This podcast contains adult themes and may
be disturbing to some listeners. Discretion is advised. Welcome to Class-A Felons, B-Films, C-Cups;
we're your hostesses. I'm Paris. Today's episode is titled:
The Manson Women: "Look at Your Game, Girl." I'd like to start the very first episode of
our podcast with a quote from one of my all-time favorite authors, Vincent Bugliosi, about
a haunted--and haunting night in August 1969: "It was so quiet, one of the killers would
later say, you could almost hear the sound of ice rattling in cocktail shakers in the
homes way down the canyon." The murders that occurred in the wealthy enclave
known as Benedict Canyon in Los Angeles, California, not far from Bel Air, instantly became known
as the crime of the century and the event that officially ended the 1960s. The chief reason for this was the intrigue
surrounding the most famous victim that night, Sharon Tate, even though she wasn't actually
all that famous. It was her husband, Roman Polanski, who had
become one of the best-known names in Hollywood the previous year after directing one of the
best horror films of all time, Rosemary's Baby. Sharon was a B-film actress, only truly becoming
a star in death. Although she was quite beautiful and improving
in her craft with every film, she was taking a break to focus on her much-anticipated first
child, who was due the following month. Yet the murders actually began about a week
prior to Sharon's, and she wasn't the only one killed that night--or the next. And then there was yet another murder before
the month was out. In all, Charles Manson would kill, or have
his cult known as The Family, kill nine people, not to mention a tenth victim previously wounded
by Charlie. The murders created ripples of panic and fear
throughout Los Angeles County in 1969. And so we begin. Enter the chilling, darkened, and surprisingly
aesthetic sphere of Charles Manson and his followers, known as the Manson Family. Gary Hinman--July 31, 1969. 34 years old. Stabbed 5 times by family associate Bobby
Beausoleil and mutilated by Manson. Steve Parent--August 9, 1969. 18 years old. Shot 4 times by family member Tex Watson. Jay Sebring--August 9, 1969. 35 years old. Stabbed 7 times and shot once by Tex Watson. Abigail Folger--August 9, 1969. 25 years old. Stabbed 28 times by family members Patricia
Krenwinkel and Tex Watson. Voytek Frykowski--August 9, 1969. 32 years old. Stabbed 51 times and shot twice by family
members Susan Atkins and Tex Watson. Sharon Tate, aka Sharon Polanski--August 9,
1969. 26 years old, 8 months pregnant. She was planning on naming her son Paul Richard
Polanski. Stabbed 16 times by either Susan Atkins, Tex
Watson, or both. Leno LaBianca--August 10, 1969. 44 years old. Stabbed 26 times with a knife and a large
double-tined fork by Tex Watson and Patricia Krenwinkel. Rosemary LaBianca--August 10, 1969. 38 years old. Stabbed 41 times by family members Patricia
Krenwinkel and Leslie Van Houten. Donald Shea, aka "Shorty" Shea--August 26,
1969. 35 years old. Stabbed multiple times and tortured to death
by family members behalf on Tex Watson, Steve Grogan, and Bruce Davis; his body was not
recovered for 8 years. Shooting victim: Bernard Crowe, aka "Lotsapoppa"--July 1, 1969. Shot once by Manson but recovered from his
wound, although Manson believed for over a year that he had killed him. There's a plethora of information out there
about Charles Manson, including podcasts, and there's also a lot of misinformation,
particularly about his early life. For instance, the fact that Charlie spent
years with a loving grandmother and was raised and even married in the Nazarene Church is
usually left out of his life story. And so I already have something in common
with Charlie; my sister and I attended the Nazarene Church as children--although not
the same Nazarene Church. So I've chosen instead to profile five women
who are, arguably, the most fascinating members of the Manson Family, starting with: Susan Denise Atkins. Susan, aka Sadie Mae Glutz, was born May 7,
1948 in San Gabriel, CA., which is in Los Angeles County. She was raised in San Jose, California by
her father Edward, a former private in the U.S. Army, and her mother Jeanne. Susan would later claim that her parents were
both alcoholics, although there's no corroborating evidence. She was an average student in school, attended
church, and never got into trouble. The event that first defined her early life
was when her mother died of cancer. Susan was 15. She sang in the choir at either school or
church that year and remembered taking the other members of her group to sing Christmas
carols outside her mother's bedroom window during her final days. "I couldn't understand why she died," she
later testified, "and it hurt me." Susan's last school photo was taken when she
was 13, so about 8th grade. She looks solemn, almost worried, in the photo,
and her hair is in a sort of shaggy bouffant. This is the year her mother was diagnosed
with terminal cancer and Susan claims in one of her books that this is the last photo taken
of her for nearly 7 years. But this isn't true. A number of photos exist from her high school
days, most of them yearbook photos. In a high school photo, she looks fresh-faced
and attractive, wearing long bangs, and the rest of her hair is either cropped short or,
more likely, pinned up in the back. She belonged to several clubs in high school,
including drama and glee club. One photo shows her dressed in a conservative
Jackie Kennedy-style tweed suit, while another shows a trendier side of Susan wearing black
pants or jeans with white go-go boots. After her mother passed away, she and her
father constantly got into arguments. They were heavily in debt due to her mother's
medical bills. Her grandparents moved in for a while to help
while her father left home for periods of time to look for better work. At one point, however, she and her brothers
had to briefly stay in a foster home. She dropped out of Los Banos High School and
went to stay in San Francisco, about 48 miles from her San Jose home. There, she took jobs as a telemarketer and
a waitress before deciding to tag along with a couple of escaped convicts and commit armed
robberies with them up the coast. They were caught in Oregon in 1966, and Susan
was sentenced to three months in jail plus probation. She had a .25 caliber pistol with her. As she was put into handcuffs, she told the
arresting officer that if he hadn't drawn his gun first, she would have killed him. Afterwards, she returned to San Francisco
and began working as a topless dancer. Susan had long, dark hair and huge brown eyes,
and an almost constant impish expression. Much of her life story cannot be corroborated,
because she was known to often exaggerate or outright lie. She bragged that she had once worked for Anton
LaVey. LaVey was an infamous entertainer who worked
at various times as a lion tamer, stage hypnotist, burlesque pianist, and police photographer,
but he's best known as the founder of the Church of Satan. Susan supposedly played the role of a vampire
who emerged from a coffin during a witches' sabbath arranged by Anton. She was adept at using her sexuality and extroverted
personality to obtain attention, manipulate others, and get what she wanted, which was
very often men. But after meeting Charlie Manson at a party
in San Francisco where she watched him play guitar, she immediately joined his group of
women followers. The day they met, he told her that she was
"perfect" and that she had a "hang-up" about her father. She was so slavishly in love with him that
once, when he remarked, "I'd like half a coconut, even if you have to go to Rio de Janeiro to
get it," Susan was instantly out the door when he called out, "Never mind." Still, she wanted first pick of any new men
who appeared on the scene. Fellow Family member Dianne Lake felt that
Susan longed to be just like Charlie and would sometimes try to act like him. Susan was believed to have brought gonorrhea
into the Manson Family, and Dennis Wilson--drummer for the legendary Beach Boys and temporary
Manson Family associate--took them all to his personal doctor for treatment. "It was probably the largest gonorrhea bill
in history," Dennis later said. In June of 1968, Susan, Patricia Krenwinkel,
and a few other Manson women traveled to Mendocino, California for a Family recruiting effort
and were arrested when they gave LSD to a minor. In an article published on June 24th of that
year, the Ukiah Daily Journal referred to them as the "witches of Mendocino." Susan received a suspended sentence of 60
days in jail and three years probation for what was then a felony charge of possession
of marijuana. Susan became pregnant in early 1968 by a Family
associate known as "New Bruce." She seemed to have a difficult pregnancy. Formerly graceful, with a great figure, and
obsessed with being viewed as sexy, she was now clumsy and awkward. On the other hand, let's not forget she was
also prone to exaggeration. She constantly complained about not feeling
well throughout her pregnancy, although she was always down for horse riding and drugs. When Susan went into early labor on October
