🩸 She went in for what she thought was an appendix surgery. She was 19. Kansas sterilized her — and 2,850+ other people — without full consent, under a law that stayed on the books for 52 years.
In this episode of Just Killing Time, Elizabeth Stanton uncovers the true, documented history of Kansas's forced sterilization program — one of the longest-running eugenics programs in American history, running quietly in our own home state from 1913 until 1965.
🔍 What's covered:
🩺 Dr. F. Hoyt Pilcher's unauthorized 1894 castrations at the Winfield asylum — before any law even existed ⚖️ Kansas's 1913 and 1917 sterilization laws, and how judicial oversight was deliberately stripped away 👶 The forgotten true-crime origin of the 1913 law: 9-year-old Edna Dinsmore's 1912 murder in Topeka 🏛️ Buck v. Bell (1927) and Justice Holmes's chilling "three generations of imbeciles are enough" 📜 Kansas's own Supreme Court case, State ex rel. Smith v. Schaffer (1928) 👧 The Kansas Industrial School for Girls in Beloit — 62 teenage girls sterilized in 18 months under superintendent Lula Coyner 🗣️ Kathryn O'Loughlin McCarthy, Kansas's first congresswoman, who blew the whistle in 1937 🎪 The 1925 "Fitter Family" contest at the Kansas Free Fair — judged in part by James Naismith 🏥 A clear, plain-language breakdown of castration vs. vasectomy vs. salpingectomy vs. hysterectomy 🔓 What occupies the old Winfield hospital site today
Over 2,851 documented sterilizations happened in Kansas alone. At least 32 U.S. states ran similar programs. Buck v. Bell has never been formally overturned.
This is the Kansas history nobody taught you.
📩 Submit your own hidden history for the Time Killer Files: JustKillingTimePodcast@gmail.com
⚠️ CONTENT WARNING: This episode discusses forced/nonconsensual medical procedures, child sexual abuse, the murder of a child, and institutional abuse in detail. Listener discretion is strongly advised.
📚 Sources: Kansas Historical Society records; State ex rel. Smith v. Schaffer, 126 Kan. 607 (1928); Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927); contemporary newspaper archives including the Chanute Daily Tribune; The Incorrigibles: The Kansas Industrial School for Girls and the Politics of Sterilization; Kansas Department of Corrections records.
🎙️ Just Killing Time with Elizabeth Stanton — Truth | Crime | Conspiracy. Available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, iHeartRadio & YouTube.
