SYSK’s Fall True Crime Playlist: The Tale of the Bloody Benders

0:00This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed Human This mind-boggling episode is an old-timey, true crimey. It concerns one of the worst families to ever set up shop in Kansas, which is really saying something. In the early 1870s, the Bender family's surreptitious killing spree, carried out in their own home no less, resulted in the murders of at least 21 people, which are in the family they nicknamed the Bloody Benders. This episode will knock your socks off, assuming they're still on your feet after the other episodes so far.

0:37Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

0:46Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck and Jerry's here too. So this is Stuff You Should Know, the murder family edition. Yeah, Halloween right around the corner. I've always liked to think of you, me, and Jerry as a kind of murder family. As in you and I and Jerry, right? We always have to correct that because people think you're talking about you, me, your wife. That's right. Okay. Yes. You, me, comma, you, comma, me, comma. No, no. I mean me, my wife, you, me, and Jerry. I've always thought of us as a... Oh, just those two. No, I'm kidding. I miss what you said, though.

1:24You thought of us as what? A murder family? A murder family, yeah. Sure. in the kindest possible way. Exactly. Exactly. No, we're no murder family. And after everybody learns about the Bloody Benders, they'll be like, yeah, Josh and Chuck and Jerry are no murder family. And we wouldn't want to be either because it turns out murder families are not so great, Chuck. Right. And can we shout out a listener who submitted this topic? Oh, yeah, definitely. I feel like that's happening more and more lately. A lot, yeah. As our world gets smaller, our listeners are reminding us that it is quite large. And we got this one from a Kansan.

2:01Oh, that's very appropriate. Is that how you say it? Kansan? I think it's Kansinianite. Okay. Kansinianite. Named Star White. And apparently Star was traveling with the family through Kansas and saw signs in Montgomery County for the benders, the bloody benders, and things commemorating this and said, I'm a Kansanianite and I had no idea that this was a thing I gotta learn more about this so we're doing one you know we like to keep it spooky in October where we can sure for sure and there's nothing spookier than a serial killing family interestingly too this past I think March what I'm taking to be is one of the definitive books on the benders came out it's called Hell's Half Acre And it is by an author named...

2:57Named a drum roll. Named Susan Jonusis. That's why I'm going with her last name. But it came out in March. It's called Hell's Head of Faker, and it does look pretty awesome. So I figured that had to do with this. But no, it's just completely off the cuff from a listener from Kansas, huh? Just driving through. Great name, too, by the way. Star White. What a great name. It's almost like Star Wipe. No wonder you like it. It's your favorite transition. That's right. I do know a bender, actually, but this is, I don't think there's any relation. Yeah, because it's not entirely clear that that was even their names, too.

3:34So we should tell everybody, we're talking about a family that lived in Kansas in the 1870s at a time when Kansas was like the frontier, maybe even beyond the frontier. The Trail of Tears had happened by this time. So the Osage people who had lived there previously have been forced off their land and moved further west to Oklahoma. And the federal government said, come, anybody, all you criminals, you unsavory characters, people escaping your past, come and settle here in Kansas. It's like Australia, but in the center of the United States. That's right. Did you do bad things back east? Right. Just pick up your bags and head west.

4:15That's precisely right. And so a lot of them stopped in Kansas. Again, this was the frontier. But people were still going west, too. So as we'll find out, this family, the Bender family, kind of put up a claim or set down a claim. They did something with the claim. I'm not quite up on my, like, old prospector terminology. They claimed something. Yeah, on this road that kind of kept leading west. And they set up a tavern, an inn, for people to stop in, which is neither here nor there quite yet. But I just kind of wanted to foreshadow that there's going to be a tavern coming in the future. That's right, and that's probably a generous term for what they set up.

