Carl Tanzler

Carl Tanzler

Tanzler worked in Florida, in the Marine Hospital. On 1930, a 22 years old Cuban woman came to the Hospital to be treated. Her name was Helena Hoyos and he fell desperately in love with her. Desperate to save her from death (she had tuberculosis), he attempted to treat and cure Hoyos with a variety of medicines and x-ray. Despite Tanzler’s best efforts, Hoyos died at her parents’ home on October, 1931.

One evening in April, 1933, Tanzler removed her body from the mausoleum and transporting it to his home. He attached the corpse’s bones together with wire and fitted the face with glass eyes. As the skin decomposed, he replaced it with silk cloth soaked in wax. As the hair fell out of the scalp, Tanzler fashioned a wig from Hoyos’s hair and dressed her emains in stockings, jewelry, and gloves. Tanzler also used copious amounts of perfumeand preserving agents, to mask the odor and the effects of the corpse’s decomposition.

In October, 1940, Elena’s body was eventually discovered. Tanzler was arrested and detained. He was psychiatrically examined, found

 mentally competent but released. Separated from his obsession, Tanzler used a death mask to create a life-sized effigy of Hoyos, and lived with it until his death.