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[Assistant] But the most common element other than broomsticks was some sort of magical product, like a powder or ointment. It was believed that right before a journey, a witch would strip naked and rub their body from head to toe in some sort of potion they concocted to grant them the power of flight.


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[Assistant] And the ingredient list for some of these ointments was quite the botanist playground. Things like hemlock, nightshade, henbane, and mandrake were common elements. But also, if folklore from the Balkans is any indication, so was pig excrement, giving it a lovely smell, I'm sure.


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[Assistant] In 1525, a Dominican friar named Bartolomeo Spina documented some of these ointments of flight in a book. One of the stories he tells is about a guy named Lugano who woke up one day to find his wife missing. After searching the entire house and finding no trace of her, he stepped outside and started to explore his property.


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[Assistant] He did find her, though. She was laying unconscious and completely naked in the pigsty.


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[Assistant] When she woke up, Lugano asked her what had happened, and she confessed to have flown off to a witch's Sabbath during the night.


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[Assistant] Perhaps the pig excrement on her body was from laying in the pigsty, or maybe it was part of the ointment she used. Who knows.


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[Assistant] In 1813, a woman named Barbara Powers was accused of witchcraft by a 9 year old girl. One of the charges was that Powers had turned her into a horse and ridden her through the air, stealing goods from local businesses as they went.


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[Assistant] Nothing ever came of the trial, as far as I can tell, but the judge let the process run its course out of pure curiosity.


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[Assistant] And while a lot of people did believe in the power of these ointments, there were a few people who called them into question. Way back in 1458, a writer named Abraham the Jew, working in Linz, Austria, documented a fantastic story that helps us peek behind the curtain on this particular bit of folklore.


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[Assistant] He wrote that he had actually gone to see a witch about obtaining some of this ointment of flight for himself. But after she crafted it and told him how it worked and where to apply it to his body, he told her that he wanted a demonstration before he handed over his money.


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[Assistant] She apparently climbed up onto her table, dabbed the ointment onto herself, and then jumped off in an attempt to fly. Only gravity proved more powerful than her magic, and she crashed to the floor, knocking herself out cold in the process.


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[Assistant] You'll have to pardon the pun, but clearly, selling magical lotions and ointments was a slippery slope for many people. But it all fed into this idea that witches could fly over your community, causing problems for everyone. Which is why there was a good amount of folklore about how to stop them too.


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[Assistant] Apparently church bells were the kryptonite to their magical powers. One woman in Italy claimed that she had been writing home on the back of a demon, just minding her own business, when the church below rang its bells. Instantly she was knocked off the back of the creature and burned by the sound.


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[Assistant] It seems that flying, whether on a magical object or through the power of an ointment, was incredibly risky. Which is what makes one last story so fascinating. Because it gets around so many of those limitations in the most creative way imaginable. Because what witch needs to fly? When they can teleport.


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[Assistant] It's a bit of a he said, she said type of story. There are reasons for that, both cultural and historical, according to 19th century historian William Andrews. But it's the sort of tale that you just have to experience for yourself. So I think I'll start at the beginning.


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[Assistant] Derbyshire is a county pretty much smack dab in the middle of England. It's a gorgeous place to live, with green rolling hills and ancient woodlands. And while it's about 150 miles northwest of London, the Peak District National Park has a way of drawing visitors up from the big city in droves.


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[Assistant] Today you can drive it or take a nice train ride, but centuries ago there were fewer options available. Horseback and walking, mostly.


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[Assistant] But that doesn't mean the roads had fewer travelers. In fact, there was a busy trade route that ran between London in the south and York in the north, with goods and people moving back and forth. And one of those routes passed right through the market town of Bakewell.


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[Assistant] As the story goes, there was a house in Bakewell along that road. A woman named Mrs. Stafford owned the house, where she worked part-time as a hat maker. But together with another woman, quite possibly her sister, they let out rooms to travelers. And who knows, maybe all of that foot traffic inside their house helped Mrs. Stafford sell more hats.


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[Assistant] And so it came that, one day in the early 1600s, a Scottish man arrived and asked for a room, which the ladies gladly offered. He was there for a number of days too, which suggests that he was in no real hurry to be anywhere. But it was what happened on the final night that concerns us the most.


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[Assistant] This traveler was upstairs in his room, sleeping in his bed, when the sound of voices woke him up in the pre-dawn hours. They were coming from directly below him, and climbing out of bed, he pressed his eye against the wide, crooked floorboards. There, in the glow of a bright light, were two women who ran the house, and they were chanting,


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[Assistant] Lunen, of course, was London, but chanting to the devil struck the Scotsman as particularly strange. But before he could do or say anything, both women vanished instantly, taking their light with them.


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[Assistant] Obviously, the Scotsman was confused, but despite his reservations, he repeated the chant out loud from his spot there on the floor of his room.


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[Assistant] The man described the sudden onset of a powerful windstorm unlike anything he had ever experienced before. And when it was over a moment later, he found himself sitting half-naked, battered and torn on the floor of a strange cellar as opposed to his bedroom. And right beside him,


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[Assistant] were the two women from Bakewell, who seemed equally surprised at his arrival.


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[Assistant] They didn't actually see him at first. It seems they were busy gathering up cloth into bundles, almost as if they were preparing to steal it. When they noticed him though, one of the ladies brought him a glass of wine, which promptly knocked him out.


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[Assistant] He awoke to find a night watchman standing over him, most likely prodding him in the side with the tip of his boot, and as you might imagine, he was hauled off to jail for attempted theft, before finding himself in front of a judge, where he told his entire crazy story.


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[Assistant] The judge was understandably confused as to how this man could have traveled from Bakewell over 150 miles away in just one night, and to do so while almost half-naked. Well, there had to be an explanation for it, even if that explanation contained some supernatural elements.


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[Assistant] Which is what they ran with. Clearly the two women from Bakewell were actually witches, and so investigators were sent to search their house. And wouldn't you know it, the Scotsman's clothing was found in their possession, proving, somehow, that they were guilty.


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[Assistant] Just how powerful was the folklore surrounding witches and their various methods of transportation? Powerful enough to have those two women arrested and tried for witchcraft. All on the word of a half-naked man smelling of wine, found asleep in a cellar he shouldn't have been in. And sadly, both of the women were hanged.


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[Assistant] Folklore is a powerful mechanism for belief. Sure, a lot of the time it's smaller, more simple things like believing an iron horseshoe might keep evil from entering a home, or that finding a rare and special four-leaf clover means you're lucky, but sometimes it exacts a darker price.


