And That's Why We Drink - E138 Five-Dollar Geodes and Our Never Ending Awkward Phase

Episode Date: September 22, 2019

That's certainly not just a rock. if you look really carefully you'll find that it's a geode and Christine will sell it to you for $5. What a steal! This week we attempt to please The Youths by filming our first episode for YouTube. You can find us at http://www.youtube.com/c/andthatswhywedrink… Give us some points! In this episode Em covers the notorious Hoedaddy - sorry, we meant Hodag - of Wisconsin, who looks like an elephant-lizard and smells like buzzard meat. Just like Christine! Meanwhile, Christine covers the infamous Edward Wayne Edwards, a serial killer whose own daughter’s investigation into her childhood led to his capture. You’ll also hear about Christine’s cameltoe disaster and Em’s clandestine locker-cleaning business. And that’s why we drink!

where should we do the the original uh well take it away christine well if you are here on audio you don't know what's going on if you are here on video you are as confused and probably upset as we are. And if you close out the tab, we do not blame you. So we this is only about 140 episodes late, but we are deciding to try going on YouTube with our with our podcast. To be fair, this was not our idea. OK, a lot of people have suggested this um in our personal lives and otherwise and people who help work with us so we're like you know what we'll just give it a shot to make

everyone happy and we've heard a lot of people prefer watching slash listening to their podcasts via youtube that's the youths by the way the youths and we want to cater to the youths we sure and we love the youths and so we're doing our best. For those listening, you cannot see this shoddy makeshift setup we currently have. We've been saying all day that we feel like we are just starting a whole new podcast because when we started, and that's why we drank episode one. It felt jarringly similar. We did not know what we were doing. Now we've got a camera facing us it's i promise at some point we will probably master it looking a little more professional i can't promise

the same but um i'm glad you can we're doing our best here and our best also includes i bought a really nice camera on the internet that was like i googled what do vloggers use oh my god you know like not the youth. Not the youth. Right, right, right. Like adults catering to the youth. Like grown-ups on Ask Jeeves. And it came back with this camera. And I was like, great. And I have a tripod.

We're good to go. Turns out I lost a little majingi for the tripod. And so I found a roll of duct tape. It's also very synonymous to our first Facebook Live. Oh, right. Because we had to balance our camera on a bag of bread. A loaf of bread. A loaf of bread.

And unfortunately, I ate the last piece of toast this morning. So all we had was duct tape. We got nothing. Listen, it seems to bode well for us that you appreciate the authenticity of our clumsiness. We'll see. So after they actually see it, they might be like, I that's not what I meant. For those who are watching and are privy to the youtube world please give us some pointers please only nice ones we're just points like however youtube works give us a few points we need them we need as many points as we can get yeah for sure thank you um cool i mean we're gonna pretend like this is a normal episode our manager says people want to watch this you're gonna find out quick that he's wrong we're gonna see i think they have that thing on youtube where it's like average watching time it's gonna be like three and a half minutes right and then

end i was also telling christine like now i have i used to come here looking pretty gross often and now it's like oh i have to explain why i look certain ways do you understand that i have eyeliner on that doesn't happen in a normal world i'm wearing a shirt with geo's face on it dressed as captain america that's fun but i also, for the people watching me, I have a massive dent in my head right now because I stabbed myself with my car keys the other day. You're really trying to win over the audio people, huh? No.

Switch over to YouTube. I don't even know who I'm catering to anymore. Just the youth. Also, for the video people, we're going to try to not edit this. Is this accurate? Yeah. So you're going to get all of the fun stuff, including every time Christine has to get up to make the dog leave which is happening right now actually happening currently so um i don't i just don't want to edit video and audio or have eva edit both so um so if you are listening to audio currently and you want all of the quote great things that happen behind

the scenes authentic just go watch the YouTube video of the exact same thing. Come here, Olive. Also, everyone can now see what Olive looks like. Hello. Welcome, Olive. She's a little bean. Our first guest. Our first guest. Oh, you're a star. Yes, you are.

Oh, so sweet. Okay, honey, I'm going to kick you out to go find your daddy. She's a little wowie, a little chihuahue. Nailed it. Nailed it. That was the first behind the scenes footage for our video faster than we thought it happened a lot not as not as fast at all for me i put an armadillo doorstop in front of the door so hopefully it won't happen again we're gonna

figure it out all together just like the entire course of this career true isn't this fun it's been a journey for us it will stay a journey for us because we keep trying to. We'll never figure it out. Try new things and we're always bad at it at first. Yes. Okay. So that being said, do you have anything, anything we. I do.

Oh. Have some announcements. Okay. What's that? Well, the first one is that we have some, I have some new additions to my zoo at my home. Oh, yes. Blaze's brother moved in with his dog, Teagan. And a lot of people on Instagram thought,

I got a new dog. I wish. She's really, really cute. She's precious. She's adorable. And she doesn't bark. She doesn't. But first of her kind here.

I know. It's not going to last. She has a bad influence. But yeah, so she moved in and Jesse moved in. And I'm really excited. And we're going to have a lot of fun in our large zoo there's now three dogs and a cat and how many humans oh god four to five four five four to five yeah I'm just estimating just like I mean six when Emma's here it's a whole thing and seven

when Eva's here oh true oh god it's like 19 kids and counting yes I should start our own my own youtube show like 19 dogs and counting which is a better version by the way i did come here today and uh i was welcomed by just a parade of dogs and it was a lot it felt exactly like what i've been expecting at some point in my life i was like i'm gonna go to the kitchen and i just had like 12 legs just running after me it was great that's good math um i also wanted to tell you a lot of people have been asking about like the weasels at my grandma's. I wanted to add my brother uploaded a video of us in my grandma's haunted house. And we did like a little ghost hunt there. So that's on YouTube on our Beach to Sandy channel.

And people went looking for the weasels. You can hear them, but you can't see them. But they're there. It's called a haunting in Bavaria. And oh, we have a new Patreon. Holy crap. Yes, we do. Speaking of video. Do you want

to talk about that? Sure. So we decided to be really ambitious in a one week span time. With this video and many other things. We're trying to, I guess. We're having like a midlife crisis. I think that's what's happening. We realize that it's been two and a half years and it's been great, but we don't want to get bored. We don't want you guys to get bored so we think you deserve more we're trying our best here so we um are rehauling revamping our patreon and it's already gone really well so far we have like a bunch of new rewards including so we only have a five dollar tier now to make it easier so five dollars across the board um if you donate you get access to our close friends list on instagram which i'm really excited about we're going to start adding usernames today um to our close friends list so you, which I'm really excited about. We're going to start adding usernames today, um, to our close friends list. So you can see kind of behind the scenes stuff.

We're posting more videos like, um, our spirit box session in new Orleans is up there. Um, a bunch of other video content that we're trying to include. And we realized that we already film a lot of stuff on our phones and then kind of make a shared album for ourselves, but nobody else gets to enjoy it so it just why not throw that your way yeah and so we're trying to really get engaged on patreon because there were a lot of people on there who were supporting us and we were like we don't give you guys enough we gave we not intentionally ended up with doing a lot of empty promises and i think when we thought oh we'll do this we'll do that we didn't realize

we were over promising right and then things just kind of got bananas and we were like it was like it fell to the wayside and we feel guilty about that so we're trying to do our best to become better people yeah if you want to sign up for that it's um patreon.com slash atwwd podcast i think that's probably a thing i should know it is okay good um so if you want to do that and we're also working on some merch stuff that's tbd we always say we're working on merch stuff we're actually like it's i wish we could talk to you about what's going on behind the scenes of merch it seems like it's such an easy thing apparently it's not we've learned it's a jigsaw puzzle i mean even just for patreon we're working on like little merch stuff but i don't want to again over promise too soon but we're working on that

merch things merch things um and i just really want quickly i want to say thank you everyone who wrote reviews like we were trying to break 10 000 reviews on itunes for a long time and then last week i kind of made like a desperate plea after all the gun talk and all the negative reviews we got and you guys came out in full force we got like hundreds of reviews in a couple days time and we went way over 10 000 reviews and i'm so thankful so thank you guys been a personal thing on christine's bucket list for a long time like a crazy person i refresh itunes constantly so thank you that just was really nice to see and made me very happy also it's nice and i'm just on a personal level to be sitting so close

to you i know in case you're wondering this is not oh almost there's a lot of things on my face no but try again i don't think you want my sweaty hand on you we uh usually christine sits across from me on the other side of the room like all the way across the room this is probably the closest we've sat in a long time doing next to each other the only ever in our lives at all the only time we were closer recording was when we were in my childhood bedroom and we only had the zoom and we were laying down our faces were very close yes that was quite a intimate it was quite if teen christine could look into the future be like what is happening here listen our faces were very close in your childhood bed oh and your mom was downstairs they felt like high school and eva was videotaping it that felt like college no oh we we have fun we have fun we have fun um god i'm sorry i

have one more thing that i thought was funny on our oh if you're on our patreon too you get to join the uh i know we close our big secret group but we have an atww patreon group which is really fun and people are really engaged on there and like we're i'm on there and it's a lot of fun um so i saw somebody named bradley posted in and said, just finished episode 137 and I live in Round Rock, Texas. Oh, cool. I want to say that the hairy man festival that M reference is not a Bigfoot festival is actually just a celebration of hairy men. Like legitimate contests about who is the hairiest man in town.

