Maybes

Well my idea maybe half-witted but I think it's as good a hunch as anyone has ever had to figuring out Vivian's past. My idea that Vivian's maiden name may not have been Davis has been fun to research. Since Vivian had listed Springfield, Mo as her hometown, I started with some old school records from Greene County Mo. Luckily of the 2 other Vivian's that I found who were an appropriate age one was very easily eliminated. Vivian Gaunt was alive and well with her family in the 1920 census the same year that Vivian Davis is found living in KCMO in January of that year and by April marries George M. Chase.

So I have one other canditate. Vivian Byrne, who became more frustrating with every step (that is so like Vivian Chase)! I find Vivian Byrne in the 1912-1913 school year Springfield attending the Liberty School. I can't find her at all in the 1920 census, but in the 1910 census I find her with her family. She is the adopted daughter of G.W. Byrne and Susannie Byrne. I can find the Missouri death certificate for George Washington Bryne in 1928 but no further record for Susannie. I'm hampered because I am only guessing at Susannie's name. The 1910 census takers penmanship was not neat. I have no success with Susannah, Susan, or Susamie. Was the diminutive Susie used back then?

Well while it's too soon to tell if Vivian Byrne and Vivian Chase are the same people it is promising to me. The FBI and police tried hard to find out about Vivian's background. Maybe the reason that they got nowhere was that there wasn't any family left that she knew about. In some ways this is good in some ways it's frustrating. There's a good chance that I may learn all about another woman who turns out not to be Vivian Chase. Nothing beats a failure but a try. Oh yeah, start praying now because accessing adoption records is going to make getting Harry Pierpont's competency information seem easy.

Vivian Again

so far I actually have 2 candidates for my little theory that Vivian was born or raised in Springfield but her maiden name was not Davis...Vivian Gaunt 11 years old in 1911 and Vivian Byrne 12 years old in 1911. Both in Springfield for the right time frame. In fact Vivian Gaunt moved from Springfield around 1917. It may be a wild goose chase but hey...nothing ventured nothing gained.

Hmmm...

OK, so for a while now Vivian's kind of had me stumped. It's like the more I learn the less I know. I'd been thinking that maybe Vivian Davis wasn't her maiden name. The marriage certificate to George Chase listed her maiden name as Vivian Davis from KC, MO and her age as 19. I can find Vivian Davis earlier in that year (1920) in the census as a single waitress in KC, MO. When she was booked for her fight with Mrs. Flournoy in 1926 she listed her hometown as Springfield, MO. Now, I've looked for Vivian Davis in Springfield and I found one. But she died in 1920 at 15 years old.

Vivian was most likely born around 1901; unfortunately, birth certificates were not required in MO until 1910. (For now, I'm sticking to MO as a birth place) The MO state archives has a wonderful website with digital vital records and indexes for the period before 1910. But no luck. I'm more than likely going to need to travel for what I'm looking for in KC (school records and such)to determine if there was a Vivian Davis who at school there during the right time period. That is going to have to wait for a while until I can afford to get away. So while I'm waiting to pursue that angle I'll see if I can't find another Vivian in Springfield during the right time frame. I found some old school records online so.... It's just one possibility and it won't hurt. Might not help but it won't hurt.

FBI Makes a Funny!

OK, I enjoy a good joke just as much as the next guy; so I have to give the FBI their props--they got me good (in a good way). I picked up my box from the post office. I didn't even rush to get home because while the Denver Mint robbery interests me I'm not obsessed with it. I run some errands, chat on the phone, clean the kitchen, etc...then I open the box. What do I find, but 500 pages on the Cherryvale Bank robbery!!!! The FBI told me they had found 20 pages related to Vivian! I am now doing a mental dance of joy!

The pages are interesting too. Some of it can't be read of course (microfilm images deteriorate over time) but nothing is red lined. I'm not even 100 pages through yet but the information is tantalizing (George M. Chase was probably still living during Cherryvale & Picher). I know it won't answer all of my questions BUT IT'S GREAT!

No Joke!

