Doomed to Fail - Ep 168: Everybody's Baby - Baby Jessica & her Well

Episode Date: January 27, 2025

Do you remember October 1987? If you were around, there is no way that you missed the live CNN coverage of Jessica McClure stuck in a well (essentially, an 8-inch pipe; "well" is generous) in Midland, TX. It was the second time that CNN's live reporting attracted millions of viewers (the first was when The Challenger exploded the year before). May we also suggest watching 'Everybody's Baby' the TV movie with Patty Duke! The YouTube we link to has commercials! It's great. Happy to report that Jessica is thriving today!  Photos from People -> Baby Jessica: 30 Years After Being Rescued From The Well | PEOPLE - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksZMIvHNeJ0 - Everybody’s Baby - 1989https://youtu.be/4WVY4evvRaM?si=8IynMR-jFIaB3H9hthis version has COMMERCIALS! News! Tiananmen SquareVHS playersToyota Carola Salon Selectives“Real Food” which means beef - with Julia Louis Dreyfus and Lauren Bacall Here’s the house - https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3309-Tanner-Dr-Midland-TX-79703/50140151_zpid/COLUMN ONE : A Hero’s Fame Leads to Tragedy : Helping to pull little Jessica McClure from a Texas well made firefighter Robert O’Donnell a star. But the limelight soon turned to darkness. - https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-05-24-mn-5474-story.htmlPhotos from - https://www.biography.com/celebrities/baby-jessica Join our Founders Club on Patreon to get ad-free episodes for life! patreon.com/DoomedtoFailPodWe would love to hear from you! Please follow along! Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doomedtofailpod/  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/doomedtofailpod  Youtube:  https://www.youtube.com/@doomedtofailpod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@doomed.to.fail.pod Email: [e-mail] 

It's a matter of the people of the state of California versus Hortonthal James Simpson, case number B.A.019. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. Good, Taylor. Welcome. Hi. How are you? Good. How are you? I'm good. I'm doing well. I was just telling Taylor that I had a Sunday, fun day, early today, which kind of, it makes you a little bit useless towards the end of the day. So energy is going to be a little bit low, but maybe that'll be a good thing. We'll test whether low energy far as is good for the listenership.

We'll see what happens. Yeah, I don't know. And I was saying that I woke up at 1 p.m. today, only because the husband woke me up and he said, Taylor, it's one. And then I said, what? I kind of felt like he was telling me it was one in the morning. It was like very confusing, you know? And I was like, okay, I'll guess I'll get up.

But I'd sleep all day if I were allowed to. That's my awesome. Sleeping's my jam. Um, cool, well, welcome to doomed to fail with a podcast that brings you history as most notorious disasters, epic failures, interesting stories. And I'm Taylor, joined by Fars. Yes, I'm here joining Taylor. We are going to dive into probably a fast-ending story. At least I know it will be for Taylor, mine. Who knows? Um, but Taylor, what did you get for us? Wow. Low energy forest is something. It's something or something right now. Um, Okay, let's go. Fars, you are from Texas. It's true.

Do you remember what happened in 1987 in Midland, Texas? I knew you were a baby. Was it the chlorine derailment? No. It involves a child and a well. Is this about Timmy, little Timmy, and the little. well it's baby jessica do you remember baby jessica i don't but i'm confusing it with like so many different other stories i'm thinking about bart when he accidentally fell down the well right and i'm

sure that came from this story honestly well and then in lassie it was like timmy's always in a well yeah yeah that was in like the 50s um yes but god used to watch lassie i forgot about that anyway baby Jessica fell into a well and it was a huge deal and it was all over the news so let me tell you about it so she's not the first child to fall into a well as we have our

just already talked about I'm sure it's happened a ton especially when people were like I mean technically we just listed two fictional characters one was a cartoon so it was very right but those stories come from somewhere and I feel like sending your child out to like a well that you see in the movies

to like bring up a bucket like that could be dangerous true do you think i mean you know so a couple other children falling into wells that were on wikipedia that i think are relevant because they were also on television so this was a huge media event so like if you were old enough to watch tv in 1987 like this is what you were watching if you were watching it it was the i'll tell you a little bit more about that um it was like a 24 hour news network thing it was the it was the original white bronco oj chase exactly exactly Exactly. But before that, a couple that also involved the television. And like I said, there's probably, I don't know, thousands, millions of children who have died in wells and all of human history. But in 1949, a girl named Kathy Fiscus fell into a well in San Marina, California. It was broadcast live on KTLA. During the first times, like it is a disaster like this was broadcast on live television. Like, 1949, live television is very, very new. She fell in on April 8th, and they got her. her body out on April 10th, and she had been dead for a while.

