Criminology - The Mad Gasser of Mattoon

Episode Date: March 12, 2023

In Mattoon, Illinois, in the mid-1940s, many people claimed they were made sick by a chemical pumped or sprayed into their homes as a gas. The gasser, or the person people imagined was the gasser, was given several monikers, including "the Mad Gasser of Mattoon" Or "The Phantom Anesthetist." Join Mike and Morf as they discuss this mysterious case of the alleged Mad Gasser of Mattoon. No physical evidence of any gas was ever actually found, however, leading many to doubt the claims of all of these people who claimed to be victims. So was there really some maniac on the loose gassing people's homes, or were these events the figment of people's imaginations? Interestingly, a similar series of events occurred about a decade earlier in Botetourt County, Virginia. You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Go to Vessi.com/criminology for your pair of Vessi shoes Turn your food waste into dirt with the press of a button with Lomi. Use the code CRIMINOLOGY to save $50 at lomi.com/CRIMINOLOGY Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 248 of the Criminology Podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Hey, Morph, man, how you doing? I'm doing good. I slept in a little bit this morning, and so I woke up, got my coffee, and I'm ready to go and record this episode.

How are you doing? No, I'm doing good. Yeah, you and I normally record in the morning, which is, you know, for me, tougher. I'm not a morning person. I'm a night owl. I like to stay up late, watch bad movies, and I don't know. I just, I've always been that way. Yeah, I like staying up late and watching movies and stuff, but as far as work stuff, I, I don't know, I'm the opposite. I like to get it done early and then get on about the rest of my business for the day. Well, good. Good for you. Good for you. My, uh, my youngest daughter turned 18

this past week. So, man, that really makes me feel old. Happy birthday. to her and happy empty nester to you. You're getting closer to that step. Yeah, she's going to go off to college this fall and it's just going to be my wife and I. So I don't know. I don't know. It'll be different for sure, no doubt about it. All right, let's go ahead and give our Patreon shoutouts. We had Julie Keahane, Colleen Holt, Chelsea Sharp, Amanda Wardle, and Vanessa T. Nanny. So a lot of great new support. We really appreciate it. Yeah, thanks so much for taking the time to support the show. It means a lot, and we can't thank you enough.

And for anyone that would like to help support the show, you can go to patreon.com slash criminology to sign up. All right, buddy, let's go ahead and jump into this case. In this episode, we have a bit of a change of pace. We're not talking about a serial killer or some type of perplexing, missing persons case. In fact, no one was really harmed, at least not seriously or permanently, this is more of a mystery than a bona fide crime at this point.

This is a case where, you know, people believe that they were the victims of crimes, but there were some conflicting thoughts on that. There have been cases where people legitimately thought they were victims of a crime, while some people, including the authorities, didn't think they really were. So that brings us to this episode about a series of attacks that may or may not have even happened where many people claim they were made sick by some kind of chemical pumped or sprayed into their home as a gas. This event or imagined event, however it turns out to be, took place in Matun, Illinois in the mid-1940s. The gasser or the person people imagined was the

gasser was given several monikers, including the mad gasser of mattoon or the phantom anesthetist. No physical evidence or any sort of gas was ever actually found. However, leading many to doubt the claims of all of these people who claim to be victim. So, was there really some maniac on the loose gassing people's homes or were these events, the figment of people's imaginations? You be the judge. Matun, Illinois is about 185 miles south of Chicago or a three-hour drive. In 1940, the town had about 15,800 residents, but it was still a somewhat rural area. There was a small population boom when petroleum was found nearby, but soon World War II would see many young men leave. Wives and children were left to tend to affairs at home in

Matun while the men were away in World War II, and during that time someone was waiting to terrorize them, or so it seemed. On September 2nd, 1944, an article appeared on the front of page of the Mattoon Journal Gazette. The headline read, Anesthetic Prouler on Loose. According to NPR, Illinois, the subheading explained that Mrs. Kearney and her daughter were the first victims. The night before at around 11 p.m., Mrs. Aline Kearney had headed to bed with her three-year-old daughter, Dorothy Ellen. Aline's husband, Bert, was working an overnight shift as a cab driver, and Aline was a bit nervous. There had apparently been prowler cited in the neighborhood before. And on that night in particular, police were searching for a Nazi P.O.W.

