Room 1046

Part Two: Artemus Ogletree

Throughout 1935, investigators in Kansas City struggled to not only determine the identity of the man calling himself "Roland T. Owen," but also had to untangle the strange circumstances that had led up to his death. Meanwhile, the family of a missing young man from Birmingham, Alabama had been unable to locate any trace of him for over a year. Their search would end up intersecting with the ongoing investigation from Kansas City in the waning days of 1936, but in doing so, would end up raising even more questions...

Artemus Ogletree was just one of three children born to his parents, Leon and Ruby Ogletree. His siblings and he were born in sequential years, with his sister, Eleanor, leading the pack, born in 1913, followed by brothers Leon Jr. in 1914 and Artemus in 1915.

The Ogletree family would live in Florida for a few years, where Artemus was born, but during his childhood, would move around sporadically throughout the southeast. After leaving Florida, they set their sights on New Orleans, Louisiana, and then followed that up with a move to Augusta, Georgia. Eventually, though, in Artemus' teenage years, the family would finally settle for good in Birmingham, Alabama.

As a youth, his parents constantly found him buried in some book. Having had an active imagination since childhood, Artemus always envisioned himself elsewhere. In particular, he dreamed of traveling the world. When the family had lived in New Orleans, he would pass hours just sitting at the wharves, watching ships sail past, wondering where they had come from - or where they were going. He dreamed of living his life like that, someday.

In 1934, when he was just eighteen years old, Artemus told his family about his desire to make this lifelong dream a reality. Along with a group of friends, he was planning to travel out to California. His father, Leon, objected, but his mother, Ruby, wanted him to achieve his dream of seeing the Pacific Coast. Artemus promised to keep the family updated with letters home, and he followed through with that... although it wasn't nearly enough, his parents worried about him, hoping he was staying safe. Occasionally he'd request some money, and his parents would willingly wire the money to wherever he happened to be at that week.

Yet, these letters would continue to be sent throughout 1935, even though they changed in remarkable ways. Instead of writing, they were now typed. And the letters, which had once been spaced apart by days, maybe weeks, were now separated by months. The language within changed, and the Ogletree family became suspicious that not everything was as it seemed.

As they'd later learn, the letters from their son were still being sent months after his death, composed by someone pretending he was still alive.

This is the story of room 1046.

On the morning of January 5th, 1935, the body of a young man was found inside room 1046, an interior room overlooking the courtyard of the Hotel President in Kansas City, Missouri. The deceased young man had been bound and viciously attacked, with him barely surviving through a heinous beating, slashing, and stabbing. In route to the nearby hospital, he'd slipped into a coma and never woke up, passing away just after midnight on January 6th.

Physicians marveled at the abuse the young man had taken before his death, enduring not just stab wounds in the region around his heart - which had pierced his lung - but repeated blunt force trauma to the head. This was the injury that had led to his coma and eventual death, a triple skull-fracture, which officials theorized had been perpetrated by a revolver butt or hammer. His wrists had also been horribly slashed, and he suffered other injuries, such as a cut to his ear and strangulation marks found on his neck.

In a brief moment of near-lucidity just before his death, the young man had been asked where he'd come from. He'd managed to mumble something that sounded like "Elmira," and it wasn't clear whether this had been intentional or not. Even if it had been, investigators weren't sure whether this had been a town name or a person's name.

Having given the name Roland T. Owen to staff at the Hotel President, authorities would quickly learn that this was a pseudonym used by the young man. For what reason, though, they had no idea, as every lead involving this identity proved to be a dead end.

Investigators would use information given by staff members of the Hotel President to determine that the unidentified young victim had complained about a recent stay at the nearby Muehlebach Hotel, so they'd check in with staff there to learn that he'd stayed between December 31st, 1934 and January 1st, 1935, under a different name: Eugene K. Scott. Hotel registration cards would prove that the handwriting between the two was nearly-identical. However, despite claiming that he was from Los Angeles during his check-in there, authorities were unable to find any link to a Eugene Scott from the Los Angeles area, leading investigators to surmise that this was just another pseudonym.

However, staff at the Muehlebach Hotel had recalled the same young man checking in with a small bag... something he no longer had with him when he checked into the Hotel President on January 2nd. Following his death, police would begin looking for this bag in the Kansas City region, but were unsuccessful in that endeavor.

