Hickock, Smith Die on Gallows
LANSING, Kan. —(UPI)— Richard Eugene Hickock, 31, and Perry Edward Smith, 36, calmly and without remorse, paced the 13 steps up the gallows stairs and were hanged early today for the 1959 slayings of a family of four.
The executions took place at the Kansas state prison exactly one hour apart.
They were convicted of the Nov. 14, 1959, robbery-murder of Herbert W. Clutter, his wife and the couple's two teen-aged children. The four victims had been bound, gagged and shot point-blank in the head with a 12-gauge shotgun. Clutter, a farm advisor of the Eisenhower administration, had his throat slit.
The killers had been searching for a non-existent fortune supposedly stashed away by the Clutter family in their Garden City, Kan., home. All Hickock and Smith got for their efforts was $80, a portable radio and a pair of cheap binoculars.
The short drive from death row to the gallows ended an exhausting five years of appeals to the courts in their struggle to save their lives.
Hickock and Smith hatched the plot within the walls of the prison where they died.
Hickock, serving a term for passing bad checks, and Smith, doing time for armed robbery, heard from a fellow inmate a tale of hidden fortune in the Clutter home.
On Nov. 14, 1959, Hickock and Smith drove from the home of Hickock's parents at Edgerton, Kan., across the state to the Clutter show-place farm home at Holcomb, near Garden City. That night they slipped into the house and began their fruitless search for fortune.
Clutter was asleep in his bedroom. They awakened him and demanded money. They took him upstairs and locked him in the bathroom with his wife Bonnie, 45, daughter Nancy, 15, and son Kenyon, 14. The robbers roamed the house in a vain search for the safe with the treasure.
There was no safe.
One by one, they removed the Clutters from the bathroom. Father and son were taken to the basement, bound, gagged and shot in the head with a shotgun. Clutter's throat was slit. The mother and daughter were also shot in the head with the shotgun, as they lay in separate beds.
The family was found by two teen-age girl friends calling to take Nancy to church the morning of the 15th.
Their trial opened March 22,1960, in Garden City and lasted a week. They were each found guilty on four counts of murder and sentenced to hang.
ASC Asks Official To Discuss Fraser
By Jim Sullinger
The All Student Council passed a resolution last night inviting James C. Canole, state architect, to speak before the ASC, April 20, on the status of plans for new Fraser Hall.
The design for new Fraser was criticized in an ASC resolution adopted at the last meeting. Construction is expected to begin in June on a site just east of old Fraser. The estimated cost of the structure is $2.2 million.
IN OTHER LEGISLATION, the ASC passed a resolution recommending the Athletic Seating Board issue a season student seating pass for basketball games. The resolution stated its purpose was to insure that the students most interested in KU basketball would have a seat.
In an Athletic Seating Board report, plans were worked out to give students seats closer to the court. The north and south bleachers plus those on the west side of the playing floor would possibly become student seats.
Daily hansan
62nd Year, No. 114
LAWRENCE, KANSAS
Wednesday, April 14, 1965
GREEK WEEK CANDIDATES - These 13 KU women have been chosen as Greek Week Queen candidates by their sororities. The queen will be chosen at a banquet April 22. The candidates are:
—Photo by Harry Krause
(Left to right) front row, Janelle Heese, Pender, Neb., junior, Alpha Omicron Pi; Susan Hartley, Atwood junior, Alpha Chi Omega; Jill Newburg, Carmel, Ind., junior, Pi Beta Phi; Carol Jo Weber, Raytown, Mo., junior, Gamma Phi Beta; Anne Jennings, Wichita sophomore,
Delta Delta Delta; Mary Lynne Mangan, Dodge City junior, Chi Omega.
Back row, Elnora Taylor, Paola senior, Alpha Delta Pi; Martha (Muff) Yankey, Wichita junior, Kappa Kappa Gamma; Carolyn Power, Kansas City, Mo., senior, Alpha Phi; Lynette Ault, Esbon sophomore, Sigma Kappa; Marsha Ballard, Wichita junior, Delta Gamma; Jeannie Padden, Holton freshman, Alpha Gamma Delta; Mary Jane Epp, Tribune junior, Kappa Alpha Theta.
Greek Week Plans Complete; Games, Queen's Crowning Set
Relays, an all-star football game, a sing and a banquet will highlight the annual Greek Week activities next week, sponsored by the Panhellenic Association and the Interfraternity Council.
For the first time in Greek Week history, an all-star football game is scheduled and will be played Friday, April 23 on the intramural field. West fraternity all-stars meet the east all-stars in the contest. Teams will be coached by men from the winning teams on each side of the hill. Phi Delta Theta and Beta Theta Pi lead the east teams and Sigma
Alpha Epsilon and Delta Upsilon lead in the west.