So they were reporting on it. They weren't sure if she were still alive, and then she ended up dying in the well. It was one of the first times there was like a long form TV thing where you would check in with the news to see how it was going, you know? Like people wanted to like keep watching it. So this is the first. So I have a thing where I generally just have the news running all the time. And I know a lot of people do. I don't, but I know a ton of people do.

So this is one of the first times people would be like going back and checking and being like, is Kathy okay? Is Kathy okay? You know? Got it. One of the really tragic and weird things is that her dad worked for the California Water and Telephone Company and they had drilled the well that Kathy fell in fell in 1903. And he had recently testified before state legislature for a law that would require to cement up old wells. So he was like trying to get that to be a thing. And then his daughter died in one before they had done that, which is terrible. I mean, he picked the right issue to care about. It's just definitely a thing.

Yeah. In 1981, an Italian boy named Alfredo Rampi. Felt on a well. This one's sad. I know this one. For Machino. Yes. It was the first live television event in Italy that had millions of people watch.

He died about three days in. And they got his body out a month later. So it's very similar to, tell me again, what's the name of the guy that died in the cave that you talked about? I know it's Nutty Puddy Cave. I can't remember the name of the guy. So that guy, it's similar to that where everything they did kept pushing him lower and lower. You know, and it was just pretty awful.

And so that was terrible. He died as well. And that was also, like, criticized because the news was so there and, like, in the face of the rescuers and just, like, really on it. And that was very, I don't know, upsetting to a lot of people. Was that a well? Or was that, like, just a,

like opening in the earth that he fell into. So I learned a tiny bit about wells. But like mostly I have no idea. So when I think of a well, I think of like the ring, right? Like stones and a bucket and you fall in. And then like at a certain point there's water.

Yeah. And you have to tread water for seven days and then you die. And then you can make a videotape somehow. Like that's what a picture well. But the well that Alfredo fell into was a, a, and I'm going to like use my hands. It was a well where like the groundwater kind of goes

not too deep. It's not too deep and it's going down and that well is like going in and like grabbing it and there's like others. So it's like not that's not that deep of a well. I don't think. But it is a well. It's just not like the prototypical well. Got it. Right. It's not like if you draw a picture of a well, you're not going to draw that.

You're going to draw the one like remember there's that guy who buried his wife under that fake well? I'm literally going to be like, do you remember what I did a story about this? The well was in the front yard Like on the street And he like threw her corpse in there Yeah

Yeah So she threw his corpse in there The woman killed the husband That's what it was Oh either way There was a well involved A fake well in that case So I

So there's that Those kind of wells But the one that Jessica fell in Is actually different I'll talk about that in a little bit But it's just like basically a pipe That she fell in too So we're in America

And it's in October 9th 1987 and we're in Midland, Texas, which is like northwest Texas. And Jessica McClure is 19 months old. Her parents are very, very young. They had her when they were 18. Her parents are Reba Sissy McClure and Lewis Chip McClure. So they're Sissy and Chip are the name of her parents. It's a very, very East Texas. Yeah. A couple name. Yeah. So it's October 14th, 1987. And Jessica is playing at her aunt's backyard. So her aunt owns like a home daycare and her mom as they're helping out and Jessica is there as well. So there's four other kids and the kids are all playing in the backyard. When the phone rings, Sissy goes inside to answer the phone. She's only gone for like a few minutes. And when she gets back, the kids are screaming and she can't find Jessica. So she goes into the yard, notice Jessica's missing and notices that the well has been opened. So this well is an eight inch pipe. So it's not big it's pretty small like eight inches pipe and it's a casing pipe and from what i understand which is

very little it means that it's like an access point to help pressurize like an underground well that goes to like the well water for like the town so in people's backyards um there will be um like pipes that are like regulating the flow regulating the pressure and they keep them covered with like a rock so you'll like have this and it's like go it's like part of the same well system in some way. Am I the only one that finds it weird or old-timey? The people pull their liquid out of the earth. I mean, that's where water comes from.