In canvasing the area around the hotel, police learned that many people had encounters with the young man in the days before his death. This included the reports I told you about in the last episode - the strange run-ins with hotel staff following January 2nd - but also included his brief run-in with city employee Robert Lane. If you recall, Lane was the driver who came upon a young man matching Roland T. Owen's description the night before his death, giving him a ride to a taxi nearby. Lane was one of thousands who dropped by the morgue to view the body, identifying him as the man he'd seen during that strange encounter.

Other witnesses reported seeing this man in the days before his death, including several bartenders along Twelfth Street in Kansas City, who reported seeing a man matching his description, cauliflowered left ear and all. Surprisingly, in many of these reports, the young man had been seen in the company of two women, leading to the belief that he may not have been a newcomer to Kansas City, but rather, someone familiar with the region. However, the two women he was seen with remained unidentified, as did the mysterious "Don," who the young man had reportedly corresponded with before his death.

In addition to trying to determine the identity of the victim and the culprit(s), authorities struggled to pin down a possible motive for the strangely violent crime. It was believed that the man calling himself Roland T. Owen had been bound and tortured by his killer, possibly in an attempt to gain information from him. But what that information was or could have been, authorities could only guess at. He'd left behind no evidence of his involvement in anything untoward or shady, and again, police could only speculate at what he'd been involved in - if anything. Investigators would also speculate that the killer(s) may have been trying to punish him for something he'd done in the past, which again, they could only speculate about.

For a time, it was theorized that Owen may have had some tie to an organized crime ring, and that the mysterious "Don" he'd spoken to may have been the head of a mob outfit of some kind. But nearly ninety years later, I can safely say that there seems to be no evidence supporting that belief.

In the weeks to come, numerous people came forward from all over the United States, claiming to know the identity of the murdered man from Kansas City.

This included a man from Shelby, North Carolina, whose brother had recently gone missing, as well as a woman from Des Moines, Iowa, whose husband was believed to have died. A wrestling manager from Kansas City believed Roland T. Owen to be an aspiring wrestler from Omaha that had recently reached out to him and his associates for representation. A police officer from Los Angeles believed he may have been a young delinquent named Gene Scott, who'd been arrested out there for a liquor law violation in 1931. Then there was a man who believed the decedent was his nephew from Texas, positively identifying him at the morgue in Kansas City, only to later withdraw the identification when his sister, the supposed mother of the victim, clarified that her son had died years beforehand.

The victim's body would remain in the Kansas City morgue for nearly three months, as police struggled to determine his next-of-kin. Failing that, they began making arrangements for a funeral... and in doing so, would kickstart one of the strangest chapters in this already-strange saga.

In March of 1935, authorities announced that the still-unidentified young man from the Hotel President, who had identified himself as Roland Owen and Eugene Scott, was set to be buried in a potter's field with a funeral service taking place at the Melody-McGilley chapel later that week.

However, after this was announced in the local newspapers, one of their editorial rooms received a call. On the other end of the line was a woman, who told them:

"You have a story in your paper that is wrong. Roland Owen will not be buried in a pauper's grave. Arrangements have been made for his funeral."

The newspaper staff member then asked:

"Who are you? Who's calling?"

The woman responded:

"Never mind. I know what I'm talking about."

The staff member:

"What happened to Owen at the hotel?"

The woman:

"He got into a jam."

She then hung up.

At around the same time, staff at the Melody-McGilley funeral home had received a strange call from a man claiming to have known Roland Owen. He offered to help pay for the cost of the funeral, with the chapel insisting that they'd already ensured Owen would receive a proper funeral, but that if the man on the other end wanted to help pay for the expenses, they'd be glad for the help. Afterward, the man had followed through, sending $25 to the funeral home in the mail, but refusing to give his name.

When chatting with the funeral home, this man seems to have provided some semblance of a motive for the strange crime, indicating that the victim - Roland Owen - had been engaged to his sister and stepped out on her during his various travels. The man on the phone claimed that his sister and he had been with Owen the week of his death, alluding to the idea that his sister was aware of Owen's infidelity and he'd sought revenge against him for that. When asked what had happened in the hotel that fateful night, the man had responded:

"Owen hadn't played the game fair and cheaters usually get what's coming to them."

When asked what Owen's real name was, the man replied:

"You have his real name. His only relatives are two cousins who won't help."

