Alcatraz: Island Of Evil Spirits
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Whether thou art a ghost that hath come from the earth, or a phantom of night that hath no hollow, or one that lieth dead in the desert, or a ghost unburied, or a demon, or a ghoul, whatever thou be until thou art removed, thou shalt find here no water to drink. Thou shalt not stretch forth thy hand to our own. Into our house enter thou not. Through our fence break through thou not.

We are protected, though we may be frightened. Our life you may not steal, though we may be scared to death. Welcome to Scared to Death, Creeps, Peepers, Roberts, and Annabelles. I'm Dan. Hello, Dan. I'm Lindsay. Hello, Lindsay. Hello, sir. October is over, but we are still here bringing the spooks all year long because every season should be horror season. I think you mean to say bring in the spooks.

And speaking of spoops, quick thank you to everyone who watched True Tales of Hallow's Eve 4 in New Orleans. Hopefully a few tech glitches and kind of funny looking back. Disgruntledformermoment.co intern who was able to hack into the comment section for a few minutes was not too distracting and hopefully the hacking part was entertaining. Yeah, I hope you guys love that because when we found out about it later, we were laughing so hard. Yeah.

We learned a lot about how you do an event like that remotely, and yeah, hope you had fun like we did. Yeah, and a big thanks to our friend and producer, Jamie Jean. He was supposed to be on vacation down there with us, just hanging out, and then we forced him into work. So big thanks to Jamie and his wife, Amy, for sacrificing a night with her husband so that we could do some fun work. And Kevin at Beaucoup. Yep, I had to think about it because it's written all French-style.

And now a very important announcement before we get into the stories. The winner of Dictionary.com's 2024 Haunting Hooks Scary Monster Edition Horror Writing Contest, none other than scared to death listener Hannah Martin. Woohoo! Congratulations, Hannah! Yeah, congrats, Hannah. Hannah will receive a $100 Amazon gift card, some scared to death swag, and some Dictionary.com swag. Oh yeah. And we will read her 50 words or less intro to a monster tale right now.

Uh, you know what? I'm going to give this little button, button for it. Make it, make it sound a little spookier. Do it. She walked down the familiar path into the woods. The cooing owls were her only friends tonight, but the beast would scare them away soon. The path in front of her had been paved by the girls who came before. She was not the first and wouldn't be the last.

Nice. Exactly 50 words. Exactly 50 words. Hannah, well done. Yeah, not a single word wasted. So hard to paint a scene like that in so few words. Yeah, well done. And also, this is so cool. The Fans Choice winner, another scared to death listener. Love it. Longtime bad magician, Greg Hawk. Greg, congrats. And Greg wrote, I woke up drunk. Again, nothing new.

facing a world-class hangover. Nothing new. The unmoving female form beside me was new. The wet coppery smell of fresh blood, that was new. Then there was the hooded figure looming in the corner. That was definitely new.

And that was a little less than 50 words, right? 45. 45. Yeah, congrats to Greg as well. He won a $50 Amazon gift card, some Scared to Death swag, and also some dictionary.com swag. And we had no idea who wrote what when we picked Hannah's entry.

very proud of our listeners. Other Scared to Death listeners made it to the final round of the contest, so congrats to you all. Yeah, what a fun contest and big thanks to the folks over at Dictionary.com for partnering with us, reaching out, asking us to do this, and you know, we're

We know that, you know, many podcasts have ads now. We're so lucky to partner with such an amazing company with Midroll, Sirius, XM, Stitcher, and they actually brought us this opportunity. So, you guys, it's like it goes to show that having a great engaged audience is really important in ways other than just

ads and just, you know, I mean, we get to do cool stuff like this. So when you click those sponsor links, you're doing more than just supporting the show in the way that you think. You make opportunities like this possible for us. Yep, absolutely. And I hope this was a good confidence booster for both Hannah and Greg. I know they sent us some excited emails and they're both very happy.

Yeah, so cool. So cool. And it was just so fun that like blindly, it just happened to be our blind picks. Yeah, because there was plenty of submissions from non-Scare to Death listeners. Yeah, we just didn't know which was which. Yep, yep. How many stories do you have for our listeners to kick off November, Lindsay? Well, kicking off my birthday month, just in case anybody needed like a reminder, I have two tales. My first tale is a classic haunted house tale.

And then my second tale, well, it's a bit odd. Okay. And even the title of it might give you a giggle. The fan entitled it The Tickle Lady. The Tickle Lady. All right. I know. I know. Both creepy and maybe a little like makes you laugh, but. Which really works. I mean, that's tickles. That is tickles. Creepy, but makes you laugh sometimes. I hate being tickled. I hate it so much. Okay.

I have two tales, I think, pretty solid ones, pretty equal in length. For my first one, we will head to a place that you and I have been before, Alcatraz. Oh, cool. But we have not been there on the show. I'll share some of the island and infamous former prison's history before getting into a whole bunch of paranormal lore. And for my second story, we will head to upstate New York to explore again some history, then some paranormal lore. We will visit Split Rock Quarry, the site of a former hazardous munitions plant and a deadly explosion in 1918.

And I'll end on a modern encounter tale set there. I think you're familiar with the year 1918. Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. I remember it well. That's when you were born, right? Yep. I was in grade school and playing with my, I don't know, what kids play with in 1918, like yo-yos and dreidels. I'm not sure. Well, I mean, you're old now, so you probably forgot what you played with then. Yeah.

Are you ready to showcase some spooky socks? Yeah, these are so cute. One of my favorite colors, lilac. They say, I put a spell on you. And they come all the way from two Texan Annabelles, Ashley and Kayla. Thank you so much for these super yummy, cozy socks. Nice. Now I have that song stuck in my head. I don't even know. I put a spell on you. I don't remember who sings it. Is that a real song? Because you're mine. Yeah, it's like an old song.

I put a spell on you. I'll have to look it up when you're telling your stories. I just like that I'm staring at you like you're so full of shit right now. No, no, it's a real song. Okay, sure, buddy. I'll figure it out later. Okay, so my first tale, we're going to visit a little corner of the world I am shocked we haven't already stumbled upon. Alcatraz Island, known to some as the Island of Evil Spirits. It is allegedly one of the most haunted places in America, and it seems it has been so for over 400 years.

Before we get into the paranormal entities and the ancient curse that supposedly permeates the land, let's briefly go over some of the island's gruesome, non-haunted history. Alcatraz Island is located in the San Francisco Bay, about one and a quarter miles from the shore. Originally developed in the 1850s as a military fortification, but then in 1934, it was converted into a maximum security federal penitentiary.

The Rock, as it's often known. The imposing prison had the capacity to house up to 450 convicts, but in the 29 years it was active, it only held up to 250. 250 inmates who likely hated their stay more than most American prisoners. Inmates were kept in dark cells approximately 10 feet by 4 feet, typically endured especially harsh treatment from guards. But the real horror of the place.

was that from the recreation yard and from some areas of the cell block, the prisoners had a full view of the bustling Fisherman's Wharf and glamorous San Francisco Yacht Club on the mainland.

Freedom quite literally just out of reach. And the prisoners were forced to watch helplessly every single day as the rest of the world went about their business, playing and working and laughing and enjoying the sun and water and concerts and baseball games. You know, having families hanging with friends and partying. According to multiple sources, that was the worst part of Alcatraz for the inmates. The partying they witnessed.

Watching the San Francisco skyline light up at night, hearing the music blaring from the yachts that pass by and the clubs on shore, the giggles of happy girls hanging out with guys these inmates so desperately wished they were. To the prisoners, it all felt like psychological torture. For almost three decades, Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary contained some of America's most dangerous and feared criminal masterminds, including Al Capone and George Machine Gun Kelly.

Al Capone, for those of you who don't know, a notorious Prohibition-era gangster and a kingpin of organized crime in Chicago from about 1925 to 1931. His infamous reign came to an end in 1931 when he was found guilty of three counts of federal income tax evasion, the only crimes the feds could nail him for since it was very hard to get people to testify against someone who would definitely try to have them killed for testifying.

And Capone was sentenced to 11 years in prison, as well as ordered to pay roughly $50,000 in fines. He was originally imprisoned in Atlanta, but then moved shortly thereafter to the newly built, much harder to escape from Alcatraz Penitentiary.

Around that same period, George Machine Gun Kelly was also brought to the isolated island to serve time. And I'm not talking about Megan Fox's boyfriend, Machine Gun Kelly. That's good because I just made a note that I was like, oh my God, this whole time. I did not put two and two together where he got that name. Yeah. No, talking about famous gangster, kidnapper, small time bootlegger, Machine Gun Kelly. OG MGK.

was arrested in 1933 for kidnapping a wealthy oil tycoon named Charles Urschel, the richest man in Oklahoma at the time. MGK and his accomplices held Urschel hostage in a remote Texas ranch for eight days, demanding $200,000 in ransom money, a lot of money at that time, for the victim's family.

The desperate family did pay up. The gangsters got their money. They released Urschel. And for a short time after that, MGK and his wife, Catherine, seemed to have gotten away with it, living out a lavish lifestyle, partying it up in Chicago, funded by their newfound riches. But a few months later, their crimes caught up to them. Both MGK and his wife given life sentences. On the way out of their trial, MGK bragged to the press that he would escape and be free by Christmas.

And that comment, unsurprisingly, really pissed off the feds. Instead of sending him to Leavenworth in Kansas, where he probably could have escaped, Machine Gun Kelly was shipped off to the remote island of Alcatraz. There he took a job as an altar boy in the prison chapel, never stopped bragging that he would soon escape, but he never did. He spent 17 years on the rock, bragging of the escape that was never going to happen before quietly being shipped off to Leavenworth, where he would remain in prison for the rest of his short life.

