Blog on the Lillypad
Saturday, August 30, 2003
 | Cruel Irony: The Disappearance and Death of Madalyn Murray O'Hair
A&E aired a Bill Kurtiss documentary on the murder of Madalyn Murray O'Hair last night. It is a sad story, yet it is filled with incredible ironies. There's no doubt, in reviewing O'Hair's public comments and treatment of others, that she was an atheist in the model of Mark Twain, an atheist roaring at God and telling Him He does not exist, reminding Him of all His fallacies. There are real atheists. I read papers by Russian scientists when I worked for Savannah River Site, and they were hard working men, but their ethic really was one of working to serve the state. They did not pray; they did not trust themselves to God even when Chernobyl blew up; they simply did not have that reference point, and they regarded the faith of others as a curiosity or a footnote of interest. They lacked the anger and rage of an American born atheist, and I would assume that is because most of the American atheists who rage and storm and get on front pages are not atheists at all. They are people angry at God. This is what O'Hair seemed to be. She zeroed in most of her rage against Christians. |
She was, apparently, controlling of all those around her. She seems to have demanded a high work ethic from herself as well as from others, and I do respect that she advocated education for everybody even if they had to be self taught. In that one point of virtue, she probably found the credibility for her own beleifs---a person has to make his or her future, and most people are smarter than they give themselves credit for and can go further by means of hard work. I think she tried to be true to these ideas and missed her own blind spots.
 | The first tremendous irony occurred in the 1980's when her eldest son became an Evangelical Christian--the other extreme from mama! He became a Bible-reading, salvation through Christ alone, shouting Baptist. She tried to psycho-analyze his conversion and then later disowned him because he dared to be a separate person. "One could call this a postnatal abortion on the part of a mother, I guess; I repudiate him entirely and completely for now and all times...He is beyond human forgiveness." [O'Hair, qtd by Lona Manning at http://crimemagazine.com/ohair.htm] As for her son Bill, he had remarked earlier that she would surely sever all ties with him. |
O'Hair relied on her younger son John and grand daughter Robin to fulfill executive roles in her American Atheists group. They were secretive about money, even from employees. They hated the IRS and they considered the FBI to be far too powerful, an intrusive arm of the government. They did not pay taxes. John sometimes shouted at his mother, used profanity, and often humiliated staff workers. Robin did the same but to a lesser extent. O'Hair did not expect them to behave any other way, apparently. She controlled American Atheists with an iron hand and held power close to her vest.
The three of them went missing in 1995, and there were enough indications that they might have just taken the money and run to New Zealand to ensure that nobody really thought that harm had come to them. It turns out that a former worker at American Atheists who was a small time crook and had been fired for embezzlement, had worked with two other small time crooks to kidnap them and whisk them away to a small motel room in Austin where he held them in comparative comfort while they gave him the numbers, passwords, etc. to empty all the American Atheist financial accounts and run up huge debts on the O'Hair's personal credit cards. There was no sign they ever tried to escape, and the unrealistic John actually had some clear opportunities to make a call for help and never did. He even flew with the head bad guy to Jersey to get money out of an account. Best guess is that he did not think they would be killed or else he was unrealistic enough and cocky enough to think he could outwit his captors.
There is some suggestion that Madelyn, at least, may have been brutalized before she was killed. But if she was, law enforcement officials point to other financial accounts that she did not give up. So she went to her end with her loud, obnoxious courage undaunted, or so it appears. The bodies of the three of them were taken out to a desolate ranch, burned, cut apart, and buried. One of the men who was in on the plot apparently was remorseful over what they had done. So the other two killed him. They threw his head and feet in with the other remains and then left his body in a different location.
Another irony is that after the case was followed almost all of the way by a reporter and a private detective, the FBI got into it and finished it up. Then the IRS got into it and assisted. These two goverment agencies that the O'Hairs hated so much actually saw the matter through to the end and would not quit until they had found the bodies. Representatives from both agencies also attended the funerals. Their reason was that nobody, no matter what they had done, should have died like that.
| And, of course, the crowning irony was that eldest son Bill, the evangelical Christian, was custodian of his mother's remains. He had all three bodies buried near each other. Keeping her wishes honored, no prayers were said. But her son recognized that prayers at that late date were too late anyway. And that was the end of Madelyn Murray O'Hair. Her death went unnoticed even by those who worked for her. She was mourned by the people she made her enemies; her final wishes were honored by a son she despised. A profound sense of the ironic, I think, is something we should not refuse to see in the Providence of God. |  |
Addendum added Sept 1, 2003: This from a poster named acribos on the Fighting Fundamentalist Forum: "Came across a story about 3 years ago that was a further ironic postscript. The IRS went after Ohair for back taxes owed on her house posthumously. Being dead, she was not able to pay them, of course. So they confiscated her belongings and auctioned them off to meet the tax bill. The proceeds from the auction were a pitance, but the one item that recieved the highest bid (about $200) was a Bible that a girls Sunday School class in Dallas TX had given her -- probably was in mint condition. ...The article may have been in World magazine."
For more info about this case: You can read a more complete account of MMO's disappearance and death at The Murder of Madalyn Murray O'Hair: America's Most Hated Woman
