Hey weirdos, before we unleashed today's macabre mystery, we were wondering, have you ever heard of Wondery Plus?
It's like a secret passage to an ad -free lair with early access to episodes.
You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or in Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
You're listening to a Morbid Network Podcast. Listening on Audible helps your imagination soar.
Whether you listen to stories, motivation, expert advice any genre you love you can be inspired to imagine new worlds new possibilities and new ways of thinking listening can lead to positive changes in your mood your habits and ultimately your overall well -being audible has an incredible selection of over 1 million audiobooks podcasts and audible originals all in one easy app find the genres you love and discover new ones explore bestsellers new releases plus thousands of included audiobooks podcasts and and originals that members can listen to all they want with more added all the time right
now i am listening to the southern book club's guide to slaying vampires by grady hendrix and i just cannot get enough of it i never want to pause it i'm literally like loading the dishwasher listening to it on the treadmill listening to it constantly it's so awesome i love being able to listen anytime anywhere i want to and there's more to imagine when you listen sign up for a free 30 -day audible trial and your first audiobook is free visit audible .com morbid You guys, I tried my mochi ice cream the other day, and I was lifted off of this planet into just another galaxy entirely.
It is a cool, creamy scoop of ice cream wrapped in a soft, chewy dough.
It's literally like a little sweet ice cream dumpling.
It's pillowy soft, D to the E to the L -I -C -I -O -U -S, and it just feels very indulgent.
I loved it. I tried the cookies and cream flavor, and I still have the mango flavor to try.
I'm so excited to try the a mango because if it's half as good as the cookies and cream, I'll probably just like fall on the floor and start crying.
Tears of joy. My Mochi is only around 70 calories per piece.
My Mochi is gluten -free, and each box has six perfectly portioned Mochi snacks.
And guess what? My Mochi is the original Mochi ice cream.
The founder of My Mochi invented Mochi ice cream.
That makes My Mochi the Mochi OG.
Feel joyfully chill this summer with every bite of My Mochi ice cream.
Look for the purple box of My Mochi Ice Cream at Walmart or visit mymochi .com to find a store near you.
Hey, weirdos. I'm Alayna.
I'm Ash. And this is Morbid.
yeah it is it is how are you today brother i'm feeling wonderful we just got to hang out with alvin and fran from affirmative murder i love them and that is a day brightener it is we have it sounded kind of like you said daybrainer it can be a daybrainer as well I might have I'm tired I started to respond and then I was like did that did she say what I thought she said I meant daybrightener yeah maybe I said daybrainer maybe I'm not gonna I'm not gonna say I didn't I'm sorry to call you out I knew what you meant but I was like wait a second actually I'm tired and you know it's just I'm having
a hard time coming up with responses 2024 is is not off to a terrible start no by any means it's just like january was 435 days long and then really it's just been like a lot of stuff like it's just been busy yeah super busy but like fun busy yeah like good busy yeah really not a lot of like bad stuff going on so i'm not going to complain it's just like everybody's tired because there's just a lot going on when we stayed at the borden house earlier this week too yes and that like totally fucks up your sleep schedule because we did not.
Yes. We stayed with Corinne and Sabrina from Two Girls, One Ghost. We're just like hanging out with podcasters.
I know. But we love them all.
I know. And then like next week I think we're going to hang out with Jordan from the Night Time podcast. Yes.
Like virtually. Obviously we're not going to Canada but.
We would love to. I'd love to.
I know. I don't know why that's obvious that we're not going to Canada.
I'm like obviously not.
I keep trying to get Jordan and his whole fam to come to Salem.
I'm like come on down.
Come in. Come in here and let's go i want to go to salem yesterday me too i love salem i also want a new tattoo as do i which those two things are synonymous because tattoos in salem yep always yeah always and forever yeah yeah hi matt and ryan hi matt and ryan you're great and jill inside oh and i love jill yeah yeah yeah black veil tattoo yeah great yeah all right um i have a sad sad case case today awesome and you might be mad at me if you're listening i'm really sorry it's unsolved oh no i know and it's really frustrating that it's unsolved but it happened in the 20s in the 20s so or no it
didn't happen in the 20s that's a lie it happened it was like the 30s in the 30s it was like i don't know it was around that time but it was old timey so fingerprints and shit just like weren't good they tried you know what are you gonna do this is why these are fascinating Fascinating, though, because somehow the case at least moves along at some kind of capacity without any kind of forensic...
Yeah, and a lot of different shit ends up going on after this.
And I just want to say right off the bat, this is a brutal one.
So just be ready for that.
Hold on to your butts.
We haven't said that in a while.
I'm holding on. I like that.
All right, so we're going to be talking about Georgette Bauerdorf today.
Georgette Elise Bauerdorf was born in New York, New York on May 6th, 1924.
she was the second of two children born to george and constance bauerdorf as the daughter of a wall street financier and an independent oil tycoon because you know i fucking love an oil tycoon i was gonna say my goodness georgette was born into new york high society and of course because of that she was afforded all the finest opportunities in life when she reached school age her parents enrolled her at saint agathon school for girls i feel like you have to say it like that saint St. Agatha's.
I like how it, like, the voice changes, and the tone changes.
St. Agatha's School for Girls.
It's not St. Agatha's School for Girls.
No. It's St. Agatha's School for Girls.
That leads me to believe that it's a little bit of an intense place.
I don't even know. Oh, okay.
I thought you knew, and you were like, it is not whimsical.
No. All right, I mean.
It's just a foreboding name.
It really is. Yeah, St. Agatha's School for Girls.
It was just a prep school on New York's Upper West Side that had been established to prepare the children of elite families for future Ivy League educations.
It was very hoigy -toigy.
The elite. You know?
When Georgette's mother unfortunately passed away in 1935, the family ended up moving to Los Angeles, where Georgette continued her education, first at the Marlborough School and then at Westlake School for Girls.
School for Girls. School for Girls, where she graduated in 1941.
