1855
Settled by Dr James Noble in February 1855.
about 0:08:40Spoilers are covered until your reading preferences load.
FILE 95 / 5 December 2018 / 148 MIN / full
This week, in Oscaloosa, Kansas ... it's in Jefferson County. about 0:07:31
Settled by Dr James Noble in February 1855.
about 0:08:40More settlers came from Iowa the same year.
about 0:08:46A Baptist minister began holding services in people's houses in the 1850s, before a church was built.
about 0:09:07Officially founded as Oskaloosa in 1856, named after Oskaloosa, Iowa.
about 0:09:28Settled by Dr James Noble in February 1855.
about 0:08:40More settlers came from Iowa the same year.
about 0:08:46A Baptist minister began holding services in people's houses in the 1850s, before a church was built.
about 0:09:07Officially founded as Oskaloosa in 1856, named after Oskaloosa, Iowa.
about 0:09:28The name is said to mean 'black rain', not 'last of the beautiful'.
about 0:10:11Forty acres were laid out in the same pattern as Oskaloosa, Iowa.
about 0:10:34Joseph Fitzsimmons opened the first store.
about 0:11:18A saw mill was built.
about 0:11:21The first post office was established in 1856.
about 0:11:23Two skirmishes of the Kansas-Missouri Border War took place near Oskaloosa in September 1856, including the Battle of Slough Creek and, two days later, the Battle of Hickory Point.
about 0:11:36A school was built in the spring of 1857.
about 0:12:02Joseph Fitzsimmons's wife became the town's teacher.
about 0:12:38A drought in 1860 caused crop failure.
about 0:13:30By the end of 1860 the population was about 400.
about 0:14:14Samuel Popard built a 350-pound sailing wagon with a nine-by-eleven-foot sail that could reach 15 miles an hour.
about 0:15:14Popard and companions set off for Pikes Peak with 400 pounds of provisions; within 100 miles of Denver a whirlwind destroyed the vehicle and injured all aboard after four weeks on the road.
about 0:16:05Local men formed the Lazy Club; members seen with any implement of labour were expelled, and the champion received a barlow knife.
about 0:17:33In 1888 Mary D. Lohman was elected mayor with an all-women city council, the first city in the state to do so.
about 0:18:09The town had a high school and churches of many denominations.
about 0:18:35Local farmers produced grain; the town had a canning factory, an electric light plant and a bridle bit factory.
about 0:18:46The population in 1910 was 851.
about 0:18:50Parker Pharmacy, a 1950s pharmacy with an old-fashioned soda fountain, still operates.
about 0:18:50Dummy Taylor, a deaf major league baseball pitcher, came from the town around 1910.
about 0:19:37James Reynolds, an actor on Days of Our Lives for over 30 years, is the town's best-known celebrity.
about 0:20:5239.8%
Biggest faith: Methodist, 13%
about 0:22:45White about 89% · Black 2.3% · Asian 0.0% · Hispanic 4.18%
Ethnicity can overlap race.Property crime
▼ about 20% under the average
Violent crime
▼ just below average
Three-bedroom, two-bath listing
about 0:26:26Three-bedroom, three-bath listing
about 0:26:43Four-bedroom estate listing
about 0:27:06"about 20% under the average"
Comparison: "national average". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:30:04
"just below average"
Comparison: "national average". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:30:08
"1,086"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:21:04
"up 1%"
Comparison: "since 1990". Direction: above.
As told in 2018 about 0:21:09
"38.8"
Comparison: "about a year older than normal". Direction: above.
