Read A Sniper in the Tower Online

Authors: Gary M. Lavergne

Tags: #History, #United States, #General, #State & Local, #Southwest (AZ; NM; OK; TX), #True Crime, #Murder, #test

A Sniper in the Tower (28 page)

 
Page 81
Richard Speck had an acne-scarred face, and he, too, chose to adorn his body with tacky permanent ink. One of his many tattoos held an accurate and direct description of himselfBORN TO RAISE HELL.
In an odd sort of way, Speck, Hickock and Smith sustained America. Reinforced stereotypes wrapped comfort into a neat little package which held the evil of the crimes together with the ugliness and utter wickedness of the men who carried them out. No room existed in such a package for handsome, bright, nice killers, especially mass murderers.
During the same week that the mass media informed America of the horror Richard Speck had wrought in Chicago, Charlie Whitman, young John Whitman, and his friend visited the observation deck of the Tower. The power of mass murder to capture the attention of, to shock, and to break the heart of a nation could not have escaped Charlie. He had to have been impressed with the new notoriety of the demonic drifter. During that awful week, the infamous label "Crime of the Century" was repeatedly attached to the Speck murders. No one knew that the dubious distinction would last only nineteen days.
II
On 5 April 1966, when Charlie should have been seeing Dr. Heatly for his follow-up session, he instead entered the Main Building of the University of Texas and boarded the passenger elevator to the twenty-seventh floor of the Tower. From there he ascended three steep half-flights of stairs and a short hallway leading to the twenty-eighth floor and a reception area for visitors interested in stepping onto an outside observation deck. A receptionist, whose duties included inviting visitors to sign the guest book and answering questions about the university, was stationed in the area.
6
Three receptionists staffed the station in shifts. Each had a nameplate to put on a single desk that faced a glass-paneled door which opened onto the deck. A beige vinyl couch for visitors, especially those winded by the stairs, was located next to and east of the desk. Hanging on the east wall next to the couch was a telephone. One of the three receptionists, Mrs. Lydia Gest, later recalled that Charlie visited the deck many times and frequently sat on the couch for brief conversations, a common practice for many UT students.
7
 
Page 82
Looking at the ground
through one of the rain spouts
on the floor of the Tower deck
(1966). A
ustin Police Department
Files.
Located 231 feet above ground level, the observation deck circles the twenty-eighth floor just below the massive clock at the base of the Tower's columned crown. A limestone parapet borders the deck. Four feet tall and approximately eighteen inches thick, the wall's size and strength made visitors comfortable, but also invited foolishness from reckless college students who straddled, sat, or walked around the top of the parapet. The deck receptionists sternly enforced the rules.
Three large rain spouts for draining water from the floor of the deck descend from each side of the parapet. The spouts jut out from the lower end so that water does not drain down the side of the building. Trying to see into the deck through the spouts from the ground was nearly impossible, but looking at the ground through the spouts from the deck was effortless. The occupants of the Tower's "high ground" could walk right up to the spouts, peer through them and see a wide-angled view of the grounds below. Military experts could hardly have designed better gunports.
8
The strength and thickness of the parapet provided an impenetrable cover. Because of his marine background and fondness for guns, Charlie Whitman instantly recognized the value of the observation deck as a fortress.
 
Page 83
East of the campus, but visible from the Tower lay flat, rich, grassy farmlands, along with some of the poorer sections of Austin. To the west rose the panoramic Texas Hill Countrythe land of Lyndon B. Johnson, then President of the United States. The hilly northwest section of Austin crept closer to small towns like Jollyville and Cedar Park. Immediately visible from the west side of the Tower, one of the better-known streets of Austin, Guadalupe Street, formed the western border of the campus. Just before the 21st Street intersection stood the Goodall-Wooten Dorm, where, on a balcony outside of room 706, Charlie first spoke of shooting people with a deer rifle. From the Tower, the West Mall opened to the Drag where the Student Union and the Academic Center were located. To the north, one might glimpse the old Lanier High School off Burnet Road and the new school under construction on Peyton Gin Road. In that direction Austin crept towards Pflugerville and Round Rock. To the south, only nine blocks away from the Littlefield Fountain and the entrance to the South Mall, stood the majestic Texas capitol, and twelve blocks south of that flowed the Colorado River, which Austinites insisted on calling Town Lake. The University of Texas encircled the Tower on all sides with a host of Spanish-style buildings sporting red terra cotta-tiled roofs. On any school day, thousands of teachers, students, workers, tourists, and motorists walked or traveled within a 500-yard radius of the Tower.
View from the Tower looking east
(1966).
 Austin Police Department
Files.
 
Page 84
View from the Tower looking west
(1966). The Hemphill's store at
center left is located on Guadalupe
Street, the Drag. 
Austin Police
Department Files.
View from the Tower looking north
(1966). 
Austin Police Department Files.
View from the Tower looking south
(1966). 
Austin Police Department Files.
 
Page 85
Charlie made another recorded visit to the Tower's the observation deck on 22 July 1966, accompanied by his troubled younger brother, John. Though still a teenager, John, along with a friend named Jim Poland, had driven to Austin from Lake Worth to visit Margaret. The boys had embarked on a near-nationwide excursion, part of a summer odyssey that would be cut short in little more than one week. Charlie took them to the Tower to see the campus and the countryside.
9
On the same day he drove to the Travis County Blood Bank and donated a pint of blood, but this time he asked for five dollars. Ten days later he would visit the Tower one last time.
On Sunday morning, 24 July, Charlie, Kathy, Margaret, John and his friend joined one of Margaret's colleagues, Goldie Harris, at her home for breakfast. Afterwards the Whitman family in Texas, except for Margaret, journeyed to San Antonio to see the Alamo and other historic sites. Smiling, each with an arm around the other, Charlie and Kathy posed for their last picture together in front of a stone arch near the Alamo. Other shots show Johnnie Mike and Charlie climbing monuments and engaging in other horseplay. Goldie Harris would later state that she never saw any hint of trouble between Charlie and Kathy. She did believe that Charlie hated his father because of the way his mother was treated.
10
John Michael "Johnnie Mike" Whitman
was a favorite of his older brother
Charlie. Shown here in the living room
of 906 Jewell Street, Johnnie Mike visited
Austin only two weeks before the Tower
tragedy. 
Austin Police Department
Files, from film left in one of Whitman's
cameras.

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