Weather
Cloudy skies and warmer temperatures are predicted for tonight and tomorrow with showers and thunderstorms expected over 40 per cent of the state this afternoon and tonight. Winds are predicted to be southerly 10 to 15 miles per hour. The overnight low should be in the 50's. Tomorrow's weather is expected to be partly cloudy and mild, the weather bureau predicted.
Frank Kearney, Shawnee Mission senior, will coach the west All-Stars in the game. He will be assisted by Tom Hamill, Colby first year law student. Bill Geiler Leavenworth senior, will coach 21 men on the east rooster.
The traditional Greek Week Sing will begin Wednesday night, April 21, at 7:30 in Hoch Auditorium. Each group will be allowed to sing two songs in an eight minute period. Trophies will be awarded to the first and second place winners in each of five divisions.
Over 150 contestants are expected to compete in the Greek Week Relays according to Glen Barnard, Oswego junior and chairman of the relays.
Barnard said preliminaries for the relays will be Sunday afternoon at 1:30 in Memorial Stadium. Finals will be Saturday, April 24 in the stadium immediately following the chariot race on Jayhawk Boulevard.
The relays will have running
and field events. Running events scheduled by Barnard are the 120-yard hurdles, the 100-, 223- and 440-yard dashes, the 440- and 880-yard relays and a medley relay.
There will be five field events. Contestants will see action in the high jump, broad jump, shot put, walking race and the 3-legged race.
The Greek Week banquet will be Thursday evening, April 22, at 5:30 in the Kansas Union Ballroom. Scholarship trophies for the fraternities will be awarded at the banquet and sorority houses receiving national house honors will also be recognized.
The Greek Week Queen will be elected at the banquet. The thirteen candidates, one from each sorority house, will be interviewed at a tea Tuesday night by judges. Three finalists will be named. Students attending the banquet will vote for one of the three finalists.
Jim Pitts, Wichita junior, and Tucky March, Tulsa, Okla., junior are co-chairmen of Greek Week.
Comic Opera 'Marriage of Figaro' to Open Friday
A musical journey into the eighteenth century's elegant society will be offered to spectators attending the KU production of Wolfgang Mozart's opera "The Marriage of Figaro."
The opera, based on a play by Pierre Beaumarchais, 18th century French dramatist, opens Friday evening in the University Theatre. Two performances will be offered this weekend and again April 23 and 24.
Mozart, through his music, has given a distinct character to each of the persons in the opera. Figaro, the barber of Seville, is witty, worldly, occasionally cynical, but a true democrat. He is in love with the charming and resourceful Susanna, the maid of the Countess Almaviva. Figaro is the servant of the count. The count is vain and
IT IS THIS roving eye of the count that causes all the trouble in the opera. Figaro wants to marry Sussana, and the count gives his permission. However, he does not give up his nobleman's right of the first night with the bride. How Figaro, helped by Susanna and a teen-age pageboy, Cherubino develop one intrigue after the other and deceive the Count, is told in the rest of the opera.
conceited, but he a human with a heart too. The countess is the person with whom one has the most sympathy. She loves her husband, but he makes life miserable for her by his intense jealousy and his numerous flirtations.
Mozart wrote his opera in 1786. He used a libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte, an Italian poet-adventurer, who also wrote the libretto for
Mozart's famous "Don Giovanni." Da Fonte adapted Beaumarchais' play very cleverly.
However, even with modifications in the libretto, the Austrian emperor at the time, Joseph II, forbade the performance in Austria, having heard about the furor the play had caused in France. The original play contained a number of subtle and not-so-subtle attacks on the aristocracy. Da Ponte managed to reassure the emperor the operatic adaptation was not like this, and consequently the opera was performed in the Burg Theatre in Vienna. It was a tremendous success, but did not help Mozart financially. Five years later he died, and was buried in a pauper's grave.
THE OPERA ITSELF is amusing and charming. It is in the
style of the Italian comic opera, and it has been said that Mozart's characters are perfected types of the characters of the commedia dell'arte (an Italian style of comedy featuring improvised line on a written plot).
TOM REA, instructor of speech and drama, is directing the KU production, which will be given in English. The translation is by Thomas and Ruth Martin.
Asked why "Figaro" was chosen as this year's production, Rea said he was not quite sure, but he thought it was done because it is in direct contrast with the opera produced last year, "Madame Butterfly." The choice also balanced this season's repertoire. Besides, Rea said, KU has a number of well-trained singers this year. He
mentioned it had been hard to get everybody together for rehearsals, especially as spring break fell right into the middle of rehearsal schedules.
The KU production promises to have an unusual aspect according to James Harrington, theatre designer, who did the decor for "Figaro." He pointed out that in most productions the decor is either Austrian, German or French rococe style. However, since the opera is set in Seville, Spain, Harrington let himself be inspired by the Spanish Baroque and rococe styles. He said the rococe period was late in coming to Spain, and at the time of the opera the style there was late baroque. He said the set designs used in the KU production could be called "baro-co," if you like.