13. Truman Capote investigated an ongoing murder case for In Cold Blood
After the publication of Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Truman Capote read an article in the New York Times about the brutal murder of the Clutter family in the small town of Holcomb, Kansas. Intrigued, Capote and his childhood friend Harper Lee traveled to Kansas to document the case. They interviewed almost every person involved in the murder investigation, as well as many members of the community. Using the information, Truman Capote wrote In Cold Blood.
The patriarch of the Clutter family, Herb Clutter, was a prosperous farmer in the small town, respected for his kindness and fair wages for his laborers. One of Herb’s former laborers, Floyd Wells, was in jail at the Kansas State Penitentiary when he told his cellmate, Richard “Dick” Hickock, that Clutter kept massive amounts of cash on his property. After Hickock and another friend, Perry Smith, were paroled, they planned to rob the Clutter family.
The two men entered the Clutter home and woke the family to find the stashed money. When the family informed the robbers that there was no cash on the property, the men tied up the family while they looked for valuables. After a disappointing take, they murdered the Clutter family to eliminate witnesses. When Wells heard of the Clutter family murders, he informed the authorities that he believed that Hickock was responsible. Hickock and Smith confessed to the killings after their arrests.
Published in serial form in 1966, In Cold Blood made Capote one of the most famous writers of the 1960s. The public consumed the book, but Capote’s colleagues criticized his writing style. The relatives and friends of the Clutters disapproved of Capote’s representation of the murders, and they condemned the book and the movie adaptation that followed. Capote himself labeled his work as a “nonfiction novel,” and In Cold Blood led to a resurgence in true crime stories.