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[Assistant] For practitioners of powwowing, it was a required tool, and they rarely went anywhere without it. It was a small book, easily stuffed into a pocket or purse, and in the world of those who believed in that particular bent of folk magic, it was practically on par with the Bible.


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[Assistant] Hannah lived about four miles outside the village, in a small log cabin just off the muddy road.


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[Assistant] Behind the tiny house was a small hill covered in boulders and trees. And off in the side yard was a kennel where she was said to keep a pair of large black dogs.


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[Assistant] Roaming all over the property, of course, were a few black cats. I guess my point is this. If ever there was someone perfectly set up to look like a witch, Hannah Heatherly was it.


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[Assistant] Sometime in the winter of 1878 to 1879, Hannah claimed to have a number of odd dreams. In one of them, she was pulled from her bed by some powerful, invisible force and carried to a nearby mill. Once there, a voice cried out, dig here, and you will find money that was once stolen and then hidden away in secret. The following night, the dream happened again.


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[Assistant] Hannah tested the signs by performing rituals that might help her, and each time she claimed that the evidence pointed toward gold.


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[Assistant] So she told a handful of her regular customers about the dreams, and a few of them offered to help.


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[Assistant] According to her, most of them were sons of wealthy local tobacco farmers, most likely looking for a way to become as rich as their parents, without the years of hard work, of course. So Hannah drew up a list of 24 locations where she believed gold had been buried.


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[Assistant] And then went to retrieve a special charm book that she kept hidden away.


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[Assistant] It was an old book, written in German, that she had inherited from her grandfather. And to keep it safe, she tended to wrap it in oiled leather and bury it beneath her ash heap. It was described by one witness as filled with text in red and black inks. Red for the blood of good spirits.


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[Assistant] It was called the sixth and seventh book of Moses.


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[Assistant] Their expeditions worked something like this. Hannah would lead a team of diggers to a particular location, and the ritual would begin.


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[Assistant] No one was allowed to utter a word, and digging would carry on for hours in utter silence, lest the spell be broken. They would dig a hole in the earth six feet in diameter and six feet deep, and then Hannah would climb down inside it.


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[Assistant] Then she would place a special piece of parchment on the dirt at the bottom, all covered in weird occult symbols and diagrams, and then pull a device out of her bag called an earth glass. It was supposed to allow her to see the treasure beneath the ground, and as long as they remained silent and did everything right, that treasure would slowly rise up toward them.


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[Assistant] Once the diggers claimed that they all saw exactly that begin to happen, a large iron chest slowly emerged from the ground, like a whale surfacing for air.


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[Assistant] But the sight of it was almost too amazing to believe, and one of the workers muttered an exclamation out loud. Instantly, the chest began to sink back down, and despite a number of them scrambling to catch it, it slipped away.


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[Assistant] For weeks upon weeks, Hannah led her team of followers all around the region, almost always at night, digging for buried treasure.


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[Assistant] Houndless newspaper articles were published of their adventures, and a handful of reporters even showed up on her doorstep to ask her all about it. But as far as the historical record tells us, they never found a single thing.


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[Assistant] Hannah's treasure hunt does teach us something powerful about hidden secrets and forbidden knowledge, though. We might not always be able to find what we're looking for. But we'll never know. Unless we dig.


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[Assistant] This episode of Lore was written and produced by me, Aaron Manke, with research by Sam Alberti and music by Chad Lawson. From time to time, my researchers will find a book that provides a deep well for a particular topic. And while an episode like this only tries to scratch the surface, curious listeners might want to learn more.


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[Assistant] To that end, I want to point you in the direction of a book called Grimoires by Owen Davies. It's thick with scholarly details, but it's well written and full of texture. I've put a link to it in the episode description and on the episode page of the Lore website. So please, if you want to know more, check it out.


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[Assistant] Lore is also much more than just a podcast. There's a book series available in bookstores and online, and two seasons of the television show on Amazon Prime Video. Check them both out if you want more lore in your life.


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[Assistant] I also make two other podcasts, Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities and Unobscured, and I think you'd enjoy both. Each one explores areas of our dark history, ranging from bite-sized episodes to season-long dives into a single topic.


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[Assistant] And you can learn more about both of those shows and everything else going on over in one central place. GrimAndMild.com


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[Assistant] And you can also follow the show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Just search for LorePodcast, all one word, and then click that follow button. When you do, say hi. I like it when people say hi.


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[Assistant] Now it's easy to assume it's just a pile of stones, and in some ways that's exactly what it is. A man-made breakwater built by the same people who built the bridge back in the early 70s. But the stones they used were actually headstones from a real centuries-old burial ground.


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[Assistant] They came from an area about 10 miles to the northwest, on the west side of the campus of Temple University. In fact, if you stand on the front steps of the Temple Performing Arts Center and look across the street, you can still see a low stone wall.


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[Assistant] It is all that remains of Monument Cemetery, a burial ground that fell out of use in the 1920s before it was purchased by the university in 1956 to allow for some much needed campus expansion.


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[Assistant] Disposing of the headstones was the easy part. It was the 28,000 graves that were much more problematic to relocate. Notices were sent out to living relatives of the people interred there, and roughly 8,000 of them came and took their loved ones to new locations. But over 20,000 graves seem to have been forgotten.


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[Assistant] So the university moved them to a mass grave in a newer cemetery north of town.


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[Assistant] It's an interesting story for a lot of reasons. For one, knowing your track and field complex is built on the site of an old graveyard. A graveyard whose headstones now help protect a nearby bridge is a great topic to pull out at parties. And for that, you're welcome.


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[Assistant] But it's also interesting for another reason. It shows us, with perfect clarity, how people tend to handle the past.


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[Assistant] We want progress. We want change. We want to move further down the cultural road, and sometimes the past can hold us back. And just like the old Monument Cemetery, we often try to just pave over history and move forward, whether or not that's the best decision in the long run.


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[Assistant] It happens everywhere, but I think it's fair to say that there are few places in America with as much historical baggage than the city of Philadelphia.


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[Assistant] Whether it's the events that led to the birth of the United States or the centuries of life and death that have played out there ever since, the city of brotherly love has become a reminder of a very powerful lesson. You can bury the pain and mistakes of the past and pretend it has all gone away, but you can never keep it from coming back.


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[Assistant] Philadelphia is a city that needs no introductions, and it's easy to see why.


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[Assistant] Both of the United States founding documents, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, were written there. And the city played a pivotal role in the Revolutionary War. And it's also a treasure trove of American firsts. The first hospital, medical school, public library, and even the first zoo. But it didn't start off so special.


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[Assistant] In 1681, King Charles II found himself with a problem. He owed a good amount of money to one of his admirals, and when that man's son paid him a visit, he assumed that the family would be demanding repayment. Instead, the admiral's son requested a charter to settle a colony in the New World.


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[Assistant] That son was a man named William Penn, and the colony he was awarded would become known as Pennsylvania.


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[Assistant] Interestingly, it wasn't his first bit of land in the New World. Just a few years earlier, he had purchased the colonial province of West Jersey, which would one day become part of the state of New Jersey. And because of that, the gift of the Pennsylvania Territory turned him into the largest non-royal landholder in the world.


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[Assistant] But Penn didn't do the typical colonial European thing when he arrived. Maybe it was the visible aftermath of previous settlements in the territory. Decades of expansion by the Dutch and Swedish had left the local Native American people reeling, with waves of smallpox and armed conflict wearing them down over the years. William Penn arrived with a different plan in mind.


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[Assistant] You see, he was a Quaker, part of an offshoot of Christianity that was heavily persecuted back in England. He understood what it was like to be a stranger under attack in a new place. So after arriving in the new world to build his new colony, he approached the Lenape people, negotiated a fair price for the land that he wanted, and then bought it.


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[Assistant] I get the feeling that from the very beginning, William Penn wanted to think a little different. He wanted people who lived in his colony to worship freely, however they chose. And he wanted their new community to exist in peace with the Native Americans who had been there for thousands of years.


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[Assistant] The actual results were never perfect, but they represented a much better start than many other colonies at the time. Built on that foundation, Philadelphia thrived.


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[Assistant] By 1758, it had become the largest and busiest port in the American colonies, and it just kept on growing. Of course, it didn't help that it was home to great minds like Benjamin Franklin and colonial spy Peggy Shippen. So by the time the murmurs of revolution began to spread, Philadelphia was a natural center point.


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[Assistant] Much of what happened after that was probably part of your history lessons in school. The colony's state house there in the city was used as the location where the Declaration of Independence was signed. Which is why, of course, they eventually changed its name to Independence Hall. And they used it again for the Constitutional Convention, which hammered out the contents of the Constitution.


