Alice Kalom's 1969 Ann Arbor Murder Haunts Boyfriend's Memory To This Day

Alice Elizabeth Kalom

On Saturday, June 7th, 1969, Alice Elizabeth Kalom (23), a University of Michigan fine arts graduate student, went to the Depot House at 416 S. Ashley St. in Ann Arbor to celebrate the birthday of a local musician friend.

When Alice left her apartment in a house at 311 Thompson St, she was nicely dressed in a purple blouse, a white mini-skirt, pantyhose, and a pair of brown loafers. She was wearing her contact lenses and not her glasses. Alice was carrying her new pair of purple dress shoes she had recently purchased at Jacobson's in downtown Ann Arbor because she didn't want to get them wet. Alice was also wearing a distinctive, multicolored, horizontal striped rain coat against the likelihood of more rain.

Alice was last seen at the Depot House dancing until after midnight on Sunday morning. That's what some people at the party told police. Others said they thought she hadn't gone to the party at all. Alice's partially nude body was found in Ann Arbor Township off of US-23 and N. Territorial Rd in two feet of tall grass just off a lane running through abandoned farmland. Three teenaged boys came across her lifeless body on Monday, the 9th at 3:40 PM.

***

Forty-five years after the murder of his dear friend Alice, sixty-nine year old Benjamin R. Cologie became very emotional when he talked to my researcher Ryan M. Place about his memories of those times. Mr. Cologie is still angry with police because of their indecent and impolite behavior when they interrogated him over the murder of Alice Kalom. "It's terrible to say, but I wish I had never known Alice."

"I went to Alice's apartment on Saturday night. We were both taking a photography class at U of M, and she left prints floating in the rinse water with the images getting damaged. I hung the prints up and waited for her. At 11:00 AM on Sunday, I called the Ann Arbor Police to report Alice missing when she didn't come home all night.

"The following day, Monday, June 9th, the police found her murder site, the Washtenaw Sand and Gravel Company. They also found Alice's distinctive raincoat, some buttons torn from her clothing, some shoes (loafers only), and a pool of blood. When I learned that Alice's body had been found, I drove to the police station and they held me overnight telling me that I was their prime suspect in her murder.

"They took me to the morgue to identify her body before they even called her parents. They pulled out the slab. She had been outside for a couple of days, her eyes were wide open, her skin discolored, and a bullet wound was visible in her forehead. I identified Alice and all the cop said to the morgue tech was 'Go tag her' and walked off coldly. That vision of Alice dead on the morgue slab has haunted me for forty-five years. I still think about it frequently. It's something I will never forget.

"About a week later, my teaching friend Marisa invited me over to her farmhouse off Nixon Rd and Pontiac Trail. By this time, my name had made it around to the newspapers. I walk into my friend's house and her boyfriend attacks me! Thinks I came to rape her or murder her or something. It was terrible. I lost lots of friends over the Alice Kalom media mess, not to forget that I lost Alice.

"Two years later, I'm teaching at Pioneer High School and the cops bring bloodstained clothes and pictures of Alice for me to look at. The rudeness of the police asking overly personal questions about our sexual relationship. They wouldn't let me rest and forget.

Four police departments didn't seem to be sharing information. I had to repeat things hundreds of times. Police weren't helpful or compassionate. They just cared about who was going to get credit for solving the crime.

"Another thing I remember from those times were the many abandoned farms in the Ann Arbor area. For our class, Alice and I used to take pictures of timber framed barn shells, the barn siding mostly salvaged from them. We went to one abandoned farmhouse on Pontiac Trail.

Body Drop Site of Alice Kalom Near Abandoned Barn.

"There was a cord hanging from the ceiling that looked like a noose. Alice put her neck through the noose-like cord and made me take a macabre photo of her standing inside this creepy farmhouse. I believe the cops still have that photo somewhere. Very scary incident in retrospect after what happened. The police confiscated all of the film and pictures from Alice's apartment."

Fornology Site Server Upgrade

As I prepare to switch servers and upgrade my site, regular readers of Fornology may notice a minor disruption in service.

Soon, all traffic will be routed to my new site which is almost completed. There will be a new look, and the site will be more interactive and functional.

My apologies for any disruptions in service as my webmaster makes the necessary adjustments.

Mother's Day Gator by the Bay Festival in San Diego

On Mother's Day weekend, for longer than I can remember, San Diego, California has been home to the Gator by the Bay Festival.

This year's Zydeco, Blues and Crawfish Festival is May 8th through the 11th. This annual joyous celebration of spring blossoms forth at Spanish Landing Park on Harbor Island along San Diego Bay. An outdoor venue doesn't get much better than this.

Don't be afraid to bring the kids and grandma and grandpa too if he behaves himself. If you love good music, fun dancing, and Louisiana food, dust off your dancing shoes, throw on some Mardi Gras beads, and join us for a great weekend.

"Laissez les bon temp rouler!"

For detailed information on this year's schedule and the musical performers line up, check out the official GBTB website:
http://www.gatorbythebay.com/

The Devil's Staircase and John Norman Collins

Levels of Hell as depicted from Dante's Inferno.

