The Story of the Not-so-Missing Nutshell

We are deep in the throes of editing Murder in a Nutshell: The Frances Glessner Lee Documentary -- getting ready for the screening in October 2024. 

Above is a still from the section about the missing Nutshell. When we were working on Of Dolls & Murder, Jerry D (if you don't know who Jerry D is, watch the movie) told me about the destroyed Nutshell and the missing one. I figured that as a documentary filmmaker it was up to me to try to find it. 

It eventually led me to a Nutshell I had never seen before. Not in archival photos and not in person. It was in an issue of Popular Mechanics magazine from the 1950s. It was an amazing find. At least that is how it felt. But I still had no idea what happened to the missing Nutshell.  Until later on when I spotted it in a photo on a website for the Bethlehem Heritage Center in NH. (Near Frances' former estate at the Rocks)

Turns out the Nutshell wasn't missing at all. No one thought to ask anyone at the Rocks. So there it sat, overlooked for decades. 

I was the first person to tell Clare Brown (She works at both The Rocks and the Heritage Center) that the Nutshell hiding in plain sight at the Bethlehem Heritage Center was considered missing. That was news to her. All she knew was that she found it in "the old tool barn" at the Rocks and literally had no idea what it was or much about Frances Glessner Lee at the time. (Side note: Clare's grandfather worked for Frances.)

This Nutshell wound up getting cleaned up and carefully sent to London for a Welcome Trust exhibit before it safely making it home. 

Interesting lesson:  Things that are consider missing, maybe never were. We just never asked the right people. 

Side lesson: Don't assume others that came before you (even detectives) did their homework. 

 

Frances Glessner Lee at the Bethlehem, NH Public Library

New display at Bethlehem (NH) Public Library. The Frances Glessner Lee and Nutshell Studies Collection. Love that Of Dolls & Murder made the display.

The Missing Nutshell on exhibit in London

You may remember the "missing Nutshell" from previous posts. If not, here's the scoop: Jerry D. of the Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner first told me about the missing Nutshell about 8 years ago. And through my research I found a photo essay in a Popular Mechanics magazine from the 1950s featuring the not-so-missing Nutshell.

Then fast forward to a few years ago, I was looking at a website of the Bethlehem Heritage Center - prepping for our shoot there and I spotted the Nutshell. Hiding in plain sight. We went Bethlehem, NH and interviewed people on camera about the missing Nutshell and how it wound up on display. To hear the full story, you have to wait for the new documentary to be done.

Fast forward again to last year - staff from the Wellcome Trust in London lamented that the Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner wouldn't answer their requests to borrow the Nutshells for their upcoming exhibit. (It's almost comical how often people ask me to get the OCME to lend them Nutshells for their exhibits.)

On one very rare occasion, the OCME lent out 4 of Frances Glessner Lee's precious Nutshells for an exhibit but honestly, they are more valuable than most normal sized houses and they are teaching tools that are in constant use.

Once I broke the news to the Wellcome Trust that they shouldn't get their hopes up for the OCME Nutshells,  I did tell them that about one other Nutshell that may be available to borrow... 

I'm happy to say that the missing Nutshell is in London right now for the Wellcome Trust exhibit. (I do hope that the Bethlehem Heritage Center was well compensated!)

 You can read all about the exhibit here. Clips of our film, Of Dolls & Murder (featuring John Waters) will also be a part of the exhibit. Hope you can make it!