Morbid - Boston’s Great Molasses Flood of 1919

Episode Date: March 24, 2025

January 15, 1919 was an unusually warm day in Boston, a welcome change from the typically cold temperatures Bostonians had experienced in the previous days. A little after 12:30 pm, the residents of the city’s North End neighborhood were going about their usual routines when all of the sudden they felt the ground shake, followed by a loud rumbling roar, as though the train had gone off the tracks. Then, without warning, a wave of molasses—reportedly fifty feet high—flooded the neighborhood with more than 2.5 million gallons of syrup, destroying buildings, toppling the nearby elevated train line, and killing twenty-one people.One of the lesser told and remembered stories in Boston’s history, the great molasses flood of 1919 caused untold damage to one of the city’s oldest neighborhoods and injured more than 150 people, in addition to the twenty-one dead. Yet for an event so remarkable and strange, it is still unknown precisely what caused the Purity Distilling Company’s molasses storage tank to burst and dump its contents across the North End, making it one of Boston’s most bizarre pieces of folklore.Thank you to the Incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research and Writing support!ReferencesBoston Daily Globe. 1919. "Death toll from tank disaster 13." Boston Daily Globe, January 18: 1.—. 1919. "Martin Clougherty awoke in a sea of sticky molasses." Boston Daily Globe, January 16: 7.—. 1919. "Molasses tank explosion injures 50 and kills 11." Boston Daily Globe, January 16: 1.—. 1919. "No Bill returned in tank disaster." Boston Daily Globe, February 13: 3.—. 1919. "Official police report of North End disaster." Boston Daily Globe, January 16: 7.—. 1919. "Scenes of anguish at relief station." Boston Daily Globe, January 16: 7.Buell, Spencer. 2019. "Anarchists, horses, heroes: 12 things you didn't know about the Great Boston Molasses Flood." Boston Magazine, Janaury 12.Daily Boston Globe. 1919. "Explosion theory favored by expert." Daily Boston Globe, January 16: 1.—. 1919. "Mayor appalled, promises probe." Daily Boston Globe, January 16: 1.Dwyer, Dialynn. 2019. "What people saw and felt in the first moments of Boston's dead Great Molasses Flood." Boston Globe, January 13.Jabr, Ferris. 2013. "The science of the Great Molasses Flood." Scientific American, August 1.Park, Edwards. 1983. "Without warning, molasses surged over Boston 100 years ago." Smithsonian Magazine, November 1.Puleo, Stephen. 2004. Dark Tide: The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.  Cowritten by Alaina Urquhart, Ash Kelley & Dave White (Since 10/2022)Produced & Edited by Mikie Sirois (Since 2023)Research by Dave White (Since 10/2022), Alaina Urquhart & Ash KelleyListener Correspondence & Collaboration by Debra LallyListener Tale Video Edited by Aidan McElman (Since 6/2025) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hey, weirdos, I'm Ash. And I'm Elena. And this is morbid. And it's one of those silly fun episodes. It's a listener tale, meaning that it's bar up to you, by you for you from you and all about you. And you always bring it. Yeah, it's like bring it on. It's bring it on.

That's exactly it. Missy's the poo. So take a big whiff. Oh, Liz Dushk. Did I fuck that? I think I might have fucked that quote up. Did you? No, I think you're good.

Missy's the poo. So take it. No, I think I did. Yeah, you got it. Yeah, you got it. Okay. I have faith in yourself. I shall.

But that's Liz Dushk is in it. Liz Dushk. If you don't know what we're talking about, go listen to Scream. The scream pod. Do it. All right. Well, we banter as fuck. But we don't talk about much in the beginning of listener tales.

We do banter. Because it's just fun. It's just fun. But this listener tale, let's start this motherfucker off. It's called I missed the boat on the Meta Murderer episode. Oh no. I know. Also, you really drew that right out. Yeah, I think I went brain dead for a second. I was worried. For a second, I was like, are you okay? The answer is a constant, the boat. The answer to are you okay, Ash, is a constant, nah. But anyways, it's not about me. This is about

somebody that I don't know if I can use their name yet. So let's see. Hello, you lovely weirdos. Let me start off like everybody else by saying how much I love your podcast. We love you. I love you. I love your podcast. Like so many others, I started listening. a couple years ago during the plague and I had the immediate feeling of OMG, it's my people. Oh, I love that. We are your people. You are our people. You are our people. You ladies actually have me excited for an hour long commute every day. Feel free to use my name. All right, Courtney. Also, Elena, when you lost Bailey, I full on ugly cried at the car. I lost my beautiful pit bull thumper in October last year. And the pain of the loss of a furry family member is like no other. I fully felt your love for Bailey in that

moment and I'm so, so sorry for your loss. I attach some picks of Thumper to aw-over over and we are all in. I'm so sorry you lost Thumper. Thumber is beautiful. He really is. Oh, he has like the kindest eyes. Oh, and your kitty cat looks like my Luxie. What a cutie. Oh, I'm sorry. That's hard. Okay, so I had started typing this listener tale and for a lot of reasons I had been debating on sending it in for several weeks. And then you had the Met a Murderer episode. And holy shit, I was like, get out of my head, guys. And we were like, no. And I was like, never.

I so appreciate how you share all these listener tales from such a place of compassion and non-judgment. Hell yeah. It has inspired me to share this story, even though it might not paint me in the best delight. It's not right. It's in the past. It's shit happens, man. As long as you didn't murder anybody, it's all good. None of us are perfect.

Not one among us. Some people pretend that they are. And those people suck eggs. Yeah, some people are like, I've never made a mistake in my whole life. And those are always the people that have made 400 gillian mistakes more than you. So don't you worry. Oh, I was going to sing like, do worry. That's what I was going to say.

Oh, I was like, what's happening over there? I don't know. No, actually, you know what I just realized. I didn't finish my coffee today. Okay. And I've had like no caffeine. We need to charge Ashes batteries. I'm drinking with one of those pineapple refreshers now from Starbucks.

So that should wake me up. But unfortunately, there's ice in it, so I can't drink it while we're recording. Should refresh you. Yeah, it should, but I can't drink it because I don't have a straw. And you know what? I appreciate that because we were on a Zoom once with somebody who's drinking out of something. Yeah, we were. You know exactly what I'm talking about.

They were drinking out of a cup with ice in it. And it was one of those like medley kind of cups, a tumbler. Hold on. Because they also weren't talking. So like, it's fine. Whatever you, whatever noise you want to make is fine. is fine on mute yeah but they were literally like all the ice was clanging against the side of the metal thing and then they'd take a big gulp and chew on the ice into the microphone and

I was like you have so much audacity yeah I was like holy shit you own the entire audacity program yeah you're also talking to two people like one more than the other with misophonia oh it was it was making me lose my damn mind but so thank you for thinking about that thank you Oh, I was saying thank you to the listener. I was like, yeah, thanks, Courtney for not drinking my drink. Thank you, Courtney. Oh, shit. All right.

La la la. I hope this, yes, I hope this can serve as a cautionary tale to somebody else who might be going through a stupid person face. Oh, God, I have so many of those stories. Seriously. Even as I read this, I found myself shaking my head and saying, Courtney, you dumb bitch. But we live and we learn if we're lucky. So here we go. Courtney, I already love you.

I love you too, and I'll make you feel better. Can I just tell my dumb bitch story that I told you this morning? Yeah. So my friend was over the other night. Hi, Kaylee. And we were outside and having a fire. And I saw a white squirrel go by. And I was like, oh my God, it's a white squirrel.

And Drew and Kaylee just look at me. And Kaylee goes, you dumb bitch, that's a skunk. You don't. I was dying. So yeah. If you think it's a white squirrel, it's probably not. Back to Courtney. I was 27 and 2011 when I was invited.

into a Marty Gras-themed club party in Denver by some burner friends. Fuck yeah. For those not in the know, a burner is one who attends Burning Man. I am not exactly, nor was I then, one of these types of hippie party animals. However, in my 20s, I was a work-hard, play-hater kind of person. Relatable. Now, I'm much more of a work-hard, Netflix-hard kind of person. Also relatable. Elena. That's who Elena's always been. But at the time, I had friends in the community, and they threw hella fun parties. Do the kids say hello these days? I don't know.

You can. You can. I still say hella. I support it. I like to think of myself as like a almost kid, you know? Like I'm not that far away from it and I say hello. You're the resident kid in this office. So.

