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Show MURDER AND SUICIDE AT PORTLAND Former Logan Educator Becomes Deranged Raymond Ray-mond Becraft Graduated Here. j PORTLAND, Ore. A blast of gunfire left three persons dead and three orphans Tuesday, victims vic-tims of what authorities believed to be an insane outburst by their father who killed his wife and son and then committed suicide. The dead were Raymond J. Becraft, Be-craft, 45; his" wife, formerly Ireta Harris, 41, and a son, Raymond Jr., 17. Becraft a TJ. S. forest service ser-vice employe, formerly was professor pro-fessor of forestry at the University of Idaho and of range management manage-ment at Utah State Agricultural college. Detective Captain John J. Kee-gan Kee-gan said no motive could be de-. de-. termined, the life of the family appearently having been "happy and congenial." He said the father fa-ther apparently had become de- ranged at the breakfast hour. Keegan said the father and son apparently were in an upstairs bedroom when the shooting began. After firing two shots at his son, Becraft apparently turned on his wife. A neighbor, Mrs. O. V. Breese, heard Mrs. Becraft scream "I'm shot!" Mrs. Breese ran to the front of the Becraft home and saw Mrs. Becraft rush out, her husband in pursuit. The neighbor said Becraft fired a shot at his wife and she fell with a chest wound. ' Keegan said Becraft apparently j (Continued on Page Four) Portland, Ore. a half sister, Mrs John Payne of Salt Lake City and three half brothers, J. Elmei and Krvin Harris of Boise anc Barry Harris of Los Angeles. Murder and Suicide At Portland (Continued from rage One) ran back upstairs, where his son was lying, and committed suicide with a bullet in the head. "Two daughters, Marian, 16, and Helen, 10, had left for school and ia third, Nancy 4, fled to Mrs. j Breese's' home " as the shooting j started. Neither relatives, neighbors nor the daughters could give police any clue to a motive, all describ-jing describ-jing the family as "happy" and in comfortable circumstances. ; Prominent in Logan j Mr. and Mrs. Raymond J. Be-i Be-i craft were prominent in Utah public pub-lic affairs during their long resi-jdence resi-jdence in the state prior to leaving leav-ing for Idaho in 1935. j Mr. Becraft was a members of the Utah State Agricultural college col-lege faculty from his graduation 'in 1917 until 1935,. except for two years of graduate study at the University of Chicago. His wife, active in L. D. S. church affairs in Logan and in Portland, Ore. Relatives here said Mr. Becraft I suffered head and spine injuries last week in a fall while making I a forest inspection near Yakima, i Washington, which they believed ' might have caused a burst of in- sanity. ', Funeral services will be oonduct-i oonduct-i ed Friday in Portland, with burial there. ! Mr. Becraft, a native of Ogden, ! was graduated from Weber acad-I acad-I emy and from Utah State Agricul-. Agricul-. tural college in Logan, where he was student body president in ' 1916-17. He had served an L. D. S. church mission in Germany. During his residence in Logan Mr. Becraft was scoutmaster of a Boy Scout troop, chairman of the! Cache district court of honor and 'for three years chairman of the I Cache valley council court of hon-lor. hon-lor. He was a member of Sigma 'ixi, honorary scientific fraternity. I He left the UP.C lr. 1935 to become be-come professor of forestry at the University of Idaho. A year ago he was named regional head of I the division of plant ecology for Jthe forest service in Portland. Besides his three daughters, Mr. Becraft is survived by a brother, Frank W. Becraft of Denver, and 'a sister, Mrs. Nell B. Rutchie of : Santa Monica, Cal. Mrs. Becraft was born February 23, 1897, in Colonia, Dublan, Mexico, Mex-ico, an L D S church settlement, a daughter of Dennison Emer and! Euncei Stewart Harris. She lived in Mexico and Cardston Alberta, j Canada, until 1912, when she en-jtered en-jtered Brigham Young high school in Provo. She was graduated from Utah State Agricultural college in 1920, shortly after her marriage the previous pre-vious winter to Mr. Becraft in the Logan, temple. Mrs. Becraft took active part in the Logan Ninth ward. When the Portland stake was organized recently, re-cently, she was named to the Y. W.M.I.A. board. Surviving, besides her daughters are her mother, of Provo; seven brothers, Dr. F. S. Harris of Provo, Pro-vo, president of Brigham Young university; Dr. ML Hyrum Harris,' secretary of the Utah Taxpayers' association; Marion L. Harris of Salt Lake City, Sterling Harris of Tooele, former Tooele high school coach; Karl Harris of Phoenix, Ariz., Leo L. Harris of Browning, Mont., and D. E. Harris Jr. of |