The caller asked for this information to not be given over to police, but was told that it would be shared with investigators. To that, he said:

"That's all right. They're on the wrong track."

In giving over the money for the funeral, this caller seems to have requested a specific cemetery for Owen to be buried in.

"Bury him in Memorial Park cemetery. I'll pay for it... I wish you would do that, for then he will be near my sister."

As I mentioned, this unidentified caller had followed through with his promise, sending the money in an envelope to the funeral home. But in doing so, he refused to give his name or his sister's. Yet a lead involving the latter would arise when it was discovered that this same caller had made floral arrangements for the funeral, at the additional cost of $10. One such arrangement, a wreathe of thirteen American Beauty roses, included the inscription:

"Love for ever - Louise"

Investigators believed that there was credence to the the claims made by the male and female callers, that the woman may have been Owen's fiancé, and during his travels, he'd stepped out on her, earning the ire of her brother (or other family members). Maybe they'd only intended to put a scare into him at the hotel that evening, but went too far - or maybe Owen fought back - resulting in more serious injuries than intended. Afterward, maybe the woman felt sympathy or guilt for what had happened, and encouraged her brother to help her arrange a funeral for the man she'd once loved... at quite a cost, spending $35, the equivalent of roughly $800 in modern currency.

Police attempted to retrace the phone calls made to the newspaper, the funeral home, and the florists, but discovered that they'd all been made via payphone. The money sent to arrange the funeral and flowers had been wrapped in newspaper and sent in envelopes without any notes or return addresses attached. Whoever they'd been, they'd left behind no evidence incriminating themselves.

At the funeral held later that month, investigators would pose as gravediggers for days before and after, hoping to catch sight of someone visiting the freshly-dug gravesite - maybe even the unknown "Louise" that had left her name on a floral arrangement for the unidentified young man. But the only attendees for the funeral were police and funeral home staff, with no one visiting the plot in the days after Roland T. Owen was laid to rest.

The theory that Roland Owen had been killed by a jilted lover is one that endures to this day, with the forced involvement by a man and woman in the weeks after the case implying that they'd had some kind of strange emotional investment in the story. After all, they'd involved themselves and given over the equivalent of a grand in modern currency to ensure this victim received a proper burial, requesting that Owen be buried close to them. And in doing so, they successfully covered their tracks to ensure no evidence implicated either of them.

Was it possible that the man and woman on the phone had been telling the truth? Had Owen promised himself to a woman, then stepped out on her with others? Thus, earning the ire of her family? If so, it would raise the possibility that the man and woman seen leaving the Hotel President after 4:00 on the morning of Roland's murder may have been them.

With few other leads to investigate at the time, investigators pursued this lead until they couldn't take it any further.

In late March 1935, shortly after the burial of the man calling himself Roland T. Owen, a couple was picked up for questioning in this case. But after questioning, they were determined to not know anything about it.

In the months that followed, the story would begin to wilt away in local coverage, replaced by more recent stories of death and distress. Yet it was still considered open and unsolved in local police records, with investigators continuing to work it as new leads emerged - scant as they were. As weeks turned to months, that began to happen less frequently.

Details of the case - dubbed the "Love Forever Murder," due to the inscription on the floral arrangement left for the unidentified victim - continued to get published in various newspapers and publications, which ranged the gamut from true crime periodicals to hair-styling quarterlies. In those, officials hoped that barbers might be able to identify the unique scar along the side of the victim's head.

It wasn't until roughly two years had passed, in the waning days of 1936, that a positive identification finally took place. And while that would provide answers, it inspired even more hair-raising questions that remain unanswered to this day.

The family of Artemus Ogletree, still living in Birmingham, Alabama, had been missing the young man since the early half of 1934. That was when he'd decided to leave home and hitchhike around America with some companions, only one of whom the family could recall the name of (Joe Simpson, an unemployed cook). Together, they'd planned to head out to California.

Artemus' father, Leon Ogletree Sr., had objected to his young son's wishes, but had ultimately given in at the urging of his wife, Artemus' mother, Ruby Ogletree. They'd agreed to give Artemus some money to fund his travel, hoping that the journey would fulfill their youngest son's lifelong dream of traveling the country.

Throughout 1934, Artemus had sent letters home to his family, which were all handwritten. In them, he described in varying levels of detail where he'd gone. What he'd been up to. Who he'd met and spent time with. Occasionally, he would request some additional spending money, and his mother was happy to wire it to him.

