Death of Hugh O'Connor
Encyclopedia
The death of Hugh O'Connor occurred on September 20, 1967. O'Connor, a Canadian television journalist, was filming a coal miner at his rented house in Jeremiah, Letcher County, Kentucky
when Hobart Ison, the property owner, arrived, told O'Connor and his crew to leave, then shot and killed O'Connor. Journalists and filmmakers had descended upon Appalachia
in the late 1960s to document the living conditions there, in relation to the War on Poverty
. This offended many local residents, who objected to the stereotyping and criticism by outsiders, as well as their tendency to show only the poor of Appalachia.
O'Connor and Ison came to represent the two sides of the conflict: outsiders who aimed to expose wrongs in the hopes of righting them and locals who resented the outsider presence and believed they were telling only one side of the story.
. He was frequently described by locals as eccentric. A lifelong bachelor, he had supposedly been engaged once but his fiancee called off the wedding. Ison had already built a home for them, and chose to leave it furnished but unoccupied for 30 years rather than live in it or rent it.
He used money from the sale of some his land to a railroad company to build several rental cottages in 1947. By 1967 he was renting them out to mining families for $10 a month.
) worked for the National Film Board of Canada
and was acclaimed as one of the leading filmmakers in Canada. He had earned a reputation for developing and using cutting-edge technology in his documentaries, such as the five-camera, five-screen film In the Labyrinth
, which was one of the highlights of Montreal
's Expo 67
. The film split elements across the five screens and also combined them for a mosaic of a single image. The film inspired Canadian filmmaker Norman Jewison
to apply similar techniques to his film The Thomas Crown Affair
. In the Labyrinth was also the earliest inspiration for the revolutionary IMAX
film format.
Apparently unaware of the hostility locals felt for outside journalists and filmmakers, O'Connor came to Kentucky in 1967 to make a documentary called US, which had been commissioned by the United States Department of Commerce
to be shown exclusively at HemisFair '68
in San Antonio
, Texas
. The documentary depicted life in the United States since pioneer days.
his last words were "Why'd you have to do that?"
Unable to find an impartial jury in Letcher County
, the trial was moved to Harlan County
and held in March 1968. The prosecution was led by veteran Commonwealth's Attorney
Daniel Boone Smith, who recalled that even in Harlan County it was assumed he would not push too hard for Ison's conviction, and many citizens approached him expressing sympathy for Ison. Boone saw his task as convincing jurors that O'Connor and his crew were respectable people who had been commissioned by the United States Government making a film about the entire United States in which the Kentucky shots would only be briefly featured.
The defense tried to get surviving members of the crew to admit they were just in Kentucky to photograph poor people, asking if they had intended to photograph richer parts of the state, and asking how much money they had made off the film. Ison's lawyer used his closing statement to speak more about intrusiveness of the reporters than he did about his client's actions. Nevertheless, the only legal issue was Ison's sanity, and a psychiatrist testifying for the defense identified Ison as a paranoid schizophrenic
, but a prosecution psychiatrist contradicted this diagnosis.
The trial resulted in a hung jury
. Jurors later revealed that 11 jurors were in favor of conviction and the twelfth held out for acquittal.
On March 24, 1969, a week before a second trial was to begin, Ison pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter
and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He was paroled after serving one year of his sentence, and died in 1978. Apparently, O'Connor had called Ison's gun a "peashooter". Ison never expressed any remorse for O'Connor's death.
, which aired on the PBS series P.O.V.
.
The weapon Ison used to kill O'Connor was a 1904 .38-caliber Smith & Wesson
revolver. The murder weapon was used in 2003 in the killing of a teenager by a housekeeper in a dispute over a house fire. The gun had been in a safety deposit box until the owner had removed it in 2000 in the hopes of selling it to Elizabeth Barret for her documentary.
Letcher County, Kentucky
Letcher County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of 2000, the population was 25,277. Its county seat is Whitesburg. The county is named for Robert P...
when Hobart Ison, the property owner, arrived, told O'Connor and his crew to leave, then shot and killed O'Connor. Journalists and filmmakers had descended upon Appalachia
Appalachia
Appalachia is a term used to describe a cultural region in the eastern United States that stretches from the Southern Tier of New York state to northern Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. While the Appalachian Mountains stretch from Belle Isle in Canada to Cheaha Mountain in the U.S...
in the late 1960s to document the living conditions there, in relation to the War on Poverty
War on Poverty
The War on Poverty is the unofficial name for legislation first introduced by United States President Lyndon B. Johnson during his State of the Union address on January 8, 1964. This legislation was proposed by Johnson in response to a national poverty rate of around nineteen percent...