Who escaped from custody in Peoria, Illinois. Although Peoria was a couple hours away from the Kearney home, the news headlines had made Aline nervous. Despite being a bit on edge, Aline left the window open to catch some of the cool night breeze coming in. Shortly after, she climbed into bed, she noticed a sickening, sweet odor in the bedroom. But she didn't think too much of it, because there were flowers just outside the open window. According to the Washington and post. As the odor grew stronger, Aline began to feel paralysis of her legs and lower body. Aline's two-year-old daughter, Carol, her adult sister, Martha, and her two-year-old nephew, Roger. We're all in different parts of the house. Aline cried out for Martha, who burst through the

closed door into the bedroom. Aline quickly explained what was going on and still felt that she couldn't move. Martha did notice an odor coming from the bedroom window. She got a neighbor, Mrs. Robertson, to call the police, while Mr. Robertson checked for signs of an intruder. Nothing was found near the Kearney home or in the neighborhood. Police showed up, but they too saw nothing unusual and left. At around 1230 that morning, Bert Kearney got home after having been contacted about the commotion at his home. When he walked up to his door, he claimed he saw a tall man wearing dark clothing and a tight hat near the bedroom window. Bert Kearney approached the man, and the man fled as Mr. Kearney approached the home.

Authorities were called a second time, and again, police found no sign of anyone around the area. Too freaked out by the prospect of someone trying to attack the home twice, the Kearney's, Martha, and her son, Roger, went to another family member's home and stayed there overnight. Aline Kearney went to the doctor to be examined, and she was found to have mouth and throat irritation, almost like burns, but she recovered the ability to move again about 30 minutes. after the initial attack. Little Dorothy was sick until the next morning, but she recovered as well. Due to the odor described by a lien and the symptoms she experienced, it was believed that she had been attacked with gas, which was possibly chloroform or ether, or a mixture of both. Chloriform is used as a

solvent, a substance that helps other substances dissolve. It can harm the eyes, skin, liver, kidneys and nervous system, chloroform can be toxic if inhaled or swallowed. Ethers are liquid at room temperature and are typically colorless with a sweet smell. Ethers are commonly used as a solvent in laboratories and as a starting fluid for some engines. It was formerly used as a general anesthetic until non-flammable drugs were developed. It was initially believed that someone had used one of these products in an attempt to rob the Kearney home because Aline and Martha had been counting a lot of money, the night of the attack right in front of the window where anyone on the street could have seen them. So no doubt a very strange situation, you have a woman who claims that she can't move.

She's, her legs, her lower body is paralyzed. It was said that the doctor found throat, irritatory. irritation almost like burns on multiple people. It wasn't just a lien. And then they all recovered. But then you have this statement that they were counting a lot of money the night before in front of the window. Okay. It's the 1940s. I don't know what a lot of money was in the 1940s. I never actually saw the figure, but it was a different time. I know personally, I don't sit in front of a window today where people can see me with a pile of cash, just counting it.

I don't think that would be a good idea. But it fits into the theory that someone saw them and decided to rob them. And if that's the case, that's a pretty strange way of robbing them, either they could walk in with a gun, something like that, and just demand the money and then take off trying to gas them seems kind of, a strange, no guarantee that it would work or how long it would take. It seems like a strange way to do it. But then also weird is you have Mr. Kearney returning home and he sees this guy in the area,

but police look around two different times and never find any sign of anyone. So a little bit of odd stuff going on here. But that's part of the allure of this case, right? you have people saying that they experienced this or that. You have some people saying they saw someone strange. And obviously you have people saying they had these severe symptoms, but police show up and they can't corroborate any of it. News of what happened at the Kearney Home made its way around the neighborhood,

and people were frightened. You would need at least two attacks to call someone the first, not the only victim. yet the first headline in the Matoon Journal Gazette called Mrs. Kearney and her daughter, the first victims. And 97% of the homes in Matune subscribe to or read the journal Gazette. So you can imagine that after hearing what happened to the Kearney Home and reading this headline in the newspaper, people in the area were on high alert for what some people called an anesthetic preller. On September 5th, three days after the incident at the Kearney Home,

four more attacks were publicized in the journal, Gazette, a man named Urban Rath, claimed that he and his wife had been attacked on August 31st one night before. The anesthetist had attacked the Kearney home at around 3 a.m. He was lying in bed when he woke up and felt sick. He couldn't move. But he noticed that some sort of gas was coming in through the bedroom window, which was open. Police checked into all of these alleged incidents, looking for a gas-carrying prowler if one really existed. On the end of September 5th, after the four additional attacks were reported by the newspaper, the first possible physical evidence of an actual suspect was found.

