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Bert Rovere’s Paris Inn & the lighter side of FBI undercover work – 1936
This was in the first draft of The Girl in the Iron Box. As much as I love the story, it had to go. Enjoy!
If an undercover special agent wanted to show his “date” a good time, impress her with his life style, spill a few drinks, and trick her into spilling what she knew about the kidnapping of June Robles, he could do worse than take her to Bert Rovere’s Paris Inn. A favorite with the Hollywood crowd, the restaurant stood out in a city dotted with flashy and garish night spots. The exterior Paris Inn resembled a Norman castle, complete with turret, while the interior looked like a street café. The satisfied clientele was treated to French and Italian fare, singing waiters, and an orchestra playing opera and jazz, accompanied at times by the burly baritone-voiced owner himself, all of it broadcast on KNX Radio.
Special Agent H. B. Myerson’s evening at the Paris Inn was set in motion when a man named Dick Collins walked into the Los Angeles FBI office with the story of his conversation with a woman he would not name. During the period 6-year-old June Robles was held captive, she’d told Collins, she was visited by a man from Tucson “who informed her he knew all about the kidnapping.” The woman wouldn’t talk openly, Collins told Special Agent in Charge (SAC) J. H. Hanson. Subterfuge was needed. He suggested that he, his girlfriend, the woman, and a special agent all go out for “an evening’s entertainment” Collins would arrange. At some point, the informant suggested, the conversation could be steered to the Robles case, prompting the woman to identify the man from Tucson. Collins was not ready to state who this woman was, at least not before the double date. Hanson advised Harold Andersen, the SAC in Phoenix, asking if he wanted to pursue this unique line of investigation.
Andersen, needing a break-through but fully aware of the oddity of Collins’s suggestion, threaded the needle. He told Hanson to go ahead with the “date,” but suggested that “discreet investigation should be made to determine who Dick Collins is.” Was he “acting in good faith or merely as a publicity seeker or one interested in obtaining copy for the newspapers.” Cover yourself, he advised Hanson. Make sure at least two agents were present for the “evening’s entertainment.”
On the evening of Tuesday, May 19, G-men Myerson and H.H. McKee, posing as traveling businessmen, joined Collins and his companion. The party of four then picked up “the woman,” Lucille Miller, and a friend of hers. They arrived at the Paris around 8 p.m. end enjoyed the dinner and show for three hours. Myerson, who was “paired off with Mrs. Miller,” waited for the right moment between drinks, bites of dinner, and possibly dancing to “discretely” ask her about the Robles case. She said she had known Oscar and Margaret Robson “for years.” She had discussed the case “on numerous occasions” with Margaret, who said she’d “begged Robson to tell her the truth… and believed him when he said he knew nothing about it.” The kidnapping, Miller was sure, was an “inside job” by June’s own family. Her reasons reflected the public’s understanding of the case, or at least Margaret’s: the victim was not ill (i.e., not harmed by the experience), her clothes were not badly soiled; and “her father did not appear worried in the least.” Myerson quizzed Miller further, but she “had nothing more to offer.” As for Collins, he passed the background check. From what the Los Angeles office could uncover, he was an electrical engineer and “special investigator” for the local sheriff who had “drawn freely upon his imagination.” If nothing else happened that evening, at least Agent McKee impressed his date. She asked Collins if another evening could be arranged. Special Agent Myerson was forced to tell Collins that the businessmen had left town.
Writing grassroots history
I think it was C.L. Sonnichsen who coined the title “grassroots historian.” Certainly, he wrote about and defined such non-academic (and often non-academically trained) historians in an article of the same name appearing in a 1970 issue of Southwestern Historical Quarterly (Vol. 73, No. 3, January, 1970, pp. 381-392). You can find the article at http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/30238074?uid=3739960&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21100835322691 . I can’t speak for other fields of history, but in the niche of Old West lawmen/outlaws/gunfighters/armed & dangerous sodbusters, the grassroots historian probably has been responsible for much, if not most of the discoveries of the past 35 or more years concerning the details of the lives, acts of violence, and deaths of such men (and occasional women), and of the many men and women who were witness to or wrapped up in their stories. The Journal of the Wild West History Association and the publications of its parent organizations, NOLA and WOLA, have provided the main outlet for the grassroots historian’s discoveries and fresh interpretations. WILD WEST magazine, the old TRUE WEST, and, to a lesser extent under its latest incarnation, the new TRUE WEST, have also provided the “roots” with a forum for their work.
If these journals and trade magazines provide the stage for the grassroots historian’s work, the discussion websites serve as the coffee shops and neighborhood taverns where the work of professional and grassroots historians alike can be lauded, picked over, and sometimes picked clean. While it would not be accurate to say that discussions in these forums are universally about an author’s facts—whether or not the author has uncovered “new” facts, whether or not an author has cherry picked them, whether or not the interpretation is fresh or holds water, etc.–facts (and factoids) and their meaning are king on the boards.
What is largely if not entirely missing from the field of Old West lawman/outlaw/gunfighter/enraged citizen studies is any meaningful concern about writing. Has the author shaped the facts into a story? Or is it a string of factual beads? This happened and this happened and that happened. Is there any evidence at all that the writer cares about the reader? Is there any evidence that he or she edited and polished and did it again? A writer’s got to know his limitations. As expert as he or she is at uncovering and assembling facts, does he care enough to get some editing help when he needs it?
I’ll admit it. I’ve been writing for 40 years and publishing for 15. And it was only two weeks ago that I attended my first writer’s conference. Sure, it was largely filled with novelists and would-be novelists. I met several authors of the next Twilight, and a few more who aim to bring on that dystopian future we’ve been waiting for. But those of us who write about and footnote the unruly past would do well to pay attention to what the best novelists, and the agents who handle them, have to say about carefully crafting and polishing that first sentence in chapter 1 , about breathing life into our historical characters. About caring as much for the reader’s enjoyment as we do about the number of horses in the vacant lot.
Looking for family papers of former FBI Special Agents
While I have personnel files for most the of FBI Special Agents who are the leading characters in my book-in-progress on the FBI’s investigation into the 1934 kidnapping of 6-year-old June Robles, I would like to flesh out this material with family photos, letters, and other papers dealing with the following agents (referred to only by initials in many documents):
Harold Edward Andersen / H.E. Andersen
Orville C. Dewey / O.C. Dewey
Joseph Edward Patrick Dunn / J.E.P. Dunn
Carlton J. Endres / C.J. Endres
Chapmon Fletcher
James Malcolm O’Leary / J.M. O’Leary
Enos Sandberg
Manuel Sorola
Lewis Charles Taylor / L.C. Taylor
Clarence D. White / C.D. White
The personnel files of Andersen and Dewey were severely gutted by the Bureau for unknown reasons, and so family papers would be especially helpful in their cases.
PaulCoolBooks.com Redesigned!
Welcome to my new website. Here you’ll find all the news about my writings, past, current, and planned. I may not blog the recommended 3x a week (or is it 3x a day?), but I will from time to time take you on side trips flowing from my research into the FBI’s investigation into the 1934 kidnapping of June Robles, my thoughts about the craft of writing and the business of publishing history, and anything else I want to draw your attention to. And the first thing on that list is my thanks to Jerry and Michelle Dorris of AuthorSupport.com for creating this site.
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