GARY L. STEWART'S SEARCH FOR BIRTH PARENTS TURNED UP A SERIAL KILLER - HIS BIRTH FATHER! A GREAT READ!

 

THE MOST DANGEROUS ANIMAL OF ALL

by GARY L. STEWART WITH SUSAN MUSTAFA  C 2014

is published by HarperCollins

 

THE MOST DANGEROUS ANIMAL OF ALL was unexpectedly interesting, a good novelesque read, and exceedingly convincing; worth the time to read it even if you aren't that interested in the Zodiac serial killer.

 

I've helped a few people who were searching for their birth parents using genealogy research methods, and so when I first heard about this book I imagined Gary L. Stewart being the person who initiated a search for his.  While he was interested in finding his birth mother, it was she who contacted him. 

 

It was she who had eloped at 14 with a much older man or who had been preyed upon and molested by this man.  (I'm remembering that in many places and times in American history a 14 year old bride was not uncommon but in this case the law was after them.)  As a Christian he attempted forgiveness and love of his mother, but then Gary decided he may as well find his father.  Maybe he wasn't as bad as all that.

 

Like many adopted people Gary L. Stewart loved the parents who raised him and were good to him but he felt there was something of a mystery about his past that needed to be resolved or in this case solved. His search included getting adoption records, trying to get his original birth certificate (he still hasn't gotten it from the state of Louisiana but at this point he probably already knows all the information on it), and reading old newspapers on microfilm.  Eventually he was in contact with the police and offering his DNA to be tested against crime scene DNA.

 

His birth mother claimed there was a lot she didn't remember, and maybe she didn't, but as some of you researchers know relatives who don't remember but start remembering more when you present them with the evidence are not uncommon.  In this case it was the old newspaper articles that revealed his parent's runaway romance as well as his abandonment in a New Orleans stairwell had been reported on but not connected.  Imagine seeing yourself as an infant in an old photo in an old newspaper in a story about being abandoned!

 

I can say that the people I assisted in finding their birth parents "prepared" themselves for the usual scenario of an unwed parent or maybe a parent who became ill or that someone went to jail but the abandoned in a stairwell type of story is maybe the worst.

 

Stewart wondered if his mother had not just forgotten aspects of what had become an abusive and strange relationship and the loss of her infant son but was lieing to him.  He confronted her, she denied it, but my guess is that she withheld information afraid she would scare him off.

 

Strangely, perhaps in a perverse but fateful way, his mother had remarried and to a detective on the San Francisco police force!  If that police force ever did or is now hiding information they long held or holding up or preventing DNA analysis, well, it certainly sounds like it.  Stewart donated DNA to compare to a match from one of the crime scenes long ago.  Did they loose the crime scene DNA?

 

Earl Van Best Jr., Stewart's birth father, was the son of a popular minister and a sex addict mother who couldn't stop cheating.  His father finally divorced his mother which temporarily hurt his career until he switched denominations. Van Best Jr.'s childhood was miserable.  Early on he was considered peculiar - a nerd - but he did have a few friends.  He developed his skill as a musician and played the organ semi professionally.  He became an Anglophile and talked in a fake British accent.  While he might have had some unusual interests or hobbies probably no one thought of him as capable of murdering a series of innocent people.  Many other people have had miserable childhoods and overcome them so I always wonder "What makes for a serial killer?"

 

Some of the people who the Zodiac Killer murdered looked a bit like Gary L. Stewart's mother, as if his father was fixated on revenge because she did leave him.  He most likely also saw the newspaper when his mother remarried the San Francisco Police Officer who became a Detective.  More importantly, Stewart has proven that in San Francisco his father encountered and had some involvement with the head of the Church of Satan as well as a man who would become one of Charlie Manson's murderers!  His father's income came from buying and selling old manuscripts and books and documents and so he traveled a route through California and into Mexico, where he eventually died.  His father also had experience in writing and breaking code as well as forging signatures and new analysis of the Zodiac's taunting coded messages that would reveal his name do reveal the name Earl Van Best Jr.

 

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DO I USE THE ANCESTRY GENEALOGY DATBASES? YES BUT NOT TO THE EXCLUSION OF MANY OTHERS!

DO I USE THE ANCESTRY GENEALOGY DATBASES?

I was asked recently what I think of the ANCESTRY.COM databases.  Well, I can say that I use that database and have over many years, but I also use Fold3, and many other databases,  and resources that are local, city, state, county, and federal. I probably will never give up using "old fashioned" resources like talking to people at historical societies.  I like interaction with other people too much to be isolated and computer bound at home all the time.

At the LATTER DAY SAINTS FAMILY HISTORY CENTERS around the country, volunteers and missionaries are very busy moving information that is presently on other databases and microfilms into FREE USE GENEALOGY DATABASES at their FAMILYSEARCH site. It's their indexing project.

