Speaker 1: All right, Hey, before we start, I gotta tell you
Speaker 1: this episode gets a little gory, but it's actually the
Speaker 1: only way to tell the story. So I'm just saying, Okay.
Speaker 1: A lot of us love a good horror flick, especially
Speaker 1: some of the classics like Psycho, Texas, Chainsaw Massacre in
Speaker 1: Silence of the Lambs. Well, these and a number of
Speaker 1: other terrifying flicks were all inspired by one guy, the
Speaker 1: so called Butcher of Plainfield. I'm Patty Steele. The horrifying
Speaker 1: story of body snatcher and murderer. Ed guy, that's next
Speaker 1: on the backstory. The backstory is back. There are certain
Speaker 1: characters in really and I mean really great horror film
Speaker 1: that just imprint on your brain, am I right? Guys
Speaker 1: like Norman Bates and Psycho, Hannibal Lecter and the almost
Speaker 1: unseen Buffalo Bill both in Silence of the Lambs, And
Speaker 1: of course leather Face in Texas, Chainsaw Massacre. Oh, who
Speaker 1: can forget Frank Townsend in the Tour de Force three
Speaker 1: on a meat Hook. Wow, Thankfully I missed that one
Speaker 1: for sure. But all these flicks and a lot of
Speaker 1: others were inspired by one terrifying individual. Ed Geine amazingly
Speaker 1: saw himself less as a killer and more as an artist,
Speaker 1: and he focused on creating his works of art by
Speaker 1: using parts of the human body. So how did he
Speaker 1: start out as a quiet, reclusive little Wisconsin farmboy and
Speaker 1: become one of America's most infamous murderers, Plus how did
Speaker 1: they eventually nab him? Edward Theodore Gine was born in
Speaker 1: nineteen oh six in Lacrosse County, Wisconsin. His parents, Augusta
Speaker 1: and George Gin, were the master chefs in this recipe
Speaker 1: for psychological disaster. Ed's mom was a fanatically religious woman
Speaker 1: who totally believed that the world was full of sin,
Speaker 1: and especially thought that women were corrupting influences instruments of
Speaker 1: the devil. I wonder if she thought that about herself.
Speaker 1: Augusta also thought that drinking was a huge sin, which
Speaker 1: was ironic seeing as how her husband and Ed's dad, George,
Speaker 1: was a severe alcoholic who could barely hold a job.
Speaker 1: Augusta ran the house with an iron fist, and she
Speaker 1: made sure to isolate Ed and his older brother Henry
Speaker 1: from the outside world. Augusta drilled into Ed in probably
Speaker 1: Henry's head, that women were evil, sex was sinful, and
Speaker 1: that they could only rely on their mama, and Ed
Speaker 1: worshiped her. In fact, he was totally obsessed with his mother.
Speaker 1: Other than that, he wasn't much of an attention grabber.
Speaker 1: As a little kid, he was quiet, awkward, and pretty
Speaker 1: much kept to himself. He never much left the family
Speaker 1: farm except to go to school, where he didn't socialize
Speaker 1: very much. But as he got older, his fascination with
Speaker 1: death began to unfold. Ed was a big reader, but
Speaker 1: it was his choice of books that became a problem.
Speaker 1: In his spare time, He'd read books about anatomy and
Speaker 1: Nazi experiments. He'd obsess over stories about grave robbers, and
Speaker 1: even started to hang out at the local butcher shop
Speaker 1: just to watch the animals get slaughtered. But then disaster
Speaker 1: struck for Ed. His mother died in nineteen forty five,
Speaker 1: when he was thirty nine years old and still living
Speaker 1: at home, and that was kind of the final crack
Speaker 1: in his fragile psyche. With Augusta gone, Ed was alone
Speaker 1: for the first time in his life, and instead of
Speaker 1: reaching out trying to make friends, he started visiting local
Speaker 1: cemeteries to dig up bodies. He'd steal the corpses bring
Speaker 1: them to his isolated farmhouse, and then repurpose their remains.
Speaker 1: I'm giving myself chills here. By repurpose, I mean in
Speaker 1: the most grotesque way. For years it was Ed's secret,
Speaker 1: but then his obsession escalated. On November sixteenth, nineteen fifty seven,
Speaker 1: his hometown of plain Field, Wisconsin, was terrified by the
Speaker 1: disappearance of Bernice Warden, the owner of the local hardware store.
Speaker 1: The store had been turned upside down, but a sales
Speaker 1: receipt showed that the last person she'd served was Ed Guine.
