The Lady In The Furnace Mystery (MyLot Exclusive #685)

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Halloween, as a state of mind, never ends. But the actual day itself comes and goes and since we are dangerously close to it going this year, I want to present a very creepy true story that many of you have never heard of. It also has its' fair share of triggers that probably should get warnings. And they would. If I only had time to issue warnings. It's about the death of Addie Sheatsley, a 50-year-old mother of four and the wife of the pastor of Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bexley, Ohio. On the afternoon of November 17, 1924, her body was discovered. In the furnace. Really. She had either been murdered and stuffed in the furnace or she killed herself by crawling into it. The police thought it was murder. The Coroner ruled it a suicide and ended the entire investigation before it really began. The problem for me is that neither theory holds much water. I've looked at several sources, three of which are linked below, and for the most part, they agree on the details, which is nice. But not terribly helpful. In order to accept the suicide theory, you have to believe that she crawled into a tiny pit of blazing hot fire, died instantly, before any carbon monoxide entered her lungs (A chemist who examined the remains found clues like that that indicate she was dead when she entered the furnace and the Coroner dismissed all of them). And then shut the door behind her. Is that possible? The police proved that a person Addie's size could get through the about 14-inch opening and into the firebox by having a volunteer do it. But she crawled into a box that didn't have fire in it, of course. If you believe it was murder, you're stuck coming up with a suspect and then figuring out his or her motive, means and opportunity. I don't have space for detail here but if you look at any of the sources, you'll see this task is difficult at best. Plus, why and how did the murderer shove Addie into the furnace feet first? It would be very difficult. On the other hand, it is the easiest way for someone to get into a furnace on their own. Be all that as it may, the Coroner shut down the investigation suspiciously quickly. If it was murder, I would bet the whole farm that he was covering up for whoever did it. And that suggests it would be her husband, Reverend Clarence. But the timeline of known events doesn't make it likely to be him. As my friend, Lieutenant Columbo, would say, the pieces just don't add up. And since the mundane explanations fall flat and it's Halloween, I say we start looking at ghosts, demonic spirits or a Supernatural Freddy or Jason type of killer. At least the Supernatural theories aren't as frustrating. ************** https://archive.org/details/liberty-v-14-n-29-1937-07-17/page/41/mode/1up ----------------------------- Marc Hoover: Did someone put mama in the furnace? March 12, 2020 https://www.clermontsun.com/2020/03/12/marc-hoover-did-someone-put-mama-in-the-furnace ----------------------------- Mrs. Sheatsley's Furnace