At around 10 p.m., Carl and Buella Coords got back to their home after a night out and went to their back door to enter their home, which was the same door they usually used. After a few minutes, they saw there was some sort of white fabric on their front screen door, a door they didn't use. Buella picked it up and noticed it was sort of wet, so instinctively she smelled the fabric. She immediately felt sick, feeling what the Matoon Journal described as

a sensation similar to coming into contact with an electric shock that raced down her body to her feet and then seemed to settle in her knees. And blood started coming out of her mouth. Just like Lean Kearney, she described a feeling of paralysis. An old skeleton key

and a tub of lipstick. That wasn't Bulas were found near the porch. They immediately called police. The couple concluded that someone, perhaps a burglar, had been trying to get the family dog to sniff the anesthetic so that it wouldn't bark at them or attack them because the dog usually slept on the front porch where the fabric was found.

It felt like a very close call to the couple. They guessed the burglar must have fled when they arrived home. Unlike other victims who recovered, from the initial effects of the gas relatively quickly, Bula was sick for over two hours. Her mouth and throat were burnt, like Aline Kearney's, and her lips were swollen and red. The journal Gazette reported that

Bula was the first person to find concrete evidence that some type of drug or anesthetic is used. Soon after Mr. Mrs. Cords called the police. A man who is never publicly identified was stopped about a block away and taken into custody. He was never connected to the incident and was released, claiming he was in the area because he was lost.

Despite investigators collecting the fabric that had made Buellis so sick, nothing unusual was found on it. The Journal Gazette makes a note that investigators checked what they thought might be a hideout for the suspect, but this wasn't expanded on, and nothing else was ever found in connection to the incident at the Quarge residents. According to a Washington Post article about this case

on September 8th, An editorial in the journal Gazette claimed that there has been a tendency in Matun police circles recently to conceal from the public. The fact that certain crimes have occurred, Matun police chief C.E. Cole claimed that the smell was due to large quantities of carbon tetrachloride being carried to all parts of the city as the wind shifts coming from the Atlas Imperial Diesel Engine Company plant. Officials that the plant denied this claim,

citing the safety of their chemicals, as well as the fact that it had never been an issue in the past. By September 9th, the Charleston Daily Courier reported on a front page headline that victims of gas prowler were now 25. So more, if there's a couple of things that jump out at me here, you know, first of all, you have the paper, reporting that 25 people had claimed to be victims of what they were calling the gas prowler. That's a, that's a very large number.

And then you have this police chief trying to, I guess, explain the situation and maybe the smells that people were reporting saying it was coming from this diesel plant. Now, obviously, they're going to come out and say, hey, it's not us. We're safety conscious. We have all the right protocols in place. But 25 is a very large number. So what do you conclude from that? You know, from my way of thinking, it's either you have a serial gasser going around trying to, you know, do something, harm people for whatever purpose, or there is some kind of gas floating around in the town that's making people sick, or one more thing, which is people saw the first reports and then started

reporting it themselves. And those are all possibilities, but the one thing that can't explain that jumps out to me is the citing by Mr. Kern in the first incident we talked about of a man fleeing the home. And in this incident where Bueller found that thread with the chemical stuff on it, in the lipstick. So at the very least, there's evidence that someone was at their home and put stuff there that didn't belong there. An Illinois Times.com article about this case detailed that on September 10th, the Chicago Herald American reported that the suspect had sprayed a deadly nerve gas into 13 homes and knocked out 27 known victims. The claim deadly is interesting because

no one had died, so it was a bit of an exaggeration, just like the initial claim that, Aline and Dorothy Kearney were the first victims of some wild gassing robber, when in fact the newspaper couldn't have known there would be other victims. Authorities in the town were upset with the newspapers for causing a panic among area residents. Commissioner Wright had stated, fear of the gasman is entirely out of proportion to the menace of the relatively harmless gas he is spraying, dispelling the claim that it was a deadly gas. So you have officials trying to, you know, disperienced. spell some of these claims. You know, I take it as trying to allay the fears of residents.

But here he's calling this person the gas man. And he actually comes out and says the relatively harmless gas he is spraying. So just by saying that, he's kind of confirming that there's someone out there spraying a gas into people's homes. Now, he's saying it's relatively harmless, but still. Yeah, it's definitely flip-flop, because originally they're trying to explain this away as this is the local factory fumes wafting through town. And now he's saying, well, there is someone out there possibly, but the stuff their spring is not that bad. The September 11th, Journal Gazette's headline read many prowler reports, few real.

The previous weekend, authorities had received dozens of calls from persons claiming they had smelled, the mystery gas sprayed by the phantom chemist. That weekend, two women had been seen by the same doctor at Memorial Hospital after claiming to have smelled the gas. One of them had been at home and the other had been out at a theater when they noticed the smell. Their doctor said that he could find no evidence of a poison gas or other chemical, instead believing that they both suffered from extreme nervous tension. Their treatment was sedatives and rest at home. So many people were so intensely interested in the mad gasser that they would follow police cars from the station to try and figure out which locations had been attacked with gas.

