Last Podcast On The Left - Murderabilia: A Chat with Harold Schechter

Episode Date: November 24, 2023

Henry and Marcus catch up with returning guest and master of true crime storytelling - Harold Schechter to discuss his newest book Murderabilia: A History of Crime in 100 Objects.

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This is the last talk. On the left. Yeah! Oh! Why are you putting your blizz? That's when the cannonball is started. Oh! What was that? Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! I don't like Thanksgiving. You're alone here. You're alone here. You're alone here, you're alone in the studio. Thanksgiving is wonderful because there's no Jesus Christ. Welcome to the last podcast and the left everybody. I'm Marcus Parks here with Glotten, Henry's a Browse. I love to sit with my family and sup.

I love to sup, but hopefully you've already consumed your meal. All right, because we're gonna talk about, I mean, after two weeks episode to go, yeah, I mean, I don't know. I'm still, I mean, we just recorded Necrofele. Yeah, we did just record it. I mean, we're getting everything out of the way before the holiday has come. But yeah, we did just record Necrofele yesterday. Yeah, I just can't wait.

And I was like, looking up, I was like, yeah, yeah, I'm recipes yesterday. And it's been like, man, I just, and I was reading all about Harold Checker's new book, Murder Abilia, which we're gonna be talking to him today in an exclusive interview. Yeah, but if I have a The Acid Bath killer. Yeah, The Acid Bath Killer is incredible. Just turn it somebody into soup. Yeah, turn many people in the soup.

Did you get to read about the guy who owned the sausage factory and put his wife into the sausage mixer? And they didn't find it until all the sausage had already gone out. That's fun. Yeah. Everyone got real upset in Chicago. Sausage sales plummeted. God, that must have been hard for the economy that entire city.

Yeah, that's a bad color. He was the one that said like, yeah, I killed him, but you ain't got nobody and got no crime. And you're like, Good luck. You just confessed to murder. Yeah, and then they found quite a bit of an evidence back in his house. We're like, oh, I forgot to rinse out that book. Oh, no. And this is where I, for DTA really comes in.

But today we have a very special Thanksgiving episode. We have one of our mentors. Yes. Close to, in true crime, he's here to talk with us about his new book, Murder Abilia and his new project upcoming projects and his thoughts on why he doesn't feel shame about loving true crime. And none of you should feel shame about loving true crime. I don't feel any shame about loving true crime. No. Henry feels shame about nothing. Almost nothing. It's more personal.

It's more on the inside. Again, I saw myself getting out of the tub the other day. Yeah. You still got the frog man thing going on. I don't look good. I don't look good. But are you ready for the sultry tones of Harold Checkter? Here he is.

Fly from North Wave. So here we are with Harold Checkter, the patron saint of last podcast on the left. Our benefactor, contributor, you don't know. You are a contributor, I'm sorry. No, I'm very honored. I mean, you guys have kind of made me a celebrity among some group of social misfit like young people who are coming to me all the time. Yes, so I'm very grateful for that.

So you're welcome. Well, it's our our okay. So you are grateful. Good. I was worried that you would. Good, good, good. We're good. Daily, say bye books.

You know what I mean? We're all they're all book readers. Everybody would. It's also I think one of the coolest parts about our audience is that they they love the information. So they're going for it and nobody does it better than you. Well, I truly am moved and appreciate that. That means a great deal to me.

Of course. I mean, you were, we've talked about it before about you being such a huge influence on the podcast because what I love about your writing is that you find this line where it's like it's lured up to a point by but still being very respectful. That's what we're trying to figure out. Well, you know, when I, I mean, the material is so inherently sensational, yeah, sensationalistic, that I felt, you know, you didn't have to play that up.

You just, you know, report it. You, you know, understatement in a way is the best way of communicating how horrible it was, you know, just letting the facts speak for themselves without using over the top lurid language or whatever. So, yes, that was a deliberate stylistic choice. But that's also one of the things that I think sets you apart from a lot of other true crime. Riders is that you don't shy away from the detail. Like you just, you give the detail as it is, no matter how horrible it is.

You know, especially like, you know, would say your book on Albert Fish. Like, it's, you know, would say your book on Albert Fish. It's, you pull no punches at any point. Yeah. Well, you know, again, with Fish, you just had to quote from his letters. But, you know, with Fish, I mean, it was particularly important to communicate, you know, how monstrous he was. You know, I think there are many people, myself included, who do regard him as the most, again, it's hard to gauge these things, but because his victims were children, and because he took such joy in torturing them, you know, it's hard not to think of them as possibly the most monstrous serial killer country has produced. And he should be proud of that. Wherever he is. I hope he's looking down him and Beethoven and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. I hope

that they're all, I hope they're having a good time. Well, you know, not entirely sure they're on the same place, but, but, but I'm sure we'd be, you know, happy to be counted as the most monstrous I'm sure we'd be, you know, happy to be counted as the most monstrous, uh, sadistic sex murder, uh, in our country's history. Yeah. I mean, jealous of new guys. Um, before we talk about your new book, Murder, Murder, uh, Murder, Abilia, which is great. Great. Love this book.

So good. Um, I want to kind of want to ask this a general question about just kind of decades spent waiting through true crime. Yeah, because as ourselves, we're about 15 years into it. Yeah. Where we're still relative newbies when it comes to really just living in the world of true crime all the time. How does it feel?

