Grady Franklin Stiles Jr. was an American freak show performer. His deformity was genetic conditionectrodactyly, in which the fingers and toes are fused together to form claw-like extremities. Because of this, Stiles performed under the stage name "Lobster Boy".
Family history
The Stiles family had a long history of ectrodactyly, according to his father dating back to 1840. Stiles was the fourth in a line born to Grady F. Stiles Sr. and wife Edna that began with the birth of William Stiles in 1805. Grady Stiles' father was a sideshow attraction in a traveling carnival when his son was born and added his son to the act at the age of seven. Stiles married twice and had four children, two of whom also had ectrodactyly. Stiles and his two children toured together as The Lobster Family. When not traveling with the carnival the Stiles family lived in Gibsonton, Florida where many other carnival performers lived during the winter season.
Murder
Stiles was an alcoholic and was abusive to his family. Due to his ectrodactyly, he was unable to walk. While he sometimes used a wheelchair, he most commonly used his hands and arms for locomotion. He developed substantial upper body strength that, when combined with his bad temper and alcoholism, made him dangerous to others. In 1978 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Stiles shot and killed his oldest daughter's fiancé on the eve of their wedding. He was brought to trial, where he openly confessed to killing the man and was convicted of third-degree murder. He was not sent to prison as no state institution was equipped to care for an inmate with ectrodactyly. Stiles was instead sentenced to house arrest and fifteen years' probation. Stiles stopped drinking thereafter, and during this period remarried his first wife, Mary Teresa. However, he soon began drinking again and his family claimed that he became even more abusive. In 1992, Teresa and her son from a previous marriage, Harry Glenn Newman Jr., hired a seventeen-year-old sideshow performer named Chris Wyant to kill Stiles for $1500. Wyant was convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to 27 years in prison. Harry Newman was given life in prison for his role as the mastermind and Teresa was given 43 years in prison for conspiracy to commit murder. Stiles' son, Grady Stiles III, disputes the claim that Teresa had him murdered. According to him, his stepmother, Teresa, and father were arguing. Teresa had said 'Something needs to be done.' Teresa's son overheard this, and went to a neighbor and repeated it. Shortly after, as Stiles smoked while watching TV on the sofa, the neighbor entered his home with a semi-automatic pistol and shot him in the head multiple times, killing him. He was hated by the local community so much that only 10 people came to his funeral, and absolutely nobody volunteered as a pallbearer to carry his coffin.
Media
wrote a book on the case called Lobster Boy: The Bizarre Life and Brutal Death of Grady Stiles Jr., and E! made a True Hollywood Story episode based on the case titled "The Murder of Lobster Boy". A&E Network also made a City Confidential episode based on the case called "Gibsonton: The Last Side Show". Stiles' likeness appears on the album cover for Silverchair's Freak Show. A person like Grady, going by the name of "Lobster Boy", appears in a Deadpool comic. Deadpool was hired to assassinate him, but fails when he figures out he is possessed by Xaphan, a fallen angel, and starts possessing the souls. He was later saved by the two Ghost Riders, but at the end is shot again in the head by Deadpool for being cruel to other freaks. On HBO's Carnivàle, set on a traveling carnival during the Great Depression, the central character, Ben Hawkins, is sent out by his employers to investigate rumors of a "Scorpion Boy" in a nearby town. American Freakshow: The Terrible Tale of Sloth Boy, a graphic novel published by IDW Publishing, tells the tale of Dante Browning, a carnival sideshow performer with clawed hands who, because of his abuse and cruelty to his family, is shot to death by a hit man hired by his wife and stepson while in his home in Gibsonton, Florida. has a Lobster Boy character. It also includes a small statue in the likeness of Stiles in the opening credits. In addition, a snapshot of Stiles is briefly seen at the American Morbidity Museum in the third episode. John Strohm wrote "Ballad of Lobster Boy," inspired by Grady Stiles and recorded the song for his 1999 albumVestavia. In his memoir Tibetan Peach Pie, author Tom Robbins refers to Stiles' life and death. American History comedy Podcast, The Dollop, did an episode in 2014 discussing Grady Stiles.
