Morbid - Gordon Cummins: The Blackout Ripper (Part 2)

Episode Date: January 13, 2025

In February 1942, Gordon Cummins, a twenty-eight-year-old Royal Air Force Serviceman, murdered four women and attempted to murder two others over a six-day period in London, leading the press to dub him “The Blackout Ripper.”At a time when the fear of imminent bombings was high and London was on high alert, authorities nonetheless launched an investigation and, quite remarkably, were able to catch Cummins quickly, thereby preventing any further murders; yet the question remains, how was it that a brutally violent killer manage to kill so many people in such a short amount of time and barely attract attention of the police and press?Thank you to the Incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research and Writing support!ReferencesBolton News. 1942. "Is 'killer' at large?" Bolton News, February 14: 1.Campbell, Duncan. 2010. "London in the blitz: how crime flourished under cover of the blackout." The Guardian, August 28.Driscoll, Margarette. 2022. "Ranmpage of the Blackout Ripper." Daily Mail, November 24.Evening Standard. 1942. "Accused of murder of 4 women." Evening Standard (London, England), March 26: 8.Evening Telegraph. 1942. "'Killer' theory in wave of London murders." Evening Telegraph (Derby, England), February 14: 8.Herald Express. 1942. "Cadet's defense in murder trial." Herald Express (Devon, England), April 28: 1.Hull Daily Mail. 1942. "London murders." Hull Daily Mail, February 11: 1.Imperial War Museum. n.d. Imperial War Museum. https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/the-nation-at-a-standstill-shutdown-in-the-second-world-war.Liverpool Daily Post. 1942. "Another London murder." Liverpool Daily Post, February 14: 1.Storey, Neil. 2023. The Blackout Murders: Homicide in WW2. South Yorkshire, England: Pen and Sword.The Citizen. 1942. "Cadet sent for trial." The Citizen (Gloucester, England), March 27: 1.—. 1942. "'Evidence was overwhelming'." The Citizen (Gloucester, England), June 9: 8.—. 1942. "Fresh Jury to be sworn in." The Citizen (Gloucester, England), April 24: 1.The Times. 1942. "Airman charged with three murders." The Times (London, England), March 13: 2.Venning, Annabel. 2017. "The Blackout Ripper; under cover of the Blitz." Mail on Sunday, January 29. 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 am Ash. And I am Elena. Hey. Hey. Oh, and this is morbid. I was like, you just threw me so far off. I have full-blown COVID brain. I don't know where I am. I don't know what time it is. Yeah, that was very uncomfortable. Yeah, we're doing a couple of batch recordings today and I am losing it. Yeah, I think we'll end on this one. Yeah, that was a very uncomfortable. Yeah, we're doing a couple of batch recordings today and I am losing it. Yeah, I think we'll end on this one. Yeah, that was a crazy one. Yeah, I was like, and hey, let's go. And everybody was like, but what is this? Where are we? What's up? You're like, what are we even recording for? I don't even know what I'm listening to. That threw me off in like a very big way. You know what it was. I got, because obviously today's listener tales and we're so excited. And I get so excited for listener tales that I have it on my screen already the first one. You were in a bullet train just like I wanted to read this. Going. And I know you're reading it, but it's just. I know you're reading it, but it's just. It starts out with what up my little chickadee. And I was like, that's fucking adorable.

I love you. I love this person. I'm ready for this. Today's haunted. Today's haunted house. Really just like giving it away. You just gave it back. You gave the fog back to me.

Let me, back to you. I think we're both in a state of fog because if you really want to reference the last weird little jumble of words that you had, it was really funny. Yeah, it was a real moment. And again, we talked about it in the last listener tale episode, but like Saturn, you know, that's all I can say. Saturn is fucking with me.

Saturn, COVID, seizures. Yeah, all of the above. Oh, my. All of it. So today's listener tale episode, we decided to theme haunted houses. We did. Because we get tons of these. They're really fun.

Why not smush a few of them together and just make it a themey, themey episode? Anything I can theme. Yeah. I'm excited about. I love a theme. Anytime I, my kids' birthday parties. Oh, they go off. The theme.

Oh, they go crazy. They go crazy, as Caleb would say. At Caleb. I miss Caleb a lot. Oh, just fucking, he had like something on his story today. Somebody was like, why are you moving? Because he's like moving closer to us. And he was like, oh, you know, and like said like some reason that wasn't the reason.

I was like, no, no, no. It's for us. It's for to be close to your best friends. It is only for us. Don't lie to the public. So here I am public telling, setting the record straight. She's blowing up his spot. Whatever reason he gave you, false.

It was a farce. He's only moving out out of where he is. because he wants to be closer to us. That's it. That's the story we are going with. That is, that's it. It's not even the story I'm going with. It's just the story.

Caleb would agree. He better. But you know what? Caleb says it goes crazy. And you know what? These tales, they go crazy. I've used it really well the past couple times I said. Really sporadically, as Ty would say.

Just like really, really, no, not sporadically lately. I've been doing it well. Is that right? I've been saying, yeah, you don't say things good. You say them well. But really. quickly. You worked that out. Really, really quickly, because this is just information you need to know, and I'll forget it if I don't say it right now. Oh, no. Okay. No, it's great. Okay. You know TGI Fridays.

I do. I'm aware of that. Thank goodness. It's Friday. The restaurant. We got takeout from them last night, and they have what's called, I think it's called like a potato stacker, so immediately I ordered it. Of course. It is like truffle potato chips with picotagio on top. Uh-huh. And nachos, like cheese. That sounds amazing. It's a nachos, but it's a truffle-tip chipped nachos. And I said, this goes crazy. I was wondering where this was going to lead back.

I was like, I mean, this sounds great. Because like Caleb stays and that's when he comes, so Drew knows all about it. And I was like, Drew, Drew. And he was like, what? And I go, this goes crazy. And he was like, it does. Just a little bit of Caleb everywhere we go. Oh, God, I love those nachos.