While doing research for The Rainy Day Murders, Ryan M. Place, came across the work of UCLA engineering researcher Dr. Mikhail Simkin. He has been studying the biological rhythm of serial killers. His theory is that "serial killers commit murder when the neuronal excitation in their brains exceed a certain threshold."

Ryan emailed Dr. Simkin and asked if the professor could plot out a graph of John Norman Collins' inter-murder intervals and help us draw some conclusions about his behavior.

Dr. Simkin wrote back stating, "Because of the limited data of seven murders and six intervals, it is out of the question to plot a probability distribution of inter-murders for Collins. The only plot we can do is that of cumulative number of murders as a function of the dates. The Collins chart can't stand on its own."

In his response to us, Dr. Simkin included an attachment of the Collins plot graph and the plot graph of Russian Andrei Romanovich Chikatilo, thought to be the most prolific serial killer in history. He was convicted in 1990 for the murders of fifty-three women and children and executed with a gunshot behind the right ear in 1994. The Russian newspapers dubbed him "The Butcher of Rostov." 

Dr. Simkin did a narrative comparison of both charts for us. "You can see that the Collins plot has some properties of the 'Devil's staircase' as there is a large step variation," he wrote. "The longest step is 15.5 times bigger than the shortest. However, for the Chikatilo plot, this ratio is 329 times bigger.... In the Collins plot, we can glimpse some features of the Devil's staircase which are far better developed in the Chikatilo plot."

"The Devil's staircase" is a statistical term referring to graph results that resemble a staircase of increasing values when plotted out. Mathematically, the results depict "a function not absolutely continuous." But the term also carries some metaphorical significance when you consider the subject matter under discussion, serial murder.

Both plot graphs show a behavioral trait common to most serial killers. As their murders increase, the intervals between the murders decreases. It is this grim logic of serial killers that often leads to their eventual undoing. As the body count rises, authorities have more data to work with and the killer's profile begins to take shape. When serial killers become overconfident in their abilities, they begin to feel immune to capture and make mistakes.

How much time it takes to solve these crimes varies with the circumstances of each case of course. Some cases are never officially solved. In the case of John Norman Collins and the six other murders he was thought to have committed, he was only convicted of the seventh and last murder. For the other six families, there has been no closure.

Two Adult Children of Rape Believe John Norman Collins May be Their Father

The crime of rape is a soul-wrenching experience for anyone to endure. As society has become increasingly open with discussing this issue, more and more children of rape are opting to discover their birth mothers and family histories. If any human experience is bittersweet, this is it. 

Today, there are organizations and support groups for adult children of rape to reconnect with their birth mothers. The stigma in our society against these innocent offspring still exists, but increasing public exposure of successful reunions is making it easier for more people to come forward.

In 2011, I was contacted by a woman who has asked that her name not be revealed. She was a child of a rape in 1968 and located her birth mother only several years ago. She has since established a loving, healthy relationship with her. Upon inquiring about her birth father though, her mother was uncomfortable and evasive when it came to revealing who he was. After some hemming and hawing, the mom admitted that she knew who the father was, that he was still alive, but that he was unavailable for a meeting. 

On a hunch, she asked if her father was in prison. "Yes," was the answer. Reluctantly, her mother told her that she believed her father to be John Norman Collins. When Collins was arrested in 1969 and his picture was in all the papers, she thought she recognized him as the man who raped her.

Only two months ago, I received another gmail from a woman who now lives on the East Coast. After reading some of my Collins blog posts, she decided to contact me believing that her father may be John Norman Collins. This woman searched for and discovered her birth mother and has since established a relationship with her. 

And of course, this woman also wanted to know who her birth father was. Whenever she inquired about him, her mother refused to tell her his name because she was still scared of him. Then her daughter found a copy of The Michigan Murders in her mother's house and read it. When she asked her mother about it, her mother looked quite upset. That was her daughter's first inkling that JNC could be her birth father, despite the antagonist's name being changed to John Armstrong in the novel.

I gmailed her back and asked if we could speak on the phone so I could report on what I knew. When I told her that she was the second person to contact me about JNC's possible paternity, she livened up. I told her the background of my efforts to contact Collins and his siblings to see if we could arrange for a paternity test to show kinship. They were unresponsive. I was told by the Michigan Department of Corrections that there is a statute of limitations for rape and we would need a court order to get a DNA sample from Collins.

John Norman Collins has often said that he loves children and would love to have been a dad, so I wrote to him in Marquette Prison telling him that he may be not only a father, but also a grandfather. If he would like more information, contact me. To date, he has refused to show any interest in his fatherhood. That's how strong his paternal instinct is. Again, it is not what he says, but what he does or doesn't do that is most revealing of his character.

On a personal note, I have spoken to the first alleged daughter many times on the telephone and am very familiar with her voice. When I heard the voice of the second woman on the phone, I'll be damned if I didn't hear a similar tone and tenor in the voices of both woman. It was eerily apparent. After receiving permission to have them contact each other, they both asked me to reluctantly inquire if there are any others within the reach of my blog who suspect Collins may be their father.