Yeah. I'm the resident kid in this office for sure. There you go. Anyway, fun loving artsy folk and good vibes all around. Two of these burners and I went way back to the high school days of slumber parties and sneaking underage vodka shots. I had met most of the members of their immediate. at friend group at other events here and there. This event was a good one. There was a different

DJ on each floor, aerial dancers, fire jugglers, and light art, lighted art installations. That sounds awesome. Fuck yeah. I would love to watch that from afar. But we was like, I would watch that on TV, kind of like how I'm watching a fucking Woodstock 99. Didn't want to go, but I want to see it later. I'll watch it later. Libations. I love the word. That's a great word. Yeah, I got to use that more. It just feels like classier. It does. I'm going to invite you over for a further. like a libation party. A libration or two. Yeah. Libations were flowing freely and weed smoke that swirled with machine fog was illuminated by laser lights creating an intoxicating haze in the air as the

music bumped. God, I feel at home. We were all dancing and having a great night when a cute skeleton showed up and started chatting up people in our friend group. Oh no, I would have felt for this too. Whatever you're falling for, I would have fallen for. Yeah. Did I mention that this was a costume party? seems to be an important detail now. Masks, face paint, the works. But back to cute skeleton guy. He was a great dancer and giving the vibes of the singer and the band Hocus Pocus. Okay, girl, you just got me. I have not read this before. I have said it from day one that guy's boss. That guy's boss. That the singer of that band has something. He has something. He has a jeniseque qua. He has a jenisequeque. I can't put my finger on it, but I've always thought he was hot. And I don't know why. He has a sexy voice. The voice? And even when he talks.

That's what I mean. Like, I'm not even talking singing. Like, he's a great singer. Oh, Courtney. Yeah, you get it. You get it. Courtney. We get it. And for those that don't, Courtney's talking about the skeleton singer of the band in Hocus Focus before Winifred takes the stage to sing, I put a spell on you. That one. Yeah. I was totally into it when he started dancing in my direction. I love dancing. You know what? I want to dance right now. I'm into this. I'm so into this. My friend from school told me that skeleton's name was Travis. Yeah, of course. It is super cool. Yeah, he sounds like a travel. Travis. He's super cool. Travis's always are for a minute. Yeah. And newishly single. Also, same. Wink, wink, wink. Also, same to like, like that Travis's are always single. Yeah. That's what I meant. I don't mean that I was single. I was not saying that. I'm engaged. I'm engaged. Did I ever mention that? Oh, God. Also, everyone there seemed to know him. Of course they did. We ended up dancing together the rest of the evening. By the time the last call rolled around, Travis the skeleton offered me a ride home since I had been drinking and smoking pot. night. Oh, poking smot all night, excuse me. Looking back, he was also most certainly drinking all

night, but didn't seem overly intoxicated to my drunk ass, so that seemed like a great idea. The friend group and my good friend that I'd known since high school were all very encouraging of this connection, so of course, I left with Travis. I don't recall too much of the ride. I remember that it was after 2 a.m. and he drove a van, red flag. Oh. He told me about, oh. Wow. Oh, do you know who she's talking about? No. He told me about. his organic granola company. You remember that case? Oh, I know exactly what you're talking about.

Oh. I'm not going to give it away yet for anybody who might not have caught on yet, but we've covered this case, this Travis Grinola Man case. Whoa, Cort. Okay. Let's go. Yep, yep, yep. I specifically recall him telling me about the evils of gluten.

Oh, God. Hippies. We ended up going to his bakery. I recall there were steel food prep tables and big barrels, I assume, for grains of sorts. There was a couch in the back in an office area. We ended up spending the night there together. This was a completely consensual one-night stand. Perhaps not my proudest moment, but hey, it happened. What can I say? Don't feel bad about it. We've all been there. At all. It's funny. When I considered sharing this story, I went online to find Facebook posts from that evening.

I couldn't find any picks with Travis in them, but I looked as cute. I looked cute as hell that night. I mean, you did. I'm sure you did. What did you dress up as? I want to know. And then they said, Courtney said, I mean, it doesn't hurt that I was 10 years young. younger, but I would have hooked up with me too. I digress. When Travis took me back to my car in the morning, he asked for my number and insisted that we should get dinner later that week. I was about to be like, oh my God, so nice. Wow. Wow. I gave him my number, but I was quite certain that I would not hear from him because, well, let's just call a spade a spade here. My friend called me the next day and asked how my night was with, oh, sorry, and my friend called me the next day and asked how my night

with Travis Forbes went. I was screaming. I told her all about the granola, ha, ha, ha. and the hookup and that he likely wouldn't call me back. Well, I was correct. My cute dancing skeleton from that night never did call me. So now we get to the true crime of it all. It was a month later when I would hear the name Travis Forbes again. I'm like shaking right now. I cannot believe this. I was doing stuff around the house and had the news playing in the background the days before podcast when they said it. It was immediately familiar. Enough so that I stopped folding laundry to watch, but I couldn't place it at first. I think the news anchor meant. mentioned a granola company and it finally all clicked. I recognized my skeletons, Sands makeup,

and an orange jumpsuit. Yes, he had skeleton makeup on when I hooked up with him. Don't judge. He was still cute. You literally don't have to say don't judge because we totally get it. My dude, we get it. We're over here. That skeleton and hocus pocus, like, I get it. Yeah. With the makeup on. Yeah. It's fine. Yeah. Then they showed the morning family and the face of, of the beautiful 19-year-old girl who Travis Forbes raped, murdered, and buried about 40 miles outside of Denver. Yeah. Oh, this case is so sad. It is.

Her name was Kenya Monhe. She was beautiful. Oh, she was breathtaking. And she seemed like one of my friends. Like, I feel like she just seemed like a friend that was in a friend group. I remember this one perfectly, you know. She went missing on March 31st, 2011. My Facebook pictures of that party were dated March 20th, 2011.

Wow. less than two weeks apart. This charming fucker who knew everybody at that party and said that goddamn gluten was evil, raped and murdered a girl 11 days after I hooked up with him. Oh my gosh. Fucking ew, David. At least I know why he never called me.

He was a murderer. Oh. So awful. After Kenya went missing, he was initially called for questioning because they had exchanged text messages about meeting up that night. Travis told detective some crap

that he did see her that night, but he dropped her off at a gas station or something, and she went off with somebody else. Neither the detectives nor the family of Kenya Monhe believed Travis's story about his interactions with her that night. On top of that, there was some pretty damning surveillance footage outside the bakery that showed Travis roll a large white cooler into the freezer of the bakery and then carry a roll of carpet from his van.

He's so disgusting. He really is. Followed by footage of him carrying what looks like a bottle of bleach to his van. It then shows him disconnect the cameras. I remember. remember this so perfectly now and you get to that part and you're like it's going to show you doing that you idiot he was also seen burning something in a barrel his van was completely bleached clean and the carpet had been replaced when detective searched it they didn't have anything to hold him on in july of 2011

oh excuse me they didn't have anything to hold him on so in july of 2011 Travis forbes was a free man free to beat and rape another woman named Lydia Tillman when i say beat i mean man this was brutal Yes. It really was. He shattered her jaw and strangled her. One article said that her family could barely recognize her to her identity. Sorry. Her to identify. Yeah, her to identify her at first, except for the tattoo on her leg. He then covered her body and bleach, set her apartment on fire and left her for dead. Lydia's a fucking hero, though, and she woke up enough to escape the fire by jumping out of her second story apartment window. She ended up suffering a stroke and was in a coma for five weeks. I'll attach some news articles about her battle. assery. It's totally worth the time to read her incredibly inspiring story. It really is. Fast forward, Ferbs eventually agreed to lead detectives to Kenya Monhe's body on the condition that he would not be charged as a sex offender. I remember this. This made me so angry. And it makes you so angry because you understand like why they have to give them these deals so that they can get them in prison. But it's like, so frustrating. God, like he should have gone to prison

a sex offender. Yeah. And he would not receive the death penalty. That was another reason he wanted it. This was five months after her disappearance. From what I've read, her exact cause of death could not be determined by autopsy due to the level of decomposition. Yep. During the interrogation, when he finally confessed, Travis admitted to taking advantage of her when she was passed out, and he said, she kind of came to, and she realized that we had sex. And then she started hitting me, and I started hitting her back. And then she started to scream, and I strangled her. I strangled her. I strangled her. I strangled her. I killed her. He cut her clothes off and burned them in a barrel. He bleached everything else that she touched. He's now serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. And after

all of this hitting the news, I talked to my friends and everyone in the burner community. They were completely shocked. The Travis they all knew was a fun, nice guy. He was smart. He was well-read, charismatic, and a good dancer. The Travis that I met that night was too. Now, I'm sure everyone thinks this about themselves, but I consider myself to be a decent judge of character. I've certainly been in circumstances where I got a bad feeling to nope the hell out and have done so. I never felt unsafe that night, not once, not a bad vibe or a gut feeling or anything. Even when I left with Travis, all these people vouched for him and there were a whole bunch of witnesses who watched us leave together, which furthered my disillusion of safety.

