Edward Theodore “Ed” Gein (1906–1984) didn’t make his mark on history with a long list of murders. In fact, authorities confirmed only two. But what police uncovered inside his lonely Wisconsin farmhouse in 1957 was so disturbing that it burned his name into the American psyche. His story is part crime history, part cultural ghost story—one that unsettled a nation, reshaped conversations around madness and murder, and inspired some of the most enduring monsters in horror fiction.

This is his story, told as faithfully to the record as possible, separating what we know from what later rumor and pop culture layered on top.

Growing Up Alone in Plainfield

Ed Gein was born August 27, 1906, in La Crosse, Wisconsin. He was the second son of George and Augusta Gein. George, an alcoholic, provided little stability; Augusta ruled the family with unyielding religious fervor. She preached to her boys that the outside world was sinful and corrupt, reinforcing isolation as virtue.

The family moved to a 155-acre farm near Plainfield, a small community in central Wisconsin. There, Augusta kept her sons cut off from the townspeople. Neighbors remembered Ed as quiet, socially awkward, and strangely attached to his mother.

In 1944, tragedy struck. Ed’s brother Henry died during a marsh fire on the property. Some locals whispered that the circumstances didn’t add up—Ed had reportedly led authorities straight to his brother’s body, which bore suspicious injuries. But investigators ruled the death accidental, and no charges followed. Still, questions about that night never fully faded.

The real breaking point came the next year. Augusta died in 1945, leaving Ed utterly alone. He sealed off the rooms she had used, leaving them neat and untouched, while he retreated into a small portion of the house by the kitchen. The rest of the farmhouse sank into filth and disrepair. Ed scraped by with odd jobs, took farm subsidies, and retreated further into fantasy. He devoured pulp magazines filled with graphic crime stories and illustrations of Nazi atrocities. These obsessions foreshadowed the horrors yet to be uncovered.

The First Murder: Mary Hogan, 1954

On December 8, 1954, Mary Hogan, who ran the Pine Grove Tavern near Bancroft, vanished without a trace. Her disappearance baffled authorities and remained unsolved for three years. Some locals even joked darkly about Ed’s odd comments—when asked about Mary, he once muttered, “She’s at the farm now.” Most brushed it off as the ramblings of an odd loner.

Only in 1957, after Gein’s arrest, did the truth emerge. During questioning, Ed admitted he had shot Mary Hogan. Investigators also found physical evidence in his home, including parts of her remains. A “face mask” crafted from her skin was catalogued among the gruesome items collected by the state crime lab.

Mary Hogan became the first confirmed victim of Ed Gein’s violence.

The Case That Broke Plainfield: Bernice Worden, 1957

November 16, 1957—the opening day of deer season—was a quiet Saturday in Plainfield. Most residents were in the woods, leaving Main Street nearly empty. Bernice Worden, 58, was running her hardware store alone.

That afternoon, her son Frank, a deputy sheriff, stopped by. What he found triggered one of the most infamous investigations in American history. The store was locked, blood stained the floor, and the cash register stood open. The last sales receipt was for antifreeze—and it bore Ed Gein’s name.

By evening, deputies had Gein in custody. A search warrant was quickly secured for his farm. What they found there, in a shed, shocked even hardened lawmen. Bernice Worden’s body was hanging upside down, shot with a .22 rifle, her torso dressed out like a deer. It was a scene of ritualistic butchery that left officers reeling.

Inside the House of Horrors

The farmhouse itself told an even darker story. Investigators who stepped inside described filth, clutter, and the stench of decay. Yet Augusta’s old rooms were preserved, boarded off and immaculate—a shrine to the woman who had dominated Ed’s life.

Elsewhere, officers catalogued an inventory that defied belief. These were not just bones or body parts—they were artifacts, objects painstakingly fashioned by human hands from human remains:

• Bowls carved from skulls.
• Chairs upholstered in human skin.
• Masks made from preserved faces.
• A corset crafted from a skinned torso.
• Leggings sewn from human skin.
• A belt fastened together from nipples.
• Four preserved noses.
• Lips strung on a window shade pull.

The state crime lab documented each item before they were destroyed. The list became the backbone of every reliable account of the case.

Among the remains, investigators also found Mary Hogan’s face and skull. This discovery finally confirmed her 1954 disappearance as murder.

One detail, though, remains disputed: the placement of Bernice Worden’s heart. Some reports said it was found near a stove, others in a bag. Because accounts differ, the most responsible retelling is to note the disagreement, not present any single version as fact.

