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Gannett News Service story about Indiana serial killer Belle Gunness, thought to have died with her children in a fire...

Anyone who says women aren't funny, and as this column develops I expect there will be many of you, should remember Miss Havisham. The first Bridget Jones, Havisham presents a hilarious cautionary tale of what happens if you care too much about getting married. Beware: marriage might not be for you. Or you might think it's not for you, then suddenly meet the right person and change your mind about everything. Either way, this riotous slapstick anti-heroine is a great reminder that you'd better get out there and concentrate on something else, because life isn't something that gets delivered on time by a postman. (Some might say: neither is anything else). Everyone harps on about Elizabeth the First. But who remembers this 14th-century Queen of England, known as \"the She-wolf of France\", a nickname brilliant even by snooker players' standards? Shipped over to marry Edward II, she happily tolerated the king's gay love affairs, having him murdered only when he found a boyfriend she didn't like. Given that many women investigate the possibility of hired assassins as soon as they notice the way their husbands slurp soup, this was extremely easy-going. Isabella marshalled her own army to take the English throne as regent (on behalf of her son) and ruled rather well, improving relations with Scotland, which is more than the coalition can manage. When Edward III took power, he executed Isabella's lover, which makes her an icon for all mothers of children who don't show a damn bit of gratitude.

More than 60 colleges and universities will be represented at Lake Michigan College's annual College Night program set for 6:30 to 8 p.m. Monday in the Mendel Center's Grand Upton Hall on LMC's Napier Avenue campus. [Stephen Ruminski] tells The LaPorte County Herald-Argus he hopes to use the short film to generate interest in a feature-length film. He is looking for actors to portray [Belle Gunness], foster daughter Jennie Olsen and farmhand Emil Greening.

INDIANAPOLIS, Jan. 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Growing up in La Porte, Ind., Andrea Simmons couldn't help hearing tales of the city's most notorious former resident, a so-called \"black widow\" and \"Lady Bluebeard\" who amassed a fortune during a devious campaign of arson and murder at the turn of the 20th century. One theory suggests [Belle Gunness] fled to California, assumed a new identity and later was charged with similar crimes. If the body exhumed in Illinois turns out not to be Gunness, Simmons' investigation may take her to the West Coast to seek samples from that murderer's grave, or from the grave of Gunness' sister, who suspiciously moved there from the Midwest after Gunness' death or disappearance. Meanwhile, in the LaPorte area, plans are being made to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Gunness house fire. Simmons is serving on a committee that is planning a spring lecture series and raising money to place headstones on the graves of some of Belle's victims. Simmons will speak about her work on April 12. A graveside service for the Gunness children and a reception at the La Porte County Historical Society Museum are scheduled for April 26.

O'[Bryant]'s work is based on her life in southwest Michigan and features street scenes, parks and forests. A native of New York, she received a bachelor's degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo. The film had its beginning in a slide presentation using photographs from the archives of the LaPorte County Historical Society. Produced by local educator Bruce Johnson and filmmaker Stephen Ruminski, it chronicles the story of LaPorte's Belle Gunness, one of the most prolific female serial killers in history. Historic photographs taken at the crime scene, Belle's farmyard, where many bodies were buried, are used to tell the story, with narration by Johnson. Footage shot on location at the cemeteries where Belle's victims are interred is included.

The killing spree lasted until 1908, when one of the victims' brothers became suspicious about his disappearance and threatened to open a criminal investigation. He had found 80 letters from [Belle Gunness] urging his brother to visit her. Belle became nervous and went into town to have her last will prepared, before buying two gallons of kerosene. By 4 o'clock the next morning her farmhouse had burnt to the ground - the rescuers unable to get in because the doors were bolted from the inside. The remains of three of her adopted children - Lucy, Myrtle and Philip - were discovered lined up in the corner of the basement, along with the body of a headless adult female whom they couldn't confirm as Belle. Four days later they started uncovering the bodies in the pig lot and realised they had a serial killer on their hands. No one, other than the sheriff, believed that Belle had perished in the fire but the coroner felt pressured to rule that she had, after her dentures were found in the rubble. The headless female body and the three children's bodies were then buried in Chicago. Before we opened the grave my instinct was that the headless corpse was not Belle's. In 1908 the coroner described it as belonging to a woman who was 5ft 4in tall and we know that Belle was 5ft 8in from her dressmaker's measurements. In fact, the body we have in the lab does appear to be the right height and age range for Belle and the crime laboratory is now attempting to extract nuclear DNA from a femur, so we can compare it with DNA collected from beneath the stamps and from the flaps of envelopes sent to her victims. If that doesn't work, Plan B is to exhume her sister, as she and Belle will have shared the same mitochondria DNA.

March 29, 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. -- \"They Called Me Belle Too: An Interviewer Remembers [Belle Gunness] Stories\" by Janet Langlois. Langlois, who wrote \"Belle Gunness, The Lady Bluebeard\" in 1985, will share some of the stories she heard while doing interviews in LaPorte in the 1970s.

Sylvia Elizabeth Shepherd, author of \"The Mistress of Murder Hill: The Serial Killings of Belle Gunness,\" will talk about her new book at 7 p.m. Thursday in LaPorte County Public Library, 904 Indiana Ave. Shepherd, a former reporter for the Chicago Tribune and a resident of LaPorte, has written about the mysteries surrounding the life and crimes of LaPorte resident Belle Gunness.