I still like to go out and have a good time on occasion, but I've made some changes to my lifestyle after this. I realize how lucky I am that my version of the story has a very boring ending, that it is nothing more than a story of a foolish hookup with a stranger after a party. When I watched Kenya's family on the news, I couldn't help but picture my family and what it would look like to have them on the news mourning their missing loved one, and it broke my heart. Not only did I feel so stupid, I felt shame in my selfishness and my overall carelessness. I always wondered if my foolish hookup is what saved my life. If I would have said no to Travis that night, would I have been another rape and murder victim?

Maybe not. there are a lot of witnesses of our whereabouts after all. I guess I'll never know the answer to that. So that's my story. I'm no journalist, so I've attached some links to some of the articles that I read to fill in any gap should you care to read them. I sincerely apologize for the lackluster grammar and run on sentences. Also, tenses are hard. Tenses are hard. I go in and out of him all all the time. Keep it weird, but not so weird that you hook up with a murderous skeleton just because he's cute and a good dancer and your friend say he's safe. Much love to you all, Courtney. Courtney, that is a wild story. I know. And you know what? Like back to the whole like judge of character thing, I'm sure you are a good judge of character. But the thing is like the substances can alter your judgment, you know? So it wasn't that you're not a bad, that you're a bad judge of character. It's just you were having fun that night. Well, and on top of that, all your friends knew him. Exactly. For him. Like he was a good liar. He was a good chameleon. Yep. Sometimes people like you, you really can't trust people. No, you can't. You

really can't expect if you don't know someone and even if you do know them you can't always trust everybody it's like and that's a hard lesson to learn and I think it's one that you continue learning through life so like don't feel bad like you didn't do anything wrong we did something millions of people do every day exactly and and wow I can't I'm sorry that you went through that because that must have been like a very traumatic thing to actually deal with once you realized so I'm sorry that you had to deal with that and damn What a story. I know. That's a lot.

I'm trying to, I should look up what episode we covered that on. Yeah, we should. Hang on. Episode 220. That case was so, so, so sad. And then Lydia Tillman at the end is like wild. Yeah, it's a really sad story. But as soon as when you said the granola and you said it again, I was like, wait a second.

I think that's what like everybody remembers when you say it with Travis. Yeah, exactly. All right. Thank you, Courtney. Now, on to the next one, which was sent to us by. Amy. She said we can use her name. Thank you, Amy. Your email picture is adorable. It really is. And it's titled, I was almost one of them. Oh. Which is very ominous. Is that a new theme? I feel like it is. All right. Let's see. It says, let me go to the beginning of us. It says, hi ladies.

Hi, ladies. First of all, I want to preface this by saying this may be long and I'm sorry. No. And by telling you that the last month of my life, well, really the last six months, but definitely the last month, has been almost unbearable. Oh, no. On May 1st, I lost my dad after a long battle of dementia. I'm so sorry. We really lost him years ago, but last November, we put him in hospice knowing there was nothing more we could do to help him. He suffered a lot, and we suffered along with him. Holding his hand and talking to him as he passed away was the hardest moment of my life.

But knowing that he was no longer in pain or confusion was an actual comfort. To anyone who has a loved one dealing with Alzheimer's or dementia, I see you. You aren't alone. Oh, I'm so sorry. That's a nightmare. I can't imagine having to go through that. The next day, after watching my dad pass, I had my first ultrasound appointment as I found out I was pregnant nine weeks prior.

Unfortunately, I found out that I was dealing with a missed miscarriage. Oh, I'm so sorry. Unfortunately, or no, I won't go into the details of the physical and mental pain I endured over the next two weeks, but it was, again, almost unbearable. Two weeks after that, I came down with COVID. Luckily, it was pretty mild, but it just felt like another overwhelming thing. Because it was. Oh my God. I'm so sorry. I have dealt with miscarriages, so I know how that feels.

That's horrible. I'm really sorry you went through that. And they say it comes in threes, but like, wow, that's a fucking trifecta. That's it. That's the trio. All this is to say two things. One, I continue to listen to you ladies throughout and you provided me with much needed laughs and distractions. Oh, good. Thank you so much for the entertainment you provide to all of us. I hope you know just how much joy you bring to us listeners. That's really nice. I know. Sometimes we need to hear that. She hear that. Two, the story I'm about to tell you just proves what a caring man my father was to me and my

sisters as we grew up. We meant absolutely everything to him. And after what happened to me, he was so passionate about keeping us safe. Him and my mom completely uprooted their lives to give us a different sort of childhood. Oh, wow. I love the you had amazing parents. I know. Everybody should.

So here we go. My parents were born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. Crazy tidbit. But their first house as a married couple was a block away from John Wayne Ging. D'Cy during the actual time of his killings. Oof. Oof. For real. For real.

My dad spent his entire career up until this point at the Chicago Tribune, starting as a copy boy and at this time working as a foreign editor. What a badass. I have a subscription to the Chicago Tribune. He was kind of a big deal in the world of print journalism. That's badass. Hell yeah. Go dad. My mom was a kick-ass pediatric nurse.

Hell yeah. Go, Mom. This is a cool couple. They both switched on and off working nights. So I definitely had plenty of time with each of them. throughout the days. Oh, that's awesome. Cool. My very favorite afternoons were when my dad would pick me up from preschool and we would go grab happy meals from McDonald's and bring them to the park. Those were the best times. This particular night, my mom was working and my dad was home with us.

I was five years old and my sisters were nine and eleven. We actually lived in a suburb of Chicago at this point, not the same place as the John Wayne Gacy shit, shivers. And though I don't remember much about it, I do remember feeling like it was a pretty nice and safe neighborhood. It was like any other night. My dad put me to bed by reading to me, which was a nightly ritual he did until I was almost in junior high. Stop. He said, good night, turned off the light and closed the door. We lived in a three-floor house, so bedrooms were on the top floor. Kitchen and living area on the main floor, and there was a finished basement.

My dad and sisters retreated to the basement once I'd settled into bed. The next moments are obviously a little hazy to me as I was only five years old, but I promise you, these images will never leave my mind. Oh, I'm so scared. I have a feeling I'm going to get very stressed out about this. I'm already stressed out because I ran ahead. I opened my eyes in there in front of me was a figure. I could see his outline because the door in my room was now opened and the light in the hallway was glowing around him.

The figure was relatively large. As he got closer, I noticed he was wearing a stocking cap on his head and what I will never forget, a tool belt around his waist. Oh, my fucking God. I can't be sure that there was anything in the tool belt, but I knew it was there. Luckily, I had the time and clarity to start screaming at the top of my lungs. I must have spooked him because he'd,

immediately fled from my room. My dad was able to get to my room relatively fast as I continued to scream. When he reached me, I told him what I saw. As most parents would probably do, he reassured me it was just a dream. However, as he was doing this, he heard a loud banging coming from the main floor. He ran to the sound and saw that our side door was broken into and was swinging open. Oh my God. That's all it took for him to call the police. I remember the police being in my room and me retelling them what had happened, but that's really where my memory ends. But here's what I would was told. For the next week, we had a police presence at our house outside all day and night to protect us. My dad said at first they weren't sure how serious they should take the situation,

but with the broken door and the way I described the man to them, the police felt like it was a real event. They said hearing those sort of specifics from a five-year-old was not normal if it was just a dream. Also, I'd like to point out that this was the mid-80s. So, you know, prime kid abduction decade. Yeah, what was with the 80s and abductions? Yeah, what the fuck was up with that? It was like a real thing. Yeah. We never had another incident at our house, but within the next year, my dad decided he had had enough of Chicago. He bought a newspaper company in a small town in Wisconsin. Fuck, yeah, he did. Yeah, he did. And our entire family moved hours north to this idyllic setting. When I say small, I mean it. I always hear people reference small towns, but you really

don't know small towns until you see one. There were no stoplights, and I graduated with a class of 40 kids. Oh, my God. Everybody knew absolutely everybody. It sounds like we're Drew is first. For real. Honestly, I think I forget about the incident as I grew up. I never felt unsafe in our town, and it was really nice place to grow up in that sense. We were out all day from morning until night playing. Walk to and from our dad, our friend's houses, unsupervised. However, I do remember forever teasing my dad about his safety protocols. He constantly locked all our doors at all times. Why would you ever need to do that in this town, we'd wonder? And at night, as he'd write his newspaper stories on the computer in the basement, he'd block out the windows because I think he was scared of being watched. feel that. Yeah. In college, I found a shotgun in his closet. I was absolutely shocked. My dad was one of the most gentle souls I'd ever come in contact with. We lived in an area where hunting for animals was really prevalent, but he was a major animal lover and would never dream of doing that. Up until then, I wasn't sure my dad had ever even held a gun. When I found the gun, I brought it up to some good friends about how surprised I was. One of them turned to me and said, why would you be surprised? You were almost kidnapped

as a child out of your own bedroom. And it hit me. The honest friend. Yeah, like what the fuck you were almost taken out of your bedroom they're like trauma bomb remember like boom and it hit me i'd had completely forgotten about all of that because of the way my parents decided to raise us like your parents literally made you forget about being almost abducted that's how wonderful they were that's some parent shit right there that is some a plus parent truly i'm now the mother of a five year old and i cannot imagine the trauma my dad endured after having that almost happened to his child i know it didn't hit me until my friend reminded me of that. And then again, when I had a daughter. My poor dad was in the house when I was almost abducted and it most likely affected him for the rest of his life. Absolutely.