His wife, Catherine, released after serving 25 years. That's such a long time. 25 years she served alongside with her mother, by the way, who was also arrested for allowing her daughter and son-in-law to keep wealthy hostage Charles Urschel on her and her husband's ranch. Dang. Yeah, she got her mom and stepdad also arrested. Stepdad also has a 25-year sentence. That sounds like a short suck waiting to happen. Yeah. Yeah.

Returning to Alcatraz, America's most notorious federal penitentiary, virtually impossible to escape from. The cement infrastructure of the buildings, the highly trained security staff, plus and probably mostly based on the strong currents and freezing water that surrounded the island, way colder than you would think, it made making a break for it a deadly endeavor. However, that did not stop people from trying.

In total, 36 prisoners would make 14 escape attempts at Alcatraz. According to one source, 23 were caught, six were shot and killed during the escape, and two drowned.

The other five remain listed to this day as missing and presumed drowned. Dang. If any of those five did escape alive, they were never seen again. I mean, if any of you five are listening, please shoot us an email. Very old. The most famous Alcatraz escape attempt took place on June 11th, 1962. That night, inmates Frank Morris, John Anglin, and Clarence Anglin used paper mache heads to trick guards into thinking they were still asleep in their beds.

They broke out through ventilation ducts and a utility corridor, used rafts and paddles they made themselves to start paddling across the San Francisco Bay. Whether or not they made it across is unknown. While many seem to think that the horrors committed to prisoners at Alcatraz and the enduring agony and rage and anger of the long-dead inmates has led to the paranormal phenomena witnessed there, the island was actually believed to be haunted long before European colonizers ever stepped foot on it.

Alcatraz is actually the ancestral land of the Ohlone tribe of California, who were the first to utilize the island for fishing and other resource gathering. And they and multiple other area tribes considered Alcatraz to be an innately evil place where malevolent spirits roamed. They believed that if you were to stay on the barren, isolated island for too long, you would die there and your soul would be trapped, tortured by the restless evil dead forevermore and doomed to join them as another angry and vengeful spirit.

According to a few sources, in some native communities, members who transgressed tribal law were banished to the 22-acre island as a punishment, sent there to die. All right, now that we know a bit about the island's sordid history, let's get into some claims of the evil that may still lurk there. Time now for the tale of Alcatraz, Island of Evil Spirits.

As you take the 15-minute ferry ride from the harbor to Alcatraz Island, you're beset by the beauty of San Francisco Bay, the rhythmic ocean waves, the Golden Gate Bridge suspended above the horizon and the piercing downtown skyline soaring radiantly upwards, and if you've gotten lucky with the weather, a pale blue cloudless sky. It's incredibly picturesque. And from far away, so is Alcatraz. But then the closer you get, the less idyllic it appears.

The first thing you see clearly is the warden's house, standing like a decrepit behemoth on top of the hill. It's falling apart, nothing but a carcass, with crows milling about as if gnawing at its remains. As you pull into the dock, you notice how much the entire island looks like bones, how the combination of time and harsh winds and corrosive saltwater has stripped the infrastructure of any of its former glory and bleached so many of the island's rocks and stones and structures. You're excited to see an important historical relic,

but maybe you feel something else too. There's more of a chill in the air than there was just a few minutes ago, and a few hundreds back, a few hundred yards back on the mainland. You feel off. The moment you step off the boat, something deep in your gut turns like the tide. Many of those who visit Alcatraz Island have reported feelings like these. Perhaps a phantom gust of wind that sends chills up your spine, but there's no breeze. Or the sensation of shivering and breaking out in goosebumps on a warm summer's day.

Overall, there's just a strong feeling that something is very, very wrong with the place. When you're done listening to the park ranger's orientation, you're set free to roam about the island. And as you make your way to the cell block, the island's most popular attraction, you might notice something on the jagged, rocky shoreline. The figure of a man, nebulous and indistinct, coughing and gagging and holding desperately onto the black rocks while wave after wave smashes against his back. At least you think it's a man.

It's bewildering. One moment he's there, the next he's gone. He looked panic-stricken and like he needed help. What if he was just swept out into the sea? Or what if he was never there at all? Since the middle of the 19th century, visitor after unsuspecting visitor have claimed to witness the same apparition fighting for his life in the water. It appears he has no idea that his days of living are long gone. Some believe this ghost to be the lost soul of a prisoner who died while trying to escape. As early as 1859, Alcatraz was used to house soldiers convicted of crimes.

Others think the apparition was never a prisoner at all, but a regular civilian named Michael Mann, who tragically drowned off the coast of San Francisco almost two centuries ago. When Michael died, he worked on Alcatraz Island when it was in use as a military fortress. He, Charles Snook, and Jay Sullivan all worked and lived there, and on January 14, 1857, the trio decided to row a small boat over to the mainland to spend an evening downtown, but they never made it.

It was an especially foggy night, and after an hour of rowing towards what they thought was North Beach, the three men realized they were lost. A story published in the Nevada Democrat on January 21, 1857, in an article titled Lost in the Fog, described what happened next. The fog had by that time settled on the water, so that they were completely enveloped, with the prospect of remaining afloat all night. They determined to proceed, and finally saw light, which they rightly judged to be Alcatraz Island.

The boat was then heading on a direct course for the lighthouse, and they were congratulating themselves on the prospect of speedily regaining the land when a breaker struck the boat and capsized it, and they found themselves struggling in the water. They all managed to get hold of the boat and cling to the bottom until another breaker came and washed them over and over again. Snook and Sullivan exerted their utmost strength to recover the boat as they were still in the deep water and succeeded and also assisted their companion to regain his hold. But another wave swept them off.

And that was the last seen alive of poor Michael Mann. The others kept afloat until they were washed ashore by the breakers. Their cries having aroused the keeper of the lighthouse, ropes were thrown to them and they were saved. The body of Mann was found on the rocks yesterday morning. He leaves a wife and two children. Unsettling as it would be to witness the fading ghost of Michael Mann, it's nothing compared to what you might experience in the main cell block.

According to literally thousands of reports, the overwhelming majority of all the paranormal activity on Alcatraz Island seems to occur where America's most dangerous criminals were imprisoned. Based on these reports, as you navigate the steel and concrete maze of the former penitentiary, you might hear the heavy, ragged breathing of the ghosts of former inmates, fuming with anger, still stuck in their cells in death just like they were in life.

You might hear the rattling of chains or the pounding of furious fists on concrete. You might feel the rage wash over you like the tide. You might feel like you're being watched by piercing eyes that come from both nowhere and everywhere. You might even start to feel like you yourself are imprisoned. Phantom activity and auditory phenomena occur throughout the entirety of the building, but it's in Block B specifically that cell doors are frequently seen or heard swinging violently open and shut without anyone around to do so.

The most well-documented case of this took place in 1984, two decades after the prison closed for good, when a park ranger named Rex Norman was working the night shift. He'd finished his cleanup duties and was beginning to settle into his bunk for the night when he heard the sound of a heavy steel door opening in cell block B. He was both surprised and alarmed. No one else was supposed to be around.

These cell doors are incredibly difficult to maneuver. They can't just be pushed or pulled open. They're operated by a steel lever, which when yanked upwards, unlocks the internal mechanism. And it takes a lot of effort to pry the lever and more effort to heave the door open. So when Rex heard the clanking sound of the lever being unlatched and the low groan of the heavy door opening wide, he panicked. He thought at first it might be a night watchman playing a trick on him, but quickly realized that would be ridiculous. There was no night watchman. He was alone.

or was supposed to be. Rex waited anxiously to the silence that followed and was just starting to convince himself that he had imagined it all when suddenly a violent clash violent crash echoed throughout the entire building. He recognized the sound immediately. It was a cell door swinging closed. To a local newspaper, Rex described the sound like this. It was like someone took a steel trash can and threw it as hard as they could from the third level of the cell.

Over time, you get to know the sounds of Alcatraz, even on stormy days. You don't get that kind of noise. Rex was so rattled by the experience that he informed his supervisors, who became so concerned themselves that they decided to reach out to an expert for some help. On September 10th, 1984, supposed psychic Sylvia Brown arrived at Alcatraz to perform a seance alongside her small team of paranormal investigators, an ex-convict and former inmate of Alcatraz named Leon Thompson, and a CBS News crew.

The television channel later released a 30-minute special on the paranormal investigation titled Ghost Encounters with Sylvia Brown. The special, which you can still find on YouTube, is, of course, a little kitschy. However, there are some genuinely disturbing moments. At 4 a.m. that night, Sylvia led a seance in the main cell block dining hall, which was illuminated solely by a single kerosene lamp.

While she communed with the other side, she reported that there were 14 spirits attempting to come through. In her trance state, she told one restless spirit, There's no one here for you anymore. Turn and go to the light. While examining some of the photos taken by the psychic's paranormal photographers, some Channel 5 producers discovered what looked like wispy phantom hands with long, cloudy fingers lingering in the background of two of the infrared negatives of the dining room.

During her tour of the former prison, Sylvia shared that she felt the presences of multiple spirits throughout the cell blocks and in communal areas, as well as in the recreation yard and the psychiatric ward, inside which she flatly stated, I see someone crouching in the corner. While she traversed cell block C, the psychic was immediately drawn to the laundry room. Inside the decaying space, she reported feeling overwhelmed by an impression of terrible violence and witnessing a tall man with beady eyes staring at her from the corner.

She learned this looming figure was the spirit responsible for opening the doors in Cell Block C, and he was known in life as the Butcher. When the psychic said those two words, Leon Thompson's face drained of life. He looked terrified and shocked. The former inmate shared with the group that he knew the Butcher when he was alive. They had been incarcerated together around the same time. He said the Butcher's real name was Abbie Maldowitz.

that he had been a hitman for the organized crime syndicate Murder Incorporated, an organized crime group active from 1929 to 1941 across America, thought to be responsible for somewhere between 400 and 1,000 contract killings. And he earned his nickname for his proclivity for slaughter. Thompson shared that the butcher had met his gruesome end right there in the laundry room when he was killed by another inmate. According to multiple sources, prison records revealed this claim to be true.