1941. Her graduation from high school actually came just months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.
Oh, wow. And it was at the onset of the US really getting involved in World War II.
What a time. Yeah. But like many Americans, the US's involvement in the war really inspired a great deal of patriotism in Georgette, who immediately looked for opportunities to contribute to the war effort, just help out, do her thing.
Let's go girls. Exactly.
Yeah. Although they weren't expected to join the military, many of Hollywood's biggest stars used their fame to support the troops by promoting war bonds and performing with the United Service Organization, among plenty of other things.
The USO. The USO, exactly.
For those who couldn't or didn't want to travel, local servicemen's clubs offered the opportunity to contribute, and in Los Angeles, there was no more prominent servicemen's club than the Hollywood Canteen.
The Hollywood canteen.
There is a Gilmore Girls episode where Rory Gilmore is joining the DAR and she has to make a function happen and she makes a place look like the Hollywood canteen and everyone has to dress up in vintage clothing.
You have no idea. As soon as I read the words Hollywood canteen, I said, make sure you take a breath after you introduce that thought because this bitch, this bitch Elena is going to go off about Gilmore Girls.
it's true and did you see me i literally said it and then i took a breath and looked right up at you moved back like i'm gonna give you space here's the stage here it is and they even have the triplets singing on stage that'll like um meet me on or don't go under the apple tree with anyone else but oh yeah anyone else but me sing it sister uh yeah it's like i that's one of i that like it's wild because of the the aesthetic of that that is just primo and when you think about what was actually happening at the time you're like like and it's just like and people have like it's like a theme yeah you're
like damn but it was a place for people to go to like I hate to say it there's no better way to say it to get away from all of that yeah to kind of exactly like escape that what was going on on the outside because man people were going through it was bleak quite a bit exactly so organized by Betty Davis and and John Garfield, two of Hollywood's biggest stars at the time.
Betty Davis. Betty Davis, honey.
The Hollywood canteen offered enlisted men and men of allied troops a place to unwind, enjoy some music, some dancing, and a few drinks, honey, while they were on leave. The canteen actually operated entirely on volunteer support, from the building materials to the personnel, and it featured nightly appearances and performances from the biggest stars of the day, like Abbott and Costello, Glenn Miller and his orchestra, boris karloff and elizabeth taylor oh dang honey the hollywood canteen baby i fucking love it now while many of these stars performed on stage at the club it was also just as likely
that they would act as bartenders servers dishwashers cooks cigarette girls wow like all of them just banded together out of this sense of i didn't know that and patriotism i love it i didn't know about that part i didn't know about that part either and i think that's so cool that like you would see maybe i don't know but you would see like maybe elizabeth taylor up on stage and then she'd just be like serving you drinks yeah like that's wild where else can you see that yeah on any given night patrons could expect uh to find the likes of rita hayworth serving tables shut up shirley temple behind
the bar serving drinks yeah which i was like is she old enough and then i was like she did grow she's perpetually a child just forever and even spencer tracy or humphrey bogart washing Washing dishes.
Isn't that really cool?
That's cool. Now, historically, the Hollywood canteen is remembered for their contributions to troop morale and the novelty of seeing Hollywood really getting their hands dirty, just getting into it there.
But there were a small number of ordinary young women.
Just kidding. Just ordinary.
They were way better than ordinary, but they just weren't stars.
Of course. Just like regular you and me kind of people who were brought on at the canteen as hostesses.
While the position was probably way more exciting on paper, more often than not the hostesses and junior hostess positions typically involved tending to the less glamorous service industry jobs that literally never would have been assigned to the volunteer celebrities.
Of course. The expectations of the hostesses would range from welcoming patrons, dancing with servicemen, to cleaning bathrooms and mopping the floor at the end of the night.
Which you know is a job.
Exactly. Like, maybe the Hollywood elite would go back and wash a couple dishes, but I don't think they were cleaning the bathrooms. I don't think they were cleaning the toilets.
To my knowledge, at least. Who knows?
But all while maintaining a look of poison elegance on par with the likes of Doris Day and Joan Crawford. You had to look the part and be willing to go clean some toilets if you were not an actress.
But still, for a young woman with dreams of making it big in Hollywood, there were few opportunities that were more exciting or had more career potential than landing a job with the Hollywood canteen.
Oh, I imagine. You're literally rubbing elbows with the biggest stars of the day.
Literally. Yeah. Your elbows will touch. Like, Betty Davis is out there.
Yeah. Like, come on.
Joan Crawford. Rita Hayworth.
Baby. Elizabeth Taylor.
Shirley Temple. Shirley Temple.
Humphrey Bogart. Morbid is sponsored by Squarespace.
Squarespace is the all -in -one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online.
With Squarespace's collection of cutting -edge design tools, anyone can build a bespoke online presence that perfectly fits their brand or their business.
Start with Blueprint AI, Squarespace's AI -enhanced website builder, or get a fully customizable website in just a few steps using basic information about your industry, your goals, and personality to generate premium quality content and personalized design recommendations.
Squarespace gives you everything you need to offer services and get paid, all in one place.
From consultations, events, and experiences, showcase your offerings with a customizable website designed to attract clients and grow your business.
Get paid on time with professional on -brand invoices and online payments.
Plus, streamline your workflow with built -in appointment scheduling and email marketing tools.
Head to squarespace .com slash morbid for a free trial, and when you're ready to launch, use offer code morbid to save 10 % off your first purchase of a website or domain.
main. You know what time it is?
It's time for a fresh approach to dog food, and that's where the farmer's dog comes in.
Developed by board -certified nutritionists, which is pretty impressive, the farmer's dog is human -grade dog food that's made with real meat and veggies and gently cooked to preserve those nutrients.
Traditional pet food is highly processed and difficult to portion correctly, but the farmer's dog, it's changed that with their freshly made food.
They take the guesswork out of serving sizes by precisely portioning your dog's food based on their very unique nutritional needs.