And it's wild all in its own. I know someone who could compete in that. Who? You? No. Fingers crossed. Someday. No, my, one of my best friends back at home, her dad growing up literally had like a sweater for hair. And during the summer he would make us like shear him. Oh, oh, oh no. So I think he could

compete. Yeah. It sounds like maybe he was a very hairy man. Okay. Well that seems like what that festival. That's my connection to that so yeah well there you go fun fact of the day game over indeed okay also yeah i have no updates except tomorrow we are gonna be in salt lake tomorrow oh god lol still haven't finished our notes for those but i know what i'm doing and i'm so excited about my story so at least there's that i don't know what i'm doing. But when do we? Yeah. Can you see that?

That's what's happening. Half the fun is not knowing what's going to come out of my mouth because I don't know what's going to come out of my mouth. Isn't that great? It's a journey for us all. Our business manager was like, you guys need insurance. I was like, you're right. For the things that come out of your mouth. It's called like errors and omissions.

It's not like we make errors ever. Not even a little bit. What's salt? Chalk? Chalk. what if someone sued us over that a scientist might it might all right uh i don't have any updates i think that's all i had um i'm just really there's a lot going on and i'm really excited about it so we're gonna see how this youtube goes hopefully it goes all right yeah i'm just gonna pretend like

let's just do what we did with the when we started the podcast were like, oh, just our moms are going to watch it. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just Linda and Renata. And then we're surprised when there's a third. I feel like our parents, remember that when we first started the podcast, everyone was like, all the grown-ups in our lives were like, I can't see the video. I can only hear it.

Well, 140 episodes later, now you can. My mom's going to call me like, you finally figured it out. Two and a half years later, I fixed it. It was a bug in the system listen if my 14 year old sister watches this i will be pleased like i've accomplished something in my life so good let's hope all right so let's let's try this remember that time i said we don't know what's going to come out of my mouth yes we're going to try that now because this is a story from a few months ago and i haven't even tried reading the notes to fill myself in.

Doesn't that sound good? Doesn't that sound like a really interesting ride? I hope this is no one's first episode and they're like, wow. This is someone's first YouTube episode. Oh, God. They're going to be like, what is going on? Hi, we're in That's Why We Drink. Oh, welcome to our podcast on TV.

It's, um. How do we explain it? There's milkshakes and ghosts and lemons involved there were milkshakes at one point there was wine at one point we still you know what used to be there was milkshake facts yeah remember that it lasted eight episodes go back to the very early ones when we were as awkward as this video thing oh and there's geo sorry and uh you'll see what milkshake facts were it didn't work out it's funny you can always tell who's new to the show because they say, they're like, I have a fun milkshake fact for you. And it's like, oh.

I'm like, that's. I bet you do. In two episodes, you'll realize that's a no-go. It's complete. All right. So this is my live show from Wisconsin. Oh. And I actually, we just had our Facebook Live episode that we did this weekend?

Last weekend? Yes. A few days ago. And someone actually mentioned this story. I forgot that I'd covered it. Yeah, they like requested it. Yeah, they're like, Oh, you should do this story. And I was like, Oh, I already have notes for that. So I'm just gonna do that. And since we're going to Salt Lake and clearly aren't prepared fully, we decided we would use some old notes that everyone has since forgotten about. Yay. Unless you're from Wisconsin. Yeah. Well, was it Madison or Milwaukee? Here's the thing, I can't

tell you that. I don't know. Oh, okay. I thought you meant you can't tell me for like... Oh no, I can't tell you because I didn't write it anywhere. Well, I also, you didn't know which one it was and I didn't know which one it was, so I just also picked a random Wisconsin show, so it could be a mix and match. Also, the shows were really small there.

True. If you have heard it, I'm sorry but one of those wisconsin shows was the show where you flashed everyone right okay well i thought that was going to be contained in the comedy club but no um what goes on youtube stays on youtube don't you know apparently after the first madison show oh god oh god and like you want to tell the story it wasn't necessarily that you mooned everyone it It's like you sunnied everyone. You know? That's so much worse. Yeah. Eva texted me the next morning and was like, hey, I don't.

Or no, not even. Like 10 minutes before we left for the next day show. And was like, I'm so sorry. I don't really know how to tell you this. This is really awkward. And I was like, what happened? Like she's going to quit or something. I know.

I thought like I accidentally fired her. I don't know. And she was like, so you were wearing those leggings yesterday and you kind of had a camel toe and everyone could see it. And I didn't know how to tell you. And you guys just kind of did the whole thing and nobody said anything. And I was like, oh my God. She goes, I just wanted to let you know. I like, didn't want to tell you, but in case you wanted to wear those leggings again. I was like, I'm never wearing those leggings again. Can you imagine being our assistant? Oh, God. I mean, this is what happens when Eva isn't around.

This would probably be a thousand times better. Oh, God. But can you imagine having to be like, oh, I have to go tell my boss that they have a camel toe. In front of 400 people. And so then the next day, of course, I'm like so fucking awkward that instead of being like, okay, just wear jeans and be normal. I was like, guess what I did to half of you who came to the show yesterday. Yeah. And so when you saw my sunny side, it's like, like, you're so ashamed.

You can't keep it in. Oh, God. You just have to keep talking about it. And that's why it keeps happening here. I'm like, I'm like to bring it up really a lot. And yeah, so here we are. So anyway, this is not the story of christine's camel tokes you just got that would be quite a horror story though um so here's a

different one this is a cryptid um which apparently everyone there seemed to already know so i did a good job in picking some part of wisconsin okay uh this is in the town of rhineland okay or yeah okay see sounds good doesn't this sound confident already yes this is the story of the hoedag oh so uh this i remember being one of my favorite cryptids i've done i remember being just wildly ridiculous so let's find out together excited i was also sick during these shows so i think i was in a fever state so i'm not even gonna i mean between maybe that's why you thought those leggings looked good. Also, the duct tape is falling. Do you guys, oh, look at that change up.

Here we are. For those who are listening to audio, the camera pointed at us, was slowly just falling, falling down. And so Christine had to readjust, but I'm sure that'll have to happen again in a little bit. Yeah, my bad. Okay, the Hodag of Rhineland. Hodag is spelled H-O-D-A-G, in case you're interested. And apparently it is known as, quote, the terror of the pine forests of northern Wisconsin. Ooh.

Ooh, ah. Ah. So the story's main character, which is something I literally wrote in these notes, is a land surveyor named Eugene Shepard. Okay. Okay. Sounds like a quite good sounds like so far i'm doing good protagonist um so eugene was born on march 22nd 1854 so he's in aries that's great and uh he was born in old fort howard which is now known as green bay and i'm sure everyone freaked out in wisconsin something like that you were also wearing a cheese tie so like oh that was a good day you're right i was wearing a cheese tie. Oh, that was a good day. You're right. I was wearing a cheese bow tie. And Em didn't understand

that it had to do with sports, so that was questionable. No, I just saw. Everyone's like, Em's a Packers fan. Em's like, what's a Packer? And I'm like, oh, there. I was like, I just wanted my cheese bow tie. So his family moved to New London, and he left school in sixth grade to work on his father's

farm, and then his dad died when he was 12. So he ended up being hired on as a farmhand in other towns. So by the time he was 12, he was out of school. He was just working on farms. At 16, he became a timber apprentice in the Northwoods, and he learned to be a timber cruiser, which apparently is another phrase for a landlooker. Which is another phrase for? For checking out land oh okay i got it so he would apparently i wrote it down because i knew i'd forget if i ever went back

to these notes thank you past m so a land looker they calculate the value of how much lumber is actually in an area based on how many trees are there so they go and literally look at the land count all the trees and they say, you could get this much lumber out of it, or this much timber out of it, and this is how much money you would make. Okay. That sounds like a complicated job. Cool job. So in 1882, Rhinelander... Oh, so the town is not Rhineland. Apparently it's

Rhinelander. I'm stupid. Good start. I must have deleted the R at some point. Glad we're not editing this. This was the dumbest thing we've ever done, is decide to make video content and not edit it. When you say was, you mean This was the dumbest thing we've ever done is decide to make video content and not edit it. When you say was, you mean is currently the dumbest thing we are ever doing. Let's hope we never do anything stupid ever again. Yeah, let's hope.

So in 1882, Rhinelander was looking for timber and lumber workers and Eugene moved there permanently. So he moved to Rhinelander. In 1893, he was working in the woods outside of Rylander, and he comes across his first hoedag. Uh-oh. So in the Near North Newspaper Report, and there were other stories that also reported on this, this is how the hoedag is described. Because I guess this made the papers, why wouldn't it?