Evidently, the FBI has located 20 pages on Microfilm about Vivian Chase! Woe, Friday I got two letters telling me no there's nothing. So of course I'm excited even if it's only 20 pages. The files have to be processed which means they will go through a classification review. The information is over 70 years old if I get one blacked out name I'm appealing. I've been through too much to get very little to put up with that BS.

I also have to decide whether I will appeal one of the 'no information' letters I received. Essentially, the letter said that it was FBI HQ policy to limit searches to HQ folders and indices in order to save time. The FBI has essentially refused to search through it's field office information. Now if the letter had said 'there's no information relevant in the field office files' I would give up with out any argument. But of course in order to tell me that they would have to know what the FO records contain. I also need to ask them to tell me if the records have been destroyed. As anal as the FBI is with information I'm sure that they could tell me definitively if those records are lost. What records you ask? Well, Vivian's autopsy file is referenced in the Luer kidnapping file and there are also Kansas City FO reports referenced that would provide information on the FBI's search for her after the Luer kidnapping and a report that might illuminate the Cherryvale Bank Robbery.

I realize that after 80 years (Cherryvale) there's a good chance something happened to the records but just tell me they are no more and I'll be gone.

Well...

Well, I've hit the wall. Friday I received a letter from the FBI basically saying they can't find any other records for Vivian Chase other than the file numbers I was previously given. Those files turned out to be perfectly worthless to me containing no information. I guess it's possible that the information was misfiled and may turn up but it's equally possible that it was stolen or destroyed. I say stolen because it wouldn't be the first time that someone walked out with a file. Of course it would have happened before there was so much security in place to prevent that.

So where do I go from here? I guess I just keep trying to close the gaps on the information I have. You know Vivian was not a major criminal (although as a female she was major) but her associates were incredibly interesting. For now I'm concentrating on Lee Flournoy and Charlie Mays. They are an interesting pair particularly Flournoy. Something tells me if I keep researching their robbery and bootlegging gangs I might just find out what happened to George M. Chase.

Truthfully, I admit to myself, I may never have all the answers to the questions I have about Vivian's life. Vivian was notoriously closed mouthed about herself. Somehow I think the problems with finding information about her have a lot to do with her karma! But you never know...maybe I'll find an answer here and there despite the cosmic interference!

John Langan

So this is John Langan; he was pointed out as Vivian's accomplice when she when on her KC, Mo crime spree. They held up a series of small stores (shoe stores, drug stores, etc) for some small change. Langan was also involved with Clarence Sparger and a couple of robberies that put him on the FBI radar. I had requested the FBI to search to see if they still maintained the files on him. No such luck. Evidently "records responsive to my request were destroyed on 2/1/1990; 3/1/1993; and 3/1/1998. Oh well...all is lost.

The FBI may still have Vivian Chase's file...they have searched through records still in their possession and have found files that were microfilmed that may be relevant. Just one problem the FBI's microfilm readers are broken! A very nice Public Information Officer explained that they would not know if these were the files that I sought for at least another month by which time the microfilm machines would be fixed. I wish I had become interested in Vivian earlier in the 80's or 90's.

Earl McDowell

Finally got to LOC newspaper reading room again. Found articles on Earl McDowell in the Chicago Tribune when he murdered a young woman who had the bad fortune to be in the bullets way. One night, McDowell went to a "beer flat" in Chicago, IL with some friends. While there, he took an intense dislike to the radio station being played. In order to register his displeasure he shot the radio. Unfortunately, the bullets found Dorothy Evelyn Renshaw, a 23 year old mother from Sioux City, IA, killing her. McDowell fled to Kansas City, MO after this incident.

It's his Kansas City exploits that concern me and proved to be the death of him. Once there he began living with Vivian Chase who began using his name. It's evident McDowell was a handsome man, but evidently he had a nasty temper. He once shot at his wife but missed her. It's always been said that Luther Jordan , another of Vivian's paramours, was intensely jealous of McDowell, but Jordan always denied any relationship with Vivian or jealousy resulting from her affections for McDowell. It makes since that Jordan would deny his involvement with her. McDowell was found dead in a ditch outside of Kansas City shortly after his arrival.

