The Secret Life and Brutal Death of Mamie Thurman

Signed by the Author

A REGIONAL BESTSELLER --- The true account of a prominent, Depression-era woman from Southern West Virginia, who was found brutally murdered, Mamie Thurman was a member of the tight-lipped, local aristocracy that frequented a private club in downtown Logan, West Virginia, where locals gambled, drank illegally, swapped wives and the like. A handyman was likely framed for her murder and spent the rest of his life in prison. However, new evidence points to several groups—from the mob to the KKK and rumrunners and local merchants—as having a part in this gruesome account.

It was over seventy-nine years ago that this murder grabbed national headlines due to the unusual circumstances surrounding the homicide. This book—a new revision offering greater detail and newly discovered information—takes another look at this puzzling tale. The story involves a number of white-collar suspects, an intense community scandal and a shocking gangland-style execution that still baffles law enforcement today.

The Secret Life and Brutal Death of Mamie Thurman is published by Quarrier Press in collaboration with Woodland Press. It represents the first in-depth investigation of the 1932 murder. It includes all-new chapters in the murder case. In spite of her local notoriety at the time and the fact that her husband was a City of Logan police officer, Mamie was savagely destroyed on a rainy night in June—shot in the head, neck fractured, face disfigured, throat slit and her lifeless corpse dumped over a mountainside, like a load of garbage at an illegal dumping site.

It is this examination of the slaying that now includes new photographs from the original West Virginia State Police investigation and court testimony from the subsequent trial, which revealed the murdered woman's adulterous affairs with several prominent local businessmen and her risky lifestyle.

According to Bill Clements, of Quarrier Press, "This new work is a complete reconsideration of its predecessor. It includes much more research and interview material than its former release. There are also several new chapters that better cover the decades-old case. The author grabs the reader's attention from the onset. It's part crime drama and part roller-coaster ride. Most amazing of all, this is a true story. Such a riveting literary work should be in every home and high school/college library across the state."

Even today, there are some who say that on a still night the tormented voice of Mamie Thurman's ghost echoes through the trees and across the mountains near Holden, WV. Mamie's ghost cries out for justice, truth and closure.

A Woodland Press collaboration with Quarrier Press, of Charleston, WV.