Sylvia tried to convince the butcher's spirit to leave the prison to go towards the light, but he vehemently and aggressively refused. Still today, if you visit the laundry room in Cell Block C, you might just catch a glimpse of the butcher looking back at you from the shadows. And if you continue your journey throughout the prison and make it to Cell Block D, you might come across something more vile and gruesome. A red-eyed demon said to haunt Cell 14. The most violent and disobedient of Alcatraz's prisoners were kept in Block D.

and the very worst of the worst were held in solitary confinement in cells 9 through 14, each of which had only a sink and a toilet. No desk, no bed, no chair. These farthest six cells in Block D were known collectively as The Hole. Prisoners were put there in isolation as a form of brutal punishment, and what they would endure inside was essentially torture. Before getting thrown into The Hole, prisoners were stripped of their clothes. For weeks, they would sit in the dark, naked and cold, hungry and on the verge of madness.

Prisoners in solitary confinement were given just an hour of exercise in the yard each week, as well as only one 10-minute shower every seven days. One former inmate testified about his time in the hole, saying, Well, you can describe it only by the word stink.

It's like stepping into a sewer. It's nauseating. After they have you, after they searched your clothing, they throw it at you for bedding. You get two blankets around five in the evening. You have no shoes, no bed, no mattress, nothing but the four damp walls and two blankets. The walls are painted black. Once a day, I got three slices of bread. No, that is an error. Some days I got four slices. I got one meal in five days, nothing but bread in between.

If ghosts can end up chained to this realm through pain and suffering and rage and trauma, it's no wonder the last six cells in Block D are haunted. Visitors and guards and park rangers and prisoners alike have all reported encountering inexplicable phenomena inside the hole. Screams of anguish emanate from within the cells. Phantasmic arms reach from behind the bars and desperately grasp at passerbys, yanking on their clothes and grabbing the arms of the living and scratching at their skin, begging in a wretched, odious whisper to be released from the perpetual hell that enslaves them.

One of the most terrifying modern claims to come out of Alcatraz's Block D comes from another alleged psychic, Richard Sennett, who once spent the night in Cell 12. As soon as the steel door closed him in, the ghost hunter said he felt ice-cold fingers slither around his neck from behind, wrapping firmly around his throat and digging his nails into his flesh. While the phantom slowly tightened its grip, Richard saw before him a flurry of psychic visions of twisted and dismembered and deformed torsos and legs and arms and heads and hands and feet and faces.

A nauseating amalgamation of body parts. The seasoned psychic investigator described the experience as the most terrifying 15 minutes of his life. Mr. Sennett, not the only living person to allege they felt choked by a spirit while visiting Cell Block D. Many visitors have claimed before and since to have experienced something similar while walking past or when peering into the hole. For some, the feeling of spectral hands around their throat is faint and indistinct.

barely intense enough to warrant telling any of their fellow tourists about the odd sensation. For others, the feeling of being choked is so powerful, they're forced to sit down in order to catch their breath, or they simply flee the main cell block in terror to try and get away from whatever entity is grabbing hold of them, afraid that if they don't, they'll actually die. Others have reported not the feeling of being choked, but the odd and petrifying sensation of someone's finger stiffly dragging across their neck like a slicing motion.

Additionally, while standing in or around cells 9 to 14D, certain visitors have claimed to have experienced a piercing and sharp stabbing pain in their lower abdomen, one that disappears the moment they move away from the hole. It's widely believed that the spirit who terrorizes visitors in this particular way is that of Henry Young, a ruthless and vengeful former Alcatraz inmate. Before his incarceration, Young was a vicious bank robber and murderer who, on at least one occasion, kidnapped and tortured a hostage.

and in January of 1939, alongside inmates Rufus McCain, Arthur Barker, William Martin, and Dale Stamphill, Henry Young attempted to escape incarceration and almost pulled it off. One evening, the five men sawed through the bars of their cells, climbed through the main cell house windows, and made it to the beach on the west side of the island.

Shrouded by fog, they hastily constructed a makeshift raft out of some driftwood, prepared to paddle across the rough and freezing waters of the San Francisco Bay, but before they could set sail to freedom, the group was spotted by an officer in the lighthouse. Several armed correctional officers began raining gunfire down upon them, and Rufus McCain immediately dropped to his knees and pleaded for mercy. That slowed down the rest of the team, and William Martin and Henry Young had no choice now but to surrender or be shot.

The two other men resisted the guards and were shot. Barker was instantly killed. Stamphill was severely wounded. As a punishment for their failed escape attempt, Young, McCain, and Martin were all condemned to solitary confinement in Block D. For 13 straight months, Henry Young was isolated in the hole. He spent that entire time naked and in the dark, seething over his hatred for Rufus McCain.

He blamed Rufus for the failure, staunchly believed that if it hadn't been for him, they would have made it off the damn island. As his lawyers later stated, Young spent over a year in the gloom of his claustrophobic cell, living in a subconscious world, brooding upon his troubles. Eventually, both men were released from solitary, allowed to rejoin the general prison population. Young got a job working in the furniture model shop, which was directly above the tailor shop where Rufus worked.

And around 10 a.m. December 3rd, 1940, when the guards weren't looking, Young grabbed a shiv he'd hidden in the furniture workshop and snuck downstairs. As soon as he spotted Rufus McCain standing in the corner of the tailor shop, Young violently lunged towards him, sinking the sharpened knife deep into his fellow inmate's stomach. McCain fell to the ground, blood spurting from a gaping wound. Young did not resist the guards as they now hauled him away. He just kept his eyes fixed on McCain and yelled a single statement. I hope I killed the bastard.

And he did. McCain died from his wound a few hours later. Young would later be transferred out of Alcatraz, end up in Washington State Penitentiary at Walla Walla, Washington, where he would be paroled in 1972 and would promptly disappear, never to be seen again. No idea what happened to him. In addition to the bitter and vindictive ghost of Henry Young, it seems something else lurks within the cavernous walls of Cell Block D. Something darker. An innate evil, not born out of suffering, but spawned from some sort of hell.

something that was never human but feeds on human fear. Sources call it different things, but mostly they call it a demon. The so-called demon of cell 14D seemingly first appeared in the 1940s when an inmate was condemned to spend 19 days in solitary confinement for misbehaving. According to reports, the prisoner was proud, tough, real stubborn bastard, went to face his punishment in the hole with his head held high.

But soon after the guard locked him inside cell 14D, the previously stoic prisoner began to wail and scream that something was in there with him and that it was trying to kill him. Throughout the night, the prisoner continued to screech and sob and begged to be released, banging on the walls, screaming at the top of his lungs that there was a demon with red eyes in the darkness with him, and soon he would be dead if no one came to help. The next morning, cell 14D was silent.

When the guards went in to check on the prisoner, they found his corpse sprawled lifeless across the concrete floor. He was logged as having died of natural causes. And then according to the legend of this tale, a few days later, the staff was doing a head count of the prisoners and found that there was one too many. Around that same time, multiple guards claimed to have witnessed the prisoner who had just died now in the recreation yard, screaming like a banshee that he was being hunted by a demon.

When they went to redo the headcount, the number of inmates returned to normal, and the screaming prisoner in the recreation yard had vanished. Yike. I mean, Alcatraz is just like an inherently strange place. Uh-huh. I don't even know how to really describe how it felt to be there when we went. But I was like, God, it's been so long. But I was like, it was, I mean, a prison is creepy. Yeah.

and heavy and dark and just, I mean, it's so many, so many, so many adjectives. It's all the things you think it is, you know? It's a horrible place. And then when it's, you know, someplace famed and storied like Alcatraz, you know, you go in with these preconceived notions. But I do remember, like, doing the little, uh,

cell block tour and just be like, this is fucking creepy. Yeah. It's really like. They're so small. So. Cells are so small. So small. I know. And it's hard. Okay. Like obviously listening to you talk about the hole and solitary confinement, my heart starts to break. I'm like, oh my God. And then I'm like, wait a second. What have you done to put yourself there? You know, I mean, I'm not saying that people aren't wrongfully imprisoned. I'm not dismissing that. Totally.

Ooh, 13 months? 13 months. But also like, I don't know. Depends what you did. Yeah. I mean, Henry Young was a savage. Yeah. Well, let me tell you something. Pedophile, you can go fuck yourself. You get in there for 13 months. That's not long enough. Yeah. You know, so there, to me, my moral compass, my lines are like, nope, fine. Yeah. You cross an uncrossable line. Yeah. Yeah.

I got some photos. I bet you do. Okay. This first great photo of Alcatraz Island on a sunny summer's day. Yeah. I mean, I mean,

I mean, San Francisco Bay is beautiful. It can be really beautiful. You know, and like if I saw that, if you didn't tell me where it was or what it was, like no identifiers or whatever, I'd be like, oh, that'd be like a really cool movie set location. Totally. Or there could be some incredible like resort there, you know? I want to stay there for a week, yeah. Yeah, looks amazing. This next one, old black and white photo from the island's prison days.

When they had a lot more structures on the island. I mean, people living there, like the warden and his family and stuff. Sure, of course. They would stay there. Yeah. Next one, dark photo of an abandoned cell block. Oh, God. Yeah. Just looks so depressing. So bleak. Yeah. And like, I just, at this point in my life, I cannot imagine doing anything that would put me there. Yeah, totally. I just, yeah. I don't even know what that would be.

Here's one of the solitary confinement cells. I already have full body chills. Just a little concrete box. God bless. Two blankets. Butt naked, two blankets, four pieces of bread. It's crazy. And cold. You're going to be cold in there. Alcatraz is not warm. No, I would be sobbing. I don't think I'd last a night. I'd be a train wreck. This next one. Photo taken on the island in 2014 by a British couple on vacation.

supposedly that woman you can see clearly in the little window in the door was not there. Oh, dang. It shows up in numerous articles. She's standing inside an office that was off limits to visitors. They referred to her as the ghost of the lady in green, an entity I did not mention. There's other entities on this island. According to reports, this ghostly woman is often seen in the washroom of the former bathroom of the former apartment of the prison warden located on Alcatraz Hill.

