Charlotte Livingston -- No Funeral Please

A self-described screenwriter who was being treated for a broken right arm at Harbor Sanitarium, a private hospital in New York City, Livingston jumped to her death from the ninth floor window of her room on May 1, 1934.  Earlier in the evening, Livingston, 35, had asked a nurse for a pencil and some paper.  A note found in her room addressed to "Gertrude and Pete" asked for forgiveness and added:  "No funeral please.  Turn my body over to the medical examiner at Bellevue."  Livingston was later identified as the former wife of Louis Livingston, a member of a prominent New York State family.

Adolph DeBerg -- Meet Judge Conscience

DeBerg, who claimed to be a film director and misrepresented himself as a field man for Universal Film Corporation, was in the lower California town of Calexico to supposedly begin shooting a Spanish talking picture titled Virgin Gold.  When the film fell through, he was subsequently wanted by police for passing two bad checks totaling $100.  On August 4, 1930, the body of the "director" was found beside a shock of hay in a small pasture in Calexico, the victim of a fatal dose of self-administered ant paste.  A note found on his body read:  "I've studied myself all over, and I'm nothing but an unmitigated scoundrel.  I've given myself a final trial and Judge Conscience, who is right always, has decreed the sentence of death.  I'm going to the movies again and then I'll end everything."  In an added postscript to the note, DeBerg concluded:  "The picture is over, and the lights are out for me."

Frank Holliday, Jr. -- Give Me a Break

Shortly after appearing on a radio program on August 3, 1948, the 35-year-old singer was arrested on suspicion of breaking into a service station on North La Brea Avenue and booked into the Hollywood Jail at 2:00 A.M. the next day.  Although Holliday had a police record dating back to 1935, he had stayed straight ever since serving a year in the County Jail for burglary in 1940.  According to the officers who apprehended the singer fleeing from the service station, Holliday said:  "I was walking around tonight, just looking around.  I was broke and didn't have any place to go.  I don't plan to burglarize the service station.  But I guess you fellows have caught me red-handed.  I would appreciate it if you would give me a break.  Would you be interested in $100 a piece to turn me loose and forget the whole thing?  This is the first time I have ever been in trouble and under arrest."  Less than an hour after being booked, Holliday's lifeless body was found in a holding cell hanging by his belt from a ceiling grille.

Lewis Harris Morphy -- The Crack Shot

Apparently depressed over the death of his mother two years earlier and the recent failure of a resort he owned in Tennessee, show business sharpshooter and stuntman Morphy, 54, murdered his wife and mother-in-law in their Hollywood Hills home on November 7, 1958.  One of the couple's three children present in the house at 2211 Stanley Hills Drive later told police that prior to the incident she heard Morphy mutter, "I've had enough.  This is it."  Around midnight, Morphy shot his wife, a 37-year-old former speedboat racing champion, in the head with a .25-caliber pistol.  When her mother came to investigate the disturbance, the 70 year old was fatally wounded when she fractured her skull against a corner of a table during a struggle with Morphy.  After phoning a friend to report that "I've lost everything," Morphy shot and killed himself at the foot of his wife's bed.

Lee D. Croft -- One Wild Ride

Croft, a brother of the treasurer of West Coast Theatre, Inc., was assistant manager of the Criterion Theatre in Los Angeles when he became infatuated with Frances Turney, a pretty cashier who worked there.  Though married, the 30-year-old Croft continued to ply Turney even after he was transferred to the Long Beach Theatre as a manager in September 1925.

Learning that the comely cashier was keeping company with another married man, wealthy Fullerton businessman T. K. Doyer, a drunken Croft confronted Turney at the Criterion on November 18, 1925.  The woman refused to accompany Croft in his inebriated condition and had theatre employees send him away.  Croft waited in his car as Doyer arrived at the theatre to drive Turney home.  The jealous manager followed the couple to Turney's residence at 1221 West Fifty-ninth Street and confronted the lovers as they sat in Doyer's car.  Croft forced Doyer out of the vehicle, fired two errant pistol shots at the man, then drove off in his rival's car with Turney on the front seat beside him sobbing hysterically.  As Croft drove recklessly through the streets of L.A. threatening to kill Turney, the young woman prayed and begged for mercy.

The wild auto ride ended at Seventy-ninth Street and Western Avenue when Croft punctured the front tires against a curb.  Croft ordered Turney out of the car and into a nearby vacant lot where a passing motorist tried to intervene, but was warned off by the crazed theatre manager.  According to Turney, Croft screamed, "Get down on your knees and make your peace with God!  I'm going to kill you!"  As the terrified woman knelt before him, Croft fired a shot that struck him in the foot.  Moments later, Croft turned away from Turney and shot himself in the head.  He died several hours later in the Receiving Hospital.

Ivan R. Gates -- The Fly Boy

Gates, founder of the Gates Flying Circus, was once among the most famous barnstorming aviators in the country.  Learning to fly two years earlier, Gates toured the country alone in 1911 performing aerial acrobatics in his own pusher biplane.  With the addition of fellow aviator-daredevils, the act grew into a circus featuring stunt flying and wing-walkers.  Sensing that the rise of commercial air travel would lessen public interest in the attraction, Gates organized an aircraft company in 1928 that designed and built training biplanes for private fliers.  The veteran aviator quickly sold his interests in the company and, following a series of business reversals, opened a museum in New York City at Fifty-second Street and Broadway where "starving artists" exhibited their work.

