The Kidnap Years: by David Stout (popular books of all time TXT) 📗

Indeed, he revered trees. “They carry in themselves the record of their history. They show with absolute fidelity the progress of the years, storms, droughts, floods, injuries, and any human touch. A tree never lies.” Perhaps, he mused, “the ancients who believed in trees as gods were not so wrong.”*

His father was a carpenter and taught his son the skills of his trade. Koehler was good with tools when he was still in elementary school.

Koehler earned a bachelor of science degree in forestry from the University of Michigan and a master’s in wood anatomy from the University of Wisconsin. By the early 1930s, he was head of the U.S. Forest Service’s laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin. He was, arguably, the foremost authority on wood in the United States and perhaps in the world.

Koehler and his wife, Ethelyn, had three children. Later, Koehler would recall shuddering as he looked at their baby son and imagined the anguish the Lindberghs were feeling. He was eager to help them. Soon after the kidnapping, he wrote to Lindbergh, telling him it might be possible to trace the origins of the wood in the kidnapper’s ladder.

Koehler was not surprised when Lindbergh didn’t respond. The famous aviator was being inundated with advice, much of it well-meaning, some of it from cranks.

Colonel Schwarzkopf heard of Koehler’s offer and sent small slivers from the ladder to Koehler’s lab. Soon, Koehler sent back a report with his findings: the slivers were of ponderosa pine, a tree native to the western United States and Canada. Tiny fibers of wool were attached to the slivers. Could they be from the clothing of the man who had climbed the ladder?

No, it was soon determined. The fibers were from woolen blankets that New Jersey State Police officers had draped over the ladder at the crime scene for protection. Disappointed and probably a little embarrassed, Schwarzkopf shelved Koehler’s report.

But in February 1933, Schwarzkopf decided to turn again to Koehler. After all, the investigation was nearly a year old and at a standstill. Nor had Schwarzkopf forgotten what Koehler had discerned just from studying slivers. What might the wood expert learn from studying the entire ladder? So Schwarzkopf invited Koehler to come to Hopewell, New Jersey, to see the ladder. The decision may have been the most important of Schwarzkopf’s career.

Right away, Schwarzkopf was impressed with Koehler, a tall, imposing man who looked like an outdoorsman. But he was a scientist first, and while he knew his task was daunting, he approached it with confidence. “The ladder was homemade, which meant that it contained individual characteristics,” he wrote later.51 “It was not one out of a thousand or ten thousand, all superficially alike; it was the only one like it and could be expected to reveal some of the peculiarities and associations of the man who made it.”

Koehler determined that whoever built the ladder knew something about woodworking but was a “slovenly carpenter.” He saw that the hand plane used by the ladder builder was dull. The three-quarter-inch chisel used to carve the recesses for the rungs—presumably the chisel found at the crime scene that had also been used to pry open the nursery window—was quite sharp, although the recesses had been carved in a sloppy fashion.

Later, the New England manufacturer of the chisel would determine it was about forty years old. It was perfectly ordinary, similar to tools found in countless basements, garages, and workshops. But as he reflected on what it had been used for and that it might have been wielded to smash a baby’s skull, Koehler realized, “I could not touch it without a sense of horror.”

Koehler urged Schwarzkopf to let him take the ladder to his lab for further study. The colonel agreed.

Back in Wisconsin, Koehler dismantled the ladder, which had eleven rungs and six boards that made up the side rails. Some of the side-rail boards were of North Carolina pine, which, despite the name, is grown in a number of Eastern states, especially along the Atlantic Coast. Other side rails were of Douglas fir, grown in the West. The dowel pins used to hold the ladder together were of birch, common in temperate regions. The rungs were from ponderosa pine, eight of the eleven from the same piece of wood.

Perhaps most significantly, one side-rail board from North Carolina pine had four holes where nails had been. Koehler speculated that whoever built the ladder may have run out of fresh wood and used secondhand wood to finish. Koehler also observed that two of the holes were made by square eight-penny nails, which were somewhat old-fashioned.

There were no rust marks around the nail holes, indicating that the board must have been used indoors originally, with no exposure to rain and snow. The lumber was of a low grade, not suitable for finishing but suitable for rough construction, as in a barn, garage, or attic.

The nails had been hammered in at different angles and depths, and the distances between the nails varied. Somewhere, Koehler knew, there must be another board or joist to which the rail board had been nailed. If that other board with corresponding nail holes were found, it could be invaluable evidence against the kidnapper, especially if it were found in his house or garage.

On March 8, 1933, Koehler stated his conclusions in a report to the New Jersey State Police. Then he asked if he could search the Lindbergh property and surrounding area for wood that matched the ladder. Schwarzkopf assigned two detectives to work with Koehler. For three months, they searched buildings, garages, outhouses, and shacks, not only around the Lindbergh tract but on properties of people with connections to the case, however slight. Nothing.

In early June, Koehler went back to Wisconsin to study the ladder pieces under a microscope and magnifying glass. In so doing, he discovered clues that would have eluded almost anyone else on the planet.

Koehler detected small grooves in the wide surfaces of the boards