Ted Bundy's grandparents' house

This is where Ted Bundy's grandparents' house once stood.

It is situated in the Roxborough neighborhood of Philadelphia.

When Bundy lived here, the address was 7202 Ridge Avenue. The lot is now home to a small strip mall built in 1970.

Upbringing

Bundy lived here with his mother, Louise Cowell, his aunt, Julia Cowell, and his maternal grandparents, Samuel and Eleanor Cowell, until he was three years old.

His mother gave birth to him out of wedlock on November 24, 1946. Due to the social stigma attached to unwed mothers during the 1940s and 1950s, his grandparents decided to raise him as their son.

For the first few years of his life, Ted Cowell was led to believe that they were his parents and that his mother, Louise Cowell, was his sister.

Census

The 1950 United States Census shows that five members of the Cowell family were living in the house and that Bundy was listed as Samuel and Eleanor's son.

The identity of Bundy's biological father is unknown. Family members have said he was a Navy veteran who refused to have any involvement in his son's life.

Samuel Knecht Cowell

There have been conflicting reports about Bundy's grandfather. Samuel worked as a landscaper and gardener who regularly advertised his flower nursery in the local newspaper.

In 1923, he married Eleanor Longstreet. The couple had three daughters: Louise (Bundy's mother), Julia, and Audrey.

Psychiatrist Dorothy Lewis stated that he was an abusive alcoholic who was cruel to animals and spoke to "invisible" entities.

However, several people who knew Samuel claimed that he was a kind, supportive, and helpful man who loved his family.

While there were long-standing rumors that Samuel fathered Ted, these were disproven by DNA tests in 2020.

Knife story

One well-known story about this period of Bundy's childhood claims that the three-year-old placed knives around his aunt while she was sleeping.

The accuracy of this account has been disputed. Based on a 1989 letter published on the "Killer in the Archives" Facebook page, the story may have been distorted.

In her letter, Bundy's aunt, Julia Cowell, recalled that he was in a "rambunctious mood" that day and that he had taken various items out of a kitchen drawer and set them on her bed. However, he did not only select knives. He also retrieved other utensils, such as spoons and an eggbeater.

If the account is accurate, then it means that Bundy did not surround his aunt with knives.

Move to Washington

In 1950, his mother, Louise, left Philadelphia and moved to her uncle's house in Tacoma, Washington, seeking a fresh start. Before relocating to the West Coast, she changed Ted's surname from Cowell to Nelson.

In 1951, Louise met a hospital cook named Johnny Bundy at a Methodist church in Tacoma.

Later that year, Louise married Johnny, who then adopted Ted as his son. At that time, four-year-old Ted Nelson officially became Theodore Robert Bundy.

Bundy likely visited his grandparents at 4617 Pulaski Avenue on several occasions while he was staying at his aunt's house in Lafayette Hill in 1969.

Eleanor Cowell died in April 1971 at the age of 76. She was a diabetic who suffered a stroke in the mid-1950s.

She also underwent electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) for depression. Because she had agoraphobia, she seldom left her house, especially during the final years of her life.

Samuel Cowell died in December 1983, aged 85. By then, Bundy was on death row.