Ep 2 - The Tragic Story of Jackie Bates Part 2

Episode Description

In Part Two of The Tragic Story of Jackie Bates, Lauryn and Nima continue their exploration of the 1930s case that shook Glidden, Saskatchewan. Listen as they discuss Ted and Rose Bates' joint trial, while the community grapples with the shocking murder of young Jackie. Uncover the jury's verdict and follow the couple's journey in the subsequent decades.

Your support for the podcast means so much to us. You can subscribe and review us on your favourite podcast listening apps, and support us on Patreon at patreon.com/rootedincrime. You can stay updated by following Rooted in Crime on Instagram, @rootedincrime.

Special thanks to Lindsay Macdonald (@lindsaymacdonaldmusic) for recording and producing our intro and transition music.

For show notes, the recording transcript, and source information, you can visit www.rootedgenealogy.com/episode-show-notes

Episode Transcript

Ep 2 - The Tragic Story of Jackie Bates Pt 2

Nima: [00:00:00] Rooted in Crime contains coarse language and mature themes such as violence and sexuality, which may not be suitable for some listeners. This episode in particular contains details regarding violence towards children. And an additional warning for this episode, we will also be discussing suicide.

Listener discretion is advised.

Lauryn: Welcome to Rooted in Crime. I'm your host, Lauryn Macdonald.

Nima: And I'm Nima Hodoudi

Lauryn: And this is the podcast that uncovers the hidden stories of historical true crime through the lens of genealogy. Together, we're going to look at historical criminal cases from around the world using a modern perspective to dig deep into the secrets of the past.

Before we get into today's episode, we wanted to give you listeners a little heads up that you may hear some background noise throughout the episode that sounds like a little kitten meowing because that's exactly what it is. We just adopted a six week old barn kitten [00:01:00] named Kirby. He's super sweet. He's full of energy.

Yes. He napped a lot today, so he has lots of energy right now. Yes. So... You may hear some little bumps and meows in the background. That's just him having fun in here while we record the episode. This is part two of the tragic story of Jackie Bates, the eight year old boy who was killed by his parents, Ted and Rose, in December of 1933 during their desperate murder suicide attempt to escape their life of poverty and shame.

In part one, we discuss the events of December 4th, 1933, when the little boy was murdered by his parents, and the complex circumstances that led them to believe murder suicide was their only option. If you haven't listened to Part 1 yet, definitely hit pause here and go listen to that first episode. And now, we'll get into Part 2.

Nima: Let's do it.[00:02:00]

Lauryn: In Part 2, we'll be discussing Ted and Rose Bates joint trial and its aftermath, and what became of the Bateses in the following decades. Before we start talking about the March 1934 trial, Nima, did you have any lingering thoughts from Part 1 that you wanted to talk about? Yeah,

Nima: I mean... I think one thing I didn't touch on too much myself was the fact that I said that it was really important that they were being sentenced and that they were being held accountable for this.

But I think, in a lot of ways, I think that he should be more, held more accountable on so many levels considering the history and the past. I know it's probably not going to work out that way, but that's kind of what I was left

with.

Lauryn: Yeah, that makes sense. And when you say that he should be held more accountable, do you mean that Ted should have a [00:03:00] more severe sentence or some sort of harsher penalty because he was the mastermind?

What do you mean by that?

Yeah,

Nima: I would say that he should have a little bit more of a harsher penalty and then she should get a lighter sentence than him. Considering what she was going through as far as abuse goes in their relationship already and to kind of push her to this point,

right, so.

Lauryn: So you don't think that she was necessarily in the right state of mind to be making this decision in the murder suicide pact?

Is that what you think?

Nima: I mean, I don't think either one of them was, to be honest, but she especially wasn't. That's just, that's kind of what I got out of it after listening to it again a couple times, so.

Lauryn: Gotcha, yeah. And that ultimately is what we saw their lawyer, Harry Ludgate, arguing for with the coroner's inquest is that their statements made to police initially be dismissed and not considered in that trial because they weren't of sound mind at that time.

Yeah, exactly. They were [00:04:00] under so much duress. They were under the effects of the carbon monoxide. So many things that would have maybe made those statements obsolete, but as we know, that's not how it was seen by the judge ultimately. Right. So, given that, what do you think of this being a joint trial before we actually get into that, because whatever they decide will apply to both of them, there's no opportunity for there to be a harsher penalty for Ted.

