THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, May 12, 1996 TAG: 9605080041
SECTION: REAL LIFE PAGE: K4 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: OBSCURE TOUR
LOCAL LANDMARKS THE TOUR BOOKS NEVER MENTION
SOURCE: BY EARL SWIFT, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Short : 44 lines
AN UNMARKED spot on Norfolk's Major Avenue is home to a mystery that remains unsolved nearly a quarter-century later.
On the roadside 30 feet south of West Little Creek Road, former Mayor W. Fred Duckworth was found dead on March 3, 1972. Six bullets had been fired into his body, one through his heart.
Duckworth, 72, had been out on his constitutional evening walk, and was armed against the chill with a business suit, hat, gloves and a gabardine topcoat when he met his end.
Ambulance crews, called when a passing motorist spotted him sprawled on the edge of a then-vacant lot on Major's north side, at first thought he'd died of a heart attack: His glasses were still on his face, and he still wore two rings, one topped with a hefty diamond.
It didn't take long to find his wounds. What the police never found was a witness - and, lacking one, they were never able to crack the case.
What complicated their job was Duckworth's past: in business and politics, he had amassed an army of enemies.
A semi-retired auto dealer, former head of the Norfolk Ford plant and the city's mayor from 1950 to 1962, the segregationist and back-room wheeler-dealer stepped on a great many toes hereabouts. A recent issue of American Heritage magazine went so far as to label him ``the Boss Crump of the Tidewater.'' Motives for his killing were multitudinous. ILLUSTRATION: FILE PHOTOS/The Virginian-Pilot
This is the spot where former Norfolk Mayor W. Fred Duckworth was
found dead on March 3, 1972. He had six bullet wounds.
This picture of Duckworth was taken about a month before he was
slain. Motives for the killing were multitudinous.
by CNB