The Halloween Card
Blog Post #3
The Halloween Card was received with a bloody piece of Paul Stein’s shirt. In other words, it cannot be a hoax.
The back of the card has an image of a grainy wooden board (first image up), which itself has nine images of eyes atop it. According to a Tom Voigt YouTube video (link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mPBH0AXaFc), those eyes are unoriginal to the card and were added by the Zodiac Killer. In other words, the Zodiac Killer decided to put exactly nine eyes atop the wooden board image. . . . But why?
As eye the sensory organ is a homophone for I the letter, the 9 Eyes on Wood could symbolize how I is the ninth letter of the alphabet. And so, the 9 Eyes on Wood work as a visual pun for I-9 in the alphabet-number code (which assigns a number to every letter based on its position in the alphabet [A-1, B-2, C-3, etc.]).
(Picture someone stabbing a bowl of cereal with a knife. . . . You have just imagined a visual pun for serial killer.)
Furthermore, the Halloween Card’s grainy board image could symbolize the grainy wood upon which the Desktop Poem is written. Fittingly, the poem’s title line contains what looks like an eye image; it is called the O/Eye Image in Blog Post #2.
As stated in Blog Post #2 aka The Desktop Poem, the “pupil” of the eye seems too thick to be the result of an accident. And so, eye imagery was added to the wooden surface of the Desktop Poem—just as eye imagery was added to the wooden board image on the Halloween Card. In other words, the two documents are connected by Eye Imagery Added to Wood.
Moreover—just by virtue of its holiday theme, the Halloween Card may be intended as a reference to how the murdered body of Cheri Jo Bates was found on Halloween morning in 1966. Eerily, that horrific event seems to have been foreshadowed by the Desktop Poem’s final statement “just wait till next time” (as circled in third image up).
The back of the Halloween Card has a total of thirteen eye images: the 9 Eyes on Wood (which seem to represent I-9 in the alphabet-number code) plus the 4 Eyes Under Boo! (is somebody sad about having to wear eyeglasses?).
Notice the orange coloring around the skeleton’s eye sockets on the back of the card (first image up). . . . The skeleton is eyeless, and that is literally highlighted.
Now check out the skeleton’s eye sockets on the front of the card (second image up). . . . All together, the Halloween Card has fourteen eye images—including one from the One-Eyed Skeleton (on the front of the card). Fittingly, the number 14 is handwritten on its bony palm. The implication seems to be, “The total number of eye images means something.” But because eye the sensory organ is a homophone for the letter I, the implication could also be, “The total number of letter I’s means something.”
As explained in Blog Post #2, the nebulous character after “if red” creates a problem with counting the Desktop Poem’s total number of letter I’s: Are there twenty-five or twenty-six? . . . Luckily, the problem is solved by the O/Eye Image as the second paragraph below explains.
As the twenty-sixth letter of the alphabet is Z as in Zodiac, 26 Letter I’s—homophones for I the pronoun—could be a big statement: I = Z or “I am the Zodiac.”
Alternatively, twenty-five letter I’s plus the O/Eye Image make 26 I/Eye Homophones for the pronoun I—and the result would be the same thing: I = Z or “I am the Zodiac.”
In Blog Post #2, the two variations are grouped together and called I/Eye am Z.
Variation 2 in Desktop Poem: 1 eye image + 25 letter I’s (homophones for I as a pronoun) = Z, the twenty-sixth letter of the alphabet.
Halloween Card: “14” eye images (homophones for I as both a letter and a pronoun) = N, the fourteenth letter of the alphabet—and N turned ninety degrees transforms into (I am) Z. . . . The Halloween Card’s “Backwards N” (as circled in image above) is a Manipulating the Letter N Analogy. In other words, Manipulating N = Z.
As the Desktop Poem’s 26 I/Eye Homophones are written/drawn on a wooden surface, they could be more descriptively called the 26 I/Eye Homophones on Wood. . . . All things considered, their thematic soulmates would seem to be the Halloween Card’s 9 Eyes on Wood.