Cause I feel like we're watching another, which is now you have documented many times. We're in a new, we were in a waxing period for true crime. And now we're in a waxing period for true crime. And now we're an awakening period for true crime. I would say, but it feels like more so, it's not as red hot as it was like three years ago. Like what is it? What does it do to you? Like as a, as a man, like when you are researching this material of like, and your relationships, like, do you, does it wear upon you? Like, does it, like as each cycle comes and goes, watching people be super into true crime and then be like true crimes horrible?

Like, like, what do you, like, kind of, how do you deal with that? Is there, are you just so deep in your own work that you don't, you know? Well, I mean, I, you know, I haven't really paid attention to any particular cycles in terms of true crime's popularity, but I'm sure you know, from my own writings as well as other sources, people have always been fascinated by true crime. When there's an audience for true crime going back probably before the invention of the Gutenberg press, in terms of murder, ballads and stuff. This recent, I wouldn't even say research, and this explosion of interest in it caught

me by surprise. When I first started writing the true crime, I may have mentioned this to you in some earlier podcast. It was considered such a subliterary genre, but I couldn't persuade my publisher, Simon and Schuster at the time, to publish my Edgene book and hardcover, because even though Capote's book had come out, you know, a couple of decades before, you know, it was still, again, regarded as a subliterary thing. And also the received wisdom at that time was that no one was interested in reading about old murder cases. The people incorrect. They whoever said that was very wrong. They whoever said that it was very wrong. Yeah. Well, it was proved wrong. So I mean more in terms of waning, I mean more just kind

of cultural. Now there's more people doing the true crimes in appropriate again. Like we're heading back into the typical gourd time about true crime in many ways. Well, you know, there's always that pendulum. I mean, not surprised by that. You know, true crime is, I think it stirs up very dangerous, fearful impulses and people. You know, part of the function of true crime is to allow us to vicariously ventilate very taboo and forbidden impulses within ourselves. I'm sure I have this anthology, true crime in American mythology, I'm very proud of published by the Library of America, which traces the history of true crime publications, really from the Puritan times. But the introduction to the book,

I begin by quoting Plato. And Plato says, the virtuous man is content to dream what the wicked man really does Yeah, and you know the point of that quote is you know that all of us possess these dark taboo forbidden unacknowledged fantasies and impulses and true crime allows civilized law abiding people to ventilate those things in some kind of safe, socially acceptable way. But the point is, you know, it does stir up thoughts and dreams. And as I say, you know, taboo impulses that make people very, very uncomfortable. So, yeah, it's not at all surprising at some point, but there's going to be a reaction against the fascination with true crime.

Sure. It's going to be condemned. It's going to be seen, you know, some sign of the moral decay of society. Again, there always going to be these moral crusaders who launch these campaigns against popular forms of entertainment that in a really in a way disturb, you know, disturb something in themselves that they can't deal with. I like that because it's things, it's causing thoughts in your head that you can't deal with. So I like that because it's things, it's, it's causing thoughts in your head that you can handle. And the rest of us are over it. I mean, I got five long stem roses

in my butt right now. But that's just again, that's just a concentrate for the intro. Yeah. Well, I think you would have been closer to Alba fish if you had them up here to refra. I mean, I'm working fingers crossed. I get there by Christmas. I got to do something for my family. Make sure the thorns are still on. So do you see like any pattern throughout history as far as like when true crime wax, when it becomes more popular or when it becomes less popular, or is it just sort of up to the fates? You know, I think it's always had a certain level popularity. You know, again, if you look at any moment in the history of Western, you know, modern Western civilization, and by modern Western civilization, you know'm going back to the 1700s.

You see this flood of true prime pamphlets every time a sensational murder happened. You know, in our own country, you see in murder Abilia, I reproduce some of the like Jesse Palmer, right, true prime panelists. Yeah. And, you know, the nice, you know, which are illustrated with, you know, to us, they look, the illustrations are very quaint. But to an audience in 1860, you know, those would have been shockingly graphic images, you know, of Jesse Palmer is slitting this little girl's throat. You know, in the 1930s and 1940s, the new stands of America were packed

with all these true detective magazines, which ran very, very lurid in graphic stories. So there's always been that. It's a little, what's happened over the last few years with this great explosion of interest in true crime is kind of an anomalous in this, you know, in a sense, I can't remember any particular period, you know, where it's captured the public's attention to that extent.

Yeah. You entered the mainstream, like fully entered, like Ryan Murphy, you know what I mean? Showrunners of like big time television shows that are obsessed with true crime. I go into meetings. This is real. Or like, I'll have meetings with like big time producers. And they're all like, tell me more about what Jeffrey Dahmer did. And I was mean like, this was used to get me kicked out of meetings. Right. Well, I think part of it's just technological, you know, you know, that the means of transmitting these stories now has changed

so much, and it's much easier for people to feed their appetite for this kind of material, and you want to acknowledge their appetite for it, you know, without being made to feel ashamed. Well, again, you know, as you're kind of talking about, I mean, the guilt eventually does come up. So, you know, weak people, people who don't get it. Yeah. In other, it could be, I just realized, is that you say the technological aspect of it, I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that a lot of true crime content, you used to have to read to get it.

Yeah. And now you have to find the book. Yeah, you have to find the books and you'd have to actually sit down and read an entire book. Is this about Zoomers? Are we about to talk about quiet quitting? And you had to buy the books. Yes.

Yes. Yes. So, yeah, I mean, I think to my mind, I could be totally wrong. What set the whole true prime praise off was the podcast serial. Yeah. And then at the same time, you know, that showed jinx about a dursd. I mean, that was just lightening at a bottle. Yeah. But I mean, serial, you know, because it was so respectable, I have very mixed feelings about Eric Larson's devil in the white city. Because I'm sure you know, you know, you know, you're very heavily in the mirror.

