Christena Stephens joins Scott and Gene to dissect the enduring mystery of the unsolved 1943 Littlefield murders with her book Bound in Silence: An Unsolved Murder in a Small Texas Town (Texas A&M Press, 2024). Join us as we discuss the dark narrative of Dr. Roy and Mae Hunt's brutal killing, a crime that shattered the peace of their small West Texas town.
Bound in Silence: An Unsolved Murder in a Small Texas Town https://www.tamupress.com/book/9798987900208/bound-in-silence/
Christena Stephens joins Scott and Gene to dissect the enduring mystery of the unsolved 1943 Littlefield murders with her book Bound in Silence: An Unsolved Murder in a Small Texas Town (Texas A&M Press, 2024). Join us as we discuss the dark narrative of Dr. Roy and Mae Hunt's brutal killing, a crime that shattered the peace of their small West Texas town.
Bound in Silence: An Unsolved Murder in a Small Texas Town https://www.tamupress.com/book/9798987900208/bound-in-silence/
This podcast is not sponsored by. It does not reflect the views of the institutions that employ us. It is solely our thoughts and ideas, based upon our professional training and study of the past.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Talking Texas History, the podcast that explores Texas history before and beyond the Alamo. Not only will we talk Texas history, we'll visit with folks who teach it, write it, support it, and with some who've made it and, of course, all of us who live it and love it. Welcome to another edition of Talking Texas History.
Speaker 1:I'm Gene Pruice. I'm Scott Soseby. Gene, it looks like and sounds like that this will be our second in a row of murder in Mayhem in West Texas as we do this. So tell everybody who we have with us today.
Speaker 2:Well, we have Christina Stevens, who is we've known for a while, and, Christina, tell everybody a little bit about yourself, if they haven't already met you who you are, what you do, where you're from. All that good stuff.
Speaker 3:All that good stuff, gene, you know me since like what? 2006? Yeah, it goes back all the way to 2006 with the Mallet Ranch project. So, yeah, it has been quite a while. So hello everybody, thank you for joining in on this podcast. A little bit about me I have two master's degrees from Texas Tech University and one was supposed to be my PhD in environmental toxicology and then I decided I could not stand that professor for working under him for another four or five years, so I walked away with the second masters and I went in heavily into nonprofit work where I was starting and founding and guiding and leading nonprofits.
Speaker 3:Then I became a professional photographer through actually through my Mallet Ranch work, which started back in 2006, and still a professional photographer today, and my work part of it. I actually wound up working for a nonprofit foundation in Ford County, texas, where I was a wildlife biologist for eight years and other than my boss at that time. That was probably the best experience I could have ever had, because it gave me the ability to biologically monitor wildlife from all angles for an eight year period. So it was kind of like I was monitoring. I wasn't just like there for a February. I was able to do it like for eight February's and I still have tons of research that I've got to figure out.
Speaker 3:What I'm going to do with tons of photos and what I'm going to do with those I have no idea yet. And right now I'm working for the USDA and my home office is actually in Brownfield and I'm a natural resources specialist for USDA NRCS, and probably my most significant achievement is me being the president of the National Intel Booker Mountain Dog Association. This is a national organization and I came on board as president where it had to lead the organization through organizational change management, and I'm very proud of that accomplishment. There are probably more than you wanted to know, but then, at the same time, I'm also an author of the book that we're here to talk about today.
Speaker 1:That is correct. And you know, first off president of any national organization biological stuff in USDA that is so far above Jean and my pay grade I'm. You know we're just in awe about the natural Don't even let us join national organizations, much less be a president one. So I mean, that's how it goes. But we are here to talk about a book you have coming out. It's out, it's just out, brand new out from Texas A&M press, titled Bound in Silence. An unsolved murder in a small Texas town Takes place in Littlefield, texas 1943, which we all know is a lot of cotton, wayland Jennings hometown. And then, other than that, tell us about Littlefield and a little bit about the book.