I can only imagine. He was such a good, kind and gentleman and I'm so grateful for how he protected me throughout my life. Oh my God, I love your dad. I do too. I'm so sorry that you lost your dad. I am too. Thank you so much for reading my story. And I'm sorry it isn't as humorous and witty as many of the listener tales are, which I love so much. But I'm still trying to crawl myself out of the hole I've been in. I hope I can also be funny again soon. Until then, thank you for providing me with your hysterical banter, engaging listener tales and interesting true crime stories. Love you, ladies, Amy. You can go ahead and use my name. I'll be so excited if you actually read it. I'll want the notoriety. Amy, Amy, Amy, Amy. Hell yeah, Amy. We love you and we're

so sorry for what you're going through right now. And we're sending you a huge giant hug. And we're literally not even hugers, so that's a big deal. That's a huge deal. We love you. We love you. you. We freaking love you, Amy. All right. Next up, listener tales. I got possessed because I was too gay to say no. Amazing. That's iconic. I'm already, I'm ready for this. Oh, my God. Already, let's go. Hello, my beautiful, ghoulish goddesses. Love that. My name is Fifer. Get the fuck out. That's an awesome name. That's a sick-ass name. And then they said yes, like Michelle. Yes. And you may absolutely use my name. Yes, Fifer. What a. fucking cool name. Holy shit. Firstly, I need to tell you that I love your podcast. I'm chronically

ill and spent a lot of time just writhing around in pain on various beds. So I don't really spend time with people outside of my roommates. I'm so sorry to hear that. Having a true crime podcast. Having a true crime podcast like years of my years has made even my worst days feel bearable. And I cannot thank you enough for how much of a positive impact you've both made on not only my life, but many lives in the community as well. Aw. Thank you. Thank you.

Man, you guys are like really pumping us up today. I know, seriously. I'm like, shit, let's record like 18 episodes today. I'm getting all like, like, like, um, like fuzzy. Yeah, like shy. Like I feel shy. Aw. I've never felt shy.

What the fuck. Your passion for the stories, you tell the compassion you hold for the victims. And the way you rip boneheads like UTK, you mean shit flour. Hell yeah. It just shreds is unmatched. And I truly hope you never forget how incredible you look far. Oh, you both are. Oh, my God. Fifer.

Thank you. Fife. Fife. I love that. That's your name. Ah, I'm getting a new cat and now I want to name it after you. Right. Fifer.

We like picked a name, but I'm like, Fifer's a cool ass name. I don't know, man. Throw it into the hat. I'm going to ask Drew. Yeah. All right. Now on to my tail.

I've attached a double space put a full for you two to read because I know it's much easier. You're a real one. You are. I'm going to say your name as much as possible. This is actually a story that I've sent in before, but I realized I left out some details, so I'm doing it again. It's quite long. As a writer, I'm, excuse me, as I'm a writer in my spare time, and I'm completely incapable of writing short things. Same. Elena. But it is pretty

spooky. I hope you enjoy, and if I ever get to hear this on the podcast, I'll probably shit several bricks. We'll get ready to make a wall out of those bricks. Ew. A ship brick wall. All right, again, guys, this is called That Time I Got Possessed while trespassing, because I was too gay to say no. All right. So strap in babies. This one's kind of long and it's a total doozy. But it's one of my favorite stories to tell anyone who will listen. So without further ado, here we go. I love that. You like, you love to tell this to anyone who listen and like a lot of people are going to hear this right now. A lot of people are going to listen. This is exciting. So for some background, when this whole thing

went down, I was 15 years old and a complete bisexual disaster who would do anything for a pretty girl. That's literally any 15 year old bisexual. Like you would do anything. for her girl. Or a boy. The girl I was interested in at the time, we'll call her Emma, was in the grade above me, and she fancied herself to be an amateur photographer, which worked because I was into film and cinematography, so we had a lot to talk about. Her style of photography was about the disarray of humanity and architecture. Oh. And you're 15 and 16. Okay, badassery. She loved to find beauty and art and decrepit places. Oh, cool. I know that is cool. So she would often break

into abandoned buildings to snap her photos. She was driven by disorder and appreciated the rawness that she could observe while walking through the empty halls of places with thousands of stories tucked inside every crack in the structure. Yeah, you are writer, Fiper. Yeah, that's, I felt that. This is already great. I'm looking at it.

Emma wanted to use her photography to fill in the blanks for those stories. She was also just, excuse me, she also just really loved, she also just really fucking loved breaking into places. because I was overruled by hormones and gay panic, but also love for the thrill of committing petty crimes, don't at me. I went along. Don't at me.

I get it. I get it. I'll lie. At me if you at you. On these little break and enter take some photos and hope to God the cops don't show updates, we would always go at sunset or late at night. Once our curiosity and memory card were satisfied, we would ghost hunt because we were a couple of dumb bitch teenagers.

Hell yeah. I love the theory, the theme of. dumb bitch and I know. I love it. I've always been sensitive to the paranormal. My sister and I are both clairvoyant in different ways. You have to be clairvoyant if your name is Fyfer. Fyfer, I knew you are clairvoyance. Me too. I think you sent it this way and like made me clairvoyant to know that. Whoa. I believe in you, Fyfer. It was like a clairvoyant, um, inception. There you go. Is that what that is? Sure. Question mark. Bye. So spirits don't always leave me be.

So I was hoping to make some sort of contact here. And oh boy, did I fucking ever? Uh-oh. Emma's choice of haunt this night was an old factory in the middle of butt fuck nowhere in our Midwestern state. This place had been up since the early 1900s and was later abandoned for horrible working conditions that resulted in several deaths. The most compelling death of all was that of the CEO, or whatever the 1900s version of a CEO was, who was reportedly involved. with the Irish mob. Oh.

Potatoes. I'm Irish. I can say that. The story goes, he did something to piss him off. And one day, a member of the mob went to his office at the factory and killed him. There are varying accounts on how he was killed. Some say he was shot. Some say he was thrown into a machine of his own factory.

Some say he wasn't even killed at all. And that his death was accidental. But either way, homeboy was dead. I was going to say death occurred somehow. Dead, dead, dead. I will try to paint a visual picture for you guys because the layout is important. Well, Fyfer, you're already good at that, so I'm ready. Yeah, I'm ready.

It was a fairly small factory, square footage-wise, but it was quite a tall building. There were a set of metal doors on the outside, which led to a little lobby area. This part of the building was two stories, however. There was no floor slash ceiling separating the two floors. So if you looked up from the lobby, you could see a few admin offices from behind the reeling. Towards the back, there was a set of metal double doors that led to a short hallway. followed by another set of double doors that led into the factory. Below the factory, there was also a basement type thing for storage or God knows what.

This is all important, I promise. I believe you. This is how my brain works. I'm seeing the setup of where Steve Martin works and Father of the Bride. Okay. You see that? All right, yeah. I get that.

Like how it's like the two floors. Yeah, okay. Awesome. Hell yeah. I'm with you. That's a great movie. I fucking love that movie, both of them. So Emma picked the person.

pathetic rusted padlock on the door and we went in. There you go. We snapped some photos of the lobby area, then we went back up to the offices. We decided to ghost hunt and take photos at the same time. So I manned the shitty camcorder that she stole from her dad, and she had her Nikon out and ready. I need to note that this was, this whole incident was captured on film. Oh my God. On film.

Stop. Give me it now. Unfortunately. No. Emma and I no longer speak, therefore I no longer have the footage. But I'll do my very best to describe. the series of events to the best of my abilities. Emma, are you out there? Give me the footage. Here's the thing. If you are both still bisexual, I feel like you could reconnect.

