Murder in Battle Creek: The Mysterious Death of Daisy Zick

INTRODUCTION

People always ask me, Where do you get your ideas for books you write? The reality is that most ideas come to me as opposed to me looking for them. I either stumble across them while writing another book, or someone makes a casual suggestion to me that this might be worth looking into. Daisy Zick came to me in such a way, and she led me down many interesting twists and turns along the way. The more I dug into the case files, the more I came to respect the investigators and was intrigued with the story that began to emerge.

Daisy Zick’s case came to my attention in 2009. I was working on my book on the 1967 bombing murder in Marshall, Michigan, titled Secret Witness. When I was doing research on Secret Witness, I would sometimes be vague with people asking what I was working on by saying, I’m doing a book about a 1960s murder in Calhoun County. Inevitably they would say, Ah, you must be talking about the Daisy Zick case. After the third time this happened, I started asking questions about that case as well as the one I was researching. The more questions I asked, the more fascinating the story became.

I tend to favor writing about crimes that are not recent, and this fit that bill, having occurred over fifty years ago. While memories are blurred, people are now able to be more open in their discussions about the case. The fear that the murderer might strike back at them after all this time has faded—for some at least. It allowed people to be brutally honest in what they thought and said.

The crime surprised me because it happened in my childhood neighborhood in Emmett Township outside Battle Creek. In fact, Daisy Zick’s home, where the crime took place, is within walking distance of the elementary school I attended only a few years later. I delivered newspapers in my youth to the home where her car was abandoned by the murderer. Daisy’s murder was the first in decades that remained unsolved in Calhoun County, making it a rarity.

In 1963, murders were less common in Calhoun County than today, and they almost always got resolved, usually quickly. Prior to Daisy Zick’s murder, there were only two other unsolved murders in the area. William Smith had been shot on Hamblin Avenue, and Estelle Terry had been killed in the Bailey Park neighborhood during World War II. Until the 1960s, the concept of cold cases that remained unsolved was foreign. Now, unsolved cases are far too commonplace, a sad indication of our times.

Daisy’s murder captured my attention because of its viciousness and the fact that, at the time of this writing, the crime remained unsolved, at least as far as the public knew. I discovered that some of the investigators thought they had found the guilty parties over the decades and that the case was solved in some of their minds if not in a court of law. Only in the minds and fading memories of the citizens of Battle Creek, Michigan, does the murder still linger like a nagging nightmare. Most people are unaware of just how close investigators came to resolution of this crime.

Daisy’s death was exceedingly brutal. She was beaten about the head and viciously stabbed over twenty times. Her death was premeditated. Her killer cut the phone cord in the home, traveled from a distance on one of the coldest days of the year and committed the crime in broad daylight. Despite there being several witnesses when the murderer fled the scene, no one has been formally charged with the crime.

The rumors tied to the Daisy Zick killing were ingrained into the collective memories of Battle Creek. There were stories circulating of her little black book, which allegedly listed the men that she had slept with. Marriages were said to be shattered as a result of her killing and the investigation that followed. Daisy is often portrayed both as victim and culprit. Variations of the events tied to this crime were spread from generation to generation, each new retelling corrupting the story a little bit more. Dozens of theories surfaced over the years as suspicious neighbors came up with their own ideas as to who committed the murder and why. The Daisy Zick story became a local legend, a bit of the mythology of Battle Creek.

Daisy worked at the Kellogg Company, one of the largest employers in Calhoun County and the company that put Battle Creek, Michigan, on America’s map. Like all large corporate entities, it had its own culture. Kellogg’s was like a social community within the larger Battle Creek society. It had its own grapevine, its own rumors, its own dark side that seems to evade company annual reports. Everyone working there knew Daisy in some way, and within that tight little community in the brick-walled factory, they helped feed the story of who might have killed her and why.

I had a chance to meet with some of the men who worked the Zick case over the years. While most of them have long since retired, I learned the truth in the old adage that there is no such thing as an ex-cop. Most of them, just like I did, wanted the final justice, some sort of closure on Daisy’s murder. At the same time, some were quick to point out that Daisy’s extramarital affairs contributed to her case not being solved. Their words echoed the sentiments of a number of people whom I interviewed: Daisy’s lifestyle in some way made her party to her own death. Somehow, her infidelity was what brought about her death. This insensitivity to Daisy was unearned and unwarranted. No one deserves what she went through in the last moments of her life or to be brutally murdered and have her killer walk free.

When I posted on Facebook and my blog that I was working on this book, I was stunned as people confided to me new tips and leads for the crime. Hundreds of people read my blog entries about the crime. Phone calls and emails started coming in, some with theories, some with actual tips. I had to reach out to the state police and provide them the leads, though they have not indicated whether any have panned out yet. What this told me was that people were still excited and interested in this murder. People love a good mystery, and this case certainly is one.

The original investigation was botched by today’s standards. Mistakes were made, not deliberately but because the nature of this murder was so far beyond the capabilities of local law enforcement. Making matters worse was the political infighting among some of the agencies and entities involved. As I pored over the case file, I saw that the investigation seemed sloppy and misdirected, the result of an age when police work was interviewing people and trusting experience and instincts. The 1963 limitations of criminal science hindered what the investigators could learn through science. A great deal of the evidence from the crime is still held in a vault at the Michigan State Police headquarters. Perhaps a new examination of it, using modern techniques, might provide new directions.

