CANYON, Minn. 鈥� On a spring day 100 years ago, a couple went into a swamp searching for evergreen saplings and instead found a pair of human legs.
Charles Harris and his wife, who is not named in newspaper archives, made the grisly discovery May 7, 1925, about 25 feet from the side of what is now U.S. Highway 53, then known as the Miller Trunk Road, northwest of Duluth, while looking for yard shrubbery to beautify their nearby farm. They immediately contacted the St. Louis County Sheriff鈥檚 Office, which launched an intensive investigation that led to twists, turns and dead ends but never to the ultimate truth.
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The mystery remains unsolved to this day.
Deputies Bert Duff and L.E. Gronseth were the first law enforcement officers on the scene, the News Tribune reported at the time. They recognized right away that the heavily bruised and lacerated legs, found 6 feet apart with no attempt made at concealing them, were the product of a homicide. The deputies believed that the limbs had been severed from the rest of the body with an ax 鈥� one just above the knee and the other at the kneecap.
No clues were found nearby. Duff and Gronseth brought the remains to Crawford鈥檚 Mortuary in Duluth, where County Coroner Dr. C.F. McComb attempted to determine the victim鈥檚 sex and time of death. McComb mistakenly declared the legs belonged to a woman before investigators discovered more of the body 鈥� all but the head and one side of the torso. Both of the man鈥檚 arms and a thigh had been dismembered, and the nude body had been hacked and mutilated.
McComb determined that the victim had been killed several months prior, and the remains had likely been in the swamp all winter.
The crime is one of the worst in the history of the county.
Due to extensive decomposition, a Duluth Police Department expert could not identify the body using fingerprints. After days of searching, authorities still could not locate the head, side or clothing. Still, St. Louis County Sheriff Frank Magie remained hopeful.
鈥淭he crime is one of the worst in the history of the county,鈥� he said. 鈥淭he only barrier to tracing it is the time that has elapsed since the murder, and we may be able to overcome this.鈥�
Deputies combed the swamp for any possible clue. They found only a rusted hubcap, which could have belonged to any of the thousands of passing cars on Miller Trunk Road, and a scrap of woolen shirt so decomposed that it was impossible to even tell what color it had been.
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A slight break in the case came May 15. After eight days of searching, deputies found the victim鈥檚 left temple and a portion of the nasal area, which appeared to have been removed from the rest of the head with a saw. These pieces of bare bone were found about a mile south of the rest of the remains. As the swamp search continued, other members of Magie鈥檚 crew tried to connect the case to one of the numerous local men who had recently gone missing.
Missing persons eliminated
Briefly, investigators considered the possibility that the body was that of Heino Mattson, a sailor from Embarrass who had gone missing the previous December. However, Mattson had a tattoo of an anchor on his right forearm, and the severed limbs found in the swamp bore no identifying marks at all. Mattson's body was found in October 1925, north of Virginia.
A few days later, investigators again tried to tie the remains to another missing persons case, this time believing the victim may have been Fred Beckman, whose wife, Hilma, took her own life by drinking carbolic acid in a sand dock tunnel about two weeks after he reportedly left Duluth in January. Hilma Beckman鈥檚 first husband had been murdered in Butte, Montana, several years prior.
However, a photo obtained from a Superior photography studio showed that Fred Beckman had a deep scar on his right forefinger. Though badly decomposed, the remains found in the swamp bore no such scar. News Tribune archives do not indicate whether Beckman was ever found.
Albert Wahl, who went missing in April during a trip to Detroit from his home in Cannon Falls, Minnesota, was also eliminated as a possibility as his description did not match up with the remains. Wahl's body was discovered east of Brainerd in December 1925.
Attempts to connect the remains to an unnamed 26-year-old man from Kathryn, North Dakota, who went missing on a March trip to the Twin Cities, proved futile.
Other reports of missing men came in from Minneapolis and Los Angeles. Neither were determined to be valid leads in the Canyon murder case.