Oh, I

Nima: didn't even realize that it's a joint trial. It's so wow. Well, I mean now that I know that I mean You know, it's not gonna work out that way So that kind of takes that whole point away But I mean, I understand Why would be a joint trial? I mean they both made the decision but again, I don't know.

Are they gonna have separate lawyers? It's gonna be the same lawyer Probably going to be the same lawyer for a joint trial. So That would be tough. I think it would have been better if we could have two separate lawyers for each of them, so they can argue the case separately, but in a joint trial, [00:05:00] we'll see what happens.

Well

Lauryn: then, let's get into the events of this March 1934 trial. Let's do it. As Ted and Rose prepared for their trial, support for the couple continued in their old community of Gliddon, but you really didn't see that support from any other external sources or really anywhere else. In Saskatchewan, anywhere else in the country, we didn't really see the same level of media presence that we saw with Angelina Napolitano's case, for example, and there's a few reasons for that.

The Saskatoon Star Phoenix reported on March 10th, 1934, that a mass meeting was held in Glidden to encourage more financial support for the couple. It was almost exclusively Glidden residents that had donated to the fund at this point and also were attending this meeting. They were really making an appeal for more donations throughout the province.

This article was also published in the Regina Leader Post, which was the other major newspaper publication in Saskatchewan at the time. [00:06:00] And these were really the only two articles that I could find about the trial, about the Bates family, about the case, anything like that leading up to the trial in between that time from the initial coroner's inquest.

Okay. So really in that between time, we're not seeing anything. Just this one really quick article in two. Overall small newspapers in the grand scheme of things. This is no New York Times or Toronto Star. They're not getting a really wide audience reach. That's really all we're seeing during this lull now during this community meeting those present gave their opinions on the case and Overwhelmingly expressed that it was the socio economic and political circumstances of the great depression that were to blame for The circumstances that drove the Bateses to what they did.

The same Star Phoenix article included that it was mentioned at the meeting that such circumstances had resulted in a 300% increase in insanity since the start of the Great Depression. Now, there was no [00:07:00] source cited for this statistic. It was just kind of thrown into the article to say that, you know, this is...

Kind of the general circumstance right now. I would say this is hyperbole. I don't think this is a real statistic Yeah, but still it shows that the overall social belief is that such unprecedented times could justify something as deplorable As killing your own child to escape such poor living conditions.

Yeah, they were tough times right and just And just like we talked about in part one It's a very different understanding of life than what we have today and I think The sentiments from that community meeting where they pretty much said, you know, the federal government is accountable for this and not Ted and Rose.

Like, they really believe that they were driven to a point where this was maybe not justifiable, but we can at least understand what got them there. Yep. When the trial began on March 21st, Crown Attorney George A. Cruz called the same [00:08:00] 18 witnesses that had testified at the coroner's inquest in December.

So it was a lot of the same evidence initially heard that had already been heard during the inquest. Harry Ledgate represented Ted and Rose once more and again tried to have their initial statements to police thrown out. But just like the ruling for the coroner's inquest, they were again accepted. They were deemed to be fit to have given those statements and they should be submitted into evidence.

Okay. This time around, Ludgate used a new tactic when it came to cross examining Dr. McGill, who was the provincial pathologist, to suggest that something other than carbon monoxide poisoning could have caused Jackie's death, i. e. an underlying or unknown cause of death. He suggested that a glandular condition called status lymphaticus could have been the cause.

Have you ever heard of this disease, Nima?

Nima: No, I have not. Please enlighten me.

Lauryn: Well, there's a reason why in the [00:09:00] year of 2023 you haven't heard of this disease. It's pretty much a made up disease.

Nima: Oh. That makes sense.

Lauryn: Before modern medicine, for several centuries, coroners and doctors would have used "visitation by God" death for unexplainable deaths, especially for children.

Nima: That's amazing. Sorry. I'm sorry. I shouldn't laugh at that. I know it's horrible, but visitations from God. That's the reason.

Lauryn: Yes, and this is getting back to as recent as like the early to mid 19th century. Okay, wow. That visitation by God is being used.

But once we get into the late 19th and early 20th centuries, we see a lot less religion and medicine, but still a lot of unexplainable deaths. There's still a lot of science yet to be uncovered at this point, so there's still a lot of things that are unknown. Yeah. So naturally, We need something to explain those unexplainable things, some sort of [00:10:00] catch all, if you will, or a few catch alls, depending on what the situation is, that can replace God for what is not fully explainable.