So this is how the hoedag was described. And it looks like it's quite a long description so bear with me but the more detailed the better maybe okay maybe according to several articles the hoedag looks like and has a large head of a frog good start good start the grinning face of a giant elephant. Huh? Thick short legs, a dragon's body, the back of a dinosaur, and a long tail with spears at the end. I'm not done before you make a comment. Spikes all the way down its entire length of its body with a fistful of needle-sharp pointed spears at the end of his tail, fangs that would rival a saber-toothed tiger and could rip out the belly of the biggest bear apparently it has horns that are growing from its temples with large fangs and green eyes that's nice oh pretty uh short black green hair i don't know what makes

it black or green and its back is covered with spikes it has tusks it has needle sharp claws and it smells apparently like quote buzzard meat and skunk perfume. Mmm, my favorite. Apparently it's known to breathe fire and smoke. It eats water snakes, oxen, mud turtles, and mainly white bulldogs. What? That's not very nice. You know what we need is a whiteboard so I can just sketch this as we go.

Wait a minute. If we're talking visuals, that is a genius idea. I mean, we... What did the YouTuber say? Put it in the comments. Wait a minute. If we're talking visuals, that is a genius idea. I mean, we... What did the YouTuber say? Put it in the comments. Oh, yeah. Leave your comment below and then we put a cool little arrow

and then also we say... This is humiliating. Click here to subscribe. I am 27 years old. Okay. We like what you see. Okay. Which you don't,

so don't finish that sentence. Don't finish it. If you don't like what you see, please. Which you don't. So don't finish that sentence. Don't finish it. If you don't like what you see, please just leave. Don't leave a comment because sticks and stones, but accept the opposite of that. Except our bones are constantly being shattered by all of your mean words. Words always hurt me. Words hurt us worse than any sort of physical injury. We're Geminis.

So if you're not saying nice things, just don't talk to us. Okay. So everything he's described so far reminds me of when michael scott is in that he's trying to describe like like the bottom of a platypus with the face of an egret or something it sounds kind of a little michael scotty okay i like it apparently he's known to be quote a terrible brute with the strength of an ox the veracity of a bear and the cunning of a fox. Oh, no. It was also rumored that the Hodag was the resurrection of a dead oxen in the lumber industry, which I-

Sorry, what? Was an ox working in- was he a landlicker? And he was resurrected? That is the weirder part, yeah. A little bit. I thought maybe I misunderstood. He was called the fiercest, strangest, most terrifying monster ever to set this earth. There's a lot of superlatives going on here.

It's very sensationalized. Oh, yeah. Yellow journalism. There it is. There it is. Others have described the Hodak as a reclusive woodland creature and misunderstood by many, which is what I call Christine. So interesting.

You're such an ass. I call you the first part. Oh, just a reclusive woodland creature. The monster that eats bears or whatever. The fuck? The cunning of a Fox. Thank you.

I'm not sure. No, the part about the skunk and the buzzard meat. Thank you. I was hoping that was next. I put that on my Tinder profile. You're going to say my tombstone. I was like,

don't worry. I've already planned out your tombstone. Anyway, does it just say Christineine did it oops oopsies i knew i shouldn't have done that um okay so basically he's a seven foot long lizard-like beast covered in spikes at the end of the day i tried to just make it easy for everyone got it a big weird lizard and maybe has an elephant face and but grinning oh dear um so anyway that is what eugene apparently stumbled upon and lived to tail the tail oh my um so when eugene and his workers came across this hoedag they tried everything to capture it i don't know why you don't try everything to get away from it away

but apparently they tried to capture it so when it fought back they ended up retaliating again this time bringing hunting dogs and guns they not just guns like rifles but they also brought um squirt guns of poison water which i don't know how they found that first of all and the squirt guns so fast did squirt guns exist back then a i don't know how to give you that answer they must have maybe i don't know super soaker i don't think they had the super soaker they might have just like the tiny little pistol ones yeah just like a like a like a clown gun oh yeah you know all about that i would yes yeah i imagine that's where the first squirt gun came from like a faux gun i also yeah i also like that it's poisoned water it's not like full of poison

it's like specifically poisoned water yeah it's just diluted poison oh my um so none of them actually got the hoedag to stay away so they kept fighting and they ended up resorting to dynamite because the diluted poison wasn't enough and so they blew it up they just blew up this hotel a picture of the remains of the hoedag was actually sent to the media and released to the public. Oh my. And three years later in 1896, Eugene came across the hoedag again. And like, like a totally different one. So they thought they blew up the only one in existence.

It ended up being one of many. Uh oh, there's more to speak of. Mm hmm. And so Eugene found one sleeping in a cave. How does he keep finding these things? Stop it. Why just him specifically? I don't know.

Why is nobody else seeing these? A little lizard-y. A little lizard-y. So Eugene rallies the other men together to help him drag it into a large pit. No. So they can capture it. Let him take his nap. Listen, maybe if he sleeps as deep as me, he could probably get it done.

So to do so, to drag him into this pit, they tied a sponge soaked in chloroform to a long pole and then fed it through the cave to get to him. So it would be like pressed right up against his little booper his little nose and he'd breathe it in and he would just kind of fall asleep more okay unconscious wait okay oh do you have a question why why would i ask a question let's hear it though i mean i have a lot but but where are they getting all of these that That's one of them. They got poison water. They got squirt guns in the 1890s. They've got chloroform. Like long poles full of sponge poles with chloroform.

This is quite elaborate. I mean, I guess we have a camera duct taped to a tripod. So that was this was just their version of potentially a loaf of bread somewhere involved. So, I mean, I guess we shouldn't judge. But at this time, the town of rheinlander was trying to bring in more people and keep the town alive and eugene decided uh or i'm sorry so the town wanted to like bring more people in and so they ended up to create tourism um they created the whoop i don't know how to pronounce this juanita or on Juanita? Juanita? Let me look at it. Juanita? Oh, Oneida. Okay.

Oneida. Thank you. We didn't have the audience to scream in our faces like they usually do, which we appreciate, by the way. We appreciate you screaming at us on stage with all of our anxiety. So the town created the Oneida County Fair to attract tourism and uh only months this happened only months after eugene actually captured the hoedag which he did with the sponge thing sure sure sure sure so he decided to rent a tent at the fair and he was like oh here's this thing i chloroformed and dragged into a pit let me showcase it to the town and it ended up being the most popular attraction at the fair that year so it went so well that e Eugene ended up quitting his job and went around the country showcasing the Hodag at all the fairs he could find. Wow.

One of those fairs was even the Wisconsin State Fair in Madison, and everyone freaked out. I'm assuming I told the story in Madison. Okay, we're figuring out slowly where we are. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good. we're figuring out slowly where we are yeah yeah yeah that's good uh after being an exhibit all over the county fair circuit um he ended up eugene started selling tickets out of his own home so even when it wasn't fair season he was like oh well you can still give me money and i'll show you this thing people weird people who put like roller coasters in their backyard and they're like

yeah pay a quarter to ride my roller coaster and i would do it is the problem. You would do it, and that's why your tombstone will say, oops. I knew I shouldn't have done that. I knew YouTube was a bad idea. So for a dime, apparently, and a dime back then, so I'm sure it was more money than that. What a steal. For a dime, people could see the hoedag, which he kept in his back shed. Doing this alone, and the money that he had at the time so a dime in that time he still made 500 of that time per weekend whoa it was one weekend approximately

5 000 people were coming per weekend you're gonna find me a hoedag i remember what happened during the show i was like hallucinating because i had a fever and i kept thinking you were saying ho daddy and i thought it was some weird prank that you were pulling on me. You were still, you were like, oh, a ho dag. And I just started laughing, laughing. You're like, what? And I was like, a ho daddy. Is that really what they call it?

Is that where, did you also say I need to get myself a ho dag here? And you said ho daddy or something? It was something like that. That sounds right. That's why it kind of triggered that memory. Yes. For $15,000 a week, you could have yourself a little ho daddy. Ho daddy. And you said ho-daddy or something? It was something like that. That sounds right. That's why it kind of triggered that memory, yes. For $15,000 a week, you could have yourself a little ho-daddy. Sure, a little ho-daddy.

So the ho-dag got so popular that, I mean, this guy was making so much money showing them this big lizard elephant thing. And he got so popular that scientists from the Smithsonian actually said that they were going to come see him. Because they were like, we don't know what's going on here. So when this happened, it was serious enough that eugene admitted that the monster was a hoax he's like the smithsonian's gonna find me he was like i'm in big trouble so he made it all up so the first time eugene came across the hoedag the dynamite slash water pistol experience um poison water yeah yeah the charred remains that ended up getting released in the newspapers were fake oh but the second time the story well the story was also fake but the the monster that was on display at fairs apparently it was actually

just a combination of wood and ox hides for the body with real horns from other animals and claws that he had made from bent rods and at the fair and in his shed it that same thing made of wooden oxides this big thing that he had created uh to look like the hoedag it was connected to wires in a very dark space and he would pay his sons to go behind the shed when people were looking at it to pull the wires and make it growl and make it look like it was moving interesting that he always described it as a lizard and then it sounds like everything he used to build it makes it look nowhere near reptilian yeah there's no scales involved or anything yeah like wood i guess if it's if the tent is dark enough you know i wonder how he made

the grin oh spooky huh i don't know just drew it on with a sharpie maybe or like some bars of soaps that's kind of horrible oh yeah well it's kind of a shitty person um so people were already skittish so whenever basically when he would pay his sons to move the animal quote around people were already kind of like nervous to go in and even see this thing but the second it moved they just ran away so there was no like analysis yeah there was no there was no one like staring at this thing it was once it moved they were scared and just you and i would have been the most gullible we are the most gullible people we would have been just like engrossed in all of this i've been like this is amazing and terrifying this is i don't even care that it's made of barbed wire and someday we should make a podcast about it. A thousand percent.

