Oh, That Ruby McCollum!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                              Girls, I thought I knew all the cases, but the episode on Tuesday of "A Crime To Remember," entitled "The Shot Doctor," took me by surprise.

                                This story cries out to be made today as a film, because the role of Ruby--which I could see Viola Davis doing--is Oscar gold for any actress who takes it on.  Too bad Philip Seymour Hoffman is dead; he would have made an excellent Dr. Leroy Adams.  As for Ruby's husband, why, Denzel, Samuel L. Jackson, or that type, would be perfect as Sam McCollum, Ruby's no good husband.

                                 Poor Ruby !  She got it from all sides--literally.  All she wanted was a better life for herself; too bad she did not take her chances, going north to, maybe, Smith or Vassar.  Instead, she stayed where she came from--Live Oak Florida.   Now, remember, girls, Florida at that time was still very much like the Old South. Negroes worked in the fields picking tobacco, and the place was an undeveloped swamp; it had not become the mecca of my parents' generation, a notion which that nut, Jim Dooley, fostered, and flourished for nearly fifty years.  Only now is that image of Florida beginning to fade.

                                 When Ruby met Sam, she thought she was marrying up.  While she was the wealthiest Black woman in town--amazing for the time, 1952-- Ruby had business sense, and knew how to keep the books.  What she did not know was that her husband and Doctor Adams were in a partnership, operating an illegal gambling hall, where Bolita--a kind of Bingo--was played.  That Doctor Adams, as you can see, was one piece of sleaze, and so many of these white, straight Southern men wanted to get it on with Black women, going back to the plantation days.  I always wondered why; was the dark meat softer and finer?  Or was it--I think--more than likely a power trip, showing some kind of ownership over these women they had relations with?

                                     Ruby's husband, Sam, was cheating on her, with some tramp school teacher.
Sam knew about Dr. Adams, but kind of looked the other way, as he needed to keep the business afloat. This union produced daughter Loretta, a light skinned child who was unmistakably Adams'.  Sam continued to love her, and live with Ruby.

                                       Eventually, Adams developed higher aspirations, wanting to run for the State Senate, and maybe, eventually, Governor. So Rudy and Sam were liabilities.  He distanced himself from Sam's business, but he made it clear he would keep things going with Ruby.  When she became pregnant again by Adams, she went to see him. She wanted to get rid of it.  She had recently discovered he had performed a similar procedure on Sam's tramp girl friend, so why couldn't he do it for her???????  Ruby had had it, with all these men, so she took out a gun, and shot the doctor dead.

                                        I say good riddance!  She ought to have shot Sam, too!

                                         Ruby was tried, found guilty, imprisoned, and lost her mind there, and was removed to a mental health facility.  In 1974, she was released, dying at 91 in 1992, at a nursing home in Ocala, Florida.  What she did in the time between is anyone's guess. As is the location and occupations of those children.

                                          Poor Ruby.  All she desired was a better life, but her limitations only allowed her to go about it the wrong way.  I think Adams deserved what he got--more than what Ruby got, who did not deserve her lot at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                            But, what a gem of a story, girls!  Someone should start writing that screenplay now!!!!!!!!!!!!!