Post Analysis by the Chicago Herald-American

The Chicago Herald-American

Psychoanalyze Mattoon to Find Cure for Terror Wave, Gas Victims Quizzed

BY EFFIE ALLEY
MATTOON, Ill. Sept. 16 -- Social and medical history is being made here today. For the first time anywhere a city is being psychoanalyzed. Fear-stricken, bewildered Mattoon is being placed under the scientific scrutiny of an expert in the hidden, subconscious causes of acute emotional tension--Dr. Harold S. Hulbert, psychiatrist and criminologist of Chicago. Terror, such as has gripped this comfortable and thriving little city during the past two weeks, causing its citizens to huddle nightly, behind locked windows and doors, is pathological. Whatever its cause, it is a symptom of community infection--an infection of fear.

CONTAINS THREAT

That this infection is mental and emotional rather than physical does not make it any the less dangerous. Indeed, it is fraught with much more ominous threats to the health of this community, and even to that of the nation, than the worst epidemic of bodily disease. It is a manifestation America is likely to see repeated time after time and with increasingly disastrous results here, there and everywhere in post-war days. For these reasons, The Herald-American has enlisted the services of Dr. Hulbert to diagnose this community illness, to get at its roots and to suggest a cure. Dr. Hulbert is interviewing victims who have detected in their homes the peculiar sweetish odor of the mysterious gas sprayed by a phantom night prowler: who have heard the sound of running feet, or caught glimpses of a shadowy, retreating form. By studying the time of each attack, the circumstances under which it was made, the symptoms induced--sometimes nausea, sometimes paralysis, sometimes choking and burning of the lips and throat. Dr. Hulbert will attempt to discover:

1. Whether or not a real, flesh-and-blood culprit exists.
2. To determine from the pattern of his attacks what manner of man (or woman) he is--sadist, maniac, or prankster.
3. If he, perhaps, only initiated the whole business which is now kept going by imitators.
4. In case the phantom proves to be a phantom in truth, what really happened and why.

Touched off on the evening of Sept. 1, when Mrs. Bert Kearney of 1408 Marshall av. reported she had been stricken by a mysterious flower-like gas which left her paralyzed and nauseated. Mattoon's reign of terror spread like wildfire. Thereafter scores of citizens called police to report that they, too, had been victimized. Armed patrols roamed the streets in the hope of catching the spray-gun prowler until Police Commissioner Thomas P. Wright, alarmed at the explosive possibilities of the situation, ordered them to put up their guns, go home and leave the hunt to the constituted authorities.

BRED BY FEAR

If it should turn out that there was no prowler and no gas, Dr. Hulbert will answer the question of why such obviously sincere and worthy citizens should have reported "imaginary" attacks, how they smelled a "gas" that did not exist and what caused the detailed symptoms of their distress--burning lips, swollen tongues and throats, sickness, prostration and all the rest. Mass hysteria is an ugly thing. It may be touched off by incidents of great or small importance, by actual or imagined danger. Bred by fear, it banishes reason and humor, the great stabilizers of human conduct. It heightens credulity and is accompanied by anger, confusion and hatred. And it often brings disastrous violence. Psychiatrists everywhere realize that post-war days hold special dangers of such outbreaks. They fear waves of food-poisonings, kidnappings and even murder. That is why the eyes of the scientific world will be riveted on the results of Dr. Hulbert's investigation of what is probably the first case of community war neurosis. In a sense, Mattoon today is a laboratory in which the causes and cure of community hysteria are being worked out.

WILL TALK TO VICTIM

In the course of his research Dr. Hulbert will confer with Commissioner Wright, Police Chief Eugene Coles, Health Commissioner Edward X. Link and other state and city authorities. He will also interview Mrs. Kearney, first victim, her sister Mrs. Edgar Reedy, Mrs. Dorothea Backer and her mother, Mrs. Norma Tatley, who detected the gas in their home on the night of Sept. 8, Mrs. Laura Junkin, who reported she was paralyzed by gas on Sept. 6, Mrs. Carl Cordes, who was overcome when she picked up a cloth she found lying on her front porch, Mrs. Bertha Bence, a later victim, Mrs. Cordie Taylor, who awoke from sleep one night to find her room full of noxious vapor, and others who had first-hand experience. -- Saturday, September 16, page 1, 2

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Chicago Psychiatrist Analyzes Mattoon Gas Hysteria