Okay. So it went, they went so far at one point to even, Eugene went so far as to wear a suit and walk into the shed. And then his sons behind the shed would make awful noises as if the beast was moving around. And then he would run out with the clothes shredded. So he would intentionally go in looking nice. And that was if people said like, oh oh we really want to see it and he would just walk in to check on it to see if it was awake and then he would run out with his clothes all tattered and he'd be like oh no like it's not in a good mood give me my my dime yeah he would say i quote i'm really sorry i can't show you the hoedag today he's just not viewable today he's

angry that's what i say about christine too she's not behind closed doors for the afternoon so it was later published that eugene had conned people before um and he would sell things like moss to people when i was little i sold rocks to people and i told them they were geodes i was kind of like a maybe you were right you just didn't crack it open that's what i said that's half of adventure. That's the moral thing that I did to myself because my Catholic brain was like you're doing a lie. And then my sneaky little Gemini brain was like, but it could be a geo. But you don't know. Who's to say? And so I would go around and sell them for $5

and the only reason people bought them is because I would bang on their door for hours and hours until finally they were like, okay, just take like, take $5. I don't want your rock. You know, in middle school, me and one of my best friends, we started a locker cleaning business, but we did it just so we could be nosy enough to look through everyone's shit. Now that's it. That was the game changer. And then we also had a teacher who I can now say her name was Miss Wood. I am allowed to say this because now she has passed on and they can't fire her for this information but she was our ho me and she was your ho dag

our ho dag and she uh was probably equally as fed up with that school as we were and we me and my friend from that we had the locker cleaning business we always got picked up last for some reason and sometimes like we would have sports games or something. We would just get stuck at school for hours. She would not encourage, but she would imply that if we did this, she wouldn't tell anybody. And so we would go into other people's lockers and steal their food. And then she would go, and then she would go into the teacher's lounge and steal other teachers food. And then we would all sit and have a picnic together and we would gossip about the faculty and the students to each other.

Yeah, that is primo. You need someone like that on your side. There were times where she would get me out of class saying like my mom was on the phone. Oh my. Just because I, she knew I didn't want to go to the class. It was, she was. What a gem. Listen, she was the number one.

Anyway, RIP Miss Wood. Get yourself a good hoedag guys. Get yourself a Sue Wood. Sue Wood. Cause Sue Wood, you know, she'd help you. Cause Sue Wood would help you. Wow. That wasP. Miss Wood. Get yourself a good hoedag, guys. Get yourself a Sue Wood. Sue Wood. Because Sue Wood, you know. Because Sue Wood would help you. Wow, that was clever. Thank you.

Listen, it only took me, what, 10 years? Yeah, you got there. Oh my goodness, where am I in the world? Oh yeah, so he's selling moss to people. Which, I'm 100% on board with that. I would have probably bought it from him. I have pulled so much shit like that. He even once used to put soap in

his mouth when creditors would come to his place so he looked rabid i told you he had those bars of soap you were right for the you said that and i knew soap was coming up i tell you he and i were kind of one in the same yeah i shouldn't judge so he knew that he was doing some stuff and he knew how to keep it quiet if he needed to even if i he meant eating soap he's on it so in response to people asking how everyone believed that this monster could exist yeah because a lot of people would be like why on earth is this why did the whole town just think this was real and what did em and christine say in defense of themselves and their gullibility so here's the defense this was a quote uh a time of scientific exploration and inquiry. A lot of animals at this time were being discovered.

Okay, that's fair. So it's not hard to believe that there's this massive lizard no one has ever heard of before that has just been discovered. Like out in the wilderness. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, we've talked about that, how people literally didn't believe gorillas were real because it was such an odd concept. Yeah. Yeah.

Like, why would you believe it? Or why wouldn't you believe it? believe gorillas were real because it was such an odd concept. Yeah. Yeah. Like how, what, why would you believe it? Like, Oh, it has just this giant long neck, but it looks like a horse. Yeah. I mean, it sounds absurd. So who knows? Also people at the time didn't travel like they do today. So if people far away from Wisconsin were hearing like, Hey, there's this animal in Wisconsin. They'd be like, Oh, I believe that, but I'll never see it because I'm not there. Sure, sure. A lot of people were like, maybe it's just a local to that area and I'll never see it. But if everyone's saying they've seen it, then it must be real.

Right, right. So at the same time that Eugene was pulling this off in the 1890s, the town of Rhinelander was struggling to keep up and they were trying to bring in more people into the city. So Eugene ended up incidentally promoting rhinelander with this creature right so people wanted to see the hoedag and maybe even if people didn't believe it in rhinelander they're like well we're not going to say anything because it's generating like a profit for us like mothman kind of point pleasant this is a quote not only

hundreds but thousands of people came to view the hoedag, and not one of them went away without having learned a little more about northern Wisconsin. And it's safe to guess that each one of those thousands told others what they had seen and heard. In this way, the beauties, opportunities, and resources of northern Wisconsin spread, and many who came out of curiosity only have come to make their home with us. Aww. Long live the hoedag. Long live the hoedag. Long live the hoedag. And that was a quote from Eugene himself. Yeah, okay.

Well, this motherfucker has no room to be like, I increase tourism. It's like, you made money off a bunch of... So he has no shame in what he's done because he likes, I think, he takes all the credit for the reason why northern Wisconsin even is still around today. Much like Christine, he found some moral ambiguity and he ran with it. Yeah. There might be a geode in this. We don't know.

The Hodag is the geode. There's a geode inside there somewhere. Yeah. If you look closely in your heart, you'll find it. So in 1923, Eugene died at 69 of kidney failure. But thanks to Eugene and the Hodag, the town of Rylander is still popping. They're proud to claim the Hodag. Apparently, Rylander is nicknamed the Hodag City or home and the Hodag, the town of Rylander is still popping. They're proud to claim the Hodag. Apparently Rylander is nicknamed the Hodag City or home of the Hodag.

Home of the Hodag. What's up? Home of Hodaddy. Yes. See there. There it is. It fits. And there is a logging museum that sells lots of Hodag souvenirs, which we should have gotten

when we were there. Yeah, wait. You were sick. So we had to get out quick. We, yes. We'll go back. Okay. We'll be back for cheese curds and beer. Hod get out quick. We, yes. We'll go back. Okay, we'll be back for cheese curds and beer. And hoedag souvenirs.

I was sick. I couldn't enjoy the beer, the cheese curds. I had a really hard time. It must have been a really bad cold for Christine to avoid beer. And cheese. How sad is that? We gotta go back. I mean, it was, everyone remembers my fluorida.

Fluorida. And this was her Wisconsin. Wisconsin, yep. And then Eva had her Nash ill. Nash ill. Oh, that one's just so sad. Poor Eva. She was trying to be so brave and she was like, I'm fine.

I'm fine. And we were like, Eva, just go. We're like, sit your ass down. Go to sleep and come back to us tomorrow. And then in the morning she was like, hi guys. And I was like, okay, Eva, you need to just sit down. Eva was like, yeah, I'm a little sick, but I think I'm fine. We were like, we're going to get on the plane and bring you home to John.

Eva, we're going to give you six times the amount of NyQuil that you're supposed to be on and just ride it out, girl. Your cats are waiting. They will come for you. So the Loggie Museum does sell souvenirs. And the entire town actually has Hodag banners, flags, signs. And Hodag is now the mascot of Rhinelander High School. I want to move there and have children and make them go to that school. And it's also the official symbol of the entire city.

Yes. One of the most popular postcards there is actually the picture in the news article of the Hodag's capture. We got to go back and buy this shit. So even though it's fake, it is like the story behind it that everyone loves. Yeah. Rhinelander Chamber of Commerce has also trademarked Hodag, TMTMTM, and has created their own statue outside of the Chamber of Commerce building. They also have two more inside. One is, quote, a life-size replica from 1951.

Nice. And one is a smaller faux taxidermied hoedag. Okay. Faux taxidermied. That's kind of cute. Didn't even know I needed that, but I have it now. We need it. There is another, actually, at Rhinelander Ice Arena with an oversized head that blows smoke and its eyes light up red.

Is it like a Zamboni? It's kind of like some sort of animatronic. Yeah. I'm very happy about that. Apparently in town, people actually blame bad luck on the hoedag. So golfers and fishers, if something ever happens, they just are like, oh, that's the hoedag. Oh, there he is again. It's not my shitty golfing. It's just the hoedag. He just threw me in the sand trap again. So the Rhinelander also hosts an annual music festival called the Hoedag Country Festival, which wow,, we gotta go. When is that?