I want some now. You would love them. But you know what? We're not talking about nachos today. At least I don't know if we, I haven't read these. So maybe someone mentions the nachos. I don't know. Notches are always a thing. But today we're talking about haunted houses and your tales about them. So my first listener tale is called listener tale, haunted house. Nowhere to eat.

Nowhere to yeat. Nowhere to yeat. Now where to yeat. Must eat everywhere. And it begins by saying, what up my little chickadees? Cute. Obviously, I'm starting out this letter with praise for my favorite podcast. You guys are the shiznet. I drive a lot for my job and I work outside alone a lot. So you two ladies are in my year. than my fam is. I truly love your banter, even though I am a middle-aged white guy. Oh my God, I love you. Oh, wait. Actually, you spend most of your time talking about middle-aged white men, so maybe I enjoy it because you make me feel better about my own life. I mean, I'm fucked up, but not those wackadoos you guys talk about. Anyways, feel free to use the names in this tale as we all have your basic generic Southern epithets. I love it. My name is Brad, by the way.

So say my name, say my name. Are you shitting me right now? I'm disgusted. I'm not related to you. I don't know you. How would Brad say it? Brad would say, say my name, say my name. No, I think Brad would say my name.

Say my name. He's a middle-aged white guy. But he put it in quotations. He did. Well, you said it. You got it. Oh, my God. I'm disowning you.

As always, shorten this if needed. This is where you say you won't. We won't. We won't. And I've enclosed it in a PDF. Please say put a foot. as only you guys can. It makes me smile. Thank you for the put-a-fah. P.S., I just purchased my copy of a little novel someone wrote, and I can't wait until September to read it. Brad, I fucking love you.

I know who that is. It's Elena Urquhart, tiny URL.com slash the butcher in the rent. Plug. Plug. Plug, plug, plug. Brad, you're fucking amazing already. I'm, I'm so into this. Thank you so much. You really are the shiznit. The shiznet. You truly are the shiznet, but you are the shiznit. You are truly the shiznet, my friend. Anyways, my tale begins with the trauma of my parents' divorce when I was eight. Wow, what a way to begin. Oh, what a rough age, too free, because, like, you know what's going on. Yeah, you're aware of a lot. They were constantly fighting at this point, and well, life happens. During their separation, my mom started house shopping. She also decided she needed a show floor corvette at this time, too, but hey, you do you, mom. Mama was having a manic moment, and we've all been there.

She found a house straight out of Scooby-Doo, a house on a hill complete with lightning rod, on the roof, ominous stairs leading to the front door, a creepy old gnarly tree hunched over beside it, beside it. And of course, it had the winding dirt driveway that led up to the top. I want to live there. Are you Brad's mom? Hi. Brad? Hello? I think you might be Brad's mom. Am I your mom? It was built in the 40s, so no chance it was haunted. I don't know. Of course not. It was exciting nonetheless because it was an awesome flat yard to play and in woods behind to roam. A dream come true for an adventurous boy like myself. She was buying it from an art teacher who, coincidentally, looked a lot like the witch from the

Hansel and Gretel book I had. It had two bathrooms, which was something we'd never had before, and we thought that was just fancy. Two bathrooms is fancy. Any bathrooms that are not one bathroom is amazing and so fancy. If you're a couple, you need two bathrooms. Yeah, it's really necessary. Just the way it is.

One bath was downstairs and one upstairs between mine and my little sister's room. She got the bigger room, but I got a walk-in closet with a hidden section big enough for two kids to hide in another closet that ran from one end of the house to the other. That's sick. You win. So we used it as an attic, but we found it odd when we discovered a peephole inside it that looked into my sister's room. Oh, that's a lot. We covered that up immediately. What the fuck? The house was odd to say the least, and it gave off an eerie feeling at times, but it was ours, and we were excited. That is until dad asked, your mom didn't buy the art lady's house, did she? Oh, no. Why, I asked. At first,

he wouldn't say, but he eventually caved into my badgering and explained that it was his, it was his art, excuse me, his teacher's house when he was a boy, and that her husband had hung himself in the stairwell. Oh, gosh. That's right, the stairway I had to climb to go to my room every night. I'm also like, did he tell his eight-year-old that? Like, whoa. And Brad says, I didn't love that. I bet you did. I bet you're in therapy about that these days. Mom immediately went to work, renovating the home. The art lady was a lonely cat lady and had, and had left it in shambles. I'm sure this was a coincidence, but my mom gradually changed.

She became angrier and more volatile the more she worked on the house. I don't know. I don't think that's a coincidence. I don't think so. Perhaps this was from all the long hours of work compounded by the stress of divorce. Perhaps not. She and her boyfriend broke up shortly after we moved in. I hated that guy and was very relieved.

He was gone. But that was when shit started getting really real. It started out small. The light for the stairs would cut on and off on its own. If you were in the basement or alone in the living room, sometimes you felt you were being watched. Mom must have felt that too because she made drapes so thick that you couldn't even see shadows from the outside through them. I love that energy. I remember one night it was storming and the lightning started to intensify.

Lightning was always bad up on the hill. The more the storm intensified, the more the stairlight would flicker on and off. Faster and faster, angrier and angrier it flickered. My mom chalked it up to bad wiring, but I saw the switch physically flipping up and down. Oh, I saw it. There were nights when I would be asleep, and I would wake up to the sound of my bedroom door opening and footsteps coming into my room.

And the sound of the attic door opening and closing as if someone just came in my room and went into the attic. What the fuck? At least they walked by you and just went into the attic. They were like, good night. Oh, the thought of somebody walking by you as you're sleeping, though? I don't love it. I'm just trying to make you feel better, but I don't love it.

