Content warning: Suicide
Ruth stands alone on a rocky shore, surrounded by a hazy sea. In the distance, a shape appears through the mist. A boat approaches, and at the bow stands a woman so beautiful she must be an angel. Right hand outstretched, left hand clutching a basin of water, the angel beckons softly, “Drink.”
This is the dream Ruth Anne Dodge recounted to her three daughters shortly before her death on Sept. 5, 1916. For three nights she had this dream, and twice she refused the angel’s invitation. On the third night, she obliged, telling her children that the angel had offered her the water of life and by drinking it she had “transformed into a new and glorious spiritual being.” This dream became the inspiration for the Ruth Anne Dodge Memorial.
There wasn’t enough space in Council Bluffs’ Fairview Cemetery for the fountain memorial that Lettie, Ella and Anne envisioned for their mother, so they acquired property on a nearby bluff, tearing down the house there to make room. The plot sits about a mile from Dodges’ 14-room, three-story mansion.
In 1917, the Dodge daughters hired renowned sculptor Daniel Chester French to craft the memorial. French and his colleague, architect Henry Bacon, were also working on a concurrent project at the time: the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. (A lesser-known Lincoln Monument stands just down the bluff from the Ruth Anne Dodge Memorial at the site on which Mrs. Dodge’s husband — Union Army General, politician and railroad tycoon Grenville M. Dodge — stood with President-to-be Abraham Lincoln in 1859. Together, Dodge and Lincoln decided on Council Bluffs as the beginning of the transcontinental railroad.)
The scope and authority of the Dodge family’s influence is uncontested. When General Dodge died just nine months before his wife, his procession and burial attracted thousands, the largest funeral in Council Bluffs history.
Though the Dodge daughters imagined a tribute to their mother with equal pomp, the Ruth Anne Dodge Memorial was ultimately dedicated four years after Mrs. Dodge’s death on a cold and lonely day in March. “The Black Angel,” as it would come to be known, reflected the scandal and tragedy of the woman who lent the angel her likeness.
For a few years beginning in 1914, Audrey Munson was arguably the most famed celebrity in the country. A Broadway and silent film actress, Munson also modeled for countless famous statues including Civic Fame and The Spirit of Life in New York, and her likeness also appears on the William Boyd Allison Monument at the Iowa State Capitol.
French had worked with Munson on The Spirit of Life just three years prior, and chose her again for Ruth Anne Dodge’s angel. Work on the memorial proceeded with the approval of the Dodge daughters and only a few setbacks. Copper shortages during the first World War delayed the bronze casting of the statue and the pipework for the fountain from which the water of life flows. By the time the memorial was finished in October 1918, the Spanish Flu pandemic was well underway. Despite this, the Dodge daughters began planning a lavish dedication for the following spring, with French and others on the guest list. But a brutal murder 1,200 miles away derailed their arrangements entirely.
In February of 1919, Julia Wilkins was bludgeoned to death outside her home in Long Beach, New York. Her husband, Dr. Walter Keene Wilkins, was soon arrested, charged, tried and convicted for the murder. Rumors swirled alleging that he killed his wife so he could romantically pursue Audrey Munson, prompting the lead prosecutor on the case to hold a public press conference announcing a search for the actress.
Though Munson denied any connection to the murder, the sensationalized news tanked her career and turned her fame to infamy. She lived the rest of her life in poverty, struggling to find work and taking odd jobs until she attempted suicide in 1922. In 1931, Munson’s mother petitioned the court to have her committed to the St. Lawrence State Hospital for the Insane, where she remained for over six decades until her death at the age of 104. Dr. Wilkins, bound for the electric chair, died by suicide before his execution.
It was an insult the esteemed Dodge daughters could not excuse: the face of their mother’s memorial was a working woman who had appeared nude in statuary and film for national audiences, and had become embroiled in a salacious murder investigation. The grand ceremony was canceled. Instead, the Black Angel simply appeared one day, and has maintained her lonely post on the bluff ever since.
Legends of the Black Angel
Many people have reported supernatural experiences related to Ruth Anne Dodge Memorial, with some claiming the phenomena began on Feb. 20, 1996, the day Audrey Munson died. Allegedly:
- The stairs to the memorial change numbers when you walk up and down them.
- If you try to take the angel’s picture, you may have unexplained technical difficulties.
- At night she leaves her pedestal and flies around Council Bluffs.
- When the moon is full, she cries real tears.
- If you touch her outstretched hand, you’ll die.
- If you look her in the eyes at midnight on the anniversary of Ruth Anne Dodge’s death, her eyes will turn red and you’ll die in two days.
This article is from Little Village’s December 2025 Peak Iowa issue, a collection of stories drawn from Hawkeye State history, culture and legend. Browse dozens of Peak Iowa tales here.