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[Assistant] And as we all know, there are often two sides to every story. There's the folklore, and then there's reality.


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[Assistant] Remember our friend Abraham the Jew who recorded his shopping experience at a witch's house in 1458? Well, it seems that after she woke up from her short trip from the tabletop to the floor, she described the most fantastical journey to him. A journey he didn't think took place because he had been with her the whole time.


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[Assistant] It turns out a lot of the ingredients in those old flight ointments, things like henbane, gymson weed, and nightshade, can all cause hallucinations. So for centuries, people were crafting ointments that didn't actually gift them with the power of flight, but the chemicals inside them made them believe they were. One story.


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[Assistant] Two sides. And that's why we need to return to our Scotsman and his encounter with those two nice ladies who ran the boarding house in Bakewell. Because many historians, including William Andrews, who documented it back in 1892, believe that there was a less magical, more sinister tale at heart.


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[Assistant] Andrews suggests that the Scotsman most likely just failed to pay for his room and was evicted without his belongings. After making his way to London, he snuck into a shopkeeper's cellar, ditched his clothing, poured a bit of wine on himself, and then delivered his fantastic story to the judge.


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[Assistant] And he did this knowing full well how much weight the accusations of a man in England carried for two poor women in a social and political climate that was on high alert for anything evil.


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[Assistant] He did it with the assumption that they would be arrested, possibly even executed, all in an attempt to get revenge on them for having the gall to charge him for his room. And of course, that's what happened.


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[Assistant] Both women hanged for their fake crime, and the legends surrounding witch transportation received a new story to support its claims. All thanks to the power of folklore.


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[Assistant] Let's be honest for a moment. Sometimes folklore is a bit like a wish list. Who wouldn't love to find buried treasure, be able to fly, or live in a world where Bigfoot and a Wendigo can hang out and hunt together? And right up there with the best of them, I think all of us wish that we could be in two places at once.


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[Assistant] In technical terms, they call it bilocation, the ability to be in two spots at the same time. It's an idea that's been around for thousands of years. There were rumors that Pythagoras, yes, the Greek philosopher that we all learned about in geometry class, could bilocate, once being sighted in two cities that were a day's journey apart at the same time.


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[Assistant] It's an attractive idea for sure, so naturally those sorts of stories persisted over the years. By the time England was obsessed with finding witches and putting them on trial, thanks to King James and others, it had even worked its way into some of the confessions of the accused.


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[Assistant] A good example took place in the English market town of Burry St. Edmunds at the start of the 17th century. It was actually a community that would be well known for its witch trials, for tragic reasons no less. But it seems to have started in 1599 with two women who were put on trial, although no verdict is recorded.


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[Assistant] Another group of victims were accused later in 1645, with 18 of them executed as a result. And then, a generation after that, the panic was back again. This time, it was two elderly women, both widows, both poor, and both unliked by their neighbors.


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[Assistant] There was the usual list of accusations, of course, using magic to make children vomit sharp needles and causing property damage and illness among the livestock. But it was when the two women went to trial that something different came up. By location.


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[Assistant] As people were giving their testimony against the older women, the alleged victims were in the courtroom, and they began to display signs of being attacked by something invisible. They cried out in pain, swatted at unseen hands or weapons, and even ran around the room to escape the pain they were experiencing. Or at least that's what they said.


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[Assistant] Without being able to see their attackers, it's hard to say for sure.


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[Assistant] Their point, it seems, was to convince the judges that the accused witches were able to send their invisible spirits outside their body to attack others. What they were witnessing inside the courtroom that day was nothing short of proof that the invisible attacks were real. And most of the judges fell for it all. Hook line and sinker.


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[Assistant] In fact, it seemed that the violence and frenzy exhibited by those alleged victims only made them believe it more. Yes, there were a few who spoke out against this form of invisible evidence, what folks back then referred to as spectral evidence, but it seems that the majority of those making decisions felt that it was admissible.


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[Assistant] Think about it. A court of law overseeing a case that had deadly repercussions and all of a sudden it was good and right to pretend to be fighting an invisible witch while expecting no solid physical proof to back it up.


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[Assistant] People talked after that. Of course they did. How could they not? Some whispered, hoping they would never fall under the critical eye of the authorities like that because they knew innocence was no guarantee of safety. And some told the tale more boldly, like old war stories to shout with enthusiasm down at the pub.


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[Assistant] Eventually, the entire incident was written up in a 60 page pamphlet known as A Trial of Witches. And as a printed work, it spread far and wide. Which is how, 30 years later,


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[Assistant] It ended up in the hands of some judges overseeing yet another version of the same sort of community panic.


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[Assistant] This one though, took place across the sea, in a land that was supposed to hold so much more promise, so much more hope, and so much more freedom.


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[Assistant] But the old world had followed them, complete with its fears and its folklore.


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[Assistant] In the end, because of this document, these new judges decided that they too should allow invisible spectral evidence to decide the fate of the accused. And in doing so, they doomed at least 25 people to their death. The community? Salem, Massachusetts.


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[Assistant] Lore has been a podcast since 2015 with nearly 400 million downloads to date. You can learn more about this show, plus the book series and the television adaptation over at lorepodcast.com. And of course, be sure to click the subscribe button and the bell icon so that you don't miss future episodes.


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[Assistant] And if you enjoyed this one, click the thumbs up too. And you can also follow the show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Just search for Lore Podcast, all one word, and then click that follow button. And when you do, say hi. I like it when people say hi. And as always, thanks for watching.


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[Assistant] If I mention them to you, the first thing you'll think of is aliens. And that would be wrong.


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[Assistant] Sadly, that's the first thing most people imagine when they hear about crop marks. They see elaborate patterns, flattened stalks, and something that looks like a corn maze.


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[Assistant] But crop marks are actually something else. Yes, they are patterns visible in a field, but their origins aren't from up above, or even from tricky locals. No, these crop marks originate from below.


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[Assistant] And it all has to do with archaeology. Here's how it works. In places where there used to be a ditch that became filled in over time, the crops planted above those spaces have more fertile soil than the areas around it. So in times of drought, the plants growing above those ancient ditches look more green and lush.


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[Assistant] Wherever there are walls though, the opposite happens. The soil there is more shallow than other areas. So during a drought, the plants growing above them look dead and yellow. And if you add in the invention of the airplane, you have a recipe for discovery, which is what has happened in England for decades.


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[Assistant] There are far too many examples to list here, but every time the weather gets overly dry and hot in the English countryside, it becomes possible to fly over normally green fields and spot shapes.


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[Assistant] The outlines of long-forgotten buildings. The contours of a Roman road. Even the ring-shaped remnants of ancient Iron Age burial mounds.


