Abigail Folger

Abigail Anne Folger (August 11, 1943 - August 9, 1969) was a victim of the Charles Manson murders.

Born in San Francisco, California, her parents were Peter Folger, chairman of the Folger Coffee Company, and Inez Mejia, the daughter of a prestigious California land grant family. She is the great-great-granddaughter of J.A. Folger, the founder of Folgers Coffee. Her catholic parents divorced in 1952 when Abigail was still young. In 1960 her father married again, to his 34 year old private secretary Beverley.

Growing up in San Francisco, Abigail was interested in art, books, and poetry. She spent much of her time painting when she had the time to do so. Besides painting, Abigail was very talented in playing the piano. She attended the Santa Catalina Catholic School for Girls in Monterey, California, near Carmel. While there, she was well known and well liked as a model student who graduated with honors in June 1961. After this she attended Radcliffe College in Cambridge, MA in the fall of 1961. During her stay at Radcliffe she became an active member of the college's Gilbert and Sullivan Players, a musical theatre group. Abigail starred in two of its productions. Starting with "The Sorcerer" in April 1963 where she played the part of one of the town's villagers. In December 1963 she starred in "The Gondoliers" as the pretty Contandine. Abigail graduated with honors from Radcliffe College in 1964. Before graduating she became a debutante in December 1961 at the Saint Francis Hotel in San Francisco. Her debutante ball was one of the high lights of the social season. After Radcliffe, in the fall of 1964, she ended up at Harvard University also in Cambridge, where she did graduate work and received a degree in Art History. After graduating in the spring of 1967, she took a 40-hour a week job at the University of California Art Museum in Berkeley, California as a publicity director. In September '67, Folger decided to move away from California in order to 'find' herself and to probe the otherside of life. She didn't stay in Berkeley for long; she soon made the move to New York City, where she got a job working for a magazine publisher, which she eventually left for a job at the Gotham Book Mart on 47th Street. While living in New York, she lived less than splendour. It was at a bookstore party in December 1967 where she met Polish author Jerzy Kosinski who was married to american steel heiress Mary Hayward Weir . Weir ran in the same rich circle as Folger and it was she who introduced Kosinski to Abigail. In early January 1968, Kosinski introduced Abigail to his friend Wojciech Frykowski at a party and the two hit it off.

Wojciech was not fluent in speaking english, but like Abigail, he was fluent in French. Abigail gave him a tour of New York, began to teach him english, and a romance soon blossomed. He moved into her apartment. In August 1968 they both decided to move to Los Angeles,California.

In Los Angeles Abigail found a house on Woodstock Road for her and Wojciech in Laurel Canyon. Like her mother Inez, who was active doing charity work with the Haight-Asbury Medical Clinic in San Francisco, Abigail got involved with volunteer work. She registered as a volunteer social worker for the Los Angeles County Welfare Department in September 1968. In the spring and summer of 1968, Abigail attended fundraisers set up by her mother to aid the Haight-Asbury Medical Clinic around the same time many of the Manson family women were being treated there. Back in Los Angeles, Abigail spent her days in the ghettos doing volunteer work with children. She was very involved with the civil rights cause, contributing large amounts of money to the campaign of Tom Bradley, a black councilman running for mayor in the spring of 1969.

Her work soon began to take a toll on her and she became depressed. Adding to her depression was the campaign loss of Bradley due to a racial smear campaign.

On April 1, while Sharon Tate and Roman Polanski were away in Europe filming movies, Abigail and Wojciech moved into the Polanski's Cielo Drive home in Benedict Canyon. It was at this time that Abigail quit her job and her relationship with Wojciech began to crumble. Constantly fighting, the pair began to sink lower into drugs.

On August 8, 1969, Abigail, Wojciech, Jay Sebring, and Sharon Tate went out to El Coyote retaurant to have a meal. Returning home, Wojciech fell asleep on the couch while Abigail was in her room reading. The Charles Manson followers then broke into the house and killed everyone inside.

Abigail was entombed at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, California on Wednesday, August 13, 1969.