The tragic death of Edward Morgan (aka Ted Gibson) - actor on Empire Builders

I started this blog within days of the 85^th anniversary of the opening and dedication of the Cascade Tunnel, located in the Cascade Mountains of the state of Washington. This event was shared with the nation in a one-hour broadcast, at the conclusion of which it was announced the Great Northern Railway was launching a weekly radio series called Empire Builders. Because I lucked into that timing, I elected to try to post something about every one of the 103 succeeding Great Northern broadcasts, with a blog submission on the 85^th anniversary of each of those dates. However, although I am again writing today about something that happened 85 years ago, this is not about a specific broadcast. It is about a man with a connection to Empire Builders whose funeral service occurred 85 years ago today.

Photo of T.W. "Ted" Gibson, NYPL photo archives. Date and photographer unknown.

That man was Edward Whitmore Morgan. As an actor of both stage and radio, Morgan adopted the pseudonym “Ted W. Gibson.” My information about Morgan remains sketchy, but here are a few of the facts that I have about him. He was born in the state of New York in 1888. He had a sister, Katherine (“Kate”), born the year before. Their mother, Mary H. Morgan, was widowed at the time of Edward’s death. She was also listed in the 1930 U.S. Census as “head of household” at 2016 Mansfield Place, Brooklyn, New York. Edward and his sister Kate lived there with their mother, as well as another widowed woman, May Lopez, a hotel housekeeper who was a boarder in their home.

Portion of the 1930 Census - completed on Census Day (April 1, 1930) -
just days before Morgan (Gibson) died.

As Ted Gibson, Morgan appeared in the theatrical productions of  “Turn to the Right” and “Abie’s Irish Rose.” I’m unable to report in what capacity or on which broadcasts of Empire Builders he appeared. I have yet to locate anything like billings for all cast members for each program – I doubt they exist. I do know that Gibson was billed alongside both Virginia Gardiner and Lucille Husting in an NBC radio performance of “The Beggar on Horseback,” which aired over WEAF in New York on February 7, 1930 – just weeks prior to his death. Virginia Gardiner appeared in nearly as many broadcasts of Empire Builders as the Old Timer, Harvey Hays, in the first two seasons of the series. Lucille Husting joined the cast of players when Empire Builders moved to the new NBC digs in Chicago in the late summer of 1930. No doubt she came to the Great Northern production with top recommendations from Gardiner, and perhaps Hays. Gibson and Hays appeared together in “Abie’s Irish Rose” in 1927. It was a tight community of personalities among stage and radio performers in those days.

And speaking of Hays, it turns out Morgan paid the Old Timer a visit the evening before his death. Police reports stated that Morgan and Hays spent much of the evening together at the St. Paul Hotel in Manhattan (which I suspect is where Hays was living at the time). At 10:55 that night, three neighbor men came upon him near his mother’s home on Mansfield Place. He had a head injury and needed help to get home. He told his mother that he had not been drinking. His mother reported that she later saw him go into the bathroom and rub salve on his head. The next morning he was found in a coma. A doctor was summoned, but Morgan died before the doctor could arrive. It was a Saturday – April 5^th, 1930.

When Morgan was eulogized at a service on the 8^th, the police were still trying to sort things out. An autopsy was performed right away, on Saturday night, and it was confirmed he died of a fractured skull, caused by blunt force trauma to the head.

Mary and her daughter Kate both told police they believed he died at the hands of robbers. The police were inclined to suspect he merely injured himself in a fall. When he made it home on Friday night he made no mention of being assaulted. Another odd element of the police report was that when Morgan returned home from visiting Hays, he stopped at a drugstore near his home where he had cashed a check that morning in the amount of $25, and that he was still owed $7, which he collected Friday night. When he was discovered injured, the money was gone, yet he was still wearing a ring with a diamond in it. The police had difficulty accepting he was robbed by someone who left the ring behind. The police retained the theory that he was injured in a fall. However, the autopsy of Saturday night seemed to contradict the notion that Morgan died of an accident. By April 17, the newspapers declared he was murdered by “thugs.”

 

Edward Whitmore Morgan
(aka Ted W. Gibson), circa 1930.
R.I.P.