Maurice Stanley

Historical Images
Paperback, 264 pages
6 full-page photographs
ISBN: 0-914875-43-4
$12.00

What would lead a grandmother to murder her two-year-old granddaughter? Rage? Insanity? Greed? Total despair? The Legend of Nance Dude presents all the known facts surrounding Roberta Putnam’s grizzly murder and the arrest, trial, and subsequent conviction of her grandmother, Nancy Ann Kerley, also known as Nance Dude.

Stanley has woven a speculative tale, drawing on both historical fact and oral tradition, of Nance Dude’s metamorphosis from a happy loving child to a convicted murderess.

Maurice Stanley, Ph.D.

Maurice Stanley and his wife, Glana, are natives of Western North Carolina. Dr. Stanley holds a doctorate in philosophy and is currently a full-time lecturer at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. He is the author of Logic and Controversy and numerous other philosophical writings. Dr. Stanley has viewed many inspiring sights during his travels to present his work — from the "dreaming spires" of medieval colleges seen from the cobblestone-lined streets of Oxford, England, to the sunsets in Oahu, Hawaii.

Maurice learned the story of Nance Dude from his mother, who learned it from her mother, who saw Nance and Roberta Putnam out walking not long before Roberta’s death. Dr. Stanley remembers walking up Utah Mountain, accompanied by his father, and seeing the site of Roberta’s murder. The North Carolina Humanities Council presented a series of performances of the play "Nance," based on Dr. Stanley’s book, and invited him to participate as a "humanist scholar" in 1999.

The Stanleys and their four sweet cats reside in coastal North Carolina, where the author also enjoys reading, watching old movies, and playing chess.

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