In Search of the American Sherlock Holmes: Tracking down Ellis Parker and the Second Lindbergh Kidnapping. A literary true adventure by John Reisinger

Court House

Chapter 4- A Safari to the Garden State- Part 2   "Oh, Geez. What do I do with this?"   We were standing in front of the Burlington County Office Building about to go in to see the Surrogate. Inside the door we could see a metal detector when I realized I had a pen knife in my pocket. Getting arrested might put a damper on the trip, so I decided to hide the knife in a flowerbed and hope they didn`t have surveillance cameras. We got in without any trouble.    The Surrogate was an old timer. He was delighted to talk about Ellis Parker and the old days. He told us about how Ellis Parker knew everyone in town and how people would come to him for all kinds of things. He gave us the name of a local lawyer whose father had testified as a character witness at Parker`s trial. I made a note to look him up. He found Parker`s last will and testament for us, a handy document that listed all Parker`s children.    While we were there we stopped by the present Chief of Detective`s office. The heir of Ellis Parker was a modern high-tech sort of a lawman. He was aware of Ellis Parker, but had no new insights and could produce no files. Such files as there were had probably been lost when the office was moved, he said, but we might want to check with his predecessor, who was Chief of Detectives in the 1960s and had inherited Ellis Parker`s secretary. He might have some memorabilia and some stories.   When we left the county offices, we went by the old Elks Club next to the old courthouse. The Elks, I had learned, was Parker`s favorite hang-out, and he could often be found there with various cronies. The Elks Club was closed and dark. I pressed my nose against the glass and only saw a small lobby, but I made a note to stop by again. After all, Ellis Parker spent a lot of time here, so I wanted to see what it looked like inside.   Our next stop was Ellis Parker`s old house. The articles had been less than precise. One said it was across from the courthouse and another said it was across from the jail. All agreed it was a three story Victorian mansion on High Street. We looked at several likely suspects until we came to one across from the jail. The sign on the front identified it as the Parker Building. The big and gloomy brick building had been chopped up into offices and apartments, and a bicycle was parked on a third floor balcony. In an effort to add more rentable space to a building that was large to begin with, someone had added a faux stucco addition to the front. It was not an architectural success, looking something like a haunted house mating with a Taco Bell.   "I guess it`s just as well Ellis Parker is dead," I said. "If he saw this, it`d kill him."   Still, the place showed some signs of the elegance it once had. There were fancy Victorian gables, some surviving gingerbread trim, graceful windows, and a slate roof.

The Parker House

At lunch at the local Friendly`s we looked at the will again and noticed the address was given as a place on Garden Street several blocks away.   "It looks like the Parker clan relocated," I said. "Let`s see what the new place looks like."   A few minutes later we were driving slowly down Garden Street looking at a string of much more modest houses. Finally we saw the one mentioned in the will, a neat two story white house with a wide front porch. It looked as if some time late in Ellis`s career, the Parker family had decided to live more modestly for some reason.   "Hey, there`s some guy out in the front yard raking leaves," Barbara said. "Why don`t you go talk to him?" "I can`t just accost a stranger about someone who lived in his house 50 years ago," I protested. "Of course you can," she replied. "Besides, he`s raking leaves. Even talking to you has to be an improvement over that." "Good point."   We pulled over to the curb and I got out and introduced myself. Garden Street must be a low crime area because the man was outgoing and friendly despite being interrupted by a stranger in an out of state vehicle.   "Do you know who used to live here?" I asked, fully expecting another Ellis who? conversation. The homeowner nodded. "Sure. Ellis Parker. His funeral was held here, too. He was laid out right in that living room. We bought the place from the Parker family in 1949." "Did you find any Ellis Parker artifacts when you moved in?" "Well there was one thing. Up in the attic they had left a box of old newspapers about the Lindbergh case." My heart started pounding. "Wow. What happened to them?" "Oh, I still have them. Do you want to see them?" Somehow I refrained from yelling "Hell yes!" and simply said "I sure would."   He led me in the back door to the kitchen where his wife looked only mildly surprised to see me. I sat in the living room and it looked very much as it must have when the Parkers were in residence. Momentarily, my host reappeared with a large cardboard box filled with old newspapers. I almost drooled. There must have been 20-30 of them; The Burlington Times, the Camden Evening Courier, the Philadelphia Inquirer and others, and they were all from the 1930s. Many of them featured front-page articles about Ellis Parker and his theory of the case. Some articles were underlined or circled, possibly by Ellis Parker himself. I looked through them for a few minutes, then said I would like to look at them in more detail at a more convenient time. After all, I had just dropped in unannounced, and there were probably limits to even my hosts` patience.   As I made my way to the hallway that led to the front door, I was startled by the sudden musical tones of a "Billy Bass" on the wall. "Now, I know that wasn`t here when you moved in," I said. Back at the car I told Barbara what had happened. "This is great. I`m sure glad I decided to talk to him." "You decided?" "Well, I agreed."   It was too late to look up former Chief of Detectives or the lawyer whose father knew Ellis Parker, because we had to make our last stop, the offices of the Courier-Journal in Cherry Hill outside of Camden. As we passed through Mt. Holly we noticed the Elks Club was still closed.   The Courier Journal offices gave me their clipping files on Ellis Parker. These consisted of dozens of clippings covering his trial in 1937. The articles went into considerable detail, even including big chunks of testimony. They even made copies of some of the articles free of charge. I would read them in detail later, but more pieces of the puzzle were falling into place.   "Well," I said. "We did pretty well on this trip. We`ll need to return to see the Lindbergh archives, go through the Garden Street newspapers, and talk to some more people, but this is a great start. It`s time to head home. The Jersey Turnpike awaits."   What secrets are in Ellis Parker's old newspapers?   Why did the family move?   Will the Elks Club ever be open?   Don't miss Chapter 5- Scraps and Pieces

Chapter 5

Home