1. “I was searching for the perfect mate, the real romance of life.”
~Doss
Nannie Doss
A.K.A Giggling Nanny

2. Background
Born as Nancy Hazel to Lou and James Hazel on November 4, 1905
One of five children (one brother and three sisters)
Had a very controlling father
Father forced his children to work on the family farm instead of attending school (didn’t learn to read well; no real education)
When she was 7 years old, she hit her head on a metal bar on a train seat and from then on suffered headaches, blackouts, and depression
Her favorite hobby was reading her mother’s romance magazines
Her father forbade her and her sisters from wearing makeup and nice clothing. He also didn’t let them go to dances and other social events.
Had no real social interaction until she got her first job at 16 years old

3. First Marriage Married Charley Braggs at the age of 16
Met at the Linen Thread factory and got married after 4 months of dating
Lived together at Braggs’ mother’s house and had four children together
Doss started to drink and smoke heavily
Braggs would often disappear for days on end
Two of their middle children died in 1927 due to suspected food poisoning
Braggs took their oldest daughter, Melvina and fled the house because he thought Doss was the one who killed their children
Braggs left their youngest child with Doss
Doss had to get a job in order to support herself and her daughter
Braggs and Doss ended up getting a divorce
Nannie Doss took her two girls back to her mother’s home

4. Second Marriage
Saw Frank Harrelson in an advertisement and began talking to him
Were married shortly after meeting in 1929 (2 years after her divorce from Braggs)
Lived together in Jacksonville with Doss’s daughters from previous marriage
Doss’s eldest daughter, Melvina, gave birth to a son named Robert in 1943
2 years after this, Melvina gave birth to another baby but it died shortly after it was born
Melvina thought she saw her mother put a pin into the newborn’s head, but she was groggy and exhausted, so no one believed her
Melvina’s son Robert died mysteriously under Nannie’s care in The death was diagnosed as asphyxia and Doss collected $500 from the life insurance she had on Robert
After all of this, Frank came home one night from drinking and raped Doss. This was the last straw for Doss and decided to fill his whiskey with rat poison. Frank died a painful death later that night

5. Third Marriage
Met Arlie Lanning through a lonely-hearts column and married him three days later
Lanning was an alcoholic but Doss would be the one who would disappear for months on end
Lanning died of a said to be heart failure, whole community supported Doss during this hard time
The couple’s house burned down soon after Lanning’s passing
Doss collected all of the insurance money
Lanning’s mother died in her sleep, which made Nannie leave North Carolina
She stayed at her sister, Dovie’s house. Her sister was bedridden and shortly after Nannie’s arrival, she died

6. Fourth Marriage
Nannie joined the Diamond Circle Club and met Richard Morton
Morton was not an alcoholic but he was a womanizer
Nannie’s mother came to live with them and ended up being poisoned to death in 1953
Three months after Nannie’s mother’s death, Richard died

7. Fifth Marriage Nannie met and married Samuel Doss in June 1953
He was an overall good guy (No drinking problem and not a womanizer), different than her other husbands
Samuel disapproved of the romance novels that Nannie adored
Samuel was admitted to a hospital for flu-like symptoms, diagnose with a severe digestive tract infection
Was released from hospital on October 5
Nannie killed him that same evening, while she tried to collect the two life insurance policies that she had taken out on him

8. Evidence
At the time of the murders, no one suspected Nannie of doing anything because she was so good at covering her tracks that they were all ruled as natural causes
The only thing that made everyone suspicious of her was when her husband, Samuel Doss died
He was at the hospital and was released because he was in good health, so when he showed up dead later that night, they knew it couldn’t have been from natural causes
The doctor ordered an autopsy and it showed large amounts of arsenic in Samuel’s body
They knew Nannie was the only one in contact with Samuel and arrested her immediately
After she confessed to the killings, they recovered the other bodies and found poison in them as well

9. Confession and conviction
Confessed to killing four of her husbands, her mother, her sister, her grandson Robert, and her mother-in-law (Lanning)
Nannie pleaded guilty on May 17, 1955 and was sentenced to life imprisonment
She would have received the death penalty but because of her gender they decided not to
She was only charged for the death of Samuel Doss but not the others
Doss seemed to enjoy her arrest and often joked about her dead husbands and the method she used to kill them, thus getting her nickname, Giggling Nanny
She died in 1965 of leukemia in the hospital ward of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary

10. Crime
Date
Victim
Punishment
Murder
July 7, 1945
Grandson Robert
None
1945
Second Husband, Frank Harrelson
1950
Third Husband, Arlie Lanning
Arlie Lanning’s mother (Nannie’s mother-in-law)
Sister, Dovie
1953
Mother, Lou Hazel
Fourth Husband, Richard Morton
October 5, 1954
Fifth Husband, Samuel Doss
Life Imprisonment

11. Cultural References Movie: Perfect Nanny Loosely based on Nannie Doss
Plot Summary: After she is released from a mental hospital, a woman obsessed with romance novels takes a job as a nanny to a handsome widower -- and will kill anyone who stands in the way of her becoming his wife.
Kindle Book by Bus-Stop Guides
Short biography on Nannie Doss

12. Behavioral Theory
The behavioral theory says there are four factors that help produce violence. Nannie had two out of the four factors. She experienced the first factor, which is a stressful event or stimulus that heightens arousal. A stressful event in her life was when she hit her head on the train. She was only seven years old and it caused her a lot of pain. This event could have caused her killings. The other factor that Nannie would fall under is that she had aggressive skills or techniques that she learned through observing others. Her father was very controlling and didn’t let Nannie do anything outside of the house. Nannie often said that she hated her father and that he was rude to her whole family. She could have learned about violence through her father's actions. When she was growing up she was devoted to reading love magazines. She wanted to find the true love that they talked about. This could have caused her to kill because she was so focused on finding real love. According to the behavioral theory, Nannie learned to think and act violently because of her childhood experiences.