Sidney and Blanche are eating the Farmer's Dog right now, and we absolutely love it.
What's really fun is each packet has their name on it, so it says Blanche's food, Sidney's food, which is just fun.
They love it. They can't read, but I kind of pretend that they do.
Maybe they can. Maybe they can.
Who am I to say? Get 50 % off your first box of fresh, healthy food at thefarmersdog .com slash morbid.
Plus, you get free shipping.
Just go to thefarmersdog .com slash morbid to get 50 % off.
That's thefarmersdog .com slash morbid.
After graduating from high school, Georgette found work at the Los Angeles Times classifieds counter.
but what she really dreamed of what her big aspirations in life were was to become a film actress a star baby honey and from her perspective a position at the canteen seemed like a great way to support the war effort while also networking with the stars so she was really thrilled when she was accepted as volunteer and she was scheduled to work on Wednesday nights alongside one of her closer friends June Ziegler a journalist Katie Dowd wrote the hostess job suited Georgette perfectly.
She had a big smile and a welcoming charm.
Oh, I love that. I know.
She's really pretty if you look up pictures of her.
I'm going to look up.
So the job allowed Georgette to feel like she was doing her part to support the troops.
But as a young woman, she also appreciated the opportunity to dance and socialize with young soldiers who were coming in to unwind.
Per the rules of the canteen, though, the hostesses were actually banned from giving out their personal information or like they weren't allowed to leave the club with the patrons.
meaning like you're not here to pick up dates essentially but journalist dowd notes georgette like so many others got around this by meeting up with men outside of work she was known to give soldiers keys to her apartment if they wanted to crash there always on the downstairs sofa while she slept upstairs friend said and she loved dating good for her good for her but never give your keys to anybody yeah no i just mean like you love dating she loves good for you georgette you're You're young, you're out here in the world.
Yeah. Yeah, don't give your keys to strange men.
Yeah, don't do that, even if they seem nice.
Yeah, you don't know them.
Ted Bundy seemed nice to some people.
Exactly, so don't do it.
Don't do it. But Georgette's generosity toward these young men was a kind of extension of her sense of patriotism.
Whenever anyone would question why she was so willing to share everything with strangers, she would tell them, I think if these boys are willing to fight for us, we ought to do anything we can for them.
That's a super nice thought.
And it's so pure hearted.
And like, obviously, I don't think Georgette had seen a lot of the world at this point.
You know? And it's like, this is also like, you know, a different time.
Exactly. Like now we're like, oh, no, no, no one is like above, you know, that kind of stuff.
Like you gotta, you can't, you can't be handing keys to people.
No. But, like, things were different in different times.
And, like, this probably wasn't seen as that wild back then.
You know what I mean?
And it's like, and especially with the war effort going on, she, that was, like, a real sentiment.
Absolutely. That you should do what you can for these, these people who are willing to risk their lives to, you know, fight for your country.
And I'm sure you're thinking if these men are willing to put their lives on, like, the front end to protect our country, they're not, why would they hurt me?
Yeah, they're not going to hurt me.
they're fighting for our country and it's like well anybody can be a bad person right unfortunately now it's also possible that this behavior was a means of establishing herself as an independent person of course having come from a very wealthy family Georgette almost certainly didn't need to work and as a young woman in the early 40s she would have been expected she would not have been expected to pay for or transport herself from to and from dates but she did both and she would even and pay for her date's meal or whatever activity they were going to do at that time what about us kind of like
to demonstrate her autonomy and independence oh hell yeah she's like i work exactly i work and i can afford this yeah no while these things would seem pretty normal today like you go dutch on dates or yeah a girl will pay for a guy vice versa whatever at that time oh this was this was unheard of yeah certain parts of her behavior did obviously carry a certain amount out of risk not only because her actions defied convention but also because she was revealing her wealth and status to strangers who might be willing or wanting to take advantage yeah absolutely but still whenever any friends would express concern
she would just dismiss them confident that it was the right thing to do completely naive to the dangers oh that hurts my heart because i know something bad is going to happen here and it's like you can tell that it was truly just her thinking that the world wasn't as dark a place as it really is.
And that's really sad.
Coming from such a pure place, like I said earlier.
Yeah. So, on the afternoon of October 11th, 1944, Georgette met up with her father's secretary, Rose Gilbert, and they had some lunch together.
They went to the beauty parlor.
They did a little shopping.
It seems like they were, like, friendly.
Yeah. And they parted ways a little after 2 p .m. Georgette had actually just bought a plane ticket to visit her new boyfriend, Jerry Brown, a soldier.
who was stationed at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.
According to Rose Gilbert, Georgette was, quote, in good health and gay spirits.
After her lunch with Rose, Georgette went home to change and she headed to her shift at the Hollywood Canteen.
When June, her friend, arrived at the canteen, she found Georgette in the parking lot knitting in her car.
That's adorable. That's so cute.
While she waited for her friend to arrive for their shift to start.
June later told reporters she seemed very happy but a little nervous.
But Georgette explained she was nervous because she was really excited about going to El Paso in the coming days.
For the most part, their shift at the canteen was pretty ordinary, but June did tell police that there was a, quote, dark husky soldier who had been harassing Georgette all throughout the night and who, quote, insisted on jitterbugging with Georgette against her wishes.
That sentence is everything.
Jitterbugging with someone against their wishes.
I know that is an actual thing.
I know that jitterbugging is a dance.
So doing that against somebody's wishes is not awesome at all.
No, of course not. It's the sentence.
But the way that that sentence structure is laid out, I just have to point out because we're all feeling it.
We are. That that is a funny sentence.
No, I'm so glad you did because I was thinking the exact same thing.
Yeah. It's just the sentence.
Actual thing that happened, not funny.
Sentence, funny. Like jitterbugging with someone against their wishes seems like it would be like a funny thing.
It seems like it would be a card in Cards Against Humanity.
Yeah, like I'm going to jitterbug you against your wishes.