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[Assistant] Through crop marks, we can see how the archaeology below has an influence on the world above, and it's incredible.


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[Assistant] But sometimes the opposite has been true. For thousands of years, the things above us have altered the way we live our lives down below. It's a realm of folklore that might seem boring and predictable, but in reality, it's one of the darkest homes of our weirdest behavior. And I promise you this.


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[Assistant] You'll never look at the sky the same way again.


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[Assistant] Our weather isn't a mystery to us today. We have computers in our pockets and on our wrists that give us up to the minute temperature readings. We can receive notifications for upcoming rain. There are even AI-driven services that tell us where the clouds will be in the future.


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[Assistant] For us, there's very little that's magical about the weather.


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[Assistant] We also have one other problem, if I can call it that. We don't depend on the weather for our food. We depend on our paychecks and transportation to the grocery store. Inside, we can buy things that normally wouldn't be in season in our neck of the woods, and we can stock up for months or just buy a little.


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[Assistant] But thousands of years ago, life was incredibly different. Bad weather could threaten the lives of entire communities or regions, droughts or flooding, or even things like hail could wipe out months of effort spent growing the crops that our ancestors would need to survive throughout the rest of the year.


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[Assistant] And for them, how it all worked, was a complete mystery.


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[Assistant] And because of all this, ancient preoccupation with the weather took on two different flavors. The first was passive, and had to do with reading the signs. Because if they could understand what the weather was going to do, they could prepare and act, right? So they did things that gave them the illusion of access to that sort of information.


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[Assistant] And some bits of it are still here today. What is Groundhog Day, if not the modern practice of divination with an animal oracle? And if you've lived in New England for more than five minutes, you've probably heard someone recite that old favorite,


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[Assistant] Red skies at night, sailors delight. Red skies in morning, sailors take warning.


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[Assistant] All these millennia later, we still think we can do it. Just read the signs and all will be revealed. They are holdovers from another age, when people desperately needed to know what to do and looked for any sign they could find to guide them. But that also leads us to the second form of preoccupation our ancestors had with the weather. Actively trying to control it.


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[Assistant] For a very long time, humans were convinced that they could influence the weather with their behavior. And before you scoff at this and make some comment about how you're glad we've left all that behind, think about how many times someone has said to you something like this. Well, I packed my snow shovels away in the garage, so if it snows tomorrow, you can blame me.


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[Assistant] It has an element of magical thinking, doesn't it? That we can do things in a certain way, and if we do, the weather will bend to our wishes.


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[Assistant] So is it any wonder that our ancestors had so many weather-focused gods? In Egypt, there was Horus, who was, among other jobs, the god of good weather. Another Egyptian god, Set, represented the opposite side, the storms.


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[Assistant] The Greeks had Zeus with his big white beard and hands full of lightning bolts ready to throw them at us. And Tempestus was worshipped by the Romans as the goddess of sudden weather and storms. Oh, and who could forget Thor, of course, with his own connection to thunder and lightning.


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[Assistant] Centuries ago in Germany, it was common for farmers to gather up earthworms and dry them over a fire in order to prevent too much rain. Why? Because people noticed that worms dried out during dry weather, so they treated cause and effect like a recipe for a magical spell.


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[Assistant] They also had another bizarre tradition there in the Rhineland. You see, they noticed that whenever it was about to rain, the crayfish would crawl out of the river and onto the shore. So whenever they needed rain, a group of naked maidens would enter the river and then crawl out like a crayfish, hoping it would nudge the rain into action.


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[Assistant] Roughly 2,500 years ago in China, a philosopher named Yan Ying was asked by a local ruler how he might encourage rain to fall on his crops. The teacher instructed him to strip naked and go into the woods, essentially exposing himself to the elements.


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[Assistant] Some scholars today think the idea was linked to the belief that the gods would take pity on such a defenseless person.


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[Assistant] In this case it worked. As a result, similar exposure rituals continued to be practiced for nearly 2000 years.


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[Assistant] And right up there with traditions like that are the rain-making rituals of a good number of Native American people groups. Almost always in the form of a dance, these rituals were designed to call down rain on dry crops.


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[Assistant] Participants would wear clothing decorated using special colors and patterns, and sometimes even masks used only for those occasions.


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[Assistant] I hope it's clear just how desperately our ancestors wanted to control the weather. From prayers to invisible gods and ritual dance ceremonies to running naked through the forest or cooking worms over a fire, the people who came before us expressed their need for control over the weather in some pretty unique ways.


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[Assistant] But as is always the case with folklore, it gets much more weird. And to see what I mean, we need to pack up and travel deep into Europe. Because the things we can dig up there, are beyond disturbing.


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[Assistant] We have to start out by laying down the rules of the game. Before Christianity entered the picture between the 7th and 12th centuries, the Slavic people of Eastern Europe had some pretty unique beliefs. And even when the church moved in and started changing things, a lot of those old beliefs stuck around.


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[Assistant] First, there was a strong belief in the Burial of the Dead as a sort of wedding ceremony between the deceased and the Earth, referred to in some traditions by the super appealing name of Mother Moist Earth. By interring the body of the dead into the ground, people believed they were, in some magical way, planting seeds. But not all of those seeds were good.


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[Assistant] You see, another prominent belief was that some dead people were clean and others were unclean. Spiritually speaking, of course. If someone lived out their long life and died of natural causes, they followed the plan laid out for them by God and were therefore clean.


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[Assistant] But if death came about for other reasons, murder, suicide, tragic accident, or plague, or they lived lives that brushed up against evil forces, like drunkards, witches, and sorcerers, then they were seen as unclean. I think you get the idea.


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[Assistant] Now if you combine both of those ingredients into a single dish, their views on unclean bodies, plus the wedding union of Mother Earth with the dead, you get something unique and disturbing. The belief that planting bad seeds can only lead to evil outcomes.


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[Assistant] Only the dead who were deemed clean were allowed to be buried in the churchyard. And if that rule was broken, bad things could happen. And of course, in an agricultural society, a lot of those bad things were weather-related. Drought, destructive winds, excessive rain. You name it, if it harmed the crops, the unclean dead were to blame.


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[Assistant] It was another of those cause and effect relationships that had been turned into a magical ritual.


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[Assistant] Sin was punished by God, so if sinful people were honored by their community, God was believed to deliver wrath and judgment through the weather. Granted, the list of things that made people sinful would cause most of us to roll our eyes today, but in that place, at that time, this stuff was the simple truth.


