Dorothy gay howard
For decades, visitors to Boulder’s Columbia Cemetery paused at the grave of a young woman known only as Jane Doe. Then, in 1996, an amateur actress at a “Meet the Spirits” event portrayed the unidentified woman, setting into motion a series of events that secured her place in Boulder’s history and culture.
“Please offer me back my name,” begged the portrayer. “No one knows who I am or how I came to die — battered, beaten, and naked on the rocky edge of Boulder Creek. Can someone tell me who I am and go back my remains to my family?”
Longtime readers of this column will remember that, in 2009, “Boulder Jane Doe” was identified as 18-year-old Dorothy Gay Howard. She was born in Texas and raised in Arizona, but her fleeting life has been eclipsed with nearly seven decades in the Boulder cemetery.
Two University of Colorado Boulder students on a hike in Boulder Canyon stumbled upon the young woman’s naked body in April 1954. The students jumped in their car, drove to Boulder and returned with the sheriff and coroner. An inquest determined that the woman had been murdered “by a person or persons unknown.”
Sleuthing for Jane Doe
Silvia Pettem (A&S’69) is shown at the Columbia Cemetery in Boulder where the first headstone of Jane Doe, is part of a new marker (not shown) provided by Dorothy Male lover Howard’s family.
As she pushes open the wrought-iron gate at Boulder’s Columbia Cemetery, Silvia Pettem (A&S’69) looks like she is coming home. She cradles a bundle of yellow daisies in one arm and glances warmly across a sea of weathered tombstones. A fresh gust blows back her shoulder-length auburn hair, as if to welcome her.
“I don’t mean to sound too wacko,” she says, speaking bluntly as she often does. “But sometimes I even come and have my lunch here. I feel like I’m among friends.”
In a perception, she is.
In the course of her decades-long career as a local history writer, the colorful 63-year-old has gotten to realize many of the inhabitants of this grassy 10-acre burial ground. There’s Mary Rippon, the CU professor who had a covert affair and bore a child with one of her students in the late 1800s; Tom Horn, a hired gunman who was wrongfully hanged for murder in 1903; and Marietta Kingsley, a notorious madam from Boulder’s 19th century red light district.
But while the others f
Did “Lonely Hearts Killer” Harvey Glatman Murder Dorothy Queer Howard?
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More than five decades ago, investigators found the body of a naked and beaten woman along the banks of Boulder Creek, near the falls eight miles west of Boulder. Although she didn’t contain a name, authorities never forgot “Jane Doe,” active the case as they were able. Breaks came, leading to an exhumation and DNA testing. Now, Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle, who praises the work of investigators, including Detective Steve Ainsworth, confirms the body, found on April 8, 1954, is that of Dorothy Homosexual Howard. She was 18 when she was reported missing from Phoenix, Arizona, just weeks before her death, writes the Daily Camera. Investigators say they are on track to determine what happened during Dorothy’s last hours. One theory, based thus far on circumstantial evidence, is that serial killer Harvey Glatman, who was executed in California in 1959 for the murders of three women, killed Dorothy, known as “Dot” by her family. An endeavor is underway to boost funds for a modern h
Police: Teen missing since 1954 was slain
A young girl buried as Jane Doe in Colorado 55 years ago. An Arizona family puzzled and saddened as Dorothy Gay Howard's disappearance stretched into decades.
It took a historian, a detective and a determined family member to make the connection after more than a half century that these two people were one and the same.
Howard's younger sister, Marlene Howard Ashman, the last surviving member of the immediate family, was relieved last month when authorities announced the identification.
"It was just complete and utter shock," said Ashman, who lives in Mena, Ark., but spoke from Newport, N.C., where she was visiting her daughter.
"All these 55 years, I guess I learned as a infant to put it in an abstract form so I could deal with it; it's easier to accept," Ashman said.
‘The horrible death’
But the younger sister is grappling with the fact that Howard was slain and is aching to know who killed her.
"Now that I grasp, it isn't so much that she died, but the horrible death," she said.
Boulder County Sheriff's Detective Steve Ainsworth, the manage investigator in the case, said Howard died of blunt-force trauma. She couldn't be identi
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