She is described as a woman in her 40s with brown hair wearing a green dress. Okay. Said the lady in green was the wife of the prison warden who committed suicide on the island while her husband was working. Since she has been haunting the place often seen looking out of the bathroom window. Okay.

Two more. This next one, a young Lindsay Radziminski. Alcatraz's sexiest apparition. I love that that's the photo you picked of me. I think you look so cute. Haunting the inside of a cell block, August 28th, 2012. I happen to know that there's a way cuter photo of me there. No, look at that. Look at that face. There was one. Gorgeous. I love you. You're so sweet. I happen to know that there's a better photo of me there. Yeah.

I'm like, oh man, why didn't you pick, why didn't you run it by me ahead of time? Finally, a young-ish Dan Cummins. Looking like he's taking a dump inside a cell. Yeah, what are you sitting on there, buddy? A little toilet. No, you're not sitting on the toilet. Oh, I guess I'm not. I'm sitting on a little bench. Yeah, the toilet's over there. Yeah. You dingleberry. Oh man. You know, here's something I love about you. Yeah? Consistency. Yeah? Yeah.

Short sleeve t-shirt, jeans, retro sneakers. This has been your look for as long as you've been in my life. Consistency. I appreciate it, my friend. I really do. Okay, good. Because I like it. Look how cute you are. Yeah. What a little baby. No tattoos? Yeah, barely any. You can see like part of one that's been covered up since Betty Page on my shoulder. Five o'clock shadow. Yep.

Funny. Yeah, that's August in 2012. That was during the trip that led to the stand-up bit she chose to lead with her face. Oh, man. Her old stand-up pants. I think it's just she led with her face. I thought so, too. I think that's what I said, but I had to look up my own bit online. Yeah. And that's what it's actually labeled on the track, what the track is labeled. She chose to lead with her face. Funny. Yeah.

And that's why I have banana slippers. Take a walk down the magic stairs or something. I can't remember. It's been so long. Oh, man. That was the first time I ever saw... Okay, guys, brief story. Dan and I go to San Francisco. First couples trip. We've just come back from him meeting my family for the first time in Cleveland. And you can go listen to the bit about how I fell down an escalator. But it was our first...

couples get away. And it was the first time I was actually seeing Dan do standup and he leads with a story about me eating shit. And I was like, wow, I guess from now until forever, my whole life is open to interpretation and joke making. And it's just on display. Yeah. No, you just threw me to the wolves. Uh, how did you feel when we were at Alcatraz? Do you remember any, like, I remember just being, I don't remember anything.

feeling any paranormal stuff. I do remember hearing like a guy talk about it. Yeah. And being like, Ooh, like kind of like creeped in the sense of like, that'd be crazy. And I remember, you know, it's damp and cold and chilly and like, uh,

I just remember just being so dark and bleak. Yeah. Where I'm just thinking like, God, that would suck where you're so close. You're just a little over a mile away. You can so easily see it on a nice day. There's downtown, all the hustle and bustle, the city and like an affluent city, all these people living these great lives. And you're stuck on this little rock in the middle of the bay.

And in these tiny, tiny cells, I just, I couldn't get over how small the cells were and be like, God, that's for years. Yeah. You're just in this little tiny cage. Yeah. Yikes.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I would want to go back now that we're more attuned to the paranormal. Oh, yeah. It would be, I wonder how we would feel about it now. Would we manufacture it a little bit in our own brains of like, oh, oh, I feel it. Yeah. Or would we be able to remain impartial? Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. But it would be, it would be cool. You ready to leave the San Francisco Bay, head to the other side of the country?

Just one question. Okay. Did you know about this Murder Incorporated?

You know what? I have heard of it before. It's been a long time. Between 400 and 1,000 contracted kills? I know. That's insane. I didn't know that detail. And I will say, I immediately paused working on Scared to Death, sent Sophie an email. I'm like, we need to do this for Time Suck. Okay, copy that. I know. I was like, oh my God. I have so many thoughts about prisons now. I'm like, oh, every prison must be haunted. All of them. And like...

How many deaths in prison, yes, are attributed to other inmates, but how many are because you've gone mad or because some spirit of somebody who's gone before you drove you mad? Is that really what happened to Jeffrey Epstein? We can hope. One can hope. All right. Yeah. Now I'm ready to move on. Let's go. Before we move on to more scares, we need to take a quick in-between story sponsor break.

Nate.

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Thanks for listening to our sponsor deals, Creeps and Peepers. We appreciate you doing so. Hope you heard some deals that appealed to you. Okay, Split Rock Quarry now. A former hazardous munitions plant located just outside of Syracuse, New York.

Split Rock, also a hamlet in the town of Onondaga, but it's more accurately described as a historic place rather than an active community. Originally, a limestone quarry was established there in 1834. And then in 1880, the Salve Process Company, a chemical manufacturer, expanded quarry operations. Limestone used for the Salve Process was delivered from the quarry by an elevated conveyor nearly two miles long to the industrial plant at Salve, New York.

Some fascinating engineering. The limestone quarry was abandoned around 1912. Three years later, in 1915, Split Rock became a large munitions factory operated by the Semit Salve Company. The plant employed about 2,500 people, and the Split Rock Quarry went on to produce a full quarter of American TNT used in World War I.

Because of the highly dangerous work environment, the plant was staffed by 300 or more trained firefighters and watchmen, but even that did not prevent a tragedy that would make Split Rock infamous. On July 2, 1918, an explosion killed at least 50 men working at the plant. Most sources say 50, some say 52. A few reports from newspapers on July 3, 1918, report 65 dead.

There were 600 employees working the early night shift that evening. An overheated bearing in the grinding machine of TNT Building No. 1, the manufacturing hub, was believed to be the cause of the fire. The flames quickly spread through the wooden building. Firefighters kept the blaze under control for the first 10 minutes, but after the roof was destroyed, a strong breeze fanned the flames into a roaring, unstoppable inferno. Making matters worse, the firefighters lost water pressure shortly after the roof collapsed.

Some fled, but a few stayed behind, believing the water would be turned back on momentarily. It was not, and many firefighters were found dead the next day, holding their charred fire nozzles in their hand. The power also went out, causing any part of the plant not lit up by actual flames to fall into darkness. The Post Standard, a paper for Syracuse, reported at the time...

Everyone hearing the sound of the wailing whistle and the frenzied shouts of the workmen knew now they must run for their lives. And then, the plant exploded. Post-standard reporter Jacinta Foley wrote on the anniversary of the blast 40 years later in 1958, "...a huge ball of smoke shot up in the air, split like a rocket and descended in a cloud of sparks. Human beings were tossed in the air like flaming firecrackers, dead when they hit the ground."

The blast received a massive amount of toxic chemicals into the air and shot flames over 100 feet high when between one and three tons of TNT exploded. On July 3rd, 1918, the New York Times reported, men were hurled in all directions. Two who were caught between two burning buildings were blown through a wall. Still alive when picked up, there was not a shred of clothing on their bodies.

Some were killed by the force of the explosion itself, while others burned to death, still others poisoned by toxic gas. 1.5 million pounds of additional explosives were stored up on a nearby hill. By some miracle, the winds changed direction and the flames didn't quite reach those explosives. If they had, the resulting explosion would have destroyed the entire city of Syracuse and half of the county.

While no one was killed in Syracuse, people in the city did see and feel the explosion. Windows shattered, horses fled in fear, trolleys stopped. Because of the ongoing world war in Europe, some feared the area had been bombed by enemy forces. Others thought there had been an earthquake. Despite this tragedy, the plant remained open and continued operations until 1954. It was then used as a New York State Department of Transportation maintenance and parking facility until the mid-1980s when it was abandoned.

The only remnant from the site's original purpose is an old piece of machinery called the Crusher, and perhaps some ghosts. Some visitors have reported hearing the sound of footsteps, voices in the distance, and the revving of the Crusher's engine despite the fact that it hasn't been used in over 100 years.

Paranormal enthusiasts who have explored the site tend to believe that the quarry is haunted, unsurprisingly, by the souls of the men who died in the explosion. In the summer of 2009, the Ghost Finders Association of Central New York visited Split Rock and said they saw a free-floating white apparition standing next to team member Stefan Morosko. It was also noted that the team's camera battery was fully charged but died suddenly once they entered a tunnel, and then by the time they got home, the battery had somehow restored itself.

And there's a lot of similar stories to these. A few that are much more intense. The following story comes from a girl who visited the quarry when she was a teen. She claims she had a brief but intense encounter with one of the victims of that 1918 explosion. Time now for the tale of Split Rock's gruesome ghost. Gina's mother had never approved of her choice in most of her friends, including Ricky Miller.

Gina had been friends with Ricky since kindergarten. They'd started growing apart in middle school, but recently he had been hanging around a bit more, often joined by his friend Sam Callahan. And Sam was a bit of a troublemaker. He'd been that way since their first day of kindergarten. He and Ricky were close, which meant that Ricky had gotten into his fair share of trouble over the years. Gina tried her best to stay out of it, but she'd been roped in a few times as well, which of course infuriated her mother. And that was why Gina told her mom she was going bowling with her friend Marissa.

when in fact she was going to hang out with Ricky, Sam, and whoever else they invited to tag along with them. And what would they be doing? She didn't know. All she had was a vague promise from Ricky that the night was going to be a fun one, something to kick off the Halloween season the right way. And she couldn't wait. She'd always been a bit of a thrill seeker, and she loved fall more than any other season. She realized where they were going as soon as they left the city, Split Rock Quarry, a notoriously haunted site.