I know, but it's weird when it's like in your back, you'll hurt. And then like you just go and do it. Mm-hmm. I want to know that it came from a pipe like 10,000 feet away from the house. in a cistern that was cleaned you know yeah totally i mean i don't want to ever see what is in pipes oh my god you know what the skinny chair again let me you know i want to know nothing about that for sure i in houston when i went to houston visit a cousin they had this like underground like i don't know what you call it it i guess it's a cistern it's like a place where they stored water

it was empty now but like you can go into it and they like made it into like a little tourism thing and it was so scary. Imagine being in like this giant empty void that you know what... I'm getting scared again. Okay, can't keep going. I like my cheeks hurt. I know, I know.

I can't do it. So I mean, so I guess what I mean is when I say well, like there's no water in the well. It's just like a pipe that accesses water, but she never touches the water. She never gets set down like that far. I don't even know if there is water at the bottom of it if it was like active or whatever.

But essentially you have this like pipe in your backyard. So, what they don't know and they'll find out as they go is they don't know how jessica got in it like they don't know what happened how she moved the rock like the rock was pretty heavy that was on top of the pipe like they don't know how she did it and what they don't know yet but they'll find out later is she goes in one leg first so she's doing the splits in the pipe so she has like her like little body her little head is up with her left leg and then her right leg is down she was forced in there there's no way

a human would do that right no she's a baby there's no conspiracy here no one thinks another child pushed her in the well she just fell it's the brother it's the John Bonnet story no she doesn't have a brother and literally that no no

I got to track that we don't know if John Bonay's brother did that I don't want to I don't know I think John Bonay's family did it for sure we can't get sued Taylor we don't know this oh please please um anyway so essentially she falls in with one foot

they don't know that yet i feel like she probably maybe she like kicked the rock off of it and then like put her foot in and like tripped and fell somehow she got she fell in that way and her left leg is above her head so cissy calls 911 immediately obviously and a ton of people come trying to figure out what the hell are we going to do they start by how did she know she fell in the well she could like hear her oh okay yeah so she couldn't find her anywhere and then she heard her crying inside the well so she fell into the well and they heard cissy heard her in there called the police and they start coming people start coming to help what they need to do is drill a tunnel like parallel to the well to be able to get her so for the first few feet that's easy

it's like dirt seems it seems like it's going to be fine and then they hit solid rock and jessica is 22 feet below the surface so she they need something else and they need to like dig really really far so they have to get like really advanced drilling equipment which is great because they're in texas and And they have that, you know? Also, 22, it's a lot to fall. Well, I guess babies are made up, like, gelatin. Like, you can basically bounce them off the ground. I think that's a big part of it, too.

You know, that, like, her, she's a little more malleable than an adult. So people start coming. There's obviously a ton of media attention. All sorts of people with different kinds of drills. A dude without collarbones says he can help. Like, he's like, I can do things. Like, Spalunkers come in. People, like, offer their children to go down the well.

And they're like, no, we're not going to take another child down the well. And what I didn't mention, and I should have mentioned in the beginning, and I'll put in now, is I watched the TV movie again that I remember watching in the 80s. It's called Everybody's Baby. And it is really good. And it has commercials. And like it has 1989 commercials and they're so good. So it's like live news with Peter Jennings because it's the Tiananmen Square.

protests are happening live. There's a commercial for a VHS player, a bunch of commercials for like perms and shampoos. And then there's one for like a Toyota Corolla where this woman's like, I love my Toyota Corolla. It's so great. And then there's one for beef like the meat with Julia Louise Dreyfus and Lauren Bacall and they call beef real food. It's really bizarre. But anyway, I'll post it because it's super fun to watch those commercials. But the TV movie dramatizes it a lot. But it's also like very close to what was. actually happening just like a lot of people are coming trying to help getting in the way being involved you know yeah so CNN was the only 24 hour news network in America and this was the second

time that they had people tuning in in the millions at a time the first time that it happened was the year before when the challenger exploded so this is the second big big hit for CNN they had its highest ratings for a single 15 minute period when 3.1 million households were all watching this happen live. Good for them. Yeah. So that's how she got the name, Baby Jessica. People also obviously wanted to help her, and they donated money. And she ended up with about a million dollars in a trust fund that she got to take out when she turned 25.