Speaker 3:You know Littlefield, texas it grew out of. You know the vast, wide open spaces of what was the line OS to Cotto. It really came into its own when the train system finally came through and, if I am remembering my history correctly, I think it was part of the XIT ranch. I'm not sure if I'm remembering that correctly.
Speaker 1:You are correct, it was part of that until George Littlefield bought part of the land.
Speaker 3:And so, you know, littlefield just sprang up and it, you know, as with any town, small town in this part of Texas, it grew and it grew. And then all of a sudden, you know, with the way life is with many people, you know, industry moves, career shifts, they, kids don't want to stay in small communities anymore, people don't want to stay in small communities anymore. So the town is kind of really dying. I mean, you have to imagine, in 1943, the Main Street of Littlefield, every single building on Main Street had some viable open business, whether it was bank, restaurant, you know, clothing store, pharmacy. And now you drive down Main Street and Littlefield and it's just, it is really depressing, it really is, because so many of those great stores they're no longer there anymore because the economy just could not sustain those built those businesses.
Speaker 2:Tell us what happened on the morning of October 26, 1943. What did the police find?
Speaker 3:So what the police actually discovered was after you had an older lady that was getting ready for her day. She was walking out to her car and all of a sudden she heard two little girls running and screaming towards her. That couple went into the house and actually took the youngest daughter back into the house with them, and what that couple discovered was the bound and beaten bodies of Dr Roy Hunt and May Hunt, and what ensued was, before even the crime scene was secured you probably had close to over 30 someone people walk through that house just so that they could get a glimpse of the bodies, because it was a small town.
Speaker 3:Rumor mill flew like crazy and you probably had people picking up the phone, you probably had people running down the street, whatever. And so as the morning progressed, you had, like the DA friend plain view show up. You had sheriff's deputies, you had the Texas Rangers all show up in this tiny little house and trying to figure out what had happened. And what had happened was the Dr Roy had actually had been slightly beaten, his jaw had been bashed in and he had been shot point-blank range in the middle of his head and May had also been severely beaten.
Speaker 3:And what ensued was the person, the killer, actually tying them separately up, tying them separately up, and then they were both tied to each other and then in a weird assortment of, I mean, it was like from lamp cords to rope to fishing line, and then you had panties laid over both of them. And so this is what kind of ensued and started this whole process of this small town being rocked in October 26, 1943, by this heinous double murder. But it really wasn't the first murder that actually happened in Littlefield, it was just the most. It was the one that grabbed nationwide attention at that time.
Speaker 1:It's a bizarre scene and it's a kind of to your mind. Whoever did it, they took some time doing it, it wasn't just a spur of the moment thing and almost sounds like I don't know, a crime of passion of some kind. I mean at least extreme anger. But so tell us about Roy and May Hunt. Who were they and what did they do in Littlefield and why is that significant to the story?
Speaker 3:So Roy was actually. He grew up in Lubbock and his family was the George M Hunt's and George M Hunt actually found it, helped found Esticado and then the Hunt. He actually moved from Esticado over to Lubbock and actually it was one of the founders early founders of Lubbock and he was Roy's grandfather. And so Roy grew up, went to Lubbock High School, he eventually went to University of Texas in Austin and then he transferred to become a doctor in Galveston.
Speaker 3:May Hunt herself and I really I struggled for years trying to get as much research as I could on her, but she came from, she grew up in Houston and she graduated from high school and then she decided she wanted to become a nurse and when Roy transferred from Galveston to Jeff Davis Hospital they're in Houston to do his internship and his residency.