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[Assistant] But like any major city, tragedy wasn't far behind. In 1793, a wave of yellow fever washed over the city, then home to roughly 50,000 people.


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[Assistant] It arrived in late July of that year, and by August 1st, it was already claiming lives. It took four months to run its course, but it was so brutal that over 20,000 people actually fled the city, nearly half of those living there.


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[Assistant] When it was over, at least 5,000 people were dead. Today it's remembered as the most deadly outbreak of yellow fever in American history. All those dead needed to be buried too. And that's the other legacy of Philadelphia that most people aren't aware of.


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[Assistant] When you're one of the largest cities in the country, it also means that you have a lot of burials to do.


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[Assistant] In fact, Philadelphia has a massive amount of cemeteries, at least 210 by most counts.


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[Assistant] Part of that is all the fault of the founder, William Penn. In order for his freedom of religion philosophy to truly be lived out, one of the things he believed was that graveyards should be established by each religious group as they needed it. And as a result, rather than finding a few large burial grounds, the city filled up with scores of little ones.


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[Assistant] Eventually, the European garden-style cemeteries became popular, combining burial grounds with something closer to a park in appearance. In fact, Monument Cemetery was one of them, before it fell into disrepair and was paved over in the 1950s, of course.


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[Assistant] But time has a way of paving over things on its own, doesn't it? As the decades have gone by, more and more of those small old graveyards have been replaced with modern development. Because humans are constantly looking toward the future, and oftentimes the past becomes a casualty in that process. To move forward, some people think that we need to leave our history behind.


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[Assistant] In a city like Philadelphia though, history isn't just something that happened. It's alive and active and seemingly all around us. Try as we might, no amount of paving or construction can make it all go away.


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[Assistant] But if the stories that are still whispered about the city today are true, it's easy to see why they'd want to.


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[Assistant] There's a lot to talk about in Philly. From Independence Hall to the Liberty Bell, it seems that the early days of the United States are on full display there. And because of that, those places and objects have become household names. But there are some lesser known ones, too.


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[Assistant] In 1770, a local group of laborers known as the Carpenters' Company of Philadelphia built a meeting hall for its large 200-member meetings. Four years later, delegates from 12 of the 13 colonies needed a place to meet to discuss a British blockade of Boston Harbor, a meeting that is now known today as the First Continental Congress, and the Carpenters' Hall was the perfect spot.


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[Assistant] During the Revolutionary War, the building was home to a military hospital, changing hands between the Americans and the British at least once. And then when the dust settled, it became the home to the first national bank. In fact, it was its use as a bank that caused one particular experience to take place.


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[Assistant] In August of 1789, two men entered Carpenter's Hall in the dead of night and then made their way down to the bank vault in the basement. As quickly as they could, they filled their bags with over $160,000, a fortune close to half a million dollars today. And then they left, vanishing into the darkness.


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[Assistant] It turns out the locks on the building had recently been changed. The locksmith the Carpenter's Guild had hired, a man named Pat Lyons, did the work without any problems, but mysteriously skipped town about two days before the robbery. So while the authorities didn't know who the two thieves were, they did try to track down Lyons.


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[Assistant] After he was apprehended he rolled on his partners in crime.


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[Assistant] One man, Isaac Davis, was finally captured four months later while he was trying to deposit an obscene amount of money into another bank. His fellow thief, Thomas Cunningham, would never face justice, though. It turns out that he actually lived in a room on the second floor of Carpenter's Hall, but died from yellow fever just a few days after robbing the bank. His rotting corpse was found later that week.


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[Assistant] Carpenter's Hall went through a lot of changes after that. Eventually, the upstairs boarding house was converted into an apartment for a permanent caretaker. And it stayed that way for over a century. Then, in the 1960s, a new family moved in.


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[Assistant] The first thing they noticed was the odd collection of noises they would hear each night. One of the first nights they encountered them the thumps and banging sounds above them were so loud that they called the police to search the home. The police found nothing in the attic other than cobwebs and dust, but they did report a powerful stench.


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[Assistant] Perhaps it was just a dead animal. Or maybe it was an echo of the thief who died in the house from yellow fever.


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[Assistant] Years later, that same family reported hearing shouting in the lower level during the night. It sounded to them like a group of men were having a lively debate, with questions and shouts of agreements filling the room.


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[Assistant] It never seemed violent, but with that many people inside the building, the caretakers certainly didn't feel safe investigating.


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[Assistant] They stayed in their apartment that night, but when they were inspecting the meeting hall in the morning, they claimed to notice the scent of pipe tobacco. But the oddest part of the experience was the date that it all happened. September 5th of 1974. Exactly 200 years after the first meeting of the First Continental Congress.


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[Assistant] But Carpenter's Hall isn't the only building with shadows of the past inside it. South of the city stands another relic from the birth of the nation, Fort Mifflin. And while its tragic history happened long ago, some people think the aftershocks have lingered on.


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[Assistant] It was built by the British as Fort Island Battery in 1772 at what must have seemed like the worst possible time for them in hindsight. Just a few years later, the Americans rebelled and Fort Island Battery was taken over to use against the people who built it.


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[Assistant] They weren't too happy about that either, and in 1777, the British destroyed the structure with cannon fire from the Delaware River.


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[Assistant] It's said that roughly 75% of the soldiers inside the fort at the time were killed in the attack. Something that certainly must have left an echo of pain and suffering.


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[Assistant] After the war was over, the United States military rebuilt the fort, renamed it after Governor Thomas Mifflin, and then kept it in operation for another century. It even served as a Civil War prison camp in the 1860s, adding another dark chapter to its painful story.


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[Assistant] Today there are a number of stories that are whispered among visitors to the fort. Some people claim to have experienced unusual sights and sounds inside the blacksmith shop located on the site. Doors that move on their own. And the sounds of a hammer pounding on metal are all frequent occurrences there.


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[Assistant] Others have heard the sounds of screaming near the officer's quarters, and while there's no way to prove it, stories have grown up around those sounds to provide an explanation. It's said that a woman named Elizabeth Pratt lived on the fort with her husband, a military officer, and their daughter.


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[Assistant] But family tragedy led to her taking her own life. To this day, visitors claim they can hear her wailing and crying in grief.


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[Assistant] But the most haunted location in the forts, according to those who have been there, is inside one of the fortified gun structures known as a casemate. During war, the casemates were structures within the wall of the fort that would house the guns, with small openings to allow munitions to be fired at enemy ships. But at least one of those casemates was used for another purpose.


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[Assistant] During the American Civil War, Casemate 11 was converted into a prison cell for Confederate soldiers and war criminals. One of those was a man named William Howe, a Union soldier who killed his commanding officer before attempting to desert his post.


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[Assistant] Howe spent his final days in Casemate 11, waiting for his trial and sentencing, and even carved his signature into one of the walls where it can still be seen today.


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[Assistant] When they executed him, the Union forces actually sold tickets. On August 26th of 1864, hundreds of locals handed over a bit of cash to come watch Howe stand atop the gallows with a black sack over his head, and then plummet to his death. And then, they all went home.


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[Assistant] But there are stories that suggest that Hau never left. Some visitors to Casemate 11 have seen odd shapes that move in the darkness, and the figure of a man in a Civil War uniform has been spotted there as well.


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[Assistant] And the clue that seems to suggest that this figure was William Howe? Well, it seems that those who have seen him have been able to describe almost everything about him except for one glaring omission. His face, they say, is covered by something dark.


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[Assistant] Tragedy comes in a lot of shapes and sizes, and throughout the centuries, Philadelphia has played host to a variety of them. From hangings to outbreaks, battles for freedom and petty crime, pain and suffering has stained just about every page of the city's history.


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[Assistant] One of the more forgotten tales, though, has nothing to do with the birth of America or the war for independence. Instead, it's a tragic story of just how bad humans are at dealing with their own failings and mistakes, and it serves as a reminder


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[Assistant] of just how dangerous our actions and ideas can be.


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[Assistant] The northeastern edge of the city is a neighborhood known as Summerton. Today it's part of the urban sprawl that is Philadelphia, but in the late 1800s it was home to a work farm for the mentally ill.


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[Assistant] Of course, an enormous amount has changed in the field of mental health over the past century and a half. So what constituted mental illness back then was a bit of a gray area.


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[Assistant] In 1907, the farm was replaced by a set of buildings that would later become known as the Bybury Mental Hospital. It was a cluster of structures that would serve as the residence and treatment facilities for patients diagnosed by the local hospital as mentally ill.


