Criminal: The Feather Lady

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Roxy Laborne retired as a forensic ornithologist from the Smithsonian in 1988. She kept working on bird strike cases for years afterwards. Roxy was interviewed by Marcy Hecker and Pamela Henson in 2001. In 2020, the Smithsonian made those conversations public for the first time.

On October 4, 1960, Eastern Airlines Flight 375 took off from Boston’s Logan airport, and then, two minutes later, it crashed. 62 people died. Investigators couldn't figure out what had happened, and they decided to ask a scientist working at the Smithsonian for help. Roxie Laybourne's investigation helped launch a whole new field of science that changed aviation and forensics.

Special thanks to the Smithsonian Institution Archives for letting us share audio of Roxie Laybourne.

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