Some crimes are so heartbreaking or shocking that they change laws, change society, or even

earn the label Crime of the Century.

But the stories that made headlines in decades past aren't necessarily remembered today.

I'm Amber Hunt, a journalist and author, and in each episode of this show, I'll examine a case that's maybe lesser known today, but was huge when it happened.

This is Crimes of the Centuries.

Music This is Crimes of the Centuries. As he made his daily walk throughout Boston collecting rent payments from his tenants,

Dr. George Parkman stopped by a grocery store for a

couple of pantry staples, butter and sugar. The year was 1849, though, so this stop to the corner

shop likely isn't quite what you're picturing. Sugar wasn't automatically sold in granulated

form back then, nor did it always come in prepackaged

bags. Butter, too, was ordered a bit differently, and Parkman needed a lot of both because

Thanksgiving was only a few days away. So, the doctor told the shopkeeper precisely what he wanted

that Friday afternoon.

I require crushed sugar, Mr. Holland, he said.

He wanted the expensive type, the white kind, and he wanted 32 pounds of it.

Holland didn't have a big enough receptacle on hand, so Parkman suggested a nearby bucket.

Then he insisted that Holland weigh the bucket, not once, not twice,

but three times to make sure he only paid for the sugar and wasn't charged extra for the weight of the bucket.

Parkman was known to do things like that.

He was quite a rich man worth half a million dollars in 1849 money. Today, that translates to

about 20 million bucks. And he wasn't one of those spend freely rich types. He lived in a nice home,

but didn't own a horse because he considered that a waste of money when he could just walk places

...