But the way I always thought of that book was that he made true serial killer stuff safe for women's book clubs. Yeah. You know, because embedding the home story in the story about the building of the Chicago World's Fair, you could read about HH Holmes while feeling you are learning something cultural. Sure, something safe. You're learning something cultural, but on this other level, again, you're getting to, you're getting to, you know, feed, you know, the philosopher, William James, talks about the carnivore within. Yeah.

The carnivore within. You're getting to throw a piece of red meat to the carnivore within without even knowing, you know, that it's aerosome. Yeah. I've seen a lot of ladies express it. But no, but I will say that's kind of why, you know, it is both who we are as people, but it's also a part of our show, which is we understand. It's like, we used to joke about how you have to get through the jokes to get to our

information. Like you have to handle like we're ghouls. Yeah. In the proper tradition, I think of true crime. It's just both being deadly serious about the information, but also kind of rumbling a little bit in understanding that this is naughty. And we are that it's kind of weird kind of, it should in many ways kind of remain. Like it should be a, it's not in the center of the pipe of entertainment.

It's probably best if it's a little bit on the French. Yeah, but I think entertainment is the key worth. People are reluctant to admit that true crime, watching the Jeffrey Dahmer mini series is a kind of entertainment. You ask people why they do it. they rationalize their answers. Well, I'm interested in learning about, you know, abnormal psychology, blah, blah, blah, you know, with the not willing to admit, you know, is that they're enjoying it.

Yeah. Yeah, you like it. You just kind of like it. Yeah, that's entertaining. You know, there used to be a zine. I don't know if you're aware of it. You know, if you remember, I mean, now they're all theseines, but back in the day, I remember, I remember zines. Yeah. So there

was one called murder. Murder can be fun. Murder can be fun. I loved murder can be fun. I used to buy it in a desert island and Brooklyn. It's incredible. Yeah, yeah. So, but, you know, the title kind of says it all That's what we do But that actually probably brings us to murder Abilia where I think that you somehow in an academic sense Still nail that tone you nail that this is it's where we are fascinated by this and it is okay to be fascinated by this. And the way you break it down, because you know, the run up of the book is the history of True Crime in objects. A hundred objects.

And I love this. I love this concept of boiling it down to these kind of like famous totems that represent massive stories. Yeah. I mean, so did you, when you were writing this book, did you start with the story or start totems that represent massive stories. Yeah. I mean, so did you, when you were writing this book, did you start with the story or start with the object for each one? Kind of with the objects.

I mean, obviously, if you're writing a history of crime, you know, there are certain crimes you feel you have to cover. I mean, there were certain crimes I wanted to cover that I couldn't find any suitable objects to, you know, and I didn't want to, you know, have every object be, you know, this is the weapon that someone so used, and this is the weapon so and so used, you know, looking for a variety of interesting objects. So yes, in many cases, it was, you know, finding what I thought was an intriguing and interesting object connected to the crime that led me to focus on that particular crime. The footstool with the Lindbergh baby was really interesting.

I also did not know that the, with the latter, with the Lindbergh baby was really interesting. I also did not know that the with the latter with the Lindbergh baby is really interesting. I like I did not understand. I don't know as much about the cases I wanted to. I didn't fully understand that there was discrepancy over the guy that they named as the killer of the baby. I did not know that. You know, there's a lot, there's always been a lot of controversy over with a Bruno Richard Halment, you know, was It was actually the Bloomberg baby kidnap. I feel pretty sure he was. I think the weight of evidence indicates that he was. There have been people who have written books arguing pointed to other suspects.

But the latter was one of the key pieces of evidence against him. He was a carpenter. He made this homemade ladder, which he used to snatch the baby from the second story room, nursery room, in New Jersey. And technically, that's like a loony tunes tactic. That's like a wild e-coyote. Yeah, well, you know, he did it. Yeah. Well, it's like Wiley Coyote. Yeah. Well, you know, he did it. So he,

you know, he almost kind of got away with it, but yes, but but it was these wood experts who were able to match the wood from the ladder to these missing boards and Haltonon's attic, you know, that, you know, help, help convict him. So I did appreciate in your book how you put wood experts and quotations. It just sounds like a lumberjack should have been like, I know wood. Yeah, so, you know, again, some controversy surrounds it, but, you know, that's a very, very famous piece of murderabelia. I should say, by the way, again, I do in the book, the term murderabelia coined by

a gentleman named Andy Cahan, who works for victims' unit in Houston. I was actually on John Wall shears ago of America's most wanted, briefly had a daytime talk show, and I was invited to be on with Andy Cahahn, on this subject, Andy, by the way, I'm calling the turn, I mean, he's violently against, anything to having to do with murderers profiting, you know, justifying from their infamy by selling things and so on.

You know, I was there to point out, as I do in my book, you know, that it's not at all a modern phenomenon, you know, that people every time in the past, and again, going back at least to the 1700s, that are a horrible sensational murder happen. Hards of people would flock to the site and want to come away with some sort of morbid souvenir. I always think of the Bel Gunnissite. When I think about that, that's interesting. Yeah. Well, the Bel Gunnissite, I mean, the Sunday after her murder farm, Well, the bell gunner said, I mean, the Sunday after her murder farm, you know, the, you know, the bodies on her murder from the dismembered lonely Norwegian bachelor's, that she would work to the side. God, she must have been something in the sack.