And this is one of them. So Ludgate was able to introduce the idea that perhaps Jackie actually had status lymphaticus, and Dr. McGill hadn't done a sufficient enough exam to actually determine what, cause Jackie's death. Hmm. So with status lymphaticus coming in as one of those placeholders for God, It's worth noting that it seemed to almost exclusively affect children.

It was almost never diagnosed in adults. Okay. And it was also virtually never diagnosed prior to death.

Nima: Oh, that's convenient. It only happens when they die.

Lauryn: It only happens when they die. It's only for kids for the most part. Okay. There's no way to I guess Diagnose this beforehand. There's no symptoms that [00:11:00] will come up to make it known

Nima: I can't believe that's an argument. That's so crazy to me.

Lauryn: So I mean at the time of 1930, we're still in a very early time with modern Right. I mean, I think some would argue against that and say that we'd had a lot of medicinal progress at that point. But compared to what we have now, almost a hundred years later. Yeah. Night and day.

Exactly. So keep that in mind. Okay. Cause we're, that's going to be important in a little bit here. Now coming back to how this is basically only affecting children, I kind of wanted to pepper in what the context was for that, for how people could so widely accept this as a reason for how, you know, Jackie and so many other kids could have died.

Okay. Child and infant mortality was still very high in Canada at the time of 1930 and the Great Depression years. Child mortality was 125. 3 [00:12:00] per thousand live births in 1930. Still high. So quite high. That's about 13%? Is that right? No, sorry. 12. 5% we'll call it. Whereas in 2020 it was only 5 per thousand live births.

Right.

Nima: Night and day again.

Lauryn: Night and day. Very significant drop. So because it was such a significant phenomenon that children were dying at a pretty high rate, you know, even in countries like Canada and the United States that we see today as being very well advanced, you know, even at the time they were well advanced, but that's really just the state of not just modern medicine, but overall living conditions, access to preventative health care.

We know things like water and sewage treatment weren't as good. Diseases were a lot more prevalent because we didn't have vaccination like we do today. There's so many different things that Made it more likely for children to die. So young that we see that [00:13:00] now today There's so few child mortalities in canada In that grand scheme of a thousand life births.

Right. So as a result, status lymphaticus was widely examined by doctors and scientists in the early 20th century. But as medicine progressed, it actually became less and less frequently diagnosed.

Nima: No way.

Lauryn: So this obviously speaks to a better understanding of medicine and science. We're discovering a lot more, you know, keep in mind.

It's not only until the 1950s that we understand DNA is a double helix, right? So that's, that's after this point, you know, so just, just to keep in mind where we are, but that being said, it was really starting to fall out of popularity at this point. And at the point of the 1950s, it actually stopped being taught in English medical schools.

So only a couple of decades later, the medical community recognized it wasn't even worth teaching to students because. It wasn't being diagnosed. It didn't have any medical merit.

Nima: I guess I never really thought [00:14:00] about it, but thinking that they taught that in school is pretty funny.

Lauryn: It was a legitimate condition.

If you were to go to a medical dictionary, Is it the DCM? Is that what? DMC? I can't remember the term for that. Yeah, the acronym. The acronym. I'm not sure. But in any case, you could have gone at the time and looked up status lymphaticus in any of those medical dictionaries and actually. Seen that it was a disease and it had something that you could use to diagnose post mortem.

Nima: That's amazing.

Lauryn: So of course, with all of that, Ludgate introduced this, that okay, perhaps it's this alternative status lymphaticus, and asked Dr. McGill if she had actually examined the thymus gland, which was believed at the time to be primarily affected by status lymphaticus. Now, Dr. McGill, she actually had a really great reply to that.

And this is a quote that was found from the Star Phoenix. "The thymus, [00:15:00] she said, was fairly large, but insisted that it was not abnormal. And in caustic replies, poo pooed at suggestions of status lymphaticus. This, she said, was sometimes put down as a cause of death at post mortems to hide the ignorance of doctors."

She just, I have to say, I know I said in the last episode I was really happy to see a woman be in such a position of judicial power to have that authority as the provincial pathologist and be at that point of credibility in 1933 /34 is really awesome. Yeah. But I really love the sass that she threw in there.

Nima: Yeah. Shots fired.