More evidence that Eye Images = Letter I’s comes in the form of the Skeleton’s O.K. Sign (as circled in the second image up), which occurs on the same hand as the HANDwritten 14 that refers to the Halloween Card’s fourteen added eye images; the o.k. sign is three fingers up, and there are three handwritten letter I’s on the left-frontside of the card (they stick out like a sore thumb because they’re lowercase). In other words, the One-Eyed Skeleton’s right hand refers to the Fourteen Added Eye Images and the Three HANDwritten I’s. The result is Right Hand = Added Eyes and Added I’s.
Moreover, O and K from the Skeleton’s O.K. Sign are the fifteenth and eleventh letters of the alphabet, 15 + 11 = 26, and the twenty-sixth letter of the alphabet is Z as in Zodiac. In other words, the Skeleton’s O.K. Sign continues the Z-26 Theme established in the Desktop Poem and other Riverside Documents (concerning the murder of Cheri Jo Bates) as described in Blog Posts #1 and #2.
The Halloween Card has 37 Handwritten Characters on its left-frontside. It was also mailed out on 10/27 (in 1970)—therefore, its Postmark Month + Day = 37 (because 10 + 27 = 37). As a result, the Halloween Card has a Theme of 37. But does the Theme of 37 extend to any other Zodiac Killer-related document(s)?
“Me - 37” appears near the bottom of “The Exorcist” Letter, which is widely considered to have been written by the Zodiac Killer. And perhaps by design, Me - 37 looks exactly like a code; between the alphabet-number code and the Halloween Card’s Theme of 37, Me - 37 could be a representation of the Zodiac Killer’s actual name. Fittingly, The Exorcist Letter uses neither the Zodiac moniker nor the cross-and-circle insignia for Zodiac brand watches—and it is the first time they were both left out since they (separately) debuted in the killer’s correspondences. In other words, the Zodiac moniker may have been traded in for a symbolic version of the killer’s real name.
In addition to what its 37 Handwritten Characters say, the front of the Halloween Card has original printed text that says, “I feel it in my bones, You ache to know my name, And so I’ll clue you in. . .” However, the original text on the back of the card (apparently) says, “. . . But, then, why spoil the game! Happy Halloween!” Yet there is a skeleton added to the back of the card, and it blocks out a good portion of that mocking text. Cutting to the chase, the skeleton on the back of the card acts like a strikethrough (a line like this) that negates the original text.
Like the 9 Eyes on Wood to its right and our left, the Strikethrough Skeleton is a visual pun. The statement is akin to “I am not clueing you in as to what my name is!” Ultimately, it is a double negative that means “I am clueing you in as to what my name is!” . . . So, how many clues are you giving, Mr. Serial Killer Guy? Is the Strikethrough Skeleton one of them?
“Skeleton” has eight letters and three syllables. Its accent is on the first syllable. It starts with an S and ends with an N. . . . Is there a popular name that would fit the same description? Yes: Sullivan.
“Sullivan” has eight letters and three syllables. Its accent is on the first syllable. It starts with an S and ends with an N. Furthermore, its fourth letter is L, and so is the fourth letter in skeleton. Is there a Zodiac Killer suspect by the name of Sullivan? Yes: Ross Sullivan. Holy crap!
Ross Sullivan’s initials are RS; R is the eighteenth letter of the alphabet, while S is the nineteenth—and 18 + 19 = 37 as in Me - 37 from The Exorcist Letter and the Halloween Card’s Theme of 37 (that is, the 37 Handwritten Characters at its left-frontside and the fact that its Postmark Month + Day = 37). Also, Ross Sullivan’s first of two middle names is Mercer, and the first two letters of Mercer spell “Me” as in Me - 37 from The Exorcist Letter. Let’s call these observations the Theme of/Me - 37 = RS solution.
Fittingly, the ninth letter in “Ross Sullivan” is I, which is also the ninth letter of the alphabet—and that synchronicity seems to be represented by the Halloween Card’s 9 Eyes on Wood. Let’s call this double occurrence the 9 Eyes on Wood = the 9th Letter of Ross Sullivan solution.