Speaker 3:That's when they met and they later married and they moved to Littlefield because Roy had been offered a partnership in the Littlefield Hospital with Dr Duke and that's kind of how they came to Littlefield when so like when you even think about in today's society of how they weren't like big celebrities, these were just regular small town people trying to raise their family because they had their first daughter, joanne, and then along came Jane, and when you think, at least when I think about Littlefield, about especially in the 1940s, I look at it as being a very quintessential town, to where everybody knew everybody's name, everybody knew everybody's phone number, everybody knew everybody, and it was that really small town atmosphere. But there was like probably there was nothing really remarkable about Roy or May. It was just that they were two people living their lives trying to raise their families or trying to raise their family there in Littlefield at that time.
Speaker 2:Well, kristina, was there any indication that somebody may have been out to get them? I mean to be honest, this wasn't the first time that somebody tried to kill the good Doctor Hunt, was it?
Speaker 3:I know it wasn't. So this is where the story takes a really interesting turn. It was a year before I think it was about 18 months earlier, which would have been May of 1942, doctor Hunt was actually almost murdered on the outskirts of Littlefield. And what happened was he turned around and accused another Doctor of this attempted murder, and that Doctor was actually from Cameron, texas. So there is still, even when I think about this and going back to my research, there is still a lot of speculation on. You know, did this really happen? I mean, did Newton actually shoot him or was it somebody else? And Doctor Newton? Eventually he was tried like three different times and then Doctor Newton was finally convicted of attempted the attempted murder of Roy, even after Roy had been killed. So that's where this starts really getting a deeper mystery into a mystery, because you're like, okay, what is going on here, what I mean? You have to believe the Doctor, but at the same time, was he actually telling the truth?
Speaker 2:Well, it was all wrapped up in a love affair, right? That's the background story.
Speaker 3:That's the background story. But the only background story that I found was the fact that at one time when Doctor Hunt was there at Jeff Davis, he had dated Doctor Newton's wife at that time and that was really the only connection there was. You know, rumors and speculation they can. You know people, they can run rampage. We all can say, oh well, you know, have our own thought processes, our own. You know, yeah, this is probably what happened. But it's kind of like when it boiled down to you, it was still all speculation here, say, and there was never really any concrete evidence. And that's what I really tried to present in this book was the fact that all of this happened but in the end there was really no concrete evidence, especially of Doctor Newton shooting Roy in 1942.
Speaker 1:Well, you've done a lot of research. What do you think? I mean, do you think that that was that this Doctor Newton killed him, or was it somebody else?
Speaker 3:It was somebody else.
Speaker 1:I think it was somebody else. So when the police got there Little Pills, in small town, even once, then you know I'm sure it was a did they have a police department or was it a sheriff's department? But they began investigating. What did they find? Did they do a good job? Can you blame some of them? Maybe what happened on the police afterwards?
Speaker 3:Oh, yes, most definitely. So you know, this is where the story gets become. It becomes even more stranger. So they zeroed in on another suspect, on a prime suspect. Were they actual murderers themselves in Galveston, texas, like less than 48 hours later? And when you even start trying to put those pieces together, it's kind of those pieces they don't match to make a picture, they don't, they don't mesh, and there's still. There's like there's a hole here or there's a hole here, and there was never any real clear indication on why the Texas Rangers zeroed in on this one suspect. Two days later, I let's see. There was Littlefield, plainview, lamisa and Nolan County. He went to trial four times for the murder of Roy. He was always convicted but at the same time it was always overturned at the appeals process due to you know what the lower court presented in court for the evidence and to bring this case to trial.
Speaker 2:This guy Thompson Wright, I think was the person who kind of gets all the blame. He was a career criminal, wasn't he? He died in committing crimes eventually, right? So maybe he was just suspicious.
Speaker 3:So his name was Jim Thomas and you know, like anybody back then I guess, he was always trying to find a way to make a quick buck. So he was involved in a couple of bank robberies. He was involved in doing some white capping type enterprise stuff in Waco. But they never ever came out and said in all of my research it was kind of like Jim Thomas, he never really killed anybody. I mean, honestly, there was never a smoking gun or anything that was directed right at Jim Thomas. And yes, he did die. He was shot himself in Durant Oklahoma years later and once that happened it was kind of like, oh well, we're just closing the case completely on the hunt because we still believe that Jim Thomas did this. And I will tell you right now.