So a lot of people donated to help her. One person who was involved in the movie, who was also a newscaster, his name is Rodney. lunch. He was 23 years old and he was a reporter during the rescue. He was on scene for 35 hours. And he also became, he played himself in the TV movie essentially. And he was super composed during his 35 hours in real life. They made him kind of act like he was tired and should probably go home during TV movie. But he said that the movie was pretty accurate to what was happening in real time. So if you want to watch it, Patty Duke is in it as well. That's really good. So that's happening in the news. And in the meantime, Jessica is still in this pipe. They can't give her any food or water because they don't know what had happened to her. Like if she had internal injuries, giving her water or food could really hurt her, you know? So that's also making her smaller because she's like... Oh, that's good point.

I didn't think about that. Like she's obviously like a baby. So she obviously has like, she has a full diaper, but like that diaper is going to overflow at some point. And then also she's, her belly is going to get smaller. She's going to get smaller. okay, she's dehydrated and starving because she's not eating or drinking. It also gets really cold because it's nighttime, October, and it's, you know, 22 feet underground. So they pump in heat, they pump in oxygen, and they're talking to her with a microphone.

And she's just a baby, so she can't have, like, she doesn't have, like, full sentences yet. But she does sing Winnie the Pooh, which, like, makes everybody cry because she's trying to, like, self-soothe herself and, like, feel better. Oh, that's going to sad. Yeah, so she cries and they can, like, hear her whimpering. So they do try to get her to talk so they know that she's still alive. While they're drilling the shaft, they're drilling it next to the pipe. It's shaking everything, obviously, and it's shaking the pipe. So Jessica will get tired, and she will lean her little head against the pipe.

And while they're drilling the hole, the pipe will shake. So when she gets out, the skin on her forehead is rubbed off, and she has a scar on her forehead for it. Oh, that's what that is. Okay. Yeah, that's what that is. And, like, all of the scars, all of, like, the wounds on her. or from just like the rubbing up against the sides of the pipe while she's in it, especially while it's vibrating, you know?

Yeah. So they drill this parallel shaft, but they're not going to be able to get to her. They have to drill a horizontal shaft beneath her to be able to do that, get through the pipe, and then pull her down. So they're going down and then across the underneath her. They ultimately get like a water jet cutting tool that's like new in 1987 where they cut, they do a lot of the drilling with like water. and that helps them do that parallel shaft, but it's, like, very thin.

And this is where, like, the guy's going to climb through it and be super claustrophobic, you know, it's just, like, the cave diving. When they get below her, it is, like, over 50 hours later when they finally get down below where she is, and EMT Robert O'Donnell, he's the one that goes in the parallel shaft. He's the one that gets her and pulls her out. when he when Robert O'Donnell was talking to the actor Whip Hubley who played him in the in the movie he he said quote

you really feel like you were in a grave you know like he really of course that's kind of what a grave is like exactly so he used they used KY jelly and a photographer's tripod that they like lubed up and like kind of poked around her to kind of like let her loose and he like lubed up the pipe from beneath and then was able to pull

her down, but it took an hour of him being in this small shaft, pulling her slowly, and finally he got her out. He pulled her through the parallel shaft, and in the bigger shaft, there's another man there named Steve Forbes. He gave him to him, and they put her on, like, a spine board, that's what you'll see. So she's on a board just to make sure that she doesn't get her anymore that kind of tie her to it, and they pull her up, and then the picture of Steve Forbes holding her and carrying her out. That picture is the one that will win the Pulitzer Prize. that year and you can see that online as well um so after she got out you know 56 hours in total she was in the well um she has that forehead scar on her forehead from rubbing against the edge of the