Speaker 1: Sheriff's deputies took a ride out to Ed's farm to
Speaker 1: have a little front porch chat right, but what they
Speaker 1: found was beyond anything they could have imagined. Inside the
Speaker 1: Gune farmhouse, they found human skulls, masks, and lampshades made
Speaker 1: from human skin, and then they found the mutilated body
Speaker 1: of Bernice Warden hung up in the shed like a
Speaker 1: hunting trophy on a meat hook. Inside the house, they
Speaker 1: found that Ed had made masks out of human skin,
Speaker 1: furniture with human flesh, and so many other household items
Speaker 1: out of repurposed body parts. There was a belt he'd
Speaker 1: made for himself by sewing together dozens of women's nipples,
Speaker 1: and he had made pulls for his window shades from
Speaker 1: women's lips. He even tried to build what was described
Speaker 1: as a woman suit for himself in order to dress
Speaker 1: himself up and recreate his mother so as he said
Speaker 1: he could crawl into her skin. Gin was immediately arrested
Speaker 1: and the more police searched the farmhouse. The worst thing
Speaker 1: Scott more of Ed's artwork using human beings as his medium.
Speaker 1: It was so disturbing to investigators that one of them,
Speaker 1: the local sheriff, physically attacked Ed. Not long after that,
Speaker 1: forty two year old sheriff died of a heart attack,
Speaker 1: which friends blamed on the trauma of the investigation. They
Speaker 1: were only ever able to pin two murders on Ed,
Speaker 1: hardware store owner Bernice Warden and Mary Hogan, a tavern
Speaker 1: owner who had gone missing three years earlier. He was
Speaker 1: suspected in other killings, but it was clear he was
Speaker 1: totally insane, So why spend the money, said the local prosecutor.
Speaker 1: During his interrogation, Ed was disturbingly calm. He confessed to
Speaker 1: his crimes in a flat, emotionless tone. It was clear
Speaker 1: that in his world the dead could be reanimated and
Speaker 1: possibly his mother could be still with him. Psychiatrist said
Speaker 1: he mainly was a grave robber and as for murder,
Speaker 1: only targeted women who looked like his mom, and he
Speaker 1: actually managed to pass a lie detector test because he
Speaker 1: believed his own lies. Eventually, ed Guin was declared legally
Speaker 1: insane and sent to a hospital for the criminally insane, where,
Speaker 1: despite some other trials, he remained for the rest of
Speaker 1: his life and was actually a model patient. He died
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty four at the age of seventy seven
Speaker 1: from respiratory failure. His grave became a target for vandals
Speaker 1: who would chip away pieces of his tombstone for souvenirs.
Speaker 1: And what about the Guine farmhouse, Well, it caught fire
Speaker 1: not long after his arrest. Arson was suspected, but the
Speaker 1: investigation just wasn't a priority to the fire chief since
Speaker 1: he was the son of victim number one hardware store
Speaker 1: owner Bernice Warden. In the Happy Go Go nineteen fifties,
Speaker 1: ed Gein's story chilled folks to the bone. His crimes
Speaker 1: were unimaginable, and they inspired some of the most terrifying
Speaker 1: villains in movie history. Just three years after his last murder,
Speaker 1: America was terrified by Alfred Hitchcock's thriller Psycho, in which
Speaker 1: Norman Bates was a killer obsessed with his dead mother,
Speaker 1: and the genre grew over the decades, with so many
Speaker 1: based at least in some part on what happened in
Speaker 1: the Guine Farmhouse. In fact, the Netflix anthology series Monster
Speaker 1: is going to take a deep dive into Guine's story
Speaker 1: when it's released late this year or early next. Edgin's
Speaker 1: story isn't just about murder. It's about the perfect storm
Speaker 1: that's created when a mentally ill child is raised by
Speaker 1: abusive parents and no one's there to stop his psychological decay.
Speaker 1: I hope you're enjoying the Backstory with Patty Steele and
Speaker 1: not too frightened by this one. Follow or subscribe for
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Speaker 1: to dm me if you have a story you'd like
Speaker 1: me to cover. On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on
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Speaker 1: Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Doug Fraser. Our writer
Speaker 1: Jake Kushner. We have new episodes every Tuesday and Friday.
Speaker 1: Feel free to reach out to me with comments and
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Speaker 1: on Facebook at Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the
Speaker 1: Backstory with Patty Steele, the pieces of history you didn't
Speaker 1: know you needed to know.