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[Assistant] But in 1907, there was a common belief that all patients suffered from physical causes that could be treated in the same manner. And sadly, that sweeping generalization led to decades of tragedy.


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[Assistant] The problems actually started in the local government, though. When the hospital was being built, the official in charge of the project allowed corruption and negligence to invade every aspect of the construction. Contractors were allowed to build the city exorbitant amounts of money for the smallest things, drawing up the budget long before the facility was ready to open.


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[Assistant] As a result, much of the hospital was built with poor materials and with untrained labor. It's said that within the first decade it was open, one patient managed to escape the residence by literally chewing through a wooden window frame. Another managed to pick the lock on their door with a kitchen spoon, illustrating two powerful lessons. The building was poorly made and the patients wanted out of it.


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[Assistant] In 1917, the U.S. military paid the hospital a visit. World War I had left them struggling to care for all the wounded soldiers returning from Europe and they were inspecting hospitals on the East Coast that might serve as overflow help.


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[Assistant] But after inspecting the facilities at Bybury, they quickly changed their minds.


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[Assistant] The hospital was becoming less of a treatment center and more of a prison for the unwanted in society. Violent criminals were sent to stay there alongside actual cases of mental illness, creating a terrible mixture of human struggles. Add in the poor conditions and the vastly outnumbered staff, and it was a tragedy just waiting to happen. And that staff was part of the problem too.


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[Assistant] Sure, they were outnumbered, but they were also unqualified for the work that they were doing. In fact, a good number of the people watching over the patients were patients themselves. Individuals who'd been promoted simply because they seemed more stable than the rest. As you can imagine, that was a recipe for disaster.


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[Assistant] In 1919, one of the local papers began to investigate the daily happenings at the facility and the details they reported were stunning.


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[Assistant] In one report, it was claimed that two orderlies actually choked a patient to death in an effort to subdue him. But because these men were revealed to be former soldiers suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, they weren't punished for their crime. Instead, they were given raises.


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[Assistant] Other employees of the hospital had less savory pasts. Violent criminals were often sent to work there as an alternative to serving their sentences in prison. For the state, they were cheaper to care for that way. But they were also entirely unqualified for the work they needed to perform. And in many cases, they used their positions to abuse the patients.


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[Assistant] By the 1930s, Bybury Mental Hospital was barely recognizable as one.


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[Assistant] Patients wandered the hallways completely naked. The truck used to deliver food to the facility was the same one used to haul away the dead. And violence and abuse were practically part of the system. So in 1938, the state stepped in and took over, renaming it the Philadelphia State Hospital. But the needed improvements never came.


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[Assistant] The population had grown to over 4,000 patients, double what the facility had been designed to care for. And it would soon get worse. By the 1980s, conditions were so bad that the hospital was at risk of losing its Medicare funding.


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[Assistant] In the end, it was two tragic events in 1987 that helped close down the facility for good.


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[Assistant] In March of that year, a court ruled in favor of a patient who had been left in shackles for over three years rather than properly care for him. And then three months later, a female patient went missing from the building. It would take over nine weeks to find her body hidden outside on the hospital grounds. No suspects were ever arrested for her murder.


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[Assistant] Those horrible revelations led to an investigation, which finally resulted in an order to close down the hospital. Yes, the building sat empty for decades, as was so common with these old mental health facilities. And yes, its empty shell became home to all manner of unusual reports and activity.


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[Assistant] But as far as I can tell, there are no collections of hauntings that people still whisper about today.


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[Assistant] And maybe that's alright. Because for a building like the Philadelphia State Hospital, stories of ghostly visions and unnatural sightings aren't necessary to paint the place as haunted. Its past was already painful enough as it is.


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[Assistant] And while the things that were documented within those walls over the years certainly seemed to include monsters, they weren't of the supernatural kind. Instead, it was us.


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[Assistant] History can be a tricky thing to manage. On one hand, it needs to be cared for and preserved so that we can pass it on to the next generation, like an heirloom. On the other, that heirloom is filled with all manner of unsightly mistakes, and it's easy to think the world is better if we never open it up again.


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[Assistant] Thankfully, there's a lot worth saving in Philadelphia. For every Bybury Mental Hospital or Eastern State Penitentiary, there is an Independence Hall or Betsy Ross House. So much of the history that has been saved is there to teach and inspire. And that's something we can all be grateful for. But it doesn't make the shadows go away.


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[Assistant] Thanks to federal regulations regarding asbestos, the Philadelphia State Hospital wasn't actually torn down until 2006, which meant that its hulking presence was there every day for years, reminding people of the horrors committed inside it in the name of science.


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[Assistant] Between the inhumane treatment of the patients there and the staff's barbaric approach to mental illness, it's no wonder locals assumed for years that the place was cursed.


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[Assistant] In the decades between its closure and demolition, police were called to the property hundreds of times, fielding reports of satanic rituals and other criminal activity. Today, the land it once stood on is mostly occupied by a modern retirement home, although there are still some remnants of the old hospital's roads snaking around the southern edge of the property.


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[Assistant] When over at Fort Mifflin, tourists still shuffle through each day to enjoy the experience. It's hard to blame them, too. The layout and history of the fort really does set it apart, and so much of it has been preserved. If you were to stop by today, you'd be able to walk the grounds on the main level and also tour through some of the buildings, including the casemates down below.


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[Assistant] Visitors to the place seem to enjoy the educational nature of the tours offered there. In fact, many people over the years have walked out with a smile on their face, which they've blamed on one of the tour guides who assisted them.


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[Assistant] They say this man dressed in impeccable period clothing and tells jokes and answers questions while he shares amazing forgotten details about the fort. It's supposed to be quite the experience.


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[Assistant] But perhaps it's a different kind of experience than everyone understands. You see, some of those tourists have stopped by the office before leaving just to pass on a kind word about their entertaining tour guide. But it's said that the staff there have always sent them away with a bit of news that's both sad and unsettling. No one fitting that description works at the fort.


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[Assistant] Philadelphia's past is unquestionably an American treasure. But I hope you've also enjoyed the tour through some of its less savory locations too. Because there's just as much to learn from the darkness as there is from the light. However unsafe it might feel.


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[Assistant] But Philly has also been home to the bizarre and I found one last tale that I think you're going to love. Stick around after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.


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[Assistant] Johann Kelp was born in Eastern Europe in 1667. Although if I told you the country of his birth was Transylvania, you might conjure up the wrong ideas. Johann wasn't a bloodthirsty warlord. He was a scholar. In fact, by the age of 22, he had already been published multiple times and had earned a master's degree in theology.


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[Assistant] Johann was a thinker. He loved wrestling with new ideas, challenging old ones and carving a path for himself rather than following the well-worn ruts in the road. So it was no surprise when his studies led him to Germany, where he met another Johann, this one Johann Zimmerman.


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[Assistant] Zimmerman was a disgraced Lutheran minister. He had a sort of revelation at some point in his career and began telling everyone he met that the Lutheran Church was the Antichrist.


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[Assistant] Naturally, he was fired from his position, and that newfound freedom allowed him to craft his own small cult. He called it the Chapter of Perfection, and by the time Johann Kelp arrived in Germany, it was growing.


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[Assistant] The group held a lot of beliefs that aren't particularly necessary for you to enjoy this story, but one of the key tenets of their faith was that a life in the wilderness would be a better way to wait for the end of the world, which Zimmerman predicted would arrive shortly. And what better place to look for that sort of environment than the New World?


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[Assistant] And thanks to William Penn's insistence on freedom of worship, they knew just the colony to move to.


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[Assistant] They were set to depart Germany in August of 1693, but before they could Zimmerman took ill and died. In his place, Johann Kelp was appointed the new leader of the chapter of perfection.


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[Assistant] And then they boarded their ship and set sail for America.


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[Assistant] They arrived in the infant Philadelphia and then headed north, following the Schuylkill River and then Wissehicken Creek north of that. And that's where they built their first community. But they kept a low profile, most likely afraid of the same sort of religious persecution they suffered through in Germany.


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[Assistant] And there they dabbled in all sorts of less mainstream activities like alchemy and numerology. They held festivals and spoke about visions from angels who visited them in their dreams. But mostly they just spent hours each day in meditation and prayer.


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[Assistant] Johann Kelp began to call himself Kelpius. And if the records are correct, he later sat for a portrait that would turn out to be the first known oil painting in the New World. But as the years wore on, the group began to shrink.


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[Assistant] There was a lot happening to the South in Philadelphia. A lot of exciting changes and modern advancements, along with steady work and social interaction. All things that were missing in their little community.


