Ed began making nocturnal visits to as many as 40 cemeteries, frequently leaving without any offense, but on at least 9 occasions Ed dug up the coffins of newly-buried middle-age women. He had scouted these women out in the obituaries. He would take what he wanted then recover the violated graves.

Besides masturbation, Ed denies ever having has a sexual experience in his life and stated that he never had sex with the cadavers because “they smelled too bad.” His cravings and compulsions still fall under the category of necrophilia. An increase in missing persons in the area began at this time as well, stumping police.

Evelyn Hartley was baby-sitting a twenty-month-old girl at the home of La Crosse State College professor Viggo Rasmusen on the evening of October 24, 1953. Rasmusen and his wife, along with many other La Crosse residents, were attending the town homecoming game. The Rasmusen house was located in the 2400 block of Hoeschler Drive. The family had a regular baby-sitter, but she also planned to attend the homecoming game that night.

Evelyn was hired as a replacement. She brought four or five school books with her and planned to study while the baby slept. She was supposed to call her parents at 8:30 p.m. to check in, but she never did. Her father tried to call several times that day and never got an answer. He became worried and went to Rasmusens’ house to check on his daughter.

Evelyn’s father found the house’s doors locked and the lights and radio on. The baby was unharmed, asleep in her crib, but there was no sign of Evelyn. The furniture inside the living room was disarranged and Evelyn’s textbooks were scattered. One of her shoes and her eyeglasses, which were broken, were on the living room floor. Her other shoe was found in the basement. All the windows in the house locked except a basement window in the back of the house. The screen for that window had been taken out and was leaning against the outside wall.  A short stepladder was positioned at the window in the basement; it belonged to the Rasmusens and they’d been using it to help paint the basement.

In addition to the indications of forced entry, was a significant amount of blood of Evelyn’s type both inside the home near the basement window, and outside in the yard. There were two pools of blood in the yard; one stain was 18 inches in diameter. There was a bloody handprint about four feet off the ground on the wall of a garage 100 feet from the Rasmusens’ home, and stains on the home of a neighbor’s house.  Tracker dogs traced Evelyn’s scent for two blocks, then lost the trail at Coulee Drive northeast of the Rasmusen home. Authorities believe whoever took her put her in a car.

Several days after her disappearance, a pair of underpants and a brassiere that could have been Evelyn’s were found near the underpass on Highway 14, two miles south of La Crosse. They too were stained with blood. A bloodstained pair of men’s pants was found along the same road four miles away; it is unknown if the pants are connected to Evelyn’s case.

Some people suspect Edward Theodore Gein may have been involved in Evelyn’s case.   He was visiting relatives in La Crosse, just blocks from the home where she was babysitting, on the night of her disappearance.  No trace of Evelyn was found on his property and he denied any involvement in her case. He has still not been completely cleared.

Her case remains unsolved.