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of a brother of mine, and we were on good terms. He was sitting
at a table all by himself in the Primrose Grill. My wife
and I were there, having lunch. I walked over and sat down
and talked to him. I told him about this letter. He says,
"You know, that's strange. We could never understand my
father's death. It was so unexpected. He had had a physical
examination and the doctor said he was in good health. He never
complained of anything. He'd been over to Jacksonville for
the weekend, had a good weekend, and next morning we found
him dead in bed. We never understood exactly what happened."
Now, I didn't ask him if there was a death certificate or
what kind of examination or determination of the cause of
death. I've never discussed this with anyone except Manning
Dauer and John A. Murhpree. I thought I had mentioned it to
you one time.
P: No, I've never heard.
L: I did one time go into your office in Gainesville to see
you and we talked about a number of things and that was in
my mind, to ask you to check his records to see if you could
find that letter.
P: Well, I've gone through Dr. Murhpree's files that were left after
Miss Pitts sorted them, and never saw that letter in there.
This is something that I had never heard about before. Do you
suspect that there might have been some foul play?
L: Decidedly so. I think he was murdered. And in the succeeding
years, being a suspicious man, I've been trying to decide in
my own mind whomight have been the assassin. I won't mention
that subject right now, but I thought it would make a great
detective story.
P: I hope you'll write it because it would make a fascinating
story. Talking about Dr. Murhpree, I-did see a letter that
he had written a few years before his death, 1923 I believe,
at the time that there was a lot of anti-Catholic feeling
throughout Florida and through the South. It was also the
time of Klan activity. Someone had written Dr. Murphree and
asked him if there were any Catholics on the University of
Florida faculty. He wrote back and said not to his knowledge,
and so long as he was president of the university, there would
never be a Catholic on the faculty. Now, that might have just