I don't know, but we're going. Okay, well, we're buying tickets. And even A-list musicians like Garth Brooks and Toby Keith have performed there. So it's like, oh, it's a real deal country festival. Yeah, let's go. And small statues of the Hodag have been given to the world leaders when they're in town, including JFK in 1959. Can you imagine the honor, though?

Can you imagine if you went as an esteemed A-list celebrity? Or like world leader, and you're like, here's a little Hodag for you. That must be such a beautiful moment. I'm tearing up just thinking about it. There's also apparently a Hodag sandwich that are in many restaurants. Doesn't sound appetizing based on the smell you described, but but it smells like skunk perfume and old meat or something buzzard uh the hoedag is also mentioned in several paul bunion stories well that's cute interesting do we know what the sandwich is made of i'm kind of hung up on that no but i can look it up i'll look

it up at the end of the story okay okay the hoed The Hodag is also a villain in the Scooby-Doo episode, The Hodag of Horror. Aww. Sweet. That is sweet. I don't remember that one. And it's also featured in an episode of the Travel Channel series, Mysteries at the Museum. Love it. It is best featured in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

Oh, okay. Some historians have suggested that the Hodag might actually have been a real creature. Hang in there. Some historians have suggested that the hoedag might actually have been a real creature. Hang in there. The hoedag strongly resembles the Native American creature Mishipishu. Oh, yeah. I remember this.

Mishipishu. AKA the water panther. Okay. So apparently they do sound very similar. So even though Eugene admits that he never saw a hoedag, he might have used his description inspired by the mishi peshu got it oh got it got it got it so it's known as the water panther or the water or a great lynx so it's a panther a lynx a lizard an elephant and a skunk and also and also just a bunch of like ox hides yes and some soap is stuffed in its mouth and some moss on top for garnish

so it's known as the water panther or the water links or the great links and it is the apparently most important water being among the great lakes tribes okay because it is the quote great underground wildcat or the great underwater wildcat i just oh i don't understand it's fine um it's a cross between a cougar and a dragon. Oh, well. I mean. Why am I surprised anymore? It apparently roars and hisses before storms or rushing rapids, to warn you.

Okay, that's kind of nice. And it has horns on its head, which represent power, apparently. Sure. And it has spikes going down its saw-toothed back and tail, which are made of copper and has very big paws. So it does kind of have already some similarities to the hoedag, with it having the scales and spikes all the way down its body. So he could have, like, heard about this tail and, like, incorporated it.

Yeah, it's like, it's as if the natives played telephone long enough until eventually Eugene was born and the hoedag was created in his head. It was like, this is my story now. Yeah, I claim it. Good. Classic white man. I'm going to make money off it good classic white man so i'm gonna make money off it so classic and then say i'm a local hero yep so uh apparently this uh water panther

or mishi peshu lives in lake superior and guards water and copper but also brings misfortune and causes people to drown oh um it is the cause of storms waves rapids whirlpools and breaks in the ice and water and apparently there's a game called mishi peshu where apparently one kid has to catch his friends and then well there's one kid who isn't mishi peshu i think like who's it who's it yeah and his friends have to catch him and throw him into the water so to like that sounds like my least favorite game ever so you could call upon the power to secure a good fish catch or for help like for um healing if you believe in like the water helping you um so sometimes he's not that great sometimes he is very great he's the master of all water

creatures and he's engaged in apparently engaged in eternal conflict with the thunderbirds which is the master of air yeah i only bring that up because I do want to cover the Thunderbirds eventually. I'm excited for that story. So Mishi Peshu might come up later. Great. But yeah, so apparently his arch rival is the Thunderbird. Stories of not praying before crossing water. Apparently people have died before reaching land.

If you don't give thanks to Mishi Pes first for like giving you a safe travel across the water there's also a theory that the description of the hodag could have been in oh i already said that it's the theory is that the hodag could have been inspired by mishi peshu right right right so the hodag not so much a thing except a symbol of the town but mishi peshu is the local uh creature that might either save your life in the water, kill you in the water, but regardless is probably the hoedag. And inspired a really dangerous game for children. And that is the story of the hoedag. I loved it.

I liked it. I liked it. It was a good one. Anyway, my turn to sit back and relax, Christine. All right. So I also did Madison notes. Oh, okay. So if you went to the Madison show, I'm super sorry.

Well, there were two. So you could have gone to one or the other. Oh, right, right, right, right, right. So we probably just lost two chances to release a live show at some point. But that's okay. So this is actually a story. I'm actually very excited that you did a Wisconsin story because this is one that I've – I had thought I had covered it. And I was so disappointed because I was like, I don't remember covering it, but, like, it's so familiar and I really want to talk about it again.

Then I remembered I did it at a live show so I can, like, retell it. But there's this podcast that I've been listening to. It's, like, so good. It's called The Clearing. I don't know if you guys have heard of this. It's called The Clearing and it's about Edward Wayne Edwards. Okay. And this story is freaking bonkers.

Yes. It is wild. Edward Wayne Edwards. Yes. Okay. And it's the story of the Wisconsin sweetheart murder. So Edward Wayne Edwards in general was a serial killer. In general.

In general. But he was also a good guy. Yeah. He had kind eyes. That's how he got you. He got those green eyes. He also brought a lot of tourism to town. No, I'm just kidding.

He knew where to get a good squirt gun of diluted poison. Ho daddy. He was a ho daddy if you've ever seen one. When he's the sweetheart murderer. Yeah. It sounds like he was a ho daddy if you ever seen one um when he's the sweetheart murderer yeah it sounds like he's a ho daddy uh so edward wayne edwards um do you guys like this listen this is what you've been missing out on this whole time this is the part two and a half years we could hide the embarrassing ways that we move i'm like i'm not wearing a bra i gotta cover that up i feel like my like i like yeah yeah oh god now one's gonna be like is she wearing a bra no i'm not wearing a bra okay sorry i'm back everyone go look at uh christine's

braless chest stop it you pervert okay so just a ho daddy just a ho daddy you're my ho daddy yay um okay so this is the story of edwin wayne edwards and um i covered specifically wisconsin sweetheart murders but he uh was prolific throughout the country. Oh, okay. So it kind of, that's why I did it in Madison. So a lot of this information was found from Rolling Stone, Bustle, the Wisconsin State Journal, People.com, True Crime Diary, of course, Murderpedia, and this podcast, The Clearing, which is like very, very, very well done. And the guy actually talks to his daughter. I'll explain it, but it's a very good podcast, so you should listen to it.

All right. Cool. All right. So Edwards, Edward Wayne Edwards, was born in Akron, Ohio, which is near Cleveland. And as a young boy, he had quite a traumatic past. He witnessed his mother die by suicide when he was very young. Oh, shit. Okay.

He had no one to raise him, so he was sent to an orphanage where he was abused both physically and emotionally. Wow, we're coming in hot on this story. Yeah, we always do, huh? Not even, like, a good sentence to warm us in. Imagine this in a comedy club. Isn't this fun? This is a... Everyone's like, oh, your job sounds great.

It's like, oh, we have to somehow be funny about some really horrific things yeah yeah we have to make you have an enjoyable time yeah what are you not entertained or with the significant other you dragged who's like why would you do this to me i don't understand um so he was sent into an orphanage he was eventually sent to juvie but he was allowed to leave in order to join the Marines. So he joined the Marines and immediately went AWOL and was dishonorably discharged for that reason. He spent his 20s and 30s traveling around the Midwest doing odd jobs such as a ship docker, a handyman, and a vacuum retailer. A lot of odd jobs.

Yeah, quite odd. In 1955, Edwards escaped from a jail in Akron and drifted around the country robbing gas stations when he needed money, quickly landing him on the FBI's most wanted list in 1961. Okay. So it wasn't just the robberies. He had broken out of jail. It was that, like, oh, yeah, now you can all see how many times I'm yawned throughout my stories. So finally the truth comes out how boring I am. I yawn at least 20 times. It's very.

You're going to get used to it. We should start doing, like, a counter in the. I'm not used to it. It makeswn at least 20 times. It's very... You're gonna get used to it. We should start doing like a counter in the... I'm not used to it. It makes me feel very incompetent. To be fair, I think it's psychological because for the first year that we told stories, by the time Christine always told her story, when we both had day jobs, it was like 11 at night. So I think I just

still, my brain thinks like, oh, time to go to sleep. Yeah, well... It's all me a really soothing story not about murder before i get yeah well here it is anyway i apologize in advance for everyone that now gets to watch me on yeah finally someone else gets to witness i'm just a naturally sleepy kind of guy you know yeah yeah um okay so da da da so he is on the fbi's most wanted list he later wrote that he never disguised his appearance during his crimes because he wanted to be famous so that's a good guy that's rough uh well it worked and he was pretty quickly arrested

in atlanta and sent to jail five years later he was released on parole having been quote fully rehabilitated doubtful end of story just the end what if that was the end i wish god if every story ended like that every story ended five minutes in and happily. No murder. Just a couple robberies. Just a lot of rehabilitation. He's all better. Yeah.

