Fixation On Youth Brings Death

Lonely Acres, known as People’s Park until about 1933, was located west of Renton, about ten miles southeast of downtown Seattle, Washington. From as early as 1916, groups held many congenial gatherings and celebrations there. But the venue was also the site of a 1937 tragedy that became a notorious part of local history. By then, facilities included a tavern with attached living area, and a pavilion suitable for band concerts and dances. The surrounding park had enough room for a baseball field (or a Bocce layout).

The first use of the “People’s Park” designation appeared in the summer of 1920. Users of the park comprised an eclectic mix. One week might see a trade union gathering, the next a picnic for business owners. Various African-American groups had outings in the park, but so did the Ku Klux Klan. Perhaps the most frequent users were associations of different ethnic groups: Swedes, Irish, Swiss, a Slavic consortium, and more. One on the most common of these, especially after about 1928, were the Italians.

Fred Anrooney.

The Lonely Acres tavern was acquired by Italian-born Fred Anrooney in 1934 or 1935. Born around 1882, Anrooney came to the United States when he was about ten years old. That family name cannot be traced to any common Italian surname, so it could be some sort of Americanization. By 1905, he was married and had found work as a musician, playing the cornet.

In 1914, he relocated the family – the couple had two children – to Santa Barbara, California. Fred became known as a fine band leader, playing at a wide variety of events. Around 1919, they moved to Washington state. There, Anrooney opened a music store, first in Seattle and later in Renton. He continued to operate a store until about the time he bought the tavern. This was also most likely when he began to lose his hearing. In February of 1937, Fred hired a new waitress, Marlene Collier, née Wilda Rae Townsend.

Wilda Townsend was born in 1914 in Seattle. Her father owned and operated a grocery store. In 1930, when she was just 16 years old, she married a young man – he was 21 – who drove a grocery delivery truck. But the couple divorced in March 1932. Wilda went back to her maiden name and found work as an elevator operator. She also began favoring the name “Marlene,” quite likely in homage to superstar Marlene Dietrich, who exploded onto American movie screens in 1930-1932.

Wilda Marlene married again in April 1933. Her new husband, 23 years old, drove a delivery truck for a heating oil company. But the marriage only lasted a year or so, and Wilma went back to her job as an elevator operator. She married for a third time in January 1936, to seaman David J. Collier. However, the couple separated after a year. Then, as noted above, she went to work as a waitress at Anrooney’s place. Although not yet divorced, in March she also began dating Russell Ringer, a 23-year-old truck driver.

In July of 1937, Anrooney began to receive threatening phone calls from an unknown man. Thus, around the middle of the month, he purchased a sawed-off  36-gauge shotgun (a European size similar to the U.S. 410 gauge). However, he was not sure he would be able to hear someone breaking in. Thus, he had Marlene keep the weapon at night

On August 1, 1937, Marlene and Fred closed the tavern about 1:30 a.m. Because the business kept such late hours, Marlene had her own room in the back part of the building. She later testified that she locked her door that night, although she did not explain why. But earlier in her employment, Anrooney had made suggestive comments to her, forcing her to “put him in his place.” Marlene went to bed and fell asleep right away. Fred also went to bed, but at some point he got up and apparently had a few drinks.

After an hour or so of sleep, the noise of Anrooney forcing her door awoke Marlene. He flipped on the lights and started toward her, despite her demand that he get out of her room. So she grabbed the shotgun and fired past him into a piano. Muttering about “damn women,” Anrooney left, but she thought she heard him pouring another drink.

Some minutes later, he re-entered her room, displaying “a wild look in his eyes.” When he started toward her again, Marlene fired another shot. She aimed closer this time, but still meant it only as a warning. It’s at least plausible that she didn’t realize how wide pellets from a sawed-off shotgun would spread. Hit in the upper chest near his right shoulder, Fred staggered out and down the hall, crying, “Help! Help!”

Marlene heard nothing for a few minutes, and finally went to see if her boss was okay. She found him seated behind the bar, but when she touched him, he toppled over, dead. She called the police and then her parents to tell them the terrible news.

News reports did not explain why officials thought that Marlene’s latest boyfriend might have had something to do with the shooting. Still, the prosecutor’s office contracted with private criminologist Luke S. May to investigate further. May’s log entry specifically mentioned that the case would require the use of the polygraph (lie detector). May tested Russ Ringer about a week after the shooting. The young man denied any involvement and passed easily.

Marlene (Townsend) Collier.

Marlene said she was also willing to take the test. However, the prosecutor said “no,” because he had already issued a second-degree murder indictment against her. She plead self-defense, based on her fear that Anrooney had been unhinged by passion and liquor. Her bail was set fairly low, which was fortunate since a series of delays pushed the trial out to May 1938.

Assessment of the pellet patterns showed that both shots had been fired from a low angle. That agreed with Marlene’s statement that she had been seated on her bed. But prosecutors made their case on the fact that Anrooney had not been hit directly in the chest. That, they asserted, should have been the case if the victim had been advancing on Marlene. The defense countered that he probably tried to dodge at the last second when Marlene lifted the shotgun to fire.

But the heart of the defense turned on Anrooney’s behavior. In 1925, at age 43, he had clung to youth by marrying a woman 22 years his junior (his first wife had died five years earlier). A decade later, hearing loss was a cruel reminder that he was no longer a young man. He responded by again seeking youth around him. The operator of a Seattle employment agency testified that he specifically sought “young, pretty, and inexperienced girls” to work at the tavern.

Then Anrooney tended to take, in the somewhat quaint words of the day, “unwarranted liberties” with them. One young woman got so uncomfortable during the interview, she refused to take the job. Several others quit after just two or three days. The agent’s account was bolstered by testimony from several former waitresses. Still, Anrooney managed to hide his behavior from family and friends, who testified on his behalf. In the end, the jury took less than an hour and a half to return a “not guilty” verdict.

A few month later, Marlene divorced her husband and again took back her maiden name, now expressed as Wilda Marlene Townsend. After that, she moved to Portland, Oregon, to work in a hotel there. Some time later, she married yet again, to U.S. Navy sailor Louis G. Sauer.  They were living in San Diego when she had a daughter in September 1948. She passed away in 1986 in Bremerton, Washington.
                                                                                

References: “[Anrooney-Collier/Townsend News],” Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Seattle Times, Seattle Star, Washington; Santa Barbara Daily News, California (July 1916 – June 1942).

“Anyone Remember People’s Park?” Quarterly of the Renton Historical Society & Museum, Renton, Washington (June 2018).

Steven Bach, Marlene Dietrich: Life and Legend, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis (2011).

Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica Ultimate Reference Suite, Encyclopædia Britannica, Chicago, Illinois (2012).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

Photo credits: Fred Anrooney, Marlene Collier. Both from Seattle Times, Washington (August 2, 1937).

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