pipe um on her left foot that was the foot that was above her head she lost her pinky toe initially they thought they were going to have to amputate her entire foot because her foot had gangrene because it didn't have any blood flow to it for 56 hours yeah it's like really bad to like not move your Bondi. It's funny, Taylor. Our stories are going to overlap, like, in a weird way. Anyways, go ahead. That was due. So she ended up losing a pinky toe, but they kept her foot. And generally, she was fine. Fine afterwards. Ronald Reagan, who was president at the time, said, quote, everybody in America became godmothers and godfathers of Jessica while this was going on. Because so many people were, you know, invested in it. In 1989, she met President Bush,

and there's a cute picture of her wearing his glasses, which is cute. Her parents divorced in 1990, so they, you know, went on to have their separate lives. And Jessica didn't remember. She didn't remember what happened, which is good. You know, also like, you don't really remember a lot from that age anyway. Later in life, she was watching a show called Rescue 9-1-1, and that's when she figured out that she was baby Jessica. That's funny. Like, she just literally didn't know.

So she, there's a video from people that I'll put the, on. our sources as well, but her name now is Jessica McClure Morales. She's got married and she has two kids. But she, I was going to say, oh, she was saying that her husband was like, I really love her, but like whenever we're out, people are always staring at her and talking to her. And like, I don't know why. Like, he didn't know either for a long time that she was maybe Jessica because she was like weirded out to tell him.

And then she told him later. And so she talks about it and talks about like her life afterwards. she did get the money from the trust fund it was like a lot of it unfortunately was depleted during the stock market crash in 2008 but she got some money in 2011 when she turned 25 the well itself was welded shut and I don't see it on Zillow I see the house on Zillow and I see the backyard they probably just like totally got rid of it I'll put that on the in the sources as well but you can see the backyard where it happens like a regular small house and like a regular neighborhood yeah a lot of those like cave diving accidents that like we've talked about before in the past like they will actually you know what the story you just mentioned they did the same thing where like they like there's no entrance to anything there now like they they try to delete its existence to not even try to make it interesting for people to attempt it yeah and I'm sure the people who live in that house have people drop by all the time you know like you drove by the house in in um celebration you know like that's just going to happen what you do that was a weird

yeah um so one more sad thing to close out this story um Robert O'Donnell the man that that saved her he ended up with like really intense PTSD um he ended up on prescription drugs and um just really kind of felt like he wasn't able to get his life back he felt like there was tons of media attention a lot of pressure to be a hero um all this stuff that he was just like not um just couldn't handle and was really upsetting. And then when the Oklahoma bombing happened, this is from an LA Times article. He was talking to his mother as they're watching the news.

And he said, quote, when those rescuers are through, they're going to need lots of help. I don't mean for a couple of days or weeks, but for years. So he was saying like how much mental health help that the rescuers in Oklahoma City were going to need. And then that sort of triggered his PTSD and his memory of baby Jessica. and on April 23rd, four days after the Oklahoma City bombing, he died by suicide. And he had two, he was only 37 and the father of two boys, and he wrote them a letter.

And it said, quote, I'm sorry to check out this way, but life sucks. Jeez. Which is pretty terrible. Oh, my God. His birthday is my birthday. Really? Yeah. What year did he die?

What you tell me? 95. 95. Yeah. So a couple years later, he was not. You're not able to handle it. So just like another reminder to take care of people after they go through something like this. Because it was, and luckily it had a good outcome and Jessica lived, but still, so much trauma, I mean, being in that, being in that shaft for an hour, being like, the whole world is watching me try to save this baby.