They have to walk back by you on the way out. They do. They got to leave. I hate it. One particular night, remember I crawled into bed and a few seconds later I heard the bathtub faucet cut on full blast. By this time, I'd become terrified of the happenings and was frozen in my bed afraid to move. My younger sister, however, could not have given two shits. Her little badass just walked right into the bathroom, switched off the light that had come on and turned off the water with an

aggravated sigh. I love it. That's Elena too. I love your little sister. She then just stormed back off to bed, irritated but not afraid of the whole situation. I gained a whole new responsibility. I gained a whole new respect for my baby sister that night. Yeah, she's kind of an icon. She is. She reminds me of Erica from Stranger Things. I haven't started yet. I'm sorry. Start it. Okay. So perhaps the most terrifying thing that happened when we lived there was something that I am not even sure was paranormal or not. I was in my room, like most nights doing my homework, FYI, playing with my baseball cards, and jamming out to sweet tunes from most likely Nirvana or perhaps I was being down with OPP. Yeah, you know me. I don't.

You know that's how that was said. You know that. I don't know what Down with OPP is. Oh my God, I thought you were kidding. No. I thought you were making it. Okay. I got to go.

What is down with OPP? It's a sign that I'm not going to sing it. Do it. Sing it. Do it. Sing it. Just do it. So I played it for Ash.

I know that song. Sorry. Because I really thought you were just making fun of me and then I was like, wait, you don't know that song. No, I'm not always. making fun of you most of the time, but also, please don't shit on my life. I really did know that song. Yeah. So I won't see it actually because I'm not on social media. There you go. So go right ahead. I looked downstairs. So I decided to go downstairs to get a drink. Jamming out works up a thirst. It does. It does. It does, Brett. Helena just worked up a thirst. I did. As I stepped out of my room,

I looked downstairs to see my mom and my sister pushing against the front door. The fuck. I made eye contact with mom and saw nothing but sheer terror in her. face. Oh my God. She screamed out, help, he's trying to get in. Oh, fuck. Oh, I just got full chills. I just got fully panicked like this is happening to us right now. My body just did that thing that you always talk about where it went, whom. Yeah, it did it. Like, doesn't that make sense to you now? It like radiates. Yeah. No, it warms. It warms. Excuse me. So I bounded down the stairs and slammed into the door with all my weight and the force of the downhill motion the stairs provided. As I did, I found the immense pressure being applied from the other side of the door. It staggered me, but I felt the door latch. At that moment, I'd lock to the

deadbolt. Mom ran to get the pistol she kept in her nightstand. As she did, I looked out the window. There was no one outside. No one on the stoop, no one on the sidewalk, and no one in the driveway. As I stated earlier, the driveway winds around to the hill, which is the backyard. I ran to the back door to make sure it was locked, and the man wasn't lurking around trying to find another way in. I rushed through the house as fast as I could, glancing out the windows as I passed, looking for a silhouette and hoping not to find one. I'm terrified. I made it to the back door to record in record time and latch the deadbolt. I looked through the peephole, nothing, flipped on the backyard light and looked out the window next to the door. Nope, no one there.

Just the thought of like having to do all of that? No. I wandered back through the house, this time at a slow but purposeful pace, searching through each window, nothing. I thought to myself, was it possible for someone to disappear out of the yard that quickly? I didn't think so. That was when mom realized she had left her purse and keys in the car in the backyard. Oh, no. She wrapped, she grabbed a wrench or something heavy, I can't remember what, and slowly went out the back door. She had handed me the revolver and told me that if anyone came out of the darkness to shoot.

Now, I was very proficient with rifles and bows and arrows, but I'd never even held a handgun before. I resisted the idea at first, but she insisted. She trusted me to be brave. How could I let her down? Oh my God, Brad. I love you. I prayed no one would appear. And then I prayed if they did, I wouldn't miss.

This was just, if not more, terrifying than someone trying to break into our home. Mom finally made it to the car. She grabbed her bag and keys and sprinted back into the house. My sister slammed the door shut and locked it as soon as mom crossed the threshold. That is hard to say. Crossed the threshold. There we go. I stood there relieved and all of a sudden drained of energy.

We all slept to get. that night, puddled in mom's bed, with every door and window locked and every draped, closed tight. It never happened again. Well, that never happened again, but other things continued to. That's a terrifying one. My mom got married, and we moved out of the house and into her new husband's home. Everything was good. They bought a property with a pond, with a beautiful wooded, with a beautiful wooded area, and planned to build a house there. To make this dream a reality, they sold his home, and we moved back into the psycho house. Why? That's what my first wife named it. More on that later. And he means psycho house like the movie. Yeah, yeah.

Like psycho. Almost immediately after moving back into the home, they started to fight relentlessly. Within a year, they were divorced. Shortly after that, my mom took a job and moved three hours away. She immediately found a renter for the psycho house, and he moved in. Four months later, he moved out abruptly. Yeah, I bet he did. This worked out great for me because I was now 17 years old. I lived with my dad, but mom cut me a deal. As long as I never missed school, work, or church, I could stay at the house on Friday and Saturday nights. There was one more rule. No girls.

Quick side note, there were lots of girls. Yeah. I was going to say, get it, Brad. Bradley. Brad. That might not even be your name, but it is now. But it is now. No, it just works with that.

Bradley. I needed two syllables. My dad would do check-ins to, quote, keep us honest, as he always said. We had a strategy, however, that always worked. We would let him in the back door, and the girl would go, we would let him in the back door and the girl would go up the stairs at the front of the house and hide in the closet inside the secret two-person cubbyhole. Look at you, Brad. Once, I had a- like hiding from people's parents. Did you ever ever in that situation? No.