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[Assistant] For example, in 1606, a pretender to the Russian throne was assassinated. He had a lot going against him too. He was suspected to be a sorcerer, he was clearly a traitor.


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[Assistant] And he died an unnatural death through murder. Which is why people got worried on the night his body was thrown into a grave in Moscow. Only to see the city gripped by a vicious early frost that killed off everything from crops to trees.


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[Assistant] So how does someone fight back against powerful supernatural mechanisms like that? Well, you dug those unclean bodies back up. That's what. In fact, all throughout Eastern Europe, there are stories of bodies being disinterred because of bad weather. And honestly, they are disturbing.


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[Assistant] In 1515, a Greek monk named creatively Maximus the Greek was working in Moscow when he actually witnessed a number of these weather-related exhumations.


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[Assistant] He wrote about how the corpses of those who died by murder or drowning were dug up, carted out into the open countryside, and then left on the ground exposed to the elements.


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[Assistant] In 1891, a Russian woman died of intoxication and after her burial, the community experienced a drought.


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[Assistant] That symbolic connection between her overindulgence in drink and the absence of rain, a drink for the earth, was obvious to locals, so her corpse was exhumed and dumped into the nearby river, hoping it would call up some rain.


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[Assistant] One of my favorite examples happened when a drought swept through a Czechoslovakian village in the summer of 1900. Locals went looking for answers and what they came up with was the realization that their schoolmaster had died months before and been buried with his head resting on a feather pillow. So they dug him up and removed the pillow, hoping for rain.


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[Assistant] And in 1868, people in the Taraskants region of Russia became so frustrated with their own drought that they dug up the coffin of a man everyone believed had been a sorcerer, opened the lid, and then hit the corpse over the head while chanting, give us rain. They then poured water over the body, again, connecting it to the wish for rainfall, and then reburied it.


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[Assistant] I think it's clear how our dependence on the weather for healthy crops has led many cultures to develop unusual traditions, even going so far as to violate the burial of the dead in search of answers.


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[Assistant] Over time, it's been labeled as taboo by the church and illegal by governments, and yet even as the decades ticked by, it has kept on popping up. And in one instance in particular, it did more than disturb people. It led to tragedy.


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[Assistant] Like a lot of similar stories, this one begins with a drought, but also a bunch of political unrest. You see, in 1905, the world in Russia was changing.


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[Assistant] Tsar Nicholas II had watched his country rise up in a revolution, ending only when he delivered some of the important things they'd been asking for. A semi-representative government and partial freedom of the press being two of the biggest.


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[Assistant] In a lot of ways, it seemed like the old ways were passing away and new modern ways of living were about to appear. But far south in Crimea, the past still had a stranglehold on the people there. So when a terribly hot and dry summer gripped one community, the people became desperate.


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[Assistant] I mentioned earlier that there was a long list of things that made someone unclean. It might be the unusual way they died, or it could have been their occupation or reputation in life that earned them that title.


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[Assistant] And one of those bad occupations was known as the au pair.


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[Assistant] In a lot of instances, the word opere is translated as a sorcerer. But because these people were believed to possess the power to literally drain the life out of people and animals, it was sometimes translated as another equally familiar creature. A vampire.


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[Assistant] There's a lot going on in that connection, all of which would take too long to dive into here. But just be aware of how that network of evil, from deviant unclean burials to sorcerers and witches, all had an impact on how people saw their world. And when that world started to die around them, people became very afraid.


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[Assistant] In this particular Crimean village in the summer of 1905, the drought drove people to remember how an old man had died months before. And despite being known as a sorcerer, he had been buried inside the town.


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[Assistant] So the people there began to plan how they might remedy the situation. And you guessed it, they were going to dig him up and then douse his corpse with holy water.


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[Assistant] Now, while the villagers were putting the finishing touches on their plans, someone knocked on the door of the local priest, a man named Father Constantine, and invited him to come along.


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[Assistant] And I know that sounds odd. The Church had publicly been fighting rituals like this for years, after all. But in a lot of communities across Eastern Europe, local priests were secret allies, sometimes visiting the graves of those seen as unclean and sprinkling holy water on the soil above them. So they assumed Father Constantine would want to come and help. That night, the ritual began.


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[Assistant] An entire procession of people marched out from the center of the village, some of them armed with shovels, while others played flutes and fiddles to give the disturbing moment its own soundtrack.


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[Assistant] According to the newspaper article that came out a few weeks later, once they reached the grave the villagers dug up the coffin, opened the lid, and then yanked the corpse of the dead wizard out of it.


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[Assistant] Then, after propping the body up against the base of a tree, as if he were sitting, forty to fifty of the villagers danced around it, all while musicians carried the tune. And that was when Father Constantine showed up.


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[Assistant] At the sight of him, the villagers cheered, referred to as joyful greetings in the later newspaper accounts, and welcomed him into the circle.


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[Assistant] But that's when the priest told everyone that he hadn't come to help after all. But to put a stop to what he called superstition and barbarity.


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[Assistant] So the crowd reacted the only way that they knew how, through fear. They accused the priest of also being a wizard. Why else would he come to stop their plans after all? And because of that fear, and more than a little vodka according to the newspaper account, four of the men grabbed the priest and tossed him into the open grave.


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[Assistant] They grabbed their shovels and quickly pushed all of the stones and soil they had previously removed back into the hole, sealing them both in. Forever.


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[Assistant] Intersections are a place of power. And if you study folklore long enough, you'll start to notice how so many of the most fascinating beliefs are born at the intersection of two typically natural forces.


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[Assistant] When it comes to weather folklore, that intersection occurs at the place where two human characteristics join forces, our innate desire to control things, and our strong survival instincts. When the very lives of our community are on the line, unusual weather often comes with the forecast of cloudy with the chance of death.


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[Assistant] As I mentioned earlier, both the Church and various governments have done their best to put a stop to these ancient rituals.


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[Assistant] Remember the story of the woman who died from intoxication only to have her body exhumed and tossed into the river? While the community itself believed it was essential, six people involved in the ritual were still arrested and sentenced to time in prison.


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[Assistant] It's a story of the back and forth, of ancient fears and magical solutions, battling with what many people view as logic and rational thought. It's a story of the staying power of folklore and how entire cultures can rise and fall and yet their traditions can live on.


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[Assistant] And it's a story of real people with real problems doing the best they can.


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[Assistant] And in Crimea, in 1905, that manifested in the unusual graveside ritual that ended with the grave being refilled with an extra occupant. A living human being, no less. And as you'd probably guess, the village was abuzz with whispers about what had happened. Honestly, how could they not talk about it, right?