What are you going to do? I mean, I think the Oklahoma City one is when having post-traumatic, like, therapy as like government-funded version of that became a thing. thing yeah yeah that's fair because that was so awful all the children yeah absolutely should be absolutely should be it's weird you i was actually talking about the oklahoma city thing earlier today too but this is a weird episode interesting interesting here we are anyways um sweet yeah interesting so yeah i mean you literally just took me right back to bart in the well timio tool was the name of the fake kid that he created because remember he got like a walkman

that was like a two-way walkman thing and he dropped that down the well and then the whole city gathered around him but then he forgot that he like had labeled it with his name and so he tried to repel down there and get it whenever he was asleep and he actually fell down there

then the whole city was pissed off of them that was the whole thing I don't remember those details about that's amazing yeah now I know where it came from isn't it funny how like the fake story embedded in my brain and I never knew the real story. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. I don't know. Unless the Simpsons did it before that because I feel like

they're always doing that. No, this, no, for sure, it was after. Okay, good. Definitely after. You know, you know, you know what they do sometimes. I know, I know. They, they pre-guess everything. Yeah. Well, fun. That was a great story. And Taylor, you also, as a aside, did a recording with one of those volunteer or not volunteer i guess what do you call them an incarcerated firefighter yes thank you um i did and you just uploaded that on sunday if i remember correctly i did it uploaded it

sunday after i woke up so sunday afternoon and um it's great it's an hour long conversation and i talked to brett crawford he um was in the prison system in utah and in california and was part of the fire um like the fire conservation camp so we talked about um a couple weeks ago and he He was, we were talking about, you know, what, you know, the opportunities that he got from that, how it made him feel. And then, you know, what he needed to change his life wasn't that. Like the fire, things didn't help. But it did help him sort of become a human again, you know, like so much a prison and you're just like learning how to be a criminal, really. Like you're not doing rehabilitation and like focusing on that and doing that kind of gave him the path to begin to see if he could be something else.

And then he joined a recovery program called the Delancey Street Foundation. And he traveled around with them, you know, speaking. And he guest lectured at Stanford and like just talked about rehabilitation and things like that. And now he has a really great life. He's an amazing artist. He has this awesome series that he did about, about Pinocchio, which is like his thoughts were like, you know, building yourself out of, you know, becoming a real person and like building yourself. And it's really cool. And so we had a great conversation.

and he was awesome and yeah I posted it and I hope that people listen it's cool. Very cool. Thanks for doing that. Brett and Brett, if you listen to this, thank you for taking the time to have that conversation. I'm sure you have a million more stories beyond that. Yeah. Yeah. He was like on CNN and Good Morning America and he came on our show

which is like just incredible. It means we're getting famous Taylor. We're just here. It doesn't mean it. It means I just emails and one and shot my shoot my shot shop my shoot whatever you know i'm also on his um his instagram guys go follow him breck crawford ink is or at breck profford ink is his um page and his artwork is truly truly unique and interesting it's cool right yeah it's very cool yeah i really like it um yeah that's it that was what i was

going to close off with please listen to that share with your friends and help us kind of understand like i don't know like we were talking about far as like the headline wants you to feel a certain way and you're like how am i supposed to feel about this you know like what am i supposed to do with this i've been so in that zone taylor for the for the record i've been like messaging taylor a bunch of like instagram posts like some of my opinions and perspectives are kind of shifting a little bit on things and and i'm just constantly just like what do i really think what is what do i what do people want me to think and what do i actually Like, it's so interesting that you never actually zoom out of your own body and think, like, am I thinking the stuff that, like, I truly believe?

Or, like, is this just my echo chamber? Is this just the media? Is this just like whatever? Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, I'm supposed to be mad.

I'm supposed to be like happy? Like, what are I supposed to feel right now, you know? Yeah. So it's good. It was great to talk to someone who had done it and listened to his story. Yeah. Yeah. Love it.

Thanks for doing that. Cool. Anything else to sign off with? That's it. Please, if you have any ideas, give us an email, doomed to fail pod at gmail.com, doomed to follow a pod on all of the socials. And, you know, if something, if you relate to one of these stories and want to talk to me about it, I'd love to talk to you. Please tell me more. And Taylor's a very good interviewer for the record.

Thank you. Brett did afterwards tell me that thank me for letting him talk and not talking over him and a couple of things that was very kind and made me. feel good because i like doing it you know i'm like i like hearing yeah i want to hear what you have to say so and also a lot of interviews don't do that a lot of them just like come with their list of questions or like just i want you to know how smart i am how much i exactly exactly yeah yeah cool we'll go ahead and sign off then okay thank you yep Thank you.