You know, like you seem like you're just being like, ha ha.
LOL. But no, you're not.
No, it's awful in real life.
Yeah, it's not great at all.
So just, again, act not good.
Sentence, hilarious.
According to June Ziegler, Georgette liked the waltzes, the dreamy kind, and I had never seen her jitterbug before.
I love that she loved the dreamy waltzes.
Yeah. She seems like such a romantic.
Oh my God, she does.
Doesn't she? she really speaks to my soul yeah i feel that way i don't think i would jitterbug with people either like she does she seems like she's just that girl like she seems like she would love lana del rey yeah if she was around now doesn't she like she would be a summertime sadness kind of kind of girl speak to my soul some more she sounds cool she does sound cool i would want to be her friend i do want to be her friend yeah now at several points throughout the evening june saw her friend politely declining this man's invitations but georgette did finally give in I think it sounds like
just to make this guy go away.
She was like, fine, I'll fucking jitterbug with you.
Which she absolutely shouldn't have had to do.
No. That's fucked up.
But after that, there were no more incidents and the evening wrapped up with Georgette leaving through the side door around 1130 that night and driving herself home.
As far as anybody could remember, she was alone when she left the canteen and there was nobody in her car when she pulled out of the lot.
Okay. Just her. Now, this is really awful.
The next morning, October 12th, Lulu Atwood arrived at the El Palacio Apartments in West Hollywood.
Where she worked daily cleaning the apartments in the Spanish -style apartment complex. When Lulu reached the Bowerdorf apartment, she found the front door unlocked and slightly ajar.
So, immediately, that was pretty weird. Yeah.
So, she knocked a couple times before entering, and she called out, before she finally did go in because nobody was answering.
Although the apartment appeared to be vacant, as she expected it would be, Lulu felt like she could hear water dripping somewhere on the second floor, so she went up the stairs to investigate.
and assuming that obviously the dripping was coming from the bathroom she pushed open the bathroom door and discovered the lifeless body of georgia bowerdorf lying face down in the tub her face and head half submerged in a shallow pool of pink tinged water lulu started screaming like could not believe what she was what was in front of her and that brought up the janitor at the el palacio who heard her screaming and it also happened to be her her husband.
Oh, wow. They cleaned together, and the two called police.
Investigators arrived at the scene a short time later, and after a brief survey of the apartment, they initially suspected the death was accidental.
I'm sorry, what? They assumed Georgette had slipped in the bathroom and hit her head when she fell, hence the blood that had seeped into the water.
I don't know about that.
However, that theory quickly went out of the window when one of the officers noticed that each apartment had a motion sensor light outside the front door that went off whenever someone walked by.
And he was like, he realized the light outside of Georgette's door failed to turn on when anyone was near.
He was like, why was that going on?
So he pulled up a chair to investigate the fixture, and when he reached for the bulb, he realized it was not malfunctioning, but had in fact been, quote, carefully unscrewed two turns to the left, just loose enough to no longer stronger automatically activate.
Oh, that's sinister.
It gives me and immediately reminds me of the strangers.
Yeah. When they turn the bulb.
Yeah. And it won't turn on, obviously.
And he turns it back and it's like, what the fuck?
Like, why did that happen?
Which for some reason, they just like, in that movie, it drives me crazy that they don't immediately leave. Yeah, I'd be like, bye.
If I found that somebody had done that, fuck that.
Bye. See ya. But that is sinister.
So sinister. Now, whether it had been done before or after Georgette's death wasn't exactly clear.
But either way, somebody wanted to make sure the apartment would be dark and that they wouldn't be seen, either entering or exiting.
Once they determined that the death was no accident, other aspects of this scene began to make more sense.
After pulling Georgette's body from the tub, investigators noticed she had what appeared to be a piece of washcloth or bath towel stuffed deeply into her mouth.
What? In the adjoining bedroom, there were bloodstains on on the floor which looked like somebody had tried to clean up though investigators couldn't determine whether they had resulted from the attack or not but they assumed most likely yeah they also found blood stains on the bed and the room was in total disarray this is a quote the bed clothes were pulled back georgette's clothing was scattered over the bed and chairs and the contents of her purse were strewn over the floor oh that's so chilling which i was like but you guys like walked through the bedroom first and thought it was an accident
and you were like wow messy girl girl must have fallen in the bathroom she's just she you know blood on the floor and then it took the light outside for you to like what what there were blood stains on the bed on the bed on the floor come on like what so now going to the motive like why did this happen yeah whatever the killer had been looking for when they searched georgette's purse it was not money there was actually a large amount of expensive jewelry on the dresser and a ton of other valuable items that that were really easily accessible all throughout the apartment.
That's even more unsettling.
None of which had been touched.
Like, nothing. Yeah.
Among the things that had fallen out of the purse was a note in Georgette's handwriting that read, June and I have date to go to the Hollywood canteen tonight, Wednesday.
And it's just, like, that's so sad.
It's like a cute little...
Just, like, plans for the future.
Also missing was the 1936 green coupe that Georgette shared with her sister, Connie, and the keys were nowhere to be found in the apartment.
Oh. Other than the disheveled state of the bedroom, though, there didn't appear to be a struggle anywhere else in the apartment, and it didn't seem like Georgette had entertained any guests after arriving home from the Hollywood canteen.
Okay. So that was all a little bit weird. Because like you said, everyone said that they didn't see her leave with anyone and they didn't see anyone in her car.
Exactly. life doesn't happen bi -weekly so why should payday the money that you earn can be in your hands today with earnin earnin is an app that gives you access to your pay as you work up to 150 dollars per day with a max of 750 between paydays just download the earnin app and verify your paycheck, then access up to $150 a day as you work and leave an optional tip.
Any money you access plus tips are automatically repaid from your next paycheck.
I feel like you should have your money as you earn it and earn and makes that possible.
You want to go out for a little date night and spend your money.
