DNA matches skull found in Illinois home of Indiana teenager who died in 1866: NPR

In November 1978, a man in Batavia, Illinois, was renovating his home when he knocked down a wall and found a human skull between the studs.

Nearly half a century later—thanks to community fundraising, a complex DNA test, and a shared descendant—the skull’s identity has finally been confirmed.

It belonged to a teenager from Indiana who died of complications during childbirth in 1866.

“We now know the skull found in a wall in Batavia as Esther Granger,” Kane County Coroner Rob Russell said on press conference on Thursday, surrounded by county officials and standing next to a replica skull in a glass case.

Granger was born in October 1848 in Indiana and married her husband Charles in 1865 at the age of 16, authorities said. She died the following year shortly after giving birth to her first child, a girl.

Public records show that Granger was buried in Merrillville, Indiana, about 80 miles from the Chicago suburb where her skull was found more than a century later.

“So the question remains: If she died in 1866 in Indiana, how did she end up in a wall in a house in Batavia?” said Russell.

Investigators believe Granger was a victim of grave robbing, which was common and profitable at the time. Perpetrators could make money on a single body for three to four months, often selling them to medical schools for anatomy studies, and were rarely apprehended by law enforcement, Russell said.

The working theory is that someone who lived in the house in Batavia obtained the corpse (or parts of it) for medical examination and, knowing the consequences, later hid it in a wall.

“There’s no definitive answer as to how Esther ended up in that wall or where the rest of her body is, but being the victim of a grave robbery certainly fits the bill,” Russell said.

The house where the skull was found is located “right in the oldest part of Batavia” and dates back to the 1850s, Mayor Jeffrey Schilke said.

“Thank you for helping us solve the mystery that we didn’t have a killer we didn’t know about,” the mayor told the coroner with a laugh.

Technology, time and money helped solve a decades-old mystery

The homeowner called Batavia police immediately after the skull was discovered in 1978, Russell explained, but their investigation was limited by the lack of DNA technology and genealogical records at the time.

The most they could guess was that the skull probably belonged to a young woman who died in her early 20s sometime before 1900.

Later, the case cooled down — and the skull somehow ended up in the Batavia Depot Museum, a local history museum located on the territory of the former station. Batavia Police Chief Sean Mazza said records show the skull was in the museum until 1979, but there is no information on how or why it got there.

Museum workers were cleaning inventory in March 2021 when they found the skull in a box. They called the police, who found the 1978 report and sent the skull to the coroner’s cold storage for further examination.

According to Russell, after two years of “reviewing existing evidence and looking for clues,” the office learned about A Texas company called Othramwhich uses a relatively new technique called forensic genetic genealogy to help solve unknown cases.

Othram scientists examined the skull and obtained testable DNA. If Othram could obtain the profile, it would run it through its database to find possible family members, the company said, advising officials that it could try to cover the costs through crowdfunding.

Russell’s office appealed to the population to donate in December 2023, and eventually raised about $7,500. Within weeks, Othram discovered that the profile had produced a match.

The company says the Granger case is the oldest case of unidentified human remains it has worked on to date, and one of the oldest individuals identified through forensic genetic genealogy.

“Not only did they have a match, but they had a family tree with living relatives,” Russell said.

Investigators contacted that relative, 69-year-old Wayne Svilar, whose DNA confirmed that he was indeed Granger’s great-great-grandson.

Svilar, a retired police sergeant with the Portland Police Bureau in Oregon, worked in the non-investigative division in the early 2000s. Speaking at a press conference via Zoom, he said he initially thought the calls were a scam and his wife assumed they were related to his previous affairs.

“To be honest, we didn’t believe a word of it,” he said. “It took two or three phone calls to convince me.”

The Granger family was able to shut her down and put her to rest

Svilyar says what convinced him that “this is not some well-organized scam”, it is the passion of the authorities and dedication to their work.

“The respect they showed us, my family, through this process was incredible,” he said.

Svilar said that he didn’t grow up not hearing anything about Granger, though he wished he had more contact with his grandparents. He said that side of the family eventually settled in Nebraska and “the only thing they ever talked about … was that life was really hard.”

After identifying Granger, authorities created a composite sketch of what she likely looked like in life. Svilyar said he sees some similarities between the image and photos of his mother.

“I wish my mom was still here so I could tell her this story — she would love it,” he said. “I really feel that the sense of completion and respect that we have shown Esther in this process has given me great satisfaction.”

Granger was buried in Batavia Cemetery with the family’s approval. Svilyar delivered a eulogy and told reporters this week that even though it was his first time in Batavia, he felt like he had been there before.

In Full Circle, Svilar added that he recently came out of retirement to take a job with the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office, where part of his duties will be handling pending cases.

Russell said Granger’s remains are in a columbarium paid for by the city and marked with a plaque.

“Now she’s a resident of Batavia forever — actually a resident of heaven, maybe — but at least physically a resident of Batavia,” he said. “And we thought it was appropriate because she spent so much time here.”