He married a woman named Kay, had five children, and felt so changed, so radically changed. I radically believe him. I radically believe him. That he wrote a book. And the book was called Metamorphosis of a Criminal. Oh, my God. In which he discussed his past life of crime and his changed ways. that he wrote a book and the book was called metamorphosis of a criminal oh my god in which he discussed his past life of crime and his changed ways he also began touring the country and speaking about his reformed ways and how he saw the light and has changed to be a better person

i'd help that he was also like very attractive and charming so he was just very good at like manipulating people into thinking he was truthful when he told these kinds of stories sure he quickly gained the trust of his community he convinced america that he was a changed man to the point let's hear it to the point let's hear it so do you remember this game show called to tell the truth it's the show where three people attempt to convince a panel of celebrity judges that they are the central character who like either has a weird occupation or has done something really wild uh and the other two are imposters so there's two actors and the actual person and it's say it's say it's like um from catch me if you can like

the guy the uh got it yeah and so he'll be like oh i you know forged all these checks and then the other two try to convince no i, I'm the one who did that. Oh, I see. Okay. And they have to try and like convince the judges and then the judges will vote on who they think is actually. It's all coming back. Yeah.

It's, I love that show personally. Anyway, he was on this show. Oh. Yeah. Did he win? So three people. Okay. So there are three people on the show.

There's actually a version of it on ABC now. I don't know as of like March or whenever we did the show, but I haven't watched it. My favorite episode of To Tell the Truth is To Tell the Truth. I am Edward Wayne Edwards. Oh. Reformed criminal. Okay. Yes.

Edwards was on this freaking show. The episode is on YouTube, so I highly recommend watching it. Since you're already here. To half of the people listening. Yeah here to watch watch just kidding everyone listening to just the audio version is like oh holy shit is this my new normal because i hate it um oh yeah it's on youtube please finish our episode first because i want to tell you what he did before you watch it because it's so much more disturbing if you watch it after. So half of the panel voted for him.

They said, actually, they picked him because he seemed the least likely read, like, whitest guy on the panel. And so the least likely to be an ex-con and the most all-American seeming contestant. So they thought, oh, they're trying to trick us. That's him. Because the other two, one was like this kind of like italian suave guy they were like oh he looks more like a criminal like it was very insensitive i mean what are we like the 60s what year is this um the 60s 60s okay i think well maybe the 70s i mean i think it was the 70s at this point um yeah so interesting there's been two different types of, that we know of, two murderers on game shows.

Because Night Stalker too, right? No. Akala. Rodney Akala. Yeah. Rodney Alcala. Alcala. Yeah.

He was on like the dating game or something. He was on the dating game and he was a fucking psycho. He looked like someone I would not want to date with. And the other contestants were like, yeah, he was a freaking creep backstage, too. However, this guy was so charming and all-American that they were like, wow. There's no way he's... Incredible. He was ever a criminal.

Wow, he's really changed. Okay, so he is on this show. He's doing this book tour. He's just this kind of American hero. Cut to a few years later surprise surprise he's back in jail on arson charges and um he kind of lived the rest of his life uh like kind of in and out of jail kept to himself but now we're gonna super fast forward to 2009 okay edwards has long been out of jail he's in his 70s he's living back in akron ohio

one of his daughters apr April Belasio. Belasio? Belasio. Let's go with that. It sounds cool. April. She's now a 48-year-old mother of three. Her kids are grown.

She decides, you know what? I'm finally going to act on some nagging suspicions I've had my whole life about my dad and about my childhood. Let's hear it so this is what that other podcast is about like her journey into like discovering all this and what happened and it's so well done but so april she she always knew growing up that something was off about her dad she said he had an obsession with the zodiac killer with murders to the point that he would like sit them down and make them watch all of these videos and crime things and store like really gruesome graphic stuff when they were like toddlers like forced them to watch it was like sickly fascinated the other weird thing is that

he would move the family from city to city every few months they never stayed in a city for more than a couple months at a time that's pretty interesting yeah she knew something was off but she had kind of repressed a lot of it she didn't have a happy that's pretty interesting yeah she knew something was off but she had kind of repressed a lot of it she didn't have a happy childhood whatsoever um and so she had repressed a lot of it but over time she just was like there's this nagging feeling i'm living with i i kind of want to see if there's anything to this that i can process so one day so what she does is she goes she remembers several of the small towns she lived in. And so she starts going back. Like, she's like, I know we lived there in 1978 or whatever it may be in this small town in the fall.

So she goes back to like the news articles, like archives from that fall of 1978. And she starts realizing there are murders happening in those towns during the time periods that they got it lived there got it she uh stumbles upon a news report of a recently reopened cold case and that was a cold case of the wisconsin sweetheart murders which was a cold case in a town that she had lived in sure the town was called watertown wisconsin and the murders had taken place in 1980 so on saturday night august 9th 1980 timothy hack and his girlfriend kelly drew both 19 disappeared after a wedding reception in town their families reported them missing the following day and one of the largest searches in wisconsin history was organized a few days after the disappearance police began to find disturbing things on the

side of the road they They found Kelly's pants, which had been cut from ankle to groin. They found pieces of rope, strange pieces of yellow tubing and more bits of torn clothing. The tubing freaks me out. Yeah. Um, three months later,

squirrel hunters stumbled upon Kelly's body in the woods and Timothy's was a hundred feet away. Uh, Kelly had been raped and timothy had been stabbed and strangled and after kelly was assaulted she was also stabbed and strangled to death oh my god so leads went in all different directions this was like horrific this is a very small town this was just like so shocking and jarring it was like this young couple and very close in the community close-knit community um as the years went by, investigators had no answers. The case went cold.

The families just kind of lived with like, we're never going to find out what happened. So that was in 1980. So we're back in 2009, April is searching through the archives of all these places she's lived. And she stumbles upon this news report. Her blood runs cold when she realizes not only did they live in Watertown, Wisconsin in 1980, but her dad had worked at the venue where the wedding reception was held that night. Nope. Yeah. Well, that does it for me. Yeah. What's more, she remembered her family leaving town only two days after the disappearance of the teens. Well, so at this point, that does it for me too. She's like, okay, my suspicions were correct. Yep. My dad is the worst guy. Yeah.

So the case had been recently reopened as a lot of cases have been in the last, you know, 10 years due to DNA evidence that can now be analyzed and funding coming in from the government to help reopen cold cases and investigate DNA. So April decided to give the lead detective, Chad Garcia, a call. And, uh, to her surprise, he was immediately like,

okay, I'm in, let's talk about it. This is like a really interesting lead you've brought up. Cause she was like, I thought they were going to be like, you're crazy. Yeah.

This random lady calling from across the country, like saying, I think my dad did it, you know? Right, right, right. Um,

but, uh, detective Garcia was like, let's hop on a call. So they followed up, they talked, and the detectives ended up traveling to Louisville, which is where April's dad was now living, Edward Wayne Edwards. He was now 76 years old in 2009.

And they go to Louisville to interview him now. At the time I wrote these notes, I hadn't listened to the podcast, but in the podcast, you can hear the, they taped the the entire interview they show up at his house and they're like oh hey we're just uh we're following up on this murder up in watertown wisconsin he's like oh what a murder and it is so creepy to hear them talking to him like knowing he did it and him pretending like i have no memory of this like that is fascinating it is gross it is jarring like dark fast it is it is and you can hear the whole thing and that you can hear the detectives just playing it so

chill and like okay man yeah i'm sure it was nothing we just you know trying to like keep him comfortable and like not spook him yeah yeah um and so it was just it's really well done and very fascinating um where am i where are? I hit a bunch of buttons. When I get excited, I start tapping and your little rat feet, little frantic. So da da da da da da. So they show up in Louisville and they're interviewing him. And, um, he's like, I don't know what you're talking about i have no memory of this he says do you remember the couple he says no i don't i've uh never heard of those people even though like if you had lived there and you at least would have heard about the murder like

right it's just a little bit off that he's like i don't know who they are then investigators asked if edwards had ever been deer hunting before okay and edwards said deer hunting no that was the wrong answer because 29 years before after timothy and kelly's disappearance investigators had interviewed edwards they said oh we had discovered him he had a bloody nose and he had been working at the venue so they were like hey man what's going on why do you have a bloody nose where were you what was your alibi he said i was out deer hunting when they got it were murdered or when they went missing i was i was at deer hunting that's how i got this injury so 29 years later they asked him have you ever been deer hunting he's like no i've never been deer hunting

right he forgot his own alibi totally forgot so they had cornered him at this point because they're like interesting our statement says that you were out deer hunting and that's how you received that injury to your face. So he, uh, was kind of cornered. And in the audio in that podcast, you can hear them asking for a DNA sample. They're just super chill. They're like, Hey, so just like, while we're here, can we get a DNA sample? And he's like, no, I watch these crime shows. I don't want anything to do with that. Like that's too far. And his wife keeps going, no, come on. Like, if you have nothing, just, like, give them a DNA sample. And they're like, well, we'll come back with a warrant.