Gina had been there once before on a school field trip years earlier. She didn't think it was scary back then, but it had been the middle of a sunny late spring day. Their goal was to at least see or hear something strange and ideally to actually see a ghost. At least that was Sam and Ricky's goal. Gina just wanted to explore the area and maybe find an artifact from the past to bring home. Although the idea intrigued her, she still wasn't sure if she even believed in ghosts.

A few minutes after they arrived, a car pulled up with Alex and Claire, two other kids from school. At first, Alex complained that the whole thing was lame, but after taking a few sips from a flask he kept hidden in his car, he and Claire decided to stay for a little while. And then everyone stood around and drank and talked about other kids from school. And eventually, Gina got bored. She thought they were there to explore, but all they were doing was standing around, same as they did during most high school hangs. She finally decided to approach Claire, who was also standing off to the side, brooding because her date was ignoring her.

She and Claire, not exactly friends, but they got along well enough and had worked on a few projects together at school. Gina offered Claire a cigarette, a habit she had picked up in the past year that her mom also didn't know about, and Claire accepted. And then the two girls stepped away and stood together in silence. A cold breeze made Gina shiver and wrap her coat tightly around herself. While she loved fall, she hated the cold, and she dreaded the coming winter months. And that was when she heard it. The softest whisper.

floating along the breeze in one ear and out the other. It was so faint, but she could still make out the words. It was a man's voice saying, Gina shook her head to clear her thoughts. Did you hear that? She asked Claire. No, Claire said flatly, looking at her like she might be crazy. Gina tried to ignore it. She did the typical convincing of herself that she must not have heard what she definitely heard that people tend to do in these situations and continued chatting with Claire about unimportant things. But then it happened again.

This time the whisper was in her left ear, as someone was standing right there, as if someone was standing right there between her and Claire. Are you good? Claire asked, noticing something was off with Gina once again. Uh, yeah, uh... Alex cut her off, yelling to Claire that it was time to go. Claire smiled, looking a little relieved, and thanked Gina for the cigarette. She jogged over to her boyfriend, and soon Alex and Claire were leaving. With their friend gone, Sam and Ricky turned towards her, but Gina was distracted when once again she heard a voice behind her softly whisper...

She whipped around as quick as she could, hand over her heart, but saw nothing but gravel and woods behind her. Of course, no one was there. Gina exhaled, frustrated, and as she did, she thought she now saw movement in the corner of her eye, something over in the trees. Without even thinking, she immediately started to walk towards it. She would later say it felt like something was pulling her in that direction. Sam and Ricky had again gone back to talking and drinking. And when she got to the patch of trees where she saw that dark shadow, she heard the voice again.

This time it was a little louder. It felt like whoever was saying it was nearby. It sounded like they were standing an inch behind her, whispering directly into her ear. She turned around expecting nothing again, but now she screamed. Standing right in front of her was a man, or what was left of him. Nothing about him looked right. He was slumped over. One of his arms was dangling by his side. The other arm completely gone. Half his face just missing.

A good chunk of the skin on what was left of his face was also missing, revealing blood, muscle, connective tissue, and even hints of bone underneath. Help me! His ragged voice pleaded as he took a stumbling step towards Gina. She screamed again and fell backwards in a panic. She also put her hands over her eyes to cover up the horrible sight, and then after one more unsteady footstep on the gravel before her, all she heard was silence. And then Gina dared to open her eyes. The man was gone.

Gina was left feeling terrified and confused. Where did he come from? He appeared without any warning, then just disappeared just as quickly. Was he even real? How could he be real? How could anyone be alive with all those injuries? Before she could think about it further, Sam and Ricky were running towards her, asking her what was going on. Gina told them everything she saw, and they weren't scared. They were stoked. They were jealous that she'd actually seen a ghost and they wanted to search around for him.

Gina wanted to go home. She begged them to leave, but they refused, Sam stubbornly telling her she could just wait in the car for a little while while they went ghost hunting. Ricky gave her an apologetic look, but he went off with his friend. And now Gina spent over an hour in the car by herself, doors locked, jumping to the slightest sounds and shadows, terrified that the man would appear again. But he never did. They made the drive back in silence. Gina was furious. Sam and Ricky were disappointed they didn't see anything themselves.

That was the last time Gina ever hung out with Ricky. It was the last time she would ever visit Split Rock Quarry as well. She was now a firm believer in the paranormal and felt like she never needed any additional confirmation that the dead didn't always stay dead.

I don't know what would be worse, the help me whispers or being locked alone in a car for an hour. After having that experience. Oh my God. Just experience or not. Locked alone in a car in the dark. Like, I mean, I understand. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. No way. That is so creepy. That's true. Yeah. Did you hear that? Uh-uh. Okay. Just nevermind. It's fine. Everything's fine. Everything's fine. Okay. My stomach is, my heart is in my stomach. It's fine. Oh no.

He seems spooked in here. Yeah, no, I've been noticing, like we had a fan stop by and we were talking about it, but like I was, I have said on like previous episodes just more recently, like, do you hear that? And now other people are like, okay, I thought I heard something too. I'm like, okay. Okay. Ichiwawa. You got some photos for me, Dan? I do, just a few. This first one, an old photo of the Split Rock Quarry back in its days of operation as a munitions factory.

And quarries are fascinating. Yeah, big old rock crushing stuff. This next one, some of the aftermath of the 1918 explosion. You can see here if I zoom in for scale, a couple guys in the upper right-hand corner of the photo. Oh, it's so hard to see them because it's all black and white. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. And then all that remains today of the crusher. The crusher. And everything is just like, you know, been overgrown by the forest again. Yeah.

Yeah, Mother Nature. Mother Nature takes it back. Takes back what's hers. She's like, you motherfuckers. I love Mother Nature. She's a badass. She is. Uh-huh. She's undefeated. That is true. That is true. Oh, the beginning of that story just had me thinking about how grateful I am for firefighters. You know, we just don't... Yeah.

We don't think about it that often because we've never, you know, been through a fire. Our house has never caught on fire. We've never needed to call a fire department. Not even for like a cat in a tree, so to speak. But, you know, it is such a crazy thing. You know, first responders in general just...

Yeah, it's a very noble occupation, one that I certainly am not cut out for, so. Absolutely. And I want to, like I said at the beginning of the episode, I put a spell on you. Oh, my God. I wondered what in God's name you were doing. 1956 song, written and recorded by Screamin' Jay Hawkins. Definitely love that guy. Became a classic cult song covered by a variety of artists. It was his greatest commercial success, surpassed a million copies in sales, and

And probably the most famous person who sang it, Annie Lennox. I still don't know this song. I'll have to listen to it later. Yeah. You know. Yeah. You can't just put a song. I put a spell on you because you're mine. No? Nothing? I mean, it doesn't really do it for me. Okay. I can pretend. Do you want to do it again? No, it's fine.

Maybe if I knew the song. Totally. You know, I would be more into it. Do you want to share some details, reminders of the giving tree? And then we'll get into your stories? I do, Dan. Thank you. Okay, guys. We're sneaking in a mid-show announcement because it's important and because you're less likely to skip it if it's in the middle of the show. So, okay, gang out there listening in. As a reminder, we are now in the donation collections phase of...

of the 2024 Bad Magic Giving Tree. Uh, if you are able to help us help our Bad Magic families in need this holiday season, which, how is it November? I know. This year has been epically quick. Uh,

Anyways, if you're able to help support the Bad Magic Giving Tree, please purchase an Amazon gift card for any amount that you feel comfortable with. Even just every $5, $10 amount helps. If you can skip your precious coffee that you maybe treat yourself to this week, knowing that it's going to go to a greater, bigger cause, we would be so grateful. We are accepting digital Amazon gift cards every

now through November 21st. And when you purchase that gift card, who you're sending it to is the email address of givingtree2024 at badmagicproductions.com. You can find all this info in the episode description and on our website, badmagicproductions.com. Just kind of scroll down a little bit and you'll see the Giving Tree banner and

And then for those of you who are in need of assistance this holiday season, we wanted to just share that info as well. And again, this will all be in the episode description and can be found on our website. So if you are busy right now and can't write it down, don't worry. We again will be able to help. Excuse me. This year, we'll again be able to help 30 families.

based on how much money we've had for donations and based on previous years, our fans coming together and supporting the tree. And the signups will be at 12 noon Pacific time on November 18th. So 1118 at 12 noon Pacific time, there will be 30 slots available.

We do ask that if you have been a recipient of the Bad Magic Giving Tree in years past, that you consider refraining from trying again to be a part of it so that other families may have a chance. But we also respect and understand that sometimes there is no other resource and...

You know, we know that it's not an ideal process, but this is the best and most equitable way that we have found to be able to do this that doesn't leave people hanging and wondering whether or not they'll be able to get help. And again, all of this in the episode description and at badmagicproductions.com. Okay. And now it's time to get spoopy. Let's get spoopy. Let's get spoopy. Okay. Do you have a Layla? I do. I got a yellow one.

Oh, cute. I haven't seen a mustard Layla in a while. She's so cute. She is. All right. Well, let's talk about this haunted house, the house on 46th Avenue. Hey, Dan and Lindsay, are you ready for this? Yep. Like, really ready? As I write this and think about the events that unfolded not too long ago, I shiver with fear. And this reminds us of why we grew to hate the house on 46th Avenue.

October 2017. My wonderful husband and I were house searching. A young, newly married couple just wanting to live the American dream.

We looked at so many homes and were outbid so many times. We were about to give up, buy a camper van and live in it with our two great Danes and our hound dog when we came across the house on 46th Avenue. And we fell in love instantly. A small little rambler with a huge garage for my husband, a beautiful backyard for the dogs to run free in, three bedrooms for our family we hoped to grow someday, and a

perfect location in a small, quiet housing community. We immediately jumped on signing an offer. The house was priced perfectly and they were even offering a fast closing with a bonus. We thought we had scored. When our offer was accepted, we were over the moon.

We quickly settled in and started to plant our roots. Not too long after we moved in, we found out I was pregnant with our first child. We were so happy. I started to sleepwalk again, which I had not done since I was a child. I had a really bad history as a young child, according to my mom, but had grown out of it when I hit my teens.

