 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  18. 1 2 Murphy (2007). p. 19.
  19. ↑ Murphy (2007). pp. 19–20.
  20. ↑ Murphy (2007). p. 20.
  21. ↑ "Authorities split on Hart clues". Healdsburg Tribune. United Press. 22 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  22. ↑ Farrell (1992). pp. 13–14.
  23. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 14.
  24. 1 2 3 "Brick used to weight Hart found". Healdsburg Tribune. Tribune Service. 18 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  25. 1 2 "Bay dragged for body Hart". Madera Tribune. UP. 18 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  26. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 11.
  27. ↑ Farrell (1992). pp. 12–13.
  28. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 13.
  29. 1 2 3 4 "Fatal Shooting Marks Dispute Over Kidnapping". Berkeley Daily Gazette. 11 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  30. ↑ "Kidnapers lower ransom demands". Eugene Register-Guard. AP. 13 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  31. ↑ "Compromise is suggested for ransom". Healdsburg Tribune. United Press. 13 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  32. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 55.
  33. ↑ Farrell (1992). p. 56.
  34. ↑ Murphy (2007). p. 25.
  35. 1 2 3 4 5 "Lynching kidnapers threat". Madera Tribune. UP. 17 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  36. 1 2 3 "Fear lynching San Jose kidnapers". Madera Tribune. UP. 21 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  37. 1 2 3 "Answer to Kidnaping Racket Says Official Claim Slayer Insane". Madera Tribune. UP. 28 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  38. 1 2 3 "Recovery Body Hart To Cause Trouble Is Fear of Authorities". Madera Tribune. UP. 25 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  39. 1 2 3 4 5 "Slayers Return to San Jose Jail—Body Seen Floating". Madera Tribune. UP. 23 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  40. ↑ "Pillow slip used on Hart found". Healdsburg Tribune. United Press. 20 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  41. ↑ "Hat murdered youth found". Madera Tribune. UP. 20 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  42. 1 2 3 4 "Extra Guard Posted At San Jose Jail Due Restless Crowd". Madera Tribune. UP. 24 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  43. 1 2 3 4 "San Jose slayers lynched". Madera Tribune. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  44. 1 2 3 "Kidnap Victim's Body Found in Bay by Hunters". San Francisco Chronicle. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 1 December 2016. Intensive Search for Murdered Youth's Remains Terminated by Chance; Knife, Tape Aid Identification
     The body of Brooke Hart, 22, slain November 9, by kidnapers seeking to mulct his father, wealthy San Jose merchant, of $40,000 in a fantastic plot, was recovered yesterday from San Francisco bay. It was found floating in five feet of water about a mile west of the Alameda shore and half a mile south of the San Mateo-Hayward bridge by two duck hunters.
     Removed to a branch morgue at Hayward, it was identified by friends of the dead youth and by department heads of the Hart Department Store, of which he had recently been made a vice president by his father, Alex J. Hart.
     Because of the condition of the body after 17 days in the water identification was established by the clothing, by a pearl handle knife found in the clothing and by the fact that the right foot was wrapped in tape. The torso and head of the victim were practically a skeleton.
     The chance find terminated a search that had called into play all the agencies of four counties and the assistance of the Government—a search employing divers, Coast Guard boats airplanes and even a navy blimp.
    Climaxes Long Search
     The discovery of the body, for which a reward of $500 was recently offered by Brooke Hart's father, was made shortly after 9 o'clock by Leonard L. Dalve, a civil engineer, 628 Maple street, Redwood City, and Harold E. Stephens, Redwood City store proprietor, living at 174 Jeter street.
     The two were in a skiff and were hunting ducks. They had started out from an Alvarado duck club on the Alameda shore at daylight, having slept at the club the night before.
    Tow Body Ashore
     They sighted the body floating about 400 feet from their small boat and at first thought it was a seal. Moving closer, they realized they had undoubtedly come upon the body for whom hundreds had been making a systematic search since November 16, when Holmes and Thurmond, captured in an elaborate trap, made their astounding confession.
