21. Newspapers Had a Field Day With This Scandal
The hotel’s doctor examined Virginia Rappe, concluded that she was incredibly intoxicated, and gave her morphine to calm her down. As it turned out, the situation was more serious. Two days after the San Francisco hotel party, Rappe was rushed to a hospital. There, a friend claimed that Fatty Arbuckle had assaulted her at the party. The next day, Rappe died of peritonitis, caused by a ruptured bladder. Although medical examinations found no evidence of assault, newspapers nonetheless had a field day.
The press, no less restrained in the Roaring Twenties than it is today, printed increasingly salacious stories about Rappe’s death and left no awkward angle unexplored. Some alleged that Arbuckle had killed Rappe with his weight when he got on top and assaulted her. Other stories claimed that Fatty had penetrated Rappe with a piece of ice. The ice assault take eventually grew into accusations that Arbuckle had ruptured Rappe’s insides when he penetrated her with a bottle of Coca-Cola or champagne.