THE LADY NEXT DOOR - Carole Tregoff Pappa

Slightly obsessed with this case? I would say so, my interest in this case grew in my later years, but comes from the stories my parents shared with me when I was younger, about our neighbors... the Pappa's. Carol Tregoff Pappa and her husband James Pappa. You need to realize I stepped foot into kindergarten in 1962, when all the hype, drama and verdicts were over...  When I was younger, the only picture of Carole Tregoff that I ever saw was in the Encyclopedia Brittannica, now in today's world the internet has exposed all the press photo's. Jim and Carole lived behind our home in La Puente, California in the mid to late 1950's. My parents lived at 13824 Barrydale Street, Carole and James lived behind our house at 1263 Big Dalton Avenue, La Puente from 1955 - 1959. Dr. Bernard Finch and his wife Barbara Finch lived at 2750 Larkhill Drive in West Covina where the murder scene later took place in July, 1959. The La Puente homes were new, fences weren't built yet and my parents remember seeing Dr. Bernard Finch sometimes sneak over to the house when Carol's husband James Pappa would go to work. Carol worked at Doctors Hospital in West Covina.

This event became bigger than life, a scandalous affair, a murder, the young beautiful secretary Carole, her body builder husband James, the rich doctor Bernard Finch, the socialite wife Barbara Finch hob nobbing with her Hollywood actor friends, money, greed and an obvious display of narcissistic personalities  - this story had the perfect ingredients for captivating a world audience back in 1959 through the early 60's, and it certainly did that. Even the producers and writers for Perry Mason would attend the trial to inspire ideas for Perry Mason episodes. America gave the trial the Hollywood treatment.

 Celebrities would attend to keep that circle of intrigue going.  The trial took on a life of it's own, a tabloid drenched media circus... Carole certainly worked the media as much as she could - you will notice that quite a few press photo's were definitely staged. As a young aspiring model - this was her time to work it in front of the cameras with her variety of fashion and hair styles during the pre-liminary hearings. However, once the trials started - all you saw her in were those 2 plaid dresses. After combing through press - photographs of Carole Tregoff - I would bet that she was more than likely photographed more times than Jackie Kennedy, my guess.

 This is a compilation only, I take no credit for any of the editorial or photography, aside from the YOUTUBE pieces I did that are somewhat of a parody, I just wanted to consolidate all that I could here. This blog contains photography from LIFE Magazine (photographed by Ralph Crane), L.A. Times, UPI and AP with editorial from LIFE, TIME and local newspapers, mostly the Los Angeles Times and Mirror.  There are 4 pages with over 130 post's -  be sure to view them all. 
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