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The murderous Bender family is based on an actual family named Bender that killed visitors to their Kansas hotel in the 1800's. They have 11 known victims including an 18 month old child. However, due to the high number of people who went missing, they are thought to have killed more. While no one really knows what happened to the family, Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote about the search in her memoir. She claimed that her father was a member of the posse that formed to find them, and that when he returned home, he appeared rather worse for the wear, suggesting that the family may have been found and killed.
The Police Station in this episode is the same Police Station used in Season 1 Episode 3 Dead in the Water (2005). This Station has also been used in other episodes as well.
This episode takes place in Hibbing, Minnesota, which is the hometown of Sheriff Donna Hanscum. However, Donna is not introduced until halfway through the 9th season.
As Dean is left handcuffed to a squad car, he says: "I gotta start carrying paper clips". It's a reference to a scene in the Pilot (2005) where Dean uses a paper clip from his dad's journal to get free of handcuffs.
When looking at Dean's physical description it says he's 6'4" (same height as Sam) even though Jensen Ackles is only 6'1".
This episode is the first which doesn't feature a teaser at the beginning of the episode. Instead, it shows the "22 years ago" recap and then goes straight into the titles. All other episodes have a short teaser of the current story before the titles.