Yeah. You know what I mean? Like lesbians are always friends with their friends. There you go. I can say that. About an hour into our investigation, Emma and I were up on the second floor and what we believe was the CEO's office where he was killed. Oh, and we heard a noise from downstairs. Of course, our first reaction was, it's on ghost. No, it wasn't. What? It wasn't. Oh, God damn it. I was just so excited to yell. I go, what? You're like, what? I was like, you're dumb. You dumb bitch.

Of course, our first reaction was not. It's a ghost. I can still yell. There you go. It was, oh, shit, it's the cop. I was going to say, that's what I would think first. Yeah, yeah. Because we were totally trespassing, on top of having literally broken into this building,

we ducked down and waited with bated breath for several excruciatingly long seconds to see if any booming voices were going to tell us to come out with our hands up. But there wasn't a sound. Emma, obviously the brave bitch here, decided to go downstairs and check it out while I stayed put and stressed myself out. There you go. While I waited for Emma to return, I tried to look out the window to see if there are any cop cars or anything outside. But there was a tree from the... Mesozoic.

Yeah, that era right outside. That was intimidating. I saw you get to that. I saw that face. I don't want to read that. Mesozoic. Because, you know, I'm like really scarred from Nin. I'm like, if I don't know what that is, I'm not saying.

I'm not going to try. The system of a down era. Yes. Plus, the window was busted and dirty, and so what I could see was precisely jack shit. But I had a camera with night vision, so I was zooming in, zooming out, trying to see anything.

You holding onto your butts? Because this shit is about to get real. Oh, man. While filming, I heard a sort of scuffling noise from behind me, and thinking it was Emma, I turned around to face her, and I woke up somewhere else. What?

You woke. I didn't, I missed the part where you were sleeping. I was, I was like, you, you, when did you sleep? What? When did you close your eyes? Piper, wake up. I don't like this. Piper, wake up. Oh, that was good. Okay. I got, I hit that high now. It was like, it was like, so hot right now. So hot right now. So hot right now. All right, why you didn't go to? I opened my eyes and all I could see was blackness. I did the thing where you blink repeatedly because you've, you think you've spontaneously gone black. We've all been there and proceeded to start screaming like a banshee in childbirth. Whoa. Oh, I like that. Never heard that one before. I spent around and in my panic, I made out the silhouettes of machinery and wires and shit, not blind then. And I just started running. I was in near complete darkness, just sprinting blindly to fuck knows where. But eventually found the metal staircase that led me out of the basement through the factory where I ran into Emma.

What? Emma started screaming at me. Where the fuck have you been? I've been looking for you everywhere. I promptly grabbed her hand. and started pulling her toward the exit. We got to go. We got to go right the fuck now.

Oh, damn. If I was Emma, I'd be like, okay. I'd be like, let's go. I'd be like, I will eat us out of here. So we grabbed our shit and we left. On the way home, Emma started asking questions, but I needed to get as far as possible from this place before I was able to tell her what had happened.

When we got back to her house, we smoked some of the married iguanas. I've never heard that either. Married iguanas. I love that. Have you heard that? No. Me either. amazing. That's awesome. Some of the married iguanas. Married iguanas. And when I finally felt calm and

stoned enough, I told her what I experienced in the factory. Obviously, she freaked out, so we decided to watch my camera footage. We skipped ahead to the moment I was alone in the office, and this is what we saw. My night vision was on, so I was filming the window, zooming in, zooming out like an asshole. Strangely, whatever noise I heard that made me turn around was not captured on the camera's audio. The camera was pretty shit, so it's not surprising. Then I flipped around and was filming the doorway. There was nothing there. Horrifyingly, this is the moment that I blacked out, but what we saw on the footage still gives me chills to this day. The camcorder was attached to my hand by the hand strap and wrist strap. My hand that was holding the camera drops down to my side. Oh, I'm like so freaked out right now. What the fuck is going to happen? So I'm now filming behind me and everything on the screen was upside down, which already is even scarier. What's going to happen? I need to know. Then I just started walking. I left the offices, went downstairs, somehow without alerting Emma, went through both sets of double doors into the factory area,

descended the metal staircase to the basement, and parked my definitely not conscious ass in front of a wall where I stood for a very, very long time. That's like you said, Blair Witch. Yes, exactly. Oh, my God. It scares me so badly. Now, up until this point, Emma and I had not yet gone into the factory.

I had no idea the layout of this place. So how the fuckety fuck I got, I did go down there on my own without knowing how. I cannot explain it any other way than that something was definitely taking over my body. What the fuck? The scariest part is that from the time I blocked out in the office to the time that I woke up in the basement, 22 and a half minutes had passed. So you're just staring, just sitting there? For 15 minutes, for 15 of those minutes, I was standing in four.

front of a fucking wall just blare-witching it in the corner. I knew you were going to come out with that fifeber. utterly silent. So I heard that's, I just nicknamed you. The fiefster. We have nicknames for you now. The fiefster. I love that. You're officially the fifester. Hope you like it. I do not remember this. When I think I, oh my, I'm like, I can't even read. It's so much. When I think back on the incident, even now, that 22-minute period did not exist. It's suspended in black in my memory. and it was like I blinked and was suddenly in a completely different place. Wow. Without the camera footage, I would have never known what had happened to me.

But I do remember the feeling I had when I woke up, thick and heavy. Like when you wake up from a nap and you have no fucking clue where you are. It did not feel necessarily dark or evil in any sense, but it was definitely restless and confused. Same though. I love that. The fiefster said that, but honestly, I agree. I am restless and confused pretty much all the time. Elena can confirm.

And confirm. We'll confirm. The Feister and Ash, restless and confused. Forget dazed and confused. We're just restless. Anyway, naturally, we tried our bus to rationalize my experience. What we believe is that whomever or whatever possessed me was the spirit of someone, possibly even Mr. CEO himself, who died in the factory, and was potentially never recovered.

But we'll never know. Emma once asked me if I wanted to go back, and I immediately told her that I would rather slam my tongue in a car door and lock myself in an iron maiden then return to that fucking place. Wow. Wow, Fifester. Damn. Since then, the factory has been demolished and I have searched for hours on any sort of public record for the same reason why, but I can't find anything on it. For the reason why. I don't know why I have the same in there. I will never know what happened there. I will never know what happened to me. And it has been a sense of frustration for almost 10 years. Fuck, I'm old. Either way, that's my story. I'm so sorry for the length, don't be. But I hope this was at

least entertaining. It was at most entertaining. It really was. Keep it weird, but not so weird that take it away, Ash. But not so weird that you go into a factory with the girl that you think is super cute. And then you end up in the fucking basement away from that girl and you don't even spend any time with her. And then you maybe got possessed and like the brother witch might have been hanging out with you. At least you still have your eyeballs in your tongue though. Because you were like fully ready to stick that tongue into Cardor and like you, yeah, I don't know. You should be thankful for it that the Blair Witch didn't get it. Love you by. Wow. That was a good one, right? Thank you. You did. And you know what, Fifester? The fifster. The fifster. You are. You're all

of it. You're the ultimate. It's automatic. I'm sure of it. No lie. So don't even try. To tell me that you're not the guy. Fifester. Oh, the fipster. I'm sorry. I was singing the real lyrics. Oh, I know. I saw this TikTok the other day that was like, what is a song from a movie that, like, you consider a real song, even though it's not a real song? And it was the one that they play, like, round and round. Oh, yeah. That's a real song by a different band. Yeah, that makes sense. Crazy. Crazy. I thought I was going to blow your mind.

You know what, the fiefster? What do you think? Did I blow your mind, fifster? The fifster? The fifster, you blew our mind. Yeah, that was amazing. For real, guys. Dang.

All of you are just wilding. All right, let's move on, I suppose. Ok-to-to-a-choki. So this one says, listener tale, the afternoon, my five-year-old self spent at the beach with one of the 24 faces of Billy Milligan. after one of his personalities committed serial rape and before he became an alleged murderer. Oh, just that?

That's a title. Okay, dokey. That is a title. Okay. Okay. Hey, weirdos. My name is Sarah. And you can use my basic white mom name because my daughter's regularly informed me that I am indeed a basic white mom.

I'm going to be so pissed when my kids start saying that shit to me. I'm going to be like, you don't even know. Hey, I'm fine with that. I grew up wanting to fit in and be basic. So I guess I can say I'd chew my dream. First off, I will say that I fell in love with your podcast during some of the darkest days of the pandemic. I have always been intrigued by true crime and especially anything spooky or weird. I was delighted to find the two of you and your weirdness help me cope with the challenges of daily life, quarantined with two teenage daughters.