From my extensive research on Collins, I've found he was a practiced rapist, so other offspring may be waiting to be discovered. If you believe Collins may be your birth father, or if you have any information that might be useful in our quest, please contact me at gregoryafournier@ gmail.com. Your information will be held in strictest confidence.

See what one woman recently did to find her birth mom: 
http://www.today.com/news/burger-king-baby-finds-birth-mom-i-am-filled-emotions-2D79437635

"The Rainy Day Murders" Spring Status Report

 

Writing has come a long way since its beginnings as cuneiform messages pressed into soft clay tablets over five thousand years ago. Once the tablets dried, they were permanent records of business transactions and simple messages primarily. A notable exception being the oldest known literature ever found, The Epic of Gilgamesh, discovered in 1853 buried in the desert of what is now Iraq.

Ancient scribes wrote their important messages on vellum, which was made of scraped and tanned sheep or goat hide. Charcoal was ground and mixed with oils to create crude ink and applied with crude reed brushes or sticks. Vellum was much more portable than clay tablets, but it was much more perishable also. 

It was the Egyptians who developed papyrus which led to the eventual development of paper. Papyrus could be rolled into scrolls for easy storage and portability. 

The ancient Egyptians also inscribed their writing on the walls and columns of their important civic buildings, as did the Greek, Roman, and other notable empires. Much of what we know of ancient history comes from the ruins of these monuments.

The printing press with moveable type was invented in 1436 by Johannes Gutenberg in Germany. Now, ideas could be mass produced and public opinion shaped. This invention helped change the political landscape of Europe. Bound paper books and libraries have been the repositories of the world's knowledge for close to seven hundred years of human history. 

In our own time, books have lost favor to digital methods of recording our thoughts and ideas in ways we couldn't have imagined possible, even twenty years ago. The digital computer age has revolutionized how we work and how we live.

What humans have used to write with has also evolved over the ages. The reed stylus created the wedge shaped notations in moist clay used by the Sumerians and Babylonians. The Greeks and the Romans used bone or ivory styluses to imprint notes and messages on wax tablets, not to mention metal chisels to immortalize their empire's achievements in stone and marble.

Quill pens were developed around 700 A.D. which was an advancement that lasted until the development of the first pencils and fountain pens in the 1800s. Then, in the late1860s, the modern typewriter was invented to mechanize how we write. Sometime in the late 1980s, word processing and personal computers took over from the mechanical typewriter.

 

Today, most humans tap out their messages digitally on a keyboard or a touch screen. Instantaneous messaging can reach a global audience, with far reaching implications for the future. Ironically, humans are once again writing on tablets, only digital ones this time around.

So that brings me to the subject of this post. With all the advancements in writing technology over the millenniums and today's high-speed computing, why does it take so long for a book to be published?

1. First, the writer needs a solid idea to develop and write about. That can take years.
2. Next, the book needs to be researched and checked for facts, corrected, rewritten, and revised.
3. Then, the writer must hire a qualified editor to help bring the writing up to current publishing industry expectations.
4. Finally, the writer needs to find an agent interested enough in the project to pitch the book to a publisher who is willing to invest time and money promoting it in the marketplace.

Interested readers of this blog have been asking me with increasing frequency, "When will The Rainy Day Murders be available?

Currently, I'm in the rewriting stage and have lined up an editor to help me over the summer. When I feel I have a quality, professional manuscript, I will solicit an agent. Then, it is anybody's guess when I can attract a trade publisher.

Despite the high-speed internet age we live in, the publishing business is notoriously slow. The only thing I can say about when The Rainy Day Murders will be available is "Stay tuned."


Check out this link for five charts showing the current trends in the publishing business. I have my work cut out for me.
http://janefriedman.com/2014/03/21/5-valuable-charts/

"The Rainy Day Murders" Reflections

When I set out to write the full story of The Rainy Day Murders and the man accused of killing seven young women in and around Ypsilanti, Michigan (1967-1969), I was primarily concerned with recounting the facts and paying a long overdue debt to history.

What began as a simple attempt to recount the details of these ghastly slayings and the evidence against John Norman Collins became a much more personal and far reaching endeavor than I could have ever imagined.

In the last three and a half years, I have researched every bit of government documentation about these cases that Ryan M. Place and I have been able to lay our hands on. As valuable as that factual material is, it tells only the official part of the story.

Newspaper accounts from back in the day were helpful to me with providing commentary, revealing public opinion, establishing times and dates, and filling gaps in the public record of which there are many.

But without this age of internet personal communication, the story I am writing now could not have been told. I have been able to reach out to many people across the country who had information and were ready to share what they know from those times. 

Still, other people have contacted me through my blog, Gmail, or Facebook accounts wanting to tell their stories about their connections with the victims or the accused. Suddenly, the writing of this book became very personal.

It is this living history that adds texture and depth to this story. More often than not, these memories were difficult to share, but most people felt relieved telling their long hidden memories after forty-five years of silence.

Finding background information on the unfortunate victims began to give them personalities beyond the facts and the headlines I began my research with. The layering of one tragic case upon another has made this a difficult story to tell, but every bit of physical and circumstantial evidence I have been able to find points to one inescapable conclusion - the State of Michigan convicted the right guy.