Autopsies and Exhumations

It might be the strangest thing I ever read in an obituary: The deceased's brother's body had been exhumed for an autopsy after being buried for eight years and was found to be filled with sawdust where internal organs were expected to be. I kid you not.

The NYT obituary for Virginia McCaskey, Chicago Bears Stalwart and Owner Dies at 102 is pretty much a routine obit about the daughter of the founder of the Chicago Bears NFL football team, George Halas Sr., who came to be the owner of the team.

Ownership of the team passed to her after her younger brother George Halas Jr. died of a heart attack in 1979 at 54. George Sr. had the two children, and George Jr. was the natural heir apparent to take over the team since he had been the team president since 1963. When George Sr. passed away in 1983, Virginia received the sole vote in a one-generation trust.

But all was not happy in Chicago. The wife of George Jr., Theresa felt her children had been unfairly carved out of shares when the Bears were reorganized in 1981. She developed a theory that perhaps her husband hadn't passed away from a heart attack, but may have been poisoned. 

It took a while, but in 1987 George Jr.'s body was exhumed so that the internal organs could be tested for poisoning. And that's when things got really strange. There were no internal organs. The body cavity was filled with sawdust.

I watch a lot of police procedurals via several streaming sites: Acorntv, Britbox, MHzchoice, PBS/ Masterpiece, and Amazon Prime. Many of these procedurals are from foreign countries, but I have no problem with the subtitles. Preferable to dubbing.

Invariably the deceased (there is always at least one deceased) is rolled into the medical examiner's operating room to be opened up and examined. Organs are seen to be removed and weighed. 

From there I don't recall what happens to the organs, if they are held aside and put back after testing. What I have never seen or heard of in any of these procedurals from any country is that the body is refilled with sawdust.

Attentive readers will remember that one of the racetrack Assembled is a retired surgeon. The question of sawdust being found in an exhumed body was put to him.

The answer came back that they took part in 31 autopsies as a resident and sawdust played no part in ever being introduced into a corpse. That saying about "ashes-to-ashes, dust-to-dust" has no bearing in the autopsy room.

The obit writer Ken Belson drops that sawdust nugget on us but doesn't let it distract us from the rest of Virginia's obit. The outcome of that discovery is not addressed other than since internal organs were not there to be tested, it was therefore not possible to test for poison. 

I suspect George Jr.'s wife Theresa tried to take other steps, but they are not mentioned. Virginia and her family continued running the team.

I do a fair amount of woodworking in my shop. I'm not sure I'll ever look at sawdust the same way.

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