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[Assistant] And then, in 1708, Kelp got sick. It probably didn't help that the man had been living in a cave for the better part of a decade. Most historians think that it was pneumonia that did him in, but not before he managed to pass along an heirloom to his next in line, a man named Daniel Geisler.


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[Assistant] It was a box, perhaps as big as a modern shoebox, but its contents were a mystery because the lid was locked. And Kelp told his assistant to take it south to the Schuylkill River and then toss it in. No one, he told him, should possess what is inside.


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[Assistant] Geissler did as he was told. Well, most of it. He did travel down to the river, and he probably stood on the rocky bank with a box in his hand. But his curiosity got the better of him, so he backed away, found a hiding place among the rocks, and then tucked the box inside it. And then he returned to his dying master.


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[Assistant] Kelp, however, was having none of it. He instinctively knew what Geissler had done and scolded him for his deception. Then, with the lecture complete, he sent the man back to finish the job.


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[Assistant] And Geisler, like a dog with his tail between his legs, hurried out to do it. Soon enough, he was standing on the bank of the river and he sent the box sailing into the air.


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[Assistant] It's said that when the container hit the water, it instantly ignited into a ball of fire. Knowing their experiments with alchemy, it could have been filled with some volatile chemical. But that's no fun in the world of folklore, is it?


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[Assistant] No, instead, it's believed that the box contained the actual philosopher's stone, which sadly vanished beneath the river's current, never to be seen again.


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[Assistant] The chapter of perfection died shortly after Johann Kelp passed away, but there are still remnants of their community if you know where to look for them. The cave he lived in like a hermit is still out there in the woods, like a rough-hewn tomb covered in moss and dead leaves.


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[Assistant] And there are neighborhoods all around it, because of course there are. People are good at burying the past, after all, and throwing up subdivisions on the site of an ancient religious commune certainly fits the bill. But it also makes it more difficult to see the past.


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[Assistant] You'll know you're in the right area though when you see the street signs. Johan Kelp might not live there anymore, but plenty of people can say that they live near a place that he left his mark on. A street called Hermit Lane.


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[Assistant] This episode of Lore was written and produced by me, Aaron Manke, with research by Marset Crockett and music by Chad Lawson.


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[Assistant] Lore is much more than just a podcast, though. There's a book series available in bookstores and online, and two seasons of the television show on Amazon Prime Video. Check them both out if you want more lore in your life.


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[Assistant] I also make two other podcasts, Erin Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities and Unobscured, and I think you'd enjoy both of them. Each one explores other areas of our dark history, ranging from bite-sized episodes to season-long dives into a single topic.


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[Assistant] You can learn more about both of those shows and everything else going on over in one central place, theworldoflore.com slash now.


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[Assistant] Elizabeth Sawyer stood on the gallows, waiting for her execution. Henry Goodkoll, the local priest, read her confession out loud to her and the rest of the gathered crowd. And then she nodded in agreement. Yes, Elizabeth told him. It's all true.


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[Assistant] It's true that she formed a pact with the devil who had given her the power to afflict her neighbors with all manner of pain and suffering. After all, they had refused to purchase brooms from her. So she used the power of the devil to kill their livestock and even one or two of their young children. But that power came at a price.


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[Assistant] All of this would haunt the community she left behind for years to come. They would whisper about her evil powers and her crimes, about how countermagic was used to identify her, and the morbid victory of her execution day.


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[Assistant] But it was her familiar, Tom, who would be remembered the most.


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[Assistant] Because it sits on the edge between a modern belief and a much more ancient idea. An idea not represented by the behavior or powers she claimed it had, but by the very shape it had taken. A shape.


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[Assistant] Most historians trace the idea of the Black Dog very far into the past. So far back, in fact, that the stories can be found well outside the realm of modern folklore. In fact, the Black Dog is present in the ancient mythology of many of the world's oldest cultures.


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[Assistant] Take Egypt for example. The god Anubis was tasked with escorting the dead into the halls of judgment where he would measure how worthy they were before granting them access to the afterlife.


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[Assistant] And of course, the shape given to Anubis is probably familiar to a lot of you. The body of a man, but the head of a wild black dog known as a jackal.


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[Assistant] That occupation, serving as an escort to the dead on their way to the afterlife, wasn't unique to ancient Egypt. In fact, there's a similar deity in mythology of the Native American tribe, known as the Manameni. There, just as in Egypt, a great dog guards the bridge into the city of the dead.


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[Assistant] There's even an ancient Bronze Age site in Southeastern England that shows just how old these ideas truly are.


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[Assistant] Flagfen is a village that was lost to time, but has been uncovered and studied over the last few decades. And along with structures, weapons, and artifacts, as well as England's oldest known wheel, workers there have also discovered remains.


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[Assistant] Some of the remains are clearly those of livestock used for food, as the markings on their bones clearly illustrate.


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[Assistant] But there is also a large number of objects that were buried as an offering. And beside it all, they discover the remains of two large dogs. Dogs that had been ritually killed, most likely to serve as go-betweens for the farmers and hunters living there.


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[Assistant] Even today, we can find Cerberus maintaining his old responsibilities as a guard dog in places like Hogwarts Castle in the world of Harry Potter.


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[Assistant] Black Dog has been used as a guardian for thousands of years, always sitting between this world and the land of death, the underworld.


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[Assistant] But along the way, the folklore around it has evolved and taken on variations. And one of the most important changes has been its transformation into a creature that crosses that boundary into our own, literally walking among us.


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[Assistant] Distant mythology is suddenly replaced with immediate danger and constant risk.


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[Assistant] One story from the middle ages illustrates that idea perfectly. It's said that a man in England became frustrated that something was trying to dig up the recent grave of a local child. To discover who the guilty party might be he hid himself near the grave in order to watch it during the night.


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[Assistant] After the sun went down, he discovered that the culprit was a large black dog who trotted into the graveyard to begin digging all over again.


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[Assistant] This man could have written the experience off as mundane. After all, wild dogs have always been common. But rather than call for a dog catcher, he allowed his fear and superstition to drive him in another direction. He called for a priest.


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[Assistant] One historian named John Brand, writing in 1777, documented stories of a black dog that roamed the streets of Newcastle upon Tyne, like a ghostly specter.


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[Assistant] According to Brand, this otherworldly dog was known as a barghast, a shapeshifting demon whose presence hinted at some impending tragedy, like some grim omen. It was all enough to fill people with complete and utter dread.


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[Assistant] In fact, a common saying has grown up in the rich soil of the Black Dog folklore. If a man shall meet the Black Dog once, the legend says, it shall be for joy. If twice, it shall be for sorrow. And the third time, he shall die.


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[Assistant] Of course, as our world has advanced and matured, it might be easy to assume that belief in the Black Dog has faded away. But that's definitely not the case. From the mysterious Hound of the Baskervilles, featured in the Sherlock Holmes novel of the same name, to Padfoot and the Grimm in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.


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[Assistant] Stories of the Black Dog show no sign of fading into the shadows of the past.


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[Assistant] In fact, if you know where to look, you'll find documented evidence of actual sightings of black dogs, reports from individuals who have set eyes on them and witnessed their power firsthand, or chronicles of those who have spoken to those witnesses and written it all down.


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[Assistant] Taken as nothing more than folklore, these are dark, entertaining tales that leave us feeling a little less safe. But if they are true, they raise some troubling questions.


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[Assistant] Questions that are more difficult for us to answer. And the implications are terrifying.


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[Assistant] In 1938, Ethel Rudkin saw a black dog. She lived in Lincolnshire County in eastern England, not too far, in fact, from the jail where Elizabeth Sawyer waited for her execution in 1621. But Ethel's troubling experience with a black dog didn't drive her away in fear. In fact, it propelled her to study.


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[Assistant] That's because she was a folklorist, and knowing that stories of the black dog had haunted her region for centuries, she set about collecting similar tales from her neighbors. It seemed that almost everyone in town had encountered the mysterious creature, at least once in the past, and she wanted to hear about those events.


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[Assistant] There are a number of people living, she later wrote, who have seen him, heard him, and even felt him.


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[Assistant] And these people were shaken by their sightings. In fact, it was her own experience with the black dog that made her a trustworthy person for them to tell their tales to. She had become one of them in a sense.


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[Assistant] According to Fleming, the event took place in 1577 in the parish church of a small town called Bungay.


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[Assistant] Most of the village had gathered for the Sunday Mass inside the parish church, and while they were inside, a powerful storm blew in unexpectedly. And to those who later spoke about it, it wasn't a normal storm.