The Grave Robberies

As investigators pressed him, Gein revealed another shocking layer. For years—since about 1947, he claimed—he had been visiting cemeteries in the dead of night. In what he described as trance-like states, he would dig up recently buried women who reminded him of his mother. Sometimes he took body parts, sometimes entire corpses, which he tanned and preserved for his ghastly projects.

Skeptical, authorities reopened three graves Gein identified. The results matched his descriptions: one coffin empty, another containing scattered remains and Gein’s crowbar, and a third showing evidence of tampering. These findings corroborated his confession and confirmed that grave robbing was central to his activities.

Motive and Psychology

What drove Ed Gein remains a subject of debate. What’s clear is that his obsession with his mother defined his life. After her death, he preserved her rooms as if she might return at any moment. At the same time, he sought to recreate her—or become her—by crafting what investigators called a “woman suit” from human skin.

Sensational accounts often label him a necrophile or cannibal, but the record from 1957 doesn’t support those claims. TIME magazine, citing case psychiatrists, reported no evidence of cannibalism or sexual acts with corpses. Instead, Gein’s fixation seemed centered on preservation, display, and identity—an attempt to hold onto the mother he could never let go.

Interrogation and Confession Problems

Gein’s first days in custody were chaotic. Sheriff Arthur Schley and other officers questioned him aggressively. Reports later confirmed that Schley lost control and physically assaulted Gein, slamming his head against a wall. This misconduct had major consequences: a judge ruled that Gein’s initial confession was inadmissible, limiting how prosecutors could use his statements in court.

The Legal Path

Arraignment and Commitment (1957–1958).
On November 21, 1957, Gein was arraigned in Waushara County. He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. Doctors diagnosed him with schizophrenia and declared him unfit to stand trial. He was sent to Central State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

Trial and Verdict (1968).
After more than a decade of treatment, doctors judged Gein competent. His case went to trial in November 1968, but at his lawyers’ request it was a bench trial, heard only by Judge Robert H. Gollmar. After a week of testimony, the judge found him guilty of Bernice Worden’s murder. In a separate sanity hearing, however, the court ruled Gein not guilty by reason of insanity. He was recommitted indefinitely.

Gein was never tried for Mary Hogan’s murder. Officials considered the evidence sufficient, but cost and logistics kept the state from pursuing another trial.

Final Years.
Gein spent the rest of his life in institutions. When Central State’s role shifted in the late 1970s, he was moved to Mendota Mental Health Institute in Madison. He lived there quietly until his death.

Death and Aftermath

On July 26, 1984, Ed Gein died of respiratory failure caused by lung cancer. He was 77 years old. He was buried in Plainfield Cemetery beside his family, but his grave attracted vandals. His headstone was repeatedly defaced, then stolen entirely in 2000. Recovered in Seattle a year later, it was placed in storage. Today, Gein lies in an unmarked grave.

The Farmhouse Fire

If his house had survived, it might have become a grim tourist attraction. But it never got the chance. Scheduled for auction in March 1958, the farmhouse burned to the ground just days beforehand. The fire was almost certainly arson, but no one was ever charged. The destruction erased the physical stage on which Gein’s crimes had unfolded.

Facts vs. Myths

Because Gein’s case has become cultural legend, separating truth from rumor is vital:

• Confirmed victims: Mary Hogan (1954) and Bernice Worden (1957). Nothing beyond those two was ever proven.

• Grave robbing: Confirmed by police exhumations.

• Sexual crimes: No evidence of necrophilia or cannibalism, despite later claims.

• Artifacts: Documented by the state crime lab, not exaggerated later.

• Legal outcome: Found guilty of Worden’s murder, then ruled insane, and confined for life.

Why Gein Still Haunts Us

Why does Ed Gein still loom so large, nearly seven decades later? Because he represented the unthinkable: that horror could live quietly next door, concealed behind a rural façade. He wasn’t a charming conman or a master criminal. He was a solitary, awkward handyman whose farm concealed a secret world of death.

The imagery of Gein’s crimes reshaped American culture. Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho drew from his mother fixation. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre borrowed the rural house of horrors. The Silence of the Lambs echoed his “woman suit” and grotesque handiwork. Each creation took pieces of his story and spun them into enduring archetypes.

Ed Gein remains a grim reminder of how ordinary landscapes can hide extraordinary darkness. His crimes remind us that truth is often more unsettling than fiction—and that sometimes, the scariest monsters aren’t born in Hollywood but in the shadows of small towns.