4. You Couldn't Get a Seat

Episode 4 of 11: Spectators brought their lunches to Harriet Schmoll's trial so they wouldn't lose their seats, and most of them were women. We look at how the newspapers turned a village murder into the biggest show in Central New York. It Made the Papers is researched, written, and produced by 8th-grade journalism students at Durgee Junior High School in Baldwinsville, NY, with support from their ELA teacher and school librarian. Season one, Murder on Marble Street, follows a 1900 murder in the students' own village and the questions it raises about life at the turn of the century. The series was inspired by Johnathan Croyle's November 2025 article on the case for Syracuse.com:⁠ https://www.syracuse.com/living/2025/11/did-jealousy-or-temporary-insanity-cause-a-baldwinsville-woman-to-shoot-her-neighbor-in-1900.html⁠ Image ResourcesEpisode cover art of the Onondaga County Courthouse as depicted in Clayton's History of Onondaga County, New York