I look forward to each new podcast with all the excitement of a basic white mom. I love you. For your reading pleasure, I have attached two PDFs. One is my listener tale and another includes a solid start on research in case. you decide to choose to do an episode on Billy Milligan. Are you fucking kidding me, Sarah? You're like way more than basic. You're fucking iconic.

Let's get you on the payroll. Let's go. Nobody's ever sent two put-a-foes. I just want to put that out there. His story is crazy and weird and disturbing, and I know that only the two of you can tell it in all its potential glory. I definitely feel already that it's an Elena thing.

Yep. Thank you for adding light and intrigue and humor to my life. I appreciate you, weirdos. Always keeping it weird, even if I'm a basic white mom. Sarah. I love you. I bet you're an iconic white mom. You are. All right, let's read this.

So my listener tale is somewhat unremarkable in the telling of it. But once I add the who and the when, it starts to become interesting. Hang in tight with me for a second. Okay. I'm here. This last fall, I was scrolling through Netflix looking for something new and excite interesting to watch. The usual true crime, serial killer, Unsolved Mysteries type shows just didn't catch my interest.

Then I noticed a new offering. Monsters inside, the 24 faces of Billy Milligan. Billy Milligan, the name caused me to pause. And then subsequently call my father to inquire about a fuzzy memory that was hovering on the edge of my mind. Sure enough, my memory was accurate. I spent a lovely, albeit likely somewhat awkward afternoon at the beach with one of the 24 personalities of Billy Milligan. I would have been about five years old. What?

How did this afternoon at the beach with a serial rapist and the future alleged murderer come about? I was wondering that. We all were. All because of my compassionate hippie father. Go hippies. And look at, there's a picture of your family and you're so cute. You're freaking adorable. Oh my God.

And your parents are adorable. I'm dying. I was born a flower child in the truest sense. My early years were spent living on the side of a West Virginia mountain with no electricity or running water, but lots of love and friends and music all the time. This isn't completely relative to this story. But still, where else can I brag about my mad accomplishment of being potty trained using an outhouse?

My family in 19796. Fucking awesome. You are, you're not basic at all. You are a cutie, patootie. I know, look at those cheekies. And your dad is holding both you and your mom. Oh, wow. I just realized that.

Strong man. That's strong man. Oh my God, you are so cute. When I was about, what's crazy is you kind of look a little bit like Ash when Ash was little. You know, I almost said that, but I do talk about myself a lot in a kind of narcissistic way, so I wasn't going to bring myself into it. No, you do.

You were both really cute. When I was about four years old, I moved with my hippie music playing parents to the hills of Athens, Ohio, so I could attend better quality schools. This is also when my father went to work as a psychiatric nurse at Athens Mental Health Center, where Billy Milligan became one of his patients in 1976, 1978. This place looks sick. I mean, obviously, it wasn't, but like, whoa. I don't want to tell Billy Milligan's story, but I will share what my father told me about his experience with Billy and why we spent an afternoon at the beach. Billy had been tried for raping three women at Ohio State University. But this was the first person to successfully use multiple personality disorder as an insanity defense. And as a result, was transferred to a mental health facility rather than prison.

At the Athens Mental Health Center, where my father worked, Billy was able to walk the hospital grounds and visit the town unsupervised. Ooh, that sounds like a bad plan. My father remembers this being a point of contention with the hospital staff in the community. I wonder why. Some believed in his personalities and felt compassion for the horrific childhood experiences that may have led to Billy's psychosis. Others were skeptical and questioned whether he was putting on an act to fool everyone, including his doctors. Well, and either way, like, you can definitely feel bad like we say for the child, but you don't have to send a rapist into town. Yeah, you don't have to do that.

My father saw him as a broken and abused young man and took him into the community on multiple occasions. And I oop. whoopsie i had to stop the recording because i was laughing so hard no i'm sure your dad is just like a very compassionate man exactly like this is by no means against your dad and honestly if it was me i probably would have done the same fucking thing it definitely would but also your dad was a psychiatric nurse so i'm gonna trust his judgment exactly but that was just like a really funny yeah that was like my whole foot just inserted in my mouth that was proof positive that we have not read these before we read them at last. It was also a great use of And I up if I do say so myself. That's actually the

definition of anti-oop. Are the kids still saying that? I'm literally crying. Okay. Just remember who doesn't think you're basic, okay? Remember, you are not basic. Your father is, you know, a very compassionate person, I'm sure. I'm going to drink my ice

drink. So, one afternoon, my father brought him to the beach with my mother and I to enjoy swimming and sunbathing. Also, he's supervised here. Yeah. That's the thing. We were talking about letting him just wander into the community without anybody. Your dad is a psychiatric nurse. And he's bringing him to the beach for a little swim. Like, that's fine. We were all right here. Everything is fun. Yeah. So I remember sitting in a blanket at the beach next to Billy and a less comfortable memory of him and my father tossing me through the air to each other in the deeper water. Wow. Okay. You were heated by this man.

Here is a picture of the beach at Strouds. How would you, Strouds? Strouds, yeah. At Strouds run State Park today. Beautiful. Oh, that is really pretty. Needless to say, I eagerly watched every episode of the Netflix Monsters and Side series about Billy. Other than Billy's core personality, Billy himself, my father believes he only witnessed one other personality of their remaining 23.

This was his most violent personality named Reagan. Because of the exorcist? Probably. According to my father. Reagan emerged in one instance when a staff member was intentionally provoking Billy and he became enraged. Watching the Netflix series, I was shocked to learn about the possible murders that Billy may have committed after his time in Athens, Ohio. Did I spend my afternoon bringing light to a troubled abuse soul? Or was I subjected to time with a sociopath who manipulated my gentle father just to have a fun day at the beach?

I don't know. It could be either, to be honest. I can't tell you. I need to know more. So my question today was Billy controlled? by his multiple personalities, or was he a master manipulator and a, quote, brilliant narcissistic sociopath? I'm hoping you, Ash and Elena, can help me answer this. Oh, that's a big job, Sarah. Oh, I'm going to read this case. Yeah, we're going to add that to the whiteboard. For sure.

We've got time in November. There you go. So we're going to take a peek at it. And wow, to be able to look back and say that. Seriously. Like, that's really wild. That's cray, cray. But I think that's the thing. Those kind of situations, like the multiple personality thing is they can manipulate so easily. It can be created so easily. You know what I mean? But it's also with it. I was actually thinking of split this entire time. Of course you were.

Great fucking movie. I saw that in theaters and it shocked me to my core. It's so stressful. Opinual opinion though. Or maybe not unpopular. I don't even fucking know. I don't like the end. I don't either.

Cool. And I don't even remember what the end is. was but I remember not liking it. I mean, I can say it because it was like came out like five years ago. It turns it, it turns it out like so whole superhero thing and he like can't be stopped. I know. So I know what it is. Is it Marvel? No, no, no. It's a, it's a prequel, I think, to Unbreakable. Yes. Which is like a serial or serial. Lord. Like a super hero. A superhero kind of thing. Yeah. So I didn't like it. I get why it happened. I just, I don't know if I'm a fan of that whole thing. Yeah. And it wasn't really like marketed as a prequel. Like I was like, I thought it was just a movie about like, I thought it was just a scary movie, you know.

That was scary movie. But was that, that was that was that. That was, you know, should have expected a twist. Our dude, M. Knight. M. Night. You know, like the fifester. We're all friends here. I know. Let's go.

Okay. Thanks, Sarah. I'm going to go ahead and take my foot out of my mouth and introduce the next one. That was a wild tale. Sarah, your little, your fam is just the cutest thing I've ever seen. No, like genuinely. And not just because he looked like me as a baby. All right.

This one is called wild. I always win two truths and a lie. A listener tale. Hello, ladies. Here's my listener tale for hopefully one of your podcast shows. Feel free to read it or read it all or part of it. I made sure to make it a put-a-foot double-spaced in size 14 font for your reading ease. An icon.

Like, that's hot. It is. This part is not for the show. Bye. Okay, we're going to move on. There you go. Greetings from the Great White North, AKA Canada. Or to be more specific, an itty-bitty town called Port McNickel.

There you go. About two hours of Toronto, north. Just two hours of Toronto. It's like away from two hours. My name is Danielle. Feel free to say it so I can brag to all my friends. Daniel. Daniel, Danielle, my bell.

