Leeson in 1985
James Leeson Jr. Dies At 79; Taped Execution Scene
By RICHARD GOLDSTEIN
NY Times
May 7, 2010
James Leeson Jr., whose taping of a May 1951 radio broadcast describing the atmosphere at a black man’s execution in Mississippi in a highly publicized rape case was drawn upon for a newly released book and a radio documentary, died Monday in Franklin, Tenn. He was 79.
Mr. Leeson committed suicide, said Detective Lt. Tony Phillips of the Williamson County Sheriff’s office. His body was found outside his home. A friend, E. Thomas Wood, wrote on a blog on the Web site of Nashville Scene, a weekly newspaper, that Mr. Leeson died of a gunshot wound.
Mr. Leeson was a part-time college student and a journalist for The Hattiesburg American when he taped a broadcast from the lawn of the Laurel, Miss., courthouse where Willie McGee, a black handyman, was executed in a “traveling electric chair” that was moved around the state. The broadcast was made while a crowd of hundreds gathered on the lawn, some of its members whooping in delight.
Mr. McGee was put to death for the 1945 rape of a white woman, a mother of three. He maintained his innocence but was convicted by all-white juries in three separate trials. The first two verdicts were reversed on technical grounds.
Albert Einstein, William Faulkner and Josephine Baker were among those who sought clemency for Mr. McGee in a case that drew worldwide attention amid allegations of perjured testimony, suppressed evidence and a hostile and racially prejudicial atmosphere. Bella Abzug, a young lawyer at the time, handled the final appeals.
Mr. Leeson’s tape recording was used by Alex Heard for his book “The Eyes of Willie McGee: A Tragedy of Race, Sex and Secrets in the Jim Crow South,” to be published by HarperCollins next week. Mr. Heard was a student of Mr. Leeson’s at Vanderbilt University in 1979 when he first heard the tape. Mr. Leeson had been in ill health recently, according to Mr. Heard.
The tape was also a basis for the documentary “Willie McGee and the Traveling Electric Chair,” which was broadcast Friday on National Public Radio stations as part of the “Radio Diaries” series.
James Turner Leeson Jr., a native of North Carolina, was a graduate of the University of Southern Mississippi and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He brokered sales of farm property.
He is survived by two nieces.
Mr. Leeson worked as a reporter for The Associated Press in Nashville and covered the civil rights struggles of the 1960s and ’70s for the Race Relations Information Center.
In an e-mail message to The New York Times last month, Mr. Leeson told how he had recorded the execution broadcast using a tape recorder with two seven-inch reels that he had obtained primarily to record music.
He said he did not “recall having any special sense in making the McGee recording other than it was a most interesting and most unusual event to be broadcast, to say the least.”
See Also...
http://www.nashvillescene.com/pitw/archives/2010/05/06/a-man-in-full-jim-leeson-1930-2010
W.E. A.L.L. B.E. TV: My Grandfather's Electrocution: Looking For Willie McGee
W.E. A.L.L. B.E. TV: My Grandfather's Electrocution: Looking For Willie McGee
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