Along with the Strikethrough Skeleton = Sullivan solution (the Strikethrough Skeleton and the described similarities between “skeleton” and “Sullivan”), that makes three clues to the Zodiac Killer’s identity thereon the Halloween Card. The other two clues have thematic support in other Zodiac Killer-related documents (because the Theme of/Me - 37 = RS solution is partly based on Me - 37 from The Exorcist Letter, while the 9 Eyes on Wood = the 9th Letter of Ross Sullivan solution includes Eye Imagery Added to Wood like the O/Eye Image from the Desktop Poem).
Unsurprisingly, the Strikethrough Skeleton also has thematic support in another Zodiac Killer-related document—but that is explained in Blog Post #5 aka Visual Puns where it is given the attention it deserves (to make a long story short, the involved analysis relates to a pattern larger than the scope of this Blog Post). . . . By the way, the Halloween Card has many more clues that Ross Sullivan was the Zodiac Killer and that he murdered Cheri Jo Bates—but they are built on premises that these first three Blog Posts have yet to establish. And so, they are explained in Blog Post #9 aka From Your Secret Pal.
Now that we’ve talked about what’s beyond this Blog Post, we should back up for a moment. . . . Who the hell is Ross Skeleton—I mean, Ross Sullivan?
Ross Mercer Stephen Sullivan worked at the library where the Desktop Poem and the murdered body of Cheri Jo Bates were found on separate occasions (for those of you who don’t know, Bates is considered by many to be an early victim of the Zodiac Killer). Moreover, Ross knew Cheri Jo (I’ve read that his brother dated one of her friends). And according to his coworkers at the library, he went missing for days after her murder, he wore military boots that would fit the footprints found at the scene of the crime, he came back to work wearing a whole new outfit—including new boots—despite how he had always worn the same old outfit to work before, and he wrote poems that creeped out his coworkers even though they couldn’t understand them. . . . Also, eight months before the Zodiac Killer murders began, he moved to Santa Cruz, California—well within driving distance of the four canonical murder scenes.
And by the way, Ross Sullivan is a dead ringer for the sketches of the Zodiac Killer.
Notice the lips and widow’s peak hairline. . . . “(He looked) . . . Normal.”
Cheri Jo Bates was murdered in an alley between two unlived-in houses used by the Riverside Community College [RCC] Library for storage. Other pictures I’ve seen suggest that both houses’ yards were kept groomed (I’ve read that they were maintained by the library’s groundskeepers)—and to my understanding, their parking areas were in the back (therefore, a lack of parked cars would not have been noticed from the street). In other words, only select people would have known that these houses had no inhabitants because they look like normal, well-kept homes. And so, the murderer either ended up by chance at maybe the only place in this quiet suburban neighborhood where he could have gotten away with the brutal slaying—or he had inside information about these witness-free houses. . . . As a library employee, Ross Sullivan would have had the inside information.
And he probably had access to the RCC Library’s storage area where the Desktop Poem was found by one of the maintenance men (yeah, it was found in storage where Ross Sullivan worked). . . . It’s never been unreasonable to say that the poet was most likely a disturbed library employee.
It was Ross Sullivan. He was the Zodiac. And that is proven beyond a reasonable doubt in Blog Post #7 aka “The My Name Is” Cipher. . . . You can safely skip to #7 if you want; you’d be missing a few premises established in the next three Blog Posts, but you wouldn’t be lost. However, you may want to have a cup of coffee before reading it; it’s a doozy.
P.S. Ross Sullivan/the Zodiac had otherworldly skills with puns—and as a library employee who knew the normal goings-on there, he could have guessed that Cheri Jo Bates would lie unseen until after the holiday sunrise. And so, he may have intended the discovery of her body to be thought of as the Halloween Mourning—and that could be why the Strikethrough Skeleton’s legs result in “Happy Halloween!”