I didn't even have to think about it. Just as like, no. I literally never. I once got kicked out of a boy's house. Wow. Yeah, I didn't do anything wrong. His mom just didn't know that we were there and she'd like, get the fuck out of my house. Oh, you know, we did hide. There was one parent, hiding time. You had to have one. It was, I was, I was. I was, I was. I was, I was, I was. I was, Lindsay's house actually and there was we had like people over for New Year's Eve and then somehow it turned into what every teen movie in the 90s and early aughts got happened where it was like they invited a couple of people over and then somebody tells the whole school and they show up that's what happened to us one time and we felt like the coolest people alive we did not

because we were freaking out being like wow her parents are going to dinner like they were coming back in like a couple hours so it was a lot yeah that is a lot but wait but like you who'd you hide from uh we had to hide people oh okay yeah so I'm I didn't technically hide. It's not as like sassy, though. Yeah, I wasn't very sassy when I was like RPGing Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So you were warping. I was warping.

So, yeah, I just wasn't in that vibe, I guess. Okay. Now, once I had a girl I really liked over, we will call her pookie. No. If you really like her, do not call her pokey. I love this. That's adorable. And the plan was to stay the night after my friends left.

Oh, Bradley. Bradley. Look at you. My dad picked this night to do his checkup. One of my friends Greg and I let him in the back door as my other friend Dave showed Pookie the hiding place. My dad did his inspection. After he finished, finding nothing, of course, we went up to get Pookie. She was gone.

That's right. Gone. What? We went back down the stairs, all three of us very confused and found her hiding behind the love seat in the corner. She was curled in a ball trembling. Pookie! What's wrong with Pookie? Greg asked her, how did you get back there?

I looked at Dave who had showed her the hidden space, and he looked as confused as I was. Both our mouths agape and with wonder. She said, I don't know, in a very weak and quivering voice. What? We helped her up from behind the couch. This is terrifying. She was ice cold and pale as a ghost. Now, keep in mind, my dad had done his usual very thorough inspection.

There was no way he would have missed her behind the love seat. I mean, all three of us had spotted her as we walked down. the hallway. She could not have been behind there while my dad was there. Not to mention that none of us saw her as we followed Dad around or when we walked up the steps to retrieve her. It just wasn't possible. After a few moments passed, once she was no longer shaking, she demanded to be taken home immediately. Oh my gosh. The entire drive to her house, about 30 to 40 minutes, she remained dead silent. All three of us tried to inquire about what happened, but she just sat there staring out the windshield. When that didn't work, Dave, who was always the comedian of the bunch, tried to

change the subject and make everybody laugh. She finally broke her stare and managed to half smile. Good for you, Dave. I know. Go, Dave. We went out a few more times and remained friends after that, but she refused to ever discuss the happenings and absolutely would not entertain returning to the house. So we don't even know what happened? So we don't even know what happened. Pookie. Come on. Like, how did she, like, did she teleport? Yeah, you get Pookie, you got to explain. Let's get Pookie on the, on the horn here. We gotta know. Pookie, you got some splining to do. I started dating my future wife late that spring. Adorable.

I was a senior. She was a sophomore. Fucking adorable. Right. It was high school sweetheart love. We fell fast and hard. And that summer we used the psycho house a lot. When I left for college, Bradley.

When I left for college, we threw a massive party there and everything went off without a hitch. That was what I thought would be the end of the story for me in the psycho house. I went away to college and my mom started renting out the house to a family. I decided to drop out of college, came home and proposed to Sarah, my high school, sweetheart and now fiance. Oh my god, so cute. We would marry a little over a year later. Congrats. A few months later, my mom called and explained her renters were leaving in the house, and the house would be free next month if we were interested in buying. We jumped on the deal as it was quite an upgrade from our one-room basement apartment in which we had to share a bathroom. I mean, I get it.

I totally get that. When I asked why the renters were leaving before their lease was up, mom said, they wouldn't say. They just had to leave as soon as possible. I'd be like, Mom, you know why they had to leave. You know, Mom. We moved in, except. I was excited to have a place of our own and quickly went to work remodeling. Uh-oh. I know. That's where he went wrong, Bradley. That's when they come out.

We painted, put new flooring in the kitchen, completely reconstructed the main bath, and built a laundry room. I hung my punching bag in the basement. I thought it would be a nice, cool place to work out. We had a guest room upstairs in what used to be my sister's room, and my room was now a gaming room. We were very proud of our little home. It sounds great.

I feel like it sounds awesome. I worked a lot of nights, and Sarah worked nine to five every day. That left Sarah at home. alone three or four nights a week until I got home around 1130. That also meant there were times that I was alone as well. It didn't take long before we remembered why we nicknamed it the Psycho House. Sarah got to where she refused to be there alone at night. Her sister, brother, or cousin would always come up and stay the night when I had to work late. Sometimes when I came home, they would all be huddled up terrified because of the happenings. That's what they called it. No one ever wanted

to go sleep upstairs. They would rather sleep on the couch than in the guest room. Once I came home and she had moved a hutch in front of the basement door. She told me either that the hutch stayed put or she left. I thought she was being foolish until the happenings started happening to me. The basement was split up into two rooms. One room I had my punching bag and workout gear. The other room was used as storage and canned foods. Both rooms had crawl space doors that led under the house.

The stairs and the door to the outside were in the canning room. I was hitting the bag and working out in the basement. and had the feeling that someone was watching me. You always had that feeling down there. I blamed it on poor wiring, as I read somewhere that electrical currents could give you a sense of paranormal. Paranoia. No, paranormal is probably a ferdinian slips.

All of a sudden, the lights went out. It's a basement, so it was pitch black, except for what little light escaped through the crack of the basement door at the top of the stairs. I'm stressed out for you. I'm so stressed. I had to make my way back to the stairs and hope that there was enough light from the stair door

to see my way to the outside door. Remember, there's a hutch blocking the upstairs door now. I love that you did leave it there. I figured somehow we had tripped a breaker or something, although I wasn't sure how since I was the only one home. I was still on the side of logic and trying to find my way out when I heard it. That's right. I heard the happenings.