7, 1968, the Manson Family members present at the time all gathered 'round. Charlie coached her through, and when her
son was born, he ordered the youngest member of the group, Dianne, to cut the umbilical
cord with her teeth. It was to be a symbolic bond, since the two
women were often scrapping with each other. Because Charlie wanted the baby to have a
"powerful" and completely "original" name, he chose--are you ready?-- Zezozose Zadfrack
Glutz. When sheriff's deputies raided Barker Ranch
in Death Valley, California, where part of the Family were staying around the time of
the Tate-LaBianca murders in 1969, Zezozose was among the children and babies taken into
foster care. He was a year old at the time and badly sunburned. Sort of weirdly, Susan's maternal grandmother
and Sharon Tate's mother shared the same name, Doris, and after being adopted by a doctor,
Susan's son, little Zezo, had his named changed to Paul, the same name Sharon had decided
on for her own son, who was to have been named after her father. Former Family member Dianne Lake has said
that shortly after the Tate-LaBianca murders, out in the desert near Barker Ranch, Susan,
Patricia, and Leslie Van Houten all told her about their roles those two nights. The three participants chattered about murder
as if they were teens sitting on a frilly pink bedspread rehashing the latest school
dance. Susan admitted stabbing Sharon Tate. This is significant, because over the ensuing
years, she recanted this admission and changed the story several times. Dianne declares there's no doubt in her mind
that Susan told her the truth about personally murdering Sharon. When the Beatles' White Album was released
in 1968, Charlie insisted that the song "Sexy Sadie" was, of course, about Susan, their
very own Sadie Mae Glutz. As Charlie began to realize that the music
career he longed for wasn't getting off the ground, he seemed to become much more materialistic
and interested in money-making schemes. He came up with the idea of have the women
in the Family become topless dancers. He sent Bobby Beausoleil to the Sunset Strip
in Hollywood to negotiate a deal. However, only Susan and a couple of others
had bust sizes impressive enough to make the cut, so Charlie scrapped that plan. On the night of the LaBianca murders, Charlie
drove around Los Angeles with Susan and two other Family members, Linda Kasabian and Steve,
aka Clem, Grogan. Charlie wanted Linda to seek out a Lebanese
actor she'd once slept with in his Venice Beach apartment 17 miles from Los Angeles
and, with Susan and Clem in tow, kill him. Dreading the thought of another murder, Linda
purposely knocked on the wrong door and when an unknown voice called out from behind the
door, she essentially told the others, "Oops, wrong apartment, guess he moved." Before they left the building, however, Susan
defecated on the landing. At the time of her arrest for her participation
in the Gary Hinman murder, Susan stood 5'5" tall and weighed 120 pounds. According to cellmate Virginia Graham, Susan
stood out at Sybil Brand, the Los Angeles County Jail for women. She'd go around singing down the aisles and
chatting endlessly about LSD trips she'd taken, karma, and good and bad vibes. Also, without warning, she'd suddenly stop
whatever she was doing and start go-go dancing. [I need to try this in my own life.] She did her exercises without underwear [well,
I've heard naked yoga was the thing back then] and sexually propositioned other inmates. She gushed about Charlie constantly and told
Virginia that it was Charlie who gave her the name 'Sadie Mae Glutz.' Per Vincent Bugliosi's well-researched book
Helter Skelter, Virginia remarked that she didn't consider that much of a favor. After blabbing to Virginia and another cellmate
named Ronnie Howard about the Tate murders and her role in them, as well as initially
agreeing to testify against the other Family members in exchange for immunity (an agreement
she later reneged on), little white stickers began appearing around jail bearing the words,
"Sadie Glutz is a snitch" (Kendall). Susan had also told Ronnie that she had reached
a point in her life where she'd done everything there was to do; there was nothing left. At times, the details of Susan's descriptions
of Sharon Tate's murder varied; however, as with Dianne, she always maintained to Virginia
and Ronnie that she had done the stabbing. Sometimes, though, she mentioned that one
or two of her accomplices had held Sharon down for her. Susan also confided to both women that she
was very good at playing "crazy," especially with psychiatrists. "All you have to do is act normal," Ronnie
retorted Susan told Virginia in detail about how the
Family planned to kill other famous people, including celebrities Elizabeth Taylor, Richard
Burton, Steve McQueen, Frank Sinatra, and Tom Jones. Susan said she would take a red-hot knife
and hold it to Elizabeth Taylor's face, carve the words "helter skelter" on her forehead,
and gouge out her violet eyes. Then she wanted to castrate Richard Burton
and mail the evidence, along with Liz's eyes, to Eddie Fisher, Taylor's ex-husband. But that's not all. She also fantasized about raping Tom Jones
and then slitting his throat as well as skinning Frank Sinatra alive with his own music playing
in the background and making purses out of his skin to sell to hippies. After tons of red-tape and dismissals, Virginia
and Ronnie were both able, separately, to report Susan's bizarre confessions. After Susan found out, she sent a jailhouse
note to Ronnie. In part, it read: "When I first heard you
were the informer I wanted to slit your throat. Then I snapped that I was the real informer
and it was my throat I wanted to cut." She then quoted from a song of Charlie's called
"Cease to Exist" [confession: I actually love this song, and I think it shows that Charlie
did have some promise as a musician]: "Cease to exist, just come and say you love me." Susan also wrote incriminating letters to
others, some of which were later read in court. Charlie's lawyer wanted the words "love, love,
love" redacted from one note because, he claimed, they were obviously a reference to Manson. "Sounds more like Gertrude Stein," the judge
commented wryly. [And I always appreciate a well-placed literary
reference.] The Los Angeles District Attorney--and, weirdly,
his last name was Younger, while the trial judge's last name was Older-- initially offered
Susan full immunity for the Hinman and Tate murders in exchange for her cooperative testimony,
which infuriated the lead prosecuting attorney Vincent Bugliosi, as Susan repulsed him and
he had zero trust in her. Her taped confession proved Bugliosi's reservations
about making her his star witness. As she talked about the horrific murders,
her voice was flat and affectless. When she related the details of Sharon's death,
she giggled. In her testimony before the grand jury who
convened to decide if there was enough evidence to bring Charlie, Patricia, and Leslie to
trial (Tex wasn't included because he was still fighting extradition from Texas, where
he'd fled after the murders), Susan related that, "Among ourselves we called ourselves
the Family. It was a family like no other family." Bugliosi was sure he heard a juror mutter,
"Thank God!" Almost immediately, Charlie managed to get
a meeting with Susan in jail, with their attorneys present, and she instantly repudiated her
testimony. Susan's lawyer remembered that Charlie asked
Susan, "Are you afraid of the gas chamber?" She smiled and said no. She would no longer be a witness, and she
would stand trial with the others. Susan's father was still living in San Jose,
and he told reporters that his daughter was sick and needed help. He blamed her involvement in the Family on
drugs and the leniency of the courts in Susan's previous sentencing. During the trial, jurors were sequestered
for nearly nine months at the Ambassador Hotel, a piece of Los Angeles history that has since
been torn down, to the utter horror of historical architecture buffs like ourselves. Robert Kennedy was assassinated there the
year before the Tate-LaBianca murders. A member of the prosecution team noted that
Judge Older had sentenced felons for less time than the jurors would have to serve. Paul Fitzgerald, Patricia's attorney, joked,
"Not at the Ambassador, though." At Charlie's direction and cues, Susan, Patricia,
and Leslie regularly disrupted court proceedings. When his motion to represent himself (called
in pro per) was denied, Charlie said dramatically, "Okay, then you leave me nothing. You can kill me now." He bowed his head and held out his arms in
a crucifixion pose. The three women immediately emulated him and
all four resisted, scuffling with the deputies, as they were removed from the courtroom. Later during the trial, Manson leapt over
the defense table with a sharpened pencil in his hand toward the judge, screaming, "In
the name of Christian justice, someone should cut your head off!" The women stood and began chanting in Latin
as they were all removed. At another point, while Susan passed by Bugliosi,