I think about that like, about because she kept these men were thirsty for her and she was built like an offensive line. Okay, first of all, I have to say that. So one of the Amazon reviews. So you know, my book, I describe her, you know, she was. Yeah, she went to and she went anyway, one of those. Yeah, she a lot of lady. Anyway, one of the reviews that I was fat, full of it.

It's just, it's if you're if we're gonna talk about it with anybody, at least do it with the serial killer. I think we can talk. It's not Oprah, you know. But yeah, but thousands of people, I mean, they were running, you know, special trains from Chicago, you know, for all the sites, see, or thousands of people. There are postcards. You know, they put the decaying remains of her victims initially in a little outbuilding on the farm. And there are photographs of hundreds of people, men, women, and children, you know, looks like the line outside the Pirates of the Caribbean or something, you know, just lining up so they can drop past and see these, you know, decomposing remains.

And you know, that's funny. Like, I've noticed that in a fair amount of story. Like, as we've been going a little bit more historical with True Crime lately, and I've been noticing that showing up a fair amount that showed up, we just did the Madam Lollari story down in New Orleans. And they did the same thing where they would displace. That was also at a protest. Yeah, but in the same, I guess, nature, they would display the dead bodies for people to come and look at, like almost as if it was the public's right to see these things. Well, back in the old West, was I'm sure you probably know, you know, they would put

the corpses of outlaws that had captured or killed on display, but it had been panged or shot to death. You know, that the Clint East would move the unforgiven, which, you know, the end, you know, when he rides into Channies, he's Morgan Friedman's body on display and that sets off his last rampage. You know, but that was very typical in the Old West. And sometimes, you know, they would put body parts

on display. And, you know, I think I say in my book, in 19th century die museums. It was a famous one in New York called the Museum of Anatomy. They would put, you know, the New York one had the preserved arm of Anton Probe's, you know, one of the most horrific mass murderers of the 19th century, you know, on display in this dime-used, I mean, they would advertise it in the newspapers as a big draw. So that's why I always disagreed when Charles Manson freaked out towards the end of his

life when he had that, it was star, right? They had that girl move in who was trying to kind of move in on his game. And then he found out that she was just angling to get his body to take it on tour after his death. And honestly, I was like, that would have been awesome. Yeah, I would have paid money to go see Charles Manson on tour. Charles Manson live. You know what I mean? You just have a couple, you know, slash comes out and plays a couple something like,

you know, and you pop up the bit like, to me, on honest, if you're a surrogate, what more would you want? Yeah. So, so you would advertise as Charles Manson lives? Ah, and then it's dead. You be in two reds and you're like, like, right in every of these dead. Why, from your brain? Um, how can I ask? Like, how do you feel about just kind of murder a billion general now?

Like I've never purchased a piece of murder a billion. I have never spent money. Most of the stuff I've gotten, you know, I have a gacy drawing, I have some stuff from Charles Aing, I have some stuff from Ted Bundy, I have some stuff just, you know, from the, and, but it's kind of just showed up in my house. Yeah. Yeah. You don't really know where it comes from.

I've got a drawing from Richard Romeras. I've got a letter from BTK. Again, I didn't pay for any of this stuff that just ended up in my possession. What do you have? What do I have? Well, one of the things I have that's in the book, it's actually kind of a treasured possession of mine, is this beautiful hand-carved wooden box that had been made by Robert Erwin of a med sculptor.

So, you know, I wrote a book about him called the med sculptor. Erwin was a very talented artist, totally crazy, who committed this very, very sensational who committed this very, very sensational triple murder in New York City in 1937, Easter Sunday, 1937. And he was in an adamental institutions. And when he was incarcerated in them, he would make a little money for the hospital canteen by either sculpting busts of the doctors and nurses and attendants and selling them for a few dollars. Or in this case, he carved this beautiful wooden box. You know, he made the box to carve it. And each side of the box and the lid of the box is decorated with a ball relief carving

of this naked woman who was this young model named Marani Gideon, who was one of the victims he killed. Jesus! Whoa! After my book came out, this very sweet woman from down south contacted me and said, you know, my husband was a guard at one of the mental institutions that Erwin was an inmate in, and he bought this box from him. And her husband was deceased. You know, I think he'd want you to have it. So I, you know, offered to purchase it from

her and flew her to New York and, you know, have this box, which is, you know, really quite an amazing piece of artwork, actually. So do you use it? Do I use it? The only thing that's in it is the original letter she sent me, The only thing that's in it is the original letter she sent me describing what it was, but no, I do not use it. You know, it's an obje d'art as the... Yeah. So, trying to think, you know, I have a couple of other things. I have a watercolor that somebody gave me from Lawrence Bittaker, I think. I have, but I also acquired actually

in doing my book an inscribed hymnal from the former son of Sam, who is now, I think, calling himself the son of light. Yeah, the son of hope. I wish that we could be high. He won't talk about, because I wanted to get in contact with David Perkowitz, but he only will talk about Jesus Christ. Yeah. And he did a weed. I do have a book that is a lot of his poetry that he's written over the years. And it does have a fair amount of Christian poetry, but then there's other poems like there was one poem just, it's just called the F-Train,

and it's about how much he doesn't like the F-Train. The F-Train, it never works. How am I supposed to get to work? Like, yeah, he was one of the worst news or... I take the F-Train all the time. Oh. Oh. Briggs Adlines, Harold Shector is pro, F-Train.

