The Real-Life Event That The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Is Based On

The true story of Ed Gein is a case of reality not only being stranger than fiction, but more repulsive. Gein is the progenitor of every modern serial killer stereotype. Fanatically religious mother with whom he lived until her death? Check. Taught from a young age about the evils of sex? Check. Asocial loner who stalked women resembling his late mother? Check. Fascination with necrophilia and dissecting human bodies? Check. 

After that, things get even more grotesque. Gein, born in 1906, worked as a handyman out of a farmhouse in Plainfield, Wisconsin, per Biography. Over the years, several local women went missing, and the mystery of their disappearances came to a head on November 16, 1957, when Bernice Warden vanished from her hardware store, cash register gone, and a trail of blood leading out of the store. Her son, Frank Warden, happened to be deputy sheriff, and suspected that Gein was involved. When police arrived at Gein's house, they discovered a horrifying array of evidence regarding Gein's activities, including the decapitated corpse of Warden hanging upside in the kitchen, skulls used for bowls, lampshades and upholstery made from flesh, leggings and a corset made from skin, and nine skinned faces of women hanging on the bedroom wall. Gein evidently enjoyed wearing the skin of his victims, and pretending to be his mother. 

And his late mother's room? In pristine, untouched condition. Gein spent his remaining years in mental institutions, before dying in 1984.

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7qL7Up56eZpOkunB%2BkmtuamhfqbWmedGemKVlnJ6zpnnEr5ynrF2ptaLAjK2fnmWkmsWiv4ycn5qhnqiuuHnMmqqsmZOnsm610maZmquVmXqwuo4%3D