This happened enough times that it had to be publicly discouraged in the journal Gazette with police commissioner Thomas V. White explaining that these people were interfering with organized police work to a great extent. Locals were tense and wanted police to do something, but when no suspect was arrested, groups of men patrolled the neighborhood. Commissioner White and Chief Cole said in a joint statement, roving bands of men and boys should disband. They asked people to put away the guns now in the hands of individuals before some

innocent person was shot. An interesting tidbit states that the only time one should shoot is upon seeing a man peering into a window of one's home. That seems like a pretty strange statement saying that you should shoot someone if they're looking into your home. So, well, first of all, you have roving bands of men and boys out with guns. You know, that's interesting. And then this statement, like you said, kind of saying when you should shoot. And I get that.

There's, there's a line drawn in the sand of when it's permissible to shoot another. person. But it's not when someone is peering in a window, right? If you're walking down the street and you see someone peering in the window, you don't just dirty, hurry it up and start firing. That seems like such a strange statement to be in the paper or to be made by these officials. Now, I get it. It was the 1940s, but still, it's not 1880. We're not dueling in the middle of the thoroughfare. Yeah, I think it was definitely some kind of sign of the times that maybe back then they defended their property, especially, you know, there's a war going on, you know, not long before

the Great Depression had happened. So people took protecting their property very seriously. So maybe they, you know, it wasn't as frowned upon as it would be today to tell people to shoot someone that's looking in your window. Yeah, I think it would be a little more than frowned upon today. You would go to jail. for the rest of your life if you shot and killed someone for simply looking into another person's window, right?

They're not even saying this from the way I'm reading it to people inside the home. I was taking it as they were saying, if you see someone peering into another person's home, that's the time where you would shoot. That is so bizarre. On September 13th, the final mad gasser attack,

in Mattoon took place. Bertha Bench and her son Orville were at home when gas apparently came through the bedroom window. Outside, they saw what appeared to be a man, dressed as a woman, spraying the gas. The next morning, footprints from high heels were found outside the bedroom window. This detail was different from any other sighting or shoe print evidence found in Matun. But it turns out, a woman's shoe print fits a series of. of gas attacks from a decade earlier in Botatort County, Virginia. This series began on December 22nd, 1933.

In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been in possible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020. Blood and water. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. If you love chilling mysteries, unsolved cases, and a touch of mom-style humor, Moms and Mysteries is the podcast you've been searching for. Hey guys, I'm Mandy. And I'm Melissa. Join us every Tuesday for Moms and Mysteries, your gateway to gripping, well-researched true crime stories. Each

week, we deep dive into a variety of mind-boggling cases as we shed the light on everything from heist to whodontas, where you're your go-to podcast for Mysteries with a motherly Touch. Subscribe now to Moms and Mysteries wherever you get your podcast. At around 10 p.m., the first of three attacks on the Huffman family began at their home near the area of Haymaker Town, an unincorporated area in Botauchamp, County. Mrs. Huffman became nauseous after smelling something weird. Eventually, the smell disappeared, and she and her children went to bed. When the smell came back, after about a half hour, her husband, Cal Huffman, went to the neighbor's house to use their phone. Investigators arrived and searched the home, but didn't find anything suspicious, and they didn't smell anything.

At 1 a.m. after all the investigators had left, the smell came back intensely, making all eight members of the Huffman family sick. They all suffered from nausea and headaches, but 20-year-old Alice lost consciences, had convulsions, and by the time a physician from the nearby town of Troutville, Dr. S.F. Driver, had arrived. She needed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation because her airway had closed. A neighbor saw someone running away from the house that night. One high-heeled shoe print was found outside near a window, and a second shoe-print was found near the porch. Two days later, on December 24th, around 9 p.m.,

Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Hall returned to their home in Cloverdale, Virginia, about 10 miles from the Huffman home. They had just walked in after attending church. And after about five minutes, they were overcome with nausea, temporary paralysis, and eye irritation. They also began to smell something that actually tasted sweet. Dr. W. N. Breckenridge reported to the scene with the police

and observed that whatever chemical had been used tasted sweet just as the holes had reported. and was reminiscent of formaldehyde. The next night, one of the Hall's family members saw someone near a window on the side of the hall home with a flashlight. On December 27th, gas attacks on homes continue appeared as a headline in the Roanoke Times. That same night, A.L. Kelly and his mother were attacked by the Mad Gasser in Troutville, Virginia.

