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Written in Blood: Negotiating Public Reaction and Professional Objectivity in the Media to the Wayside Murder in Youngstown, Ohio, 1876-1877

Koltonski, Edward Anthony
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1366629737

Abstract Details

2013, MA, Kent State University, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of History.
This narrative history investigates the trials, conviction, and ultimate execution of Charles Sterling, a tramp, for the murder and rape of Elizabeth Grombacher in Youngstown, Ohio. In the final fifteen months of Sterling’s life, much of Youngstown and its surrounding communities remained so certain of his guilt, despite a lack of concrete evidence or witnesses, that Sterling eventually fell victim to the unique confluence of social ideas and cultural norms which made it impossible for a poor outsider to prove his innocence in a late nineteenth-century American city. It is the inconsistencies between rival papers The Register and Tribune and The Vindicator that forms the primary basis for exploring this case and the community’s reaction to it. By applying theories of presentation and framing, pioneered and influenced by Erving Goffman, to the coverage of these leading Youngstown newspapers, this study endeavors to show the complex negotiation that took place between members of the community who otherwise left no written record. Ultimately, this inquiry finds that Sterling’s fate though decided by a jury and under the watchful eye of a judge, did not come from the courthouse but from extra-legal beliefs and pressures.
Kenneth Bindas, PhD (Advisor)
Elizabeth Smith-Pryor, PhD (Committee Member)
Kevin Adams, PhD (Committee Member)
126 p.
American History; American Studies; History; Journalism; Modern History
crime; murder; tramps; nineteenth-century; Youngstown; objectivity; executions; newspapers; sensationalism; narrative history; urban history

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Koltonski, E. A. (2013). Written in Blood: Negotiating Public Reaction and Professional Objectivity in the Media to the Wayside Murder in Youngstown, Ohio, 1876-1877 [Master's thesis, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1366629737

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Koltonski, Edward. Written in Blood: Negotiating Public Reaction and Professional Objectivity in the Media to the Wayside Murder in Youngstown, Ohio, 1876-1877. 2013. Kent State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1366629737.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Koltonski, Edward. "Written in Blood: Negotiating Public Reaction and Professional Objectivity in the Media to the Wayside Murder in Youngstown, Ohio, 1876-1877." Master's thesis, Kent State University, 2013. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1366629737

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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© 2013, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Kent State University and OhioLINK.