Revelations 20 (10-15)
10 And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13 The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. 14 Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15 Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
Ronald Rickman’s Bible, gifted from his parents.
Information on Ronald Rickman’s has been delegated to a made for tv film and small handful of archival newspaper articles. In 1962, at the youthful age of 24, Rickman murdered two Wisconsion woodcutters. A 1956 car crash that resulted in a brain injury subsequently lead to an insanity verdict followed by several years in a state run mental hospital. When he walked free in 1972 Rickman wasted no time getting his life back on track, buying a home in Green Bay and thereafter finding a wife. Given his violent history, when Rickman’s wife went missing in 1981 all fingers were pointed at him. It would be years until anything broke in the case. After an arrest in 1989 for illegally possessing a shotgun his loose tongue got the best of him - speaking to an inmate in a lighthearted way regarding having the same feelings towards the two murder victims as he did towards his still missing wife. Ronald Rickman would finally make his way into a prison in 1993 after an unprecedented conviction considering there was no body or murder weapon to tie him to the missing woman. Rickman would live out the rest of his life in prison, dying in the year 2004.
A made for TV movie was the only media focus on this case. It had never been documented in print beyond short newspaper articles.
Given the obscurity of this case, it is a rarity to have archived any items relating to it. Ronald Rickman’s personal bible - including some pieces of ephemera which he saved between it’s pages is one of very few insights into his psyche.
Dedication from Rickman’s parents in the year which he committed his first two murders.
Handwritten note found tucked in the pages.
A newspaper on Rickman’s missing wife, which he saved from a newspaper and kept in his bible.