But it was like a low, guttural growl. It was as if a large wolf were in my basement. Leave. I had no bearings as to where I was and no idea. where the growl was coming from. Oh, I'm warm. I'm warm. At once, both rooms produced a slamming sound.

I wasn't sure what this was, but it sounded like wood slapping concrete. Oh, my God. I don't have a single hair on my body right now. That is not standing. Save left. I made it to the stairs. I could not see the outside door, but I had my bearings now. And from the steps knew approximately where the outside door was.

The slamming sounds grew louder. and the growl, the growl now sounded like it was behind me on the steps. Oh my God. I yeeded my ass towards where I thought the door was. Yeah, you did, bro. I slammed into the door, finding the handle immediately. Of course, in my panic, like every cliche scary movie, I could not get the door to open without several twists, turns, and jerks.

It was like someone outside force had made me forget how to use a stupid door handle. Finally, in a tug of desperation, the door flung open and daylight flooded into the door. doorways as I ran outside. I leapt up the outside steps and fell into the grass of the front yard. My heart pounding. What in the living hell just happened? After I calmed down, I had to figure that very question out. I wasn't a little boy anymore and I was not going to be scared out of my own home. At least that's what I told myself to keep from running like a scared little girl. There had to be a logical reason. I grabbed my flashlight, a crowbar and a baseball and a baseball and I headed down back to, I live, a baseball, not a baseball bat.

I feel like maybe you probably forgot to put back. I hope it was a baseball, to be honest. It's like when Pat just went downstairs with a couple of water. During the whole, I got to tell this like quick little side note, which I feel like we've probably told before, but it's bare. Yeah, Deb Dead Dead. Sheared her listener tale about this. Yeah, we just say, we got to repeat it.

During the Boston Marathon bombings, my Deb, Deb, who chooses all these, was right in the thick of that whole manhunt. She was in the same neighborhood. She was, they found him, like, only a few doors down from where she lived. It was mayhem. So they were on lockdown. There were SWAT team members, like, busting into their house. And so there were gunshots, like, going through people's windows and shit.

It was wild. And at one point, her husband went downstairs and, like, met, and I think because they, like, heard something. Yeah, and they heard something. They thought it was, like, you know, maybe he broke in. Nobody knew where he was. Like, he could have been. in an anyone's basement. He was hiding in someone's boat. That's where they found him.

So he heard something. So he went downstairs and what he chose to use as his weapon of choice was a tepid glass of water. But to be fair, he did have a good plan to throw it in the guy's face, which probably would have thrown him off for like a minute. But it wasn't cold, it wasn't hot, it was just tepid. Like it was one of those things that you would just

been like, ooh, if it happened to you. Like it wouldn't even start. You'd be like, well, that's lukewarm. I don't know what to do with that. It's not even like a bucket either. No, just a glass of water. Just got and Deb never, we'll never forget it. How could you ever let him love that down? It's so good. I love them. So yeah, that's, that you had a baseball. I headed back down the stairs peering into the darkness as I eased my way down. I used the crowbar to wedge the door open for better light, aka a quick exit if needed, flicked on the flashlight and made my way to the breaker box with ball bat in my right hand. Are you all right, Brad? With ball bat in my right hand, slightly raised above my head. First, it was a baseball.

Now it's a ball bat. I opened the breaker box and checked all the switches. Nothing had been tripped. I went back outside and into the house to retrieve some bulbs, thinking that maybe all the light bulbs had just somehow all went out simultaneously. Of course, that happens. Yeah. I went back down the steps to the basement entrance and all the lights were now magically back on.

Whoever this is is having so much fun. Having a blast. It was like nothing had a blast. ever happened. Leaving the door wedged open, I went back inside the basement, flashlight and bats still in tow. It's a bat now. What could have made the growling noise? That's what I was concerned about, Bradley. I was like, I know we're looking for breakers and shit for the lights, but like what I'm concerned about is that wolf that was in the basement with you. What if it was a raccoon? I saw a tic-tok the other night of a raccoon that broke into this woman's house,

and it was the scariest thing I've ever seen my life. Did it sound like a wolf? No. Okay. You're like, so maybe it was a raccoon. But they make, they kind of like screeing. I think. They do. I need to know what this wolf is. What could have made the growling noise? Was I going mad? Where did the slamming sounds come from? I looked up the stairs that led to the inside of the house where I had heard the growling. Nothing. I looked around the basement floor looking for something wooden or something that could have made the loud bangs. Nothing. I was about to abort the mission when I gazed around the room one last time. I spotted the crawl space doors. I went over, lifted one door up and peeked into the darkness. I started to reach for the flashlight and shine it

underneath the house when all of a sudden, I felt the gaze upon me once again. I stepped back quickly, yanking my head out of the darkness and letting the door fall shut. This is when I heard it, the slamming sound. It was the crawl space doors that had made the noise moments ago. I figured that out, but how? What could have made both crawl space doors in different rooms slam repeatedly and simultaneously? A poltergeist. Yeah, a wolf that is in your fucking basement. Not tempting fate any longer. I walk back to the exit. Unwedge the crowbar, flipped off the lights, and closed the door shut. Purposely taking my time to show whatever it was that caused the happening to occur, that I was not afraid. I was truly terrified. I never worked out in the basement again. Good for you,

blame you. Shortly after that, winter came upon us in a very sudden way, as it does here in the mountains. That was when some of your great writer, Brad, by the way. You are. That was when some of our old copper pipes. Copper pipes. Some of our old copper pipes. started leaking, mostly in the basement. It really wasn't a problem, though, until we sprung a leak underneath the house. I'd mostly forgotten the happenings in the basement by this time and grab my tools in flashlight and headed to the basement determined to fix the problem. That's what I am, a problem solver after all.