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[Assistant] The very next morning after those dark events, two women felt compelled enough to visit the local authorities and tell them what happened.


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[Assistant] They had hope, however thin it might be, that if people acted fast enough, Father Constantine might be saved.


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[Assistant] Men were sent to the graveyard and the loose soil was once again lifted out one shovel full at a time. When they reached the priest, he was silent and unmoving, but they pulled him out, still hopeful, and handed him over to a team of physicians. And those doctors worked for more than an hour to resuscitate him. Sadly, it wasn't meant to be.


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[Assistant] That cold dark grave had become an instrument of death, a sudden end to his life's journey, and the beginning of another from which there was no going back.


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[Assistant] All of it, from start to finish, driven forward by the engine of fear.


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[Assistant] And did it help? Did the drought end in a massive shower of rain that answered all of their prayers and justified their desperate actions?


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[Assistant] Of that, we have no record. But then again, that's never the point, is it? Because when it comes to magical cause and effect beliefs like this, only one truth is ever recorded.


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[Assistant] Stories of weather folklore are always a good way to bring a smile to someone's face or get them shaking their head in bewildered confusion. Either way, they never fail to entertain and they never really go away because the weather is always there, always present, and always important.


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[Assistant] And there's another branch to these stories that deserves exploring. In fact, I have another fantastic story to share, and I can't begin to tell you how striking it is. Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.


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[Assistant] It's hard to imagine bad weather, especially the sort with thunder and lightning, without the Norse god, Thor. And my guess is, even if there used to be a few people who had never heard of him, a decade of big budget superhero films probably filled in the blanks.


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[Assistant] But don't let the spandex and leather outfits fool you. Lightning was a big deal for our ancestors. In fact, it often acted like a bookmark, pointing out the moment where the divine stepped into the mundane. If only briefly.


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[Assistant] According to Durham University Professor Elizabeth Warren, the ancient Greeks held lightning in such high regard that they often built temples on the locations of known lightning strikes. And the Romans who came after them had their own reverence for it, requiring anyone killed by lightning to be buried right there, where the tragedy happened.


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[Assistant] Oh, and if someone broke that rule, they'd be sacrificed to Jupiter, the Roman pantheon's version of the Greek god Zeus. Because of course.


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[Assistant] In Russia, people killed by lightning strikes were classified as, you guessed it, unclean. And that included things like house fires caused by lightning. In fact, if your house caught on fire thanks to a freak storm, not only were you discouraged from rescuing any of your possessions inside, but it was also recommended that you use unusual liquids to put it out. Things like beer or milk were preferred.


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[Assistant] Again, this was all part of their worldview that saw God dishing out divine punishment from high above. Most saw lightning as a marker that highlighted the sinful, and if their house or life were destroyed, it had to be for a good reason, right?


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[Assistant] Today I think we worry less about lightning strikes, and the stats help us with that. Back in 2020, the National Lightning Safety Council, yes, that's a real thing, published a helpful report. Between 2006 and 2019, only 418 people were recorded as having died from lightning strikes.


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[Assistant] But those tiny numbers, statistically speaking, hide real pain. And while it happened long before that report was ever written, there's one story in particular that I think illustrates the danger of lightning and why ancient peoples universally feared it.


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[Assistant] It began on the evening of July 23rd of 1857. Robert was a worker at the Navy Yard on the northwest edge of Brooklyn, and he lived nearby at the corner of High Street and Hudson Avenue. And that evening, as he had probably done a number of times before, Robert left home on an errand.


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[Assistant] He'd made the walk many times. Living there with his wife and two kids meant that he knew exactly where to go to buy just about anything he needed. And that night in July, it was a handful of groceries, which meant a trip down to Lafayette Avenue.


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[Assistant] The sky above looked dark when he left home, but it was also evening, so I'm guessing Robert didn't fully realize why there was so little light. But on his way there, the wind picked up. That sort of cool, sharp breeze that comes in ahead of a storm. Maybe he picked up his pace a little. He certainly didn't turn around and go home, though.


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[Assistant] Once there, he did his shopping as planned, but I can imagine the sound of the wind could be heard through the shop's open windows. So after paying for what he came for, he headed back out, this time walking with a bit more urgency. But almost immediately, the sky opened up and drenched him with a shower of rain. And then, it got worse.


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[Assistant] Thunder rumbled as he walked, and soon enough the rain grew thicker, less of a shower and more of an assault, and every few steps the darkness was ripped open by a flash of lightning. I imagine it wasn't long before Robert decided that it would be best to step out of the storm and wait for it to pass, so he looked for some shelter.


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[Assistant] What he found was the front step of a brownstone and the decorative stone casing that wrapped around the wooden door. It didn't provide total protection, but it was enough to stop the rain and let him dry off a bit. And it was at that moment that the lightning struck.


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[Assistant] The bolt connected with the brownstone high up on the roof, back at the rear corner of the house. But electricity is a lot like water. It flows by nature, following the path of least resistance. And that path took the lightning through the wall of the house, down to the second floor, and then forward to the front.


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[Assistant] From there it continued downward, eventually connecting with the top of the stone casing around the door. The wet, stone casing.


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[Assistant] That entire journey, of course, only took a second or two. Way too fast for anyone to notice at the time. But as the lightning passed through the house itself, the windows on the front of the building exploded outward. And at that very same moment, most likely, so too did Robert McKnight.


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[Assistant] Actually, exploded might not be the best term to describe what happened to him. The medical examiner would later report that the lightning entered Robert's brain through the left eye, having jumped the short distance from the stone casing above. Once inside him, it shot straight down to the ground, passing through him in an instant.


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[Assistant] When the windows exploded, the homeowner ran to the front door to see if any other homes in the neighborhood had been damaged. But as soon as he opened the door, he stopped, because there, standing on his front steps, was a man, Robert. And that man was on fire.


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[Assistant] The robber was already dead. The lightning had killed him instantly and then blown all of his clothing below his belt into nothing more than a bunch of ribbons. Even his boots were destroyed and the foot through which the lightning had exited had been smashed to pieces.


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[Assistant] The newspaper account of his death has that delightful yet creepy perspective that so many Victorian papers had at the time. Yes, it recounted his final tragic moments. But it also took time to list out the contents of his pocket.


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[Assistant] Not much, if you're wondering, although the gold coins he had with him managed to survive.


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[Assistant] The weather, like so much of life, is entirely unpredictable, and that's probably why it fascinates us so much. We long to put logic to it, to wrap it in clothing we can understand. And even then, just when we think we've got it, it throws a curveball at us. Or, in this case, a lightning bolt.