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[Assistant] They said that the sky grew tremendously dark, lit up every few seconds by a brilliant flash of lightning that seemed to make the stained glass windows glow in an eerie light. Rain slammed against the building and thunder shook the very earth that the church sat upon.


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[Assistant] No one had expected it, and no one could remember another storm in their lifetime that equaled its power. But things were about to get worse.


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[Assistant] Suddenly, another flash of lightning filled the church with a momentary light, and everyone turned to see the figure of a dog standing in the center aisle. They described it as enormous and evil-looking, and most importantly,


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[Assistant] In a heartbeat, the dog was upon them. With its powerful jaws, it gripped the neck of one man and twisted so hard that his spine snapped, killing him instantly. The same fate awaited the man beside him, but then the massive dog turned round and faced the congregation.


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[Assistant] Snapping out with its powerful jaws, it caught another man on the back, and he crumpled to the floor like a wet rag. And then, it was gone.


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[Assistant] The strange black dog that had appeared so suddenly only to bring death into their midst seemed to vanish just as quickly. But although it had disappeared, it would live on forever in the minds of the people who sat in that church that morning. And they weren't alone either.


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[Assistant] It turns out that another nearby church reported a similar experience. They too reported the great storm, one so powerful that it damaged their bell tower.


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[Assistant] And in the middle of that, the same black dog had appeared among them, where it killed two more men before burning a number of others. Even the doors of the second church were marred by long black scorches, like otherworldly claw marks.


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[Assistant] Because to so many people, the story is just as real today as it was back then.


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[Assistant] True or not, the story of a demonic beast that attacks a church fits the popular idea of the black dog.


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[Assistant] In fact, some scholars believe that one of the most common names for the creature, Black Shuck, comes from the Old English word for demon. All of the details that folklore ascribed to it, the black fur, fiery eyes, and monstrous shape, all of it aligns neatly with what happened inside that church in 1577.


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[Assistant] Even if it turns out to be fake, at least the stories are consistent.


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[Assistant] And the stories haven't ended either. As late as 1996, locals have continued to report sightings of an enormous black dog.


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[Assistant] Which is why it's no surprise when an amazing discovery was made in the ruins of Leaston Abbey in 2013, just 20 miles south of Bungay.


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[Assistant] There in a shallow grave among the broken walls of the abbey, researchers found the complete skeleton of an enormous beast. Were it still alive today, they believe that it would have been nearly seven feet long and weighed in at over 200 pounds.


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[Assistant] Folklore is a lot like plant life. Given enough time, it spreads like a weed, filling new landscapes with fresh iterations of itself. And the primary agent in that migration is humanity. Wherever we go, so too does our folklore.


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[Assistant] Harry was born in Connecticut in 1867. Just a little more than a year after his birth, his father William passed away, leaving Harry's mother Anne to care for the boy and raise him as best she could.


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[Assistant] And she did a fantastic job of it too. By the time he was ready to head off to study at Trinity College, she had already taught him ancient Greek and Latin, giving him an advantage over many of his peers.


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[Assistant] After Trinity, he moved on to Harvard, where he studied geology. It was a pedigree that helped him launch a strong career, most of which was filled with teaching and writing about geology. In fact, he wrote two articles in 1898 that are about the Connecticut landscape.


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[Assistant] But it's the first of those that I find most fascinating because it's less about rocks and more about folklore.


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[Assistant] It was about an experience he had while studying at Harvard. Sometime around 1892 most likely.


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[Assistant] Harry described his hike that day as a bit slow, due to how often he felt compelled to stop and examine the various outcroppings and layers he noticed. Soon enough, he found a formation he wished to take a sample from, so he began the hard labor of chipping away at it. And it was during a short break from that hard work that he straightened up, turned to look down the path, and noticed something strange.


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[Assistant] It kept the distance from him, but after his task was finished and he continued his hike,


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[Assistant] The dog joined him, becoming something like a shadow as Harry wound his way through the hills around West Peak. He never feared for his safety.


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[Assistant] But he did notice one odd characteristic in the dog. It never made a sound.


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[Assistant] At the end of a long day of hiking and work Harry retreated back to his horse before heading into the nearby town. When he did, the dog quietly slipped off the path, vanishing into the shadows from where it had come.


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[Assistant] Later that night, he enjoyed a hearty meal beside the fire of an old inn, and he couldn't help but smile. It was, he noted, for joy.


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[Assistant] That day on the Connecticut hills stayed with him as he continued his studies at Harvard. Then three years later, he decided to return.


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[Assistant] This second trip would take place during the winter, so he invited a colleague to join him, a man named Herbert Marshall.


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[Assistant] Marshall had hiked the Hanging Hills many times before, and in all seasons, and so he seemed like a good companion for the challenging journey. Once they met up at the foot of West Peak, they began their climb.


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[Assistant] Uninvited, Marshall brought up the old saying I mentioned earlier.


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[Assistant] If a man shall meet the black dog once, it shall be for joy. If twice it shall be for sorrow and the third time he shall die. When he was finished, both men left and then continued their hike.


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[Assistant] The weather wasn't very friendly though. Soon enough their hands were numb, and the wind had begun to lash at them like the winds of a storm.


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[Assistant] But both men were determined to reach the summit, so they continued following the path that clung to the side of the small mountain. Marshall, always in the lead.


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[Assistant] Then, closer to the top, Marshall stopped in the middle of the path.


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[Assistant] Marshall turned to look back at Harry, his face as pale as the sky above them.


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[Assistant] With his finger still aimed at the shape atop the peak he groaned in a barely audible voice. It is the third time, he said.


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[Assistant] In an instant, the edge of the path crumbled beneath his feet, and Harry watched in horror as his friend vanished into the swirling snow and rocks below.


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[Assistant] Harry turned and retreated down the path. He said it took him hours to make it back down to the bottom, but when he did, he quickly located Herbert Marshall's body. He had died upon the cold, snow-covered rocks at the foot of the mountain.


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[Assistant] Harry managed to return to town and gather a group of men to go retrieve Marshall's body. It took them hours, hours that Harry used to warm himself beside the fire. This time there was no joy for him, only sorrow. But then again, that would make sense if he truly believed the legend that he and Marshall had recited before their hike began. When the men returned they carried the body, but they also brought news.


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[Assistant] The stories we tell have a way of following us everywhere we go. We humans are mobile creatures, and when we move and extend our boundaries into new places, we bring our folklore with us. And I sometimes wonder, perhaps that's an essential part of our survival.


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[Assistant] I think it's clear that this world is still a place of mystery and the unknown. We are still discovering brand new creatures and locations, which has a way of leaving us guessing. What else is waiting for us around the next corner? What other dangers have we yet to encounter? Where should we place our fear?


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[Assistant] And the black dog answers a lot of those questions, if only in a non-specific sort of way, just as it has for thousands of years.


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[Assistant] When our ancestors' brains couldn't seem to find an answer to those noises and creatures they experienced, they filled in the blanks with story. And right up there among the most commonly used was the black dog.


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[Assistant] Harry William Pynchon's experience in the Hanging Hills of Connecticut followed him for the rest of his life. He went on to graduate and earn a reputation in his field. And as I mentioned earlier, he published an article in 1898 about that tragic hike. But all the while, West Peak was like a beacon to him, tempting him to return.


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[Assistant] They say that Harry finally gave in and returned to the Hanging Hills later in his life, where he walked off into the shadows and never returned, hinting that he had his third and final encounter with the Black Dog.


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[Assistant] It's a powerful ending to the story, with more than its fair share of drama.


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[Assistant] But sadly, despite being repeated frequently over the past century, his unnatural death is nothing more than a work of fiction.


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[Assistant] It was most likely a misunderstanding due to that article he'd written back in 1898.


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[Assistant] But even if the story turned out to be a work of fiction, the fear and superstition it tapped into was more than real, as evidenced by the rumors of his death. And that's the power of story, isn't it? Because true or not, every tale means something to someone, and as a result, it takes on a life of its own. It's a lot like the old adage we've heard before. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.


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[Assistant] Stick around after this brief sponsor break, and I'll tell you one more tale of this ancient beast.


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[Assistant] That's when her father, Philip, stepped outside to find both of the ponies had been killed during the night. He knew this because the creature that had killed them was still standing over their corpses, eating their bloody flesh with huge ravenous mouthfuls.


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[Assistant] Both of the ponies lay on their side in the grass of the backyard, where Carol had left them tethered the night before. The ropes still hung loosely from the trees to their halters, but they were no longer necessary.


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[Assistant] The first thing the creature had done, it seems, was rip out their throats.