Only A.L. who was in a bedroom upstairs got sick. Ayl remembered seeing a 1933 Chevy with a man and a woman inside, driving up and down the street that night. A neighbor must have noticed them too, because they got a partial license plate, but authorities were unable to locate the car. Just as would later happen in Matun, Illinois, the residents of Baudetort County were on high alert for the gasser. Headlines confirmed the existence of an attacker, and the confirmation increased the tension. A $500 reward for the apprehension of the suspect was offered by the county board of supervisors. That's about $11,000 today. Men armed themselves and spent nights waiting for the gasser.

Farmers patrolled area roads late at night or sat near their windows, gun and hand, waiting and watching. Authorities cautioned vigilantes, warning that someone may get hurt, but the warning didn't decrease the anxiousness. Those who couldn't arm themselves slept over at neighbors' houses, hoping that staying in groups would help keep them safe. The New Year only brought new terror. On January 10, 1934, the Hilton family home near Finn Castle was almost attacked.

A woman who has only identified as Mrs. Moore, who was living with the Hilton's, was in the downstairs part of the home when shared voices outside, and what sounded like someone trying to open a window. She smelled gas and started feeling numb, so she quickly took her baby outside. The Hilton's who were upstairs didn't notice anything and experienced no symptoms. They would have had no idea anything happened at their house

if Mrs. Moore hadn't been outside yelling for help, which alerted them. A neighbor of the Hilton's confirmed that he had also heard people talking outside around the exact time that Mrs. Moore did. Homer Hilton stayed up the rest of the night waiting for the gasser to return, But they never did. That same night, just seven miles away in Troutville, G.D. Kenzie reported the gas attack.

One doctor suspected that a chlorine gas had been used. Less than a week later, more incidents were reported. On January 16th, the Duval home in Bonsack, Virginia, just eight miles from Troutville was attacked. Upon noticing symptoms, F.B. Duvall rushed out of his home to get to a phone, to summon help, and he saw a man fleeing. The man ran to a parked car and quickly drove off. In the morning, authorities found women's shoe prints where the car was seen. Three days later, at around 7.30 p.m., Mrs. Campbell was sitting by the window of her home near Cloverdale when she saw the curtain in her window move. She was instantly overcome with nausea. Just two days later, at around 9 p.m., Mr. Mrs. Howard Crawford arrived back at their home, which was located between Cloverdale and Troutville, two areas known to have been attacked. They had just returned from a night out with friends and became sick from what was described as a cloud of gas while Mrs. Crawford was lighting the lamp.

On January 22nd, the day after the Crawford's became ill, there were three reported gas attacks in Carvins Coat, which is about four miles away from Cloverdale. the homes of Ed Reedy, George C. Riley, and Raymond Eder were all attacked along a two-mile stretch of Carvin's coat. One of the Edder children saw a man running from their home. One of the Reedy sons had smelled the gas and ran outside and fired a shot from his shotgun. And what he thought was someone running away from the home. George Riley, after a run-in with the gasser, called his brother, a Roanoke police department officer and a roadblock was quickly set up. Still, no one was found.

The gasser continued to slip through the cracks. According to the website, Legends of America.com, two days later, on January 24th, at 4.30 a.m., a woman identified as Mrs. R.H. Hartzell arrived at her home near Fincastle only to find that the house was filled with gas. She had been sleeping with a neighbor out of extreme caution and not home. when her residence was apparently attacked. As the number of victims grew, so did the amount of media coverage.

Virginians are terrorized by gas thrower, who flees a night after making victims ill, appeared as a headline in the New York Times. The Virginia State Assembly worked quickly to pass a new bill, making the release of noxious gases in public, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and in cases of injury from the gas, the suspect would be deemed guilty of malicious wounding, and the penalty would be between one and 20 years in the penitentiary in the discretion of the court. The mad gasser seemed like a serious threat.

The biggest newspapers in the nation were talking about the attacks, and lawmakers were trying to pass bills aimed specifically at stopping the attacks. Apparently, all of the attention on the attacks was not enough to scare the gasser away. On January 25th, Chester Snyder heard his dog barking. Stepping outside with his shotgun, he saw a man fleeing. He fired one shot but didn't hit the suspect. Authorities responding to Snyder's call, found footprints proving someone had been in his yard and had taken cover behind a tree.

If it was the gasser, they were not spooked. Because just a few days later on January 28th, the home of Ed Stanley and Cloverdale was attacked, five people inside started to choke and became extremely nauseous. Farmhand Frank Guy headed outside. headed outside for fresh air and saw four men running from the scene. He fired one shot from a shotgun, but like others, didn't hit the gas or in this case, gassers two days later on the night of the 30th. Stanley was inside the home and heard noise outside.

