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One to Go. As news of Held's bloody rampage reverberated across central Pennsylvania, puzzled officials discovered a tenuous chain of logic behind his actions. Mrs. Ramm had quit a car pool, complaining of Held's driving. Many victims at the paper plant either were in authority over him or had been promoted while he had not. Held and Quiggle had feuded over smoke from burning leaves, and probers soon found that Held's stolid surface had masked truculence, resentment and rage. His doctor, noting that Held had shown paranoid tendencies a year ago, said: "He felt the people at the plant were talking about him." Another neighbor, Mrs. Ella Knisely, told of a spat over a fallen tree limb that so enraged Held he beat the 71-year-old widow with the branch. She took him to court on assault and battery charges, but the magistrate threw out her case and Held's cross complaint. If the jurist "had thought a little more carefully," said Mrs. Knisely, and seen that "here was a man who was sick and sent him to a psychiatrist, this thing could have been prevented."
Mrs. Knisely added that she wished Held had slain her instead of young Quiggle. Indeed, he may well have intended to include her with the rest. As he lay dying, doctors said, Held thanked a nurse for a glass of water, asked about his oldest son, and murmured, "I had one more to go."