We were aware that in 1968
Ruth Ann Moorehouse married Edward Heuvelhorst so she could be an emancipated minor and not need
to answer to her parents and she would no longer be a minor in the eyes of the
law. Ruth Ann was 16 years old and Edward was 23 years old.
The story of their marriage
as I understood it was that Ruth Ann married Edward and left him at the altar. It
was a marriage of convenience for Ruth Ann but not necessarily for Edward. The
two were married May 20th 1968 in Scotts Valley, Santa Cruz County, California.
It has been said that she hitchhiked back down to Los Angeles and to the Family
the same day she married, leaving Edward behind.
Who was Edward Heuvelhorst?
Searching through records I
was surprised at the couple of things I found about Edward. Edward Lewis
Heuvelhorst, Jr. went by the nickname of Ted, nobody called him Edward. He was
born in Michigan and grew up in Holland Michigan according to his obituary.
Holland Michigan is where Ella Jo Bailey was from, she was about a year and a
half younger than Ted. However, I was not able to find Ted in any high school
yearbooks for schools in Holland.
Ted’s mother, Mary
Heuvelhorst, taught school in Holland MI beginning in the 1950’s but his father
lived in Grand Rapids MI. I surmise that Ted’s parents were separated or
divorced. BTW Ted’s mother’s maiden name was Good but I didn’t find a
connection to Sandy Good.
Edward Lewis “Ted”
Heuvelhorst Jr., is a distinctive and unusual name. The only other person with
that name in the US according to Ancestry .com was his father with Sr. as a
suffix. I found Ted in the 1962 and 1963 Ottawa Hills High School, Grand Rapids
Michigan, yearbooks for his sophomore and junior years. Then I found Ted in a 1964
Menlo-Atherton High School yearbook. That high school is located in Atherton CA
and today it is one of the wealthiest zip codes in the US. It was a very ritzy
area back in the 1960’s too.
I was not able to learn why Ted came to California for his senior year of high school. Ted did stay in California after graduating from high school. I found a city directory listing for him living in Palo Alto and working for a construction company.
The next thing I found on
Ted was a mention of his name in an April 26, 1968 article from the Ukiah Daily
Journal in Mendocino County. The article was about some hippies putting on
festival at the fairgrounds in Ukiah, naming it the 1st Annual
Calvin Coolidge Day Fair. I have no idea why that name, I couldn’t find that
the April 27th date had any connection to Coolidge. Ted was
mentioned because he was shoved by someone standing in the fairgrounds office
and he went to the police department to report it.
Hmmm, Mendocino County, Brooks Poston was mentioned in an ad taken out by one of the followers of Jim Jones extolling the reverend’s virtues that was published May 5, 1968. Rev. Jones made a deal with Brooks that if Brooks would get his hair cut, Jones would attend a non-violent peace march with Brooks.
Deane Moorehouse was in
Mendocino during that time frame, too. And towards the end of May 1968 or early
June 1968 five of the Manson Family girls rented a house in Philo, up the road
from Boonville, just over the hill from Ukiah. It’s possible that Ruth Ann met
Ted in Mendocino County.
It does not appear that Ted ever remarried or had any children.
