Where is the body?

February 16, 1947
Los Angeles

Police and railroad officials continue their search today for Eugene Hamilton White, 31, tool company executive missing since Valentine’s Eve, when he cashed his paycheck and left his office en route to his Woodland Hills home.

His bloodstained car was discovered near a Southern Pacific loading spur and warehouse, between 50th and 51st Streets, Long Beach Avenue and Alameda Street, its top ripped open and window shattered. Inside, the man’s empty wallet, eyeglasses, overcoat and jacket, a heart-shaped box of Valentine’s candy, a silver belt, and a blood-soaked handkerchief wrapped around the end of a tire iron.

Police suspect the man was beaten and robbed, then thrown into a passing freight car. His distraught wife Elizabeth, waiting at 22034 Providencia with little Bette Gene and Eugene Jr., says her husband was devoted to the family, and she can think of no reason for him to disappear.

Published by

Kim Cooper

Kim Cooper is the creator of 1947project, the crime-a-day time travel blog that spawned Esotouric’s popular crime bus tours, including The Real Black Dahlia. She is the author of The Kept Girl, the acclaimed historical mystery starring the young Raymond Chandler and the real-life Philip Marlowe, and of The Raymond Chandler Map of Los Angeles. With husband Richard Schave, Kim curates the Salons and forensic science seminars of LAVA- The Los Angeles Visionaries Association. When the third generation Angeleno isn’t combing old newspapers for forgotten scandals, she is a passionate advocate for historic preservation of signage, vernacular architecture and writer’s homes. Kim was for many years the editrix of Scram, a journal of unpopular culture. Her books include Fall in Love For Life, Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth, Lost in the Grooves and an oral history of Neutral Milk Hotel.

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