The Heartbreaking Story Behind The "The Most Beautiful Suicide"

Evelyn McHale's last wish was that her body not be seen. She wanted her family to remember her body as it was before she jumped from the Empire State Building's 86th-floor observation deck.

Four minutes after her body landed on a parked United Nations limousine at the curb, a photography student called Robert Wiles dashed across the street and took a photograph that would go on to become renowned worldwide.

The Photographs That Captivated The World

The student's photograph depicts Evelyn McHale as appearing almost tranquil, as if she were asleep, while nestled in a heap of crushed metal. Her feet are crossed at the ankles, and her pearl necklace is held in her left gloved hand, which rests on her breast.

It appears as though the photograph was staged when viewed in isolation. But the truth is considerably darker than that, and the shot gained worldwide attention nonetheless.

Since the shot was taken on May 1, 1947, it has made headlines, with Time magazine dubbing it "the most beautiful suicide." Even Andy Warhol utilized it in one of his prints entitled Suicide (Fallen Body).

Who is Evelyn McHale, though?

Evelyn McHale's life is mostly unknown, despite the publicity of her death.

Evelyn McHale was one of eight siblings born to Helen and Vincent McHale on September 20, 1923, in Berkeley, California. Her parents split sometime after 1930, and the children relocated to New York to live with their father, Vincent.

In high school, Evelyn was stationed in Jefferson City, Missouri as a member of the Women's Army Corps. She subsequently moved to Baldwin, New York, to reside with her brother and sister-in-law. And she resided there till her passing.

She was a bookkeeper at the Kitab Engraving Company on Manhattan's Pearl Street. There, she met her future fiance, Barry Rhodes, a college student who had been released from the United States Army Air Force. In June 1947, Evelyn McHale and Barry Rhodes planned to marry at Barry's brother's home in Troy, New York, according to sources. However, the wedding never occurred.

"The Most Beautiful Suicide"

Even little is known about the events leading up to Evelyn McHale's suicide.

She had visited Rhodes in Pennsylvania the day before her death, but he stated that everything was well upon her departure.

The morning of her death, she arrived at the observation deck of the Empire State Building, removed her coat and hung it neatly over the railing, and wrote a brief message, which was discovered next to the coat. Then, Evelyn McHale jumped from the observatory's 86th level. She landed on a parked vehicle.

When she leapt, a security guard was only 10 feet away, according to the authorities.

The message, which was discovered by a detective, did not provide any information as to why she had done it, but she requested that her remains be burned.

The note stated;

“I don’t want anyone in or out of my family to see any part of me,” the note read. “Could you destroy my body by cremation? I beg of you and my family – don’t have any service for me or remembrance for me. My fiance asked me to marry him in June. I don’t think I would make a good wife for anybody. He is much better off without me. Tell my father, I have too many of my mother’s tendencies.”

Her body was cremated in accordance with her desires, and she had no funeral.

The Legacy Of The Suicide Photograph Of Evelyn McHale

However, the shot has endured for seven decades and is still acknowledged as one of the finest ever taken.

The image of her body on the car, captured by Robert Wiles, "has been compared to the photograph by Malcolm Wilde Browne of the self-immolation of Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thch Qung Duc, who burned himself alive at a busy Saigon road intersection on June 11, 1963," which is also regarded as one of the greatest photographs in history.

Ben Cosgrove of Time praised the image as  being “technically rich, visually compelling and … downright beautiful.” He said her body looked more like it was “resting, or napping, rather than … dead” and looks like she is laying there “daydreaming of her beau.”