Friday, August 22, 2014

Where Is Beverly Potts?


(This is the Only blog post, that I go into the archives to repost...And until we know what happened Beverly Potts, I will continue to do so...August 24th 2011 marked the 60th anniversary of Beverly's disappearence)



Friday August 24th 1951, 10 year old Beverly Potts vanished from her Cleveland neighborhood...Never to be seen again...The case is still open...And even though it has nothing to do with me...It haunts me...

She had disappeared after attending a showagon at Halloran Park....The showagon was a group of singers dancers, and other performers, that went from park to park near the end of Summer...Halloran Park was at the corner of Beverly's street, Linnet and 117th...

Beverly had gone there with her best friend and next door neighbor, Patsy Swing...Beverly was told she stay for the whole show...Patsy had to be home by dark...When it got close to 9:00 PM...Patsy left...She tried to get Beverly to come with her...But Beverly wanted to stay...And did...

Once it was 10:00 PM, Beverly's parents, and older sister became worried...Her father and sister went to the park to look for her...They came back with no signs of Beverly...They checked again...Her mother called the police...Later, after the police hadn't shown up...Her sister called the police again...It was now after midnight...The search was on...Her father Robert searched the neighborhood...Neighbors began to realize something was wrong...And started searching also...

By all accounts, Beverly was extremely shy...Especially around boys, and men...Even men she knew...So the thought that she would have left willingly with some one was highly doubted...Yet no one at the park had noticed any type of struggle, or anything alarming...It's estimated that there was 1500 people there...

Then Saturday morning came...No sign of Beverly...The neighborhood was in shock...The Cleveland police was working non-stop, lead by Chief of Detectives, James E. McArthur...Every lead...I stress every, was checked out...Hot lines were setup...All three Cleveland papers were covering the story, non-stop...

One of the scariest things to me, is the number of stories that came out...A woman down the block from the Potts house hearing a girl scream "I want to go home!" as a car sped by...A man seeing a young girl in a car with an older man...And then seeing that car in a field a short time later, about a mile or so away...The man beating the girl...A cab driver picking up a suspicious looking man and a young girl on 117th, and taking them to the bus station...These are just a few...You can't be sure what is true, and what isn't...But if any of them are true, why the hell didn't some one do something, or speak up sooner...

There was also many reports of people seeing a particular type of car...With a creepy looking person...Some accounts saying two people...Trolling around the park during the Showagon...

It's all so sketchy...Especially 60 years later...Yet...Even today...If a tip comes in...It's checked out...It's still an open case...Nothing has ever been found...

"The earth might as well have opened up and swallowed the child. She has vanished into nothing." -Ben R. Tidyman in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, 9-4-'51

The Potts family was investigated...Neighbors interviewed...Classmates interviewed...Every know sex offender questioned...I was surprised to read how well the police kept tabs on sex offenders back then...Over the years, there have been many promising tips, that have just never panned out..

In 2001 letters were received at the Cleveland Plain Dealer...A dying man confessing to the disappearance, molestation, and murder of Beverly...On the 50th anniversary of the disappearance, he was going to turn himself in at Halloran Park...Then he sent another letter, just weeks before...Saying he has become to sick, and was being put into a nursing home...The Police checked everything and anything they could...The man was never found....Beverly has never been found...No trace of her has ever been found...

It's been said, that after Beverly's disappearance, Her mother Elizabeth, "seemed to be crying softly virtually all the time." I can only imagine. Elizabeth Potts died 5 years later, in 1956...

I said at the beginning that this story haunts me...I'm not sure why...I do know that it bothers me even more, now that I have kids of my own...My father grew up at Halloran Park...It was just steps from his childhood home...He knew of Beverly Potts...He's a few years older then her...She was friends with my aunt...

I had spent plenty of time at Halloran Park when I was kid...We'd walk up there when we were visiting my grandfather...I didn't find out about the Beverly Potts story until I was in high school...Although I didn't think much of it...But I always felt uneasy at the park after that...I took my wife there once...It was our first date that didn't start in a bar after work...We went ice skating there...But I still felt strange...I drive past Halloran everyday...And I think about what may have happened to that little girl...