But in 1935, those letters changed drastically. This change happened at the very beginning of the new year, around the same time that an unidentified young man was killed in a Kansas City hotel under mysterious circumstances. The letters, which had once been handwritten, were now typed. That alone struck the Ogletree family as odd, as Artemus had never once used a typewriter before, and as far as they knew, he didn't know how to type. But to make matters even stranger, Artemus stopped asking about the family, and the language used in the letters changed overnight. Artemus, a rather-bookish individual, was well-versed with the English language. The typed letters, on the other hand, contained misspellings and slang phrases that Artemus had never once used. One such phrase used often in the typed letters, "tired of this burg," was a phrase used by Chicago residents and occasionally New Yorkers, but not Artemus Ogletree, who'd spent his entire youth in the southeast.

The letters would also become more rare than ever. While Artemus had already written his family rather-infrequently through 1934, that pace began to slow to an absolute crawl. Once separated by weeks, the typed letters were spaced out by months, and mailed out from locations that Artemus had never told his family he planned on visiting. The first came from Chicago, where the letter-writer claimed he was attending business school. The second and third letters were mailed from New York.

In a surprising twist, the typed letters also detailed Artemus' adventures continuing outside of the country. In the second typed letter mailed to his family in 1935, the letter-writer claimed that he was heading off to Europe, sailing to France. In that, he provided an address in Paris to send mail to. In the third letter, mailed months later, the writer claimed that Artemus was now heading off to Cairo, Egypt on a steamship.

In these typed letters, the writer explained why he'd shifted to typing his letters instead of writing them by hand. He claimed that he was unable to write because he'd lost the thumb of his writing hand in a fight, trying to protect the life of another man... a companion during his travels.

This other man would acquaint himself to the Ogletree family later that year, roughly nine months after the so-called Roland T. Owen was found dead in a Kansas City hotel. This man, calling himself Godfrey Jordan, called the Ogletrees from Memphis, Tennessee, and in a rambling thirty-minute phone call, described his relationship with Artemus. He recalled many details about Artemus and his life that his family knew had to have come straight from the source. At the time, they still believed Artemus to be alive, but considered this phone call to be strange and the caller to be irrational.

The man calling himself Godfrey Jordan again explained to the Ogletrees how Artemus had saved his life in a fight, and had lost the thumb on his writing hand as a result. He was now left unable to write letters by hand, instead typing them. This man also told the Ogletree family that Artemus had married a wealthy woman in Cairo, and was living well in Egypt.

Throughout 1935 and even 1936, the Ogletree family would attempt to validate any part of this story. They'd reach out to consular authorities in Cairo, but were unsuccessful in finding any trace of their son. No foreign governments or shipping companies had any record of Artemus Ogletree having traveled overseas. Failing to turn up any record of Artemus traveling abroad, his family would begin reaching out to police authorities throughout the region. They'd send pictures of Artemus to police departments, and even attempted to report him missing to the FBI.

The Ogletrees, unable to find Artemus, would even try to send letters to the French address provided by the typed letter-writer. However, all of those letters would return to them unopened.

It was as-if the world itself had swallowed up Artemus Ogletree whole.

In autumn of 1936, a family friend of the Ogletree family was perusing the Sunday edition of a local newspaper when she came upon an article pushed by police in Kansas City. The article detailed the strange, unsolved murder of a young man at the Hotel President, and pleaded for anyone with information to come forward. This family friend, who'd known Artemus as a youth, showed the article to her friend, Artemus' mother, Ruby Ogletree. Upon viewing the sketch of the deceased young man, things began to click for Ruby.

Artemus had been presumed missing since around the same time this strange murder took place. That was when the strange typed letters, the misinformation, and rambling phone calls had started.

Fearing the worst, Ruby Ogletree reached out to police in Kansas City, giving them pictures of Artemus. Through this correspondence, police there were finally able to give a name to the murder victim they'd buried under an alias more than a year beforehand.

Roland T. Owen was none other than Artemus Ogletree.

In the weeks ahead, the Ogletree family traveled out to Kansas City, speaking to not only police officials there, but hotel staff. They hoped to, if not learn more about his final days or even hours alive, then at least understand them. While in Kansas City, the Ogletrees would arrange for Artemus' remains to be exhumed and re-buried closer to home.

