Venue

: The Wyncote NW Forum
: 1119 8th Ave (Entrance off Seneca St.)
Seattle, 98101 United States + Google Map

Event Format: In-Person

Note: Doors for this event will open at 6:30 PM.

Town Hall events are approximately 75 minutes long.

From left to right: headshots of Caroline Fraser and Bruce Lanphear

Arts & Culture

Ted Bundy, arguably the most notorious serial murderer of women in American history, committed many of his crimes in the landscape of the Pacific Northwest. But in the 1970s and ’80s, Bundy was just one perpetrator amid a large number of serial and violent acts across the region. Why were there so many, and so particularly gruesome? What caused the rise and then sudden fall of an epidemic of serial killing?

In Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers, nonfiction author and Pulitzer Prize winner Caroline Fraser maps the lives and careers of Bundy and his infamous peers—the Green River Killer, the I-5 Killer, the Night Stalker, the Hillside Strangler, and even Charles Manson. Fraser’s research takes her around the Northwest as she seeks to uncover mysteries and investigate an overlapping pattern of environmental destruction. For example, in nearby Tacoma, Bundy’s ground zero, stood one of the most poisonous lead, copper, and arsenic smelters in the world. As Fraser’s investigation proceeds around our region and beyond, evidence mounts that the emissions from these smelters not only infected and sickened millions but also warped young minds, including some who grew up to become serial killers.

Whether a fan of true crime or noir novels, anyone curious about the minds and motivations of serial killers may find Murderland‘s findings of interest.

Caroline Fraser is the author of Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder, which won the Pulitzer Prize as well as the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Heartland Prize, and the Plutarch Award for Best Biography of the Year. She is also the author of God’s Perfect Child: Living and Dying in the Christian Science Church, and her writing has appeared in the New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, the Los Angeles Times, and the London Review of Books, among other publications. She lives in New Mexico.

Bruce Lanphear, MD, MPH, a Professor at Simon Fraser University, has conducted research on the sources of lead exposure and impacts of lead poisoning for over 25 years. He led studies used by federal agencies to set standards for lead in air, water, and house dust. His studies also obliged federal agencies to conclude that no amount of lead is safe. Dr. Lanphear, who is a member of the US EPA’s science advisory panel for the national air lead standard, produces videos to show how human health is inextricably linked with the environment and to elevate efforts to prevent disease.

Presented by Town Hall Seattle.