And they make it really difficult. Finally, he gives in. He's like, okay, okay, take my DNA. And not surprisingly, it was a match to the semen found at the scene. And so after almost 30 years, had finally caught the wisconsin sweetheart murderer oh wow and it was someone nobody had expected um they interviewed the dad of kelly the daughter who had been killed yeah oh no sorry of the son timothy got it and the dad said like all these years living in that town for 30 years he just every he said everybody he looked at every

neighbor he's like could that person have done it that guy's always been an asshole could he have done it like that guy had a dream imagine just that paranoia for your entire life and you never know you're like i can't and then you find out after like decades like oh i never had anything to worry about he was already gone he was yeah it was some random guy that like i never would have even thought about or known um so it was just very disturbing but when they did tell the dad about the how they had found him he was like i was actually like so proud that my son had caused that bloody nose he's like i was just so happy to hear that like he had a bloody nose and so at least he went down fighting and it was right just very touching um so at this point they had caught him but this is only the

beginning edwards ended up confessing to committing... I thought that was the end of the story. Bye. He's rehabilitated again. Anyway, he's on our game show next week. No. Oh, good. Good, good, good.

So he ended up confessing to committing five murders between 1977 and 1996. It turns out the whole time he was on his little speaking engagement tour and on the game show talking about his former life of petty crime and how much he had changed, he was an actual serial killer committing murders. Yes. So the first murders he confessed to were the Wisconsin sweetheart murders. Then he confessed to the murders of another teenage couple. So he had an M.O. Their names were Judy Straub and her boyfriend, Billy Lavaco, back in 1977.

Their bodies had been found in a park, both having been shot point blank in the neck. Oh, my God. Yeah. He was convicted and received life sentences for those murders in 2010. Lastly, Edwards confessed to the 1996 murder of his own foster son, Danny Boy Edwards. Oh, no. In Burton, Ohio. So Danny lived with the Edwards family in the 90s,

and although the Edwards hadn't technically adopted him, the court had allowed Danny Boy to actually change his name to Edwards because he felt like he was a son. That's so gross. Yeah, it's really fucked up. Wow. So Edwards admitted he had murdered Danny Boy in a scheme to collect insurance money.

Quote, And with Danny, I saw an opportunity. I set it up to collect the money and ended up gettingy i saw an opportunity i set it up to collect the money and ended up getting 250 000 out of it and it was arranged it was premeditated it was thought out it was planned and that's what i did and if you listen to the episode in the podcast they go into much more detail you can hear the phone calls between him and danny boy where he's danny boy thinks that they're in a scheme together to get money but actually wow actually edwards is like laying out an audio trail like he's recording all his own phone calls yeah

an audio trail of like oh no he went missing like like it was so fucked up oh no turns out he had brought him out to ask for help you know picking up some some material building materials or something and when he turned around he just shot him right in the back of the head and um hid his body and the skull has never been found by the way oh my he god held out on that for for the rest of his life um so he was sentenced to death so he was sentenced to death he was put on death row for the murder of danny boy in march of 2011 it's been made clear that he did not admit to these murders out of a guilty conscience, but because they had taken place in Ohio. And that's because he was facing a life sentence and he decided he was in Wisconsin and he wanted to spend his life sentence in Ohio,

not Wisconsin. No offense, Wisconsin. But he's... I'm sure Wisconsin's not offended. Yeah, they're like, take him, please. We don't want him. Get rid of him. So he admitted to the specifically the Ohio crimes only after being promised that if he gave information, he would be moved to Ohio. Got it. So all very strategic. Only a month after his sentencing on April 7th, 2011, Ed Edwards died of natural causes at the Corrections Medical Center in Columbus, Ohio. But that's also not the end of the story. in Columbus, Ohio.

But that's also not the end of the story. So it's believed that Edwards was responsible for many more murders than those he admitted to, especially because he only admitted to the Ohio ones so he could be moved strategically to a different jail. Detective Chad Garcia, who was in charge of the Sweetheart Murders case, says he's pretty confident there are at least five to seven more murders

Edwards committed and, quote, who knows beyond that. So they're confident that there are at least five to seven more murders edwards committed and quote who knows beyond that so they're confident that there are at least five to seven more um and a lot of the podcast i know i keep talking about this other show i'm sorry but a lot of the other show is is april going through her memories and saying i remember living in this part of town and this kid disappeared who lived on our street and like i want to see if my dad had anything to do with it and so a lot of it is can you imagine like now every town you ever lived in yeah every kid that ever got hurt you're just gonna think maybe my dad maybe my dad did it responsible and like a lot of it was you know we rushed out of town in the middle of the night and she's like well there had to be a reason like

right something happened and it's just very disturbing and she actually meets a lot of the relatives of the people that he murdered and so there's a lot of that of like forgiveness and reconnecting and her saying, I'm sorry what my father did to your family and murdered your son. And it's just like very heavy, but like very fascinating. Yikes. Yikes. Yikes. Yikes. Yeah. So a lot of experts also believe that Edwards was responsible for the murder of another young couple, Beverly Allen and Larry Payton in Portland, Oregon, in 1960. They were murdered on a lover's lane, that's the M.O., and later found stabbed and strangled, which was similar to sweetheart murders. He had actually been questioned early in the investigation because he was in town around that time, but was released when they didn't have enough to hold him. in town around that time but was released when they didn't have enough to hold him and so now there's this whole rabbit hole that has been created um about this guy because that he moved

so much and there were so many different like potential links right can't fully be confirmed that people have kind of just started going on in these like wild you know pinboard yeah uh sprees of trying to figure out who he could be charlie day charlie day style yeah um so want to come down this rabbit hole with me because i do let's let's bounce around it's a trip so in 2018 a true crime series came out on paramount network called it was him the many murders of ed edwards the man behind the series uh who was also interviewed on that show on the podcast is retired cold case detective john. Cameron, who has spent the last eight years working to prove that Edward Wayne Edwards was the most prolific serial killer the world has never heard of. Oh.

Cameron believes Edwards committed upwards of 100 murders and was involved in some of the most famous murder cases of the past 70 years. And was involved in some of the most famous murder cases of the past 70 years. Now, this is extremely controversial because it is very conspiracy theory-y. So, I mean, you know, down our alley. But, I mean, yeah. Here's a list of some of the murders for which Cameron believes Edwards was responsible. Okay, big breath. JonBenet Ramsey.

Lacey Peterson. Teresa Halbach of Making a Murder. adam walsh son of america's most wanted oh my gosh chandra levy jimmy hoffa martha moxley steve branch michael moore christopher byers of the west memphis three case and the black dahlia cameron no okay cameron also believes edwards was the zodiac killer and that he is responsible for the atlanta child murders so what he's just like oh every murder you've ever heard of yes that was him and i think it's one of those cases where he started the evidence he's discovered he's using to bolster something he's created as a theory

rather than got it you know and like uh probably not true just a lot of branches are coming out and they interview him. They go to his house and interview him. And, um, April, uh, Edward's daughter is like, listen, I, I, as much as you want to find out all the, all of my dad's victims, but like, I think this takes away from the case. If you're saying like he murdered John Bonnet Ramsey and like he murdered the black Dahlia, like he would have been like 13 or something. Like it just doesn't make sense.

And like, I think you're taking away away from from actually finding out who did it so it's kind of controversial a lot of people are like on board because it's just such an insane like fascinating theory sure i mean why not why not ride it a little bit right that way just to see like just to see you can find out but and of course like you know he has facts or evidence that backs it up but then there's a lot on the other side that's like no no and she even said like no we weren't living there at that time and he was like well he could have flown there got it flown back in two hours and she was like but why it's just a lot of it it's a little illogical yeah and like why would he fly somewhere to kill a random person he doesn't know and then fly back right he would just kill someone where he lives he was already doing that and like she she even said like as

sick as it sounds like that's not his type like he had a type and it's pretty clear in the mo's of the people he murdered they were all couples teenage couples yeah and he would like assault the woman and murder both of them and that's just what he did and so like the west memphis or the um yeah west memphis three and the Atlanta child murders, she's like, it just wouldn't necessarily fit. Yeah.

So I'm not saying he's not a shitty person. Right. Exactly. But he didn't do all of that. Yeah. And she's like, I know how terrible he was. I'm not doubting that or denying that,

but like we need to have some element of logic here too. So anyway, the most absurd of all these is the black dahlia accusation um which we did in episode three if you want to go back talk about going back to our awkward phase i guess we're just having we're going through puberty all over again oh no oh my nightmare um so experts have agreed elizabeth short the black dahlia was killed by someone with advanced surgical knowledge and edwards would only have been 13 at the time of her death. Got it.

So, not very likely. It doesn't make much sense. Now, interestingly enough, the most realistic theory to come out of this six-part series is that Edwards could be the Zodiac Killer. Is that logical? So, that's the most logical to come out of this, and I'll tell you why. Is that logical? So that's the most logical to come out of this, and I'll tell you why. It has actually been heavily speculated by other people, too, that Edwards was the Zodiac Killer.