We love a Canadian. Oh, fuck. We might join you soon. I found your podcast while scrolling through the true crime section a couple of years ago. I saw the word morbid and my brain immediately took control of my hand and forced finger to click on it because anyone who named a true crime podcast morbid was worth listening to hell yeah thanks then i hooked then i got hooked on you wonderful ladies also hello to drew john and the little thank you they say i'm back they said hey i wanted to write in for a listener

tales episode for ages but i'm going to be honest and say my overthinking every fucking little hold on and say my overthinking every fucking thing until all the fun is gone brain couldn't decide what tale to tell you oh i relate to that so hard i mean local local ghost stories about drunken sailors playing soccer with the head of their decapitated friend. Yeah, that one. Working in a store that was haunted by a curious dog, that one. And hearing a very long-ass scream while staying in a haunted hostel in Ireland or just a few of my options. We'd like all of those, please. I pick a D, all of the above. Danielle, please. Please. I decided to ignore those for now. How dare you? Although there will

be a footnote about the soccer game because it's a Halloween thing. And I know you ladies are all about spooky season. So feel free to cut that part if you want. No way. I don't. I'd apologize about this being long and for the F-bombs, but I'm really not sorry. And we would never want you to be. I love you. My tale is about how I always win true to the true truths, true, truth, and a lie. So to set the stage, I was about 25 and worked at a local store in the shipping and receiving department. Boring job, but I was there to save money for school, not to make a career of it. Every Christmas season, all the employees were split into groups for a month of manipulation and backstabbing. I mean, friendly competition.

The group was the highest sales at the end, excuse me, the group with the highest sales at the end of the competition won a small commission. Got it? Got it. This shit isn't complicated and I'd be concerned if you were. I love you already. You're funny. On the day my tale starts, the phone rang. Scary, right?

Yes. Terrifying. Two scariest things in the world. Your phone ringing and somebody knocking on your door. Yep. The voice on the other end was pleasant, very soft and a little high pitched. The band placed in order for some small thing. I can't remember what it was, but it doesn't make a difference in the story.

He was chatty in that only mildly annoying way that nice customers tend to be. Then he came in, then came the first kind of creepy thing. He was calling from the mental health facility one town over in, thank you for the pronunciation key, but even that is fucking intimidating. Penetanguishing. Yeah. I did my best. It sounded good to me.

It was a massive complex and still is that houses everything from community outreach to the criminally insane. Fun fact, it actually sits on spills. land named... On a spit of land. It sits on spit land. I was like, what's that? What's spit land? I'm going to be honest. I think I need new contacts because I'm like actually squinting at the screen. I'm going to blame it on that.

Even though I've been doing it for four years. Yeah, it's fine. Fun fact, it actually sits on a spit of land named Asylum Point. It was common for the inmates whose families would supply them with an allowance to call and order things from local businesses. A driver would then go from the store to store every Thursday and pick up all the orders. Nice. I know, that is nice. Now, there was no easy way to know why somebody was a guest at this place since most of them used an alias. I didn't question it. It was a sale and I wanted my team to win. No, I'm not super competitive, but my work nemesis was on the team just ahead of mine in the standings and I wanted to beat her into the ground. Whoa. I felt that. It was petty, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who's wanted to defeat someone they didn't like. Are you a Capricorn? A Capricorn? A Gemini? A Scorpio? Or, yeah, I think that's it. That's probably it. Or an Ares.

Over the next few weeks, he called back about half a dozen times. Each order was bigger than the last. During our last phone call, he asked me for my full name. I only ever gave my first customers as a rule and address so he could send me a tip. That's a no. A fucking claxon. Claxton horn. Claxon horn went off in my head and a silver robot waved his arms around screaming.

Danger. Lost in space reference. Sorry, I speak in movie and TV references and song lyrics sometimes. I love that. So do we. I told him. to send it to the store and that my boss would make sure that it got to me. Little did I know that one of my helpful co-workers had already supplied my business card to the driver. So he got my full

fucking name anyway. Gotta love coworkers. Yeah, gotta love them. I love my co-worker. I love mine. I'm just kidding. Not about loving you. Anyways, I don't know. My foot's still at my mouth. At this point, he got even jattier. Told me he was being transferred to a medium security facility for prolonged treatment for something. Probably wouldn't call me again and was very grateful for all of my help. I was in customer service, so I did the song and dance. We all do for the customers.

Hope things go well. Too bad you're going so far away. Blah, blah, fucking blah. Retail, am I right? You know, I've never worked a retail job. I know, that's wild. I know, but I was a waitress, so I fucking made up for it.

That's true. That Thursday, the driver showed up with an envelope with my name on it. Inside was a $10 bill. Score! Okay, wondering how this is scary. Be patient. It's coming.

A co-worker saw my pretty $10 bill and asked me about it. I explained that a patient had sent it to me. Was I not lucky? I told her his name and she asked who it was. This was the day I found out that the color drained from their face wasn't a literary exaggeration. The look on her face actually made me scared of some unknown thing. Like the time another coworker had started screaming as she ran from the room. You bet your ass I was right behind her screaming all the way.

That time it was a bad, not scary, I guess, but she was. She was a bit phobic. Yeah. Like, I just ran. Really? How many of us don't run screaming from the room? When a bat dive bombs our heads. All of us do.

We like literally just had that experience and I thought that it was a bat that flew into the home. It was a bird. It was a tiny little bird. But it was dark in color. It was dark in color. And it flew right past me and one of the kids in the bathroom as I was doing their hair. Thank God I wasn't cutting their hair. That's all I have to say.

Anyway. She said two tiny fucking words. changed everything. Google him. Uh-oh. Oh no. Okay. There was no way I was not going to look him up. I also wasn't going to wait until I got home. This was before we had computers in our pockets. Yes, I am that old. I feel that. And broke the no personal internet use at work rule and typed his name in. Russell Johnson. Up popped page after page of hits, all saying the same thing. The bedroom strangler. 11 known assaults, seven known rapes and murders.

What? Holy shit, I had been sharing friendly chats with a fucking serial killer. Then it hit me. He knew my name and where I worked. Oh, no. The serial killer, whose MO was to follow female victims home from work, bus stops, or stores knew where I was. Oh, no, no, no.

That $10 got dropped in the first donation bin I found because it was just too creepy to keep it. Oh. You might be wondering how my coworker knew his. name. Well, it turns out one of his last victims was supposed to be her mother, but he got the floor wrong while pulling an evil fucking Spider-Man up the outside of the building and killed her upstairs neighbor instead. Oh my God. Yep. This pond scum monster in human form had literally scaled the outside of a multi-story building, or excuse me, scaled the outside of multi-story buildings to get his victims after following them home. Are you fucking kidding me? I am horrified. You think

you're safe on the fourth floor? Think again. Where there's an evil will, there's an evil way. Oh! Obviously, I'm still alive, so this story had a happy ending for me. I got out of that job shortly after this happened and moved on to better and serial killer-free things. His story didn't go so well. He lived up to his evil status and was soon removed from the medium-security institution and returned to high-security lockdown. To this day, he remains there, chemically castrated, and safely locked away from society. Damn. And that boys and girls is how I always went at two treats and lie. I've had actual conversations with and got tipped by a serial killer. It still creeps me out to this day that I cannot sleep with any window in my home open. Good. I don't even care how hot and humid it gets. And Canada and a heat wave can be deadly. It's the humidity that gets you. Oh, I feel that especially this week. Oh, my goodness, for real. Oh, and my team totally won the competition, which made up for the tip that I couldn't bear to keep. Hell yeah. All right. So if you want me to stop here, I can. I won't hold it against you. Okay. Delight in the mood. Here's a cute picture of my cat. Leonard Nimoy.

Oh my God. Nimoy. So cute. Yeah, Nimoy. I figured I said I wrong. I love it. As promised, more on the soccer game mentioned earlier. If you're ever in my neck of the woods around Halloween and want a good scare mixed with a healthy dose of real ghost stories, try Pumpkin Furno at Discovery Harbor. I'm there. Pumpkin Furno? I am there. You had me at pumpkin. It is a restored military and naval base from the 1800s and is just below asylum point, which adds

to the creepiness. Although visiting the place the rest of the year, you can still get a little spooky. They go all out for Halloween. The story of the soccer match has been told for decades. It's about a group of sailors who got in an argument after a night of drinking and murdered their friend. They decided there was only one thing to do in the middle of the night when you're drunk with a decapitated corpse.

They decided to play a game of bloody soccer. And before you ask, yes, the workers have been, uh, wait what, sorry? They have been known to recreate the game minus the murder. Oh my gosh. Jesus. I need to see this. Thank you for the amazing podcast. Me too.