My husband had been accepted into the police academy, which kept him away five days a week. I woke up to things in odd places like the milk jug on the stove or the ketchup bottle in the sink half squeezed into the drain and random items from our kitchen strangely placed in our spare bedroom.

Mm-hmm.

This was a stressful time for us and my hormones were raging and they say that these things are the set off for sleepwalkers. These were the first few odd things we noticed, but of course brushed them off.

I was going to be late one night coming home from work on a weekend and wanted to notify my husband. His phone had gone straight to voicemail, which was odd. I remembered our security cameras on the dog kennels allowed us to talk through them. Knowing my husband should have been home, I opened the camera app to tell him to answer the damn phone when I saw a young woman sitting at my kitchen counter. I was livid. I told my worker, come see this.

and that I needed to go home to my filthy, cheating husband and catch him and this woman in the act. She looked at my phone and immediately backed me up. It took me, I don't know, 10 minutes to get home, and let me tell you, I watched that camera like a hawk as safely as I could the whole way home. I had seen my husband walk into view and sit down next to the woman, though he hadn't said a word to her.

When I rushed in, he was sitting there on his computer playing a game. He smiled at me as I walked through the door and I immediately wanted to know where she was. He was absolutely puzzled. She had never left the house. None of the outdoor cameras ever tripped and they were on the whole time. Never turned off. Trust me, I checked the log.

My husband was so upset. He broke down promising me he would never do that to me. I honestly had never even considered him being a cheater or cheating on me until I saw it with my own eyes. And so did my coworker. We reviewed the footage together and

But there was absolutely no one else there with him. You can see my husband sitting there alone. Was I going crazy? Was it the hormones? Sleep deprivation? Wait, no, couldn't be. My co-worker had seen it too. My family suggested it was a ghost, but my highly skeptical military cop husband and I both thought, no way.

Around this time, we both stopped sleeping well. We woke up every night to noises in the house or bad nightmares that had me screaming, my husband tossing and turning, and sometimes he was even punching at the air. Fast forward to Christmas Eve when we brought home our amazing little baby boy.

He brought a whole new energy to the house. We were just so happy. My husband had graduated from the academy and landed a job, and our newborn son was so cute, and so all was well. My best friend had come to stay with us for a week to see the baby and to help me out. My husband was working all weekend, making this the perfect time to catch up on trashy reality TV and newborn cuddles with my best friend.

We had put the baby down for bed and we were watching TV when the lights on the baby monitor lit up and then we heard a man's voice. We went running to the baby's room. We thought for sure someone was in our house. So we grabbed the baby and hid in the bathroom while I called my husband. He rushed home. I mean, thankfully, he patrols the beat he lives in. No one was around or in our house. And the dogs had never barked either, which is highly unusual for our hound dog.

Problem solved.

A couple of months later, our baby was sleeping through the night and we were finally getting great rest. Our son was an amazing sleeper. I could vacuum, bang around, set the fire alarms off while cooking, and he would just be passed out cold. One weekend, my husband and I were watching a movie when we heard a knock on the baby's monitor. My husband went to check it out but saw nothing. Brushing it off, we continued to watch our movie.

Then we heard his little interactive letter book go off. Again, my husband checked the baby's room. He picked up the little toy and pulled out the batteries, thinking the toy was going dead. We were just about to go to sleep when we checked the monitor for the last time. That book lit up and went off again. My husband looked over at the nightstand where the batteries he had pulled out of the toy were now sitting.

He grabbed that book and immediately took it outside to the trash. My non-believer husband was starting to not be able to, quote, cop explain this one away. The next night, my son woke up screaming at the top of his lungs as if he were being hurt. He never, ever screamed like that.

I ran in to comfort him. My son's Himalayan salt lamp I always left on for a low lighting was turned off. I turned it back on, no problem. Maybe my husband had turned it off, no big deal. But after I fed our son and set him back down to sleep, it turned itself off again. I thought maybe it had burnt out and told myself I'd replace the bulb in the morning.

That night, we were awakened to a loud knock on the baby monitor, followed by screaming from our son. My husband went running down the hall into our son's room. He was in his crib crying and had not moved an inch. Our dogs were in our room on the bed the whole time. I don't know, maybe it was thunder, tree outside our son's window, the wind, any rational excuse. I, on the other hand, was coming around to the idea of the supernatural."

The next night, we heard another knock. My husband angrily got up and ran to our son's room and as he did, the salt lamp went out and would then not turn on. Frustrated, he unplugged the lamp and moved it to a different light socket in our room. Still nothing. The next day, I purchased a new lamp and bulbs. No problem. A couple of weeks later, we were exhausted from running around all day and we quickly fell asleep. We were both awakened to an extremely loud knock on the monitor.

My husband grabbed his gun and went running down the hall. Thinking someone had broken in, the dogs followed him, barking down the hall after him. I reached for my phone to dial 911, but hesitated when I heard nothing but silence. My husband came back into our room, ghost white. He told me to grab the baby and keep him with me, and that he was going to investigate outside.

When I grabbed our son, his new salt lamp was off. I was a bit frustrated, but too scared to look further. When my husband finally came back after checking the whole house inside and out, he said that he hadn't seen anything.

The next day, my husband shared that he had been having such an odd dream before we woke up to the loud knock. He said he saw a man walk from our bedroom into the baby's room, pick the baby up and drop him on the floor. He then continued to say he swore he thought the knocking sound was our son hitting the floor. But then he woke up. He said he panicked because he was certain it was real.

As he's saying all of this, I begin shaking, tears streaming down my face. I had the exact same dream at the exact same time. My husband finished by saying that when he opened the baby's bedroom door, he felt something truly evil emanating from there.

We both did not sleep a lick that night. And when we got up the next morning to let the dogs out, they refused to walk by the baby's room. This fearless pack had never been afraid of anything before and was now cowering in the hallway. My husband assured me all was fine and that we had been listening to way too much Scare to Death and watching far too many scary movies. He acted as though nothing had happened the night before.

Immediately upon arrival, without any prompting, she looks at me and says, It's the closet, isn't it?

"'What are you talking about?' I asked. "'The baby's closet is your problem,' she stated. Still not quite understanding, she explained she'd had a dream the night before that a black mass was in the baby's closet and was waking the baby up by hitting him and dropping him. I damn near fainted. My husband, who's just 30 minutes ago brushing this off, stands up and declares, "'That's it! I'm calling a priest!'

We were not religious in any way, nor does he believe in blessings, sagings, or crystals.

My sister and I immediately left for the witchy little store in town where I purchased the needed supplies. We're grabbing sage, crystals, how to sage for dummies books, I don't know. And then the store owner walks over to me and asks if we need any help. I told her, I think I need to sage my home. And without cluing her into anything at all and not having any idea who this woman was, she says, because of the baby.

I snapped at her. No, but also, how do you know I have a baby? She replied, I can sense darkness around a young baby. My sister gasped out loud and screamed, I told you so, in the brattiest little sister voice ever. We went home. My husband took the baby out and I saged our home, chanting a basic but positive get out of my house kind of chant.

As I was approaching the baby's room, the embers on the sage went out. I tried to relight it, but now the lighter stopped working. Okay, weird. I had literally just used it five minutes ago. I searched for a different one. Still nothing. I took the sage out of the room and was about to give up, but something told me to try again.

The first lighter worked when I went into the kitchen. Then I made my way back to the baby's room. I was about to open the closet when something knocked the sage right out of my hand with a solid and heavy smack. I screamed just as my husband was coming back in the house with the baby. He ran to the bedroom and saw that the sage had started a small fire on the carpeted floor. He stomped it out with his boots and immediately said we needed to get the fuck out now.

We stayed at my parents' house that night and slept incredibly well. I went to work the next day and one of my lovely witchy co-workers placed a piece of obsidian in my hand saying, do you need this today? I had never used crystals and never even thought I needed to, but I put it in my pocket.

That night, the dogs woke us, barking at the door to go out. And as we did let them out, we heard a guttural, animalistic scream come from our baby's room. When I opened the door, the baby was sideways in his crib with his legs hanging out in between the bars. He couldn't even move sideways or even roll over, nevertheless put his legs through the bars. That was it. We were done. Tired, exhausted.

exhausted and defeated, we all slept on the couch in the living room together. The next morning, I saged, salted, and spent way too much money on crystals. Things were really good and quiet after this. It had worked. We decided to wait until the spring to put our house on the market per our realtor's advice.

Our baby was now talking, walking, and running around. And we found out we were expecting our second child. My son came to me one day saying, Mommy, Mommy, Mr. Bones in my room. I remembered my dad telling me the small little skeleton figurine in my mom's fish tank is Mr. Bones. And I said, No, baby, Mr. Bones is at Nana's house.

What he said next almost damn near made me pass out on the floor right there. No, mommy. The big Mr. Bones in my closet and shoes. He hits the wall and scares me.

We called the realtor that night and asked how quickly we could list the house. We sold our house within one day of it being on the market. The day we moved out, my son turned to his aunt and said, Auntie, go tell Mr. Bones that no-no come to new house. I don't want him touching me. Since that day, I started an obsession with crystals and the metaphysical. My extremely skeptical husband is now a complete believer, though he still thinks crystals are just rocks.

We had barely spoken about the house on 46th Avenue just until last week. We chatted about the events, and I finally asked my husband what the man he saw from his dream looked like. We saw the exact same man in an old fishing hat with a button-up shirt and tan pants. Crazy.

The new couple who bought our house had the same last name as us. This means our mail crosses all the time. We decided to drop their pile off one day. While we were there chatting with them about the house and laughing at the same last name similarity, the owner asked my husband if there is something wrong with the pipes in the walls.