Lauryn: Shots fired. And, and I, I think it's a really great defense for herself when somebody's questioning her. And her professional opinion to throw right back at them and say, okay, well, let's discredit those that are using it because it's not even a valid diagnosis.

Nima: Yeah, doing her job well.

Lauryn: Defense witness [00:16:00] Dr. W. D. McPhail was called. He was a local doctor and he'd actually been Jackie's physician on prior occasions. He argued that Dr. McGill should have removed the bronchial glands and lymph nodes to fully assess if status lymphaticus could have been cause of death, which it seems she hadn't done.

I wasn't able to find conclusively that she didn't do those things, but it seemed like that from reporting. Okay. And defense argued that based on Dr. McPhail's assessment, there was not sufficient pathological evidence to prove that carbon monoxide poisoning was the cause of death.

Nima: Oh, really?

Lauryn: So they're really trying to poke holes in what we saw a few months prior at the coroner's inquest where it was found that it was carbon monoxide poisoning that killed Jackie.

It was just whether or not that there was some sort of responsibility in Ted and Rose's hands essentially. Yeah. That was, that was the question we saw from that. So here, Ludgate's basically trying to distract from that question from the coroner's inquest [00:17:00] and now say, well, we can't even trust what was done by the provincial pathologist to say that this is how Jackie died.

Look at all of these things that weren't even looked at. How can we know for sure at this time? We can't say it was Ted and Rose. Yeah, for sure. There was lengthy cross examination about the legitimacy of Dr. McGill's post mortem exam, since Dr. McPhail essentially questioned everything she did. The judge actually had to end the cross examination because it was getting into medical technicalities that were not relevant to Jackie's case.

Nima: Interesting. It was just like a pissing contest, essentially, I think, after that.

Lauryn: I don't know if I'd say it was a pissing contest, but like I said, really trying to distract from what was seen forensically and medically in Dr. McGill's post mortem exam.

Nima: Yeah, okay. That makes sense. Just trying to sway away from that, really.

Lauryn: Exactly. So Dr. McPhail's professional opinion was that [00:18:00] Jackie died from hyperactive thymus poisoning. As opposed to the carbon monoxide poisoning or status lymphaticus, which I thought was really interesting considering Ludgate tried introducing that and this was his witness. Yeah. Again, I, I unfortunately wasn't able to access the actual court records and transcripts.

This really comes from the reporting. And like I said, there wasn't a huge array of reporting on this case. It was mostly those local papers, Star Phoenix and Leader Post. Right. And typically those news bulletins were reported on by local. Reporters, and then those were sent off to other papers across North America.

So it was typically the exact same article published in the Leader Post, as was the Toronto Star, Montreal Gazette, etc. Interesting. So, not a great array of media coverage, and also it's not for a long duration, you're not getting the same perspectives that you did at the beginning when the case was first reported in December where we saw, you know, there was a lot of [00:19:00] interest from Vancouver, for example, since the Bateses had lived there recently.

That's not really happening anymore, and it's really just those local communities that, are really getting media access to this or really care to get that media access. Right. Nonetheless, we do see from all of that reporting that there ultimately were two opposing medical opinions in this case. We see the provincial pathologist is extremely firm in her assessment that it was carbon monoxide poisoning that caused Jackie's death.

However, Dr. McPhail's opinion is that there was not sufficient evidence to rule out other causes of death, and his review of Dr. McGill's examination gave him enough to suggest status lymphaticus or the overactive thymus poisoning. And again, it's still a little unclear exactly where his position is, but it seems it was the overactive thymus poisoning more so in his opinion that killed Jackie.

Right. Ludgate's closing remarks included reminding the jury to consider if Ted and Rose were guilty beyond a reasonable doubt and that the [00:20:00] onus of proof was on the Crown. Zunima, given that, do you think the Crown had enough evidence to prove that Ted and Rose were guilty?

Nima: I think, considering how they found them in the car, considering the statements, considering the injuries, And considering the original reports that we're looking at, that, I don't know, I would find them guilty of the monoxide poisoning over anything else.

But that's just me knowing everything now, right? So.

Lauryn: Yeah, I agree with that. I do think from a modern perspective, knowing everything that we do know now, having our modern understanding of science and medicine, you know, even just as, The, the lay people that we are, neither of us are doctors, neither of us have any medical training, but we can understand based on the forensic and scientific evidence that [00:21:00] was presented.