Okay, weird that we picked this tale today because that exact thing is currently happening at my house. That is really weird. Not the growling. No. The crawl space doors are about six inches from the basement floor. So I had to position a lot, or six feet, that's six feet. Nope, six inches. Is that an inch?

Foot. Foot. Feet, right? Yeah, because the two comes after. Right? The two comma and the A are. It's feet. I don't know what's happening.

Yeah. Because the one is a foot. Yeah, we got it. So the crawl space doors are about six feet from the basement floor. So I had to position a ladder underneath the door. That would have given me a good hint. Yeah. Climb up and crawl underneath the house.

It was dark. so dark I could not see my hand in front of my face. I flipped on the flashlight, a light that moments ago seemed more than sufficient, now seemed to only illuminate what was just a few feet in front of me. I don't want to know, but I do. I really do. The space was tight, and the closer I crawled towards the leak, the more the space and the darkness closed in around me.

Once I made it to within about four feet of the leak, I had to roll onto my back and inch my way up, no, until I was almost directly underneath the pipe. My face was now just three inches from the floor, joyce to the house. No, no. Bye. I positioned the light towards the pipe. The space was so tight now with the light pointing upward that I could only see the pipe in my hands. Nothing else. I'm getting very like breathless here. I'm getting claustrophobic. Brad, what are you doing? I set mine to fixing the leak. Linky's like, I'm going to fix this fucking leak. In these situations, I get hyper-fixated

on the task at hand. So I wasn't thinking of anything else except find the pinhole leak, cut the pipe, add a coupling, and piece the pipe back together. That's the job. I was in the middle of attaching the coupling when it started again. I could feel it. The happenings. Something was under there with me. I knew it. There was nowhere to go. Nowhere to eat this time. I told myself I had to focus. There was the name. I love when the name appears in a movie. There it is. It's in the tail. Now where to eat. I told myself I had to focus on the task at hand. Get it finished and then worry about getting the hell out of here. Coupling is on. Good. Now glue. it and piece the pipe back together. This time I heard something. What was it? Perhaps a groundhog or a

raccoon? A raccoon. Makes an appearance. That had made this space. It's home. Not the time to figure that out. I got the pipe back together. Good enough, Brad. Now get your ass out of Satan's hideout. I grabbed the flashlight and moved it around in a scanning motion with what little room I had. I couldn't see anything, but oh boy, I could feel it. That was when the growl happened again. And I could hear something scurrying towards me. I had to get the... hell out of here now. I wiggle down far enough to where I could roll over onto my stomach. It's coming. I spin around to face the crawl space door and start army crawling my way toward it as quickly as possible. The growls are getting louder. It is really close now. It feels like at any moment something is

going to grab my feet or sink its teeth into my leg. Jesus. I am almost to the door of the crawl when it falls shut. No. Unfortunate timing to say the least. No time to push it back up and latch it open. It is coming. I spin around and kick it open, using my legs to search for the ladder. In doing this, I've exposed my face to whatever it is underneath the house with me. I scan my flashlight back and forth, just waiting for something to lunge out of the darkness and drag me back in. Where's the ladder? I don't know, Brad. My feet cannot find it. I'm sorry. My patience and nerves are no longer wait, they no longer wait for my feet to find what now appears to be missing. I take a deep breath and using my arms, propel myself out of the crawl space and onto the basement floor. I could have sworn

just as I hurled my body through the opening as the flashlight shined up towards the bottom of the house and just before gravity slammed the door behind it, in that split second, I saw a toothy grin and slanted black, blank reflecting eyes. I hit hard, jarring every bone in my body onto the unforgiving concrete floor. Not wasting any time, I jumped right back up and locked the crawl space door. I was not about to look to see if that what I thought I saw was real or just my imagination. Standing there, leaning against the door and the wall, I slouched and hug my head. I needed a moment to collect myself. I need a moment to collect myself.

As do I, Brett. What just happened? Was that real? Am I going crazy? No, I'm not crazy. Did I get all my tools? What caused the... I love that.

Did I get all my tools? What caused the crawl door to close? Why couldn't I find the ladder? I gasped. The ladder. Where the hell was the ladder? It's gone. I had positioned the ladder underneath.

the crawl door and used it to get up and underneath the house. It should have been right where I was now standing. I surveyed the room from right to left, corner to corner, and there it was, folded and leaned up in the corner on the opposite side of the room. The fuck up. Nice of them to fold it. But how? How did it go from opened underneath the crawl space to closed and leaning against the opposite wall 15 feet away? I never figured this out. Luckily, that was the last leak we encountered while we were there. Damn. There was one other major occurrence while we were in. Curran. An other occurrence. Today we have an occurrence to talk about.

There was one other major occurrence while we were in the home. It was for me the most unexplainable and at the moment most frightening. Sarah and I were trying to have our first child and not having any luck. We had tried for months but to no avail. I totally feel you, Brad. That's really hard. She was all right with it until her mom and her friend of me both became pregnant around the same time. That's always how it happens to.

Like trust me, it just, that's how it happens. I remember that happening. you she was uh so neither one of them were trying and this really upset her we began to fight and bicker like it seemed all the previous couples did that resided there before us we were still trying to have a baby and perhaps the stress was getting to us we were fighting pretty consistently and it was getting bad then something unexplainable happened now before i begin to explain let me first describe the layout of our bedroom if you entered from the living room the right side of the room had three windows end to end with the same heavy curtains my mom had made 13 years prior still hung in their place.