she kicked a female deputy in the leg, then grabbed Bugliosi's trial notes off the lectern,
ripping them in half. While Linda Kasabian, star witness for the
prosecution, described the murder of Steven Parent, the three women assumed disaffected
poses, with Susan giggling, Leslie sketching, and Patricia looking bored. Virginia Graham, Susan's one-time cell mate,
took the stand to testify against her. She was a very glamorous woman who styled
herself according to the big-hair and heavy eyeliner standards of the day. Susan called out in court to her, "Why don't
you take off your wig and phony face? You are not a very good actress." One day, Susan lost her bra and court was
postponed until another one could be located for her to appear in at her trial. Although Patricia and Leslie's parents testified
in the penalty phase of the trial on their behalf, Susan's father refused to have anything
to do with her and never appeared in court. What he did want to do, he told reporters,
was get his hands on Manson. Bugliosi managed to ask Susan on the stand
if she thought that Charlie was Jesus Christ. She was evasive, so he asked her again: "You
think that maybe Charles Manson, the man over there who is playing with his hair, might
be Jesus Christ?" [This is why I love you, Vince.] She finally answered, "He represented a God
to me that was so beautiful that I'd do anything for him." When asked how she felt about the victims,
she responded, "They didn't even look like people…I didn't relate to Sharon Tate as
being anything but a store mannequin…[s]he just sounded like an IBM machine…and I got
sick of listening to her, so I stabbed her." All four defendants--Charlie, Susan, Patricia,
and Leslie--were sentenced to death. That day, they appeared in court with their
heads shaved. Before the sentence was read, Charlie yelled,
"You people have no authority over me…Half of you in here ain't as good as I am." He was once again removed, and after the verdict
was read, each of the remaining defendants also had something to say, unprompted. Patricia proclaimed, "You have just judged
yourselves," while Susan taunted, "Better lock your doors and watch your own kids." Leslie followed this up with, "Your whole
system is a game. You blind, stupid people. Your children will turn against you." One trial spectator, Los Angeles Times reporter
Dave Smith, observed of Susan, "Watching her behavior--bold and actressy in court, cute
and mincing when making eye contact with someone, a little haunted when no one is paying attention--I
get the feeling that one day she might start screaming, and simply never stop." This assessment seems to sum up Susan's life
from her early helplessness at her mother's death to her exaggerated gleefulness at sentencing
others to die. In 1972, the state of California overturned
the death penalty, and all of the Manson Family's sentences were automatically commuted to life
in prison with the possibility of parole. In 1977, Susan cowrote a book from prison
called Child of Satan, Child of God in which she attributed her willingness to murder for
Charlie to Satanic possession and now claimed to be a born-again Christian. During her stay in prison, she was denied
parole a total of 17 times. She participated in prison programs and taught
classes. In 1981, she married a serial husband named
Donald Lee Laisure. I call him a serial husband because Susan
supposedly became his 35th or 36th wife. He was a heavyset guy who liked to replace
the 's' in his last name with a dollar sign, and he professed to be a millionaire, except
he wasn't. The marriage lasted less than a year. Susan then married a James Whitehouse, fifteen
years her junior, who became a lawyer and began representing her at parole hearings. Like her mother, Susan had health issues throughout
her life. She reportedly suffered from hepatitis while
with the Manson Family. In early 2008, she was diagnosed with brain
cancer. She also had one leg amputated. Her attorney-husband requested what's known
as a 'compassionate release' from prison. Vincent Bugliosi did not oppose the release,
stating that she had paid "substantially, though not completely, for her horrendous
crimes" and noting that it would save the state a great deal of money in medical costs. However, others, including Deputy DA Stephen
Kay, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and members of the Tate and Sebring families wanted her
to remain in prison until death. Susan and her attorney-husband's request was
denied just 22 days before she died on September 24, 2009. Born December 3, 1947, Patricia Dianne Krenwinkel,
also called Patty, Big Patty, or Katie, was maybe the most insecure of Manson's women. She had long, thick reddish-brown hair and
striking blue eyes. In her photos, her physique seems to alternative
from slightly heavyset and muscular to extremely thin and petite. At the time of her arrest for the Tate and
LaBianca murders, she was 5'6" and 120 pounds. She was 22 but looked older. She also sometimes went by the aliases "Marnie
Reeves" and "Mary Ann Scott." She grew up in and near Mobile, Alabama with
her father Joseph, her mother Dorothy, and an older half-sister, Charlene, from her mother's
first marriage before the family moved to California. Her father, Joseph, was an insurance agent
in Inglewood, near the city of Compton, then a solidly middle-class area. Patricia had an ordinary childhood and was
very involved in extracurricular activities, such as the Bluebirds and Camp Fire Girls,
which focused on children's outdoor activities, Job's Daughters (a Masonic-affiliated spiritual-based
girls' organization), the Audubon Society (an environmental group), and the church choir. She was an average student in school. She was briefly enrolled at Westchester High
School, the same school fellow family member Lynette Fromme attended--although they didn't
know each other--and then went to University High in West Los Angeles. Patricia lost her virginity at age 15 and
never saw the boy again. The experience caused her tremendous guilt. For a while, she became obese and finally
lost the weight through the use of diet pills, which would have afflicted her with unpleasant
side effects. When she was 17 and her parents amicably divorced,
she briefly moved back to Alabama to live with her mother and attended a semester at
Spring Hill, a Jesuit college there. It's been said that she considered becoming
a nun at the time. But she soon returned to California and moved
into an apartment in Manhattan Beach, in the South Bay Area of Los Angeles, with her half-sister
Charlene. Charlene later died at age 26 back in Anniston,
Alabama after Patty had been extradited to California and was awaiting trial for the
Tate-LaBianca murders. Reportedly, Charlene had gone skinny-dipping
at night with her boyfriend. They got separated, and her body was discovered
in the morning lying in shallow water. It's been widely speculated that she was on
drugs at the time and perhaps died from a drug overdose. On September 12, 1967, when she was 19, Patricia
abandoned her car in a Manhattan Beach parking garage, quit her job as a file clerk without
collecting her paycheck, and abruptly left town with Charles Manson. Charlie was the first man who had ever told
her she was beautiful. In early 1968, Patty, along with another Family
member, Ella, were picked up by Dennis Wilson while hitchhiking along Sunset Boulevard. The acquisition of a wealthy benefactor and
music industry insider like Dennis was considered a major contribution to the Family. According to Dianne Lake, Dennis initially
drove the women to Spahn Ranch, where he met Charlie & his philosophies, listened to him
sing "Look at Your Game, Girl," and was told by Charlie, "You know, man, you got your father
in you. He took over your mind, and that's why you
don't believe in your own music." On at least one occasion, the women rode with
Dennis in his burgundy Rolls Royce to the local A&P or Ralph's supermarket to go dumpster
diving for food. Once, they made him a strawberry cake topped
with dumpster Cool Whip from their spoils. The Manson Family women also once stripped
the satin sheets from Dennis' bed to make swimsuits and pants for themselves. Dennis scheduled a recording session for Charlie
at his brother Brian Wilson's house in Bel Air with some music producers. Charlie had trouble getting into his game
and soon stormed out of the studio. He was not only upset at their helpful advice
for improving his sound, he was also enraged at their aesthetic suggestions, which he described
to Dennis: "Dig it, man, they want me to dress like you dudes. I ain't gonna wear no threads like that. That just ain't me!" On the night of the Tate murders, Patricia,
like Susan, wore a dark t-shirt and blue jeans. Tex Watson wore a black velour turtleneck
and dark pants. The women were barefoot. After stabbing Abigail Folger to death, Patricia
went along the next night to kill the LaBiancas. She stabbed Rosemary multiple times, then
went into the kitchen and wrote "Healter Skelter" (misspelled) in blood. She walked into the living room where Tex
had murdered Leno holding a large two-pronged carving fork that, in better times, was used