It most likely was carbon monoxide poisoning. Yeah, it sounds that way at least right it does I think again from our perspective They would be found guilty based on the evidence that was presented at trial. Absolutely Crown attorney crew stated that there was ample evidence to prove the intent to murder was there and that the couple Executed their plan.

So right in line with what we're saying. Yeah, he also reinforced. Dr McGill's legitimacy stating that she'd been the provincial pathologist since 1915

Nima: So at that point, what, 15 years?

It's 1934 at this case, so we're close to 20.

Oh, wow. Okay, yeah, that's fair. Yeah,

so That's legit.

Lauryn: That is legit. She definitely has the experience.

And again, I mean, just really great to see that a woman has that kind of a career. Totally. And I wonder how much of that is coming into play with Ludgate trying to poke holes in her examination. Her medical opinion of how Jackie died. I really wonder what the gender [00:22:00] understanding of that is from the jury if they maybe believe dr.

McPhail to be more credible because he's a man and Dr. McGill can't be trusted because she's a woman and maybe she doesn't have the same kind of Knowledge or intelligence. I don't know.

Nima: Yeah, I can see that.

Lauryn: It's my own speculation, but like we've discussed in, you know, previous episodes, there definitely was that discrimination against women.

Yeah. So, from a modern perspective, hella cool that we get to see Dr. McGill in this position since 1915. Yeah. But I wouldn't be surprised if those prejudices do come in here.

Nima: Yeah, 100%.

Lauryn: The judge's instructions to the jury were to consider the three proposed courses of Jackie's death. The first was that he was intentionally killed by his parents via carbon monoxide poisoning in their murder suicide attempt.

The second was that Jackie was unintentionally killed by carbon monoxide poisoning. And the third was that another cause, [00:23:00] unrelated to carbon monoxide poisoning, could have killed the boy. So Nima, based on the closing remarks from both lawyers and the judge's instructions to the jury, along with the evidence that we've discussed and the background to this case, what do you think the jury of 1934 will decide?

Nima: I think, I think they will decide that they did, in fact, murder Jackie. However, depending on the jury, and because of the situation of the times, I don't know, right? There might be other considerations that they took in that they're like, hey, maybe it was unintentional and that's the way we do it, right? So to maybe give them that less time because they feel the struggles that they went through, right?

So, who knows?

Lauryn: Who knows. And like Ludgate said, it's ultimately on the crown to prove that it for sure was Ted and Rose beyond a reasonable doubt. [00:24:00] 100%. So with all these considerations, the jury deliberated for about two hours during the evening of March 22nd and found that Ted and Rose Bates, charged with the murder of their eight year old son, were not guilty.

Nima: What? Really? At all? So what did they, in that case then, what did they go with based on what the judge said?

Lauryn: So there really wasn't much given explicitly from the jury on why they came to that decision. I mean, ultimately, all it takes is one of those jurors to say, No, I do not agree with this. We are not at a consensus.

Right. They did not, beyond a reasonable doubt, Prove it. Kill their son. Right. So somewhere along the way, there was enough of, Ludgate's arguments, all of those different testimonies from all those different witnesses, from different experts to put enough doubt in the jury's [00:25:00] mind that Ted and Rose intentionally killed their son.

Nima: Yeah, he did his job.

Lauryn: And we have to keep in mind where all of this is happening. We're in, you know, western Saskatchewan where it's a lot of really small, rural, struggling towns at this time. It's really only those types of people on the jury That's who would have been called to the jury that were local, right?

So they have that Local community understanding of what Ted and Rose went through, of the ways that the government has let the citizens of Saskatchewan, of Canada down through these economic times, there's all of that present. Both on the jury and in the courtroom.

Nima: Yeah, and there it is, right? I said that might be the case and that's exactly what happened, so.

Lauryn: That ultimately is. And as a result, with the courtroom being filled with friends and supporters from Glidden, it was actually a really happy scene when that not guilty verdict was delivered. Right. I could imagine. It was widely [00:26:00] felt locally, and even by some on the jury, that although the couple was ultimately guilty, like I said, people really understood that Ted and Rose did kill their son.

It happened, yeah. They weren't deserving of such a harsh punishment as a murder conviction. And given the circumstances that drove their actions, and what we saw throughout this trial, there was enough doubt for them to say they didn't intend to do it. They were charged with murder. We can't prove that that's actually what they did.