But, yeah, I mean, there is something, you know, as I say, the introduction to the book, you know, I've always been fascinated about, you know, the kind of power that emanates, you know, from these items, you know, And why people are so drawn to them and why people want to have them in their households. Again, I see them as the shadow side of saints' relics, just as some sort of divinity in hears, to a saints' relic, to a piece of bone or whatever, of a saint, there's some, you know, there's some dark quality

of evil that we're drawn to. In fact, I've come to think, okay, I'm going to run this by, for the first people I've spoken to about this. I've come to think that a lot of the fascination with serial murders and true crime, because there's a weird quasi-religious quality to it. I can see it. If you want to speak on, I can respond. But let me just say, one of the central issues of theology in a letter, and I don't want to get too pedantic, but in a letter to his father, John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, said in Latin, Undeimalim, whence evil, where does evil come from? It's a mystery that religion has always grappled with and essential to religion. I think somehow people are partly drawn to these true crime documentaries and podcasts,

because it confronts you with that age-old question of the nature of evil, the source of evil, the existence of evil. There's something about that in owning a piece of murder of Belia. And I also think there's some primitive thing going on. It's like evil, fighting evil, like people who wear the evil eye or something. All these superstitions that if you carry around

some token of evil, it will ward off other evil. Anyway, I mean, those are just theories that I've been playing around with them. I wonder if they people view, quote unquote, holy good people, saints. I love this connection of murderabilia to saints, like objects, religious objects. Because I think that there's on one hand,

if you believe in God, like if you believe in that, this idea that there's some pure good in this world, a saint is someone that knows something about that world that we'll never know. They have some form of intimate knowledge of this purity of God, that we are, or people who want that are desperately chasing and looking for and also just kind of curious about like thing in general. I mean, like, how do you go like because a lot of them started as people, just normal people,

how did they become a saint? How did you become this other thing that was became like deified in a way? You got, you got touched by this, this, this energy and you have, there's connection to it. I think that there's a, on the other side, there's a transgressive version of that, which is those guys as much as you want, as much as we, I mean, we make fun of them as losers and they are in it's, in it's, again, we do believe it's your killing, essentially, is also born of extreme mediocrity. It's because you're not going to really anything else. You can choose this other thing that then you can get an instant name for yourself by destroying a bunch of people's lives. But they think there's something

in that that they have crossed over to a world that we will never see. You know, like they have done thing, they have done the most taboo. They have, they've stepped into the extreme taboo and, and the thing in some ways, there's a curiosity about, yes, like whence evil, right? Like, what made you go do that? But also like, there is something about you. That means there's something inside. There's something. There's an experience that you add that I will never understand. Well, it may also be a case of a C. It's a lot easier to touch the devil than it is to touch God. He's there. He's wanting his pants are down.

And if you're wanting to get into something that, you know, super natural or something external or anything like that, something religious, then, you know, if you believe in God, therefore you must believe in the devil. And it's a lot easier to touch someone who's touched bad.

Much easier to do bad than good. I think about Gacy and I think about guys that are like true villains of American history, right? Like not just like low like murderers or mass murders, but like those guys that are like, we know, you know, John Wayne Gacy, I know upon rewatching his stuff, there was like, I had a re-interested in him

not that long ago. And he was a guy that I believe was probably one of the worst predators that ever walked the face of the planet. Yeah, I agree. But there's something about like, what was it like in that Rumpus room on a Wednesday between these murders where you're walking on top of this pile of the own, your own bodies that you have created

that are in your home. You got the fucking Pogo costume, the Pogo costume hanging in a closet. You know, I mean, like this guy is become, it's a demon kind of walk on the earth in a way. And so there's something about something that that guy touched. And then now you're like, oh, wow, this is, this is, this is imbued with something. And I don't know whether I like it or not, but I'm endlessly fascinated by it. Well, a lot of it, you know, being like, you know, I don't want to be there. I don't want to be in that place. But like, holy shit, what would that be like? Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. By the way, speaking of murder, a billion gasey, I know somebody, uh, who actually showed me this who owns, uh, and it's signed by him. John Wayne Gacy's Bob Ross learn had a paint.

Well, I also had what this but he had guys working for him. He had guys doing the paintings for him. He had other guy like he had everybody. They was like an assembly line. I went to a showing of a bunch of his art and they just showed like he did a whole series of the seven dwarves, but they were all just paint by number sets and he'd just sign them and then ship them. Yeah, yeah. So, but, you know, apparently Bob Ross was a big influence on his art. Love to see that conversation. So this is like religious element. Is this sort of

a, is this an outcropping of like kind of the new revelations that you had when you revisited Edgene for, have you heard of Eddie Geendon? Yeah, I mean, I felt, you know, this such, it's so inexplicable, you know, phenomenon like Ed Dean. But, I mean, what I came to believe is that all the psychic pressures that were brought to bear on him opened up some kind of fissure, you know, in his deep psyche. And all of this are weird archaic stuff, just came pouring out. And he was enacting, you know, these kinds of, you know, very, very, very,

adevistic rituals of human sacrifice. And again, flaying human skin and so on and so forth. You know, it's one of the sources I think of the fascination that surrounds you, you know, because you have, you know, this guy living in 1950s, you know, the American heartland in the 1950s, you know, the rest of us are there watching leave it to be around TV. So I'm going to say, and he's in this little remote farmhouse acting out, you know, these very bizarre, you know, very bizarre rituals, which would have been again familiar to Aztec priests and stuff. So, you know, there, you know, there is some element of that.