The investigation of this case seemed to pass on to newer generations of investigators, who brought new insights, perspectives and desire to resolve the murder. With each new generation that took on the hunt for the killer came tantalizing leads that all seemed to fizzle. Ultimately, as late as 2001, investigators found themselves walking down the same path their colleagues had done in 1963.

In looking at this as a potential book, I was nervous because the crime is still unsolved. Many true-crime authors steer clear of such projects for all the obvious reasons. People want to see a book like this driven to the end. They want answers, a sense of closure. With an unsolved crime, some of those things are not achievable. There was a time when I considered not writing this book for these reasons. Two books changed that for me: Mardi Link’s When Evil Came to Good Hart and Mark Fuhrman’s Murder in Greenwich: Who Killed Martha Moxley?

Link wrote her book about an unsolved Michigan killing in the same decade as the Zick murder. From it, I saw that such a book was possible and found a way to provide readers with a chance to come to their own conclusions given the suspects involved. Regardless of what you think of Mark Fuhrman and his involvement in the O.J. Simpson Case, his prying open the case on Martha Moxley led to an arrest and eventual conviction of her killer. I came to realize that a trial and conviction were not necessary for a great book about a true crime. In fact, shedding light on the open wound the community felt might just bring out new details and new clues that could help bring a real end to the case.

Daisy only had one child, Jim King. I have met with Jim and talked with him on the phone on several occasions. When you look into his face and hear his voice, you come to understand one thing: he has never stopped loving his mother. Despite the decades that have passed, he has never stopped wanting some degree of closure. Someone killed his mother, and the investigation seems to have halted. When he spoke, I didn’t hear or see an older gentleman in front of me, but I saw, instead, a young boy who loved his mother very deeply. Other than Jim and his family, there is no one in the wings whispering Daisy’s name, taking up her cause and prodding officials to find long-hidden answers. There is no one other than total strangers, such as myself and a handful of police officers, that is still searching for that elusive justice she so rightly deserves. The only other people that want to know are the people of Battle Creek who view this murder as an old wound that occasionally opens and bleeds into the history of the city.

Now nearly half century has passed since that bitter cold January morning when Daisy was savagely beaten, tied up and stabbed. The key suspects are dead. If one of them was not the murderer, the true killer most likely has passed away by now. But there’s no statute of limitations in Michigan for murder. There is a chance, however slim, that someone reading this book knows something, perhaps a rumor that grew from some kernel of truth decades earlier, that might shed new light on this crime. It’s not too late to bring solace to Daisy Zick.

Chapter 1

DAISY’S LAST DAY ALIVE

She was nice to everyone. I never heard her say a bad word about anyone. If she didn’t like a person she would leave them alone but would never say anything about them.

Battle Creek Enquirer and News

January 14, 1963

When you speak to anyone about the day of Daisy Zick’s murder—Tuesday, January 14, 1963—they almost always start by telling you about weather. It was cold, bitterly cold, even by mid-Michigan standards. The night before the murder the temperature was near zero. The day Daisy died, it was going to dip to between ten to seventeen degrees below zero after nightfall. There was already six inches of snow on the ground, and the forecast called for another two by the evening. Gusting breezes made the cold penetrate even the warmest coat and nostrils sting just to breathe. Mustaches became white and brittle with frost in a matter of minutes. Gunmetal-gray skies unleashed a stinging snow that day, making it that much more undesirable to be out. Caught in the twenty-five-mile-per-hour wind gusts, the fine powder drifted as it hit the already snow-covered ground. The snow was the kind that crunched and squeaked loudly under the soles of boots. It seemed odd that someone would pick such a day for a murder since the weather was bound to keep people at home. Then again, there were a lot of things that didn’t add up about the crime that day.

Daisy did not have an inkling that January 14, 1963, was going to be the last morning of her life. It was supposed to be a normal day, almost mundane, even by Battle Creek standards. For her, that day was supposed to be another day on the factory floor. She was most likely looking forward to a cup of coffee with a friend before heading off to her afternoon shift on a production line in the packing department at the Kellogg Factory in Battle Creek. Daisy was an attractive, forty-three-year-old redhead. People who knew her described her as peppy, outgoing, friendly and perky. She was short, only five foot two, with a slender 108-pound body.

One of the last known photographs of Daisy Zick. Courtesy of the Battle Creek Historical Society.

Daisy and her husband, Floyd, lived in the modest suburb of Calhoun County’s Battle Creek called Emmett Township, specifically in Wattles Park. Calhoun County, Michigan, is one that is a mix of contradictions and as such, it struggles with the image that it wanted to portray. Much of the county is rural, with the flat Goguac Plains growing corn and wheat for the burgeoning breakfast cereal industry. But there is also a distinctly industrial edge to the county. Battle Creek was a factory town whose primary business was to put meals on the world’s kitchen tables every morning. The Kellogg Company and Post Cereals plants were only a block apart, separated by a strip of seedy bars and tiny lunch restaurants. The county had tiny, unbelievably quaint little towns, like Marshall, which appeared to have been the backdrop of a Norman Rockwell painting, and Albion, Michigan, with its red brick roads and a grittier look and feel to it. Compared to the tall buildings of Battle Creek, the smaller communities stood out. Battle Creek was the industrial hub of the county, while the other towns clung to old traditions and