You know, sometimes things pop up unexpectedly.
I would hate this for you, but you might have to go to the vet and drop some cash there.
You need the cash when you need the cash download earnin today spelled e -a -r -n -i -n in the google play or apple app store when you download the earnin app type in morbid under podcast when you sign up it will really help the show morbid under podcast earnin is a financial technology company not a bank cashouts are based on your available earnings standard cashouts take one to two business days with no mandatory fees option to expedite your transfer for free tips are voluntary and don't affect the service see the cashout user agreement for details services not available in all states Summer is in full
swing. Whether you're traveling, taking kids to summer camp, or heading to the pool, we are all looking for ways to stay healthy and save money this summer.
With GoToRx, you can save up to 80 % on prescriptions for you and your family.
Pets, too. Check GoToRx before every single trip to the pharmacy for big savings on both brand and generic medications.
GoToRx is free and it's easy to use.
Just search for your prescription on the website or the app, compare prices, and get a free coupon to show your pharmacist. Use GoodRx to save at over 70 ,000 local pharmacies nationwide, including Walmart, Walgreens, CBS, Publix, Kroger, and many more.
And now, you can enroll in GoodRx rewards and earn points every time that you use a coupon at the pharmacy.
Remember, GoodRx is not insurance, but it works whether you have insurance or not, and it could even beat your insurance co -pay price.
Today, I saved $5 on a prescription for my grandpa because I pulled up the GoodRx app and I said, look at this.
So you could save too.
Save at the pharmacy this summer with GoodRx.
Go to GoodRx .com slash morbid.
That's GoodRx .com slash morbid.
Given the victim's high profile and her connection, however tenuous to well -known Hollywood figures, investigators quickly mobilized to investigate the murder, luckily.
In his first press conference, Inspector William Penrose told reporters, There are still a few elements of the mystery that I can't explain, indicating that he would provide more information following the results of an autopsy.
Now, when detectives were able to reach George Bowerdorf by phone in New York, he insisted his daughter's death had to be an accident, telling police she suffered from cramps and heartaches and refused to go to a doctor.
So he thought this was like a medical issue or something like that, and they were like, they had to tell him what had actually happened to her.
The autopsy definitely determined that Georgette's death was not an accident.
According to the county autopsy technician, Frank Webb, despite being found face down in the water, there was actually no evidence that Georgette had died by drowning.
Rather, she had died of, quote, strangulation from a wedge of towel stuffed down her throat.
So that is bleak. That is horrific.
Horrific. Suffocated.
Suffocated. By having towels shoved down her throat.
Yeah. Oh. Like, it makes you have to take a deep breath.
I can't even imagine.
Oh, that's, oh, I can't even.
That is so brutal and vile.
That's the thing. That's, like, really brutal.
It is. Webb estimated that the death had occurred about 8 to 12 hours prior to when Georgette's body was discovered, and her stomach contents indicated that she'd eaten a snack of canned hand -stringed beads, and melon an hour or two before she died.
So it seemed like she just left work, went home.
Had a snack. Had a snack.
She had changed into her PJs.
Like, normal night.
Like, was just getting ready for bed, really, it seemed like.
So somebody just came in this house.
Now, trigger warning for sexual assault here.
In addition to the cause of death, the autopsy noted that Georgette had experienced a rather violent sexual assault just before her death, which explained why she was discovered wearing only her pajama top while the bottoms were found at the foot of the bed she had abrasions on her hands and her face and the knuckles on her right hand quote were smashed and bruised other injuries included a large contusion on the right side of her head quote as could be caused by a fist blow my god and in a similar injury on her abdomen on her right thigh and this is particularly bleak webb found a quote bruised
imprint of a hand even Even to the fingernail marks piercing the skin.
My God. This person is like a monster, like a rabid animal.
Literally. What the fuck?
And like that's from like holding her down, you would assume.
And like the force with which they must have been holding her.
To bruise someone? To bruise down to the fingernails.
And it seems like she fought like hell.
To the nail, it seems. For her knuckles to be all bruised and smashed.
Like she was, oh, and that's even worse.
And she had clearly tried to get away and that's why there were contusions.
And she's in an apartment too.
i'm like did anyone hear anything yeah oh no yep from what investigators could tell georgette had left the hollywood canteen around 11 30 that night and arrived home about 10 or 15 minutes later where like i said earlier she changed into pajamas and made herself a snack just getting ready for bed yeah and this timeline was supported by georgette's downstairs neighbor who told police he heard the sound of high heels on the floor just a little after 11 30 followed shortly by a quote crash as if somebody dropped a tray or something and then silence so you can understand why he didn't investigate
your neighbors drop shit all the time oh yeah if you live in an apartment building you hear shit like that you're not calling the police for every like small like a crash that you're probably waiting a second to be like do I hear anything else like maybe that was just someone dropping something according to her friends Georgette was a creature of habit and this was all in keeping with her bedtime routine which is why everyone who knew her insisted that that she wouldn't have let her attacker in the apartment willingly at that hour.
They, quote, swore Georgette would have never entertained while in her pajamas.
So, like, she wouldn't have opened the door in her pajamas.
Yeah, she was ready to go to sleep.
This seems like it was just she was doing what she does before bed.
Yeah. And somebody surprised her, it sounds like.
And you want to say, like, did somebody break in, but then you think she had given her keys to people previously.
Unfortunately, yeah.
unfortunately. Around 2 .30 a .m., now this is when I'm like, another of Georgette's neighbors was awoken when he heard a woman screaming in one of the nearby apartments.
He later told a reporter, I sat right up in bed and listened.
It was a feminine voice screaming, stop, stop, you're killing me.
Then I didn't hear anymore and I decided it was just a family row.
It was just a family row and she's yelling, stop, stop, you're killing me?
Even if It's a family row.
That's called domestic violence, fucker.
Call someone. And, like.
Call someone. It's a different time.
People didn't want to get involved in shit, but, like.
