Kill Brother, Kill Sister: Episode Four: Neil Mackay
Podcast: Episode Four – Star Cursed Love
Apple Podcasts: Episode Four – Star Cursed Love
Schedule: Tuesday, Thursday
Like Muriel, Neil Mackay was a child of immigrants. His parents were both Scots, refugees from the Highland Clearances that saw vast swaths of Scotland brutally converted into sheep grazing. The people working those lands had to go. Neil Mackay’s parents were among them, originally settling in Glasgow, a major seaport. But they kept going. And say what you will about immigrants, there’s a difference between those who only go so far and those who keep going. The latter are often more motivated, more resourceful, more determined to succeed. The others sometimes felt more cursed than blessed.
Neil’s parents met in Winnipeg, Manitoba, that wind and often ice-covered city on the Canadian prairie. The weather can be unforgivable and, soon enough, the newlyweds – Hector and Marianne — had seen enough. They fled the blizzards of Manitoba for the sunny promise of Los Angeles. Neil was but six months old. And this is where we slide into… More troubled — maybe even cursed — waters.
(Red Marker; Courtesy Google Maps)
It was there, in Los Angeles — in what is now a convergence of the Santa Anna and Long Beach freeways — that Neil Sutherland Mackay experienced a life-changing event. The date was August 28, 1928. His father, Hector, who was working as a telephone cable hand, was involved in an automobile accident. Although details are scant, it appears that he was in a one-vehicle accident. Hitting, perhaps, a building or a tree or other immovable object.
The official report describes the impact on Neil’s father as follows: “Crushing in of front of skull. Auto accident – driving own car.”
The accident site was Ford Ranch, California, in the valley near Pico Rivera. Hector was immediately taken to Murphy Memorial Hospital, where he died five hours later. Hector, his wife and their two children – Neil now had a younger sister, Carolina – had been in the promised land all of five years. And now they were without their chief breadwinner. The promised land now appeared unremittingly cursed.
Bad News Travels
The bad news quickly made its way to Winnipeg, where it reached Neil Mackay’s grandmother. The Winnipeg Evening Tribune soon carried the story. “Hector Mackay, aged 39 years, former well-known resident of the city, where he was employed for a number of years by the Canadian National Railways shops at Transcona, was killed instantly Tuesday in an automobile accident at Los Angeles, California.”
The “instantly” part is debatable; the only place that description occurs is in the Winnipeg Evening Tribune. It hardly matters. Hector Mackay was undeniably dead.
Grandma On The Way
And then, a day later, there was news that Mrs. Neil Sutherland, accompanied by her daughter Neilina, was on her way to Los Angeles for the funeral. Yes. Neil Mackay’s maternal grandmother was on the way. She apparently took the train to Vancouver, B.C. and then down the West Coast. She was the woman who soon became notorious for shutting off the Mackay’s water, albeit during a time of regional water shortages. Not just any water shortages. For several years the Los Angeles newspapers had been filled with lurid headlines. If you’ve seen the movie Chinatown, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.
“Los Angeles aqueduct dynamited.” “Dynamiters hunted by city police.” “Plan to arrest Owens Gang.” “Aqueduct guards asked.”
Those details notwithstanding — they’re hard to process when you’re only five — Neil Mackay came to hate his grandmother. But those indignities were insignificant compared to the trauma that accompanied Hector Mackay’s death.
The trauma of that event – when Neil was five years old – is significant. Traumatic memories persist. Studies show memories all the way back to age two for a sibling birth or personal hospitalization. And from age three for a death in the family. So yeah. It came as little surprise that Neil Mackay would write the following — almost fifty years later:
I am far from being an expert in many areas but from my own personal experience I know how it feels to lose a parent. My father was unexpectedly killed in an automobile mishap when I was approximately five years old. I still have clear and unpleasant memories surrounding my father’s death but I do have the fondest remembrances or him. […]
Neil S. Mackay in court documents addressing the impact of Muriel’s death on Scotty Mackay (October 1976)
The Evil Stepfather
Indeed, let’s also remember that “[Neil] always missed his father,” according to one of his longtime friends. And then, when his mother remarried, he “gained” a stepfather who “was not kind to him” according to one friend, who added, “Let’s say the discipline was brutal.” The beatings were never far behind with that railroad boss stepfather, who took the family to a godforsaken railroad town called Yermo, California, smack in the Mohave desert.
All of which takes us to a question perhaps at the heart of this marriage between two opposites. Is there something deeper. The dad tragedy? Maybe? Yeah, definitely. They both had one. They both lost one. Love cursed. Maybe double cursed. But let’s not be foolish. Love is a tricky thing. A vibe, a look, a je ne sais quoi.
That said, by the time Neil Mackay met Muriel, he had seemingly moved on. Having arrived in Alaska in 1951 – three years before Emil Pfeil’s death – he almost seamlessly transitioned from bank Vice President and owner of a funeral home, to a legal practice and then on to… property development. It was during this latter phase that he went into partnership with Muriel’s family. They became so intertwined that a 1965 lawsuit names Mackay as both a co-defendant with the Pfeil’s and… as their attorney.
It's worth noting that Muriel graduated high school in 1953. And, as mentioned elsewhere in these pages, she was featured in multiple news pieces. Not just during high school days, but afterwards, like this headshot from her European stay. Did Neil Mackay see them?
Let us also point out that by the time Neil Mackay started flirting with Muriel Pfeil, Barbara Hayes Mackay – his childhood sweetheart and longtime bride – had become his “long suffering wife.” That revelation comes from none other than Barbara’s sister-in-law. According to a 1987 police report, Mackay’s sister-in-law told APD Investigator Joseph Austin that, “NEIL and BARBARA had trouble in their marriage because MACKAY was a heavy drinker. She said they had no real marriage for a long time.” So… Cursed. Again.
Rebound Relationship
There is a temptation to call the Muriel-Neil relationship a rebound affair. The kind where the pain of the last relationship is hastily traded for the shine of something new. Except… Muriel didn’t seem to be on the rebound from anything. And Neil… Well, let’s talk about Barbara. Truth told, she remained in Neil’s life for all his days. He depended on her in ways no one could replace. Think: irreplaceable business associate. Trusted partner. Yeah. There was something strange and powerful between those two. It just wasn’t marriage.
The Book: Kill Brother, Kill Sister
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Copyright Leland E. Hale (2026)