Pansy Carpenter, a native of St. Petersburg, went to deliver a telegram to her tenant, Mary Hardy Reeser, 67, on the morning of July 2, 1951. Moments after arriving she phoned the police after discovering that the doorknob of the flat at 1200 Cherry Street was hot to the touch.
Once inside officials found horrifying things there, and that investigation would be debated for decades.
Mary Hardy Reeser was nearly completely burned; according to sources, only her skull, a portion of her spine, and her left foot—which was found still in a slipper—had not been reduced to ashes. The flat as a whole was largely fire-free, but she had been sitting on a chair that clearly had fire damage, as did a few surrounding items.
The unusual circumstances surrounding Reeser’s death disturbed the now-deceased J.R. Reichert, the head of police in St. Petersburg at the time, sufficiently for him to provide information to the FBI.
It was one of the earliest instances of spontaneous human combustion that federal law enforcement looked into.
Since then, the incident has received media attention, been discussed online, and been the focus of television programs that like “dramatic re-enactments.”
Who or what actually occurred is unknown. According to the FBI study, Reeser most likely fell asleep in the chair while smoking and was harmed by what is frequently referred to as “the wick effect,” in which fat and other physiological tissues burn swiftly and intensely:
“As indicated above, these cases are explained by the fact that the body becomes ignited from some outside cause such as burning clothing, a burning mattress, chair, or other means. Once the body·starts to burn there is enough fat and other inflammable substances to permit varying amounts of destruction to take place. Sometimes this destruction by burning will proceed to a degree which results in almost complete combustion of the body.”
Many people have, however, questioned how the heat generated during the cremation process could preserve such a large portion of the immediate area. Chief Reichert allegedly sought the advice of physical anthropologist Wilton M. Krogman, who is now deceased, for his professional judgment. Although his case files are nowhere to be located, Krogman is claimed to have initially had his doubts about the outcome being an accident before changing his opinion.
“To this day, I believe that the FBI report given to St. Petersburg police in August 1951 is the most credible, if incomplete, explanation of the incident — that Mrs. Reeser’s own body fat provided the fuel for the fire that consumed her,” wrote former Tampa Bay Times columnist Jerry Blizin in 2009. “The FBI said there was no ‘spontaneous human combustion,’ nor was her death caused by lightning or chemicals.”
Reeser’s enigmatic demise occurred 70 years ago. Nobody is certain of what took place as of this writing. We may never know the solutions.
In Pennsylvania, a part of Reeser’s ashes were interred next to her husband once the FBI inquiry came to an end. The remainder was left in St. Petersburg with her children.
The St. Petersburg Times was previously told by Reeser’s family that they used to sense her presence—at least until they got rid of her old furnishings.
“That’s Grandma again,” they used to say when a breeze rolled by. “Don’t worry. She’s nice.”