The Ed Gein Story’ Fact vs. Fiction

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Monster: The Ed Gein Story!

The residents of Plainfield, Wis., thought Ed Gein was just a lonely farmer, but he turned out to be a murderer and body mutilator, who was later known as “The Butcher of Plainfield.”

Gein and his disturbing acts are the inspiration for Monster: The Ed Gein Story, the latest season in Ryan Murphy‘s Monster anthology series on Netflix. Charlie Hunnam plays Gein, whose story is terrifying and influenced classic films like Psycho and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

“[Gein] is probably one of the most influential people of the 20th century, and yet people don’t know that much about him,” Murphy told Tudum. “He influenced some of the biggest serial killers of the 20th century — which is another thing that I think people did not and do not know about him — Ted Bundy, and on and on and on.”

Gein lived a quiet life in the Midwest until he was linked to the death of a local hardware store owner in 1957. As a result, police searched his property, where they found a collection of human remains, including masks and body suits made out of human skin.

Gein eventually confessed to two murders, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. He pleaded not guilty and claimed insanity in one of the cases. In the end, Gein was institutionalized until he died in 1984.

Here’s everything to know about what is fact and what is fiction in Monster: The Ed Gein Story.

Did Ed Gein rob graves?

Yes, Gein dug up graves and stole body parts.

He monitored obituaries to know who had been freshly buried. Gein admitted to only taking parts of the body, like the head, but he stole an entire female corpse once, per TIME. One of the graves was located next to where his mother, Augusta Gein, was buried.

He claimed he “preserved the remains just to look at.”

According to A&E, Gein visited local cemeteries about 40 times over the years. Additionally, Rolling Stone reported that he was active between 1947 and 1952, exhuming the bodies of nine women.

Did Ed Gein make masks and suits out of human skin?

Gein did make masks and body suits out of human skin.

When the police searched the Gein farm, they made a gruesome discovery in the house. There were masks and body suits made of female skin, along with human skulls for soup bowls and other disturbing oddities.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Gein had a complicated relationship with his mom, which made him want to “become more like a woman,” and he resorted to creating a suit made of human skin using corpses of women that reminded him of his mom.

According to History.com, the remains of 10 women, including the headless and gutted body of a hardware store owner, were found when investigators searched Gein’s farm.

Was Ed Gein a cannibal?

Gein committed many gruesome crimes, but cannibalism was not one of them.

As TIME reported in 1957, Gein claimed not to practice cannibalism or necrophilia. The body parts and corpses he stole from the cemeteries were used for skin suits and decorative purposes.

According to A&E, Gein said he did not have sex with the bodies because “they smelled too bad.”

How many people did Ed Gein kill?

Gein confessed to killing two women: Bernice Worden, a local hardware store owner who had recently gone missing, and Mary Hogan, a tavern owner who had disappeared three years prior.

Both women were shot, with Hogan killed in 1954 and Worden in 1957.

Per Rolling Stone, the police thought Gein might have been involved with other missing person cases from around the same time, but he passed a polygraph test, indicating he was innocent.

Did Ed Gein kill any of his family members?

In the first episode of Monster: The Ed Gein Story, Gein is shown killing his older brother, Henry Gein.

In real life, Henry died under mysterious circumstances, but there was no evidence that Gein killed him. According to USA Today, Henry died of heart failure while the two brothers were battling a fire on their farmland after they tried to burn away marsh vegetation.

As for his mother, Gein was close to her, but he did not kill her. A year after Henry’s death, Augusta suffered a stroke and died from a second stroke, per the publication. Her death is depicted in a scene in the Netflix series.

Gein’s father, George Gein, died of heart failure in 1940, four years before Henry’s death.

Is Psycho based on Ed Gein?

Yes, the book and movie Psycho were based on Gein, per The New York Times.

Like Norman Bates in Psycho, Gein had a bond with his mother. Director Alfred Hitchcock and the making of his groundbreaking 1960 horror film are depicted in Monster: The Ed Gein Story.

Gein was also the inspiration for other killers in pop culture, including Leatherface in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs. The making of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is also shown in the Netflix series.