Author Talk at Perth East Public Library - Dundurn

Author Talk at Perth East Public Library

Guest Speaker John Goddard, author of The Man with the Black Valise, is coming to the Perth East Library Tuesday, September 27, 2022 at 7:00PM. Tickets are $5.00/person and must be purchased in advance. Don't miss this amazing opportunity!

The Man with the Black Valise by John Goddard

The story of one of the vilest murders in Canadian history.

One glorious autumn day in 1894, a drifter attacked thirteen-year-old Jessie Keith so violently that people thought Jack the Ripper must be loose in rural Ontario. To solve the crime, the government called in Detective John Wilson Murray, the true-life model for Detective William Murdoch of the popular TV series Murdoch Mysteries. His prime clue was a black valise.

The Man with the Black Valise traces the killer’s trajectory through three counties, a route that today connects travellers to poignant reminders of nineteenth-century life. Chief among them stands the statue of the Roman Goddess of Flora, gesturing as though to cast roses onto Jessie’s grave.