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[Assistant] Philip described the beast as an enormous dog, roughly the same size as the ponies it had slaughtered. He said it had elements of German Shepherd and maybe Rottweiler in its appearance, but it was like no dog he had ever seen before.


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[Assistant] It was big and black and deeply interested in its morning meal. And Philip, a big, strong firefighter, was afraid for his life.


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[Assistant] He aimed at the large shape and fire, assuming that it would be nearly impossible to miss. But somehow, he did.


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[Assistant] The sound of the shot did startle the creature though, and it quickly bolted for the shadows of the trees at the back of the property. And then, it was gone. But it wouldn't be the last time it would be spotted.


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[Assistant] Still, Philip alerted the authorities, and the sheriff quickly set out to find and kill the creature. They focused their attention on the edge of town, where civilization blurred into woodland and mystery. And as they did, the community spiraled into panic.


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[Assistant] People were afraid for their safety, for their children and pets and anything else that might be at risk outside. And as the panic spread, the police began to receive phone calls about sightings and rumors.


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[Assistant] At first it was a trickle, but it quickly turned into a flood. By the end of the third day, the police had received over a thousand calls, hinting at just how deep of a nerve this mysterious dog had touched.


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[Assistant] Schools brought in police to guard their children during recess, stores sold out of firearms, and Philip stayed busy too, responding to a steady flow of requests from the police to identify animal remains in hopes that the beast had been killed.


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[Assistant] The officer following the search dog found the mysterious creature walking along a stretch of railroad tracks near the woods. Knowing that the animal had been reported as extremely dangerous, he aimed his shotgun at it from a safe distance, and then fired.


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[Assistant] The shot echoed through the open air and birds launched themselves into the sky from the trees around the tracks. But the enormous dog just stood silently, unmoving and unshaking and unafraid. And then, after a few nervous moments,


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[Assistant] It quietly turned and walked off into the woods as if nothing at all had happened.


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[Assistant] The folks of Abington never saw the Black Dog again. But true to the power of folklore, they've never forgotten it either. And how could they? Because all of us have wondered about the danger that lurks in the shadow. About the things we don't understand that leave us feeling out of our depth. And for the people of Abington, the Black Dog was that nightmare come to life. It's almost as if they expected its arrival. And who knows when it might return.


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[Assistant] This episode was written and produced by me, Aaron Manke, with research by Carl Nellis and music by Chad Lawson.


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[Assistant] I also make two other podcasts, Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities and Unobscured, and I think you'd enjoy both. Each one explores other areas of our dark history, ranging from bite-sized episodes to season-long dives into a single topic.


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[Assistant] You can learn more about both of those shows and everything else going on over in one central place, theworldoflore.com slash now.


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[Assistant] And you can follow the show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Just search for Lore Podcast, all one word, and then click that follow button. When you do, say hi. I like it when people say hi. And as always, thanks for listening.


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[Assistant] All 129 of them assumed they were going to make history. Looking back nearly two centuries later though, it's clear just how much they missed that target. They had hoped to find the elusive Northwest Passage, but instead, they met their doom.


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[Assistant] The Franklin Expedition began in 1845 and seemed to be primed for success. Their leader, John Franklin, was an Admiral in the British Navy who had been knighted by King George IV, awarded the gold medal by the Geographical Society of Paris, and had already managed other successful expeditions.


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[Assistant] They were well supplied, expertly staffed, and full of passion and drive. Everything a professional endeavor requires to have the best shot at success. And yet they seem to have missed the most obvious things. Their rations were kept in tin cans that had been hastily sealed with too much lead, contaminating the food inside.


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[Assistant] The conditions were much more harsh than they assumed. The ice was more troublesome than they could have predicted.


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[Assistant] And for the superstitious among us, they went and gave their two ships a pair of horrible names. The Erebus, named after the god of chaos and darkness, and the Terror.


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[Assistant] Honestly, after a long series of failures, how could anyone have expected the expedition to do anything other than fall apart?


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[Assistant] Many historians today believe that the Franklin expedition was doomed to failure before it even began. And we've all heard that sort of judgment before. Whether it's been leveled against a Hollywood film, a startup business, or even a relationship.


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[Assistant] Some things just don't get off on the right foot, and that misstep haunts them from that day forward.


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[Assistant] It's something that happens a lot more often than you'd expect, too, and not just with small groups of people. Because for all the planning and preparation that we seem to naturally pour into our biggest endeavors, humanity seems to miss the mark on a regular basis.


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[Assistant] And when it happens at the founding of a great city, it has a way of altering the destiny of the people who live there. It changes what might have been, extinguishes hope, and sets an ominous tone that can still be heard to this day. And as we already know, when the light is gone, all that's left are shadows.


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[Assistant] After retaking the throne in 1660 following the English Civil War and Oliver Cromwell's death, he set about expanding English territory elsewhere in the world.


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[Assistant] In 1663, he called together a group of his eight most loyal friends and granted them permission to settle an area of the New World that was known as the Carolina Territory.


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[Assistant] It took them seven years to get it done, but in early 1670, a ship delivered 93 colonists to the area.


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[Assistant] It was a chance to have a fresh start for many of them, and the land along the coast there looked like it was going to deliver on that promise. The fishing was good, there was lots of timber for building, and two rivers provided plenty of fresh water.


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[Assistant] But within months, that flame of hope began to flicker. Disease broke out among the settlers, including smallpox and yellow fever. And thanks to their proximity to the water, the mosquitoes were only happy to help spread it all. But the English weren't the only ones to get sick.


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[Assistant] Every time a new group of Europeans arrived in the New World, they brought sickness. Sometimes the passengers would have suffered through an outbreak during the Atlantic crossing, while other times they were carriers of things they themselves had built an immunity to, but not the native inhabitants of North America.


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[Assistant] Historians estimate that of the roughly 20 million Native Americans that lived on the continent prior to the arrival of Europeans, over 90% of them were killed by imported diseases. They weren't gone, but it meant that by the time those settlers arrived in Carolina in 1670, there weren't enough of them left to put up much of a fight for their land.


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[Assistant] The settlers named their little community after the king who sent them, calling it Charlestown. And then they got to work setting up colonial life there.


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[Assistant] Part of that life involved slavery, which began almost at day one. In fact, Charlestown was the only English settlement in North America that had slaves from its very beginning. And it was a character flaw that they would cling to for another two centuries.


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[Assistant] And as you might expect, it was also a big source of darkness for the community. Slavery was such a big industry in Charlestown that the official point of entry, Sullivan's Island, has become known as Black Ellis Island. That's because roughly 40% of all enslaved Africans brought to British North America passed through the quarantine area there.


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[Assistant] Today, it's estimated that upwards of 30 million African Americans can trace their roots back to that one small stretch of land. And Charlestown was a microcosm of many of the challenges that their ancestors faced. They suffered through all the brutal treatment you might expect, while also struggling to rebuild their lives and cultures in a foreign land.


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[Assistant] In 1739, a slave revolt took place near the Stono River, about 20 miles south of the city.


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[Assistant] And at its peak, about 60 people joined the rebellion, cutting a path southward with the goal of traveling to St. Augustine in Florida. They were stopped by an armed militia, who killed about half of them in a brief battle, while the rest were executed in the aftermath.


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[Assistant] Decades later, the American Revolutionary War ended with Charlestown looking for a way to distance itself from its English roots and the monarch it was named after. And that's where today's name came from. Charleston. Although, with King Charles' name still visibly in it, it's unclear just how much of a clean break the change really was.


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[Assistant] In the lead up to the Civil War, South Carolina was the very first state to secede from the United States, citing in their December 1860 letter to the federal government their complete objection to the anti-slavery views of the northern states.


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[Assistant] And after war broke out at Fort Sumter a month later, it was clear just how badly Charleston wanted to maintain the right to own other human beings.


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[Assistant] When the war was over, Charleston was a different place. So much of the industry that made the city wealthy and prosperous had been either legislated away or destroyed by Union forces, leaving many people in poverty. And even though the slaves there had been freed, they too faced a cold new world in the broken city. But at least they faced it as free people. But not all of Charleston's dark spots were man-made.


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[Assistant] Over the three and a half centuries that the community has existed, a number of natural challenges have come their way as well. There have been a number of devastating tornadoes over the years, including one in 1741 that involved two tornadoes at once.


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[Assistant] After ravaging different parts of the city, the pair of twisters eventually combined just off the coast, where it did damage to nearly 20 ships, sinking at least five.


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[Assistant] But it was an event in 1886 that left the deepest scar. On August 31st, after just two decades of rebuilding the city in the aftermath of the Civil War, a massive 7.0 earthquake rocked the community to the core.