4:50Yeah. It was a pretty remote, I guess, you know, not to make too many Kansas jokes, but it was a pretty remote part of Kansas, southeastern Kansas in 1870. It was not Cherryvale yet, but it would eventually become Cherryvale. Right. And at first, the two gentlemen arrived. John Bender Sr. He was around 60 years old. People called him Pa. He didn't talk a lot. when he did talk. It was mostly in German. And then he was with a younger guy in his 20s. And, you know, we're going to say things like identified as his son or, you know, may or may not have been the daughter. Like this is because of a lot of things, partially just, you know, a lot of record keeping back then wasn't super solid, especially when it turns out you may be using aliases and you may be faking that you're a family or you may actually be a family.

5:44Like No one really knows for sure the facts of this, but John Bender Jr. was with him, and he also occasionally went by an alias, put a pin in this one, named John Gebhardt. Chris Gebhardt. He's a comedian. He's great. I know. But apparently John Gebhardt or John Bender Jr. was a bit of a comedian himself. Sort of? From some reports, he was his own audience and no one else was. So to put it another way, he apparently laughed at stuff like inappropriately like Dr. Hibbert. And also at times when – exactly. That was a great John Bender Jr. impression, by the way. But at times where people were like, this guy ain't quite right.

6:32And he also talked a lot. So he was kind of an odd fixture as well, as we'll find out the whole family was. Yeah, he had a German accent but did speak fluent English. And some people think he may have been intellectually disabled. Looking at kind of some of the things that happened, it seems like, I don't know about clear, but, you know, at a time in 1870, they wouldn't have been categorizing people as such anyway, you know. No, for sure. But from the articles of the time, that's what I'm going with from now on. Nobody said anything even remotely like that. I saw it on one, I think, Crime Reads article, and that was about it.

7:14I just got the impression that he was really kind of weird and almost like a Jethro Clampett type. That's who he reminds me of. Okay. So what they built on their 160 acres was, you called it a tavern. I call it just a big room, kind of like a bunkhouse maybe. They called it, or Livia, who helped us with this, called it a foothouse. But it was 16 feet wide, 24 feet long. So what they eventually did was they would put up a canvas sheet, kind of splitting it in two. They lived in the back, and then they called it an inn. You called it a tavern. It was really just a room with some canned goods and supplies and I think a couple of beds, sort of like a bunkhouse.

7:59It was not fancy at all. No, but I'm guessing like as you were passing through Kansas back then and maybe even today, it was pretty appealing. You think? Well, I mean, it was better than sleeping out on the open prairie with the bedroll, right? You know, there was a hot meal. You know, they probably had tobacco. And, yeah, I mean, it was better than nothing. And I think I get the impression also one of the things that made it better than nothing was the daughter who I say we meet right now. Her name was Kate, and she showed up after this tavern, this house had been built. That's right. The two ladies were sent for after everything was done, and it was Ma Bender, who everyone just sort of assumed was the wife and the matriarch of the family.

8:45She went by Elvira sometimes. She was maybe in her 50s and led on like she didn't speak any, if very little, if any, English at all. But had like a terrible temper. She was widely reputed from anybody that met her that she was just a terrible cuss of a person from what I gather. Yeah. In fact, I think she may have been the one sort of leading this whole charge that we'll get to. I've seen both. I've seen her or I've seen Kate. And Kate was the daughter. She was in her 20s. But I think more than anything, she kind of attracted passersby with flyers advertising her mediumship. Like she was into spiritualism and free love apparently too.

9:32And who knows what that means in 1870s Kansas. She was showing a little ankle. I don't know. Like, I have no idea what free love means in that context. But it was unusual, at least, and got attention. Some people thought she may have been the daughter. Other people thought that they presented she and John Jr. as a couple. So it was just sort of one of those things. It's loose out there in 1870s Kansas. So one other thing I read, Chuck, that Liv, you didn't quite hit on was that this family, they weren't like exactly, you know, fading into the woodwork or the prairie. Like they were well known in their little community, mainly because there were only like eight or 10 other settlements around them at the time.

10:14But also because I think they were the only ones running a tavern and they had an orchard that will factor in later. But apparently their cherries and apples and peaches were like really prized out there at the time. So they were part of the community, but they were known to be weird and ma in particular, but you just kind of avoided her as best as you could. Right. So they have this thing set up. It's on the edge of the Great Osage Trail, which is, like you mentioned earlier, where a lot of people continued westward. And it was a good place to have a little bunkhouse that, you know, sold a few things.