The wall straight ahead had two windows in a closet. If you looked left, there was a bed in the corner of the room and a door leading into the dining area beside it. The room was small, therefore the bed had to sit directly against the wall, of which the other side of the wall was the dreaded stairway where the man had hung himself. And the footboard of the bed stopped directly against the living room door. It was the only way you could fit a queen-sized bed and still be able to open the door. This left about eight inches from the side of the bed to the door's hinges. I had built us a small nightstand that fit between the two to put our alarm clock. Yes, this was before smartphones, and we had one of those old late 80s alarm clocks like everyone's parents had back in the

day. Fun fact, I still have one of those. Love that. Sarah did not like to sleep in the corner, because whomever did, inevitably ended up between the mattress and the wall. That meant I had the pleasure of the mattress wall, a cold wall wedge. This particular night, we had spent some quality tickle time together. Brad, never again. Brad, don't ever say that. You know what, though, Brad, never change. Never change. But don't say that again. Quality tickle time together. And both of us had passed out asleep. It's the tickle for me. Oh, um, uh, fucking tickle you internally. Yeah, a ghost lyric, there you go. This is all connecting. Thanks for pointing out. We're all feeling that. I was going to say, I need that.

to make everybody know that. I'm sure people know that. But you know what, Brad, we're in it. We're in it together. You're in it with ghost. We're all together. Yeah. So they passed out very happily. Suddenly I was startled awake. Very happily. This is something that used to never happen as I was a very heavy sleeper. I looked up and saw a light at the foot of the bed. I thought to myself, it was an intruder. So I yelled, who are you? As I quickly pride myself out of the aforementioned at Wedge. Amazing that you were like, intruder. What's their name? Who are you? State your name. Oh, my God. I was going to say state your business here. Both, please. So he's stating, who are you? The light was the size of a flashlight, but a much dimmer glow,

as if the moon had shrunken to the size of a four inch diameter and was now floating around my bed. You are just glorious. Wow. Brad. I'm sorry I yelled at you. It's okay. I answered for Brad, because we're really close now. So I feel like I can do that. And I'm not. I mean, you yelled at him. So he's a crowd. It's okay, but you're going to have to work your way back into his good graces. Okay. Right, Brad? Okay. It's actually Bradley. You don't know that. All right.

As I scrambled out of Lucifer's Wall Wedgie, that is when I noticed, cute. That is when I noticed there was no one on the other end of this light. It was just floating in the air. This frightened to me as I was expecting to fight someone. But how do you fight a tiny moon? With a one-two punch. What a question for the ages. How do you fight a tiny moon?

How to fight a tiny moon? for dummies. Bye, Brad. How do you find a tiny moon? Again, I had nowhere to eat. Helplessness and fear washed over me like a case of anxiety and dread filled my heart. I scurried back against the headboard, but my wife lay unaware between me and this thing. I mustered up the courage to repeat my first question. Who are you? I'm just waiting for Sarah to wake up and be like, are you good? What is happening? Who are you talking to? Or for the light to just be like, a tiny moon, bitch. I am the light.

If it's a light, could it be bad? I don't know. I mean, it's definitely bad. Maybe it's like fucking with you by pretending to be a light. Having a good time. It's just here for a good time, not a long time.

This time my voice was not its normal baritone self, a voice that is quite intimidating when I needed to be. Instead, it sounded weak like a small child. No answer was returned. Instead, the light just gracefully

floated around the foot of the bed, and now was just diagonally across from me at Sarah's knees. I'd be like get away from my girl, light. What do you want from us? I asked. This time my voice was still quivering and childlike, but with less fear in it. Sarah still laid asleep and dead to the happenings, just a mere two feet from her. Again, no answer.

All of a sudden, I was no longer afraid, but pissed off. How was this thing going to come into my bedroom and terrify me? Just who or what did it think it was? This was my family, my home, my bed, not today, Satan. Yes, Brad. Leave us alone. Get out of here, I yelled. This time with the man base full in effect, and I felt like myself again.

And Sarah's like, all right. And Sarah's like, God, get out of here. Who's us? Damn. The light, or whatever it was, just floated back the way it came and into the living room. The anger I had was immediately replaced with relief. And again, I felt helpless. I reached over and shook Sarah awake.

I had to share this experience with someone. And how in the world did she sleep through the man versus ghost showdown? I know. My question. Right? She awoke with a grumble and I explained what had just taken place. Still half asleep, she merely nodded her head, snuggled up against me and promptly went back to sleep. I love Sarah's energy. Sarah's the best. I laid there the rest of the night on edge and on the lookout for more tomfoolery.

I had never believed in orbs. I always thought that there may be a poltergeist or a perience. Never heard of that. Did I say that right? I don't know. Apparians, but not floating lights. Those were just dust particles and people. Well, people were full of crap. I spent, I agree. with that. I spent the next couple of weeks trying to make sense of what happened. I kept trying to explain it away with a solution of how it could have happened. Countless times I attempted to recreate the light with vehicles passing by the road or coming up the driveway, flashlights from the yard, etc. Nothing could explain it. That was it, however. No more happenings after that. Three weeks later, we discovered that we were having our very own little diaper filler.

Amazing. Nine months later, Ethan Bradley Bowman was born. Congratulations. Congratulations. I love that is such a strong name. And it is Bradley. We were right. We were right. We knew you. We knew you, Bradley. We knew you.

We see you and we know you. So Ethan Bradley Bowman was born and four months after that I received a life-changing career move. Oh my goodness. So I think that light may have been a good thing. I think it was like near her knees. I think it was being like, there's going to be a maybe. Like maybe it was being like, don't worry. It's happening.

Sometimes that will happen. Like it could be like, um, like it could be like, like a family member or something. And now was three weeks later they discovered they were having a baby. So she was pregnant. Yeah. That's wild. Wow. Oh, congrats you guys. As soon as the funds started rolling in, we moved out of the place, never looking back. Four years later, and we had our second diaper dandy. I wish I could tell you this had a happy ending, but it doesn't. No. We parted ways on the week of our 15-year anniversary.

It's all good, though. Now back to the Psycho House. Oh, Bradley. Now back to the, I need a minute. Okay. This is a real roller coaster, Bradley. God, I'm so sorry. Oh, you know, Bradley? Fifteen years? Man. Just bye? Oh, okay.

