The strange case of Constance Flood

By reporter Willa Okker Iverson, who covered the trial for the United Press.

Although the case was not during the Victorian age, it does have Victorian roots. A little girl named Constance lived with millionaire James Flood and his first wife Rose in the 1890s. When Rose died, Flood married her younger sister Maud, at which point Constance seemed to disappear. No one heard from Constance again until Flood died in 1926 and Constance came forward to claim a daughter’s share of the inheritance.

Flood’s estate was worth $18 million, which would be about $180 million today. As a result, the case was the talk of, well, most towns.