BY EFFIE ALLEY
MATTOON, Ill. Sept. 16 -- Is it possible for an entire community to fall a prey to its own fears? To barricade itself nightly behind locked doors and windows against a non-existent madman and a noxious vapor which emanated only from the mind? To take up arms and to patrol the streets in search of nothing more substantial than a fear-bred phantom?
The answer is yes That is exactly what happened in Mattoon, according to the findings of Dr. Harold S. Hulbert, psychiatrist and criminologist, who at the request of The Herald-American made a scientific investigation of the wave of hysteria that has swept this city during the past two weeks. If gas and its sprayer had no existence in fact, were the people who reported attacks malingering? Did they seek to deceive? Did they want to cause trouble? Not at all. They are good, honest, sincere people. Not for one moment did they want to mislead anybody. But as Dr. Hulbert told Police Commissioner Wright in a conference at the close of his investigation, in times like these the soul of a community, like the minds and hearts of members, is troubled. He said:
"One way or another, everybody is afraid...afraid of sabotage, of the postwar world, of what may happen to their boys in the service. Fear upsets people, makes them unstable. That is why this thing didn't die out after the first day or so." Dr. Hulbert's diagnosis agrees with that of Health Commissioner Dr. Edward X. Link, who said yesterday that there is no scientific proof that any of the many victims showed symptoms of gas poisonings. Mattoon's terror began in a modest little tree-shaded home at 1408 Marshall av., rising suddenly out of the night to terrify a sweet, motherly woman and to throw her whole family into confusion. It was here, then, that Dr. Hulbert began his investigation. When Dr. Hulbert arrived in Mattoon to search... -- Continued on Page 3, Column 1.

Illness of First Gas 'Victim' Blamed for Wave of Hysteria in Mattoon
Psychiatrist Lays Origin of Terror to Sickness, Worry

Continued from First Page.
...out the hidden causes of the community's panic, he had in mind three possibilities:

1. That a cowardly sadist was loose in the city--an individual who derived malicious pleasure from hurting others and who had devised a novel means of doing so.
2. That the gas poisoner had inspired others to imitate him, thus making possible gas-spraying attacks in many parts of town at one time.
3. That no such malicious individuals existed or had ever existed, but that Mattoon as a community had become a victim of its own collective and deep-rooted fears, fears bred and brought to unbearable tension by war.

He began with Mrs. Bert Kearney, first victim of the phantom prowler, because he felt that here was the key to the whole situation. Her experience, so terrifying that it caused her to summon her husband home from work and call the police, touched off the excitement. It was the focus of the infection which was later to spread through the whole city. Young and rather heavily built, Mrs. Kearney is quiet and even subdued of manner. Meeting her, you are impressed with her calm good nature and feel instinctively that she would not easily be thrown off balance. This was fully indicated by the domestic situation which we met on our arrival. We came in at a moment when grief and illness were by themselves giving Mrs. Kearney enough to cope with, and yet she greeted us calmly and graciously.

Remains Calm Despite Harassing Situation

Her sister, Mrs. Edgar Reedy, who makes her home with the Kearneys while her husband is in the navy, had just received word of her mother-in-law's unexpected death in another city. To make matters worse, Mrs. Reedy was ill--still in bed after an appendicitis operation. There were wires to be sent, telephone calls to be made, a sister's grief to comfort and three small, insistent children to look after, her own two baby girls and her sister's toddling boy--and yet Mrs. Kearney showed no signs of being fussed. She took care of first things first and then sat down to talk to us and to answer the doctor's kindly questions in a co-operative and friendly manner. The attack, she said, came about 11 o'clock on the evening of Sept. 1. They had had company earlier. The children were all in bed. Her sister was lying down in the front room in the bed she now occupied and she herself was in bed in the back room, reading the paper. No, she didn't remember what she was reading. She had been so frightened when the attack came, so sick afterward that everything else had been driven out of her head.

Sister Also Smells 'Cheap Perfume'

Yes, she had been violently nauseated--terribly sick. First though, her legs got numb. Afterwards, she had a headache and her lips were dry and burning, her tongue thick and swollen.
How about her eyes--did they burn, too?
No, her eyes were all right.
Now, what about this odor? How did it smell? Did it come a little at a time or all at once?
This was more difficult to answer. The odor was puzzling. Mrs. Kearney went on:
"At first I thought it was the flowers. I have a lot of flowers on that side of the yard. Then it became unpleasant, heavy--like a cheap perfume." Then Mrs. Reedy interposed: "She called me and asked if I smelled anything. I didn't, but later, when I went into help her after she got sick, I did. That was the way it smelled--like cheap perfume."