     Wrapping the body in a piece of canvas the two duck hunters towed it to a peninsula of mud on the Alameda shore.    (subscription required)
  45. ↑ Holzmeister, Karen; O'Brien, Matt (29 November 2005). "Hayward site of spark for last lynching in state". East Bay Times. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  46. ↑ "CRIME: California Lesson". TIME. 4 December 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.(subscription required)
  47. ↑ Adams (2005). p. 211.
  48. 1 2 Farrell (1992). p. 153.
  49. 1 2 Brier, Royce (27 November 1933). "Kidnapers Lynched!". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 1 December 2016. Mob Storms Jail, Hangs Slayers in San Jose Square—Avengers of Hart Defy Tear Gas Bombs to Drag Thurmond and Holmes From Cells to Death
     SAN JOSE, Nov. 26—Lynch law wrote the last grim chapter in the Brooke Hart kidnaping here tonight.
     Twelve hours after the mutilated body of the son of Alex J. Hart, wealthy San Jose merchant, was recovered from San Francisco bay a mob of 10,000 infuriated men and women stormed the Stanta [sic] Clara County Jail, dragged John M. Holmes and Thomas H. Thurmond from their cells and hanged them in historic St. James Park.
     Swift, and terrible to behold, was the retribution meted out to the confessed kidnapers and slayers. As the pair were draw up, threshing in the throes of death, a mob of thousands of men and women and children screamed anathemas at them.
    HOWLING MOB BESIEGES JAIL
     The siege of the County Jail, a three-hour whirling, howling drama of lynch law, was accomplished without serious injury either to the seizers or the 35 officers who vainly sought to defend the citadel.
     The defense of the jail failed because Sheriff Emig and his forces ran out of tear gas bombs. Bombs kept the determined mob off for several hours.
     Help from San Francisco and Oakland officers arrived too late to save the Hart slayers.
    HOLMES PLEADS AGAINST HANGING
     "Don't string me up, boys. God, don't string me up," was the last cry of Holmes as the noose was put about his neck in the light of flash lamps.
     Thurmond was virtually unconscious with terror as the mob hustled him from the jail, down the alley and across the street to his doom.
     Great cheers from the crowd of onlookers accompanied the hoisting of the two slayers. Some women fainted, some were shielded from the sight by their escorts, but the gamut of human nature was here in the park. Old women with graying hair and benign faces expressing satisfaction at the quick end of the murderers, and young women with hardened faces broke down and wept.
    KING MOB TAKES LAW TO ITSELF
     King Mob was in the saddle and he was an inexorable ruler.
     And here was a sovereign whose rise in invincible power stunned San Jose and will stun the Nation and the world.
     Brooke Hart's torn body was found in the water this morning. Barricades went up before the County Jail and the crowd gathered and stayed all the day. It was a good natured crowd. It knew the deputies and the police and the State highway patrolmen who stood guard. It bandied words with them.
     There had been talk of an organized mob, and as the crowd grew in the evening there was no organization. There was shouting, and good nature still ruled.
     "This crowd won't do anything," was the constant reiteration of Sheriff Emig's deputies.
     Yet as their words of confidence were being spoken there flashed, like a prairie fire, the word through San Jose—11 o'clock! 11 o'clock!
     The constant bombardment of that hour on the ear was monotonous and ominous.    (subscription required)
  50. 1 2 3 "Guard force use refused by Governor". Madera Tribune. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  51. ↑ "Hanging Gets Gov. Rolph's Endorsement". Ellensburg Daily Record. AP. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  52. 1 2 "Hart slayers lynched by mob". Ellensburg Daily Record. AP. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  53. ↑ "San Jose jail in shambles". Madera Tribune. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  54. ↑ "Mob lynches Hart kidnapers". Healdsburg Tribune. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016. WARNING: Includes pictures from the lynching.
  55. ↑ Anspacher, Carolyn (27 November 1933). "Hell Rips Loose--Women Laugh--Women Sob and Cheer On Frenzied Mob". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 1 December 2016.  SAN JOSE, Nov. 26—Hell turned loose here tonight and women laughed.
