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Ah, June. Roses are blooming. Wedding bells are ringing. Brides and grooms across the country* are preparing to say “I do.” But darker stories can lie beneath the smiles, flowers, and
vows. In this edition of Vintage Crime Gazette, we look back at four weddings that serve as reminders that not every walk down the aisle leads to happily ever after. *October dethroned June as America's most popular wedding month in 2019.
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Life on the Farm Isn’t for Everyone
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BURLINGTON, VERMONT, May 16, 1936 – Marie Dore and Wilfred Hamlin were enjoying a breakfast reception – their wedding took place at 7 a.m. – when one of the guests excused herself to meet someone outside. The wedding party heard two loud bangs. They thought someone was popping balloons. Then came the scream.
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They found Eva Lacourse, 24, on the stairway outside the
apartment, bleeding from bullet wounds to the abdomen and chest. The shooter was Maurice Poulin, 30. Eva had recently broken off their engagement because she didn’t want to live with him on his family’s farm. That’s where Poulin fled after the attack. On a bridge over the Browns River, he shot himself in the chest and fell into the water. He survived the plunge and recovered from the gunshot wound at a hospital. Eva succumbed. Poulin pleaded insanity at his trial. Jurors convicted him
of second-degree murder and sentenced him to life in prison. Eight years into his sentence, Poulin hanged himself in the
prison boiler room.
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‘Absolute Dumbness’ST. LOUIS, July 3, 1937 – Marie Porter would do anything to prevent her 38-year-old brother, Bill Kappen, from marrying. Indeed, she made history. It’s not that Marie (right) disliked Bill’s betrothed, Irene Traub. Rather, Marie knew Bill would remove her as beneficiary of his $3,300 life insurance policy if he and Irene tied the knot. |
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Bill Kappen’s body lies beneath a sheet where it was found near Belleville, Illinois, on the day Kappen was to marry Irene Traub. She identified the body. (Photo: Belleville Daily Advocate)
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When the wedding day arrived, Bill was a no-show. That night, Irene learned a man had been found dead on a rural road across the Mississippi River in Illinois. She identified the body as Bill’s. He had been shot in the left temple. Suspicion quickly focused on Marie, 39, a widowed mother of four, and her 22-year-old lover, Ralph Giancola.
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Ralph (left) confessed that Marie offered him $800 to kill her brother. Judge Dick Mudge sentenced the two to death, saying, “This case was conceived in absolute dumbness.” Marie and Ralph were executed on January 28, 1938. Marie became the only woman to die in the state’s electric chair and just the second woman ever executed in Illinois. The state abolished the death penalty in 2011. |
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TACOMA, WASHINGTON, February 23, 1940 – Hale and Myra Nosler were celebrating the start of their honeymoon when someone knocked on their front door. It was John Ord, a Tacoma firefighter who had been Myra’s
common-law husband for the past decade.
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Ord aimed a pistol at Nosler and pulled the trigger, but Myra jumped between the two men and took the slug in the stomach. Nosler attacked the intruder but was beaten with a poker and shot. |
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Myra would tell police that Nosler (right) was still alive as Ord drenched him with kerosene and turned him into a human torch. The resulting fire killed Nosler and burned down the house. |
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Ord (left) took Myra to a hospital, but she died a few days later. Ord was sentenced to life for the two murders but served only 14 years. He died in 1964. |
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DENVER, COLORADO, September 10, 1947 – It took just three days for 17-year-old Gertrude McNabb to realize her marriage to Charles Geiser was a terrible mistake. She left his Denver apartment, moved back in with her sister
and asked Geiser for an annulment. |
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Geiser, 6 years older than Gertrude, was a former Air Force mechanic taking courses at Denver University. Gertrude was a car hop. Two weeks after she left him, Geiser bought a pistol and confronted Gertrude at her sister’s place. He became enraged seeing her in the same blue dress she wore at their wedding. |
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When he pointed the gun at her, she cried, “Oh, Chuck!” He slowly recited “until – death – do – us – part,” punctuating each word of the wedding vow with a blast from the weapon. A jury rejected Geiser’s insanity plea, and a judge sentenced him to 45 years to life for second-degree murder. He was freed within 15 years and moved to California. He even got married again – to a woman 6 years older than he.
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Dan Williams and M. J. Van Deventer are the authors of the forthcoming historical true crime book Madeline Gets Life, to be released by Level Best Books in May 2027. If you enjoyed this issue of Vintage Crime Gazette, please forward it to a friend or two. Subscribing is easy — and free. Just click the red button below. Missed an issue? Browse the Newsletter Archive.
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