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[Assistant] To put this in perspective, there were reports of the quake as far north as Boston and Chicago to the northwest. Even people in New Orleans and Cuba felt it, which is crazy to think about.


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[Assistant] Closer to home, it was more than feelings. Some buildings in Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia were damaged in the quake, and more severe destruction was reported on Tybee Island in Georgia. But in Charleston, where the quake seemed to be centered, it was terror and chaos.


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[Assistant] Some historians estimate that over 2000 buildings were destroyed.


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[Assistant] Not damaged yet livable, but brought to the ground in rubble.


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[Assistant] Over 60 people were killed in the destruction, and for 35 years following the quake, Charleston experienced over 300 aftershocks. That's a multi-generational earthquake that left the people of the city in a constant, never-ending state of fear and tension.


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[Assistant] But all those failures and tragedies were challenges that drove the people of Charleston to rise up, to survive and to better themselves. It doesn't wash away the stain of things like slavery, but it shows that the past can be improved upon.


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[Assistant] And in many ways, the city has done just that, rebuilding their lives into something better, even as the aftershocks rattle the walls.


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[Assistant] But some problems weren't handled so bravely. Sometimes the people of Charleston faced challenges that pushed the limits of their own humanity and the way they responded.


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[Assistant] It's the one story you can guarantee they'll tell you. If you visit Charleston today, you'll have your pick from a plethora of ghost tours. Each one adding their personal touch to a guided tour through some of the creepiest tales from the city's past. But all of them mention the infamous pirate that most people have heard of. Blackbeard.


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[Assistant] Of course, Blackbeard wasn't his real name. He was born Edward Teach roughly ten years after Charlestown was settled on the coast of Carolina territory.


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[Assistant] After years of serving on the ships of other pirates, he joined the crew of an older, more experienced captain in 1716, and a year later, he was in command of the entire fleet. Edward Teach was a man on the move.


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[Assistant] But while he had the reputation for being fierce and frightening, he left it to one of his commanders to be the charming one. Stead Bonnet was a former military officer and a wealthy landowner who had turned to piracy, and those who knew him loved to refer to him as the Gentleman Pirate. He and Blackbeard were quite the team.


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[Assistant] In May of 1718, Blackbeard's fleet imposed a blockade on Charlestown, demanding they hand over some medical supplies that they needed.


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[Assistant] The two-week ordeal ended with Blackbeard's victorious escape, which left the city frustrated and itching for revenge. So when Stead Bonnet sailed back in the fall to have some work done on his own ship, the local militia attacked them and took the pirate captive.


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[Assistant] Bonnet was taken to the home of the local marshal, but a few weeks after his arrest he managed to break free and run for his ship.


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[Assistant] Hoping to prevent a second escape, he was recaptured and placed in the dungeon below what is today known as the Old Exchange. Conditions there were horrendous, with dead bodies decaying alongside open sewage, all in a space that lacked clean air or room to move about.


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[Assistant] Bonnet's trial was saved for last, after each of his other crew members had been found guilty and executed. He tried to put up a good legal fight, even choosing to represent himself and cross-examine some of the witnesses, but in the end it was no use. He was found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging.


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[Assistant] He died on December 10th, roughly a month after Blackbeard himself was killed in battle up the coast in modern-day North Carolina.


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[Assistant] Today, visitors to the dungeon below the old exchange claim there's still evidence of the inhumane treatment that went on there. The staff who work in the building above have often reported hearing sounds they describe as moans coming from the dungeon below, while visitors have reported approaching tour guides in period clothing, only to watch them vanish right before their eyes.


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[Assistant] Others have felt invisible hands choke them while touring the space, and some have even heard the echoes of far-off screams, as if someone were being tortured or crying out for help. On more than one occasion, tourists in the dungeon have witnessed objects there move on their own, making folks wonder if the old prison really is completely empty now.


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[Assistant] But there's another place in Charleston that saw even heavier use over the years.


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[Assistant] The old jail started out life in the early 19th century as a makeshift structure that was prone to disrepair and bad conditions. Historians tell us that it was underfunded and that left future generations to slowly add on to the building, eventually turning it into what we see today. An ominous castle-like guardian located on Magazine Street.


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[Assistant] It opened its doors in 1802 and served prisoners through 1939, but don't think of it as a well-run facility. For a very long time, poor conditions led to death after death inside those walls. In fact, some historians estimate that upwards of 14,000 individuals died there, either from exposure, torture, or their own execution.


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[Assistant] The list of prisoners who lived and died there is a motley crew of characters, all of whom the city of Charleston was trying to lock away and forget about. There have been serial killers, Civil War prisoners of war,


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[Assistant] Common criminals and even rebellious slaves. And once inside those pale brown walls, their captivity exposed them to human waste, extreme seasonal temperatures, and poor nutrition.


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[Assistant] And honestly, after reading about some of the things that went on there, it's easy to think that dead was the better option for many of them.


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[Assistant] Today, as you might expect, the Old Jail is a hotbed of visions and experiences that seem to defy explanation.


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[Assistant] Regular tours are guided through the building, but not all of the local tour guides are willing to step inside the old jail. Some have claimed they felt the overwhelming sensation of being watched, while others have actually felt invisible hands touch them. But the tour guides are not alone.


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[Assistant] The tourists who passed through there have had their own fair share of run-ins with the echoes of the past. Sounds of slamming doors have often been reported, as have whispering voices that seem to come from distant parts of the building. Objects have been known to move on their own, and some people have seen dark shadows that slip through doorways and vanish around corners.


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[Assistant] It seems that in the Old City's effort to contain their darkness, they only succeeded in creating more of it. And even though most of it happened over a century ago, the stories that flood in each year seem to stand as proof that some remnant of it has stayed around.


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[Assistant] Maybe it's just the emotional baggage of knowing what happened in places like the Exchange Dungeon or the Old Jail. Or perhaps something happens when so many people are forced to suffer in such a horrifying way. Like the low rumble of aftershocks that can still be felt after the earthquake is over. Either way, the past has given birth to stories. And they haunt the city to this day.


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[Assistant] One event, though, is true, and it stands head and shoulders above all the others, both for its vivid detail and the claim to fame it gives the city. Charleston, it seems.


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[Assistant] Now before we dive in, I need to make something clear. Legends have a way of growing beyond the truth. Like a house plant that overgrows the pot it was rooted in.


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[Assistant] This story is a powerful and frightening one, but it's also layered with details that have clearly been added somewhere along the way between the truth and today. So keep that in mind as we walk through the events together.


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[Assistant] Back in the early 19th century, Charleston was a bustling city with an economic life that depended, at least in part, on the flow of goods into and out of the city. The port was busy, and an endless parade of ships came and went each week. And from there, the goods they carried would be transported inland to the smaller communities.


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[Assistant] That's what John did for a living. He would fill his wagon up with valuable items from the port, and then slowly drive them north, up the Cooper River toward places like Goose Creek. But the farther he traveled from the city, the more dangerous his work could be.


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[Assistant] Highwaymen waited everywhere for the chance to relieve merchants like John of their precious goods, and there was always the risk of physical danger. So travelers like John tended to find lodging for the night in the many road houses that had been set up along the way.


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[Assistant] Legend says that John approached a house about six miles north of Charleston at dusk sometime in February of 1819. Even from a distance, he could see the woman on the front stoop. She was young and beautiful and dressed in something most respectable ladies in the city would reserve for the bedroom. And she called out to him.


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[Assistant] I don't know what they discussed, but it was most likely about lodging for the night. The hostess gladly offered John a room in the roadhouse, and as she did, her husband appeared beside the wagon to take the reins and allow John to step inside. But what John didn't know was that he was stepping into a den of thieves. At least by reputation, that is.


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[Assistant] Apparently, the local highway robbers used many of the roadhouses as a home base, gathering there when there wasn't enough work, and hiding inside when the authorities were looking for someone to arrest. And in the weeks prior to John's arrival at this particular roadhouse, the owners had been caught harboring some of these thieves.


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[Assistant] So when John stepped inside this roadhouse, he was entering a place with a reputation for crime and danger. In fact, the young woman who had met him out front, Lavinia Fisher, had a reputation for violence herself. But John didn't know all this. He just knew they had a room to let, and a hot meal on the table that was ready for him.


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[Assistant] Reports vary on their dinner conversation. Some claim the soup contained odd ingredients, like strange meat, and that John noticed this and brought it up. But most of the retellings focus on the unusual behavior of John's hosts, who sat with him and made conversation as he enjoyed his meal.


