Meanwhile in Mankato (1): Lies, Silence & Murder in Minnesota

Dakota Spotlight: True Crime & Cold Case Investigations

James Wolner

Documentary, Society & Culture, True Crime

4.8 • 900 Ratings

🗓️ 6 November 2025

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In 1965, seventeen-year-old Brian Hendrickson committed a small-town murder when he walked into a gas station outside Mankato, Minnesota, and shot clerk Ray Dahms twice at close range. Sentenced to forty years, he served just over five.The case would later be remembered as the Mankato Gas Station Murder. In this opening episode of Dakota Spotlight’s twelfth season, host James Wolner takes us back to 1965 and the small town of Rapidan, Minnesota. We meet the classmates and friends of Ray Dahms, shot down at the age of 18 in this Minnesota murder case — people who have never forgotten him. The episode traces Ray’s final hours on September 25, 1965, and introduces us to seventeen-year-old Brian Lee Hendrickson, whose own path that night would lead to tragedy at Rothfork Truckstop in Blue Earth County, Minnesota. Dakota Spotlight is a true crime podcast dedicated to investigative journalism, revisiting cold cases and small-town murders across the Midwest. Learn more about the Mankato Gas Station Murder at DakotaSpotlight.com. Meanwhile in Mankato was written, researched, edited, and produced by James Wolner. Additional research assistance by Mari Zoerb Hansen. Check out the full catalog and everything Dakota Spotlight: https://dakotaspotlight.com/ Get all episodes early, ad-free, and more. Subscribe to Spotlight PLUS: https://dakotaspotlight.com/spotlight-plus/ Sign up for the Dakota Spotlight newsletter: https://dakotaspotlight.com/newsletter/ Email: dakotaspotlight@gmail.com Facebook: https://facebook.com/groups/dakotaspotlight X/Twitter: @dakotaspotlight Instagram: @dakotaspotlight TikTok: @dakotaspotlight Bluesky: @dakotaspotlight.bsky.social YouTube: @dakotaspotlightpodcast4800 Proudly produced by Six Horse Media: info@sixhorsemedia.com Advertise your podcast or brand in Dakota Spotlight episodes: info@sixhorsemedia.com All content in this podcast, including audio, interviews, and soundscapes, is the property of Six Horse Media. Any unauthorized use, reproduction, or rebroadcast of this material without the express written consent of Six Horse Media is strictly prohibited. For permissions or inquiries, please contact info@sixhorsemedia.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	True Story Media.
0:07.3	You're listening to Dakota Spotlight. My name is James Walner.
0:17.9	If you've ever been to a garage sale or an estate auction, you've probably felt that
0:22.8	tingle of excitement while sifting through items on a table or in a box, because somewhere
0:28.9	mixed in among the junk, there just might be a gem. We like nice surprises after all.
0:37.8	Sometimes we can spot a treasure immediately,
0:40.8	and other times we're just not sure.
0:43.3	Is this Beatles album just a plain old copy,
0:46.2	or could it be the rare one worth $15,000?
0:50.3	Other objects have no monetary value,
0:52.9	but jump out at us for other unknown reasons, as if speaking to us, begging to be brought home.
1:02.0	That happened to me a couple of years ago. No, not at a garage sale, but in the online archives of a library, I was scrolling through old newspapers, half distracted
1:12.6	by the blur of endless headlines, when a little story caught my eye.
1:17.6	It was an old one from 1965 about a murder.
1:22.3	Reading it felt a little bit like one of those flea market finds, as if I was picking up
1:26.6	an old brass door knob or something
1:28.5	and rolling it over in my hands, feeling its weight. It was interesting, but also I didn't really
1:34.0	know what I might do with it. The headline read like this. Mancato youth arrested in shotgun
1:41.2	slaying. I dug a little deeper, and here's what I found.
1:46.7	On a late night in September of 1965, in rural Minnesota, a clean-cut 17-year-old high school
1:54.3	student walked into a local crossroads gas station on the edge of town.
1:59.3	In his hands was a loaded shotgun. When he walked out,
	...

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