December 21. 2020
Los Angeles, California
Happy Winter Solstice!
I just had the great pleasure of watching Beyond Baroque’s 83-minute video “The Signature of All Things: A passionate ode to the artist Kenneth Rexroth.” (It live streams free through the end of December 2020, do try to watch it.) Or, if in the holiday gift mode, better yet, purchase a copy of the show for yourself or a friend.
The George and Dorothy Hodel/Kenneth Rexroth Connection
George Hodel Kenneth Rexroth Dorothy Hodel
For those of you that are familiar with my ongoing series of books, Black Dahlia Avenger: A Genius for Murder, you may recall that included in the LA DA Secret George Hodel Black Dahlia taped transcripts there is a recorded conversation between my father, George Hodel and his and my mother’s good friend, poet KENNETH REXROTH. Rexroth’s friend, author, Henry Miller, was also a regular friend/visitor to the Hodel residence and the Hodel’s also regularly visited Miller in BIG SUR.)
Kenneth Rexroth recorded at our then residence, the Sowden/Franklin House, 5121 Franklin Ave., Hollywood.)
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Dr. George Hill Hodel residence 1945-1950
My main interest in this blog is to present the aforementioned Beyond Baroque video documentary on Rexroth’s remarkable life and poetry, however, as a point of interest, I will here include the secretly recorded DA transcript between my father and Rexroth.
It was recorded as part of the Black Dahlia Surveillance of George Hodel which lasted six weeks (February 15, 1950-March 27, 1950).
The Rexroth/Hodel conversations begin just four days into the electronic stakeout. DA and LAPD officers are monitoring the conversations LIVE (not phone taps) and have broken into the residence and implanted microphones in the wall and have run a “hard line” to telephone wires outside and then to the basement of LAPD Hollywood Detectives (about two miles away) where 18 detectives monitor the conversations in six hour shifts 24/7 for the next six weeks.
SKH Note: Remarkably this Kenneth Rexroth visit to the Hodel Franklin House occurs just two days after a probable “murder in progress” has occurred by GHH and an accomplice, Baron Harringa. Details of that assault of a “Jane Doe Female” in the basement are summarized in the transcript pages preceding this interview and include an extensive “confession” by GHH to the Black Dahlia murder and the forced overdose “staged suicide” of his personal secretary, Ruth Spaulding. (For those interested a full copy of the original 146 pages (print or Kindle) can be ordered HERE.
GEORGE HODEL AND KENNETH REXROTH CONVERSATION
Scanned pages from original LADA Hodel Black Dahlia Surveillance that occurred beginning Feb 15, 1950 and continued 24/7 for the next six weeks. Pages below include telephone call and then physical visit to residence by Kenneth Rexroth who stayed overnight then accompanied GHH to visit Dorothy Hodel in Santa Monica. Rexroth conversations begin on February 19, 1950. These pages appear as scanned from original LADA Secret Black Dahlia Files obtained as part of my investigation in 2003.
(Included below are jpeg scans as well as duplicate pages as a PDF.)
rexroth hodel conv final da file
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