So he rushed outside to investigate and he heard someone run off. So I think more of one thing jumps out immediately is that everyone in Virginia at this in this part of the country at this point in time has a shotgun. And I think that was probably true for large parts of the, the country back during the 1930s and into the 1940s. It seemed like everyone had a shotgun made by the door and that was their security. And from the sounds of they weren't afraid to pick it up and fire shots. Yeah.

Now, nobody hit anybody, but they were definitely, they were shooting to, wound or kill, it sounds like. By this point, residents in that area of Virginia were frightened. Newspaper articles mixed with rumors and fear created a lot of confusion. I don't know if it was the different descriptions of the suspects. A man and a woman, a man dressed like a woman, four men. But residents had begun to voice the opinion that the entire saga of the gasser was some sort of mass hysteria.

According to the website Legends of America.com, they felt the whole gassing case was a mere hoax or fragment of the imagination of reported victims. But Dr. S.F. Driver, who had responded to the Huffman home, believed there was a gas for attacking people, but later admitted to the county board of supervisors that some of the incidents had been linked to fumes from faulty coal stoves. People in nearby Roanoke County and Rockbridge County also began to report gas attacks, but none of the details in those cases matched the same circumstances as the Baudetort County attacks. On January 24th, a woman in Fincastle ran out of her house,

alerting her neighbors that she had been a victim of a gas attack. According to Appalachian History.net, Constable C.E. Williamson determined it had been a prank, stating that the suspect had tossed a common fly-killing fluid into the kitchen, apparently as a joke. One supposed gas attack was found to have been the result of fumes from a car's exhaust. Another attack was just fumes from burning rubber. Passing trains, furnaces, radiators, running cars parked in garages, but no gasser. The last verified, or at least suspected gas attack, in Bota Tork County happened between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. on February 3, 1934, in NACE, less than 5 miles from Troutville.

Seven people in the Skaggs family became severely ill, convulsing and screaming. The local sheriff was quoted as saying, No amount of imagination in the world would make people as ill as the Skaggs are. Even the dog had been affected. Days later on February 7th, there was an attack in Roanoke County. Mrs. Mielan, home alone with her 12-year-old daughter, noticed a strange smell coming from the front door. After a few minutes, she became sick and her daughter felt dizzy.

Mrs. Meal was taken to the hospital overnight but recovered. On February 9th, seven different attacks were reported, but responding officers didn't notice any odors, and not one of the reports involved illness. On February 11th, there were five more attacks reported in the area, but liquid scooped from a puddle near the scene was found to be harmless. And according to Appalachian History.net was similar to that of fly exterminators, used in practically every household. Many reports of gas attacks were from people who had smelled something, but hadn't noticed any physical symptoms.

Soon, articles in the Roanoke Times were dispelling the notion of gas attacks with statements like Roanoke has no gasser. As quickly as the Virginia gassing's and later the Illinois gassing's came without warning, they ended. The phantom gasser, if there was one, or more than one, was gone. No one was ever killed by any of the gas incidents, and no one reported anything stolen or any entry being made in their homes while they were paralyzed. This led some to believe that the attacks were simply pranks, rather than intended

assaults or precursors to other crimes. What led others to believe there were never any attacks at all? A lot of questions remain in this case. Were there two mad gassers that only wanted to cause chaos and panic? Or were there two entire communities separated by hundreds of miles and a dead of decades time that were terrified by their imaginations, or could the Madgaster or Botetort County have moved from Virginia to Illinois? I mean, I think you'd have to say having one of these series in the town is very strange, right? The number of reported incidents. But then when you

find out that a decade earlier, it happened in another area. Okay. That brings in a other element. The two seemed somewhat similar in the fact that, you know, for me, it was almost like there were reports with physical ailments. And then the reports kind of snowballed. Many reports later on where people thought they smelled something, but they, they weren't really suffering from anything. So, you know, you just have to wonder how much of that was, kind of this hysteria that had built up. You know people had to have been on edge. We talked about people sitting around with shotguns on their lap.

So at the slightest hint of a smell, would people report being gassed or thinking that they possibly could have been gassed? Yeah, I know mass hysteria is something that can really happen and it's real, it's documented. but at the same time, people are seeing people running through their yards. They're getting license plates of vehicles. They're finding shoe prints. You know, that's not mass hysteria. That's physical evidence.

That's eyewitness accounts of strange stuff going on. So, you know, mass hysteria is a possibility. But on the other hand, it seems there's some kind of evidence that maybe it wasn't. Well, but also could you look at it as, and we've seen this in, in a number of cases, copycats later on, trying to kind of further the panic by throwing in this fly exterminator or some type of other chemical that was different than what was used originally, but just trying to incite fear because people do that. It's happened throughout time.