Trudging Along

Well I found George Chase in the Missouri Penitentiary in 1920. Whether or not he is Vivian's George Chase is the question. I wrote the archives to see if I could get some information. Hopefully they have intake papers and a mugshot. It will take them 8 weeks to get back to me. It would be great if it turned out to be Mr. George M. Chase.

I also think I have found the right Vivian Davis. 18 years old in 1920 living in Kansas City working as a waitress. Rooming in a household of older men. Yes that sounds like Vivian. The marriage certificate states that she is from KC and 19 years old. The date of the certificate is April 1921.

When she was arrested in 1923 Vivian gave her place of birth as Springfield, MO.; I don't know. Births prior to 1910 in Missouri are harder to trace. Not impossible though.

I guess the only thing for certain is that Vivian is a product of Missouri and Kansas during Prohibition. It would have been so much easier if she had been from Chicago. There's loads of information on Chicago. It's so funny so much happened all over the country but historians typically focused on New York and Chicago so if you go looking for information on who, what & where for some other area you have to cross your fingers and hope.

Oh S#!#

A years work down the toilet. Evidently, I have been completely and utterly wrong. There's no way that the Vivian Davis who married George M. Chase in 1921 is Vivian G. Davis of Springfield, MO. That Vivian died a year and a month before the wedding!

Time to take another look at the sources or perhaps I could interest one of those mediums, who are always bothering dead people, to visit the graves and find out the truth from the source.

I have learned a valuable lesson. I will never trust someone else's research at face value. I will always do my own or verify as if it were my own. Truthfully, piecing together someone's information from old census records when they have a common name is not easy. It is easy to trip up when you can't find everything at once i.e. birth, marriage, and death data scattered everyplace. I just have to look at this as part of the process and not give up.

George C. Robertson

G.C. Robertson, was one of the inside guys on the Montgomery County National Bank robbery. I was a little surprised to find out that he was 35 at the time of the robbery. Because I read that he was the bank Vice President, I was expecting an older man with a paunch like Lionel Barrymore.

There's more to this story than is commonly known. Mr. Robertson, who served 1 year and a day in Leavenworth for his role, is originally from Springfield, MO. The address he gave for his father's home is on the same street, Kimbrough, that Vivian Chase's family occupied. Hmmm.

So where is my fertile mind going with all of this? Did Vivian actually know Robertson prior to the robbery? Did she set him up? Or was he in on the double cross from the beginning?

There is something odd in Robertson's Leavenworth file. Supposedly he had no prior arrests to the Cherryvale robbery, yet there's an FBI arrest record for in his file for a Clarence Griffin dating back to 1918. Maybe it's a mistake someone else's information in his file. Maybe not.

Vivian Grace Davis

LDS family search shows that Vivian Grace Davis died in 1920. I wonder where they got this information because there is no death certificate in Missouri vital records to support the claim. MO required death certificates for all deaths after 1910 so a 16 year old girl could not just die without some formal record. So where does this information originate? I wonder if I write the LDS if they keep records of who tells them what. I can try. Vivian married George M. Chase April 1, 1921. Maybe she left home, under less than favorable circumstances, in 1920. Maybe someone knows the story and after 87 years I can find out what it is.

As Brian Beerman (thanks Brian!) suggested I am trying to find obituaries for Vivian's parents Alfred and Sarah Davis. Unfortunately LOC doesn't have any holdings for Springfield, MO during the time of their deaths. So I'm contacting various MO organizations and MOGENWEB. It would be interesting to get an idea of where Vivian came from....

Endings

Well, finished reading the copies I made at the archives. Always enlightening but this time just a little sad. One of the documents that I copied was a report on Vivian Chase's funeral. At the end of the report there's an addendum detailing what happened the night she was killed.