Danielle. Thank you for the two amazing stories. Wow. Holy canoly. Wowzers, Danielle. Oh, my goodness. That was intense. All these people that have had some.

kind of contact with a serial killer is wild to me. I know. I feel like we need to do like so many more installments at the time. We really do. Murderer like wasn't like had a had a involvement with truly. So kreikere. Oh man. Okay. So this is the last one and I think it's it's a good one. Okay. I'm going to say burlap clad hunchbacks in the Bridgewater triangle want to rub sand in your eyes. I've heard that. I've heard that before. Let's do this. I have never heard. heard that before. I'm ready. All right. Hey, Elena and Ash, first off, I love the podcast to a degree that some might find unhealthy, but hey, screw them. Screw them. I just can't get enough true crime and spookiness in my life, I guess. This is actually the second story I've sent because I've had

a few notably weird experiences in my 36 years, and I guess I want to fill your mailbox with spooky spam. Please do. It's welcome. I'm a fellow maceole hailing from Swampskit and love to to, I love to hear that distinct accent and special brand of banter. I miss so much now that I, that I miss so much now that I live in Los Angeles. Oh, wait. Is Swamps get a place or is that like a play on words? No, that's a place. I've never heard of that. Yeah. You call yourself a macehole. I know, right. My name is also Ashley. I don't go by a nickname unless you're my grandpa and for some reason you thought Ashcan was a cool thing to call your firstborn grandbaby. Yeah, why did people call us that? I also hate when people assume that you either do go by a nickname or you don't go by a nickname. Like if you say

like, hi, I'm Ashley. And they're like, hi, Ash. You're like, I didn't say that. Yeah. But sometimes I say hi, I'm ash. And people are like, hi, Ashley. And I'm like, I didn't say that. You're like, I didn't introduce myself as that. Feel free to use my name if you read this in an episode and I'll change the names of the others involved because frankly, I don't speak to them anymore. Iconic. Now to the story. Fuck them, right? Yeah. This encounter happened during my last year of art school amidst the hellish time of working on my senior thesis and animation. I was super overwhelmed drawing my ass off day and night and even experienced the first panic attack I'd ever had. So, of course, when my boyfriend asked if I could help with his project, I obviously said yes, because sure,

I have tons of free time to spare my dude. To put my workload in perspective, I spent that entire year on two minutes of hand-drawn animation. Sorry for all the capitals and such, but I type the way I talk, which is very punctuated and east coasty. I feel that. My boyfriend at the time was mildly obsessed with the paranormal, especially the East Coast variety. For his project, he had reached out to a local ghost hunter slash spooky expert who hosted a radio show on the South Shore.

Oh, shit. We were going to tape some interviews with Tom, the host, and be guests on his radio show and spend the whole day with the paranormal expert. You know, like you do. The station was located in a town on the South Shore, smack dab in, you guess. sit the motherfucking Bridgewater Triangle. South Shore. So blah, blah, blah. Fast forward. We did the interviews, radio show. Yes, I was

shit my pants nervous on the air. And we packed up all our gear for the day. It was well past dark when we were done and we were so ready to go home and have a beer. Turns out spending the day with a paranormal expert and ciss super draining. And I didn't have many fucks left to give anyway. We packed up the car and got to driving. My boyfriend Chris was driving. I was in the passenger seat and our friend Mike and Eric, Chris's brother, were seated in the back. I know you ladies know what it's like driving around the heavily wooded areas in that part of the state. You sometimes don't pass another car for miles on end. There are no street lights and you're surrounded by thick black forest on either side of the road.

Oh yeah. None of us were really talking much and we were all a little pooped. The road we were on was a narrow two-way street and some deep, deep, dark butthole of the Bridgewater Triangle. That could be like any of the streets around there. I was spacing out, staring out the front windstreet. shield when out of fucking nowhere something crossed in front of our car. The only light illuminating this creature with the headlights of a shitty celica or whatever we were driving. I will never forget this thing even though I only saw it for a few seconds. From out of the forest on the left

hand side of the road, I hunch a hunched over creature on two legs started scurrying across the street. It was about three feet tall, seemed to have a hunchback and was wearing what looked like a robe made of burlap. Like why do fucking Pukwaguchi sounds so cute though? They do. My brain screamed, that's a deer, right? Nope. But no way. I've seen plenty of deer in my time to know, this ain't no deer. They usually don't wear robes.

I've never seen a deer in a robe. I can tell you we have a lot of deer in our yard. Never seen one in a robe. Nah, they like to be naked. What I remember most about the creature was the unnatural way it moved on two legs. This burlap hunchback moved like nothing I'd seen before, extremely fast and so smoothly across the pavement. My entire body froze up and I went into complete sharp.

It felt as if I were having a sleep paralysis episode, which you ladies know is the literal worst. Oof. The first car we had seen in miles turned onto the street, and the second its headlights hit this creature, it disappeared. I was shook. What? Still paralyzed and unable to speak. My boyfriend noticed the intense reaction I was having and put his hand on my leg. He repeatedly asked if I was okay, and the other two joined in on making sure I wasn't having a stroke or something.

When I regained my motor skills and speaking abilities, I was able to explain. what I had just seen. No one else in the car saw this thing. I couldn't believe that I was the only one. I mean, Chris never hit the brakes once because he obviously didn't see the burlaped hunchback demon crossing the road. But it was clear from my detailed description and entire body response that I was not full of shit. Suffice it to say, I probably had 100 beers that night and didn't sleep a wink. Now you had no fucks left. None. Fast forward a bunch of years and I'm watching some shit on Netflix or Prime as usual with a different boyfriend Will Call. Sean. I popped on a super low budget documentary about the Bridgewater Triangle and all of a sudden I scream, whoa, that's Tom. Hey, oh, as soon as you said radio show, I was like, are you talking about the guy from that documentary? That's what I was thinking of. It was the paranormal investigator we had interviewed that night and he was in this weird documentary. Interest peaked. Anyway, they covered all sorts of sightings encrypted seen in the forest and then they started talking about

puck wudgee. Do it was a puck woggy. Puckwagy translates to, according to some dude named Henry schoolcraft, little wild man of the woods that vanishes. I love that little wild man of the woods that vanishes. Nine, eight, I just looked at my eight figures and said nine. That's where I'm at. It means pug wudgy. Yeah. It makes sense. Sound familiar? Yeah. I completely shit myself. Every description I heard in that documentary was almost identical to what I had seen. When you Google image search puck wudgee, obviously I immediately did. You are met with pictures and drawings of little brown hunchback creatures on two. A Wikipedia article on Pukwajis describes, quote,

They are known to kidnap people, push them off cliffs, attack their victims with short knives and spears, and use sand to blind their victims. Whoa. Another source, native languages.org, states, Puckwidgee's have magical powers which vary from tribe to tribe, but may include the ability to turn invisible, confuse people, make them forget things,

or bring harm to people by staring at them. I hate that. This one hit a little too close to home for me. I sometimes think that maybe because I had spent the whole day in a spooky state of mind that somehow I was open to this creature. Probably. Nevertheless, I was so, I'm so glad the little fucker didn't blind me with sand. I'm going to end this already because it's incredibly long and I'm so sorry.

Never. Anyway, I hope you like this story enough to read it on the podcast and it gave you some full body shives. Thank you so much for doing what you do. Never stop and stay weird. But not so weird that. Take it away, Ash. Not so weird that you have to do this project. Actually, you have to do your own project.

And you're like, actually, fuck it. Instead of doing my own project, I'm going to do my boyfriend's project and my boyfriend's project is to go talk to this guy. Tom is from this weird documentary, but I haven't realized that and he has a radio show and he's a paranormal guy. And then on the way home, I see this puck wudgy and I'm like, oh my God, that's a fucking puck wudgy. And then years later, I watch a documentary and I see Tom all over again. You're like, holy crap, oh my gosh, a puck wudgy. I saw it. I'm glad it didn't blind me with sand. Keep it that weird. Or don't know. That's your choice. I'm glad it didn't blind me of sand.

Wow. Ashley, that was a good one. That was so weird for a second. I was not talking to you. I know. I was like, what? What? You're like, what now?

I don't think you have called me Ashley in like fucking 20 years. I can't even remember the last time I called you Ashley. Ashley. But this Ashley. That was crazy. Well done. Fucking. Whoa.

I think it's great to end on a puck wodgey. I think it's great to end on the fucking spaceship that is pouring up. right now. I know. I don't know if you guys can hear it. It might be another thunderstorm. Oh, no. That's John bringing the barrels in. No, it's not trash day. No, it is. Yeah. It's Wednesday. I was like, why is you bringing the barrels in then? Because that's what that is. You know what day it is. Oh, fuck. Yeah. Did you know. Put your barrels out. All right. Well, we should go. Okay. All right. So anyways, we hope that you keep listening. And we hope you. Keep it. Wee. But that's where they didn't. put your trash barrels out. Bye. Fuck my life. Bye.