JUST BEFORE SUNSET on the evening of April 12, 1946, Milwaukie residents James and Mary Rader were strolling with their friend H.C. Foster along the river by the Wisdom Island Moorage in Oak Grove when they saw a strange parcel swirling in an eddy under the dock.

The parcel was about the size of a suitcase, wrapped in burlap and tied up with ropes and wires. It looked like it could be something important — or not. Foster thought not; he said it was probably “a bag of drowned cats” and best left alone, but he got a stick and hooked it and dragged it to the shore for curiosity’s sake.

It was carefully wrapped, that was for sure. And it was a solid object, about 30 inches long and 16 inches wide and less than a foot thick. The three of them untied it and started unwrapping the layers of burlap.

They peeled off the burlap, then a grayish-black tweed topcoat, followed by a long pair of “union-suit” underwear, a dark blue sweater, and a pair of brown slacks.

The slacks were the inmost layer. When those were removed, the three of them found themselves looking down at a naked female torso — headless, armless, legless. (Portland, Multnomah and Clackamas County; 1920s, 1930s, 1940s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/2505a.torso-murder-anna-schrader-698.518.html)