And given the materialistic society we live in, you know, the secular society we lived in, still on some level, you know, we believe in these cosmic forces of love versus evil, you know, that are, is it war with each other? And, you know, as he were saying, you know, on the one hand, the saints relax, which resonate with this quality of self-sacrifice and utter selflessness and, you know, love. And then the shadow side of that, this murderabilius stuff, which resonates with all this satanic meaning. It's cool. Incredible.

It's pretty cool. Now that we've arrived on the subject of Edgene once more, like we were both on a new MGM plus documentary series about Edgene, in which we all got to hear Edgene's voice for the very first time. Among the first people on Earth to hear Edgene's voice, since he died, what was your first thought upon hearing Edgene's voice?

Like after spending arguably you are the Edgene expert Amongst experts you know more about him than anyone you sit more time with him than anyone like how did you feel upon hearing that voice? What did you think? Well, when it first started you know, he just sounded like a regular guy That's what's weird, man. He sounds like he's just, oh, yeah, you know, you know, that's a reason, you know, for various reasons, you know, partly because in my researches, reading about people to new him, you know, he was always, I had the impression of him as being a little, I don't know if this is still, you know, an acceptable word to people who use a word of feminine anymore, but

a feminine. Yeah, but I don't know, but yeah, he does, he was, you know, yeah. But, you know, but so I was almost expecting to hear that a little in his voice. Um, but yeah, there was none of that. He was just like this regular farmer guy. Yeah. I know what I, I think a regular rural American, not even a Wisconsin accent. That's what was weird to me is that you just had this regular. Yeah. I just went on and I found her and I did it. And then I just, I did it. I actually wonder if it's a part of his, because like these guys, right,

they all kind of have some of these guys have cloaking mechanisms. You know, like they have these things where, you know, they have families, so they have, you know, and you see, look, no, I'm normal. You know, I got this other stuff going on. Why wonder if that's just his way? It's like how I'm trying to learn how to,

I'm trying to learn about football, so'm trying to learn how football so I could talk to men, right? Because I got nothing to talk about except aliens and cerrored colors. So I'm learning to try to, I use football. I'll go like, ah, you know, the cowboys, huh? And that works where I wonder if Edgene affected more of a tougher accent. Yeah. I don't think it was an affectation. I mean, you know, I think, you know, when he wasn't robbing graves and dissecting corpses

and dressing up and, you know, flade skin and so on, you know, he was leading, you know, this kind of regular, plain field Wisconsin life. I'm just a regular guy. Just like you. Let me feel your sides. Let me just see. Oh, yeah, what's your waist? But yeah, he's yet, but he's just a regular guy. Yeah. Yeah. You know, obviously none of his neighbors, well, of course, you couldn't really imagine anything. That's the thing.

When you're in the, he's in the willy-wank, a chocolate factory. You know what I mean? No one knows what's going on in there. And the Oompa Loompas are afraid. Yes. Well, you know, people would sometimes ask me, you know, didn't some of his neighbors suspect, but, you know, I mean, who would suspect what? He's grave Robin. He's wearing human skin. He's dancing in a field. Like they probably would

leave it lock you up. Yeah. Yeah. We've been suggesting it. It was a great, you know, the satirical newspaper, the onion. Yeah. So they had this great headline years ago. Neighbor said she always suspected the man living next door was a serial killer. And she, you know, I think it was those nurses, he was bearing in his backyard. But you know, but if you don't, you know, if you don't actually see that, you don't suspect,

and again, it would be unimaginable for anybody to suspect the kinds of thing that he was doing. Of course. Yeah, because he was just inventing stuff. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I think if him is a little bit of an outsider artist. Oh, very much so.

Very outside. He's a solar system artist. Yes. But, you know, Dean again is endlessly fascinating. As you see in Murder Abilia, a friend of mine came into possession of Augusta Gaines crucifix. I saw that. I was going to ask you where that came from. Yeah.

He actually wrote me. I'm going to ask you where that came from. Yeah, he actually wrote me. I'm not sure how it happened. He was puzzled because apparently we reproduced the flip side of the crucifix. But in any case, where that came from was that gain formed a friendship, an epistolary friendship. You know, just were ledist to each other with some guy when he was in the institution that he was in until his death. They became very, very close pen pals. And at some point Geen sent him as a gift gift Augustus crucifix with a little card. I don't quite remember how my friend came into possession of it,

but he purchased it from this other person. And he has Augustus crucifix and the card, Ed Gene's card, that accompanied it. So... God, I wonder what his signature was like. Edgene's car that, you know, that it, that, that accompanied it. So God, I wonder what his signature was like. I just see it as like Ed like just in the block letters. No, no, I mean, I've seen, I've seen cards from him. You know, we had perfectly normal handwriting. You know, he was kind of disappointing. You know, he was, you know, he was not a stupid man. You know, people saw him as a simple-minded kind of village idiot. But, you know, when he was incarcerated, you know, he

apparently read pretty widely from what I know from some people who interviewed him. He even read some Freud. And he was very interesting. Oh my god. What? Oh, no. Well, he was very dismissive of Freud's theory. I imagine. I imagine that doesn't track for me. That's the best thing. Complex stuff has nothing to do with me. Yeah. Well, in murder belia, like one of the things I really appreciate about it is that it's not, I kind of get the feeling from it's not just a history of true crime, but it's also like kind of a cultural history of like how people process true crime. The thing that I found most interesting, like the objects I found most fascinating,