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[Assistant] Some have said that he wasn't too much of a tea person, while others claim he suspected something nefarious was in the works.


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[Assistant] John seems to have been a nervous, cautious man, and that would pay off in the end. But how he knew, I have no idea. The story just makes it clear that he suspected something, took a small sip to be polite, and poured the rest out when the others weren't watching.


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[Assistant] After dinner, John was taken down the hall to a sparsely furnished room. He didn't need much, though, just a bed and some quiet, but it was far from hospitable. Lavinia wished him good night, and then John tossed his bag on the bed and sat down to pull off his boots and stretch his feet.


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[Assistant] It was just a few moments later, before he had a chance to lie down on the bed, that he heard the shouting from down the hall.


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[Assistant] Legend says that he could overhear Lavinia and her husband. Also, name John by the way, which is super confusing, I know.


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[Assistant] Arguing about how to kill the merchant. Lavinia wanted to pull the lever, she said, while her husband wanted to use an axe. Neither choice sounded appealing to John, though, so he just stood in the middle of the room, frozen by fear. And that's when Lavinia pulled the mysterious lever.


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[Assistant] John heard a noise, and then the bed he had been intending to sleep on swung downward like a trapdoor, dumping his bag and boots in the cellar below.


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[Assistant] John gasped, and then back toward the door to leave, but when he opened it, he found Lavinia on the other side, poised to enter and surprised to find John still in the room.


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[Assistant] There was a struggle. Lavinia called for her husband who had been waiting in the cellar with his axe, and together they tried to restrain the merchant so that they could finish the job. But John was faster, and he managed to slip outside, locate his wagon, which was thankfully still hitched to his horse, and then rode off into the darkness.


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[Assistant] John, of course, went to the authorities, who soon arrived at the roadhouse to arrest the criminal couple.


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[Assistant] It's said that when they investigated the building, they made a series of horrifying discoveries. But that's part of the story that seems to have grown over the years. According to some, a handful of bodies were found in the cellar, in various states of decomposition, while other tales tell of hundreds.


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[Assistant] Either way, the evidence was enough to make for a quick and easy trial.


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[Assistant] A couple pled not guilty, of course, and during their stay at the old jail, they made at least one attempt to escape. In the end, roughly a year after their arrest, Lavinia and John Fisher had their final appeal rejected.


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[Assistant] On February 4th of 1820, both of them were led to the gallows. Legend says that Lavinia arrived for her hanging dressed in a white wedding gown as a way of showing the authorities that she was still a married woman in a state that didn't allow for married women to be executed.


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[Assistant] So they took care of John first, effectively making her a single widow.


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[Assistant] When it was Lavinia's turn, it's said that she boldly faced the crowd that had gathered to watch her die and uttered her famous last words.


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[Assistant] The darkness of Charleston is a bit of a chicken and egg sort of thing. It's unclear whether things fell apart so early because the people who settled it brought the shadows with them, or if it was the world that awaited them that started it all.


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[Assistant] Either way though, by the time the first foundations were being laid, the people of that community were already deeply intimate with suffering and pain and death.


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[Assistant] And that's the darker side of living in a community. By doing so, we swim in the shadows of its past and become part of its story.


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[Assistant] It's easy, especially in a place like Charleston, to become constantly reminded of our collective failure on a regular basis. Like the aftershocks of a terrible earthquake.


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[Assistant] Don't get me wrong, Charleston is a lovely city today. The architecture and historical locations are a looking glass into another time, and we can learn a lot about early American life by studying it. But around every sunlit corner is a shadow, and we would be wise to never forget that.


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[Assistant] The story of Lavinia Fisher though is a different matter. There's very little evidence to support a lot of the stories told about her. No record of the hundreds of bodies that were found in the cellar. And there's even a possibility that Lavinia didn't even exist at all. Which would be a disappointment to a lot of people, I know.


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[Assistant] But while the details of her crimes and the house she and her husband used as a tool to murder unsuspecting travelers are still up for debate, we do know that the crime of highway robbery was a capital offense at the time.


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[Assistant] So if she did exist, and if she and John really did meet on that dusky February evening, the charges that ultimately got her arrested were most likely related to that.


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[Assistant] Most people believe that Lavinia Fisher was buried in a pauper's grave outside the old jail. But there are rumors that her skeleton was preserved and put on display in a local museum.


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[Assistant] If it was, no one knows where it is today, which is why many think her spirit is restless and still visible from time to time.


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[Assistant] People have claimed to see her ghost in all sorts of unusual locations over the years, including in the Unitarian Church graveyard where they claim she was dancing on the grave of one of her judges. It's a deeply satisfying image and more than a little poetic, I'll admit.


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[Assistant] The trouble is, the judge was buried elsewhere, making the reports a bit suspect, if you ask me.


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[Assistant] But the most common place she has been spotted over the years is right where she spent her final days. In the old jail.


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[Assistant] Visitors and employees in the building have reported seeing a young woman looking out from various windows, while others have heard the sounds of feminine laughter echoing through some of the empty halls.


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[Assistant] A handful of people claim to have seen her standing in the jail yard, as if she were waiting for her execution to begin, or perhaps revisiting the site to remind us of what she had done and how it all ended for her.


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[Assistant] But what ties all of these sightings together is one frightening detail. One that seems to confirm at least some part of the legend as true. Almost everyone who has witnessed her has reported a single, unifying description.


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[Assistant] I hope this guided tour through the shadows of Charleston's past leave you feeling better connected to the people who have lived and died there. But it's not all dark prisons and highway robbers. In fact, one of the most haunting tragedies in the city's history took place not that long ago.


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[Assistant] Stick around after this brief sponsor break and I'll tell you every little detail.


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[Assistant] The moment Elmer guided his 1938 Oldsmobile sedan onto the bridge, he felt the change. It was almost 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and the Johnson P. Grace Memorial Bridge stretched out before them across the glistening Cooper River. But something didn't feel right.


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[Assistant] The Cooper River is one of two main rivers that pass by Charleston, turning the city into a small peninsula. In fact, most people don't know that the Cooper River and its sibling, the Ashley River, are both named after the same person.


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[Assistant] Remember that moment in 1663 when King Charles II granted permission to a group of his friends to settle in the Carolina territory? Well, one of those friends was the Earl of Shaftesbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper.


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[Assistant] And from 1929 to 1966, one of the bridges that crossed the Cooper River was the Grace, although most locals just refer to it as the Cooper River Bridge. It was a cantilever bridge that hovered 250 feet above the river, high enough for many of the frequent cargo ships to pass beneath on their way to port.


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[Assistant] The Nicaragua was a massive 10,000 ton freighter that had been anchored nearly half a mile from the bridge. But at 3.59pm that day, roughly the same time that Elmer was driving toward the Cooper River Bridge, a sudden momentary storm known as a line squall sent a blast of wind upriver.


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[Assistant] The force of the gale actually broke the freighter free from its anchor and within moments it drifted 700 yards before colliding with the bridge. The nose of the ship bit hard into the eastern approach with enough force to break a massive 240 foot long span out of the structure. The bridge had a hole in it.


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[Assistant] Elmer Lawson's Oldsmobile was full that day. His wife Evelyn was beside him and their two young children were in the backseat with their grandmother, Elmer's mother Rose. And while a number of other cars on the bridge were able to stop in time, something prevented the Lawsons from doing the same.


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[Assistant] A heartbeat after the gap in the bridge opened up. They drove straight off the edge and into the water.


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[Assistant] As you can imagine, everything was chaos for a long while. No one was able to cross the bridge. Traffic backed up and the crew of the Nicaragua made panicked attempts to right the ship and assess the damage. And in the confusion, people's memory of what happened got a bit muddled.


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[Assistant] Some people thought they saw a green car fall through the gap, but they weren't sure. So no rescue teams were sent into the river.


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[Assistant] It wasn't until March 19th, nearly a month after the tragedy, that a salvage crew discovered a car at the bottom of the river near the bridge. Using a large grappling bucket, the crew of the little boss managed to grip the bumper of the car and haul it to the surface. Inside was a horrible scene.


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[Assistant] All five of the Lawsons were still in the car, having died within moments of falling into the river.


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[Assistant] And as you might imagine, that vision quickly began to haunt the minds of many Charleston locals. And then there were the stories.


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[Assistant] The most popular involved another family trip, this one twenty years later in 1966. The bridge had long since been repaired, and a whole generation had grown up, pushing the tragedy of 1946 deeper into the past. And when we forget, we tend to have trouble understanding certain things.


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[Assistant] The man driving this car certainly had a hard time understanding why the old car in front of him was driving so slowly across the bridge.