Ted Bundy and his Grandfather, Sam Cowell
Theodore Robert Bundy’s roots were not in the Seattle area, where he grew up, but with the Cowell family in Philadelphia. A large but loosely knit clan of intelligent, hardworking folks, the Cowells had not spawned so much as a jaywalker until Ted Bundy.
There were signs of severely disturbing behavior in Sam Cowell, Bundy’s grandfather and the oldest of seven children. A talented landscape gardener, Cowell was obsessed with the delicate alpine plants that he nurtured. He would kick dogs until they howled and swing cats by the tail if the animals got near them. According to Louise’s youngest sister, Julia, he would « get so mad that he would jump up and down » and rage at the men who worked for him.
Grandfather Cowell’s temper tantrums were so violent that Ted’s Aunt Julia « did not look forward to my father coming home. The shouting was always just around the corner. » Julia told me that, angered at her sleeping until nine, her father once yanked her out of bed so hard that she stumbled down a three-step landing. « But that’s the only time he ever touched me, » she insists.
She characterizes her father as more of a verbal than a physical tyrant, a man who brooked no dissent. « I doubt if my mother ever got a chance to express her opinions about anything. »
Louise Bundy has admitted, Cowell on occasion did hit his wife, « Well, he could get awfully mad and yell out. You could hear him from here down to the corner. He had a bad temper, but it wasn’t— it wasn’t anything…He was never violent with anyone. He did beat up on my mother once in a while. » Eleanore, Ted’s gentle grandmother, was repeatedly taken to hospitals for shock treatments for depression. Her fears grew until she refused to leave the house, a victim of agoraphobia.
Ted’s great-aunt, Virginia Bristol, Sam Cowell’s feisty, articulate sister said that Cowell’s own brothers feared him and that « I always thought he was crazy. »
Ted Bundy’s mother was the oldest of three sisters. Audrey was in the middle, and Julia was ten years younger than the prudish Louise, who, like her father, had an explosive temper, was « very secretive, undemonstrative, and difficult to get close to. »
When Louise was 22 she forfeited her role as model child. The baby that would one day become one of America’s most infamous murderer began to grow within her. She was unwed, and still living at home.
Julia, a pre-teen, was « told not a word » when Louise became pregnant. She cannot recall her older sister even having dates. But she does remember faint whispers in the night, and watching her sister pack her bag and leave. « To be in a family like ours and have to face my father! » Even when the baby was brought home, and for the three years he lived with them, « it was never spoken of. Like Louise, my father was so concerned with image, I don’t think his pride would allow him to speak of it. »
On November 24, 1946, Theodore Robert Cowell was born. There were « no complications. He was a full-term, seven-pound nine-ounce normal newborn. »
For two months, Ted was left at the home, without his mother, as the Cowells seriously debated whether to give him up for adoption. It was her father, Louise says, who wanted her to keep the boy. So, three months after Ted was born, Louise returned to pick him up. According to the home, she planned to stay in Philadelphia « if accepted, and go elsewhere if not. »
Whatever turmoil was on in the new mother’s mind as she returned to a home with a depressed and ill mother and a thundering father has never been disclosed. In letters to the home she « spoke of Teddy with great affection. »
In the Cowell home, Ted’s « real father never was mentioned. I think therein lies one of the answers, » says Aunt Julia, who was twelve when Ted was brought back to live with them. She remembers him as a « sweet, darling boy » and, like many in the family, has sought to find out what went wrong. « I felt all along this was the crucial thing for Ted. Louise covered over and blocked it. She was very much like my father, wanting to put forth only the good. »
Great-aunt Virginia recalls the year Ted was born: « When I heard Louise was not home I knew things were not right. Next thing I heard was that Sam and Eleanor had adopted a boy. I was smart enough to know damn well they weren’t adopting this baby. No adoption agency would give them one; I knew it was Louise’s baby. But they wanted to cover up. No wonder Ted has come to a tragic end. He was never told the facts. Surely he had to catch the discrepancies. »
When a family member once asked the grandfather about Ted’s paternity, « Sam became enraged and he acted like a madman. » Despite this charade, family members remember Ted calling Louise « Mommy » when he was three.
(…) By all accounts, once the decision was made to keep Ted, his grandparents adored him and his mother tended to all his physical needs. However, according to later psychological tests, « he lacks any core experience of care and nurturance or early emotional sustenance. Sever rejection experiences have seriously warped his personality development and led to deep denial or repression of any basic needs for affection. Severe early deprivation has led to a poor ability to relate or understand other people. »
As a teenager, Ted once asked his wealthier, cultured Great-uncle Jack, a college professor, to adopt him. « Can you imagine doing that to a mother? When I heard that, I knew something was terribly, terribly wrong, » says Julia.
Apparently Grandfather Cowell’s rage was never leveled at Ted. Ted remembered only pleasant moments with his grandfather in the greenhouse and had no recollection of family violence.
Sam Cowell died while Bundy was in prison; for years Louise and Audrey hid newspapers stories about Bundy from his grandfather. In all that time, Louise never discussed it with her father. « I’m not sure how much he knew when he died », says Louise. - Vanity Fair, 1989