Vivian and other members of her gang had finished a robbery. They decided to have a few drinks. Vivian said something to one of the men, Clarence Sparger, and he shot her then he ran away from the group. Evidently the remaining gang members took Vivian to St. Luke's Hospital. They left her inside the car at the hospital's parking lot. She died a couple of hours before anyone found her body.

There has always been speculation that Vivian was executed because of a double cross. The truth is it was a drunken quarrel.

Vivian again

Ah..today I went to the Archives again. I can't believe this is my last day of vacation.

I'm almost positive that I was wrong about Vivian and Pearl Loge being the same person. I took a close look at the original photograph and Pearl Loge seems less hardened; she also talked up a storm. Vivian Chase was notoriously closed mouth when questioned. Also, agents noted the resemblance to Vivian right away so I'd tend to think that they would have tried to match fingerprints with Vivian's first thing.

Another thing, Percy Fitzgerald, one of the August Luer kidnapping team stated that Vivian was only used to gain entry into the house. Some how that makes me feel better about her because it was an incredibly unprofessional job. I like to think she did her part and then let the rest of them make a mess. Looks like I have some fun reading tonight.

Same Woman?

Well I had my field trip to the Archives yesterday and actually spent the whole day with the Luer kidnapping file. I'm pretty sure that this file contains everything the FBI knows about Vivian Chase since this Kidnapping is the only federal crime she was ever wanted for.

I got some miscellaneous dope on Vivian that I can add to my biography. I also took the liberty of making photo copies of her mug shot for a mere $5.75. Doing the research your self is whole lot better than buying the book!

Anyway take a look at the pictures to your left. These 3 women are not the same woman according to the FBI. The 2 pictures to the right (mug shots) are Vivian Chase the picture on the left is Pearl Loge. According to the FBI file Pearl Loge was captured with the other Luer kidnappers and questioned. Supposedly, Pearl shared a room with Vivian at another suspects' rooming house and that's how Pearl knew the kidnappers. I'm thinking Pearl and Vivian are one in the same! And that means that when I get another day off with pay I take a second look at that particular file. While there are mention of Vivian's fingerprints I not completely sure that Pearl was fingerprinted. Maybe they aren't the same...I'm going to have some breakfast and read my copies. I love it when things get interesting and complicated!

NOT Vivian

FBI Woes

Violet is insisting on sleeping where I normally do my studying so in deference to the boss I thought I'd just post my latest "crisis".

I've been trying to get the FBI information on Vivian Chase. Well even though she is a well known dead hood (at least to those of us who study dead hoods), the FBI would not consider my request unless I provided her death certificate. So I got a copy of her 1935 death certificate and sent it to them. Well, the FBI does not like this death certificate, because the coroner listed her approximate age as opposed to listing date of birth. How inconsiderate of him (it was always a him back then). Well you know in those days everyone figured if you were alive once and lying on a slab then obviously you were born and exact dates weren't all that necessary.

So, OK, do I give up on the G-men? Well, the head of the records dept. sent me a rather lengthy FOIA law that I can look up to see if I can find some common sense approach when the death certificate is 70 years old. I also have to ask my self what do I hope to find; those old files more than likely won't give me any added insight into her life. Let's face it they are mostly surveillance history and Vivian did an astounding disappearing act. They would have had to have found her to watch her. After the Luer kidnapping she didn't surface again until they found her corpse. Maybe I will just ask for the Luer kidnapping files.

Vivian Chase Bio

This is a picture (mug shot) of Vivian Chase taken in 1926; supposedly, she was much prettier. The circumstances of her arrest (she'd been drinking and participated in brawl) may have something to do with her looking so mean!!

When she was sixteen years old she left her home in Dade County, Missouri.  She married George Chase on April 1, 1921. The circumstances of her marriage are unknown; however, George Chase by this time was considerably older (30) and had begun to make a name for himself as a thief. {unfortunately there is no documentation about her home life. Nothing to determine if she ran away with George to escape a bad home or whether she was already on her own at the time. During the 20's it wouldn't have been unusual for a 16 y.o. girl to leave home to start working. But we just don't know}

Vivian Chase first gained notice as George’s wife. On December 23, 1923, George Chase was arrested for an altercation during which he was shot by Ella Keller. Ms. Keller stated that George and his companions attacked her because she had reported them to the police and that she had to shoot George in self-defense. After arresting George, the police went to his home where they found Vivian wearing six diamond rings. Since she could not explain possessing the rings, Vivian was arrested for “suspicion”. She was released after three days.