Most theories as wild as it may seem conclude that we're looking at two different episodes. of mass hysteria. One 1979 Washington Post article notes that there was a popular novel in 1944, My Life in Hard Times by James Thurber, which at one point described a woman so afraid of being poisoned by chloroform to be robbed that she always piled her money, silverware, and other valuables in a neat stack just outside her bedroom with a note reading, this is all I have. Please take it and do not use your chloroform as this is all I have. One of the victims in Mattoon was supposedly reading this very same book before bed, while the 1944 incident in which one of the Matun victims was reading this novel may have been caused by

being afraid of what she read. What about the Virginia gas incidents a decade earlier? Could they have been the result of that novel? Well, it turns. It turns out that my life in hard times was published in 1933, the same year as the first Botetort County, Virginia incident. We talked about the possibility that some of these gas incidents were related to faulty heating or stoves. The reports, both in Mattoon and Botetort County, began when the weather was colder. It's not out of the question that more people were using heat sources in small areas,

causing their symptoms accidentally. Common symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning are headaches, dizziness, weakness, and vomiting. Headaches, dizziness, and nausea are also three of the most common symptoms in episodes of mass hysteria, also called mass psychogenic illness. Burning throat, irritated eyes, numbness, and paralysis are also very commonly found in mass hysteria. It may sound absurd to some people that so many residents of these towns could fall victim to a mass delusion or mass hysteria. Astoria, but World War II had caused months of dreary intense headlines that were front and center for many of the people that reported these incidents. Many articles had been written about the fear that the Nazis would use chemical attacks against the Allies on some of the front pages. There

are articles about the mad gasser and then other headlines about Nazis. The first gas attack in Matun was just two months after D-Day when soldiers from the U.S. and other allied nations invaded parts of the coast of France in order to create a path for supplies and troops from the United Kingdom. The fear of German attacks, whether out of retaliation or desperation, was definitely clear in the media. There are many good arguments from mass hysteria in these cases, but still, not everyone agrees that there was really never a gasser. Some people think the gasser was indeed real. Published in 2003, there's the mad gasser of Mattoon,

dispelling the hysteria by Jackson High School Physics and Chemistry Teacher Scott Maruna. In his book, Maruna looks at the arguments for hysteria and explains them away. For example, historically it has been women who were most likely to be involved in episodes of mass hysteria. But during World War II, most areas of the United States, including Matune, were missing a lot of their men, leaving women as the most likely victims of real crimes. Maruna's book also names the most likely identity of the Mad Gasser, a local man named Farley Llewellyna, Maruna explained to the Illinois Times,

in a fit brought on by mental instability in years of pinup rage against the town that would not and could not accept him, Farley tinkered in toyed with various organic solvents, in an attempt to create a suitable weapon. He concluded that Farley's sisters, Florence and Catherine, were behind some of the attacks, which is why a woman's shoe print was found

because they were trying to take suspicion off of him. The attacks ultimately ended due to a combination of factors. Florence and Catherine got nervous about the shoe print being found, and Farley entered a mental hospital. With Farley gone, there was no reason for his, sisters to continue the attacks. Other people feel that the claims of Farley-Lewan's involvement have no factual basis. Bob Ladendorf is one of these people.

He co-authored the 2002 article, The Mad Gasser of Mattoon, how the press created an imaginary chemical weapons attack. Ladendorf wrote a letter to the editor of the Illinois Times after Marona's book was published, refuting his claims. In it, he wrote, I question his assumptions and generalizations about the mad gasser, if there is indeed one. He went on to note that Maroon has cited no references or statistics for many claims in his book. It's Leidendorf and his co-author's conclusion that there were no attacks.

Instead, the mad gasser was triggered by confluence of factors, sensational press coverage, ignorance of human perceptual fallibility, and memory reconstruction, fear of Nazi poison attacks, an escaped Nazi in the city, and a robbery crime wave. So I think when you break it down, that's really the crux of the mystery here. Was there ever an actual person or people using gas or chemicals to scare people? Could it have been Farley Llewellyn and Mattoon? If so, then what about Virginia? A decade earlier, did two different towns really experience the same exact type of mass hysteria?

Could this sort of thing happen to us today? in response to certain events, mass panics have happened. Like in 2001, after anthrax was mailed to multiple senators and media offices, there were more than 2000 false reports of anthrax exposure. In 2019, the first known case of mass social media induced illness was reported after multiple young people developed ticks. It was thought to be due to the rise of influencers with threats and other illnesses, coupled with rising. anxiety over COVID-19 in the economy. Maybe it's just a matter of time until something like this happens again. So, Morph, as we wrap up this episode, I don't know what the answer is. You know, was there really someone in two different parts of the country, a decade apart,

trying to gas people? And if so, what was the reason? You know, that's one of the things that kind of struck me as we were going through this case. what would be the reasoning behind the gassing? It didn't seem to be, you know, to knock people out so somebody could come in and rob a house or commit some type of sexual assault. Why?