     Their laughter and cries rose shrilly above the shouts of the men of an avenging mob as two men were hanged by their necks until they were dead.
     From the heavy boughs of darkened trees in St. James Park, across the street from the Courthouse and County Jail, John M. Holmes and Thomas H. Thurmond, the confessed slayers of Brooke Hart, paid for their crime at the hands of a howling mob.
    HUNDREDS ARE WOMEN
     Hundreds of that mob were women. Old women, young women and girls in their teens.
     Not all the women laughed. Some fainted. Some the laughter was hysterical, They knew not what they did.
     Women milled with the men and surged around the gas-infested courtyard of the little jail. And when Thurmond and Holmes were seized from their jailers and dragged to their doom women followed and were in at the finish.
     Earlier many of them had whispered words of encouragement to the men—egged them on.
     "I hope they hang them. This is one case where I believe in lynch law."
     All evening long, as the mob of thousands massed in front of the jail, which later was stormed and captured when the guards' supply of tear gas bombs ran out, this admonition was heard from many feminine lips.
    RECALL HART'S FATE
     During the day they had recalled Brooke Hart's fate, stirring their men folk on to taking the law into their own hands.
     A few of the hundreds of women who witnessed the lynching tonight as if it had been a garden fete, yielded to feminine impulses. Some wept softly. Others shrieked.
     Still others dropped soundlessly to the gray sidewalks and on the lawns and there were forgotten by all save their male attendants. There were women there without men. And if they fainted, that was just too bad.
     But others among the women all but danced around the death trees. They hurled maledictions against the dying men. They clawed at their dangling bodies like avenging furies.
     The scene was like the hell of Dante—the awful avenging hell of the New Testament—a hell peopled by women.
    FORGOT COUNSELING
     Many of these women were gently bred and for days had been counseling that the law be permitted to take its course.
     Then, as the rising tide of frenzy grew higher, and steel smashed with resounding and implacable force against the brick walls of the little red brick jail, there came a metamorphosis.
     It was amazing—as if a magician had waved his wand over the gathering.
     These gentle, timid housewives and stenographers and racher's wives, these debutantes and subdebs and school girls, seemed to hear the voice of Mephisto himself.
    DROP ALL REFINEMENT
     From them dropped all vestige of refinement. They became beings who were guided by instinct rather than by thought.    (subscription required)
  56. ↑ Farrell (1992). pp. 165, 255.
  57. 1 2 3 4 "Stories of Youths They Led Lynching Party to Be Probed". Madera Tribune. UP. 29 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  58. ↑ "Parents hold to innocence of son". Ellensburg Daily Record. AP. 27 November 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  59. ↑ Kulczyk (2007). p. 85.
  60. ↑ "Royce Brier". Media Museum of Northern California. 7 May 1934. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
  61. ↑ "No arrests Rolph says". Healdsburg Tribune, Enterprise and Scimitar. 30 November 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  62. ↑ "Demand trials San Jose mob". Madera Tribune. 12 December 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  63. 1 2 "Dislike of 'outsiders' expressed". Healdsburg Tribune. United Press. 14 December 1933. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  64. ↑ "Lynch leader hearing set". Madera Tribune. UP. 15 December 1933. Retrieved 29 November 2016. Eighteen year-old Anthony Cataldi who boasted he led the mob that lynched Jack Holmes and Thomas Thurmond, kidnap killers of Brooke Hart, was arraigned today on a charge of participating in the hangings and preliminary hearing was set for 2 p. m. next Wednesday. The boy’s arrest was brought about by the American Civil Liberties Union which, as a part of its nationwide campaign against lynchings, interested itself in prosecution of the San Jose hangers.
  65. ↑ "Grand jury fails to indict San Jose lynching suspects". Chicago Tribune. UP. 19 January 1934. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  66. ↑ "San Jose Jurors Fail to Indict Lynch Suspects". San Bernadino Sun. Associated Press. 18 January 1934. Retrieved 30 November 2016. Resolved that the testimony submitted to this grand jury to date is totally inadequate to justify the bringing of an indictment against any person or persons for participation in the lynching of John M. Holmes and Harold Thurmond, and we have therefore failed to bring an indictment against anyone. If, however, any person, persons or organization have any concrete or definite evidence implicating any person or persons in the above mentioned lynching they are hereby requested to present the same before this grand jury for its consideration.
