The Black Dahlia and Sharon Tate

The latter half of the 1940s found the major cities of post-war America in a precarious position. On the one hand, population centers were reabsorbing many thousands of returning veterans into the work force, and into a social system they had not experienced for some years. Previous relationships had changed during their absence, and many were starved for female company. While making the necessary readjustments to the war's end, major cities such as New York, Chicago, Cleveland, and Los Angeles, were plagued by regionalized mob rule behind the scenes of the entertainment industry, from clubs and casinos to print and film media. Included in the list of supporting institutions and side markets were studios, liquor manufacturing, and all peripheral markets connected with gambling, and prostitution.


At the same time, a migration of aspiring young people flooded into cities like Los Angeles in the hope of establishing movie careers, a good percentage of them coming from rural or small town lifestyles. Many were young women who left their homes under a variety of circumstances to enter the bourgeoning Hollywood cinematic culture. Some arrived as runaways, without the necessary funds, personal support, or maturity to face the unexpectedly perilous big city life, and a few did not survive the experience.


In the years following World War II, Los Angeles and other large American cities were hit with a series of brutal murders that, in many ways, fit into distinct patterns across the country. The Los Angeles Police Department was overwhelmed, caught up dealing with mob activities, inner corruption, a regional press that brazenly invaded legal confidentiality within the walls of the police department itself, and a lack of advanced technology. As a result, several of the most highly publicized murders committed against young female newcomers went unsolved in perpetuity, and they have remained topics of conversation among crime enthusiasts well into the following century.


That said, one of these crimes stands above the others as an iconic example of unthinkably grotesque savagery, a psychopathic act equal to any horror movie Hollywood has produced-the January, 1947 murder of Elizabeth Short, famously dubbed 'The Black Dahlia' by an engrossed press and public. The investigative case of Elizabeth Short was - and still is - filled with speculative suspicion so saturated with circumstantial evidence that to accuse a perpetrator outright is all but impossible without immediate qualification and backtracking from the claim. The horrific physical realities of the crime reach out in many directions, toward medical practitioners, the arts, the mob, writers, and in every case, the macabre.


In 1969, things were looking up for one of Hollywood's most marketable actresses. After appearing as a model in fashion magazines and having bit parts on shows during the early part of the decade, Sharon Tate was a star in the making. That summer, she was pregnant with her first child by director Roman Polanski, who had just recently become her husband, and a few months earlier, she had just finished filming The Thirteen Chairs, co-starring Orson Welles.


Tragically, superstardom would never come, and even today, over 45 years later, most details of Sharon's life and career are completely overlooked by people who continue to be morbidly curious about her murder at the hands of the Manson Family on August 9, 1969. The murders committed by Charlie Manson's followers transfixed America, and Tate has been inextricably linked to one of 20th century America's most notorious criminals.