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Luzerne County union workers reach 12% health insurance contribution benchmark

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Luzerne County August personnel report released

Three girls canoeing on Harveys Lake discovered the body of Freda McKechnie, 27, in four feet of water about 20 feet from the once popular Sandy Beach on July 31, 1934.
				McKechnie, of Cherry Street, Edwardsville, was found wearing an orange bathing suit and her clothes were found a quarter mile away along Bear Hollow Road, the Times Leader reported Aug. 4, 1934.
				Her boyfriend, Robert Allan Edwards, 21, of Church Street, Edwardsville, was charged with murder hours after the body was found. A Luzerne County Grand Jury indicted Edwards with murder on Aug. 21, 1934.
				The murder case became known nationally as the &ldquo;American Tragedy.&rdquo;
				Large crowds gathered at the courthouse wanting to enter the courtroom of Judge William Alfred Valentine when the trial began on Oct. 1, 1934. Those unable to enter the courtroom waited outside in the corridors and rotunda until a seat opened.
				&ldquo;Equipped with full riot equipment, husky state troopers today maintained order in the courthouse corridors, jammed with curious hundreds intent on attending the Edwards murder trial,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported that day.
				District Attorney Thomas M. Lewis outlined his prosecution, telling jurors Edwards killed his neighborhood sweetheart McKechnie because he wanted to marry his other girlfriend, Margaret Crain, a music teacher in East Aurora, N.Y.
				Edwards and Crain met while they studied at Mansfield State Teachers College.
				&ldquo;The Edwardsville defendant planned to marry Miss Crain but Freda&rsquo;s expectant motherhood stood in the way of his plans,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported Oct. 1, 1934.
				McKechnie was pregnant when she was killed.
				Crain visited Edwards while he was in jail but did not attend the trial.
				Each day during the trial, Edwards was seated in a chair along the railing separating the courtroom well and the gallery. He shook hands with those who tapped him on the shoulder.
				Irene Cohen, one of the three girls canoeing who discovered the body, testified: &ldquo;It was a very bright day and you could see plainly. We thought someone was swimming under water,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported on Oct. 3, 1934.
				Lewis presented a blackjack, which was recovered by divers in Harveys Lake, to the jury. The blackjack belonged to Edwards&rsquo; father, Daniel Edwards, a paymaster for the Kingston Coal Company. Daniel Edwards obtained the blackjack when he was a member of the Home Guard during World War I.
				Statements Edwards gave to police were also introduced, including when he learned McKechnie was pregnant while they walked from Kingston Corners to Kirby Park on July 23, 1934.
				Nearly 175 love letters Edwards sent to Crain were read during the trial.
				Seventeen character witnesses testified for Edwards.
				The jury returned their verdict on Saturday, Oct. 6, 1934.
				&ldquo;Death in the electric chair will jolt Robert Allan Edwards into the veiled eternity where Freda McKechnie, his blackjack slain sweetheart, awaits his coming. So decreed a jury of twelve middle-aged and elderly men at 8:20 o&rsquo;clock this morning when their verdict, reached after almost six hours of wrangling debate, was opened by Judge W. Alfred Valentine,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported that day.
				Edwards, described as having a &ldquo;poker face&rdquo; during the trial, &ldquo;took it standing up,&rdquo; the newspaper reported.
				Days after the trial, Edwards requested a retrial, claiming a juror had pre-judged his guilt. The juror was a neighbor and a friend to both Edwards&rsquo; and McKechnie&rsquo;s families.
				Valentine denied the request.
				The state Supreme Court upheld Edwards&rsquo; conviction.
				Under heavy guard, Edwards walked out of the Luzerne County Jail at 5 a.m. on May 4, 1935, for a three-hour trip to the Rockview Penitentiary.
				A crowd gathered outside the jail&rsquo;s front doors as Edwards was placed in a state police car for the 150-mile journey.
				&ldquo;State troopers and deputy sheriffs brusquely shouldered a path through a throng of fifty men and boys and half dozen women at 5 o&rsquo;clock this morning, bundled the manacled youth and two guards into a high-powered sedan and roared away to Rockview,&rdquo; the Times Leader reported.
				Edwards was executed May 6, 1935, and buried in Fern Knoll Cemetery in Dallas. His death certificate says &ldquo;judicial electrocution&rdquo; as the cause of death.
				As it was custom in the day, McKechnie&rsquo;s funeral had been held from her home on Aug. 3, 1934. Hundreds of people gathered outside and proceeded to the Forty Fort Cemetery where she was buried.

Look Back: 1934 Harveys Lake homicide called ‘American Tragedy’