The sad saga of the October 26, 1965 Sylvia Likens torture murder passed its 50th anniversary recently. Over the past two columns we’ve revisited the crime, its impact on the Likens family, and the astonishing postscript that seems to defy reality. On Mother’s Day, May 10th, Sylvia Likens’ older sister Dianna (Likens) Bedwell went missing in the harsh high desert region of Southern California. Bedwell and her husband Cecil Knutson, both of whom are insulin dependent diabetics, disappeared after leaving a casino in Valley Center in California. Two weeks later the couple’s 2014 White Hyundai Sonata was found stranded along a dirt road. 79-year-old Cecil Knutson died in the ordeal. Sixty-seven-year-old Dianna Bedwell was found alive, but just barely. High-profile attorney Gloria Allred has been retained by the family for “a number of legal issues and questions.”
On Sunday October 25, 2015, Dianna Bedwell and Gloria Allred traveled to her sister’s gravesite at Oak Hill Cemetery in Lebanon for a memorial service. The ceremony was organized in part by loyal eastside historians Douglas and David Guffey alongside longtime Sylvia Likens champion Victor D. Phillips and Sylvia’s cousin Wanda Likens. Dianna’s attendance was a last minute, unscheduled addition and Counselor Allred’s attendance an unexpected surprise. Ms. Allred is a well-respected fighter for women’s rights whose career spans three decades. Along with her involvement with Bedwell, Allred is representing 28 women who have accused Bill Cosby of sexual assault, harassment, and other misconduct.
“Gloria is a stand-up person.” says Doug Guffey. “She has assumed the role of a surrogate big sister for Dianna.” The Guffey brothers provided a banner honoring Sylvia that was displayed at the memorial and made sure that every guest had an individual flower to place on Sylvia’s grave. Doug provided a flower for both Dianna and Gloria. “That was the most poignant moment for me. Dianna walked to the gravesite and quietly said, ‘I’ll see you in heaven with my husband.’” said Guffey. The Guffey brothers, along with Phillips, have tried hard to assure the Likens family members feel especially welcome at these events and have become close friends with the family over the years.
According to Victor, this year’s memorial, the second held in Lebanon, was the largest gathering since their group dedicated the Sylvia Likens memorial marker at Willard Park in 2001. “Jenny attended that ceremony and she can be seen standing next to Dianna in the YouTube video we made for the marker dedication.” said Victor. “We had to move the ceremonies to Lebanon because Willard Park has become dangerous and too risky.” Phillips says that he has had guns pulled on him at Willard Park in recent years while visiting to clean up the trash around Sylvia’s marker. “The shelter house has been taken over by thugs and undesirables and we just can’t risk having the ceremony there anymore so we moved it to Lebanon,” continued Phillips.
Victor credited Indianapolis Police Officer Tom Rogers and Indianapolis native turned Hollywood filmmaker Ivan Rogers as the driving forces behind the Likens memorial in Willard Park. Ivan, who died of throat cancer in September of 2010, supplied the funds for the Likens cenotaph marker. The memorial was among the first positive changes made to the park as part of its restoration. Rogers had been a child in Indianapolis at the time of the murder, with dreams of becoming an Indiana State Trooper before heading to L.A. and starting his filmmaking as a career.
IPD officer Tom Rogers’ interest in creating the memorial can be traced back to his childhood memories of the Likens children. He first met them at the Hamilton movie theater on East 10th street. Likens twins Dianna and Danny were his age while Sylvia and twins Benny and Jenny were younger. Ironically, Rogers remembers casual hand-holding puppy-love bouts of flirting with both Dianna and Sylvia, sometimes through the screen of his eastside home’s bedroom window. He gradually lost touch with the family and only learned of the tragedy through the media afterwards. The Likens saga was a deciding factor for his eventually becoming a policeman.
Willard Park is located one mile east of downtown at the intersection of S. State Ave and E. Washington St. The site of the memorial is in a quiet and peaceful setting tucked away in a lonesome corner, surrounded by shade trees in the southwest section of the park. The front of the 6-foot tall granite memorial features an image of Sylvia above an inscription reading: “I see a light; Hope. I feel a breeze; Strength. I hear a song; Relief. Let them through, for they are the welcome ones! Ivan Rogers Indianapolis Police Department April 25, 2001.” The back of the monument reads: “This memorial is in memory of a young child who died a tragic death as a result, laws changed and awareness increased. This is a commitment to our children, that the Indianapolis Police Department is working to make this a safe city for all our children.” Victor can’t help but see the irony that a memorial dedicated to the protection of children and honoring a child who died a violent death is now threatened and regularly defaced by kids with guns. But Willard Park hasn’t always been this way.
The 11-acre park began as addition to the grounds of the first Indiana School for the Deaf. The school was founded by William Willard for whom the park is named after. Willard, who was deaf himself, taught the school’s first class of twelve students in 1843. Enrollment flourished and the state agreed to build a residential campus where Willard Park stands today, which opened in 1850. The Indiana School for the Deaf was only the sixth school in the U.S. to provide education for the hearing impaired and the first to offer the services at no cost to students or their families. Willard retired from teaching in 1860 and over the next four decades, the Indiana School for the Deaf gradually fell into disrepair, closing in 1907. That same year the City of Indianapolis purchased the school’s 14.7-acre grounds for $45,000. The school moved into a new facility behind the Indiana State Fairgrounds in 1911.
The park itself was begun in 1907 and completed in 1909. Tennis courts, a baseball diamond, football field, and a crushed stone walkway were added in 1916, followed by a swimming pool and picnic shelter in the 1930s. The park’s current bath house was erected in 1982 and the playground rebuilt in 1996. A spray pool with jets of water for children to play and cool off in were added around the same time. Other features include two basketball courts and a soccer field. It also has a picnic area complete with shelter, and a roughly half-mile walking trail around the park.
The park thrived as an eastside retreat for the next three generations but by the mid-1990s, urban flight caused the park to fall into disrepair. The memorial rests close to the walking trail leading from the playground to the picnic area and shelter. Sadly, it is the marker’s placement near the shelter, now a hideout for troublemakers, that Victor D. Phillips says makes it hard for people to visit nowadays. Sylvia’s marker was seen as one of the first positive changes to the near eastside for the new millennium, but according to Victor, it didn’t last. Willard Park is plagued by the same issues as the surrounding neighborhood — crumbling sidewalks, problems with trash, drug use, increasing crime and vandalism.
But Victor is quick to point out that the Willard Park marker is not the only one dedicated to Sylvia. There is another marker to Sylvia at her Lebanon gravesite. It is this second marker where the Guffey brothers and Victor D. Phillips plan to host all future gatherings and they could use your help in making future memorials successful. If you would like to help insure the success of future memorials for Sylvia Likens, or maybe simply get details about attending yourself, feel free to contact Victor D. Phillips, Douglas Guffey or me via Facebook. I would be happy to forward your information.
At the memorial service, Doug Guffey asked Dianna Likens Bedwell if she could tell the world anything about her little sister Sylvia, what would it be. Guffey knew that Dianna had been awake and traveling for the past 24 hours and was scheduled to depart quickly for the plane ride home, so he wasn’t sure how she’d react to his query. Dianna paused for a moment, then said, “I wish everyone could have known her. She was a sweet young thing…do anything for anyone.” Yes, I think we all wish we could have known Sylvia Likens.
Al Hunter is the author of the “Haunted Indianapolis” and co-author of the “Haunted Irvington” and “Indiana National Road” book series. His newest book is “Bumps in the Night. Stories from the Weekly View.” Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
