Farewell to Rosegate: the Joan Kiger Story

From the AuthorsSince writing my book, A Dream Within a Dream, in 2008, the enigmas of the Kiger family have slowly been peeled away, revealing pain, suffering, regret, and forgiveness. My wife, Barbara, a psychologist who has worked with adolescent girls and their families for the last thirty years, has been very curious as to how such a tragedy could have taken place in this seemingly normal family. After many late night discussions and debates, we decided to write a play exploring how this horrific incident affected the survivors, Joan and her mother. We wanted the play to highlight Joan as she transitioned from an innocent 15 year old to a 16 year old marred by fate and the legal system . And what about Jennie? What was life like for her after her family was totally destroyed by this inexplicable event?In our writing process, we each seemed to gravitate to those scenes which somehow spoke to something deep within us. For Barbara, it was the mother- daughter relationship and Joans metamorphosis: becoming the young woman who guides her mother toward forgiveness and truth; and for me, it was about the machinations of men interested more in their own fame, fortune and survival than in helping a troubled teenager. Our thanks to all who have contributed to the search for what happened to this family that fateful year of 1943 and to the Boone County Historical Society under the guidance of Asa Rouse and Bruce Ferguson who were the first to bring this story from the yellowed pages of sixty- year old newspapers to their recreation of the Kiger murder trial.