at LaBianca family holiday festivities and plunged it into Leno's stomach. She then carved the word "war" into the dead
man's abdomen. After that, Patricia, Leslie and Tex took
a shower and began to feel hungry (as you do just after murdering innocent people). So they went back into the kitchen and ate
the LaBiancas' food. Leslie also took some of Rosemary's clothes
to wear back to Spahn Ranch. When Patricia, Susan, and Leslie later recounted
the murders to Dianne Lake, she thought their actions seemed in character for Susan and
Leslie, but she was shocked at Patty's voluntary participation. When the police investigation began to close
in on the Manson Family, Patricia fled back to Mobile, Alabama. A warrant was put out for her arrest in connection
with the Tate-LaBianca murders. Local police spotted her riding around town
in a car with a male teenaged friend. She was wearing what the L.A. Times termed
"hippie garb": a big, floppy hat, blue jeans, and a man's checkered shirt two sizes too
big for her. When she saw the policemen staring at her,
she pulled the hat down over her eyes (Larsen). Patricia was convicted of seven counts of
murder and one count of conspiracy to commit murder. She was sentenced to death which, as with
Susan, was commuted to life in prison with the possibility of parole. She's been at the California Institution for
Women in Chino, California ever since, holding the record for the longest-incarcerated woman
in state history. Although she has a perfect prison record with
no write-ups ever, she's been turned down for parole 14 times. She's earned a Bachelor's degree in Human
Services via correspondence courses at the University of La Verne. She's active in several prison programs, including
Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, teaches reading, plays on a prison volleyball
team, and plays guitar. By 1974, Patricia, along with fellow killer
Leslie Van Houten, had professed to be sorry for the murders, possibly with an eye toward
future parole hearings. Leslie Louise Van Houten, aka Lulu, was born
August 23, 1949 in Los Angeles, California to Paul, an auto auctioneer, and Jane, a teacher. Along with one older brother, they all lived
in a typical middle-class neighborhood. After the Korean War, Leslie's parents adopted
two more children, a boy and a girl, who had been orphaned in Korea. However, in 1963, they divorced, and the children
all remained with Jane. From an early age, Leslie struggled with impulsiveness. She went into rages when she didn't get her
way, and she once beat her adopted sister with a shoe. At her first trial, however, her mother described
her as "feisty" and fun, with a wonderful sense of humor. As a young teenager, Leslie loved to go dancing
at the Harmony Park Ballroom in Anaheim, California, near Disneyland. This venue was made famous by its house band,
The Del-Tones, by Hometown Jamboree, a country-western radio and, later, TV show that broadcast there,
and by the fact that Richard Berry wrote the hit song "Louie, Louie" there in 1955. Leslie even bought shoes based on how well
they would slide across the ballrooms wood floors. With her straight brown hair and big brown
eyes, Leslie was popular at Monrovia High School and was elected homecoming princess
twice, in her freshman and sophomore years. In her junior year, she wasn't chosen for
the homecoming court, and she became bitter over the perceived rejection. At the same time, though, she began experimenting
with drugs, especially LSD. She became pregnant at 15 by an older boy
and Jane forced her to have an abortion, which created a deep resentment toward her mother. She ran away with the young man to Haight-Ashbury
but soon returned home; the hippie scene, her mother said, frightened her. She managed to graduate high school in 1967
and immediately moved in with her father. She enrolled in business college, planning
on becoming a legal secretary. She also became deeply interested in yoga. In 1968, while visiting a friend in San Francisco,
she lived in a commune for a few months and met Bobby Beausoleil. Leslie joined the Manson Family shortly thereafter
when she visited Spahn Ranch with Bobby, his wife, and his lover Catherine Share, aka Gypsy. Leslie was Bobby's girlfriend of the hour,
but when he took off, Leslie and Gypsy decided to stay. Spahn Ranch was an old Western movie set where
dozens of movies and television shows had once been filmed. It was in a fairly isolated area of Chatsworth,
about 40 miles north of Los Angeles. After Westerns fell out of vogue, the octogenarian
owner George Spahn turned it into a dude ranch where people could rent horses to ride. Spahn was blind and allowed the Manson Family
to stay at the ranch in exchange for doing chores and the "companionship" of some of
the women. Leslie seems to have initially rubbed several
of the Manson women there the wrong way at first. Dianne Lake writes that she was unsure of
Leslie and never felt close to her, and Sadie apparently viewed her as competition for men,
because Leslie was conventionally attractive. She was also obsessed with physical beauty
and later admitted that she wasn't attracted to Charlie, although she still willingly killed
for him. Leslie described the stabbing of Rosemary
LaBianca to Dianne Lake as strange at first but ultimately "fun." She admitted to her that she wasn't sure whether
Rosemary was dead or not when she began stabbing her. When called in for questioning by detectives
at the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department regarding the murders, Leslie adapted a cute little
girl affect, putting her manipulation talents on full display.Before the trial began, Leslie's
attorney at the time, Marvin Part (and side note here, all of the Manson women went through
attorneys like hot cakes), interviewed Leslie to obtain her version of the murders. Afterwards, he told the judge, "That girl
is insane in a way that is almost science fiction." In any case, Leslie was so confident that
she would serve minimal time for stabbing Rosemary LaBianca that she wrote her parents
and told them that even if convicted, she'd be out on parole in seven years. Leslie's lawyer for most of the trial, Ronald
Hughes, was known as a "hippie" lawyer because of his full beard and disheveled appearance. Before being appointed as her attorney, he'd
briefly served as Charlie's counsel. After the prosecution rested its case and
the defense announced it would also rest without calling any witnesses, the Manson women suddenly
demanded to testify. They planned to incriminate themselves and
claim that Charlie had no part in the murders. Hughes stood up to Charlie for the first time,
arguing, "I refuse to take part in any proceeding where I am forced to push a client out the
window." Just before final arguments, on November 30,
1970, he failed to appear in court. Later, it was discovered that he'd gone camping
at Sespe Hot Springs, a rugged area 130 miles northwest of Los Angeles, with a teenaged
couple. It began to rain, and the teens left, but
Hughes decided to stay behind. He was seen, alone, the following day and
seemed fine, but no one had contact with him again after that. A search turned up nothing. Hughes had left some court transcripts in
the teenagers' Volkswagen, but a psychiatric report on Leslie was missing. A new attorney, Maxwell Keith, was appointed
to finish out the trial with Leslie. Months later, Hughes' body was found in a
gorge in Sespe Hot Springs, so decomposed that the cause of death could not be determined. Prior to the release of a documentary film
called Manson in 1972, director Laurence Merrick interviewed some of the Manson women. Sandra Good confided in him that "Hughes was
the first of the retaliation murders." In 1977, five years after Leslie's death sentence
was commuted to life, she was granted a new trial. The appellate court ruled that because her
attorney had died in the midst of the proceedings, a mistrial should have been declared. Her jury deadlocked and a third trial was
scheduled for March of 1978, but in the interim, she was released for about six months, her
first taste of freedom in eight years. She even attended the Academy Awards ceremony
incognito that year. However, she was sentenced again to life in
prison with the possibility of parole. Back behind bars, Leslie began to suffer from
anorexia. She briefly married a man named Bill Cywin,
a former convict. The brief marriage ended when his plans for
breaking her out of prison were revealed. Keeping pace with Patricia, correspondence
courses yielded Leslie a Bachelors degree in English Literature from Antioch University,
and she's at least initiated additional courses toward a master's degree in philosophy. Alongside Patty, she's participated in AA,
Narcotics Anonymous, and teaching other inmates to read. In 1985, filmmaker John Waters, famous for
cult classics like Hairspray, Pink Flamingos, Cry-Baby, and Female Trouble became intrigued
by Leslie and what he perceived as a uniquely troubled life. The film Pink Flamingos, in its opening credits,
is even dedicated to "The Manson Girls: Sadie, Katie, and Les." Waters wrote her in prison, and they struck