Speaker 3:The really the amazing part of this whole story is how my book became published. I sent this off. I was scared to death because I'm like nobody. I was scared of putting my work out there. I don't know how it was going to be received. I still don't know how it's going to be received, but I sent it off to three publishers and Stony Creek Publishing came back and Lauren Steffi he asked me the one question. He said I read through the book and he said do you think Jim Thomas did it? And I was like, came back and I said no, I don't. And he said if you will do this and do this and then if you will give your own thoughts of what you think actually happened to this whole case, he said I want to publish the book. So I'm extremely grateful for that.
Speaker 3:But the other thing that I want to point out about what makes this book so spectacular, or this story so spectacular and so grippy, is the fact that Joanne Hunt she was five years old, she was the only one who saw the actual murderer in her parents' house and Joanne basically, yeah, the cops tried to talk to her, the sheriff at that time, he tried, but he didn't really talk to her. And then after she was transported to Vernon Texas, she was bound to silence for 70 years and she never talked to anybody about her story. She never even talked to her sister, jane, about her story, about what happened in that house that night. That is the most significant part of this, because I have her story. Nobody else has the story.
Speaker 1:That's unbelievable, that's amazing. So sounds like the police, the Texas Rangers, like they often do, zeroed in on one person. Did they ever think about any other suspects? Was there anybody else ever on the radar for this? They just it's the one, he's the only one, nobody else. And you're working at this. Would you come up with anybody else that may have done it?
Speaker 3:Okay. So my thing is, what I came up with it was somebody that knows them, that knew them at that time and it knew them intimately, that knew the layout of the house and the true victim was never the true. The actual victim was never supposed to be Roy. May was always May because if you remember, scott, what you said at the very beginning of this podcast about the passion and all of that, if you look at the facts and you look at the prime scene photos and you put all those pieces together, may was always the victim. She was the target. It was never about Roy, wow.
Speaker 1:Who could that have been? Was it? We're talking about another love triangle, perhaps, or something?
Speaker 2:like that. We have to wait till the book comes in, maybe.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you'll have to wait for the book.
Speaker 2:Well, I gotta say you know I knew of this crime because I did an oral history when I worked at the Southwest Collection with Harold LaFont, who I think was the DA in Lamb County at the time, and he showed me, he gave me to put in the Southwest Collection photographs. They never made it in there because they were really graphic and so I've seen the murder scene and the police and I think I shared those with you a long time ago and you know, I gotta say you know you're talking about how the daughter didn't speak about it for 70 years. I can imagine she was quite traumatized and it took a long time to get over that.
Speaker 3:Well, it's not so much that she was traumatized, it was the fact that her aunt, at that time where she was staying, said that she would never get to see her baby sister Jane ever again. If she spoke about what happened in that house ever again, really yes. So Jane Joanne, actually, yes, she did testify in court. But you know, even back then prosecutors, the DA's lawyers, they didn't really sit down and try to talk to witnesses before they brought them up on the witness stand. It was always like, you know, they leaned it and yes, we do this podcast.
Speaker 3:Yeah Well, I mean, you know, Jean, I wanted to tell you that it's kind of like so, after I did that paper presentation, they're in Lubbock and that was what the largest presentation attendance ever by any West Texas at any West Texas Historical Association conference meeting. And then you walked up as me and Cecily are sitting there on the couch and you tell me Christina, you need to turn this into the book. Oh, and, by the way, I had the original crime scene photos. Do you know what that did to me? It was kind of like, oh my gosh, I you know. And then those pieces started falling in place. And, yeah, it took a long time for me to get this done. But you know what Life happens. And life happens you have to deal with what you're dealt, what is put on your plate, and then you move on, and then you get brave and then all of a sudden decide, okay, in one, you know, one night. Here goes, you know, my three proposals all to three publishers. We'll see what happens. And this is where we are today.