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[Assistant] It's no wonder that humans have longed to control it, but given all we know about the weather, perhaps we should fear it instead.


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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. Lore is 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 and executive produce a whole bunch of other podcasts, all of which I think you'd enjoy. My production company, Grim and Mild, specializes in shows that sit at the intersection of the dark and the historical.


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[Assistant] You can learn more about all of these shows and everything else going on over in one central place, GrimAndMild.com. And you can also follow this show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Just search for Lore Podcast, all one word, and then click that follow button. And when you do, say hi. I like it when people say hi. And as always, thanks for listening.


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[Assistant] It was the sort of history you could taste. And for me to unpack that statement, we're going to have to go on quite a journey.


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[Assistant] Museums around the world are filled with artifacts from another time. Sometimes those objects are weapons, sometimes clothing. Even human remains sometimes become exhibits for crowds to come see. But there are also cooking implements.


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[Assistant] Working with some experts in the fields of microbiology and ancient brewing, he managed to get some dormant yeast samples extracted from some bread-making objects from the Old Kingdom. That's over 4500 years old, if you're keeping track. And once the yeast had been pulled out, they woke it up.


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[Assistant] Blackley nurtured that yeast sample all the way to a starter, using only ingredients that the ancient Egyptians would have had access to, and then continued the process until he was ready to bake. The result? Bread that's as close as we could hope to what the Egyptians would have tasted all those millennia ago.


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[Assistant] I might live in New England, but I'm a Midwest boy at heart. More specifically, central Illinois. And growing up amidst all those small towns laid out on a nice grid and separated by about 30 miles of cornfields in all directions, you learn to find things to explore in your own backyard.


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[Assistant] One of my favorite haunts, no pun intended, was the nearby cemetery. Now, I could tell you about my visits there, or what it felt like, or even why I was there in the first place, but chances are good that most of you have done it too.


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[Assistant] Cemeteries have an undefinable attraction, and we can see that in all sorts of cemetery-related folklore.


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[Assistant] Of course, there's the general superstitions involving cemeteries, right? How many of you grew up hearing that you're supposed to hold your breath whenever you drive past a graveyard or else something bad might happen? And how many of you still do it?


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[Assistant] There's also the old folklore about burial order. First burial in the new cemetery is sometimes considered unlucky, while the last burial is sometimes seen as the guardian over all that came before them. And some people believe that weeds growing over a grave is a sign that the person buried there was evil.


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[Assistant] But aside from the general folklore, there are specific stories. Up north in Decatur, Illinois, there's Greenwood Cemetery.


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[Assistant] Much of its reputation comes from its state of disrepair, which is a pretty common theme, actually. Cemeteries sometimes shut down, whether the land runs out or business goes bust. And as they grow unkempt, they become home to legend.


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[Assistant] A common tale told about Greenwood is that of a young couple who planned to run away together because their families wouldn't agree to let them marry. But the young man who worked for one of the local bootleggers made the mistake of telling his boss, who didn't want information about his business leaving town,


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[Assistant] The young man's body was found later that week, floating in the nearby river, and then buried in Greenwood Cemetery.


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[Assistant] After that, his heartbroken lover drowned herself in the same river and it's now believed that she haunts the cemetery, slowly walking between the headstones in the wedding dress she never got to wear in life.


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[Assistant] South of it, in Spring Valley, the Masak Mausoleum inside the Lithuanian Liberty Cemetery has its own chilling tale. Local legend has it that a ghost known as the Hatchet Man guards the graveyard and possibly rests inside the Mausoleum.


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[Assistant] The proof? Some say the door to the crypt is always warm. That, and sometime in the 1960s, someone broke into it and stole a skull. Which, admittedly, is a great way to tick off a ghost. So many unusual reports have come from the cemetery over the years that police routinely patrol it now.


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[Assistant] But the legend that's closest to my heart is actually the one that's closest to me. You see, there's a plot of land just outside of the town of Streeter that was once the home to a settler named Jacob Moon. It's said that he and his family arrived in the early 1800s, and as many settlers did, they eventually needed to start a family cemetery.


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[Assistant] Over the years, more and more people were interred there, earning it the name Moons Point Cemetery. Although, growing up there myself, most people called it Moon Creek Cemetery, or the nearby creek of the same name. Regardless of what you call it though, this graveyard has a couple of thrilling legends to keep everyone on the edge of their seat.


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[Assistant] First, there's the Hatchet Lady. No relation, I assume, to Spring Valley's hatchet man. This spirit is said to be the ghost of a woman who guards the grave of her son, who died in the Civil War.


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[Assistant] Over the years many visitors to the cemetery have encountered strange lights and sounds, including the voice of a woman, whispering in a tone as cold as the winter wind. Get out.


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[Assistant] For the most historically minded, though, I need to point out that there's no record of a woman buried there with a Civil War son. But my hometown paper, The Times Press, does reveal a possible answer. The 1886 grave of a man killed with an axe in an alcohol-fueled bar fight.


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[Assistant] There's also the train to worry about. You see, the only way to get to Moon Creek Cemetery is to drive down a long road that crosses an old train track.


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[Assistant] That's not altogether unusual in Illinois, honestly. There are rail lines criss-crossing the landscape all over the place. But the legend about this one is slightly more... restrictive.


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[Assistant] Legend tells of a ghost train that passes by the cemetery each night. And if you've been brave enough to drive out to visit the place after dark, but don't leave before the ghost train arrives, then you'll be trapped there forever.


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[Assistant] Me, I know about the train tracks because I've been there many times, even at night. Once, I even had to wait for a train to pass by on the tracks before the road became passable again. Clearly though,


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[Assistant] I've lived to talk about it, which calls the truth of the legend into question.


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[Assistant] As I mentioned before, I'm from Illinois. And if you dig into popular folklore from that state, the one that shows up the most is one we've already covered on this show before. Resurrection Mary.


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[Assistant] To quickly recap the legend, Resurrection Mary is said to be a ghostly young woman who has been picked up by drivers since the 1930s. This woman always requests being dropped off at the Resurrection Cemetery, southwest of Chicago on Archer Avenue. After getting out of the car, Mary always disappears.


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[Assistant] But Resurrection Mary is just one example of many ghostly sightings in Illinois. Some, just like hers, are even grounded in cemeteries. And a good example is White Cemetery in the town of Barrington.


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[Assistant] Along with numerous reports of odd lights and glowing orbs inside the cemetery grounds, there are also stories of unusual sightings closer to the road. It seems that people over the years have reported driving past the cemetery only to see a handful of shadowy figures standing by the front gate.


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[Assistant] And on the rare occasion that someone has pulled over to investigate, those shadows have always vanished before their eyes.