up a lasting correspondence. He's even visited her numerous time at the
women's prison in Chino, California and remains a stanch supporter and advocate for her release. She's been denied parole 20 times. In both 2016 and 2017, the parole board recommended
her release, but it was vetoed both times by California Governor Jerry Brown, who argued
that there is still a slight risk that Leslie could be a detriment to society. Lynette Alice Fromme, aka Lynette, Lyn, Squeaky,
Red, or Mrs. X, was born October 22, 1948 at Santa Monica Hospital near Los Angeles. She was the first of three children born to
William Fromme and Gertrude Helen Benzinger. Helen, as
she was called, has been described as plain and "mousy," while William was seemingly unassuming
and socially awkward in public but controlling and cruel at home, especially toward Lynette. He dressed with care and wore a crew cut. He worked as an aircraft engineer for Northrop,
and the family lived in an upscale suburb called Westchester, six miles south of Santa
Monica, California, close to where Patricia Krenwinkel grew up. Lynnette wrote her name in the wet cement
on the sidewalk outside her new tract house in 1960. In the early 1950s, J. Tillman and Louise
Hall, formerly of Big Sandy, Tennessee, became the Frommes' neighbors and began a children's
dance troupe called the Lariats. Tillman had once been Gene Kelly's drill instructor
in the Navy, and the actor occasionally dropped in backstage after performances. Lynette joined as one of the youngest members
and grew along with the troupe as it became a prominent performance group in Southern
California during the '50s, appearing at the Shrine Auditorium, the Hollywood Bowl, and
Disneyland. Walt Disney himself loved the troupe and once
invited the Lariets to a party at his ranch, where Annette Funicello of the Mickey Mouse
Club was in attendance. The Lariets also appeared on television shows:
the Lawrence Welk Show and Dinah Shore's and Art Linkletter's talk shows. Lynette and the other girls often appeared
in frilly dresses and ballet slippers. They visited the White House, although then
Vice-President Nixon, who was supposed to meet them, failed to appear. At home, however, Lynette wasn't treated nearly
as well. Her father would make her eat meals in the
kitchen instead of at the dining table with the rest of the family. He would sometimes stop speaking to her entirely. She didn't know why. She was fairly close to her mother, although
Helen seemed completely cowed by William, and to her grandmother, who lived at Leisure
World in Seal Beach, California. This ginormous retirement community and the
giant metal framework globe sculpture near the front entrance is a familiar sight to
anyone from the Orange County area. Lynette entered junior high school in 1960. Among her classmates was future actor and
comedian Phil Hartman, who would later die tragically. They were friendly and took drama class together,
but Lynette soon entered a more eccentric clique. She became that girl in school who wore black
clothing and introduced everyone else to Ouija boards, although in her last year at Orville
Wright Junior High, she was voted "Personality Plus." In high school, her favorite subject was poetry. After graduation, she briefly attended El
Camino Community College. Near the end of her first year, she and her
father got into an argument, and she left home, hitchhiking to the bohemian Venice Beach. While sitting on a bench at the boardwalk,
a smelly "elflike" man approached and introduced himself. "Up in the Haight," he said, "I'm called the
Gardener. I tend to all the flower children." We can guess who this man was. "So your father kicked you out," he went on,
and shortly, Lynette was convinced enough of his psychic abilities that she became the
second member of his so-called "Family," joining his girlfriend Mary Brunner. The most outspoken and devoted follower of
Manson, Lynette--who soon became known as Squeaky, due to the high-pitched squeals she
gave when old George Spahn grabbed or pinched her on the rear--was Manson's second in command
after Mary Brunner, also known as "Mother Mary." Strangely, even though Lynette was born and
raised in Southern California, her speech began to closely resemble that of an old Appalachian
mountain woman after joining the family. This was probably a deliberate or subconscious
emulation of Manson's midwestern accent. One of her special talents within the Family
was making herself appear helpless and innocent, a sweet little girl that people could trust. (Kind of reminds me of "The Bad Seed.) In fact, she had insidious dark impulses. She helped precipitate one of the first Manson
Family murders, that of Spahn ranch hand "Shorty" Shea, by telling Charlie that he was complaining
to George Spahn about the Family's presence and, in response, George was now grumbling
that "[t]oo many longhairs…makes a place look bad." Shortly thereafter, Shorty disappeared; his
body was discovered buried on the ranch years later. When biker gangs began hanging around Spahn
Ranch at Charlie's invitation, Lyn enthusiastically began to collect denim vests and Buck brand
knives for herself and the other women in the Family. On each vest, she embroidered a skull and
crossbones, along with the words "Devil's Witches--Devil's Hole, Death Valley." During the raid on Barker Ranch, Vincent Bugliosi
encountered Lynette and her closest friend in the Family, Sandra Good, walking down the
street in the nearby small town of Ballerat. Guessing who they were based on descriptions
he'd read, he approached them and asked if they'd be willing to talk to him at the Inyo
County District Attorney's office. They both said they would if he'd buy them
some candy. He did, and they came in. He noticed that they seemed more like Barbie
dolls than human beings: they displayed what seemed like programmed expressions, tonality,
responses, and lack of individual personalities. Lynette did volunteer the information that
she was in love with the 81-year-old George Spahn, that she'd marry him if he asked her,
and that he was very good in bed. During the Tate-LaBianca trial, Lynette demonstrated
her devotion to Charlie by holding court with reporters on a street corner outside the courthouse,
staging a "Crawl for Freedom," in which she and other Manson Family members crawled 15
miles down Sunset Boulevard from the beach to downtown Los Angeles, carving an 'X' into
her forehead--as did the rest of the group with either knives, razor blades, or soldering
irons--and, at one point, shaving her head in solidarity with the inmates. She was the one most often asked to speak
on behalf of the group, because she was so articulate and willing to talk. She still had a sweet tooth, and Patricia's
attorney Paul Fitzgerald often took her to House of Pies in Burbank to gobble down pie
and ice cream. A couple of times, Lynette accompanied Fitzgerald
to visit Charlie in jail. On one occasion, Charlie remarked, "Wouldn't
it be nice if I could see some of God's creatures again?" The very next visit, Lynette somehow snuck
in a four-foot snake in a burlap bag, which the guards had failed to search. "Look what we brought you! One of God's little creatures!" She said happily. Fitzgerald was appalled and hissed, appropriately,
"Put that away!" But Charlie reacted like a pleased old lady
visiting a bird sanctuary. "Oh, that's very nice," he said. In her spare time, Lynette and the other women
made clothes for the defendants, who treated their trial as a fashion or costume show. Charlie usually dressed modishly, and Susan,
Patricia, and Leslie donned satin dresses, miniskirts, pantsuits, and cloaks. On December 18, 1970, Lynette was indicted,
along with four other Manson Family members of obstruction of justice and attempted murder
for spiking the hamburger of a potential prosecution witness in the Tate-LaBianca trial with an
enormous dose of LSD. Charges were eventually reduced, and she served
only 90 days in jail. After Charlie went to prison, he became involved
with the Aryan Brotherhood, a white supremacist gang, and made some deals with them. One involved Lynette and Sandra becoming the
"property" of paroled gang members, to which they readily acquiesced. Around this time, they also met a married
couple, Lauren and James Willett, who had an infant daughter. In November 1972, Lynette, along with another
woman and several Aryan Brotherhood members, were arrested for the murders of the young
couple. Their baby daughter was found alive and well,
being cared for and living with the group. The charges against Lynette were again dropped,
but the others did prison time. Meanwhile, the Manson Family had disintegrated. Most of its members were in prison now for
various murders, robberies, and other charges. Those who weren't had either abandoned the
lifestyle or were following a new leader named Kenneth Como, aka Jesse James, also of the
Aryan Brotherhood. Lynette felt increasingly isolated but remained
obsessed with Charlie. In 1974, Lynette made the acquaintance of
a Mr. Harold aka "Manny" Boro, age 64, while living in Sacramento. Manny was balding, drove a 1963 Cadillac undoubtably