weren't really the murder ballads, because of course I know a lot about murder ballads and it's great that those are included in there, but the kidnapping songs were bizarre. That's interesting. Tell me a little bit about those. Like those were fascinating. Well, the one I remember most, and again, as I think I said before we started,

as soon as I write a book, I forget everything that's in it. But I do include this little Charlie Ross sheet music. I think it was called the song that's called something like, I want to see Mama again. music. I think it was called the song is called something like I want to see Mama again. It's called yeah, bring back our darling. Was it with that the Charlie Russman? Yeah. Wasn't there one like I want to see Mama again or something? But there was a couple of them. If the fox. Oh yeah, but but Charlie Ross was the first child to his kidnap for ransom in the United States. And the case became a big sensation. But as you say, it says something about the culture of the time and it's, you know, love of these highly sentimental, you know, this highly sentimental poetry and music and so on and so forth, you know, that they turned this thing into a piece of

sheet music. So you could, you know, take this music home and sit in your parlor and entertain family and friends, singing this hard tugging song, you know, about this little missing kidnap boy. But, you know, what you're saying is one of the things out. You know, as always, you know, I regard myself as a true crime historian and one of the things I feel very strongly is you can learn a tremendous amount about any period in the culture by seeing which particular crimes, you know, the public is fascinated and obsessed by at that moment. You know, for example, you know, one of the books I wrote was about the Bath School disaster of 1929, where this guy, you know, Farmingham Andrew Kehoe, you know, blew up of the town public school and

killed 38 children and teachers and so on and so forth. Yeah, I think we called them on the show the biggest asshole of the century. And you know, remains the worst school massacre in US history. At the same time that was happening, and it disappeared from public awareness within days. People just really weren't interested in it. But at the same time, they were obsessed with the Ruth Snyder and Judd Grey case. You know, the so-called Dublin-Demnity Murder

with his housewife Ruth Snyder, along with her kind of milk-a-toast lover boy, conspired to murder Ruth's husband. And that, that obsessed the public for months and months and months. This guy blows up a school of kids 38 children and the American public of the time shrugs it off. children and the American public of the time shrugs it off. The case with this woman who conspired with her, a deltorous lover to murder husband, because front page news for months, and it's because she embodied something

that the public was very, very terrified at the moment. She was this flapper, this 1920 flapper, you know, who was flaunting her sexual freedom. It's another moral panic. It's juicy. It's juicy. It's got, it's got, it's got, yeah. But she represented, you know, a threat to the whole Victorian domestic order. You know, that was being completely overthrown,

you know, during the jazz age. You know, she was being completely overthrown, you know, during the jazz age. You know, she came to embody that. You know, some extent that we have pulled in love also, you know, embodied the, what they call the flaming youth at the time. You know, it wasn't that their crimes were so horrific. I mean, you know, she killed one person. Keeho murdered 38 children. You know, she, she murdered, you know, this kind of bullying husband that she really had no

relationship with. So it wasn't the horrificness of the crime. It's what she represented. So my point is, you know, you can learn, you can learn, you learn as much about the 60s counterculture, you know, from looking at the man's in case, you know, as you can from looking at Woodstock. Yes, very interesting. looking at the man's in case, you know, as you can from looking at Woodstock. Yes, very interesting. No, I'm just saying there's a sociological dimension to it. You know, as Marcus was saying, it's the shadow. It's the understanding the shadow of a time period.

I think that there and it's what's in the shadow. I am in Jungian therapy. So the shadow is a lot longer than you think it is, right? The shadow actually encompasses quite a lot. Yes, and Jung says, the meeting with yourself, is it first the meeting with your shadow? Yeah. Where you're in any kind of self-awareness, the first step is you have to be able to face your shadow. And of course, the shadow, you know, my classes, I would always tell my students, because I taught this course called Myth and Archetype for many years. You know, and I'd say, whatever is the most shameful guilt-ridden thing you can say about yourself,

you know, something you would never reveal even to your most intimate friend is not the shadow. your most intimate friend is not the shadow. The shadow is something that is so abhorrent, to everything you consciously think and all the values you hold that you can't even admit as part of yourself. And that again is something you confront, but it's necessary to confront. That in true crime is one of the ways that, you know, helps people come face to face with it, even though they don't, again, you know, not consciously, you know, consciously acknowledging that, again, they're dreaming those things at these wicked men are really doing. So, it's very interesting.

I also, well, we're kind of hitting it now too, because, you know, we cover what we call our terms of heavy hitters, like of these kind of fascinating serial killer figures that we want to investigate and we're discovering we're because of the years we've been doing this. I feel like there are some crimes like the, the bath school massacre that are so bad. No one wants to get into it. Like we're starting to come up against, well, like the guys that are kind of left that we're starting to kind of cover, each one's worse than the last one, you know, like we're having a hard time finding a proper source for the toolbox killers, right?

And then it's because as soon as you look into it, you're like, oh, this is pretty unpleasant. I could see why there's not a lot of focus on this story. And then it's because as soon as you look into it, you're like, oh, this is pretty unpleasant. I could see why there's not a lot of focus on this story. Yeah, there was someone that you covered in in the book, Gary Heineck, is that Gary Heineck? Yeah. That was, I'd actually never heard about that story in the full detail. And, you know, it's about a man who, you know, kidnaps women and keeps them chained up in his basement. And he, one of them dies. And he grinds her up in the meat and feeds the remains to other women. I've never heard of that. Not cool. I had Nick had one of my two favorite defenses of any criminal. Heimnick's defenses. You say he

of any criminal. Heimnick's defense, as you say, he lured these young, these women into his home and chain them in the basement and torture them in various ways. His defense when he was arrested was the women were there when he moved in. I know. Dale, I honestly, I was trying to get him to leave. Yeah.