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The strange case of Bennie Haight
Benjamin "Bennie" F. Haight, 22, left his family's Railroad Street home in late February 1925 to meet a man at the Superior YMCA. A few days later, his mother, Lydia Haight, found his clothes thrown onto her porch. A subsequent prank phone call claiming to be from the coroner鈥檚 office asked her to identify an unclaimed body.
Bennie Haight, a native of Danbury, Wisconsin, had married Olga Edblad, 16, the previous year, but the tumultuous union lasted only three months before the couple agreed to part. Haight had recently quit his job as a Duluth trolley conductor. His former employer described him as being despondent when he quit and said Haight told him he planned to work for a brush company in Wisconsin.
Upon hearing about the body found near Canyon, Lydia Haight wrote to Magie in the belief that the remains might be those of her son. Authorities agreed that his description did fit. Both Lydia Haight and Bennie鈥檚 wife, Olga, positively identified the remains.
鈥淚t looks like Bennie,鈥� Olga told a News Tribune reporter after seeing the body.
The Salvation Army conducted funeral services, and the body was laid to rest in Forest Hill Cemetery in Duluth. The investigation shifted to finding Bennie Haight鈥檚 killer.
However, before long, the case grew more complex. Investigators learned that a few days after his disappearance, Haight checked into a hotel in Mellen, Wisconsin, where they discovered a stack of love letters, suggesting that a jealous husband may have committed the murder.
I wouldn鈥檛 take the money 鈥� that would be like taking blood money.
They also spoke to a West Duluth soda clerk named Clarence Erickson, who claimed to have spoken to Haight the week before his disappearance and said Haight told him about an upcoming cabin party in the outskirts of Superior. Meanwhile, Duluth鈥檚 police chief disclosed that Haight was under investigation for writing bad checks at the time of his disappearance.
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Haight had two insurance policies totaling $2,500, but the beneficiary, Olga Haight, did not appear to care. She said her husband brought her the paperwork soon after they separated, and she resisted. He threw the policies on the table and left. That was the last time they spoke, she said, though she would occasionally see him when she rode the trolley.
鈥淚 wouldn鈥檛 take the money 鈥� that would be like taking blood money,鈥� she told the News Tribune. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 know anything about the case and I don鈥檛 want to have anything to do with it. I want to forget it,鈥� she added.
Lydia Haight attempted to collect the insurance, but it was not paid as she was not the beneficiary.
Square one
The case fell apart in early June when a friend of Haight鈥檚 told the sheriff that Haight had enlisted in the Army and was stationed at Fort Riley in Kansas. Magie learned that on Feb. 21, it was believed that Haight went to Milwaukee, where he enlisted under the name Bernard F. Haig, giving his address as 2607 W. First St. in Duluth, where he did not live.
Lydia Haight expressed hope that her son was alive but was skeptical. 鈥淚 have written to the man in Kansas and until I hear from him, I can鈥檛 be sure,鈥� she said.
A day after Army officials questioned him about his real name and address, the man who enlisted as Bernard Haig went AWOL. Duluth police were warned of his possible return to the city and were notified of his pending charges for fraudulent enlistment and desertion.
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Magie said the dismembered body would not be exhumed, and the investigation would continue with the search for the skull.
Hope wanes
On June 11, Magie put the case on the county鈥檚 unsolved list. He told reporters that with 鈥渁bsolutely every clue exhausted, nothing to work on, and with only a remote chance for discovery of the missing skull, I frankly believe that neither identification of the body, nor capture of those connected with the case will ever be made.鈥�
Lydia Haight, in the meantime, emphatically reiterated the belief that the dismembered remains were that of her son. She said Capt. Malcolm Byrne, of Fort Riley, had not responded to identify photos of Bennie Haight as the man who deserted the army camp.
Olga Haight was granted a divorce in 1927 on the grounds of desertion and cruel and inhuman treatment. It is unclear whether Bennie Haight was present in court. When contacted by the News Tribune in January 2025, the sheriff's office's records department reported having no data connected to the case or to Bennie Haight.
A Jan. 6, 2025, information request with the U.S. Army was not answered.
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