  67. ↑ "Action is Brought by Widow and Children Of Brooke Hart Killer". Healdsburg Tribune. 20 April 1934. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  68. ↑ "Holmes widow sues sheriff". Healdsburg Tribune. 27 November 1934. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  69. 1 2 Szymanski, Kyle (22 April 2015). "Harry Farrell". Spartan Daily. Archived from the original on 29 November 2016. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  70. ↑ Farrell (1992).
  71. ↑ Murphy (2007). pp. 5–12.
  72. ↑ Murphy (2007). p. 12.
  73. ↑ Murphy (2007).
  74. 1 2 Murphy, John D. (8 September 2010). "Shadows of Doubt". SanJose.com. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  75. ↑ "Obituary of Alexander Joseph Hart Jr.". Mercury News. 2010. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  76. ↑ http://mytown.mercurynews.com/archives/rosegardenresident/20071109/news1.shtml[] Rose Garden Resident, Nov 9, 2007 - Fictional movie recounts the kidnapping, murder of a Rose Garden family's son
  77. ↑ St. James Park by Executioner San Jose Punk Band on YouTube
  78. ↑ Burks, Dave (August 2010). Gray, Robert, ed. "And one more thing ... a conversation with Dave Burks". Punk Globe (Interview). Interview with Helwig, Kenny. Archived from the original on 27 August 2010. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  79. ↑ Stecher, Raquel (13 July 2015). "Fury" (PDF). Library of Congress, National Film Preservation Board. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  80. ↑ Stecher, Raquel (13 July 2015). "Fury (1936) Essay for the National Film Registry". Out of the Past Blog. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  81. ↑ Barker, Jennifer Lynde (2013). "3: Radical Projection". The Aesthetics of Antifascist Film: Radical Projection. New York, New York: Routledge. pp. 65–72. ISBN 978-0-415-89915-4. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
  82. ↑ Erickson, Glenn (21 July 2009). "Try and Get Me! (The Sound of Fury)". DVD Savant. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  83. ↑ Night Without Justice (2004) at the Internet Movie Database
  84. ↑ "'Night Without Justice' to be filmed in San Jose" (Press release). Los Angeles, California: pr web. 29 April 2003. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  85. ↑ Valley of the Hearts Delight (2006) at the Internet Movie Database
  86. ↑ Zamora, Jim Herron (13 September 2005). "BAY AREA / 1933 lynching is a movie / 'Valley of the Heart's Delight' scenes being shot in Bay Area". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  87. ↑ Hamlin, Jesse (25 October 2007). "Ugly chapter in San Jose's past is retold on the big screen". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
  88. ↑ Steinbeck, John (October 1936). "The Lonesome Vigilante". Esquire. p. 35. Retrieved 29 November 2016.(subscription required)
  89. ↑ Delgado, James P. (Summer–Fall 1983). "The Facts behind John Steinbeck's 'The Lonesome Vigilante'". Steinbeck Quarterly. 16 (3–4): 70–79.
  90. ↑ Steinbeck, John (1938). "The Vigilante". American Lynching. Retrieved 29 November 2016.
  91. ↑ McEnery, Tom (14 January 2016). "Tom McEnery: San Jose rose above the horrors of 'Swift Justice'". The Mercury News. San Jose, California. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  92. ↑ Herhold, Scott (4 January 2016). "OPINION—Herhold: 'Swift Justice' replays ugly San Jose incident". The Mercury News. San Jose, California. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  93. ↑ "Swift Justice". The Tabard Theatre Company. 2015. Archived from the original on 12 May 2016. Retrieved 30 November 2016.
  94. ↑ Reynolds, Eddie (January 2016). "Regional Reviews: San Jose/Silicon Valley—Swift Justice—The Tabard Theatre Company". Talkin' Broadway. Retrieved 30 November 2016.

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