. This offended many local residents, who objected to the stereotyping and criticism by outsiders, as well as their tendency to show only the poor of Appalachia.
O'Connor and Ison came to represent the two sides of the conflict: outsiders who aimed to expose wrongs in the hopes of righting them and locals who resented the outsider presence and believed they were telling only one side of the story.
Ison
Hobart Ison was born in 1898. His family came to Kentucky in the late 19th century, and their wealth was tied to the land. In the 1920s, during the coal boom, Ison had several local businesses including a car dealership, but lost all his wealth except his inherited land in the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
. He was frequently described by locals as eccentric. A lifelong bachelor, he had supposedly been engaged once but his fiancee called off the wedding. Ison had already built a home for them, and chose to leave it furnished but unoccupied for 30 years rather than live in it or rent it.
He used money from the sale of some his land to a railroad company to build several rental cottages in 1947. By 1967 he was renting them out to mining families for $10 a month.
O'Connor
Hugh O'Connor (born 1921 in ScotlandScotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
) worked for the National Film Board of Canada
National Film Board of Canada
The National Film Board of Canada is Canada's twelve-time Academy Award-winning public film producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary, animation, alternative drama and digital media productions...
and was acclaimed as one of the leading filmmakers in Canada. He had earned a reputation for developing and using cutting-edge technology in his documentaries, such as the five-camera, five-screen film In the Labyrinth
In the Labyrinth
In the Labyrinth was a groundbreaking multi-screen presentation at Expo 67 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It used 35mm and 70mm film projected simultaneously on multiple screens and was the precursor of today's IMAX format.The film split elements across the five screens and also combined them for a...
, which was one of the highlights of Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
's Expo 67
Expo 67
The 1967 International and Universal Exposition or Expo 67, as it was commonly known, was the general exhibition, Category One World's Fair held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, from April 27 to October 29, 1967. It is considered to be the most successful World's Fair of the 20th century, with the...
. The film split elements across the five screens and also combined them for a mosaic of a single image. The film inspired Canadian filmmaker Norman Jewison
Norman Jewison
Norman Frederick Jewison, CC, O.Ont is a Canadian film director, producer, actor and founder of the Canadian Film Centre. Highlights of his directing career include In the Heat of the Night , The Thomas Crown Affair , Fiddler on the Roof , Jesus Christ Superstar , Moonstruck , The Hurricane and The...
to apply similar techniques to his film The Thomas Crown Affair
The Thomas Crown Affair (1968 film)
The Thomas Crown Affair is a 1968 film by Norman Jewison starring Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway. It was nominated for two Academy Awards and won the Award for Best Song with Michel Legrand's "Windmills of Your Mind"...
. In the Labyrinth was also the earliest inspiration for the revolutionary IMAX
IMAX
IMAX is a motion picture film format and a set of proprietary cinema projection standards created by the Canadian company IMAX Corporation. IMAX has the capacity to record and display images of far greater size and resolution than conventional film systems...
film format.
Apparently unaware of the hostility locals felt for outside journalists and filmmakers, O'Connor came to Kentucky in 1967 to make a documentary called US, which had been commissioned by the United States Department of Commerce
United States Department of Commerce
The United States Department of Commerce is the Cabinet department of the United States government concerned with promoting economic growth. It was originally created as the United States Department of Commerce and Labor on February 14, 1903...
to be shown exclusively at HemisFair '68
HemisFair '68
HemisFair '68 was the first officially designated world's fair held in the southwestern United States. San Antonio, Texas hosted the fair from April 6 through October 6, 1968. More than thirty nations hosted pavilions at the fair. The fair was held in conjunction with the 250th anniversary of the...
in San Antonio
San Antonio, Texas
San Antonio is the seventh-largest city in the United States of America and the second-largest city within the state of Texas, with a population of 1.33 million. Located in the American Southwest and the south–central part of Texas, the city serves as the seat of Bexar County. In 2011,...
, Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
. The documentary depicted life in the United States since pioneer days.