Yeah, for sure. And like I said before, this is not something that was widely reported on, so we don't really see any sort of... national or international backlash, like how we saw those differing opinions in Angelina's case. It's kind of cut and done after that. It's, it's really reflective of the economic and social times, the political times.

Everybody was struggling. There were a lot of really, really heartbreaking, tragic stories of, People [00:27:00] being killed in really precarious circumstances or taking their own lives in those circumstances. Right. Other really terrible desperation. It's just the time. And so to see this kind of story come up and really fade quickly isn't actually that surprising because so many people were struggling.

And people just didn't care. They had their own shit to worry about basically.

Nima: Yeah, that makes sense.

Lauryn: After this not guilty verdict, the province did not appeal the decision despite standing firmly behind Dr. McGill's autopsy findings and testimony. So essentially the Crown felt they wouldn't get a conviction after the initial not guilty verdict, so there was no point in trying for an appeal.

Nima: Yeah, don't waste the money I guess, right?

Lauryn: We see that this couple legitimately killed their son. They literally killed their son and they were let off the hook by a jury of their local community, of their peers. Right. And that would be the same circumstance for them to go through again, basically. [00:28:00] Even if they were to have that trial in a different part of the province, I highly doubt there'd be that different of an outcome.

It's, it's a pretty shared. Circumstance, social circumstance across the province, you don't really see, you know, if you would go to Regina instead of being closer to Saskatoon, that those opinions are going to be greatly different, like you maybe could between major cities in Ontario, where there's a greater diversity in that population.

Yeah. Like I said, from a modern perspective, I really don't think we... I think we would have seen the not guilty verdict today. I think we would have absolutely seen a conviction here. I also don't think it would have been a joint trial like you said. I think we would have seen them charged separately.

Yeah, it's rare. Rare tried separately. It's rare that you see a joint trial. No, it's, yeah, it's pretty rare, I think. Mm-hmm. , it's al, I don't even know if you

have them anymore, honestly. But I have no clue. I don't know.

I, I have no idea for criminal. Yeah, no clue. We're not experts , no. With Dr. McGill's examination and [00:29:00] testimony especially, you know, we see that it's speaking to those changing medical and forensic attitudes.

She sees status lymphaticus as bullshit. So I think. Definitely today, what she presented would be enough to convince a jury that they killed their son, it was the carbon monoxide poisoning, based on testimony from witnesses, their statements given to police, there's enough to prove that their intent was there.

It was premeditated, everything had been planned out and they executed that plan.

Nima: Yeah, they might have gone manslaughter or something if they couldn't prove everything, but I mean nowadays with DNA too, there's just so much evidence.

Lauryn: It's very different, and that's part of the fun in looking at these historical cases, is we can't really put that modern forensic understanding into how these are being looked at.

Right. So with that... We're closing off this case with the not guilty verdict. Ted and Rose are not going back to jail. They're free. And so we're going to look at what [00:30:00] ultimately came of Ted and Rose afterwards, but we're going to take a quick break first.

Nima: Sounds good.

And

we're

back.

Lauryn: We are back. So we just saw that Ted and Rose ultimately were found not guilty. And after this not guilty verdict, they returned to Glidden temporarily with some short term support from the community fund. Saskatoon newspapers published that the Bateses were really open to any kinds of employment and looking to establish themselves in the newspaper articles I found immediately following the trial.

Okay. So they were turning to that community support that they did have to try to find a way to support themselves going forward. That makes sense. It was hard to pin down exactly what happened to Ted and Rose in the years immediately after the trial. I wasn't able to find any records or any newspaper articles until 1939 when they settled down in Rosetown, [00:31:00] Saskatchewan, which is about halfway between Glidden and Regina, and Ted was able to work there as a butcher again, which I found on a voters list.

Hmm. Historian Bill Walser found in his research of the 1940 National Register that Ted was actually living about an hour north of Rose in Carrobert, Saskatchewan, while she was actually back in Glidden at the time of the 1940 National Register being taken.

Nima: Okay, so they've split up by that point.

Lauryn: They split up, but they actually did come back together, so it's not, it's not clear why they were separated.

Nima: Maybe for work?

Lauryn: It could have been for work perhaps Rose was living with somebody else at the time for some sort of, you know, way to have like cheaper living conditions between the two of them if, like you said, it was maybe Ted going to look for work. It was easier for him to maybe be a lodger with somebody and Rose could stay with somebody rent free essentially back in Glidden while he established himself in this new community.