10:48What's the word I'm looking for? A general store. No. Ollie's Bargain House. Rations. Oh, okay. Yeah, selling rations and things like that. They sell rations at Ollie's. What is Ollie's? It's like a deep discount liquid area. Like if you stole a truck, you just drive it over there and they'll buy everything and then turn around and sell it. I don't think they actually do that, but it's the appearance of that kind of thing. Yeah, we should be clear. We're not a legend. I've never heard of Ollie's, so I'm innocent of this. You should go wander around one. You'd be like, okay, I got you. Here's an Oriental rug.

11:26Here's some off-brand bleach on the next aisle. Like, it's just that. Really? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Where are these places? All over the place. Really? In every strip mall, in every city, in every country in the world. It may be one of those things that's so ubiquitous I've just never noticed it. Yeah, I think so. Like, right under my nose. It's possible. All right. So, they set up Anali's right there on the Great Osage Trail. And maybe this is a good place to take our first break. Oh, I wasn't expecting that. Let me see. Okay, that sounds good.

12:27Okay, Chuck, so one of the things that made the benders, made us call the benders a murder family, is that they started murdering people pretty shortly after they set up this homestead along the Osage Trail. And one of the things about Kansas at the time was it was really, really violent. Not just in the wars against the Native Americans there. There were also pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions that committed atrocities against one another. The Civil War hybrid kind of broke out thanks to Kansas struggling which kind of state it was going to be. So it was a really violent place. And it was with that kind of violent backdrop that a family could just kill a bunch of travelers without anyone really taking notice.

13:17Because it was also just the kind of place where people just went missing. It just happened. It was a really dangerous place to travel. So when it happened, it didn't exactly like set off the media and search parties didn't usually come out for people. Yeah, absolutely. However, when they start turning up in regular order around town, then you've got a problem. And that's what happened. Yeah. In May of 1871, the body of a man was found in local Drum Creek. This is southeast of the Bender's house. And this is very key here. He had his, he'd been brained, he had his skull bashed in and had his throat cut, which, as you will see, becomes the recurring MO of this family.

14:02Yep. Two more men were found shortly after, I think a few months later. A few months after that, another body was found all in the creek. And apparently they all had that same kind of mortal wound or that combination of injuries. And one of the bodies was identified as a man named William Jones. And he had been carrying, known to have been carrying about$250, which at the time was like a lot of money to today. So it's six grand, close to it. Okay. And he was going to pay off his mortgage for his homestead, which is something people did at that time, too. It's another thing that made it dangerous.

14:41A lot of people were walking around with a lot of cash because they were going to buy land, pay off mortgages, do God knows what. and there weren't banks. So they were traveling with cash. And this guy was exactly that. And there was a farmer whose land he was found on that was initially accused, but they were like, I don't think it was him. So he got off, but I'm sure he was like, wait, what, what? No, it wasn't me. Yeah, and the way he got off too was kind of frustrating as a, like a crime enthusiast reader because they investigated it and they found that the wagon that dropped him had a very distinctive track that one of the back wheels was off center.

15:20And I kept waiting for that to come back. It's like, remember that wagon? That's what eventually led to the killers. But spoiler alert, that does not happen. So don't put a pin in it. Take the pin out of that. Yeah, just throw that pin away. Break it in two. So the thing about, I think one of the reasons why people started getting hot under the collar about these murders too, is that this area got a really bad reputation really fast. Like, it was like you avoid the spot as best you can. Like, maybe go out of your way to avoid this area on the Osage Trail because people just wind up missing there.

15:57And that kind of got people aware of, like, the whole problem that the area was facing, but they didn't know who it was. And they certainly hadn't centered on the benders. The Benders just had a reputation as being odd and possibly a little maybe violently unusual, but not murderers by any stretch. They just weren't suspected for a really long time. Violently unusual. Yeah. What a reputation. Yeah, that's pretty serious. Here's another story, too, that you do need to get that pen out, put it back together that Josh told you to break in half. Oh, I'm sorry, everybody. And put a pin in this story because this was, chronologically speaking, February 1873.

