Surrealist filmmaker who passed away on Jan. 15, 2025, at age 78, leaves behind one of the most unique filmographies of any director in cinematic history, releasing 10 feature films between 1977 and 2006. But arguably Lynch's most popular contribution to popular culture wasn't a film at all, but a TV show: . Premiering on ABC in 1990 before being abruptly canceled after its second season in 1991, the supernatural mystery series centers on FBI agent Dale Cooper's (Kyle MacLachlan) investigation into the murder of local prom queen Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) in a small Washington town.

The series became an instant pop culture phenomenon, spawning a polarizing prequel film, an acclaimed third season released on Showtime in 2017, and various other media, from books to music. But, despite the show's immense popularity, many viewers might not know that its premise was inspired by real-life events. Indeed, series co-creator Mark Frost based the story of Laura Palmer on the 1908 murder of 20-year-old Hazel Drew in Sand Lake, New York. But, while ABC controversially forced Frost and Lynch to reveal Laura's killer, Hazel's murder remained unsolved for over a century — until two Twin Peaks fans decided to investigate the mystery themselves.

According to a 2017 Washington Post article by Twin Peaks fans David Bushman and Mark Givens, Frost's inspiration for Laura Palmer came from stories he heard as a child from his grandmother during his many summer vacations in Taborton, New York. Frost's grandmother warned him that the nearby woods were haunted by the ghost of a girl who was killed near Sand Lake, a town which closely neighbors Taborton. That local legend was so deeply embedded in Frost's memory that, several decades later, he would recount it to David Lynch in an LA coffee shop as they discussed ideas for their new show.

As he and Lynch began developing Twin Peaks, Frost traveled to the city hall in Sand Lake to do more research on Hazel's murder. He learned that, shortly after her death, authorities unearthed a secret stash of postcards and letters that Hazel had locked away in a trunk (which, as Bushman and Givens note, foreshadows Cooper's discovery of Laura's diary in Twin Peaks). It turned out that, like Laura, Hazel had concealed an entire double life from her family, during which she was romantically or sexually linked to several local men in and around Sand Lake.

Many of these men, as well as Hazel's family members, would serve as the templates upon which Frost and Lynch based the show's memorable cast of characters, such as a local millionaire who ran a resort that allegedly hosted orgies (like Twin Peaks' Ben Horne and his clandestine brothel, One-Eyed Jack's).

Even though Bushman and Givens close out their Washington Post article by conceding that the truth about Hazel's murder "may lie forever beyond our grasp," they would drastically change their tune five years later. In 2022, they released a book entitled Murder at Teal's Pond: Hazel Drew and the Mystery That Inspired Twin Peaks, in which they claimed to have found the probable identity of Hazel's killer — or killers.

Yes, according to the New York Post, the book implicates not one, but two men: Fred W. Schatzle and William Cushing. Both men knew Hazel and admitted to the police that they had jointly secured a carriage to Sand Lake the night of Hazel's murder. Not only that, but a married couple told police that they had encountered a fancy-looking carriage by Teal's Pond, the body of water where Hazel's body was later found, on that very same night. The couple reported that, as they passed, the driver turned his back on them, as if to avoid being recognized, while another figure could be seen on the shore of the pond, close to where Hazel's belongings were later found.

However, despite the couple's insistence that they could identify both mystery figures, the police never showed them any pictures of Schatzle and Cushing, and they were eventually dropped as suspects. Although the coroner later concluded that Hazel died by suicide, the authors are strongly convinced that Schatzle and Cushing were the likely culprits.

As to the men's motives, Bushman and Givens have a rather sinister theory. Shortly before her death, Hazel was employed as a housekeeper by several powerful Republican men in the city, including the former treasurer who stepped down after a scandal. Furthermore, in addition to the trunk full of postcards and letters, a journalist later found a hatbox full of bills and receipts indicating that Hazel had been taking menstrual pills, possibly to induce a miscarriage.

This evidence, the book argues, suggests that Hazel might have been murdered to conceal a potential sex scandal for one of her influential former employers, with Schatzle and Cushing being hired to carry it out. The authors even posit that the police detectives' own involvement in Republican politics might have incentivized them not to investigate the town's Republican officials. As the NY Post sums up, "Both Hazel Drew and Laura Palmer were small-town beauties whose murders exposed the ugly misdeeds of wealthy, prominent locals."

The relationship between Twin Peaks and the murder that inspired it is a fascinating case of life imitating art — and vice versa. A real-life murder inspired a fictional TV show, while, in turn, the show led to the real murder being solved. Twin Peaks, then, is not just a tribute to the talent of its late co-creator, but also to the young woman without whose story the show wouldn't exist. May they both rest in peace.

All three seasons of Twin Peaks can be streamed on Paramount+, while Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992) is available on the Criterion Channel and on Max through the link below:

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