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The 1942 Genesee Hotel Suicide: The Story Behind the Photo Which Was Titled “The Despondent Divorcee”
The 1942 Genesee Hotel Suicide: The Story Behind the Photo Which Was Titled “The Despondent Divorcee” Even more shocking than the photo of Evelyn McHale is this photo of the Genessee Hotel Suicide. 35-year-old Mary Miller leapt from the 8th story to her death on May 7, 1942. It has been theorized she made the jump after learning her love had died in World War II, though the reason for her suicide has never been confirmed. On May 7, 1942 I. Russel Sorgi, a photographer for the Buffalo Courier Express in Buffalo, New York was on his way back to the office from an assignment. Having taken a different route than usual, Sorgi was passed by police cars when he decided to follow them. The cars pulled up to the Genesee Hotel at 530 Main Street where Russell Sorgi noticed a woman “sitting on a ledge outside an eighth-floor window” on the corner of Gennesee and Pearl Street. Sorgi’s recalled, “I snatched my camera from the car and took two quick shots as [the woman] seemed to hesitate… As quickl