Clue Discovered by Psychiatrist

The doctor said:
"I am puzzled as to why anyone should want to molest this nice little home. Have you any ideas about that?" No, Mrs. Kearney couldn't say. Nobody would want to, unless, she added, they were after the money.
"Oh, you had money in the house, then?"
Yes, Mrs. Kearney had had an unusual sum of her own and her sister had that day cashed her allotment check for $75. It was all in the house.
Her husband wasn't at home. He drives a taxi and has worked nights for a good many years. She was used to being alone and she'd never been nervous about it. That was all. A straight forward story told in a straight forward way, and confirmed by one who had been present when it occurred. On the face of it, it would seem to an observer, there was scant material for a psychiatrist to work on. And yet Dr. Hulbert found here the clue he sought and was able to draw from it certain important conclusions. Strangely enough, the symptoms described by Mrs. Kearney were not those of gas poisoning but of paralyzing fear.
That was of first importance If she didn't have the symptoms of gas poisoning, then she couldn't possibly have been poisoned. That's cold, scientific, medical fact, and there is no way to get around it.
How then to account for her illness? Undoubtedly she had been suddenly and alarmingly ill immediately after detecting a sickeningly sweet and overpowering odor. Every detail of her story was stamped with truth. It was impossible to doubt it and, if it had been doubted, there were her sister, her husband and the police to confirm it. What, then, is the answer to this puzzle?

'Victim' Exhausted, Excited and Worried

The doctor found it in the unusual sum of money in her keeping. This money represented, he pointed out, especially in the case of the sister's allotment, not just so many dollars, but 75 necessary, irreplaceable dollars. For a gentle, non-aggressive woman like Mrs. Kearney, none too secure at any time, it meant a heavy responsibility. An extra responsibility, for, as Mrs. Reedy pointed out, she usually paid her bills the moment she cashed her check and so as a rule had very little extra cash on hand. Extra responsibility plus a basic though unconscious and unrecognized feeling of insecurity frightened her and she did not have the temperament to deal with fright. She was tired. She had had company that night, with unusual work and unusual excitement. Undoubtedly, according to the doctor, she was due for a bilious attack. So what do you have? A burdened woman, in a state of fatigue, a stomach getting set to rebel, the scent of flowers drifting in through the open window. As you know, if you've ever had a sick stomach, any scent at all, particularly a sweet one, is distasteful at such a time. But, the doctor explained, there is also another factor. Any person about to be sick at the stomach will get whiffs of unpleasant odor from that source. Mingle the two together and you can see that you might get something resembling a cheap and disgusting perfume, the odor of which would become more apparent as the sickness increased. Numbness of the legs, a foul taste in the mouth, clamminess--are all a part of the preliminaries of a vomiting attack. And don't forget that Mrs. Kearney was genuinely frightened. Not by anything that happened outside, but by unconscious fears rising out of her insecurity and stimulated by extra responsibility. This fright reinforced and made worse every symptom that she experienced. Is she then to be thought of as an irresponsible, hysterical woman who willfully and maliciously touched off a community reign of terror?
Never!
She merely reported what was to her a fearsome experience.
She didn't realize that it had its origins within, rather than without. When she tried to explain it, she explained it in terms of sensations from the outside world.

Contrasting Case of Tired Woman

Now, for contrast, come with the doctor while he interviews a later victim, Mrs. Laura Junkin, who experienced an attack by the phantom gas man Sept. 6, four days after Mrs. Kearney's misfortune had been reported in the daily papers and when the terror in Mattoon was at its height. This case also occurred at night between 11 and 12. At 11, Mrs. Junkin went to the bedroom of her apartment back of the Big Four restaurant, which she owns and operates. She noted the dread odor of gas on her pillow and along the edge of the mattress. It made her ill, although not to the point of vomiting, and caused her to lose control of her legs. She was tired and sleepy. Her mind was full of the phantom prowler whose exploits were on every tongue. It was a time of night when the critical faculty is not too keen. She probably did smell something. How natural, then, in her keyed-up state, in her fatigue, to attribute it to the thing which every one then feared--the unknown and fantastic sprayer The case of Mrs. Junkin, according to the doctor, was simply one of suggestibility in a weary woman. -- Sunday, September 17, page 1, 3 (Further details of the psychoanalysis of Mattoon's gas hysteria will be revealed in Monday's Herald-American) Photo Caption
MRS. BERT KEARNEY soothes daughter, Dorothy, 4, a victim of mysterious Mattoon malady blamed on a 'gas madman' and which has struck terror through the thriving central Illinois city. Another daughter, Carol, 2, watches. Photo Caption
POINTING to bedroom window, Mrs. Laura Junkin explains to police and Mattoon city officials how she was 'gassed' while sleeping.