Ed Gein

Film subject

1906 – 1984

40

Who was Ed Gein?

Edward Theodore "Ed" Gein was an American murderer and body snatcher. His crimes, committed around his hometown of Plainfield, Wisconsin, gathered widespread notoriety after authorities discovered Gein had exhumed corpses from local graveyards and fashioned trophies and keepsakes from their bones and skin. Gein confessed to killing two womentavern owner Mary Hogan on December 8, 1954, and a Plainfield hardware store owner, Bernice Worden, on November 16, 1957. Initially found unfit for trial, after confinement in a mental health facility he was tried in 1968 for the murder of Worden and sentenced to life imprisonment, which he spent in a mental hospital.

His case influenced the creation of several fictional killers, including Norman Bates of the movie and novel Psycho and its sequels, Leatherface of the movie The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Jame Gumb of the novel The Silence of the Lambs, Ezra Cobb of the movie Deranged, and Bloody Face of the TV show American Horror Story: Asylum.

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Born
Aug 27, 1906
La Crosse County
Also known as
  • Edward Theodore Gein
  • The Plainfield Ghoul
  • The Mad Butcher
  • The Ghoul of Plainfield
  • The Plainfield Butcher
  • Grandfather of Gore
Parents
Siblings
Religion
  • Lutheranism
Nationality
  • United States of America
Lived in
  • La Crosse
Died
Jul 26, 1984
Mendota Mental Health Institute

Submitted
on July 23, 2013

Citation

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