It's a different time, but you still have a goddamn brain in your head, don't you?
Stop, stop, you're killing me.
I'm sorry. I hear someone yelling, stop, stop, you're killing me.
I'm at least calling to be, like, I don't know what's going on, but.
This is where I heard this.
This is what I heard. This was, unfortunately, the last time anyone would hear anything from Georgia at Bowerdorf.
Oh, that's awful. That's awful.
Truly. That's, like, really upsetting.
that everything about it is upsetting but hearing that somebody heard her screaming stop stop you're killing and for them their reason to be i thought it was a you mean you thought it was somebody beating their wife and i just didn't want to get involved and you just didn't want to get involved in that when she's saying you're killing me come on dude on another level so if you heard the next day that some wife had been beaten to death by her husband would you be like well it was a family row Wow.
No. No, not at all.
That irritates me. Same.
After the scene was processed and statements were taken, investigators determined the only things that were missing were $100 from Georgette's purse and Connie's green coupe, the car that they both shared.
The car was discovered actually later that afternoon, about 12 miles from the apartment on San Pedro Street, excuse me, out of gas with the keys still in the ignition.
The car was immediately processed for fingerprint evidence to be compared with the, quote -unquote, thousands of fingerprints collected from the apartment with the hope that they could later match the prints to a suspect.
Yeah, they're hoping it's somebody who had been in the apartment before left fingerprints this time.
Yeah. And then they're on the car, which, good police work for the time.
Yeah, for the time, for sure.
Aside from the blood evidence on the floor that the killer had apparently tried to clean up, there was also a number of cigarettes stubbed out on the living room floor that also likely belonged to the killer, since Georgette didn't smoke.
Yeah. And most importantly, her diary was discovered among the scattered bedclothes.
Wow. Georgette was known to keep detailed records of her dating and social activities, so investigators hoped that the book, which contained scores of references to civilians and servicemen, would provide as a lead to identify the killer.
Yeah. Like any kind of lead.
I mean, if she's keeping those kind of records.
Based on everything investigators had learned about Georgette's life, they concluded that the killer was not someone she was close to, but was more likely somebody who she had recently met and extended some amount of generosity or hospitality towards, which, when you think about that, her killer was likely someone she met just recently and was kind to.
Yeah. And had, like, maybe given somewhere to stay, maybe helped them out in some way.
Wild. Yeah. Absolutely wild.
Rose Gilbert, her father's secretary, told investigators about Georgette's tendency to give rides to soldiers, saying she She had the means to do it, and she was interested in servicemen.
She used to show them the sights and foot the bills.
Aw. Given what they learned, investigators focused their investigation on the men that she'd been seen with at the canteen on the night of the murder, starting with the soldier who kept cutting in on her all the time and forcing her to jitterbug with him.
Yeah. Although the pool of potential suspects was really quite large, there being soldiers actually worked to the benefit of the investigators because they could narrow their focus.
As Dowd points out, quote, any soldier who missed curfew would have been noted down as going AWOL, which allowed detectives to rule out large pools of suspects, which that's pretty interesting.
Yeah, that is a good way of doing it.
It is. Yeah. This included the dark and husky soldier who had harassed Georgette all night, later identified as Captain Cosmo Volpe.
Oh. He was confirmed as having been back at the base during the window that Georgette was believed to have been murdered.
Oh, interesting. So he was just kind of a creep, not a murderer.
Just being a creep that night, but not a murdering creep.
Yes. Having ruled out so many men so quickly, within a week of the murder, investigators found themselves at what appeared to be a dead end in the investigation with their most significant evidence, fingerprints collected from the scene proving to be virtually worthless.
Oh. Yeah. The only match between the prince in the car and the prince in the apartment were Georgette's.
Oh, man. Yeah. Yeah.
And the only suspects they had thus far, two soldiers and part -time janitors at the El Palacio apartments, had offered solid alibis and they were released from custody soon after being brought in for questioning.
So every time it seems like, you know, like June tells them, there was this weird soldier that was like forcing her to dance with him all night, they check that out, he's got an alibi.
He checks out. They find these two janitors who also happen to be soldiers, alibi.
yep now after less than a week the large pool of servicemen suspects had been whittled down to none and the theory of the killer being a soldier was actually pretty much abandoned oh wow about five days into the investigation detectives received a letter from a soldier in sacramento who claimed to have received a ride from georgette between 11 p .m and midnight on the evening she was killed huh this soldier explained that the driver of the car matched the descriptions and photos that he'd seen of Georgette in the papers, and she had excitedly told him about her plans to visit her boyfriend in Texas
in the days that followed. Oh, yeah.
So he had insider information.
After ruling him out as a suspect, investigators were confident that the killer wasn't a soldier from the canteen because Georgette had been alone when she picked this guy up and presumably then drove home immediately after dropping him off.
Yeah, and look at her.
She's picking up hitchhiker soldiers.
Like, she's even giving them rides.
Yeah. Yeah. When the investigation began, there seemed to be a wealth of suspects and leads.
But just a week later, nearly all of those leads and suspects had been ruled out or shown themselves to be worthless.
And detectives found themselves at really a loss for where to go next.
The predominant theory was that Georgette's killer had arrived to the apartment shortly after she'd gotten back from work, allowing her time to get into her pajamas and then eat something.
And then after unscrewing the bulb outside the door, he somehow convinced her to let him inside, where he attacked and sexually assaulted her in the bedroom, stuffing a piece of towel in her mouth to prevent her from screaming.
and once he realized that she'd been strangled to death the killer threw her body in the bathtub turned on the water tried to clean up quickly and then turned out her purse in search of her car keys and flood the apartment and took the money too given that a considerable number of values have been left behind it's most likely and the detectives believe that the motive was most likely it seems like it was i think the car was incidental it was just to get away And I honestly think the fact that she died was not what this person intended, actually.
I think it was like, oh, shit.
Exactly. Yeah. Which is so sad.