Sorry. My sister Misty bought that place, married and moved in. Why are you all moving into this house? You got to stop. Oh, shit. I just read the next sentence. Two years later, she was divorced. Her husband started using drugs and went loopy.

Oh, no. After he had left, she also had a strange encounter during a snowstorm. What? It was pouring snow, and she had the wood stove going full blast to stay warm. All of a sudden, the door to the wood stove flung open. Fire started spewing in and out of the stove and smoke started to fill the room. Oh, my God. She was sitting across the room in a rocking chair when this happened.

She was rocking her baby son back and forth, but had to move quickly. Showing no fear. That's right. She's still a badass. I forgot this is your little sister. Fuck, yeah. She laid her son down, grabbed the stove poker, and used it to slam the stove door shut. She pried the poker against the door so it wouldn't happen again and told the ghost to cut it out.

I love that she is like, misty. She has never given this ghost the time of day. Never, and she never will. She moved out of that house shortly after that and back in with my mom. She rented it out the next 20 years. People were constantly moving in and out of that house. She finally rented it out to a construction company as they worked on a highway nearby. It was an all-male crew and they had no issues in the home.

Interesting. After they left, another young couple moved in with their two toddlers. They lived there for about four years. One month, Misty did not receive their rent payment. They always paid on time so she knew something must be wrong. She could not reach them via phone so she asked Mom to stop by and see if everything is okay. Mom went by and told Misty that no one was there. It was clear that no one had lived there and it was very apparent they had left abruptly.

Eventually, Misty was able to get a hold of the husband via his cell phone. He did not go into detail. He only said that they just had to get out of there. They paid Misty the final month's rent, but they would not go back. into that home or say why. I want to know why nobody will say why. That's the thing. Just talk. Just tell me. She explained to them that they had left a lot of their stuff in the house and they needed to clean up or they would lose their deposit. They told her they would rather let her keep the deposit than go back inside that home. Oh my gosh. After that last summer, she decided to sell Psycho House. I returned one last time to help her get it

ready for market. I went down into the basement on spider duty and stopped to look at those crawl space doors, the ones that had slammed open and shut when I was 22 years old. I stood there for several moments waiting for one of them to start slamming up and down. I expected it to happen at any second. Nothing. No feelings of being watched, dread or anxiety. The only thing I felt was old and left wondering how in the world did my fat ass ever fit through those things. Bradley.

Life comes out of fast. It does. The market was at its peak and she sold the house in less than two weeks. The people started painting the outside of the house. of the home and a month later it was on the market again. It again sold quickly. The new owners took a loss on it for no apparent reason. One last thing. I asked my sister to read this and make sure it was okay to share her side of it. This is when she told me that as a girl, she used to talk to the man who had hung himself. She said he always, just one last thing. Yeah, just a side. Yeah. He said,

she said he always appeared to her as an older father figure. She used to ask him to protect us because her dad wasn't there to do so. She said he always seemed friendly to her, but that she asked him to stop fooling around because he scared mom. He seemed perfectly safe, but perhaps there was something else in the home as well. My entire body just warmed so hard. It did. So that's the end of this listener tale. Thank you for reading it. And I hope it wasn't too long. And I hope I was able to portray it in a manner that makes sense and wasn't boring. That is the least of what it was. Yeah, Brad. I'm so bored. I have never felt compelled to to write anything before now. Your podcast has inspired me. My sister and I have always shared this

between ourselves and I wanted to share it with you guys because you guys feel like friends at this point. I mean, at this point, we're like B. Bradley's. We're in it to win it together. You are how I start by Mondays to help me start the week with a smile. Thank you again for your hilarious banter. Hope you have a good week and hope you keep it weird. Take it away, Ash. Oh, this is like a paragraph. He gave you one. Oh, all right. Keep it so weird that you talk to your friendly ghost out, but not so weird that you repeatedly move into a house that you know will scare the bejesus out of you. Keep it so weird that you have a friend named Pooke, but not so weird that you find yourself under a haunted house with Lucifer's house. And finally, keep it so weird that you aren't afraid to start a new life, buy a new house, a new sports card, take on the world alone, but so weird that you find yourself having to hand a gun to a small child to protect you from the demon intruder to a small child to protect you. did. You basically did. It was worth it. Like, I love you guys, but nothing can follow that. I think that's like, that's it. That's the show. Bradley. That was Brad's show and we were all just watching it. It's

Brad's world. We're just living in it here. I knew you were going to say that. And I, I, I'm so glad you did. I'm for that. That was, that was like John Allen level. It was. That was a John Allen tale. Literally. Brad. Damn. Our listeners are so fucking talented. Seriously, because that's the thing, like, honestly, all of you are, like, such talented writers whenever. Like, I just find it so interesting, especially when I'm not the one reading, like, listening to you read it.

I'm just, like, sitting there, like, looking off in the distance sometimes, just, like, picturing what these people write. Oh, yeah, I pictured every single part of that. Like, I was the entire time. The entire time I was in that house. I see the, I see your punching bag. I saw those crawl space doors. I saw the ladder all the way across the room.

every single thing. And I, all I can picture is the intro to this, the like, OG Scooby-Doo. Oh, yeah. So good. Oh. That, I don't, you can't top that in the listener episode. No, that's, you just got a whole episode and you fucking deserved it. We're going to start a new next time. Yeah, we are. And guess what? Now we have like a ton of other haunted house episodes to read, which we literally just name this like, oh my God, we have to name this like Bradson. tale. And surprise Brad. Yeah, we're going to surprise Brad. Let's do it. Surprise. Surprise, Brad. It's all about you. Well, we hope everybody keeps listening and we hope Brad writes us another tale sometime soon. And we hope you keep it weird. I already told you exactly how weird you're not supposed to keep it.

Brad told you. Fuck. Damn. Psycho house. I thought you were going to swear again. Fuck. Damn.