News account drawing shows the Murder Hammer Technique.

Murder Hammers of the Bloody Benders

Cherryvale, Kansas

John Bender, his wife, and their two adult children were serial killers. They would invite solitary travelers to a meal inside their cabin inn; the guest would sit with their back to a curtain hung as a room divider. One of the Benders would stand behind the curtain and whack the victim in the head, through the curtain, with a big hammer. If this didn't kill them outright, a subsequent throat cutting did the trick. The corpses were buried in the Benders' vegetable garden. Body count: possibly 20. The Benders didn't make much money by robbing the dead; investigators surmised that they killed simply because they liked it.

After the Benders disappeared in 1873 (and were never found), their cabin was torn apart by souvenir hunters. The Cherryvale Historical Museum has three of the murder hammers on display, as well as a replica dining room where visitors can sit with their backs to the curtain of doom.