Someone at one of the FAMILY HISTORY CENTERS told me that originally all these databases companies, non-profit and otherwise, once agreed to share all information.  That is why you see information original to JEWISH GEN on ANCESTRY.  I use JewishGen once in a while but must say that their constant begging for donations, which seemingly has increased significantly in the last year, has really gotten on my nerves.  But why should they go begging when they have either turned over or sold all their information to Ancestry? 

This person at the LDS Family History Center told me that the sharing as promised may not be in all cases two sided anymore, since there is a fortune to be made selling subscriptions, etc.

I've used FAMILY HISTORY CENTER RESOURCES FOR YEARS!  I actually love spinning film and find it easier on the eyes and the hands than databases.  I also have greatly enjoyed talking to other genealogy enthusiasts and have experienced some synchronicity in doing so!

I've also found information that was not microfilmed or microfilmed only in part on some of the databases I use.  I know this because I have the photocopies OF THE BACKS OF INDEX CARDS that provided extra good information other than the fronts.  Then there is the long time problem of typists who have produced misspellings despite their best efforts.  As I understand it, at the FAMILY HISTORY CENTER when a volunteer comes across a questionable handwritten name, they will call in a couple other people to give an opinion, and they may also assign people who understand something about the language or names in that language to contribute.

I've had my fair share of encountering sloppy handwriting and misspellings in my years as a researcher, though I'm usually pretty good at making it out, better than most people I would say.  Still, this is a good reason to obtain a copy of the microfilm so that you can go back and check.

Since I'm not associated with the ANCESTRY.COM company, I can't do them an advert. 

HERE IS THE LINK TO FAMILYSEARCH.ORG

THE GREAT INDIAN WARS - 1540-1890 : BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF AMERICAN HISTORY

THE GREAT INDIAN WARS 1540-1890 is a BCI ECLIPSE triple set of CD's

This documentary film covers a few hundred years of Indian (Native American) and American history, beginning with Francisco Vazques de Coronado and his expedition to the Great Plains, and includes some of the great battles such as Battle of Horseshoe Bend, the Battle of Little Big Horn, and the Battle of Wounded Knee.   It includes the Buffalo Cowboys too.  Perhaps most interesting to me was the way various tribes became experts at riding and using the horse for warfare in the years after the Spanish brought some to the America's, which is actually late when it comes to the occupation of the continent. There is a lot of what looks like old film footage, but I was unable to tell how much of this black and white film was truly historical or how much had been filmed for movies.  Covered are the heros of battles but ultimately the defeat of the Indians.

The film gave me a deeper understanding than I had of the progression from east to west, as well as an understanding that certain tribes had themselves moved from one place in the country to another, before the expansionists pushed them elsewhere. 

As a genealogist I've learned more about history from researching around the time and place that ancestors lived.  I've found documents that don't always agree with the official story, such as places where the big slave holder was a Native American, and I think the most important question when doing Native American research is WHAT TRIBE!

Today there is a lot of controversy over who is or isn't qualified to be part of a tribe.

GHOSTS IN PRINCE GEORGE'S NURSERY AND IN YOUR FAMILY STEAD?

With the summer ahead - finally - it might not be the spookiest time of year to be talking about GHOSTS but a recent article on the internet suggested that Great Britain's baby Prince George is in a remodeled nursery that has been the scene of several sightings of ghosts - ancestral spirits.

Here is one of many articles quoting biographer Andrew Morton, famous or infamous for writing about Princess Diana.

IS PRINCE GEORGE OF CAMBRIDGE'S NURSERY HAUNTED? : O CANADA

EXCERPT " Andrew Morton, the famous biographer of Prince William’s late mother, Princess Diana, is quoted in England’s Mirror explaining that “Prince George’s nursery is in Apartment 1A of Kensington Palace, which has been a notorious spot for ghost sightings...The Mirror reports that apparitions of George II, Caroline of Brunswick and Princess Sophia have all been reported in the palace, with ghostly visions in “Regency dress” disappearing through walls.”

Another author mentioned in the article says there are ghosts OUTSIDE THE PALACE as well!

It's one thing to honor your ancestors (by, say, doing genealogy) and another to be visited by them as ghosts.

I believe ghosts exist though I don't claim to totally understand their technology.  Some say they are souls who do not know they are dead and haven't moved on to a higher spiritual plane, others say that they are haunted because there is unfinished business.  I don't know enough about the named ghosts to know how they died or when at this point.  I think ghosts need to be cleared out though because this time on earth is for the living.

DO YOU HAVE GHOSTS IN YOUR FAMILY STEAD?