I mean, so that's one thing that I struggle with in this case. What would be the reasoning behind the gassing other than to torment people to cause some type of mass hysteria? And that's not out of the question. You know, we've seen people, you know, do certain things that don't seem to have any real rhyme or reason to them other than to create confusion and chaos because what? They enjoy it? Maybe. And I think in both the cases we talked about, there was an attempt to calm people and residents, but a lack of any answers, a lack of arrest really sort of stoke the flames of. of these people in these communities that were worried that there was something going on here.

And when police weren't able to provide them with answers, they sort of, you know, they were all taking to the streets and armed and, you know, trying to fend off whoever or whatever was attacking them. Well, and I think you also have to look at the media,

right? The media back then was putting out these stories. So people are sitting around reading the newspapers, because a lot more people did, read the newspapers back then. And you have to kind of ask that question, how much of that reporting from the initial incidents fueled the subsequent incidents, right? So people were now worried because they had read about it. And so at the first inkling, did they report their own quote unquote gassing? And we talked about how that could have led to men.

mass hysteria, seeing other people being attacked, then you smell something, all of a sudden you think you're being attacked. But as we've mentioned in several instances, there were people seen in yards, there were cars driving around, there were footprints discovered, things like that. So, you know, that's sort of, you can't lump that in with some kind of mass hysteria. That's evidence of some sort. So I think that really muddies the waters a little bit as far as this being just a mass hysteria incident in both of these communities. Yeah, I really don't know what to make of it because I don't know, like when you say evidence, I don't know what all of that was evidence of.

Okay, you saw someone. Was that someone trying to gas or who had gas the home? Or was it a peeping Tom? or, you know, was there a woman's shoe print, but it didn't have anything to do with anything? So I know that you keep using that word evidence. And, you know, obviously there were people who said they saw people running away from their home. But what does it mean? Now, I just think it's another element of this case that is perplexing, you know, because in some instances, there were four people. So we had four gassers or we had four people playing around.

who then were caught and ran away. I just don't know. But, you know, it's part of what drew me to this case. I think it's so interesting on a number of different levels. Number one, you could have somebody out there who is really trying to hurt people or at least injure them, scare them to the point where they're creating this mass confusion. And then there's this other side of the story, which is how many people kind of got swept up after hearing about these reported cases and thought they were victims themselves when maybe it was their stove that was putting off some kind of noxious chemicals or I just don't know. Yeah, we really can't put the cart before the horse.

But if this same type of thing happened today in 2003, I think it would be a lot easier to try and determine whether there's really some kind of mad gasser or gassers. Because with so many homes having surveillance systems and close circuit television and things like that, I think there'd be a lot of ways to sort of track who's moving around the areas and what times and validate if anyone really had intruders or people that were possibly doing this. So, again, putting the cart before the horse, we can't really do that. it'd be interesting to see if the thing could ever happen again the way it happened in the 1930s and 40s in these two towns. Well, I think, you know, we mentioned the 2001 anthrax thing, and that's probably the closest thing that I could think of.

Maybe you could go back to the Tylenol poisonings. Those incidents created a mass hysteria. Now, there was something real behind it for sure, and there may have been something real behind these others. But 2001 was not that long ago. You know what, 22 years ago. It could definitely happen again. For me, a lot of it has to do with, you know, the way things are reported. I don't think it's out of the question that we could see something like this again, whether

it's localized within, you know, a town or a city or it's national or global, like some of the other things we've seen. it'll happen again. My big question about this case is what really happened? Was there, you know, a real gasser? And then people began reporting it because they were so scared. That, that seems like it could be the case. But the question of why the gassing in the first place, that I don't know. And that's scary that if this began with some kind of real person doing this, and that person escaped justice and got away with us. Yeah.

So because they were never caught, you don't have the answers, right? You don't know why they, they would have done it or the reasoning behind it. But that's it for our episode on the mad gasser of Mattoon. If you love the show, but haven't done so yet, take a minute, go out, give us a rating, leave a review. Keep telling your friends that word of mouth about the podcast really helps us out. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod. You can also find us on Facebook by going to facebook.com slash criminology podcast.

Or you can join our Facebook discussion group, criminology podcast discussion in fans. So that's it for another episode of Criminology. But Morph and I will be back with all of you next Saturday night with a brand new episode. So for Mike and Morph. We'll talk to you next week. Take care, everyone.