Vivian does not surface again for three years and when she does she is in the company of Charlie Mayes, also known as Pighead Hardman. {I can't find a definitive reference for George's death. He is believed to have been killed in a bank robbery soon after the Dec 1923 escapade) On February 15, 1926, Vivian, Mayes, Lee Flournoy and Flournoy’s wife were arrested after a free for all fight in a rooming house in Wichita, KS. During the arrest Vivian refused to talk. The investigation led investigators to her brother in law Charles Chase and allegations of involvement with the Joe Bratton liquor gang. { Charles' wife Grace was also arrested it is telling that Vivian maintained contact with them. She also used Grace's name from time to time as an alias.} On June 9, 1926, following a “drunken party and joy ride”, Flournoy and Mayes were fatally shot in a Picher, OK gun battle. Vivian Chase was with them. {this is the second man with whom Vivian has been involved who is shot down during a crime. It's interesting to note that we don't know if Vivian participated in Mayes' and Flournoy's crimes or whether she was just the girlfriend. }

The three of them had been under surveillance by Ottawa County Oklahoma officers for several days because the deputy sheriff informed the Sheriff of Montgomery County, KS that he had found the people who robbed the Cherryvale Bank on May 29, 1926. Vivian was placed in jail where she refused to talk to reporters.She was released on June 13, 1926, after insufficient evidence was found to charge her with a crime.

Once again the record goes silent on Vivian Chase. {It's unknown what she was doing with herself after Picher, OK. The money from the robbery was never recovered; but no one has ever said that she had it. She was known to live in style though. R.D. Morgan says that she worked at prostitution during this time in a well known road house; but she was never charged with the crime. Besides if she was comfortable making a living selling herself why steal?}

She resurfaces in June 1932. She is arrested with Jackie Forman and Enos Weeks for the robbery of the First National Bank in North Kansas City on April 9, 1932. She is held on $50,000 bond. It was a small robbery; no more than $1,500 was taken. Vivian was held at the Clay County Jail in Liberty, MO. She escaped after four months by sawing through the bars of her cell and lowering herself down with a rope made of bed sheets.{Conditions in County Jails were particulary grim during this period. It's surprising that she had sufficient bedding, but it would have been easier to bribe the guards to get more as was the custom (see Crucibles of Crime)}

After her escape from the Liberty County Jail, Vivian fled to St. Louis, MO. She became involved with Walter (Irish) O’Malley. On July 10, 1933, Vivian participated in the Kidnapping of banker August Luer. Vivian, O’Malley, Percy ‘Dice Box’ Fitzgerald drove to Mr. Luer’s home in Alton, IL. Vivian accompanied by O’Malley rang the doorbell and requested to use the phone. When she was let in and shown the phone’s location she cut the line. O’Malley wrestled August Luer to the floor and gagged his mouth. Mr. Luer was taken to a farm where he was hidden in a damp underground cellar while his captives tried to ransom him. Mr. Luer was not a well man and fearing that he would die before they were able to receive any ransom his kidnappers released him after 123 hours. Both Vivian and O’Malley fled from Illinois back to Missouri after the bungled kidnapping. O’Malley managed to elude capture for two years until he was apprehended in Kansas City on May 23, 1935. Vivian eluded capture.

In the early fall of 1935, Kansas City experienced a series of drug store robberies. The robbers were described as a man and a woman. The woman was further described as approximately 5 ft. 6 in. tall, slender, with hennaed hair. When victims were shown a photograph they identified Vivian as one of the robbers. On November 3, 1935, Vivian’s body was found in a parked car at St. Lukes Hospital in Kansas City, MO. She had been shot in the neck with the bullet exiting through her chest.