Most surprising of all, even after they'd reclaimed their son's remains and put him to rest once and for all, they continued to receive typed letters from someone claiming to be Artemus. The final letter sent to the Ogletree family was mailed from Bombay, India and contained details they now knew to be completely and totally false.

In identifying Artemus Ogletree as the murder victim from Kansas City, Missouri - once known as Roland T. Owens - police announced that they had learned the name of a companion of his, who Police Chief Thomas J. Higgins said had been with Artemus in at least three different hotels in the Kansas City region before his death. Describing the murder as "the perfect crime," Chief Higgins told reporters:

"We traced Ogletree and his friend through three states, and we know where they were in Kansas City. The friend left right after the killing and hasn't been back here since. We have no clue involving any woman in the murder at this time."

Despite tracing Artemus and his supposed companion through three states, there were long gaps of time that investigators struggled to fill in. After all, Artemus had left with a group of companions in early 1934, and had made it out to Los Angeles that year. Roughly nine months later, in January 1935, he'd been murdered at a hotel in Kansas City, having frequented bars and hotels in the region for weeks beforehand. But his traveling companion at the time - who authorities claimed to have identified - was now in the wind. Per Kansas City Police Sgt. Frank Howland:

"It's still a wide open case. But we're seeking a man - maybe two men. He may not be far from here, but we can't afford to say any more until we find him... We've never quit trying to solve this slaying, but we've had nothing until now to work on. The room was cleaned out. But we've traced Ogletree to three hotels where he lived and discovered a companion lived with him. With that information, we hope to solve the crime."

In the summer of 1937, the suspect that police had been pursuing in the unsolved murder of Artemus Ogletree would become known to the world: a 36-year-old named Joseph Ogden, who'd previously found employment as a cook and a dishwasher.

Police had suspected Ogden of involvement for a while, having refused to name him in the papers because they didn't want him to catch wind of their suspicions. But following his arrest in 1937 for an unrelated crime, authorities stated their belief that he'd been Artemus Ogletree's companion in the final months of his life, and may have even been the mysterious "Don" that Artemus had left a note behind for and spoken to on the telephone just hours before his death.

Following the identification of Artemus Ogletree in 1936, police attempted to pick up Ogden's trail, but were unable to find him. They learned that both he and Artemus had used aliases throughout their travels, and tried to pick up the pseudonyms Ogden used, such as Joseph Martin, Joseph Marshal, and others.

But in August 1937, a grisly discovery in New York led authorities straight to Ogden. A man brought a large trunk to a shipping company, requesting it to be shipped to Memphis, Tennessee. However, he'd apparently done an inadequate job in preparing the shipment for transportation, as a wet splotch began growing on the side of the trunk. Suspecting it to be blood, employees at the express agency opened up the crate and discovered the nude body of a young, red-haired man inside. His clothing removed, the young man had been shot and killed, and an identifying tattoo on his forearm had been scraped off with a blade of some kind.

The victim was quickly identified as Oliver George Sinechal, a petty thief and narcotics dealer that lived a nomadic lifestyle. However, police would learn that the victim had most recently lived with another man, Joseph Marshal. Following up on their leads, police arrived at the victim's apartment within seven hours of the body's discovery, and inside, found the aforementioned Joseph Marshal, along with a .32-caliber revolver, a blood-stained shirt, and a bottle muriatic acid. They determined that the suspect, Joseph Marshal, was attempting to destroy evidence and preparing to flee at the time police arrived.

Following his arrest, Joseph Marshal - now identified as Joseph Ogden - denied killing Oliver Sinechal. At least, until he was confronted with overwhelming evidence implicating him in the shooting death, at which point he realized denying the allegations could only make his potential punishment more severe. Soon thereafter, he confessed to the slaying. But investigators theorized that this wasn't the only crime he'd likely committed, and police in New York were soon in touch with detectives from Kansas City.

Beyond having killed another young man and leaving their body in a strange, nude state, there were a number of surprising links between Joseph Ogden and Artemus Ogletree. For starters, Ogden was believed to have been Ogletree's travel companion for weeks, if not months, before the latter's murder in January 1935. Ogden was identical to the description provided by staff from numerous hotels, who recalled someone looking just like him traveling alongside Ogletree. He lived a nomadic lifestyle, constantly moving around. At the time of his arrest, Ogden was living in New York, where if you recall, two of the typed letters sent to the Ogletree family had been mailed from. And when he was trying to ship the trunk containing the body of murder victim Oliver Sinechal, Ogden had tried shipping it to Memphis, Tennessee, the same place where one of Artemus' travel companions had called the Ogletree family months after his death and lied about his... well, everything.