As told in 2018 about 0:21:17
"52%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:21:20
"about 89%"
Comparison: "small town America is 90% white". No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:22:15
"2.3%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:22:15
"0.0%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:22:15
"4.18%"
Comparison: "usually almost 17%". No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:22:15
"30%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:28
"62%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:28
"7.3%"
Comparison: "normally 1 to 2%". No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:45
"about 4%"
Comparison: "lower than normal". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:24:48
"$51,000"
Comparison: "national average almost $54,000". No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:24:58
"86"
Comparison: "100 is average". No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:25:18
"39.8%"
Comparison: "50-50 is the normal". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:22:45
"13%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:10
"0.0%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:15
"0.0%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:23
"0.0%"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:23:25
"58"
Comparison: "100 is average". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:25:24
"$109,000"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:25:24
"over 50%"
Direction: above.
As told in 2018 about 0:25:45
"$840 a month"
Comparison: "about $400 lower than normal". Direction: below.
As told in 2018 about 0:26:05
"1,216 square feet for $115,900"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:26:26
"1,650 square feet for $164,900"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:26:43
"4,400 square feet on 15 acres for $588,000"
No direction stated.
As told in 2018 about 0:27:06
5.0 / 5 · average of 1
“A lifelong resident says there is no better small town, with just enough people to talk to and not enough to feel claustrophobic; the people are friendly and extremely united.”about 0:27:35
Oskaloosa is a small town of one square mile in Jefferson County, north-eastern Kansas, about thirty-five minutes from Topeka and an hour from Des Moines, Iowa. At the time of the episode its population was 1,086, about 89% white, with a median age of 38.8. It was settled by Dr James Noble in February 1855, founded officially in 1856 and named after Oskaloosa, Iowa.
Camille Arfman, whose full name was Zetta Camille Arfman, was 14 on 5 November 1999. Her mother lived in the next town. Camille was a studious, churchgoing girl who attended Countryside Baptist Church and had transferred to Oskaloosa High School from Nortonville.
At about 5.30 p.m. William Noble, a colonel in the US Army and a professor of military science at Fort Leavenworth, was bow hunting from a deer stand near the Zool dairy farm. He climbed down and ran towards the sound. He heard nothing more. Richard Zool, the dairy farmer, was working outside and heard nothing.
Camille was reported missing at 12.50 p.m. the next day, 6 November. Heidi had assumed she was with her mother. The police initially treated her as a runaway, saying that 90% of missing children are runaways.
He had graduated from Oskaloosa High School in 1993, lived with his parents and worked as a security guard at Farmland Industries in Lawrence. He knew Camille and attended church with her. He was the only member of the family who did not join the search, and the police said he would have known her schedule.
She was found in the family's trash dump behind his parents' house, under dirt, several sheets of plywood and clothing. She had been shot once in the back of the head, a contact wound, and three times in the chest. The autopsy concluded that the head wound was not fired where she was found.
No fingerprints were on it, but shell casings in his bedroom matched it. The KBI could not say for certain that the bullet in Camille's head came from that gun because it was too damaged.
A detective established that he bought duct tape and a sweatshirt at a hardware store at 4.20 p.m. He worked at the Zool dairy farm and was seen starting the evening milking at about 6.15 or 6.30. He called Zool at 11.30 p.m. to say a cow was not giving milk, which was later than the three and a half to four and a half hours that milking normally took. Camille's mother called him at about 10.30 p.m. to say she was going to the police, and he told her not to.
The coroner said Camille was probably shot in the head first, placed in the ditch, and then shot three more times.
He left three suicide notes, one to his wife, one to his parents and one to 'whomever cares'. In them he wrote that he had killed Camille on 5 November 1999, that he had sex with her and killed her, and that he had driven her to the family trash ditch, got his nine-millimetre from behind the seat, pushed her down to scare her and the gun went off behind her head.
November 5, 1999 / the family property near Oskaloosa, Kansas
As told in the episode, on 5 December 2018.
Accused
Accused
Public places are marked on the map.
body found
about 1:04:39business
about 0:34:07other
about 0:37:23church
about 0:42:31school
about 0:44:37landmark
about 0:33:20business
about 0:55:13business
about 0:56:29business
about 1:39:31police
about 0:45:20school
about 2:01:40business
about 1:58:21school
about 2:08:43home
about 1:18:16other
about 0:50:45