The Harvard Medical College Murder
A Harvard professor, a janitor with a chisel, and whose word Boston took.
Listen to this place’s story in Peplos.
How the story begins
Five days after George Parkman disappeared, Professor John Webster gave the janitor an order for a turkey. Ephraim Littlefield had worked around him for seven years at Harvard's Medical College, the last three on this street. "It was the first time that Dr. Webster ever gave me anything," he told the court. Parkman was rich and collected every penny he was owed. Webster taught chemistry and owed him money.
The rest is in the app. Peplos plays the full story when you reach the place. You can also listen ahead of time.
Visiting
North Grove Street, West End, by Massachusetts General Hospital, near Charles/MGH station. The college building is gone and its land is now part of the hospital site. This is a street visit with nothing to enter.
Sources
- George Bemis, Report of the Case of John W. Webster (1850), Internet Archive
- JSTOR Daily, The Infamous Tale of the Murderous Chemistry Professor
- PBS American Experience, Murder at Harvard
- PBS American Experience, The Parkman Family
- Mass Moments, Dr. George Parkman Disappears
- Countway Library, Harvard, Nathan Cooley Keep and the Parkman-Webster Murder Trial
- WBUR, on the Webster trial (2018)
- Boston.com, A 19th-century murder at Harvard Medical School (2017)
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