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[Assistant] Alton, Illinois is a town that few have heard of, probably thanks to its larger neighbor across the Mississippi, nearby St. Louis. But its cemetery is the final resting place of a man named Elijah Lovejoy, an outspoken abolitionist who ran a newspaper there in the 1830s.


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[Assistant] Apparently, Lovejoy wouldn't stop printing materials that called for the end of slavery. So he was driven out of St. Louis and over the river to Alton.


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[Assistant] Once settled there, he started up again, which ticked off all those fanboys of human trafficking. So they raided his warehouse in November of 1837, and Lovejoy died defending his printing press.


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[Assistant] Worried about vandalism by the same people who killed him, the town had Lovejoy buried in an unmarked grave. But six decades later, his remains were located and reburied in the Alton City Cemetery, along with a massive 100-foot-tall monument nearby to honor his sacrifice.


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[Assistant] But that monument is also said to be the location of constant sightings by visitors of a ghostly figure, along with frequent reports of cold spots and unusual lights.


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[Assistant] And I know it's easy to dismiss stories about foggy, wispy visions. They often lack evidence and rely solely on belief to survive over the years. But as I said before, the best way to understand history and folklore is to experience it for yourself. And with that in mind, do I have a story for you?


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[Assistant] In the summer of 1997, I was enjoying life as a newly graduated, college-educated young man with few commitments.


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[Assistant] And that left me free to hang out with friends quite often, which is why one night in July or August of that year, I headed out of Streeter to the nearby town of Pontiac to enjoy an evening around a fire pit in a friend's backyard.


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[Assistant] After the fun was over, everyone climbed back into their cars and trucks and headed home. For me, that meant heading north up Route 23, which would take me back to Streeter. But it was a drive that often felt like traveling through a tunnel thanks to the tall stalks of corn on either side of the road.


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[Assistant] It was late and very dark, but the sky was clear and the stars were bright. I eventually passed by a familiar sign marking the turnoff for the tiny village of Longpoint and then kept driving north. And it was some time after that when I experienced something I have rarely talked about in the 25 years since.


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[Assistant] From a distance I could see something pale at the edge of the corn at the farthest reaches of my headlights. More than likely just a piece of plastic blown in from a nearby farm.


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[Assistant] Now, let me be clear. I had not been drinking that night. And being a night owl at the time, I wasn't overly exhausted either. But I could clearly see a pale, transparent, almost glowing woman stepping out of the corn beside the highway. Her white dress waving slowly in the wind.


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[Assistant] And then, as quickly as I came alongside her, I was passed, and my brain immediately began to flood my thoughts with doubts. Glancing up at my mirror, I quickly looked to see if it had all been in my imagination. But she was still there, slowly stepping back into the corn.


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[Assistant] A lot has happened in the 25 years since that night on a small Illinois highway. I moved to New England, I did a lot of writing in my spare time, and I eventually started this podcast.


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[Assistant] And while I've been privileged to do a lot of cool things because of this show, one of the favorite things to do is to go on tour. What does that look like? Well, it's basically a long string of flights with my buddy Chad Lawson, whose music you hear playing right now in the background.


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[Assistant] Together, we would visit city after city, check into the hotel, have lunch, and then head to the venue to prepare for that evening show. The live lore experience is what you'd expect. Chad playing a grand piano, and me reading stories just like I do into this microphone here at home.


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[Assistant] Oh, and a thousand or so amazing people in the audience, too.


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[Assistant] One leg of our last tour, back in 2019, took us to Texas and the beautiful city of Austin. It was there on September 15th that we were set to do a show at the historic Paramount Theater, a place that you really must visit if you ever have the chance.


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[Assistant] It was built back in 1915, and for over a century, it's been a place where locals could go for all sorts of entertainments. Way back in the day, that meant vaudeville, and performers like the legendary magician and escape artist Harry Houdini, the Marx Brothers, and even Hollywood icon Catherine Hepburn.


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[Assistant] But you don't find many century-old theaters without ghost stories, and the Paramount is no exception.


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[Assistant] For example, there are tales of an old man who is frequently seen in one of the opera boxes, quietly smoking his cigar. Those who have seen him all describe him the same way. But even when he can't be found with their eyes, visitors know he's there because of that smell.


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[Assistant] Some of those ghostly sightings are actually blamed on a building that once stood next door, the home of the War Department for Texas. And while it's no longer standing, it's easy to see how people over the years have connected the stress and pain that must have emanated from that place with the restless spirits who now wander the theater.


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[Assistant] The tales are entertaining for sure. And when I show up at a theater to tell ghost stories, I consider those local legends to be helpful stage dressing. It sets the mood, even if I've never experienced them myself. But all of that changed at the Paramount.


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[Assistant] That evening, Chad and I did what we always do before a performance. I read through a portion of my script while the sound team does a mic check, walking around and making sure everything sounds right. And Chad? Well, he gets all of his gear set up, micing the piano and making sure that everything is in proper working order.


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[Assistant] After that, I go backstage and pour a glass of scotch. Something that I'll bring out with me for the show. You know, as a prop.


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[Assistant] Chad usually takes a bit longer, though. But when he's done, he always stands up from his piano and takes a photo of the empty theater with his phone.


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[Assistant] So that's what he did that night. He raised his phone, aimed it at the seats, and then tapped the shutter button three times in quick succession. And then he headed backstage.


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[Assistant] It was only later that night, after all the excitement of the show was over and he was back at his hotel room, that Chad had a chance to look at those photos. And that's when he noticed something unusual. In one of the shots, there was a woman.


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[Assistant] Her figure was semi-transparent, but you can clearly see that she was wearing a white gown or dress. In fact, if you do a quick search for them, you'll be able to see what I mean. This isn't one of those blurry blob photos that gets passed around that barely looks human at all.


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[Assistant] But the most chilling detail of all, is that the woman is only in one shot.


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[Assistant] Our world is full of folklore. I would hope that the last 200 episodes of this show has made that clear. Humans are very good at filling their minds with belief, or plugging holes with notions and ideas that grow and evolve over time, eventually taking on a life of their own.


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[Assistant] And your local library is absolutely full of books about that sort of thing. You could read scholarly volumes on various branches of folklore or you could grab a classic novel like Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House or Stephen King's Pet Sematary and discover new worlds inspired by old legends.


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[Assistant] No matter how you get there, I know you'll enjoy the journey. But the best way to experience history, if you can manage it, is to experience it firsthand.


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[Assistant] Of course, those personal encounters tend to be the least documented and the most subjective, but they're also the most thrilling.