Police would also learn that one of Joseph Ogden's aliases was none other than Donald Kelso. This was the name he'd been using he'd been in the Kansas City area, at around the same time Artemus Ogletree was murdered. Someone with this name had checked into a hotel alongside Ogletree just days before his death using this same alias. Police reasoned that this could have been the mysterious "Don" that Artemus left a note for in his hotel room, and spoke to on the telephone on January 4th.

Police would compare handwriting samples of both Joseph Ogden and Donald Kelso, and determined them to match. However, it is worth noting that handwriting analysis is a very imperfect science to this day, much less so a century ago, and an analysis by the FBI in 1950 was unable to conclude that there were any similarities between the two's handwriting. But that didn't deter investigators in 1937 and 1938 from concluding that Joseph Ogden and Donald Kelso were one in the same.

Following his confession in the Oliver Sinechal murder, Joseph Ogden was sentenced to twenty years to life, and was first sent to Sing Sing Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison operated by New York State. For the remainder of his life, he'd spent time in and out of both prisons and insane asylums, including a period in which he escaped from jail, but if he was responsible for the murder of Artemus Ogletree, it was never proven.

Investigators in Kansas City believed Ogden to be the most likely suspect in the case, and came up with multiple theories as to why he may have killed the younger man. These theories ranged from jealousy (Ogden being jealous of Artemus' popularity with the ladies) to a lover's spat (Ogden was believed to be a gay man that demanded some level of control over his companions, the same thing that'd led him to kill Oliver Sinechal).

Despite learning of his conviction in New York, officials in Kansas City seemed to have become comfortable assigning guilt to Joseph Ogden in the unsolved Artemus Ogletree slaying. Yet they would never prove this case, theorizing that he'd killed Ogletree for some obscure reason and never pursuing a prosecution. For that reason, Ogden remains just a likely suspect in this case, but his guilt has never been proven.

Believe it or not, there is yet another suspect in this case who I've yet to really talk about. However, you did hear their name earlier in this episode.

Joseph Simpson, who'd previously found work as a cook, was one of Artemus Ogletree's earliest travel companions when he left Birmingham, Alabama in 1934. He was just one of several companions at the time, but the one that the Ogletree family remembered by name. He'd reportedly been with Artemus all the way through to Los Angeles, where according to Simpson, the two went their separate ways. However, as reported by Kansas City Magazine in their in-depth article on this story, Artemus' family - in particular his mother, Ruby - believed this to have been a lie from Simpson.

Following the identification of her son as the murder victim from Kansas City, Ruby Ogletree began to suspect Joseph Simpson of some kind of involvement in the case. She found it odd that Artemus had left home with Simpson and that the two had split up some undetermined amount of time before his death, but Simpson had never really tried to reach out to them - or anyone for that matter - to provide information about their travel or companions, even though so many details remained clouded in mystery. But at the time, Ruby's suspicions were cast aside by Kansas City detectives, who'd already focused in on Joseph Ogden as their primary suspect.

Following Artemus' burial in Alabama, Ruby began trying to gather information about Joe Simpson, including stuff like his high school records. She tried to arrange a meeting with Simpson multiple times over many months, just to get a chance to speak with him, but was rebuffed at every turn. It seemed like the man was doing his best to avoid her. It wasn't until the waning days of 1939 that she finally succeeding in tracking down Simpson, later writing to detectives with the Kansas City Police Department:

"In talking with the boy, Joe Simpson, I was reasonably convinced that he is the person that talked to me from Memphis, Tennessee, seven months after my son was killed."

Believing that Simpson was the man who had called her after Artemus had been killed - and had likely been the person writing her letters from abroad - Ruby Ogletree claimed that during their conversation together, Simpson had brushed off the claim that the case would ever get solved, describing it as "unsolveable." But when he was told that Ruby would always remember the voice that had spoken to her on the telephone, Artemus' reported companion from Memphis, Ruby Ogletree wrote that Simpson:

"... turned red, dropped his eyes and was nervous."