But they were in Rosetown before, so I'm not too [00:32:00] sure. How they got back to Glidden and why there was that back and forth that wasn't clear with any of the research that I was able to do.

Nima: Fair enough.

Lauryn: This 1940 national register just to quickly let people know what that was about because you're probably thinking what is this?

We haven't heard this before. This was essentially a requirement of anybody over the age of 16 in Canada where they had to register with the government under the War Measures Act. Right. So keep in mind 1939 is when World War II starts. Yeah. So as a result we see the War Measures Act come in and Then everybody has to register with the government.

They want to know what everyone's doing, especially for boys and well, I guess men, but if you're over the age of 16, I'm gonna say boys too, because there's still kids at that point. Oh, yeah. They want to know if you're fit to serve, you know, if you're 16, when are you gonna be turning 18 so that you can enlist, that sort of thing.

They need to keep tabs on people at this time. So that's how we see that. Ted and Rose are actually in separate places at the time of this register being taken. But we do [00:33:00] see again in the 1945 voters list that they're living together in Rosetown and Ted is working as a butcher there again. So not too sure what that back and forth was about, but they did eventually settle down for the rest of their lives in Rosetown.

Okay, together. Together, yes.

Nima: Trauma bonding, eh?

Lauryn: Yeah, I guess trauma bonding wasn't the greatest relationship from what we heard in the beginning So and I think maybe it was more of that that given Attitudes towards marriage and divorce women being on their own at the time, you know at this point Rose is in her 40s.

So She doesn't really have much employment experience It seems like either she was, you know, a stay at home mom for so long and then it seems like just a housewife So yeah, what could she have done? Otherwise, right? She needed to rely on Ted to support her. It seems like right So they stayed together until Ted's death in 1954, he passed away of cancer on December 12th.

And then it wasn't too long [00:34:00] after this that Rose actually returned to her hometown in England, leaving Canada at the beginning of August 1955, with her passage records indicating that her intent was to remain permanently in the UK.

Nima: Oh, okay.

No more Canada after that. I mean, you kind of want to leave some of that behind, probably go be with

your family.

Lauryn: Exactly. And it doesn't seem that any of her family ever came out to Canada to live there permanently from what I was able to find. Right. It seems everyone stayed in England. Yeah. So, it makes sense given. everything that she was up against given what her life was at that point to want to go back to her family.

Yeah, absolutely. So she did end up living permanently in the UK, residing there until her death on February 14th, 1978. So 24 years after Ted's death. Yeah. I was able to find her probate records indicating that her estate was valued at 1, 606 pounds, or about 8, 343 pounds [00:35:00] today, which works out to about 14, 000 Canadian in today's dollars.

That was her estate? That was her estate. So not much. Not much. Also inflation. Yeah. Oh, let's not talk about that. I don't know exactly what the inflation situation would look like. In the UK compared to Canada, I think it's really hard to apples to apples make that comparison, but nonetheless, not a huge estate.

I don't think she really had much that she left Canada with. I don't think Ted would have left her with much given that, you know, he was working as a butcher, pretty simple life. Everything they went through, don't think there was much of a nest egg for her. Yeah, makes sense. Now coming back to Jackie, his blank concrete slab marker was actually replaced in more recent years.

So he today has a proper gravestone at his burial site.

Nima: Oh, when, do you know when it was replaced or?

Lauryn: I unfortunately wasn't able to find that. I was able to find the picture of his gravestone on findagrave. com. So with [00:36:00] those websites you're able to see when those website postings were created. Right. But you're not able to really find out when things like grave markers go in, you know.

Mm. Mm. Sometimes do you replace those for family members? It's not so unheard of. So it's not really something that those types of sources would keep track of.

Yeah, I wonder who did it.

I I really do wonder. It was interesting in my research to see kind of what the sentiment was in the community around Jackie's story.

I don't want to get too much into it because historian Bill Walser, he did a really great job writing about it in his article of Perry Prayerble that I used as a source for this research. So definitely if it's something you're interested in finding out more about what that... Public memory was and how that carried on through the decades after Jackie's death.

