Why is the Grafton, Vermont area so murdery, by episodes?

Grafton peaked early. About 1,500 people before the Civil War, with sheep and wool mills along the rivers, soapstone quarried near Bear Mountain, and an inn trading since 1801. The 2025 population is 587, which turns five murders within 25 miles into a striking ratio.

Call it the Grafton area. The centre first, then Townshend nine miles out, Newfane at 13 and Lempster at 22. The dates sit close together: 1992, 2002, 2004 and 2005. Episode 642 has two of the five victims, a pair found in a state forest a few miles from the village. The other three episodes have one each, so the total doesn't rest on one case.

What links them is ordinary: lumber yards and a grocery cooperative, a party at a rented house, a household that had just lost a job. These are small towns with falling numbers, where neighbours live a long way apart.