A Further Examination of William Copley’s “It’s Midnight Dr. ______”: Black Dahlia Crime Scene Address Concealed In Surrealist Painting

June 15, 2022
Birch Bay, Washington

“It’s Midnight Dr. ____”

William Copley 1961

Original Tiled Master bathroom Sowden/Franklin House as it appeared in 1947

The photo below “It is Midnight Dr. ____” shows Dr. with a medical bag, surgical tools spelling HODEL MD, and a nude female who is either dead or unconscious at his feet.  The tiles in the background are identical to those shown above in the photo of Hodel’s master bathroom as it appeared in 1947.

An Explication of Surrealist’s Hidden Clues
in Wm Copley’s: “It’s Midnight Dr.___”

In Wm Copley’s 1961 painting: “It’s Midnight Dr. ____” the artist arranges a standing clothed male figure carrying a ‘medical bag’, a reclining nude female figure, and six (6) ‘medical instruments’ on a grid background that could represent square tiles. This grid is twelve (12) tiles across and fifteen (15) down for a total of 180 tiles. What Surrealistic Puzzle could this pose? One interpretation by Mr. John Scott from Australia suggests the answer could be found in the artist having created a grid that contains 12×15. spaces or tiles.

If you put those two dimensions side by side you have: 1215. To the Surrealist artist what could the numbers 180 (12×15) and 1215 mean? In finding your way with a compass, it has 360 degrees. Regardless of your direction of travel, if you want to go in the opposite direction you go 180 degrees the other way. If we speculate that the idea of a canvas with a grid containing 180 tiles is meant to represent the opposite and we see the grid is 12 by 15 then the opposite of 1215 (or one, two, one, five) is five, one, two, one or 5121.

If we combine this information with the previously ‘discovered surrealistic clues’ in the painting: a male figure holding a doctor’s bag, whose hatband spells: GEORGE HODEL; six instruments that spell: HODEL MD; all standing/arranged above a nude woman, what could this grid represent?

Mr. Scott suggests that the reverse/opposite of 1215 is 5121 which is the numerical address of the Sowden/Franklin house, e.g.: 5121 Franklin Avenue, Los Angeles CA.

This speculation and deduction confounds the concept of ‘coincidence’. If the grid is numerically representative of Dr. George Hodel, MD’s residence address and inside that residence is a bathroom floor and walls set with square ceramic tiles, then it is reasonable to deduce, (particularly if the woman is representative of Elizabeth Short before her bisection/hemicorporectomy), that the grid is representative of that residence’s bathroom floor, i.e. the Black Dahlia killing floor. (rjs 11.11.19)

Hodel residence at 5121 Franklin Ave., Hollywood

Copley painting reveals/identifies killer with five hidden “clews”:

1. Depicts a doctor as killer.

2. Depicts surgical tools spelling his name- HODEL MD

3. Depicts location of surgery as tiled bathroom identical to Hodel master bathroom.

4. Designs doctor’s hat to hide and spell HODEL

5. Conceals actual numerical address of murder in graph as-5121

6. In separate artwork Copley depicts himself lying supine in the Minotaur position (as was victim Elizabeth Short) with the initials G.H. on a wall above him depicted as Glove and Hat.
   (See blog here: https://stevehodel.com/2019/10/10/surrealist-artist-william-copleys-new-hat-trick-a-third-drawing-and-clue-to-black-dahlia-whodunit/)

Surrealist Artist William Copley’s New “Hat Trick” – A Third Drawing and Clue to Black Dahlia Whodunit?

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