So without any new evidence, investigators began to consider alternative theories as to how Georgette died and turned to the last person to have seen her alive, who was Sergeant Gordon Adland, the serviceman who she picked up hitchhiking on her way home.
He had been cleared as a suspect and detectives didn't think he was involved.
But something he said in his letter made them wonder if the crime had occurred somewhere else.
Because according to him, when Georgette let him out of the car, quote, she turned north of Sunset Boulevard, which would have taken her into the Hollywood Hills or into San Fernando Valley instead of back to her apartment.
So she took a weird turn.
So investigators theorized that she could have traveled to the valley to meet a serviceman that she had met earlier that evening.
And after attacking and killing her, quote, he might have driven with her body in the car to her apartment to set a stage to baffle the later investigation.
I don't know about that.
It's a little shaky for me.
Yeah, that one. I don't think so.
That seems, that's messy.
That's a messy, I don't like that one.
Very tenuous. Yeah, it doesn't seem likely.
No. I'd be shocked if that was the case.
I don't think it is.
The new theory was developed when detectives reversed their earlier belief and once again established that the murder was most likely committed by a serviceman.
Wow. And this was based on the coroner's discovery that the cloth removed from Georgette's throat was actually an elastic cotton bandage, not a washcloth, the kind used by servicemen in the military.
Oh. Mm -hmm. Interesting.
But the problem with this theory that, you know, she had met somebody, gotten killed, and then they drove her back to the apartment.
Gotten killed elsewhere, like the blood.
It ignored all the other evidence, like you were just going to say.
In order for this to have been the case, one, the killer would have had to spend time at the scene smoking cigarettes.
Yeah. And remember, like you were just saying, somebody transferred blood onto the floor.
And the bed. And the bed, which obviously happened during a fight there.
Yeah, absolutely. And it also ignored the fact that Georgette had clearly been home long enough to eat something before the killer arrived.
Exactly. They said at least like an hour.
Right. And the fact that her neighbors had heard her on at least two occasions.
Saying, stop, stop, you're going to kill me.
Exactly. So given that, this theory was quickly abandoned.
I'm glad. Which was the fact that they even were like, maybe.
Well, I even bring that one up.
Yeah. Like, you're ignoring everything.
That's one of those you bring up out loud to the rest of the investigators.
And as you're saying it, you go, I now realize that this is definitely not the case.
Nice, but I had to say it out loud.
Yeah, as you're saying it, you're like, I'm not going to finish that one.
No, just had to say it to you guys.
Let's not let it leave this room.
Yeah. In 1920, a broke immigrant in Boston became one of America's richest, most infamous men practically overnight.
He swindled the modern equivalent of a quarter billion dollars and etched his name into history as the mastermind behind one of the most notorious scams ever, the Ponzi scheme.
Hosted by Maya Lau and featuring award -winning comedian and actor Sebastian Maniscalco, this is Easy Money, The Charles Ponzi Story, an Apple Original podcast produced by Atwill Media.
Follow and listen on Apple Podcasts.
While the second theory had been dismissed as far -fetched, it still emphasized the fact that But aside from the unusual nature of the bandage, investigators had almost no evidence or leads that would point them toward the killer.
So as a result, they began grasping for any ideas that could explain the murder and possibly point them in a new direction.
Two weeks after Georgette's death, Lieutenant Garner Brown, one of the lead investigators on the case, held a press conference where he laid out yet another new theory.
According to him, Georgette at times failed to draw the curtains and her slayer may have watched her preparations to retire before gaining entrance to the Hollywood apartment where she was raped and strangled.
That, that to me seems more likely.
That seems plausible to me for sure.
Whatever the killer's motivation or trigger event, the trail quickly went cold and by the end of October, the investigation had completely stalled out.
The story had all but disappeared from papers.
But then, on December 28th.
Hey, my birthday. Your birthday.
22 -year -old former Navy seaman John Sumter walked into the FBI in their office in San Francisco.
I just walked into the FBI. Just walked into the FBI. And confessed to the murder of Georgette Bauerdorf.
According to him, they had met on a streetcar earlier that day.
He told her he was out of money and looking for work.
He said, she told me this was no time for a man to be broke because there were jobs everywhere that sounds like her yeah right and he claimed that the two then arranged to meet another soldier at her apartment later that night and a little after midnight when the other soldier left georgette's apartment he attacked and killed her and then fled the apartment any hope that he was the killer quickly faded after hearing his story which contradicted literally all of the evidence and information collected so far.
Inspector Frank Ahern told the press, Obviously, all are repetitions of the magazine article.
Yeah. Referring to the magazine that he was quite literally holding when he entered the FBI's office.
Awesome. Yeah. He's very mentally ill, man.
Yeah. Obviously. It turned out he had been dishonorably discharged from the military before being court -martialed for Czech fraud, and it appeared he was just seeking attention when he confessed to the murder.
The next day, the press reported the incident, describing him as a, quote, slack -jawed, shabbily dressed man who had 20 cents in cash and a check for 1 .5 million dollars signed by himself and made to cash in his pockets.
Wow. Yeah. Okay. Two days later, the L .A.
County deputy sheriff held a press conference where he declared Sumter a phony and told reporters, I'm not, I'm satisfied he's not the man.
Oh, her poor family.
And to get hope that maybe there was going to be some kind of justice.
Yeah. According to a spokesperson for the sheriff's department, Sumpter explained that he had confessed to the murder because he, quote, wanted to, he said, I wanted to die in the chair because I had nothing to live for, but I was afraid to commit suicide.
Wow, that's really sad.
Yeah. Like, it's not, it doesn't excuse what he did, but it's like.
No, but what a sad.
Wow, that's awful. Way to exist. Yeah.
Yeah. So he was held on a charge of vagrancy and police in San Francisco expected that after going before a judge, he would be sent to, quote, a psychopathic ward at San Francisco Hospital for observation.
Yeah. It's a very sad end there.