They didn't want to go. Yeah. The second favorite defense of all time was a few years ago, probably decades ago. A woman, I think it was in Miami, a summer in Florida, a woman collapsed on the street and this homeless guy immediately started sexually assaulting her. And his defense was, I thought she was dead. What are you going to do, officer? Yeah.

Honestly, what are we going to do? And they're all like, we have to let it go. We have to let it go. I thought she was dead. It takes it every kind. Yeah. Well, we just did a last week. We just did a full series on Necrophiliax.

We went real deep into the world of Necrophilia. Yeah, we went, we went all 10 subdivisions of Necrophiliax. But there's something about that type of crime that's also very interesting because unless it's tacked on to some other serious crime, like even other like serial murder, you don't hear a heck of a lot about it because it seems it's pretty gross. Yeah. Well, also, yeah. And necrophilia, I mean, there aren't really laws against it.

I mean, there are laws against violating graves and so on and so forth. I'm not sure that they're specific. I found 40 states have laws on the books about necrophilia, but there's no federal statute for it. I think it's why droves of people are moving to Arkansas. Incorrected. Wasn't on the books in California until 2004. Wow.

Okay. Well, yeah, I know I've done some research into it. I mean, he was just rereading stuff about Sargent Per Tron to ensure you covered. We absolutely did. So I believe that was a case where somebody first coined the term necrophilia. Yep. So yeah. You should do that book.

You should do that book. Yeah, bro, you should do that book You should do that book. Yeah, bro. You should do you do that Honestly, I would I would love it. Can I just ask you to do Various topics so that I can read more about them. You know, there is a very good book on Bertrand But it's in French I'm sorry. I can't read European. Yeah, this is a question that we had on the show that maybe you can weigh in on as that when we were putting together the story of Necrophilia and putting together like kind of a murderer's row of Necrophilia acts, the majority of them were French. Why? Um, well, you know, I mean, you know, how the French feel about having sex with women.

You're very liberal. Part of the, yeah. I mean, I, I, I, I, mean, I can only assume that it is part of the French attitude toward La Mour. I know Pepe La Pue is canceled recently. Honestly, finally. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if that had anything to do with that, but yes, I can't, you know, it does. You heard it here first, ladies and gentlemen. Harold Schechter says, Peppie Lapue is a necrophilia. I wouldn't put it past him. I wasn't totally sure why he was canceled. I'm just throwing that out there.

He's a touching. He's a touching. It touches too much. Yeah. Well, I mean, man, this has been so great. This has been so much fun. This is so fucking great. Thank you so much for talking to us for so long.

Do you want to talk about, I mean, I know that you're working on another book right now, are you just finished it? You said 50 states of murder. Here's a nice one. So it's a book about what I tried to do in it was, you know, there's very little about all the most notorious cases that are associated with certain states. I mean, because who needs to read more about Charles Manson or Jeffrey Dahmer or even Keene. So what I tried to do was write about crimes that were very, very notorious within each state

but are largely unknown to the rest of us. Crimes that have entered into the criminal annals of the state, gone into the criminal law of the state. So yeah, there are over 250 cases I cover. Most of them were new to me and many of them are very, very fascinating. Not sure exactly what the, I just handed the book in, not sure exactly. I'm thinking maybe it'll be out in 2025, but that's awesome. I'm very, very proud of Murdered Bealea and I'm really glad you guys liked it. I love it.

Really glad you guys invited me to be on the show. So it's a great pleasure to talk to you guys. You're the best. So good. Looking forward to the book. Looking forward to your book, a necrophilia. I'm looking forward to it. I should say that Eric Powell and I were actually thinking about doing a book on that subject connecting it to Ed Dean. I'm not sure that that project is still a go. We're working on something else, but we did actually talk about Neckrofilia. You must know the case of Count von Kosoel. Yes, Carl Tansler, that we did. Yeah. That's another, talk about Bill for a comic book too. Yeah, that's great for a comic book. Very visual., so Eric and I were batting that idea around, you know I don't know if something will come of it or not, but I'd love to see you guys collaborate again

Like did you hear what Eddie Geandon was my favorite graphic novel of the year so good to yeah, I'd love for you guys I vote yes over here Karl Tansler Karl Tansler everyone's favorite romantic Marcus just your favorite graphic novel of the year. Okay, all time. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Shector, for your wisdom and your time. Thank you very much. I'm Northway.

What a fascinating interview. Always a fascinating time with our good friend Harold check there. We want to thank him so much for coming on to the show and gracing us with his presence. Once again, he's always a treasure guest and a treasured part of the crew, true crime community. He's wonderful. So check out his new book, Murder Abilia and check us out on twitch.tv slash LPN TV. Come in to it. We're going to be obviously we're off this week, but we're going to be rolling

back with new stuff and then a bunch of new shows in January, which are really exciting for and check out the operation sunshine. Number two, it is out in stores. Yes, right now that in your local comic book store. We're going to Australia, New Zealand. Go check out our tour tickets at lastpodcastlive.com. Do it's gonna be great, can't wait. And, Hail Sweet State, on Hail King. Why don't you?

Hey, me, you terkies. No, you all a bunch of terkies. You sweet terkies. You greasy terkies. You Stephens. Mm. You Stephens? Mmm. You Stephens, it's wrong with the Stephens. Ugh.

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