Slaying
On September 20, 1967, O'Connor's film crew visited a group of rental homes owned by Ison. The crew was unaware they were rental properties, and obtained permission to film three residents. Each signed a release and was paid $10. Ison was told of the activity and flew into a rage. Witnesses said Ison approached O'Connor and his crew as they filmed a coal miner with three cameras and told them to leave his property, then aimed his gun at them. The crew did not want to leave without their equipment. Ison then fired at them, first the cameras and then O'Connor, who died soon after. According to a story in The New YorkerThe New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
his last words were "Why'd you have to do that?"
Trial and sentencing
Although many were shocked by the crime, local residents rallied to Ison's defense. About 100 residents attended his bond hearing to support and offer assistance in paying the bond. According to a 2001 book:"Locals defended Ison not because they approved of murder and not because of an innate, clannish suspiciousness of outsiders, but because they perceived the prying eyes of reporters to be an assault on manners, common decency, and the integrity of their communities."
Unable to find an impartial jury in Letcher County
Letcher County, Kentucky
Letcher County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of 2000, the population was 25,277. Its county seat is Whitesburg. The county is named for Robert P...
, the trial was moved to Harlan County
Harlan County, Kentucky
Harlan County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It was formed in 1819. As of 2000, the population was 33,200. Its county seat is Harlan...
and held in March 1968. The prosecution was led by veteran Commonwealth's Attorney
Commonwealth's Attorney
Commonwealth's Attorney is the title given to the elected prosecutor of felony crimes in Kentucky and Virginia. Other states refer to similar prosecutors as District Attorney or State's Attorney....
Daniel Boone Smith, who recalled that even in Harlan County it was assumed he would not push too hard for Ison's conviction, and many citizens approached him expressing sympathy for Ison. Boone saw his task as convincing jurors that O'Connor and his crew were respectable people who had been commissioned by the United States Government making a film about the entire United States in which the Kentucky shots would only be briefly featured.
The defense tried to get surviving members of the crew to admit they were just in Kentucky to photograph poor people, asking if they had intended to photograph richer parts of the state, and asking how much money they had made off the film. Ison's lawyer used his closing statement to speak more about intrusiveness of the reporters than he did about his client's actions. Nevertheless, the only legal issue was Ison's sanity, and a psychiatrist testifying for the defense identified Ison as a paranoid schizophrenic
Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by a disintegration of thought processes and of emotional responsiveness. It most commonly manifests itself as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions, or disorganized speech and thinking, and it is accompanied by significant social...
, but a prosecution psychiatrist contradicted this diagnosis.
The trial resulted in a hung jury
Hung jury
A hung jury or deadlocked jury is a jury that cannot, by the required voting threshold, agree upon a verdict after an extended period of deliberation and is unable to change its votes due to severe differences of opinion.- England and Wales :...
. Jurors later revealed that 11 jurors were in favor of conviction and the twelfth held out for acquittal.
On March 24, 1969, a week before a second trial was to begin, Ison pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter
Voluntary Manslaughter
Voluntary manslaughter is the killing of a human being in which the offender had no prior intent to kill and acted during "the heat of passion," under circumstances that would cause a reasonable person to become emotionally or mentally disturbed. In the Uniform Crime Reports prepared by the...
and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He was paroled after serving one year of his sentence, and died in 1978. Apparently, O'Connor had called Ison's gun a "peashooter". Ison never expressed any remorse for O'Connor's death.
Legacy
In 2000, the slaying was the subject of a documentary by Elizabeth Barret called Stranger with a CameraStranger With A Camera
Stranger With A Camera is a 2000 documentary film by director Elizabeth Barret investigating the circumstances surrounding the 1967 death of Hugh O'Connor. Barret, who was born and raised in the region, explores questions concerning public image and the individual's lack of power to define oneself...
, which aired on the PBS series P.O.V.
P.O.V.
POV is a Public Broadcasting Service Public television series which features independent nonfiction films. POV is a cinema term for "point of view"....
.
The weapon Ison used to kill O'Connor was a 1904 .38-caliber Smith & Wesson
Smith & Wesson
Smith & Wesson is the largest manufacturer of handguns in the United States. The corporate headquarters is in Springfield, Massachusetts. Founded in 1852, Smith & Wesson's pistols and revolvers have become standard issue to police and armed forces throughout the world...
revolver. The murder weapon was used in 2003 in the killing of a teenager by a housekeeper in a dispute over a house fire. The gun had been in a safety deposit box until the owner had removed it in 2000 in the hopes of selling it to Elizabeth Barret for her documentary.