"At 7:00 a.m. on December 9, 1937, St. Paul firefighters battling an arsonist's fire in the abandoned Aberdeen Hotel discovered the badly burned body of a woman. The victim was soon identified as 31-year-old Ruth Munson, a waitress at the Union Depot--a 'small-town girl' who had moved to the big city in search of a new life. Using original police records, Ruth's own diary and letters, newspaper accounts, public documents, and other primary sources, author Roger Barr meticulously retraces the investigation, as detectives examined Ruth's background, work history, relationships, and social life in search of clues to her killer"--