at least always 10 miles under the speed limit, and favored golf caps and polyester sport
shirts. He had been divorced for decades, had few
friends, and was a retired draftsman. He owned a 40-acre ranch and was apparently
a real grump. That is, until he met 25-year-old Lynette
in a Sacramento park. The two began a sexual relationship. Manny bought her a used red 1963 Volkswagen
Beetle, but it constantly needed repairs. So she borrowed his Cadillac and, in short
order, totaled it completely. Despite her new relationship with Manny, Lynette
still kept in touch with Charlie in prison. He concocted a new religious order, with Lynette
and Sandra Good, as his only converts. It was called the "Order of the Rainbow,"
and he wrote up a strict set of rules that allowed him to continue to control the women
from behind bars. These included the following instructions:
"No meat. No smoking. No make-up…no fornication or showing your
ass…oh yeah, no movies with violence that sets thoughts to death and confusion." Guess who was deemed to be the deity of this
religion? Why, Charlie, of course! The gist of this new theology, according to
Lynette, was as follows: "We're waiting for our Lord [meaning Charlie] and there's only
one thing to do before he comes off the cross [meaning prison] and that's clean up the earth. We're nuns now…Our red robes are an example
of the new morality…They're red with the sacrifice, the blood of the sacrifice." Charlie had suggested they begin wearing long
cloaks and veils in public. This was a complete 180 from the free love
days on Spahn Ranch. Lynette enthusiastically passed on Charlie's
new ideology to Susan, Patricia, and Leslie in prison, but they weren't interested and
even began to refuse the letters she wrote to them. Lynette set about obeying Charlie's new edicts,
except that she began to embrace violence more than ever. Following Charlie's lead as he began complaining
about environmental pollution, she drafted letters to corporate CEOs--and their wives
as well. One template threatened, in part: "Your [product]
is killing, poisoning the world…If you do not stop killing us, Manson will send for
your heart…Close the shop. Flee the country. Or watch your own blood spell out your crime
on the wall. Remember Sharon Tate." In the summer of 1975, classic rock group
Led Zeppelin was in Los Angeles, staying at the Continental Hyatt House. Prior to August 1969, they almost always sojourned
at the famous Chateau Marmont, but after the Tate-LaBianca murders, they felt more secure
at the Hyatt. They weren't secure enough, though. Lynette found them, or more accurately, pestered
their publicist. She wanted to see guitarist Jimmy Page, she
said, to tell him she'd had a vision that something terrible was going to happen to
him, perhaps at his next concert. The publicist, who was used to bringing women
to the band's room for them, took one look at Lynette, pale and earnest (I picture her
sweating) in a wrinkled dress and sent her on her way. On September 5, 1975, after nearly eight years
of trying to find ways of proving her devotion to Charles Manson and being overshadowed by
other Manson women, Lynette finally carved out her own moment of infamy. She attempted to assassinate the president
of the United States. President Gerald Ford was on a whirlwind West
Coast trip, visiting Seattle, Washington, Portland, Oregon, and Sacramento, California
within the course of 24 hours. Just the evening before his unplanned run-in
with Lynette, he'd had to attend a dinner and dance fundraiser in Portland. Author Jess Bravin uncovered in his research
on Lynette a memo that explained to Ford--a man born in the Charleston era--that this
event was being called "Hustle with Ford' after "the currently popular dance 'The Hustle.'" Just a few hours later, an exhausted Ford
was flown into California where he spent the night at the Senator Hotel in downtown Sacramento,
which was just across the street from the state capital building. After delivering a keynote speech at a breakfast
for local business and political leaders, Ford was scheduled to walk across the street
for a meeting with Governor Jerry Brown (the father of California's current governor Jerry
Brown). In the muggy Sacramento heat, Ford wore a
blue suit with a red, white, and blue tie. He began his walk at 10:02 am, two minutes
behind schedule. A cheering crowd, two to four people deep,
stood at the edge of Capitol Park, lining Ford's path along the concrete walkway to
the Capitol's East Wing. Ford shook hands with as many bystanders as
possible as he passed. Secret Service agents flanked him on all sides,
while local Sacramento police roamed the park. Lynette was there, in her red robe, with a
purse, a red kerchief on her head, a holster strapped to her bare thigh with an elastic
belt, and a .45 caliber Colt pistol in her hand, pointed at the president. Under her robe, she wore a scoop neck flower-print
dress. A Secret Service agent, a policeman, and a
male bystander immediately tackled her as Ford was whisked away. She was heard yelling, "It didn't go off! It didn't go off!" The pistol's hammer was down, and there was
no round in the firing chamber, but it's unknown whether or not she was aware of this at the
time. A later inventory of her purse revealed its
contents as a periodic table of the elements, a picture postcard of Pope Paul VI with his
face crossed out in ink, a driver's license, a social security card, $11.76, a 25-cent
food stamp credit slip, a stick figure sex cartoon drawing, Charles Manson news clippings,
lists of addresses of reporters and government officials, and letters to other Manson Family
members. Lynette was charged with one of the most rare
and serious federal crimes: attempted assassination of the president. Her bail was initially set at $1 million but
later lowered to $350,000. Investigators located her parents in Palos
Verdes, a wealthy coastal town about 20 miles south of Los Angeles. They revealed that Lynette had been under
psychiatric care back in 1966, but they knew almost nothing about her since that time,
except what they saw in the news. When an investigator asked Lynette why she
did it, she replied, "For the trees." She also later claimed that she'd wanted to
raise awareness about her desire to get a new trial for the imprisoned Manson Family
members. When questioned about the gun, she revealed
she'd taken it from her sugar daddy, Manny Boro. After badgering him to buy her a gun "for
protection," she took his .45, which he'd never fired. He protested, but she ignored him. He said he hadn't thought she'd ever actually
use it, or do anything this unbelievable. When Charlie got wind of Lynette's actions
over at San Quentin prison, he said only, "Oh my God" in a "noncommittal and surprised"
tone. Sharon Tate's widower, Roman Polanski wrote
to Time magazine in response to its decision to put Lynette on its cover that featuring
her "in all her fresh-faced, tender-lipped vulnerability, gazing dreamily into history"
was "the epitome of irresponsible journalism." The publicity surrounding Lynette also seemed
to produce similar outrageous disturbances. On September 22nd, just 17 days after she
pulled a gun on the president, another woman, 45-year-old Sara Jane Moore, actually did
shoot a gun at Ford when he returned to California for a brief trip to San Francisco. A bystander grabbed her arm, and the bullet
intended for Ford instead hit a taxi driver in the groin. From the onset of Lynette's trial, she commenced
to make it as much as a circus sideshow as possible, following in the footsteps of Charlie,
Susan, Patricia, and Leslie at their trial. Like Charlie, she fired her attorney and insisted
on representing herself. She constantly interrupted proceedings and
the judge himself. Luckily for her, Judge MacBride was indulgent
toward Lynette. They had an almost comical rapport and would
banter back and forth like an exasperated father and a sassy daughter. During the prosecution's opening statements,
Lynette interrupted so many times that the judge had her removed to an adjacent cell. He said she could return if she promised to
be "a good girl." At these times, her fired attorney, who was
now working for her as a type of legal assistant, would take over. Voir dire--the choosing of a jury--also became
humorous at times. Judge MacBride asked one woman if there was
anything that would prevent her from sitting on a three or four week trial. She replied, "I have gas sometimes when I
sit so long because when I eat I have to watch what I eat." Lynette, acting as her own attorney, moved
to excuse the woman as a juror, blurting out, "Mrs. Banks, I'm going to dismiss you so you
don't--" Before she could finish, probably fearing what Lynette would say in open court,
Judge MacBride quickly interrupted: "All right, Mrs. Banks, thank you for coming." Lynette's attorney promptly subpoenaed President
Ford for the trial. Arrangements were made for him to record answers
to a list of defense questions from Washington DC. To do this, some newfangled equipment was
utilized for this historic event. According to author Jess Bravin, "a squad
