Arizona republican., 1912-06-16
MURDER AFFECTS VALUES.
Realty Depreciates in the Vicinity of
 the Crime.

The suggestion that HildrOp Cres- cent. the scene of an alleged crime, should take to itself another name brings once more into notice the fact 1 than when d particularly sensational murder is committed in a locality it is frequently a serious matter for the property owners there.
 | This first became strikingly appar- ent in connection with the dreadful poisoning crimes at Rugeley, in Staf-
 fcrdshire, for which Dr. Palmer was hanged
 People quilted the place as if it were plague stricken, and soon half the houses were standing empty, not
 withstanding an all-around reduction in rents.
 Faced with ruin. as they thought the Rugeley landlord sent deputa- tion to London to interview Lord Palmerston. who was then prime min ister They desired, they told him, to change the name of their town. oh, certainly" said he. Why not call it PalmerstOn."
 The deputation thanked him and withdrew. nor did it dawn upon them until later that his lordship had been chaffing them. Of course, to have carried out the change as suggested would only have made matters worse since Palmer was the very name of all others that they desired to dis sociate from Rugeley.
 RainhilI. near Liverpool. was sim ilarly summed for a while, after the terrible crime which the newspapers made known to two continents as the "Rainhill horror" This was the case where a man named Deeming butch cred his wife and family, and buried the bodies under the scullery floor, afterwards cementing it.
 The owner of the actual house Dinham Villain which the murder was committed, however, did not do
 SO badly out of it from pecuniary point of view. for he sold it for good round sum to Madame Tussaud.
 She had it pulled down. and then that portion it wherein the crime was committed was removed to Lon don and set up again, stone by stone
 and brick by brick, inside their ia nous Chamber of Horrors. In this connection the Tussaud's s representative underwent a somewhat eGTlo e&ptIleilCc AlltA IAiO NOii4B'N tion of the purchase he had perforce
 to sleep alone in the building, for no one could be hired locally to keep ! him company. Indeed, the generally received opinion in Rainhill was that the ghosts of the murdered woman and her children would appear and l haunt him.
 | Not all landlords, however, are so l lucky as was the owner of Dlnham
 Villa Indeed, it frequently happens | that a house where a peculiarly | ghastly murder is committed becomes practically unlettable, and has to be
 pulled down. Such was the fate, for instance, of the pretty detached Villa
 residence wherein poor old MT. Smith was battered to death by the nDto-
 rious burglars Milsom and Fowler.
 Although there is no recent in
 stance in England of an entire town having changed it's name owing to
 it's association with crime. single streets have frequently been rechrls- tened for such a reason. The very latest case in point is that of Stam-
 ford street, notorious in connection
 with two of Neil Creams diabolical IpOisonings.
 A young journeyman baker was
 murdered in an underground bake
 house situated below a large con
 fectioner's shop near Regents park
 and his body was cremated by his
 assassin in the oven which had been
 prepared for the days batch of bread
 The proprietor was also attacked, but
 managed to escape with his life.
 Similarly the flourishing brush
 makers business carried on by Vain
 wright in the Whitechapel. road was
 ruined when the mutilated remains of Harriet Lane were distinerreC there The premises stood empty fol years.
 r Hire a little salesman at The Re