And April even says, I think it's possible. Oh, wow. Okay. And the reason being, so as we know, the Zodiac Killer terrorized the Bay Area in the 60s and 70s. He was never caught. Their entire website's devoted to this specific theory. So let's humor it. Why not? Why not?

That's what we're here for. Why not? The Zodiac Killer claimed responsibility for 37 murders, but has only officially been linked to attacks on three couples and a taxi driver from 1968 to 1969, which means targeted young couples, which is typically a pretty rare victim type. So if you think about it, it was a similar MO of young couples on lover's lanes,

that kind of thing, was Zodiac Killer's MO and Edwards' MO. So that's one similarity. Sure. What's more, there's evidence that Edwards lived in Northern California in the Bay Area during the time of the Zodiac killings. Witnesses often describe the Zodiac as being about five foot eight with a medium to heavy build, which Edwards was not the most, you know, compelling evidence, but it still fits. Uh, so the switchboard operator who spoke with the Zodiac, her name's Nancy

Slover, um, the switchboard operator who talked to him in 1969 said he sounded like he was probably 35, like mid thirties at that point edwards was 36 uh when the zodiac first approached young couple brian and cecilia so we covered this in episode 86 also maybe less awkward phase but still pretty awkward during that time of our life i'm sure i mean there has not been it's all been awkward just different levels of how terrible we've never really escaped it no um so when he approached brian and cecilia and brian was the only person to survive and like had a full account of um like what the zodiac looked like and everything so brian later said the man had introduced himself as an escaped convict from

deer lodge prison interestingly enough edward's book that he wrote the metamorphosis bullshit sure mentioned serving time in deer lodge prison numerous times oh and this was like somewhere i think it was in wisconsin or like somewhere far away it was not interesting it was not nearby it was not in the bay area like it was a very small random prison in like a totally different state so that was just a very weird coincidence and finally for what it's worth april ed ed edward's daughter believes she really believes her father was a zodiac killer um there was a documentary on investigation discovery and now the podcast in which april explains that her dad had a deep deep deep obsession with the zodiac

killer he used to make his children watch videos about the Zodiac Killer, and he would just scream, that's not how it happened. Like, every time something would go on, he'd be like, that's not what happened, and, like, get so defensive, and they just were like, what is his deal? And now looking back... Well, that was the most red flag I've ever heard. Right? I mean... And he was obsessed with his whole life.

He had clippings. Every clipping he could get his hands on of the Zodiac. Talked about it constantly. Just was constantly analyzing news articles in the media and how it portrayed the Zodiac Killer. Was correcting every time they said something wrong. Wow. Very, very

weird. So he's a Zodiac Killer in my head, officially. I mean, she believes it and she's already she was able to pin him to multiple murders herself, so I'm just saying. On a hunch, by the way. So imagine when she's already, she was able to pin him to multiple murders herself. So I'm just saying. On a hunch, by the way. So imagine when she's got another hunch. Let's go with it.

Yeah. She seems to be pretty spot on and everything else. And so Edward's DNA has not actually been checked against the Zodiacs yet, but perhaps one day it will be. And I'm really hoping for that day because that would be so, that would just add such a layer. If you could combine this story with the Zodiac and finally, I mean, that would be so that would just add such a layer if you could combine this story with the zodiac and finally i mean that would be quite i'm surprised that that wasn't the first thing they did after like news like this yeah i mean i think but i think the only compelling quote-unquote news is like she thinks he did it which like isn't really true you know i mean maybe not i feel like i would try i would find it on my lunch break or something i don't know how dna is

tested i'm just pretending it takes 30 seconds. Sure. I know it doesn't. But if you think about it too, there's so many theories about who's the Zodiac Killer. And they all seem very... Like D.B. Cooper. I mean, there's so many that are like, well, maybe. So it's kind of...

Yeah, who knows? There's a lot there, but I really hope that they actually do go through with that because I'd be fascinated to know. So perhaps one day it'll be tested. I'm really hoping so. Guys, can you do that? Click here to do it. Click somewhere.

Click here. Click on M's stupid key in the forehead. Nonsense. My weird specific exact dot in the center of my head. People are like, how did you do that now i was just talking with my hands because i don't know how to do anything else and then i realized that i like left my phone in the car or something and i went oh no and then i i was like oh no there's keys in my head oh actually no yeah i picture it more it was like dag nab it and then like just like

like almost wanting to like face palm or like slap myself in the forehead because I'm so stupid. And I did it with keys. So I was double stupid. Wow. That's rough. I mean, well, it's fine. It's fine. I'm healing. We're healing.

Emotionally. We're healing together. Anyway, so hopefully his DNA will be checked. Maybe someday we'll know definitively whether or not that theory is true, which I'd be interested to know either way. Either way, Ed Edwards is still a murderous fucking bastard and that is his story thanks to april his really strong and brave and smart daughter yeah wow april this this one goes out to you yeah seriously she's a fucking baller if you listen to that show she's like i've worked through this for years and like i just finally got to a point where i was like no i need to make it known what the fuck my dad did

wow yeah like while she was a child and it's just disturbing to a point where I was like, no, I need to make it known what the fuck my dad did. Wow. Yeah. Like, while she was a child. And it's just disturbing to hear her childhood. She's like, yeah, sometimes he would have us run in the woods and then he would shoot after us and, like, scare us and stuff like that. What the hell? He was a nut. Like, he was a fucking terrifying person.

I don't even know why she claimed she had a hunch. I think she was trying to be polite. I think she was like, I know something fucking happened. Well, it worked because they took her seriously. You know, she like didn't come off as crazy at all. They were just like, wow. Okay. Actually, I think you're on to something.

So yeah, she did a great job. So yeah, that's the story. I'm very excited. I got to cover again. Yeah, that was a good one. Thank you. Yours was good, too. This was a good episode.

I think. I mean, we don't know. I mean, visually visually who's to say give us some points um i guess that's it for us then yeah this was fun i mean we did it at least yeah yeah yeah i hope let's go back and see if any of this recorded can you imagine it just didn't record in the whole time we're talking on audio and it's like watch our youtube and it just doesn't exist well in case it is on youtube and people want to find it where can they look and that's why we drink podcast oh so to send people to youtube yes so we're at and that's why we drink doesn't exist. Well, in case it is on YouTube and people want to find it, where can they look? And That's Why We Drink?

Podcast? Oh, so to send people to YouTube? Yes. And That's Why We Drink. I think it's youtube.com slash c slash and that's why we drink. You can also find our website and that's why we drink.com. Yes. You can also find us on Twitter and Instagram at ATWWD podcast. Click here

to figure out how to do that. You can also follow our personals Xteen Schieffer and Liam Schultz. And Patreon if you want to be on our close friends list which you do. Maybe you do. I post some weird shit and when I'm about to make it exclusive weird shit it's going to get even more fun.

That we tell ourselves no one will ever see except you guys. Ooh it's going to be a trip. What else? Oh we've got an address if you'd like to send us gifts. We do our fan mail videos. For Patreon. So you can send your gifts to our P.O. box. It's 1920 Hillhurst Ave, number 265, Los Angeles, California, 90027.

Yay. Also, you can email us. Yeah. And that's where we drink. At gmail.com. At gmail.com. And you can also submit your personal listener stories for our listeners episodes will come out once a month true crime or ghosties

yes and uh or cryptids or aliens one thing we are thinking about doing too for uh our new with our new patreon is people getting to pick the topics for our listeners stories like the themes christine's been picking themes she's more been shouting them at eva i've been screaming them into the void and somehow they're returning to me. But if you would like to submit either your own personal story for us to read on air, or if you would like to come up with a theme, you can always email us. We've had themes like cowboy ghosts, mirrors. Doppelgangers.

I've requested doppelgangers. I think we're going to do that one soon. So yeah, we might do some of those and see what we come up with. You guys can help us. Because the see what we come up with you guys can help us because i mean the other one we came up with was cheese and like that was not helpful to anyone yeah um uh we also uh so we do have our our last two shows of the year tomorrow in salt lake but they'll be over when this comes out sorry yes but when we uh that means that all you've got to look forward to now are the, our official 2020 tour.

We're working on it guys. It's actually happening. And it's going to be a very different format than what you guys have already seen. If you've come to a live show before I know we were originally doing individual stories at every individual city. Right. Our brains just can't do it.

We realized there's a reason why everybody else on earth doesn't do an individual set for every city they go to. So we have figured out something that we think is super duper cool. And the fact that like it's September and we're working, we're heavily working on this right now, starting for our tour in 2020 means like we are really putting it together. So it should be a good time. It's going to be a fun tour.

It's going to be not at all like what we've been doing. So totally different. But we're going to hopefully release all those at some point and hopefully all together. So it's not like sporadically releasing dates. We're going to release one big tour date. That's all the shows. And when that happens, we'll post it on social media and stuff. And yeah, we're excited to meet more of you guys.

We're just trying to get more streamlined while also becoming more chaotic, if you will. So until then, and that's why we drink bye love you