16:42A woman who didn't really have any money apparently stopped at the home, asked to rest, asked for some food, fell asleep on a bed in the back. And then when she woke up, there was Ma Bender, and she pointed to a table covered in pistols and knives and said, there, your supper's ready. Right. So this lady somehow apparently manages to stay composed and not like react with alarm. She goes, oh, fiddlesticks. Yeah, exactly. And said, I just need to step outside for a minute to do something. Just apparently made a private excuse is what the Kansas City Times said. Yeah. And ran and took off running barefoot, basically, you know, in her sleeping clothes, ran for a couple of miles to find help.

17:33and it's hard to parse together what this sentence from the times even means but i'm taking it to mean that it didn't really it still didn't set off alarm bells for this family it didn't and that by the way is a classic example of being violently unusual right okay you know they were just like if you're violently unusual you have the kind of house that people run two miles away from in their bare feet yeah where guns and knives are presented as supper Exactly, right? So this is just kind of going along. The benders are humming along doing their murdering thing. People don't really suspect them, but the area's got a bad reputation.

18:10But there was a series of murders, actually a combo, one-two punch of murders that finally led to their discovery as a murder family. And the first thing started with a guy named George Newton Longcore, who left Independence, Kansas, which was just to the west of Cherryvale along the Osage Trail. And he was on his way to Iowa, so he would have passed through Cherryvale, along with his 18-month-old daughter, Mary Ann. And he never made it to Iowa. And that caught the attention of another man, a physician named William York, who was his neighbor and was concerned enough that he started traveling around inquiring about him to see if he could figure out what happened to George and his daughter, Mary Ann.

18:54Yeah, good neighbor. Yeah, really good neighbor. Like to do such a thing, to take this trip. So starts investigating, finds out that the horse and wagon team was abandoned near Fort Scott, Kansas. And in the spring, I mean, I think that's what led him to go out there. So he's out there in the spring. He gets to Fort Scott. All that stuff is still there. Basically, all of their stuff had been abandoned. They were nowhere to be found. So he's like, something is going on. I need to go back to independence. And then he disappears. Yeah. And that really caught the attention of people because it turned out Dr.

19:33William York. And if I said Edward the first time, please forgive me. His name was William. And he was a doctor. And he was a York. And there were two other Yorks. He had a brother named Edward who was neither here nor there. But he had a really important brother named Alexander York, who was a colonel from the Civil War and also a Kansas senator. So they had murdered the brother of a Kansas senator who was known to be out looking around the area of Cherryvale for somebody else who had gone missing. And that really got people's antenna up. Yeah, big time. Enough to where they got a search party.

20:06Colonel Alexander, I think about 75 men set off. And they were, you know, they were scouring around. They were, they basically kind of figured out at one point that they definitely went by the Bender's house. So let's go by and talk to these people, see what's going on. And when they do this, Ma Bender, you know, claims to not speak English, which seems like her main jam, her big joke besides here's her supper of guns and knives was I also don't speak English. Kate, young Kate says, I don't know anything about this guy. And then John Jr. said, hey, listen, I was shot at when I was out there at Drum Creek where all these like bodies have been found.

20:48And I can take you out there and, like, maybe the people that shot at me killed your friends as well. Yeah. And, again, just imagine Jethro Clampett saying this and taking people out to look at a place where he claims to have been shot at, right? I just – I love that bit. So – But he's also just kooky, you know? Did you watch the Beverly Hillbillies? I did. Like a lot? Yeah, yeah. I watched it a lot. So do you remember the time or the period, I guess it was a phase where Jethro ended up becoming like a movie producer in Hollywood? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, things got a little weird later in that show.

