Unheard Witness : The Life and Death of Kathy Leissner Whitman / Jo Scott-Coe.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Scott-Coe, Jo, 1969- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Abused wives.

Mass shootings.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (360 p.) : 34 b&w photos

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Austin, TX : University of Texas Press, [2023]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

"Written for a general audience, this book taps into and reorients the narrative of the 1966 UT Tower shooting--the first mass campus shooting--to a person and side of this crime that have been too-long overlooked: Kathy Leissner Whitman, who was married to the Tower shooter. This book explores Kathy's experience with domestic violence at the hands of the shooter, Charles Whitman, and her murder as well as the murder of Kathy's mother-in-law the night before his rampage. Scott-Coe uses Kathy's letters, which have not been available until now, to her husband and family to craft a biography that provides a rare glimpse of how one woman expressed--and sought to change--her life with a coercive and sometimes violent partner, during a time when "domestic abuse" and "mass shooting" were not part of our vocabulary. She traces Kathy's life, focusing on the years she spent with Whitman, from their whirlwind courtship in her first year at UT, through her graduation and beginnings of a career as a teacher despite domestic turmoil, up to the last weeks before her death at age 23. In doing so, Scott-Coe challenges assumptions about Kathy and Charles that have been baked into this story, and more broadly, about how intimate partners "should" respond to domestic violence. Kathy's story is framed by an introduction and conclusion that place this tragedy in the context of the largely invisible epidemic of domestic abuse in the United States and the link between mass shootings and violence against women in the home"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Danger, 1961

Country life, only daughter

Pulled off-course

Whirlwind

Trouble starts at home

Mapping an escape

Separated and almost safe

Barometer dropping

Between the leaves

Disturbed horizons

"Back to normal soon"

Behind the eyewall

Epilogue. Recovery and response

Questions for book groups or classroom discussion.

Notes:

Includes index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 01. Nov 2023)

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-4773-2765-7

OCLC:

1401756324