Not that we're aware of. Why? He said, we hear knocking all the time, the new owner said, and we can't figure out where it's coming from. My husband asked him, do you believe in the supernatural? This grown man's face went white and he had to sit down. What he said next confirmed why we GTFO'd. He said his wife had been telling him that the back bedroom was haunted, but he kept telling her that she was crazy.

Love, your fellow crystal enthusiast, Manny. You say Manny or Mandy? Manny, M-A-N-N-Y. Manny, oh man. Ay-yi-yi. Yeah, a lot in that story. A lot of stuff going on. Yeah, just like a good classic haunted house. Uh-huh, like intensely haunted. There was that thing, the... I mean, the thing...

Early in the story, Manny talks about Manny's husband seeing on her cell phone this footage of a woman being with him with a co-worker, but then they don't see anybody. And then my mind just drifted to this place where it's like, okay, with all these ring cameras out there and everything, why don't we have more proof of the paranormal? Why isn't there obvious ghosts? But then that made me think like,

What if, like, these ghosts are presenting themselves as fully formed people? Oh, my God. Because then you would never have proof. You'd be like, check out this proof of a ghost. And somebody would be like, yeah, that's just a lady. And it's like, yeah, but that lady wasn't real. The energy in here is so weird right now, right? It is. It's kind of spooky. I don't like it. Ugh. But, uh...

But yeah, so that, so my mind was going on that where it's like, that's a big, obviously problem for a lot of people, which I get, you know, me too. Like the skeptic in me is like, why isn't there more proof, like concrete evidence of the paranormal? But also like who is scanning through hours and one, who has their

cameras at their house running 24 hours a day. Well, totally. And who's coming through all that footage. Totally. So it could be picking up stuff that we're just not even seeing. Yeah. There could be stuff that we don't see, or there just could be like what looks just like people. There could be like- Not in your house. Oh, not in the house. Not in the house. But okay. But even if, if you said like, oh my God, there's a ghost in our house, check out this evidence. And then it just looked like a regular person. I wouldn't think it was a ghost. I would think like, well, no, somebody broke into your house.

I see what you're saying. But then also like on the doorstep, you know, outside of the front door, if there's like, oh my God, look at this evidence of a ghost. I'm like, that's just a delivery person. No, it's not. That's a ghost. You know, it's like. Well, and also like the breaking in thing. Okay. Just hear me out. Like if, okay, if we had footage inside our house that appeared to be a fully formed person, well, then we would begin searching our house for, well, how did they break it? Totally. So without proof of breaking and entering. Yeah.

And the way that our security system is, it's like every time a door opens, there's an alert. So then we would very quickly deduce that it was not a breaking and entering. Totally. We would. Yeah. But it'd be real hard to convince anybody else of that because they're not going to take all the time. And they have to believe you. Like, did you check the doors? Sure. So that's like, oh, okay, maybe there is more proof than we realize out there.

And then another thing just from the story of that whole thing of the same dream, the same night. We've come across that before. That is so freaky. Like co-dreaming. Co-dreaming. And then like not only did they both dream that, but they talked to a third person who also was like I had some, who had some kind of indication of like,

a dark thing in that same closet, like a dark mass. Right, right, right. So it's like them and their kid all coming to the, separately to the same conclusion about a dark mass in the closet. Yeah. And then the sister comes over and says there's something with the closet. Yeah. All the stuff with the closet and the dogs didn't want to go to the room with that closet in it. Totally. That come, just that, just that one night, like, I don't

I don't know. We got to do something about this room. No, I'm so proud of them for moving quickly. Yeah, yeah. Very lucky that that was an option for them, but like so proud of them for getting out. Get away from Mr. Bones. Ugh. Great story. God.

Something is just like, feels so off in here. Let's tell your last story. Let's get the hell out of here. Get the fuck out of here. I got to burn some, I got to do some smoke cleansing after this. I'm just going to. We're clearly recording late at night for this one. Okay. I'm just going to spray some, that sound you just heard is me spraying some like crystal spray. Just kind of do a little cleansing. Do you want to spray yourself? I'm good. Whatever makes you feel better though. Okay. Well, I'm safe.

All right. Now, this next story, I mentioned the title. It might give you a little giggle. Yeah. The Tickle Lady. The Tickle Lady. Yep. All right. Here we go. As ghost stories go, this one started in a seemingly normal home. An American suburban family, two brothers who shared a room, and of course, one really annoying witch.

It was a typical night for the brothers, dinner at the table, a little bit of TV time, and bed by 9 p.m. The older brother, Salvo, had trouble sleeping, so it often took him quite a while to drift off. Their parents usually went to bed around 10 p.m., and Salvo would lie there thinking of the headless horseman and imagining that he would come to claim a head from him.

On this particular night, he really couldn't fall asleep. Salvo had a vivid imagination and often found himself lost in his own fantasies, whether he was dressing up as Clark Kent slash Superman or convincing himself he'd seen a UFO while standing in the front yard. It was a rainy and rather cold evening in Northern California. Salvo lie in bed, hoping to fall asleep while his younger brother Chase was already deep in dreamland.

The sound of rain pattered on the roof and occasional gusts of wind whipped around audible through the window. Mom and Dad were sound asleep, leaving Salvo alone with his thoughts, staring at the slightly open bedroom door. Then he heard a giggle, then the shuffling of feet. "'Chase, are you awake?' he whispered. No response from Chase, who continued sleeping peacefully."

The giggling had stopped. Or maybe it was just Salvo's imagination. How could he be sure? He decided to crawl out of bed and investigate. With mom and dad's room across the hall, what could go wrong? Salvo made his way to the door. The giggling had ceased and he no longer heard any footsteps. Slowly, he opened the door.

Darkness filled the hallway, and the sounds of the weather swirled through the house. Just a quick look, he thought. He saw nothing, but a chill crawled up his back. The next day passed uneventfully, but as bedtime approached, Salvo told Chase about the odd sound he'd heard. "'Just your imagination. It was probably the wind,' Chase said."

Chase was probably right. Salvo had been particularly frightened lately when he'd gone to bed, especially after watching the cartoon Legend of Sleepy Hollow. His imagination had been running wild with sounds and sights ever since. Bedtime came, and the two boys climbed into their respective bunks. The older brother, Salvo, asked his little brother, Chase, to keep an eye and ear out for anything unusual. Chase agreed, but he knew his eyes wouldn't stay open for long.

Salvo lay in bed, his mind racing, wondering if the sounds would happen again. The giggling, the shuffling feet on the hardwood floor. Please, not tonight, he thought. But then he heard it. A slight giggle.

It grew louder as he thought, as he, a slight giggle. It grew louder as he heard the feet rubbing against the floor, faster and faster. The high-pitched giggle did not sound friendly. It got closer and closer, faster and faster. He pulled the covers up over his head, knowing the door would swing open any minute. Chase! Chase! Chase! What? Chase mumbled.

The door flew open, and she moved with lightning speed to Salvo's bed, fingers or claws clamped down on his chest, and started tickling him. Giggling and tickling and giggling and tickling. Salvo started to laugh, but then cried because she wouldn't stop. Salvo! Salvo! Salvo, are you okay?

Chase shouted. She stopped and moved quickly to Chase's bed. The giggling grew louder and then Chase began to cry. Chase, hang on! Salvo yelled. He got out of bed and turned to his younger brother. She was gone? She was gone? Are you okay? Salvo asked. Yeah. What was that? Chase asked. I don't know. I really don't know.

The brothers kept their secret from their parents, knowing they would dismiss it as imagination, the house creaking, or anything but a creepy lady giggling and tickling them to tears. The next day passed quickly, but the incident weighed heavily on their minds at school. They didn't tell anyone and dreaded what the night might bring.

As nightfall approached, the boys made every excuse to stay up later. Just one night, please! But their parents were steadfast and kept to a strict bedtime. They even contemplated throwing a big fit, hoping to delay the inevitable. Instead, they convinced themselves it wouldn't happen again. It couldn't. She'd had her fun. She got what she wanted.

From what they gathered, the tickling and the pain she caused were exactly what she wanted. It stopped after she reached the two boys. Maybe it would be over just as quickly tonight. Wash, rinse, repeat. Sure enough, as soon as their parents were sound asleep, the boys heard the giggle.

Then the shuffling feet. Then the door bursting open. Hiding under the covers, they hoped she wouldn't see them. To no avail, though. The claws seemed sharper this time, digging into their flesh. The boys were crying, punching into the dark. Why couldn't their parents hear them? Why wouldn't they come in and rescue them from this witch? And as soon as it started, it ended. How do we stop her, Salvo? I don't know. I don't even know what or who that is.

We need to tell mom and dad. But they don't even hear our cries or that lady's evil laugh. They're not going to believe us. Salvo couldn't sleep that night contemplating what to do. How do you kill something that no one else sees? She was strong. She had claws. And she knew how to get into the house without their parents knowing.

The next day was rough. The boys discussed not going to school, claiming they were sick, but they knew their parents would never go for that. You pretty much had to be throwing up, bleeding to death, or both, and be witnessed by said parents to even get a consideration for a sick call.

They considered telling some of the other kids at school, but they knew the outcome. They'd be mocked, shunned, laughed at, and maybe even beaten up. Selva was no stranger to being bullied, and Chase hated being made fun of. So they sucked it up, and they got through the day. As Selva was getting ready for bed, he noticed something. Could it work? His dad had bought him a cap gun a couple of weeks back, the kind with the roll of red caps.

Could this really work, he thought. He turned to Chase as he was getting into bed. I'm going to kill her tonight, Chase. What? What are you going to do? I'm going to kill her, and I'm going to use this gun to do it. They both climbed into bed, and Salvo set the gun next to him. He had to be quick. He had to be smarter than the witch. He had to be faster than the witch. The parents made their way to bed, and soon the lights were off. Not long now, he thought.

Come on, come on. He waited and waited and waited. Where was she? Chase had fallen asleep, exhausted from the night before. Salvo's eyes were hard to keep open. He didn't want to be surprised. He needed to stay awake for this. He heard a sound. Was it her?