It is unknown what ever became of Joseph Simpson, although just like Joseph Ogden, he was never confirmed to have had any involvement in Artemus Ogletree's death. Yet, he remains one of the few people we know of that lurked in his orbit during his final weeks alive.

Nearly an entire century later, this bizarre locked room slaying remains unsolved... and is likely to remain that way, barring some miraculous discovery. Everyone involved in this saga is almost assuredly no longer with us, and it's possible that even the children of many involved have since passed away, so we are likely generations removed from finding any resolution in this case.

It remains unknown who killed Artemus Ogletree - or why.

Was he the victim of a bizarre wandering killer like Joseph Ogden? Was he killed by someone closer to him, like Joseph Simpson?

Or was he the victim of a jilted lover revenge plot? Was there any truth to the rumor that his fiancé's brother had discovered he'd stepped out on her and his payback simply went too far?

Some theorize that Artemus may have gotten himself involved in organized crime, perhaps a roving gang that dealt in narcotics. Is that what happened here?

Others speculate that he may have even been involved in some German spy craft ahead of World War Two, although that seems even less likely than the other theories.

Most likely, he was the victim of some nefarious plot that has been lost to time. A plot which we'll likely never know the full details of, carried out by individuals that did their best to distance themselves from this mystery as soon as it happened.

In 2012, John Horner of the Kansas City Public Library put together a retelling of events, which were then published on kchistory.org. At the end of his posts, he reveals what exactly had spurred him into action, the impetus for his research:

"About eight or nine years ago... I took an out of state phone call from someone who asked about the case.

"This person and another had been helping itemize the belongings of an elderly person who had recently died. They found a box with several newspaper clippings about the case. The caller said that, besides the newspaper clippings, something mentioned in the newspaper stories was also in the box.

"The caller tantalizingly refrained from telling me what that something was."

At the time of his death in January 1935, Artemus Ogletree was just nineteen years old. And despite his murder occurring nearly ninety years ago, the mystery surrounding it endures to this day, compelling many to wonder what, exactly, happened in room 1046 that fateful early morning. Maybe someone out there has the answers to solve this century-old cold case... maybe someone who inherited a family secret, such as the box mentioned by John Horner of the Kansas City Public Library. If so, I'd encourage that person to come forward, so that Artemus Ogletree's story can finally be completed.

Until such a time, this strange saga will remain unresolved.

Episode Information

Writing, research, hosting, and production by Micheal Whelan

Published on November 18th, 2024

Sources and Other Reading

Newspapers.com Entries (Roland Owen and Hotel President)

Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069176/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069203/
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/655688629/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649178577/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649178567/?terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069334/
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069356/
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1003876948/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/655688762/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649179015/?terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069584/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024069715/
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649179274/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024070187/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/657048143/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024060052/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649180584/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/657014624/
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649181808/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/649182509/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen murder. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/671866848/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Roland Owen murder at Hotel President. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1024059058/?match=1&terms=roland%20owen%20hotel%20president%20murder

Newspapers.com Entries (Artemus Ogletree)

Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/656926118/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/19619494/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1025445780/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/671935392/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/656950790/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/657031715/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree
Newspapers.com. (n.d.). Artemus Ogletree case. Retrieved from https://www.newspapers.com/image/1037914065/?match=1&terms=artemus%20ogletree

Other Sources

Kansas City Magazine. (n.d.). The Owen case. Retrieved from https://kansascitymag.com/the-owen-case/
Kansas City Public Library. (2012). The Mystery of Room 1046, Pt. 2: Love Forever, Louise. Retrieved from https://web.archive.org/web/20120725031332/http://www.kclibrary.org/blog/kc-unbound/mystery-room-1046-pt-2-love-forever-louise
Kansas City Public Library. (2012). The Mystery of Room 1046, Pt. 1: Roland T. Owen. Retrieved from https://web.archive.org/web/20120321030654/https://www.kclibrary.org/blog/kc-unbound/mystery-room-1046-pt-1-roland-t-owen
The New Yorker. (1938). The homicide squad in action. Retrieved from https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1938/01/08/the-homicide-squad-in-action
FOX4 Kansas City. (n.d.). Unsolved murder in 1935: The unusual guest at a Kansas City hotel. Retrieved from https://fox4kc.com/news/unsolved-murder-in-1935-the-unusual-guest-at-a-kansas-city-hotel/