Cambridge, So Much to Answer for
Ethel Parmele Cardwell Higonnet was a medieval scholar, a postdoctorate teaching fellow at the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University. Respected, held in high esteem for her scholarship and, indeed, beloved by her peers, she lived with her husband, formerly one of her professors, and 2 stepchildren in a nice, well appointed neighborhood just outside of Harvard Square in Cambridge.
In the early evening of Saturday, November 24, 1973 Ms. Higonnet was making her way home down Brattle Street after tending to some work at her office and in the Widener Library. Her family was expecting her for dinner. Near the entrance to Longfellow Park and only 2 blocks from her home, she was grabbed by a man with whom she struggled. Both fell to the ground and the man forced her up, dragging her into the park. A 14 year old boy witnessed this portion of the attack and will later provide police with a description of the assailant.
Forcing Ms. Higonnet deeper into the park, her assailant removed items of her clothing intending to rape her. At about 5:45 PM, numerous people called the police, having heard a gunshot coming from the park. Her attacker had shot Ethel Higonnet in the head. Police found her still alive, brought her to nearby Mount Auburn hospital were she died 2 hours later.
As the victim was found still alive and medical care was administered, it is unclear what evidence may have been collected or if a sexual assault had been attempted or left any biological evidence that could now be retested.
The Harvard community was then experiencing a drastic increase in violent assaults on employees and students, including at least 3 murders of Cambridge women by 2 different serial killers. On November 3rd, weeks before the murder of Ethel Higonnet, 2 Radcliffe students had been stabbed in the street. Two days after the attack on the scholar, a secretary at Harvard Business school was seriously injured when someone threw a brick at her. In 1975, another B school employee, Carol Peterson will be stabbed to death in the vestibule of her apartment one block from the university.
3 women recognized the police sketch of Ms. Higonnet’s killer as resembling a man who had exposed himself to them in public however this suspect was never identified. No suspect in the murder of Ethel Higonnet has ever been developed and her case remains unsolved. Her husband Patrice will later marry one of her sisters. They have a daughter they named Ethel. Cambridge police state they “think” a suspect in the murder of Carol Peterson was arrested but a flood destroyed records, files, reports stored at the Western Ave. police headquarters so it is unclear if her murder was ever closed/solved. There is no record of any court case associated with her murder.
In April of 1991, Mary Jo Frug, a professor at NE School of Law and feminist legal scholar, was on sabbatical and, like Ethel Higonnet, was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute. Her professional work often focused on violence against women and the law. Like Ms. Higonnet, Professor Frug was married to a Harvard professor- Gerald Frug of the Law School. The Frugs and the Higonnets lived in the same wealthy Brattle St. neighborhood near to Longfellow Park.
Around 8:30 pm on April 4th, after dinner with her husband and teenaged daughter, Ms. Frug went for a walk up Sparks Street, which is off of Brattle St, to make a convenience store run. She was accosted by a man in front of the Armenian Holy Trinity Apostolic Church. Choir practice was then in session in the church so any cries for help are unlikely to have been heard. Professor Frug was stabbed 5 times by an attacker who fled the scene. She was able to flag down a passerby in a car for help- who presumed she was a pedestrian struck by a hit and run driver. They ran to the church for help. Choir members came to Ms. Frugs’ aid, comforting her and holding her hand until an ambulance arrived. She also died at nearby Mount Auburn Hospital, attacked and killed like Ethel Higonnet within 2 blocks of her own home in the same Cambridge neighborhood.
It was repeatedly stated that there was no obvious motive. Professor Frug had not been robbed. No attempt was made at sexual assault however she was stabbed in the chest and between her inner thighs- which would indicate otherwise. Extensive investigation of Professor Frug and her family - including students and colleagues of both herself and her husband- was conducted. Professor Frug was a feminist, expressed these views in her writings, some of which appeared in the Harvard Law Review, and was the subject of much scorn from her male peers and the male students at Harvard Law particularly the Harvard Law Review.
At the time of the attack on Ms. Frug, there was a home invasion rape in a nearby Harvard owned housing complex, a rape near the Alewife T station and several attempted sexual assaults on women in Cambridge including an attempted kidnapping near the Porter Square T station.
One year later some of the Harvard boys could still not contain their cruel feckless glee over the brutal unsolved murder of a woman and feminist with whom they disagreed:
"In March 1992, the Harvard Law Review published an unfinished draft article by Frug called "A Postmodern Feminist Legal Manifesto,"... which explored the legal theories on violence toward women. Some members of the Review were opposed to publishing the piece, and later, on the anniversary of her murder, parodied it in [...] On April 4, 1992, the Harvard Law Review held its annual gala banquet, when the torch of the nation’s most prestigious legal journal is passed to a new generation of editors. Among those invited: the murdered woman’s husband, Gerald Frug, a member of the Harvard Law School faculty. Had he attended, he would have found on his plate a parody of his wife’s last article. The parody, titled “He-Manifesto of Post-Mortem Legal Feminism,” was produced by the Law Review’s editors and paid for by the school. It depicted Ms. Frug as a humorless, sex-starved mediocrity and dubbed her the “Rigor-Mortis Professor of Law.”
No suspect was ever identified in the murder of Mary Jo Frug. The murder weapon was recovered and tested by the FBI with no results that advanced the investigation. Her murder remains open and unsolved.
If you have any information about the November 1973 murder of Ethel Cardwell Higonnet or the April 1991 murder of Mary Joe Frug in Cambridge MA please contact the Middlesex County DA at 781-897-6600.
Ethel Cardwell Higonnet
Mary Jo Frug