Newspapers speculated that she had been double crossed by an accomplice and was shot before she could him. She had a .22 caliber pistol on her with .45 caliber bullets in her handbag. She was shot with a .45 caliber gun. When she was found the coroner estimated that she had only been dead 2 hours or less leading to speculation that her killer drove her to the hospital while she was still alive expecting her to be found before her death.

She seemed destined for burial in a potter’s field. The owner of the funeral home she had been removed to received an anonymous call asking about the cost of providing her with a funeral. The next morning the funeral home received an envelope of money for the costs; also received were a blue dress and undergarments (her own) for Vivian to be buried in. Nine mourners outside of reporters and law officers attended her funeral. No one signed the guest book.

SOURCES

• 1910 USA Census Missouri State Greene County
• Marriage License Jackson County MO at Kansas City, MO
• Kansas City Times December 26, 1923
• Wichita Beacon February 16, 1926
• Wichita Eagle February 17, 1926
• Miami News Record June 10, 1926
• Miami News Record June 13, 1926
• Kansas City Times June 8, 1932
• Startling Detective Magazine June 1936
• R. D. Morgan: “Irish O’Malley & the Ozark Mountain Boys” (unpublished)
• Kansas City Journal-Post November 4, 1935
• Kansas City Times November 9, 1935

Mean Men

I just got this in the mail! The author Robert Winter kindly sent me a copy and some materials on Vivian Chase. I can not wait to read everything I am making headway, maybe just enough to write a short bio that contains more than she was born on and was found dead on such and such a date.

I have the marriage certificate, but not the application. I did find her family in the 1910 census by that time they were in Greene County Missouri. Still can't locate them in the 1900 Nebraska census. All of the children in this family were born in Nebraska, the last Vivian in 1905; therefore, I should be able to find them in Nebraska in 1900. Cross your fingers. I can think of several reasons why they wouldn't be there. Most glaring is that census takers were not always conscientious. We'll see.

Blah Blah Blah

I have got the Blahs! I am sitting here and not studying on a Saturday. Nothing was sinking in. I'm doing my laundry and trying to prepare for my small dinner party tomorrow. It's going to be a simple menu: "oven" grilled chicken, spinach with bacon & mushrooms, seasoned rice with chocolate cake for dessert. I just have to make sure everything is nice and that my ironing and such are done so I can have an easy week and start to get set for Thanksgiving.

The picture above is of Crown Point, Indiana around 1911. You can tell it's early by the absence of cars. Everyone is aware of Dillinger's escape with the wooden gun from the Crown Point jail. Some people insist that one of the Trustees smuggled a real gun into him, but the FBI files have affidavits from other prisoners that Dillinger and his accomplice in the escape Herbert Youngblood that refutes that. Evidently, the two whittled the gun from a wooden piece of a wash table that was in the communal washroom. The rest as they say is history, but what what fails to be mentioned is that these high profile escapes by Dillinger and others have a responsibility for the controls and such that we have in our modern correctional institutions.

It's interesting how changes come about. Think about it typically we have to learn the hard way before we correct mistakes. I am having a bear of a time trying to find Vivian Chase's family prior to the 1920 census. If she was born in Nebraska then I thought it would make since to look for her family in Nebraska during the 1900 census but so far no luck. It doesn't help that Davis is such a common name. Oh well, Nebraska didn't start having actual birth certificates until well after Vivian's birth. Hmmm....what's interesting is that if this family is hers then she is a puzzle. While the family wasn't rich they owned there own home in 1920. I can trace the parents to the same house in the 1930 census and they list that they have $3500 worth of income for the year that's around $42,000 in today's currency. http://www.minneapolisfed.org/Research/data/us/calc/

Her sister Hazel, I found in boarding house and she worked as a registered nurse. What's interesting about all of this is that in 1935 when Vivian was shot to death no one claimed her body. There was sufficient coverage in the newspapers to doubt that her family did not know of her death. So if these are the people she was related to by blood, they wanted nothing to do with her by the time of her death and allowed her to be buried in a potters grave.