table talk

What it is that draws people to disaster and true crime stories like the murder of JonBenet Ramsey is a perplexing observation of human nature. I tend to think the phenom is highly individualized; some motivations more wholesome than others. According to author John Stark Bellamy II, it could be in part due to the victim's personality - -

Cleveland Heights native still details gruesome Cleveland disasters
By Lindsay Betz, Sun News

"CLEVELAND HEIGHTS -- John Stark Bellamy II has seen it all, or at least researched it.

The former Cleveland Heights resident has dedicated much of his life to writing about the greatest disasters in Cleveland history.

He has published seven books detailing these gruesome events, from the Collinwood School fire of 1902, in which 172 school children perished, to the East Ohio Gas Co. explosion of 1944, which destroyed an entire neighborhood...

Bellamy will share stories about these and other shocking disasters in the city....For a complete listing of dates, times and locations visit www.grayco.com/events/events1.shtml#bellamy

Bellamy said he has always been interested in murders and disasters since he grew up in a “family of newspaper people where it wasn’t considered bad manners to talk about torso killings at the dinner table.”

...He said our society is interested in these types of stories, citing public obsessions with the O.J. Simpson case and the JonBenet Ramsey murder.

Bellamy suspects people are interested in these cases, in part, because the killers or victims often have interesting and captivating personalities....[read more]

About the author: John Stark Bellamy II is the author of several books about Cleveland crime and disaster. The former history specialist for the Cuyahoga County Public Library, he comes by his taste for the sensational honestly, having grown up reading stories about Cleveland crime and disaster written by his grandfather, Paul, who was editor of the Plain Dealer, and his father, Peter, who wrote for the Cleveland News and the Plain Dealer.