Speaker 1:So how long total? Christina? Did you work on this book? I mean, we've all had projects that take us a long time, so give us you know it sounds like bits and start. How long did you work on this book?
Speaker 3:So it was over 10 years. It really was.
Speaker 2:But you know, look, a lot of people work on books for a long, long time, so I think that you know you had plenty of time to think about it, and so it's probably a better book now than it would have been 10 years ago.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely. It's a better book than it would have been even five years ago. I mean, you have to understand, I was trying to consider telling this story and at the same time, when it was almost like I've always wanted to throw in my speculation of what happened, especially after dealing with this for so long and being immersed in it for so long. And when Lauren came back and said, you know, if you add what you actually think, your authors thought that was just like oh my gosh, he is. You know, he is the person that needs to do this, he gets it, he understands what needs to happen with this. So there you have it.
Speaker 1:So this case is officially closed. I guess you said after because they just decided that Jim Thomas did it and even they did it that it's officially closed. So do you think there's any chance that it could be reopened? That somebody might actually hey look, let's find out who did it Some cold-clays people or something like that.
Speaker 3:I think, if so, in my gut, in my gut, there is still somebody out there that knows something. I could be mistaken, but that's my gut. Sometimes my gut does not lie or lead me astray. I think that there is something out there. Technically, even though, yes, they said the case was closed after the murder of Jim Thomas, this is still an unsolved murder. It's an unsolved double murder because you have no answers as to who, as to why. I mean yes, I alluded to the why in my author's thoughts. Even with Joanne's narrative that's in this book, you pick up on that, that's. The other thing I'd like to say is the fact that until I heard Joanne's story and I heard it twice, that's when I started putting the pieces together that it was. This was about May, it was never about Roy.
Speaker 2:Well, that sounds really interesting. One of the things that I think that it tells us you hit upon this is that policing in law and order weren't like the TV shows that we see today, or even the real justice system. It's long, it's complex and, back in those days, probably a little bit more naive than it is today.
Speaker 3:Oh yes, and I mean mistakes even today still happen and still occur. But even it was more so even back then, even with the birth of forensics and what was available back then. And even I go into that in a chapter of that because I remember it, one presentation I didn't love it. I had a wonderful little old lady speak up and she was like well, can't you go back and dig those bodies up and get some DNA off of them? And I just, you know, it's those moments that it makes you. That is what carried this book to where it is today.
Speaker 1:Before we go. Chris, I meant to ask you this earlier and I just get carried away and it didn't. You know, paul Cross used to press on Jean and I probably you probably heard him say this too. Titles mean thing. Tell everybody why the title bound in silence.
Speaker 3:Oh my gosh, you are going to. You're going to be amazed by this. So this book has evolved with so many titles over the years and it came down to it early last year where my publisher was like we need a title, we need a title, you need to come up with a title. So Jenny, who is really you know, she is my best friend we were on the phone. We got on the phone with each other and we started, you know, writing things out, typing things out, and with her collaboration, that's what we came up with was the bound in silence.
Speaker 2:It's a great title. I wish I could come up with great titles. I've never had a title. That's stuck. You know the editors go that's nice and they change it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know, the great thing about Lauren was the fact that you know he was very, you know he was very hands on with this entire process, but at the same time, once we decided on this, he was like, yeah, let's go for it. So that's how that title evolved.
Speaker 1:That's great. Well, christina, I think 30 minutes that comes quickly all the time when we do this, so so I just want to remind everybody. First off, thanks for talking to us. It's been great. This is fantastic. I didn't know. I'd kind of heard of this, I didn't know this much about it and I can't wait till the book gets here so I can read it. It's from Texas A&M University Press. Found in silence an unsolved murder in a small Texas town. Thank you for being with us so much.
Speaker 3:Thank you both Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Christina.