I'd say definitely go there There's some really interesting interviews that he did with different residents of Glidden and other nearby towns. I will say Overwhelmingly, [00:37:00] it seems that it was something people knew about but it wasn't really talked about until more modern times When people were more removed from

it. wasn't that same sort of Shame and You know, let's let's not air our dirty laundry in public type feelings. You do see that change over time Yeah, but like I said definitely check out Bill Walser's article I think he does a really great job of encapsulating all those different thoughts and feelings and The link to that will be included in the show notes So if you are interested in reading up more on that, you can go to rooted genealogy comm slash rooted dash in dash crime And there will be a link in the episode description if you're listening on Spotify or any of those other apps Jackie's story is just one of the many from the Great Depression where we see people either taking the lives of others or their own lives as a result of being victims to the overall socioeconomic and [00:38:00] political circumstances that they were in.

Statistics from Canada during the Great Depression were hard to find, but suicide rates peaked in the US during the Great Depression, seeing 21.9 suicides per a hundred thousand people, which we have not seen as high since. We do see that cyclically, economic downturn leads to increased suicide rates, and just for a comparison, we saw following the Great Recession in 2008, for the year of 2009 in the U.

S., there were 11. 8 suicides per 100, 000 people.

Nima: Wow, that's high.

Lauryn: In comparison, right? Very high

in comparison. Like it's really close, right? So. Nearly double is what you were seeing in the Great Depression compared to 2009. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that speaks to a few things. I think that speaks to a, our understanding of mental health and the resources that are now available for those experiencing mental health issues and mental health crisis.

Yep. There are avenues for people to talk about their problems and be able to [00:39:00] receive the support that they need. That's something that was widely discussed in Jackie's case and in the case of his parents where so many community members said, Well, if they had just come and talked to us, we would have given them that help.

Right. You know, people are always so willing to give but to actually accept that. Yeah. To actually seek that help. That was not something people did back then. It's still something we see people really struggle with today. Obviously the issue of suicide, the crisis of suicide, is still very much a worthwhile issue and an important issue that we need to discuss.

But comparatively, when we compare what the stigma was then to what it is now, knowing what

access to resources were, I think it makes sense that we see these numbers where they are.

Nima: Yep. I would agree. With the mentioning of suicide in today's episode, we wanted to include some resources for you listeners if you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide. [00:40:00] In Canada, you can call Talk Suicide Canada at 1 833 456 4566.

In the U. S., you can contact 988 SUICIDE and Crisis Lifeline, call or text 988.

Lauryn: And that's it for part two of the tragic story of Jackie Bates, the second episode of Rooted in Crime. That was sad. I know it was a pretty heavy episode, so definitely take the time that you need to take care of yourselves and your own mental health.

You know, give yourself those mental health days when you need them. Don't be shy to open up to people that you can trust and talk to. And if you need to turn to any of those resources that we mentioned, that's why they're there. So with that, that is it for episode two.

Nima: Thanks for listening, everybody.

Lauryn: Yes, thank you so much for all of your support.

Like we've said, we really love hearing [00:41:00] all of your feedback. We've heard a lot more in the last week, which is really awesome. It's great to see how much you guys really love listening to the episode, the different suggestions that you have for topics to cover, different ways to tell our stories. We really love hearing all of that, so keep all of that feedback coming.

Nima: Yeah, keep it coming.

Lauryn: With that said, we have been talking to a few listeners, some friends, family, that good stuff. And in talking with a friend, Nima, we actually found out a friend of yours has a pretty interesting story in her family tree.

Nima: Yeah, quite, quite the story that I had no idea about until we talked about it.

Lauryn: Yeah, and it turns out she didn't actually know that much about it and her Younger family members of more recent generations don't actually know that much about it. They've only heard things So it's going to be really interesting to see what i'm able to uncover And in a few weeks, we'll be finding out more about that case, but I don't want to say too much for now So that's all i'll give you guys

Nima: [00:42:00] Awesome. Can't wait

Lauryn: So before we end off here, just a few spots that you can find us. If you did want to reach out with any of that feedback or any cases from your own family tree or your hometown, you can find us on Instagram @rootedincrime, or you can get in touch with us by email at rootedincrime@gmail.Com. You can also check out the episode show notes on rooted genealogy. com slash rooted dash in dash crime. If you'd like to support the podcast, you can do so at patreon. com slash rooted in crime, where we have bonus content and lots of other episode features you won't hear on other listening platforms.

And as always, a special shout out to Lindsay Macdonald for recording and producing our intro music. And until next time, thanks again,

guys.

Nima: See you next time.[00:43:00]

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