Yeah. And once the story of his confession receded from the headlines, the case once again went cold for several months until a strange new lead gave investigators reason to hope that this case might soon be solved.
In late September of 1945, a schoolgirl in Los Angeles discovered what investigators described as a rambling note in which the writer confessed to being Georgette's killer.
This letter was typewritten.
So weird. It was typewritten and smeared in what appeared to be iodine stains.
Oh. And the note read, To the Los Angeles police, almost a year ago, Georgette Bauerdorf, age 20, Hollywood canteen hostess, was murdered in her apartment in West Hollywood.
Between now and October 11th, a year after her death, the one who murdered her will appear at the Hollywood canteen.
The murderer will be in uniform.
He has since committed the murder, been in action at Okinawa.
The murder of Georgette Bauerdorf was divine retribution.
Let the Los Angeles police arrest the murderer if they can.
What the fuck? It was very strange.
Lieutenant Garner Brown declared that the note was likely prepared by a youthful prankster.
But the police still kept an eye on a Hollywood canteen just to be sure, which had since closed.
It wasn't even open.
Oh, wow. The author of the note was never identified.
They never found anybody outside the Hollywood canteen.
And Brown's theory of a hoax was believed to have been true.
Jeez. This reminds me of like, it's very Black Dahlia -esque.
Strange you should mention that.
Oh, is that part of this?
We are going to touch on that very briefly.
That is really, you're a little psychic over there.
It's like a very, it just has that vibe to it, like the Hollywood of it all.
Forties. The forties of it all.
And then all these people confessing to it, like that's a strange thing, you know, like it's very much. So the final new lead that year came when investigators arrested 61 -year -old Henry Lynch, a plumber and quote -unquote self -appointed sleuth, who claimed he had been collecting evidence for the past year and was not able to solve the case.
Oh. In the days leading up to his arrest, he had just been seen loitering outside of the apartments where Georgette had lived.
And whenever he was asked what he was doing there, he said he was working on the Bauerdorf case.
After investigating his alibi and talking to family members, they determined that Lynch was what would today be described as a citizen investigator.
And he was released from custody and just told to stay away from the apartment complex. He's somebody who would be like on the internet trying to solve a case.
Exactly. yeah the final suspect in the case was questioned in 1950 when police arrested corporal chester vucas in sausalito vucas was believed to have strangled an 18 year old woman on a public foot path in los angeles and investigators thought that there were enough similarities between the cases that he could possibly be the killer but when they arrived in sausalito they discovered that he would have only been 16 years old at the time that georgette was murdered and while it wasn't completely out of the question they just felt he was very unlikely to be the killer yeah I don't I'm like we've
heard a lot of 16 I mean 16 year olds can be very adult when it comes to what the shit they do exactly so I know I'm like I feel like maybe that was thrown out I get why they're like it would be a little unlikely but like we can't really you can't totally throw that out the window you don't know what kind of 16 year old he was and I don't know his build or anything thing like that like i you see 16 year olds and you're like you're 16 like yeah like you look like a giant exactly uh a short time later though he was also acquitted of the murder of the woman and the young woman in los angeles oh so i
think maybe that one hand yeah that probably helped now when the investigation into georgette bauerdorf's murder began detectives felt like they had more than enough evidence to find the killer but just a few months later when that suspect pool started narrowing down and with all the evidence stripped away all they really had was a few cigarette butts and some fingerprints that had no matches and an unusual bandage that was used in the murder yeah so with no more leads or evidence to be found the case quickly went cold and by the end of the decade it was just shelved alongside countless other
murders in los angeles open but inactive oh that's so infuriating but when the dead and mutilated body of actress elizabeth short aka the black dahlia was discovered in a vacant lot in la a few years later some in law enforcement and the press actually thought there may have been a connection between the two huh and that was based largely on the fact that the main suspect in the black dahlia case also would have had access to the medical grade bandage used in georgette's death ah but that theory has mostly been debunked ah today georgette's murder remains unsolved and unlike the black dahlia and so many
other high -profile hollywood murders it's really been mostly forgotten by the public.
Yeah. So that's why I wanted to pick this one and talk about it.
It's not because I've never heard of it.
I had neither. I was looking for cases actually on TikTok and I found a couple videos that talked about her.
And I was like, I've never heard of that.
And Dave and I started looking into it and I was like, it's enough for an episode.
Yeah. And who knows?
Absolutely. Somebody could still be alive.
Yeah. You never know.
Saw something that night or.
You never know. I hope that hopefully someday it gets solved.
Oh, poor Georgette.
I I know, it's a really sad story.
Like I said, she just seemed like a cool girl who would have liked Delana Del Rey.
Yeah. And just, like...
She would have had, like, a charity set up by now, I think.
She was just that girl that was like, ah, I got coffee today, don't worry about it.
Yeah, exactly. Or, like, you're down on your luck, and she's like, crash on my couch. Yeah, she's like, whatever, don't worry about it.
She just seemed like a really, like, empathetic person.
What a horrific end.
Horrific end. Yeah, it's really awful.
Wow. So, yeah, that one was really sad, and I'm sorry.
It really was. But again, I hope it gets solved someday.
I do too. You never know.
Yeah. But in the meantime, we hope you keep listening.
And we hope you keep it weird. But I swear that you give anybody the keys to your apartment.
Don't do that. Don't do that.
If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad -free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
Prime members can listen ad -free on Amazon Music.
Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery .com slash survey.
zone to the breakfast aisle with three cereal -loving wide receivers, Justin Jefferson, Aman Ra St. Brown, and Jamar Chase.
You can find these football stars on limited edition cereal boxes of Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Lucky Charms, Honey Nut Cheerios, and Reese's Puff cereal starting in August. And don't miss out on Justin Jefferson's Jetta's Mix, a fruity fusion of of frosted lemon Cheerios and cinnamon toast crunched strawberry for a limited time only.
Be sure to score them all, where every bite tastes like a touchdown.
