1708: Anne Harris, twice a hempen widow 1927: Three persistent
escapees  1949: Jake Bird  July 14th, 2012 Meaghan   Contrary to
what all the slasher films would have you believe, an ax does
not make a very good murder weapon. Axes are big. They are
heavy. They are difficult to conceal. When used they create a
big mess. And if you are caught with one, it’s hard to come up
with a suitably innocuous explanation for it.  Nevertheless,
this was Jake Bird’s weapon of choice on October 30, 1947, when
he broke into Bertha Kludt’s home and killed her and her
seventeen-year-old daughter, Beverly June.  Perhaps if he had
used a different weapon, things would have turned out
differently. As it was, the two women’s screams — and that’s
another problem with the ax: unless you can wield it like Gimli,
the victim is going to survive the first blow and start
hollering — attracted two police officers, who apprehended Bird
after a foot chase.  This excellent History Link article
provides a thorough account of Bird’s life and cr