21:28It really did get weird. So it's not clear whether this is that Hollywood producer of Jethro or the original mountaineer son of Jethro. Either way, it works pretty good. But he takes Alexander and the search party out there. I guess he gave enough of an explanation and was, you know, pointing out different spots well enough that they're like, either they believed him or they just didn't really care. And they kind of headed on, basically. Yeah, I mean, he showed bullet holes in a tree, or not holes, but bullet markings, which, you know, Kansas in the 1870s, about half the trees had bullets in them.

22:04Sure. So that doesn't prove anything. But like you said, it was enough at least to sniff them slightly off the case, at least temporarily. But they came back a few days later, said, listen, we heard about this lady over the past few days who came here. And I don't want to really start anything, but she said that you said, here's your supper. And it was guns and knives. There was something about a pistol supper or something like that. And that's weird. She ran away barefoot for two miles, and no one made a big deal out of it. But now we kind of want to know, this is where Ma Bender all of a sudden starts speaking English.

22:45Apparently, the quote is, she flew into a violent passion and went off saying that that lady was a witch. And she has cursed Kate's coffee that she was going to drink. And if she ever comes back here, I'm going to kill her. We got her out of here. She was a witch. Yeah, she converted Kate's coffee into that mushroom coffee. And now Kate refuses to drink it. What's mushroom coffee? It's exactly what it sounds like. Like a magic mushroom coffee? Except it doesn't actually have coffee. No. Oh, it's made out of mushrooms. Yeah. Yeah, you should try it sometime just to say you tried it. Yeah, that's what on those survival shows, they get like roots and twigs and boil that stuff down.

23:26They're like, here's my morning coffee. It's not coffee. Have fun with that. So, again, still, like they were kind of like, okay, this family's really weird, but we don't really have anything on them. But it was enough that Alexander York kind of stuck around town. And they held a meeting with basically the whole town that Pa and John Jr. even attended. And they said, hey, this place has a bad reputation. Something's going on. These two people, at the very least, have turned up missing. We need to just search everyone's homestead. and apparently very brassily, at least one neighbor said, I've got nothing to hide, search my homestead.

24:08And Pa said the same thing. He said, I don't either. You guys search my homestead. And so I guess they kind of did a slow motion search because it was at least a week I saw, if not a couple of weeks before they finally made it out to search the Bender's place. And when they showed up, they realized very quickly that the Bender's weren't there and probably hadn't been there since the night of that meeting. Yeah, when they realized they told people to come search their house. You said what? My favorite part about Kate's jam is that they asked her to do the seance to, like, give some more information, like, well, if you're so good at that.

24:44And she said, no, it's daytime. There's too many people around. Like, have you ever seen a seance? She was like, why don't you come back tomorrow night, just the two of you, and we'll do one. And they were like, no, thank you. Right. I think I'll take the zero in that one. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Dr. Colonel, no, Colonel Alexander York was a sharp dude, basically. Yeah, but the townspeople weren't sharp enough to go. I don't know if they were searching other places. I know there was a weather issue. But like you said, by the time they got there, they were gonzos. They left there. They took a train because they found their horse and wagon and even their dog just on a public street near the train station.

25:26And they got the heck out of Dodge. Well, not out of Dodge. Out of what would become Cherryvale. Very close. Very close. So the volunteers were like, well, I guess since they left, we can just go ahead and go on in. And apparently they found very quickly that there was a trap door in the floor. And when they opened the trap door, I guess a lot of them gagged because it smelled like decaying human remains. And even though they looked in there and there weren't actual bodies, there was so much blood and gore in this cellar rotting that it was enough to make a person gag, even without a full body decomposing there.

26:03I think it's a great place for our second break. Oh, OK. Great. The height of suspense. Let's do it. We'll be back and talk about what was making that smell right after this.

26:41All right. So they have a stone cellar under the house, covered in blood, and stinks like dead bodies, even though there's no dead bodies. and we said we were going to get to the bottom of the smell. The bottom of it is there were dead bodies in there previously. Yeah. So they had this. It was pretty easy. They had the trap set up, the trap door set up, so it led to a hole in the cellar, and then there was like a way out or I guess a way in from the foundation, and they would kill people, put them in the trap door, through the trap door to the cellar, and then retrieve them at night when there weren't prying eyes around.