Many Antioch graduates have gone on to renown, but in the case of Nancy Evans (Titterton), the renown was the wrong kind, as she became a victim in a sensational murder in New York City, as reported in the April 11, 1936 issue of the Evening Independent of Massillon, Ohio:
POLICE ON WATCH FOR MYSTERY MAN
Nearly Nude Body of Former Ohio Girl Found in Bath Tub
PEN IDENTIFIED
Effort is Made to Discover Fingerprints on Pajamas
NEW YORK, April 11. (AP)—An autopsy established today that Mrs. Nancy Evans Titterton, 34-year-old writer and wife of a broadcasting company executive was criminally assaulted before she was strangled with her pajamas in the bathroom of her East river apartment.
Dr. Thomas Gonzales, assistant medical examiner made the announcement as the sole potential clue to the slayer—a fountain pen—was cast aside by the police.
Pen is Discarded As Clue
Assistant Inspector John A. Lyons said the pen, found on Mrs. Titterton’s bed, was established definitely as the woman’s own property.
Her husband had been unable to identify it, and police at first thought it might have been dropped by the slayer.
A sash made from her pajamas, knotted double around her neck, was treated with a silver nitrate solution in an effort to find the slayer’s fingerprints.
Fingerprints on the wall beside the bathtub where Mrs. Titterton’s body was discovered late yesterday were smudged so badly they were worthless, and the officers said.
Lewis Titterton, husband of the victim, told the detectives he never had seen the pen before. The officers assumed the slayer dropped it.
Earlier today after 12 persons questioned for nearly six hours by the police were released, Deputy Chief Inspector Francis J. Kear and Assistant District Attorney William F. O’Rourke announced:
“We have found no new leads in this case. The medical examiner’s autopsy will determine further action.”
Husband Questioned
The victim’s husband, Lewis Titterton, in charge of literature rights and continuities for the broadcasting company, was one of those questioned. The others were two delivery men, who found the body when they entered the unlatched door of the Titterton suite in a fashionable Beekman place apartment building; two janitors, four painters who had been working there yesterday and three persons described as friends of the family.
Titterton who was at his office when notified of the tragedy late in the afternoon, said the last time he saw his wife alive was when he left for work.
Mrs. Titterton, who wrote short stories for a magazine under her maiden name of Nancy Evans, was killed between 11 and 11:30 a.m. police said.
As police reconstructed the tragedy, the slayer entered the apartment by way of the door, choked the pretty, red-haired young woman until she was dead or unconscious, ripped off all of her clothing except her stockings, and then attempted to assault her.
They believe the slayer carried her body to the bathroom and left it face downward in the tub.
A sash made of part of Mrs. Titterton’s pajamas and of a torn piece of a red blouse was knotted around her neck. On her wrists were marks indicating they had been grasped by muscular hands or had been tied.
Clothing Scattered On Floor
At the foot of a bed in the adjoining room where the attack occurred, the police found a shirt and a brassiere which had been torn off her violently.
Buttons, and hooks and eyes from her clothing were found scattered on the floor.
Persons in adjoining apartments said they heard no sound of a struggle.
Police virtually had abandoned the possibility that the crime was committed by a robber. Although Mrs. Titterton’s purse was empty, a platinum ring was left on her finger.
Mrs. Titterton, a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Evans of Dayton, O., married her husband, and Englishman, six years ago.
The Countess Alice Hoyos, who occupies an apartment two floors below the Titterton suite, furnished investigators a partial description of a mysterious intruder, a young man who was in the building about eight hours before Mrs. Titterton was found slain.
She said he rang her doorbell about 3 a.m., and said:
“I’m looking for a Miss—,” and mumbled the name.
The countess said the same well-dressed youth had rung her bell twice before within a week between midnight and dawn, giving the same excuse, mumbling a different name each time.
Mrs. Titterton, using her maiden name as nom de plume, was a writer of literary reviews and in the August issue of the magazine Story had published a work of fiction, “I Shall Decline My Head.”
Mrs. Titterton had attended Antioch college at Yellow Springs, O., and came to New York in 1925. From a job of bookselling in the department store she turned to literary reviews. She and Titterton were married in the Little Church Around the Corner, Oct. 5, 1929.
Titterton himself, is a well-known book reviewer.
Showed Literary Talents in School
DAYTON, April 11.—(AP)—Mrs. L. H. Titterton, only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank W. Evans, while still in school showed literary talents, probably her first experience in writing being when she was a student in Steele high school.
Later, while attending Antioch college, at Yellow Springs, she was a member of the editorial staff of “The Antiochian,” the college paper, in 1923 and 1924. While at the school; she established a record as a brilliant student.
She left the school in 1924 to accept a position with Doubleday Doran Co., publishers in New York, and in the fall of 1929 was married to L. H. Titterton, executive of the National Broadcasting Co., in New York.
Her parents left here two years ago. They now live in Georgetown, O.
Her father formerly was employed as operator of a a street car company here.
The case was eventually solved in a fairly remarkable fashion.