of technicians, drawn from the Navy Department and the White House staff" came together to
operate video equipment for an exotic device that was virtually unknown to most people
in 1975: a VCR. Ford was unable to provide any insight except
for his recollection of seeing Lynette, who appeared to want to shake hands, speak, or
get closer to him. She caught his eye because of her bright,
weird red robe. Lynette also attempted to subpoena Charlie. In explaining his importance to her defense,
she cited his musical talent and noted that "Mr. Manson is a dancer of exceptional, and
awesome, capability." Her motion was denied. Charlie would not appear at her trial, not
even to dance. Throughout the trial, whenever Lynette was
a "good girl" and present in the courtroom, she changed from her jail uniform into clothes
that she or Sandra Good had likely made themselves. These were often shapeless pantsuits. One was aquamarine; another was green corduroy. The day before Thanksgiving, the jury reached
a verdict. Judge MacBride was so on edge that he addressed
Lynette as "Miss Verdict" instead of "Miss Fromme." She was found guilty. Just before the sentence was handed down,
the prosecutor was allowed to speak. He noted, in part, that "the defendant has
shown herself, through evidence that has been adduced at trial, to be a person who does
have and is filled with feelings of hatred toward others." Without warning, Lynette, who had just so
happened to be holding an apple in her hand, threw it at him with perfect aim and screamed,
"Hatred?" It exploded just above the prosecutor's temple
and knocked his glasses off his face. The mild-mannered judge didn't punish her
for this outburst, but he did tell her that if it happened again, he would order her strapped
to a wheelchair with her mouth taped. He then asked if she had any more apples on
her. "No…that one was for you," she replied calmly. "That's what I was afraid of," the judge nodded. It reads like a bad '70s sitcom. On a more serious note, MacBride sentenced
her to life in prison with the possibility of parole. As deputies removed Lynette from the courtroom,
she threw herself to the floor, kicking and screaming. The deputies hurried her out by using her
as a battering ram to open the courtroom's double doors. "You animals!" Sandra Good shouted from her seat. The other spectators could hear Lynette screaming
at the top of her lungs down the hallway. In March 1979, while at the women's prison
in Pleasanton, California, along with Sandra Good, who was serving time for the threatening
letters the two women had sent, and Patty Hearst, the famous kidnapping victim-turned-bank
robber, Lynette got into trouble yet again. She attacked another inmate, Julienne Busic
with a hammer. Julienne was in prison for helping her husband
and three others hijack a TWA plane. Lynette's grievances with her included the
claims that she was "a rat," Patty Hearst's best friend, and "very disrespectful" to Lynette. Her punishment was a transfer to a West Virginia
prison. Then, in December 1987, she briefly escaped. She was found two days later just two miles
from the prison, soaked from a rainstorm. She'd heard that Charlie had testicular cancer
and decided she had to go see him. In fact, Charlie was not dying and would not
die for another 30 years. Lynette was released on parole on August 16,
2009 and reportedly moved to a small town in New York, where she's apparently been living
quietly ever since. Also known as 'Snake' within the family, and
given a Family-approved assumed name, 'Dianne Bluestein,' the auburn-haired Dianne Lake
joined Manson's vagabonds when she was only fourteen years old. Despite her age, she had experienced an already
complex and unusual life, thanks (or no thanks) to parents who'd decided to 'drop out' of
society and become hippies. In many ways, her story is the most compelling
and sympathetic of all the Manson family members. Dianne began her life in 1953, in a seemingly
normal, middle-class Minnesota family, the eldest of three children. Her mother Shirley was a homemaker and her
father Clarence first a house painter, then an artist who did creative painting, then
an advertising display artist for a telephone company. Just after Dianne began elementary school,
Clarence began telling her about his new interests: jazz music and the Beat author Jack Kerouac. He also began complaining about how the system
was holding them down and stealing their souls by pulling them into "the establishment trap
of materialism" (Lake 15), more commonly known as the old mortgage payment on the family
home. When Dianne was in second grade, he decided
to move his family to California, a place he saw as "happening" and traded his entire
house for his neighbor's travel trailer. This wasn't a down-payment or anything. He just traded his family's shelter and security
for a crappy trailer. The Lake family, of course, had to give up
most of their possessions but Shirley was surprisingly admiring of her husband's dreams
and agreed to his impulsive plan. Dianne was taken out of school, which her
father derided anyway, and they all set off for their grand road trip. Before they'd even left the state of Minnesota,
the car broke down and they were stuck on the side of the road with their few remaining
possessions in the trailer behind them. They were towed to the nearest trailer park
and Clarence's California dreaming had to be postponed for a few years--just after Shirley
discovered him in bed with her best friend, prompting him to undertake his California
adventure with his new girlfriend instead of his family. In hindsight, Clarence's leaving was probably
the best thing to happen to the rest of the Lakes, but two years later, in 1965, he decided
he wanted them back--as long as they were willing to move to California to be with him. They all moved into a home he'd rented in
Santa Monica, nine blocks from the beach. In early 1967, it was Dianne's mother who
introduced her father to marijuana. Soon, Clarence was getting thirteen-year-old
Dianne stoned. Nearly overnight, the Lake family began embracing
the Los Angeles counterculture and attended the first Human Be-In (an event with music
and speakers promoting LSD) at Griffith Park. Clarence wore a fringed vest, blue jeans,
and sandals and ditched his usual Don Draper-style pomade, while Shirley donned a cotton peasant
blouse, a long, flowing skirt, and a beaded headband. All seemed to be peace and love, but as the
rest of 1967 unfolded, Clarence went into a psychedelic spiral, philosophizing about
LSD guru Timothy Leary and Beat poet Allen Ginsberg and cutting the legs off of their
dining room table in an attempt to make it over into a Japanese chabudai. The family attended a 'love-in' (as the 'Be
In' was now being called) in March where The Doors, not yet famous, were performing. After wandering among the crowds, Dianne began
searching for her parents and realized they'd left her there at Elysian Park. She eventually hitched a ride home with a
stranger. When she arrived, her mother began to cry,
telling her, "I was praying that the universe would protect you," but her dad merely responded,
"She's fine, Shirley. I told you she would be. She is resourceful." In early June, Daddy Love Beads began giving
his fourteen-year-old daughter and her friends LSD. The family's rental home became a crash pad,
packed with hippies. They filled every room and often lounged around
in the nude. One couple referred Dianne to a 'professional
photographer' who took nude photos of her, instructing her to imagine she was a fairy
in the forest, and tried to molest her. Clarence also bought a bread delivery truck
from a nearby bakery that he painted in acid-inspired patterns and turned into a makeshift mobile
home. (Didn't this idea fail miserably the first
time?) That's when Clarence and Shirley announced
to their children that they were all going to 'drop out' of society. The adults would quit their jobs to live 'off
the grid' and off the land, and they were taking the children out of school, or as Clarence
referred to Dianne's Santa Monica junior high, "that idiot school." Again, they all had to sacrifice most of their
possessions in order to fit a family of five inside a bread truck. At first, Dianne resisted--she was able to
obtain a written note from her parents advising that she had permission to be on her own. First, she stayed with a couple who had a
young child and were expecting another. Ostensibly , she was to be their live-in nanny,
but she soon discovered that she was expected to share their marital bed with both of them. Next, she went to San Francisco with a boyfriend
who left her without food or money for a week, then returned and expected her to service
his father. She hitchhiked back to Southern California,
where she found her family at the now-famous Hog Farm Commune. This community was founded by comedian and
poet Hugh Romney (aka 'Wavy Gravy') and his wife Bonnie Jean Beecher, a former actress
who had guest-starred in The Twilight Zone and Star Trek. Immediately, Dianne, who had already been
living independently, felt out of place. At heart, she craved structure and rules,
