In the closing years of the nineteenth century, when Chicago was bursting with industry and ambition, a man named H. H. Holmes built something far darker than a business empire. Behind his polite smile and bowler hat was a mind that turned murder into method and fraud into daily practice.

This episode of Dave Does History examines the life and crimes of Herman Webster Mudgett, better known as H. H. Holmes, often called America’s first serial killer. From his eerie “Murder Castle” near the World’s Fair to the insurance scheme that finally brought him down, Holmes left behind a trail of deceit, death, and mystery that still unsettles historians today.

Join us as we follow the twists that led from Chicago’s booming streets to a Philadelphia prison, and finally to a concrete grave that tried—and failed—to bury the legend of the man who killed for profit and lied for pleasure.

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