 
In chronic pain from past injuries and depressed over a bleak future, the 42 year old was with his wife in their sixth floor apartment at 220 West Twenty-fourth Street on November 24, 1932, when he announced, "I think I'll jump out of the window."  To placate him, she suggested that he get something to eat and drink.   After drinking a glass of warm milk, Gates dashed it to the floor, threw open the window, and with his wife attempting to restrain him, jumped to his death.  Four days later, Gates' former flying comrades scattered his ashes over the Holmes Airport, Queens, where he had been the first pilot to land a plane.

Claire Del Mar -- Rudy's Dance Partner

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

On January 10, 1959, the mutilated body of 57-year-old Clara Eloise Mohr was found in the home she shared with her aged bed-ridden mother in Carmel, California.  According to the investigating sheriff, the woman was struck over the head outside the house then carried into the bedroom where she was sexually assaulted and butchered with a steak knife.  Scrapbooks and photographs on the wall identified Mohr as one-time silent screen actress Claire Del Mar who had appeared uncredited in the films The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921, dancing with star Rudolph Valentino), The Jazz Singer (1927), The Grain of Dust (1928), and The Wedding March (1928).  A marriage to Hollywood cameraman Hal Mohr in 1926 (with Erich von Stroheim as best man) ended in divorce in 1929.  As of 2014, the case remains open.

Vivivan LaGrange -- The Determined Poser

A poser in the vaudeville production Patterson's Bronze Artists, the attractive 25 year old had caused a minor sensation in Butte, Montana, when the showed played at the Family Theatre during the week of November 16, 1908.  After traveling with the show to Spokane, Seattle, and Vancouver, LaGrange returned alone to Butte and registered at the Northern Hotel on Front Street on February 15, 1909.  Seemingly depressed over a broken love affair, LaGrange swallowed morphine two days later.  She was discovered, and over her objections, nursed back to health.  Less than a week after being given a clean bill of health, the actress downed a large quantity of bichloride of mercury in her hotel room on February 21, 1909.  She lingered for six days before dying at Butte's General Hospital.

Kyle McKenna -- The Bottom

 In a career lasting from 1997 to 2000, the gay porn star (real name Russell Charles McCoy) worked for every major company in the adult film industry including Centaur Films, Hot House Entertainment, Studio 2000, and Hollywood Sales.  A fan favorite, McKenna was chosen as the "Best Bottom" in 1997, and the "Hottest Ass" in 1998.  McKenna's films include Invaders from Uranus, Das Butt, Ranger in the Wild, and Whatever You Say, Sir!  Quiet and reclusive on the set, the 31-year-old performer broke up with his boyfriend in late 1999, and was struggling with bouts of depression.  On February 16, 2000, McKenna packed up his belongings in a trash bag and left them outside the house he was sharing with friends in Salt Lake City, Utah.  After writing a suicide note he took a lethal dose of sleeping pills.  In accordance with his last wishes, McKenna's body was cremated and the ashes scattered in the desert.

Walter F. Eberhardt -- Here's Looking at You

A veteran exploitation publicist who worked for a number of film studios (Famous Players-Lasky, First National), Everhardt joined Electrical Research Products , Inc. (part of Western Electric) in 1929 as director of publicity and advertising.  In recent years, the executive had turned to mystery writing, producing the novels Dagger in the Dark (1932), The Jig-Saw Puzzle Murder (1933), as well as two film novelizations.  For years Eberhardt had worn a glass eye, but shortly before his death feared that he was losing sight in the other.  On October 26, 1935, the 44-year-old publicist took his life in the garage adjoining his home at 46 Walbrooke Road in Scarsdale, New York.  Eberhardt's body was found slumped down in the front seat of his car with a rubber tube attached to the exhaust running up through the floor boards of the vehicle into his mouth.  Three notes were located on the floor next to the body.  In one, believed to be for his aunt, Eberhardt wrote:  "I am sorry.  I wanted to call you, but it was already too late.  My abiding love.  Walter."

Ihor Tanin -- The Ultimate Act of Control

Tanin, described as a fixture in the Milwaukee music scene, repaired equipment at his store, the Rock 'n Roll Hospital, for bands like the Violent Femmes and Streetlife.  Known as "E" (a nickname for the pronunciation of his first name), the 45-year-old electronics wizard began in the industry in the 1970s with Gary Tanin in the band Otto & the Elevators, and in the Skunks.  On November 15, 2003, in what friends of the dead woman called Tanin's "ultimate act of control" over her, the music equipment repairman repeatedly shot Kristy-Jo Szentes, 35, before turning the gun on himself in the townhouse the couple shared in the 1200 block of Balmoral Court in Brookfield, Wisconsin.  The bodies were found by Tanin's teenage daughter whom Szentes had raised as her own for several years.  Szentes, a 2003 graduate of Lakeland College with a degree in medical administration, worked at Zablocki Veterans Affair Medical Center.  The Szentes family had given Tanin his start in the music business 25 years earlier by letting him repair equipment in the back room of their store, Uncle Bob's Music Center, in West Allis.

Allen McPhail - Life is a Joke

"I have worked hard to make good for eight years, but I have failed.  Life is a joke," read the suicide note-cum-epitah penned by the 28-year-old musician on October 22, 1909.  A violinist at the Orpheum Theatre in Butte, Montana, McPhail played scores of theatres in the East prior to heading West to try to win a soloist position.  Failing, the frustrated musician cut the arteries of one wrist and hanged himself from the bedpost in his room at the Hotel Fair in Butte.