and she couldn't quite fit into the circus-like atmosphere, while Wavy Gravy and Bonnie Jean
didn't really want an attractive under-aged teenager around either. Dianne didn't even last a month. She left without telling her parents, figuring
they really didn't care what she did at this point. Later, she discovered that her mother cried
after finding out she'd left, and her father, now calling himself 'Chance,' kicked Shirley
out of the bread truck for crying, which was the first step toward their eventual divorce. Dianne moved in with a young hippie couple
who invited her to a fateful party a couple of weeks later. This is where she met Charles Manson and the
Manson Family. Upon walking into the party, Lynette immediately
jumped up and yelled, "Dianne is here! Dianne is here!" Understandably, Dianne thought this was some
strange psychic kismet, a sign that she belonged with them. Unbeknownst to her at the time, her biological
family had already met Manson's group at the Hog Farm while she was in San Francisco and
had even traveled to the desert with them in Charlie's black school bus, which was decorated
inside like The Arabian Nights and had the words "Hollywood Productions" painted across
the side. Shirley had even dropped acid with Manson,
and Dianne's eleven-year-old brother had been taught how to French-kiss by some of the Manson
women. Like many of the other Manson recruits, Dianne
was inducted into the Family through sex with Charlie and instantly fell in love with him. From ages fourteen to sixteen, she was a faithful
disciple. But not long after Charlie's initial seduction
of Dianne, he began to physically abuse her. He often seemed to take out his frustrations
on her, the youngest member of the Family, by using her as a punching bag and punishing
her for offenses such as asking questions or doing anything without his permission with
beatings, threats, and even rape. Once, when she ran into her former best friends
from junior high while she was with the Family and greeted them enthusiastically, Charlie
became agitated and yelled at the outsiders, "You don't belong here, little girls…You
have your mother all over your face." This remark served to remind Dianne that he
hated make-up and what he called "painted ladies." Despite the lack of money and nomadic lifestyle,
Dianne still took an interest in pretty clothing and fashion, despite the unfortunate-sounding
balloon pants that she made out of Dennis Wilson's blue satin bed sheets (maybe Sadie's,
Patty's, and Leslie's satin dresses at their trial was made out of Dennis' bed coverings
as well?). She and Ruth Ann Moorehouse, Charlie's other
fourteen-year-old recruit, liked to flip through fashion magazines, although they found the
then-current late sixties' trends boring. Dianne had an orange bikini that she personally
embroidered with flowers and paisley designs. She took a liking to Diedre Shaw, the daughter
of screen and stage actor Angela Lansbery. Diedre hung around the Family for a period
of time, fascinated by their oppositional lifestyle. She was spirited, fun, and generous. She was about Dianne's age but drove a sports
car and lived near the beach in Malibu, an upscale community popular with celebrities
and tourists alike. She'd visit the family and bring them donuts
or, if her mother was out of town, she'd invite them over to her house. Once, she showed Dianne her enormous closet
bursting with clothes and, as if recalling Charlie's rants against materialism, gave
Dianne many of her expensive items of clothing. Dianne was disappointed at the time that Charlie
wasn't able to impregnate her. She believed that having his baby would make
her more valuable to him. However, malnourishment and the stress of
being a Manson Family member had caused the cessation of her menstrual cycle, and she
was unable to conceive at the time. After the Family was arrested during the raids
at Barker and Spahn Ranch, just prior to the indictments for the Tate-LaBianca murders,
Dianne confessed to police that she was only sixteen years old. She was made a ward of the state and spent
some time at Patton State Hospital, a mental institution, until she was able to break free
of Charlie's ideological spell. Dianne was one of the last witnesses called
for the prosecution during the trial against Charlie, Susan, Patricia, and Leslie. As Dianne walked down the hallway of the Los
Angeles Hall of Justice toward the courtroom, Lynette and Ruth Ann shouted after her, "You
ain't plastic and you know it. You can't turn your back on your love." Although her parents each remarried and became
more stable after a beautiful and touching 'divorce ceremony,' Dianne was raised by foster
parents and went on to live a happy, well-adjusted life. For the vast majority of Manson's women, Charlie
made them feel, above all, indebted to him. He exaggerated his role in taking care of
them and made sure they all felt guilty and undeserving, good for nothing but domestic
chores, sex, and working to gain his favor. He would say that women had only two purposes
in life: to serve men and birth babies. And the entire group of women decided to each
custom embroider sections of a vest they'd taken from a three-piece suit as a gift for
Charlie. One member, Nancy Pitman, had a wealthy mother
and stole her fur coats and other possessions to give to the Family. The other women used the furs to decorate
Charlie's dune buggy, along with long locks of their hair. He presented himself to them as a mysterious,
sexy musician. He never played covers of other people's music;
his songs were all original material, but the lyrics always related to his philosophies. As he began to allow himself to think that
he might get signed to a major music company, the informal sing-alongs at Spahn Ranch became
less lighthearted and more like boot-camp or Mormon Tabernacle Choir rehearsals, where
the women were expected to become perfect back-up singers. While the women were in jail on vandalism
charges after the Barker raid, another loyal Manson woman, Catherine Share, aka Gypsy,
wrote to science fiction author Robert Heinlein, asking him to bail them out and portraying
the crimes as mere defiant acts against the establishment. He wrote back, saying that although he had
committed his own pranks in his youth, he wasn't going to be able to help them. So the women, who were all placed in one cell,
used the back of his letter to keep score for an ongoing gin rummy game. They also decided to take turns drinking milk
straight from Sandra Good's breasts, because she'd just had a baby and they all believed
that not allowing the baby to live in the jail with them was just the man's way of keeping
them down. Charlie harped on his view of women as lessor
beings and constantly emphasized that no one else would ever love them the way he did (that's
a good thing). When Mary was giving birth, Charlie announced,
"No one woman will fill his head with lies." He isolated them from others who might challenge
his authority and philosophies, especially their families and former friends, convincing
them that it was the Family versus the world and everyone else was out to get them. He also tried to make himself seem super smart
and philosophical, so that no one would ever question his crazy ideas. He normally wouldn't allow the women to cut
their hair, claiming it was their "crowning glory"--how very Victorian of Charlie--but
really, he wanted them to cultivate traditional femininity to help recruit followers and so
that he could easily pimp them out. He would let each one think they were his
personal favorite. For Charlie, it was all about power and control. With the 50th anniversary of the crimes approaching
next summer, several projects are in the works which offer even more evaluative viewpoints
of the Manson Family and their victims. A documentary titled Charlie Says about the
adjustment of Atkins, Krenwinkel, and Van Houten to post-Family life is currently in
post-production, and Quentin Tarantino has announced he plans to release a movie about
the Family called Once Upon a Time in Hollywood in time for the 50th anniversary of the Tate-LaBianca
murders in August 2019. We also have some exciting news for those
with thousands of dollars to throw around. Sharon Tate's sister Debra has announced an
auction of some of Sharon's clothes and other personal belongings, to take place on November
17th. Apparently, the auction is to help Debra pay
for breast cancer treatment, and we wish her all the best, as well as a speedy recovery. Among the items offered are a brown silk Travilla
dress, a chocolate mink swing coat with an asymmetrical collar and fur puff buttons designed
by Fuhrman's of Beverly Hills, a black floral Christian Dior mini dress, monogrammed floral
luggage used on her honeymoon with Roman Polanski…and her 1968 ivory silk moire wedding dress, valued
between $25,000-50,000. Interestingly, the fur coat and the dress
were reported stolen from Debra Tate's home back in 2011. That concludes today's blast into the past. If you've enjoyed our show, please pop over
to iTunes and rate us. Thank you for listening and we'll be back
soon to learn something new about the past together.