Then he saw a light turn on. Mom or dad must have gotten up to use the bathroom. Okay, that made sense. The witch didn't bother his parents. She knew they were still awake. That had to be it. Salvo lied there, staring at the light coming through the crack in the door. A few moments later, the light went off, and he could hear the adults make their way back to the bedroom. Then came the silence. Then the darkness. Then the quiet.

Evil giggling began, quickly making its way down the hall. The door flung open and Selvo finally saw the witch approaching his bed. Eyes glowing, teeth sharp as needles. Without thinking, he sprang into action. He reached for his gun as the claws outstretched towards him. He turned and pointed the gun, firing off the caps.

This stopped her in her tracks. She reared back, the giggling turning to a hiss. She lunged again and he fired once more. He kept firing until the pistol was empty and then she just disappeared. Gone. Salvo made his way over to his brother's bed, shook him, and Chase sat up quickly, expecting the worst. I got her, Chase! I got her! Both my brother and I look back at this and still don't know what happened or what she was.

We don't know if it was our imagination or if something evil was lurking in the house. Our parents never saw or admitted to seeing or hearing anything. Were we both dreaming the same thing? We've talked about this a lot throughout our lives, and admittedly, we just don't know. We're just happy she never returned. Isn't that such a wild story? That is such a weird story. It's so weird, but I somehow also really love it. Yeah, it's like...

Really creepy moments. Yeah. And also cute. Yes! Like, did you ever have a cap gun when you were a kid? No, my parents were... Oh, that's right. Yeah, no toy guns. No toy guns, not even water guns. Okay, yeah. I forget about cap guns because it's kind of a funny thing. Like, there's a little roll...

That you put in them and then, yeah, just make it pop, pop, pop. Like a little, like, you know, pop sound. Kind of like a snap. But nothing, like, comes out of it. No. Like, you can't actually hurt anybody. But it just makes more of a bang sound. Yeah. With that stuff. It's just so funny to, like, picture little kids. I mean, I can totally see myself doing that as a little kid. Of course. Be like, I got to shoot this thing with my toy gun. Makes total sense, right? Also, like...

That's such a weird concept of like a scary monster. It's like this witch looking entity with his sharp teeth and the claws, this creepy giggle. But then when it gets a hold of you, it just tickles you. Well, yeah, but think about like, think about like a creepy ass clown. Oh, yes. It's totally creepy. Yeah. But it's just funny that it doesn't like trying to stab you, like, you know, something much more malevolent. Well, if you were, I mean, and it's tickling you until it hurts. Yeah, it hurts. Until you cry. Yeah, yeah. So it is like, you know, I don't know.

tormenting you. Yeah, that's a good word. But yeah, so strange. But that would be so upsetting. So upsetting. Because it's so like, what the... Like, I can understand how these two little kids are like, what is happening? Because it really doesn't make sense. Can you imagine now as an adult, like you and I are laying in bed tonight and a fucking witch entity, a little monster comes into our room. And tickles us. And tickles us. It would be so upsetting, but also like...

How high are we? Yeah, like what drugs are we on? Honestly, in that situation, I just think like, is there CO2 poisoning in our house? I know. I would think some really peculiar things. Also, you had a pretty funny little word flub. Yeah. You said kickling instead of tickling, which made me think of like, I want to get that out there. Like if you kickle somebody, it's tickling with your feet. Oh, like toe tickle? Like you can only use your legs to tickle.

Like you got to tickle somebody kind of like, um, what would they call it? I think, I don't know if this is even like a proper thing now, but like the Indian leg wrestling. Is that what it was called? You lay on your back. It was this whole thing when I was like a kid and I came up with that. That's the right term. But you lay on your back facing some, no, no. Okay. Both people are laying on their back. It's a contest and your legs are towards each other.

And you kind of like leg wrestle and you try and like slam the other person with only your legs. I vaguely, I don't remember if I ever totally even knew the rules. This sounds weirdly familiar because I have especially strong legs and I remember being very good at this. Okay. But I don't remember what it was called. Yeah, I feel like most kids have done it. Yeah. Some form of weird form, made up form of kid wrestling that somehow just gets spread around from generation to generation where you're only going with your legs. Yeah. And I just picture kickling. Yeah.

being like that, but you have to get somebody to submit like, mercy, no more, but only using your legs to tickle them. Okay. And I think the person defending themselves should only be able to use their legs to defend themselves. Okay. So let's, yeah. So go creeps and peepers, get to kickling. All right. Let us know how it goes. And yeah, and that's all I got other than I like the name Salvo. I like the idea that we can get rid of ghosts with cap guns.

Yeah, just shoot to blast those ghosts. I imagine cap gun sales going up really highly for scared to death listeners because they're like, okay, I'm going to get some Palo Santo, some crystals, and some cap guns. Oh my gosh, you know what you should try with ghosts? Those little salt guns that people use for bugs. Oh my gosh, that'd be hilarious. Because your salt is supposed to be good for that kind of stuff. So just shoot the ghosts with salt.

Okay. Get a little salt gun. I think they sell like little salt shotguns too. Okay. No, we could get really weird with this. Yeah, I like this. Let's go ghost hunting with our salt guns. And you could have a squirt gun with like blessed water. Oh, this is actually, that's brilliant. To the combination of salt. Guys, how have we never thought of this? Yeah, just light them up. Oh my gosh. Now, do we have any listeners who work for...

custom water gun manufacturers because what we're going to need are custom scared to death water guns. But like specific for shooting...

And a custom scared of the assault shotgun. Yeah. Like we need to bring out the heavy. Do we need like a like assault wrist rocket? That would be great. Like big chunks of salt that you can wrist rocket at them. Well, you don't have to have a custom that you can just use a regular wrist rocket for that. No, I wanted to make a cool scared to death one. Okay. I like I like where we're heading with all this. Yeah, this is great. Oh, the musings of our mad minds. Do you want to thank some Annabelle's?

I guess. Okay. I'm just kidding. Of course I do. Of course I do. I want to thank our Annabelles for continuing to support our show and making our monthly donations possible. Melvin Baugh, Robert Tinnen, Sam Bonus. Well, that is just the best name ever. Bonus. Sam Bonus. Just like, that's just great. Kenneth Lauchs, Janessa Addison.

Bobby Graves. Well, Bobby was meant to be on this show. The last name like Graves. Come on. Old Bobby Graves. You and Shakey. Oh, man. Worst concert ever. Angela Hare, Kim Angel, Aaron Freeze, and Lizzie Conkey. Yeah. Thank you for supporting our show. And also thank you to the following Annabelle's Stephanie Hockett, Drew Bathen, Haley Adele, Captain Bing Bong. I like it.

Maddie Yee, Lindsay Patton. Great name. Sean Mallett, Crystal LaRosa, Amanda Dalton, and Megan Benitez. Nice. Okay, I have a slew of spooky shout-outs this week. To Holly from Casey and Zach, our stinky dog. Oh, from Casey and Zach, our stinky dog. Happy birthday. I love you lots. Stay spooky.

To Maddie, from Maddie, you are doing great. You're an amazing mom. Aw. Even when it doesn't feel like it. And you will get that promotion. Yeah. No, let's will it into existence, Maddie. To Arlene, from your dad, Danny, happy 13th birthday. I love you. To Yadin, from Yadin, happy birthday to myself. May Lusafina send me a little treat. Nice. I like it. To Pixie, from Husbeast, this is so cute. Okay. Okay. So, uh...

This is the inverse of last week because the female partner emailed me one week. Oh, nice. And then the male partner emailed me. And then I was like, oh my gosh, you guys, this is so cute. Anyways, to Pixie from Husbeast, happy anniversary, nine years of love, chaos, geekery, and more. I love you, Froggy, no matter what space poop falls on you. Oh my God. It was something about like, I think he said like,

birds poop on her all the time. Like, if there's a bird nearby, she will get shat on. To Angela from Sean, happy belated birthday. You're the strongest person I know. I love you.

To Kayla, from Kayla, happy 30th birthday, bitch. Go ahead and have your midlife crisis. You earned it. Kayla, I hope 30 is not your midlife. Yeah, no kidding. Girl, girl. Save the midlife crisis for another decade or two. Or I just like read like a very, no, not read. I was listening to an interview with Andrew Garfield, like Spider-Man. Yeah. And he said,

something to the effect of like a midlife crisis what if we reframed it instead of calling it a crisis like what if we just called it like a midlife evolution and I was like wow that's beautiful because it's very valid at 40 I'm going to say midlife evolution I'm a different person and it's ugh so anyways Kayla 30s are awesome 40s are even better

And lastly, to Ash from your Yeti man, happy first year or wedding anniversary just depends on when you finally get caught up to me on Scared to Death. You're slacking. Can't wait to dance into forever with you. I love you. Adorable. Adorbs. Totes dorbs. And that is our show. Thank you for continuing to send in your personal tales of terror to mystoryatscaredtodeathpodcast.com. I got to get out of this space. It's spooky in here. You can email us for everything else at info at scaredtodeathpodcast.com.

Thank you to Logan Keith scoring today's show. Thank you to Heather Rylander organizing the My Story emails. Thank you to book editor Drew Atana polishing and preparing listener stories for book number six.

Thanks to Molly Box finding the first story I told this week and to Olivia Lee for finding the second. We are on Facebook and Instagram where we post the pics that accompany episodes and more at Scared to Death Podcast. Also have a private Facebook group called Creeps and Peepers full of horror lovers. And big thanks to the All Seen Eyes, the Creeps and Peepers moderators. Now enjoy your nightmares, Creeps and Peepers. Hope you were scared to death. Bye. Because you're mine. Shut up.

If spirits threaten me in this place, fight water by water and fire by fire. Vanish their souls into nothingness and remove their powers until the last trace. Let these evil beings bleed through time and space. Evil may pass through but have no home here within. Scared to death. Bad Magic Productions. I put a spell on you.

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