I always think about how much better things were in our society, when i was kid...I knew there were kid touchers, and evil people...I was prepared for it...But it didn't seem to be too bad...Then I would think about when my parents were growing up, and how much better a time it was in the world...There couldn't be this much bad sh!t...Then I learned about Beverly Potts...And her story leads you to so many more horrible stories that happened back then...Clearly, this world has always been f**ked up....

I guess all we can do is prepare our children for the bad as best we can...While not forgetting to show them the good...

Many times you hear questions like, 'If you could ask God one question...What would it be?' Or some silly sh!t like that...I'd ask, WHERE'S BEVERLY POTTS?

Not that it would do any good for her family...They're all gone...Maybe it's just my Catholic upbringing that just wants that poor child's soul to finally rest peacefully.





For more on Beverly Potts case...There is a great book called "The Twilight Of Innocence" by James Jessen Badal.
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Beverly's page at The Charley Project... http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/p/potts_beverly.html
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National Center for Missing and Exploited Children... http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PublicHomeServlet?LanguageCountry=en_US

Monday, August 18, 2014

Monday Moaning



Well, I had to start this week with a good pic...As College Football season nears, my Notre Dame Fighting Irish seem to have a problem...

This past week news broke that Notre Dame had an internal investigation looking into allegations Academic Misconduct...When 4 players were noticeably absent at practice, it was easy to figure at least some of who was involved...LB/DE Ishaq Williams, CB  Keivarae Russell, WR Davaris Daniels,and LB Kendall Moore...Daniels had just come off of suspension for his GPA dropping...Moore, a 5th year senior has slipped on the depth chart during Spring and Summer...Russell is the top CB on the depth chart...And Williams, while not officially being a bust, has not lived up to expectations, and the Irish were hoping to see him reach his full potential this season...

The players have not been dismissed from the team or University...But they are being withheld from practice and games until the investigation complete...And while the Notre Dame haters are licking their chops, dying to blast us Irish fans who hang our hats on the academic standards, this is the same School that threw their starting QB out shortly before the start of last season for academic violations...

It is reported that a faculty member brought the allegations to the University, feeling that work turned in by these players (and possibly other students) was not their own...There is also speculation, but no confirmation that academic advisors could be involved...What makes me happy is the University took it seriously right away...They didn't try and hush it up, or sweep it under the rug, in the name of football...And the Athletic department, and head coach Brian Kelly put up no fight over...It's also reported that none of the coaching staff was aware of any of this until it was brought to their attention...(so far)...They are all in with finding out what happened and who the problem people are...

I really like what Brian Kelly had to say in his press conference Saturday...





Another sign of how serious Notre Dame is taking this...They brought in Maurice Clarett to speak with the staff, and players Sunday...


Shit, if there's a guy that knows about the pitfalls college athletes can fall into, it's him...Seriously, if you haven't seen the ESPN 30 for 30 about him and Jim Tressel, you have to see it...You'll gain a lot of respect for Clarett, and you'll lose even more for Tressel...What a fake, piece of shit that guy is!

I guess, I don't really have much to say about this yet...Mainly because we know very little...I just know that I'm happy with how Notre Dame is handling it so far...As more information comes out, I may change my mind...I mean these are the guys that thought Manti Te'o had a girlfriend they never saw, then gave him a football to bury with her when she died, you know, whenever he got back to Hawaii to bury her pretend body!

That's it for now...Stay tuned...

Have a week...

The Beeze.

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Monday Moaning...On a Tuesday




It's "Shark Week" people....And I'd rather watch that over pre-season football!

Saturday the Cleveland Browns had their first, uneventful pre-season game, against the Lions...What a steaming pile of crap...And the worst part...All the Cleveland media, and most fans could talk about during the game (via Twitter) was when is Johnny Manziel getting in...

When the coach says so assholes...And Cleveland sports media, you better stop calling yourselves journalists when you are openly rooting for one guy over another to win the starting job...They wrote and spoke and tweeted of his 7 for 11 completions, for 63 yards as if it was somehow amazing, and so much greater then Brian Hoyers 6-14 for 92 yards...Manziel played against 2's and 3's...Hoyer had a couple drops...But the Play calling stood out to me...When it was timing playing, 3 steps and the ball is out, Hoyer looked great...When the Browns called a read-option on 3rd and 2 with Manzile in there, it was just so completely predictable, that the Lions ate it up...

The biggest thing that stood out was the Browns yards per pass average...5.2...That shows they weren't trying to stretch the field...Or just dumping off to the check downs...

I did like a lot of what I saw from the defense...Then again, it was the Lions, in pre-season...It was what I expected...A boring, meaningless, pre-season game...

The Big Story from Saturday night came from auto Racing when Tony Stewart ran over and killed Kevin Ward Jr.....It was a fucked up situation...




I'm not willing to speak on this topic...I know nothing about auto racing...I never wrote about it before...I'm not starting now...Although, I will say, if you're going o get out of your wrecked car and try to start a fight with a guy in a moving car, you're probably suffering from Cranial-Anal-Insertion...And you're gonna lose...

Big news that broke Monday, Actor/Comedian Robin Williams committed suicide....It's sad...Very sad...He was amazingly talented...But many people suffer with the same things as him, and no one talks about it...I loved his work as an actor, but I have a hard time going on and on about some one who killed themselves...Even worse, networks like CNN completely stopped all news coverage and just talked non-stop about Williams...Kinda makes me sick...

Here...Enjoy a depressing song while I go watch "Shark Week"...





Have a week...

The Beeze.

Monday, August 4, 2014

Monday Moaning



They say every picture tells a story...I bet that gal has a helluva story to tell us! Well, words may not be her thing...She seems like an action girl!

So, what other pictures have something to say to us? How about this...


This picture tells us Baltimore Ravens fans are fucking assholes...Fucking assholes who clearly don't care that this ass-hat punched the shit out of his lady...But then again the NFL's weak stance is almost saying, 'Oh it's okay!'


This says....'I don't know...I'm fucking clueless...I just want to make more money.'

What about this one...


Ahhhh....'I fuck on the first date!'


Yes folks, I'm not being very serious...A promotion at work has increased my hours, and after a long Sunday shift, I got a few drinks in me....But there has been some topics that have gotten under my skin...A couple weeks ago I wrote THIS....The ongoing murder of innocent people in Gaza has really bothered me...


What does this picture say?

Better yet, how does it make you feel? What are you thinking when you see this child standing in the rubble that was his home?


I think this picture speaks for itself...Yes people, the U.S. has been supplying Israel with arms for a long time...And while our politicians sit there and talk about setting up a ceasefire and peace talks they are using U.S. tax dollars to send more arms to Israel...

If you haven't caught on, I am totally against Israel's constant bombing and killing of innocent Palestinians...Yes, if Israel wants to go after Hamas, fine...Go for it...But don't say you are using pin point strikes to take them out, when you are bombing a U.N. School or hospital were refugees and already injured innocent people are, who have no ties to Hamas...

If you have a half hour to kill, watch this video....There are a number of details in it that the U.S. media doesn't talk about...Including an unwarranted attack by Israel on a U.S. Navy ship in 1967...




Yeah, I know, a little heavy for a blog that started with a hottie and ripping Ray Rice an the NFL...

How about this?



It's funny 'cause it's true...I find it humorous just how heated a nation of immigrants gets about more immigrants wanting a better life, and they want to come here...You know, just like my great grandparents did, and your grandparents did, and that dude's parents did...Yeah, people shouldn't come here, or go to Canada illegally, but if you had a clue of just how fucked up, expensive, and nearly impossible the legal way is, you'd consider crossing a river when no one was looking...

Well, that feels like enough hot button issues for this week...Feel free to discuss...

Oh, since I brought up Ray Rice and the NFL...Here's Bill Burr on hitting women...





Have a week,

The Beeze.