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[Assistant] I can't express just how big of a chill I got when Chad showed me those photos from the Paramount. I've seen a lot of ghost photography in my day, and this one felt neither fake nor forced.


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[Assistant] Of course, it all took on even more significance once he started to dig into the theater's past. Because apparently it's played host to a whole assortment of ghostly characters. The old man with the cigar is just one of many. Almost like the cast in a production of some old Dickens tale.


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[Assistant] And as Chad learned more about the reports over the years, well, it made the photo that much harder to dismiss.


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[Assistant] The most common story in the theater is that of a woman named Emily. She's been witnessed by countless staff and visitors over the years, and many assume that she is somehow connected to that old war department building next door. Perhaps a former employee, or the widow of a husband killed in action.


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[Assistant] In the wide world of folklore, it's easy and enriching to explore distant lands and foreign cultures. But every now and then, it's good to stop and take a look behind us. Because sometimes the places we once called home, contain their own collection of chilling tales.


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[Assistant] Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about one more creepy location from my home state.


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[Assistant] Growing up in central Illinois meant that I was always just a couple of hours from one of the greatest cities in the country, Chicago. Whether it was high school field trips to the museum and financial district, or later adventures there with friends, the windy city has always held a special place in my heart.


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[Assistant] But of course, Chicago has played host to a lot of darkness as well. Infamous serial killer H.H. Holmes preyed upon the crowds who arrived in the city for the 1893 Columbian exhibition. And notorious crime lord Al Capone ran much of his criminal empire from there. But there's so much more beneath the surface.


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[Assistant] Back in the 1830s, Chicago was a growing community, and like all places where people live, they needed a way to manage those who died. In 1837, the state government offered the city a solution. Attractive land just outside city limits, and along the shore of Lake Michigan.


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[Assistant] Yes, people were dying to get in, but that was par for the course when it came to graveyards, right?


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[Assistant] But I do think that it's helpful to hear about one of the more prominent burials there. Ira Couch was a businessman who started out as a tailor and haberdasher. Here in the US, that meant that he was a clothing retailer, probably selling neckties and suits and that sort of thing.


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[Assistant] Burn Down reopened, Burn Down again, and finally seemed to find its footing in its third incarnation. Heck, it was from the balcony of the hotel that Abraham Lincoln gave his famous house divided speech in 1858.


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[Assistant] A speech, by the way, that was at least partially inspired by Elijah Lovejoy's murder the year before at the hands of pro-slavery thugs.


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[Assistant] Anyway, Couch was the guy who ran the place, and he seemed to have been well respected in the community, making his untimely death in 1857 a bit of a shock.


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[Assistant] But Chicago would keep him close. His stone, above-ground crypt was built in the city cemetery, complete with his surname carved into the stone in big letters. And for decades, that's where his body lay.


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[Assistant] By 1866, though, folks had stopped using the city cemetery. There was a rumor going around that rotting corpses were falling into Lake Michigan, contaminating the water and spreading what they called miasma, basically bad smells and unhealthy vapors.


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[Assistant] City officials started to plan what they might do about it, eventually settling on a massive effort to remove all 35,000 burials to a new location.


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[Assistant] But they moved at a snail's pace, with some estimates claiming they only ever disinterred a few dozen. What stopped them? Well, a bit of fire, actually.


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[Assistant] The Great Chicago Fire of 1871, to be exact. That October, the now infamous blaze changed everyone's priorities for a long time. And I think by the time the dust had settled, the old cemetery was honestly the last thing on their mind.


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[Assistant] Which is why, in the years that followed, the land that once held the graveyard, as well as more than 50 acres of land stretching north, were all converted into a public park.


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[Assistant] Oh, and they named the park after the president who gave his house-divided speech from the Tremont balcony as a candidate all those years before. Lincoln Park.


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[Assistant] Yep, that's right. If you're ever standing somewhere in the southern part of Lincoln Park, there's a very good chance that you're standing on a grave. In fact, the only sign that the land was ever a cemetery at all, at least above ground, is the still standing stone crypt for our old pal, Ira Couch.


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[Assistant] And that includes the Lincoln Park Zoo, where building projects over the years have uncovered all sorts of human remains. Actually, if the stories are true, all those burials underground have resulted in some exotic sights up above.


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[Assistant] As well as odd sounds like footsteps and human voices in places where no one should be.


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[Assistant] Chicago is a beautiful city. There's no doubt about that. But there's also a lot of nuance to its history. From the gleaming white structures of the Colombian exhibition to the darkness of its criminal underbelly, the windy city holds a never-ending supply of frightening tales.


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[Assistant] And it also illustrates an important lesson for anyone interested in folklore. Sometimes the most chilling thing we can do is return to our roots.


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[Assistant] This episode of Lore, in true old school fashion and in honor of the 200th episode, was researched, written, and produced all by me, Aaron Manke, with 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 and executive produce a whole bunch of other podcasts, all of which I think you'd enjoy. My production company Grim and Mild specializes in shows that sit at the intersection of the dark and the historical.


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[Assistant] You can learn more about all of those shows and everything else going on over in one central place, GrimAndMild.com. And you can also follow this show on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Just search for Lore Podcast, all one word, and then click that follow button. And when you do, say hi. I like it when people say hi. And as always, thanks for listening.


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[Assistant] Everyone wants the latest and greatest. The newest fancy phone is typically only a small improvement over the previous version, yet eager customers will plunk down massive sums to own it. And even if your laptop is practically brand new, the moment a newer version is announced, you can feel its obsolescence.


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[Assistant] Well in 2018, legendary distillery the McKellen released a limited batch of 72 year old single malt. That's a scotch that has aged in barrels for over seven decades before being bottled up and sold.


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[Assistant] And each bottle came with a price tag of roughly $65,000. One bar in Beverly Hills was reported to have sold one ounce pours of the stuff for just $12,000 apiece. The same could be said about a lot of things.


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[Assistant] He'd bought it in 1974 for about $350 and then he never wore it. Thanks to the popularity of that model, known as a Daytona, and four decades in a safety deposit box, the watch is now estimated to be worth half a million dollars.


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[Assistant] The veteran, by the way, fell over when he heard the news, as any of us would, I'm sure.


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[Assistant] It seems that aged like a fine wine isn't always an exaggeration. Time can be powerful magic, transforming the ordinary into something more, something exceptional. And that doesn't just apply to fine objects and tasty beverages. Even the places we live can become extraordinary given enough time.


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[Assistant] After all, the longer humans live in a place, the more of themselves they imprint on its streets and landscapes.


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[Assistant] But if you want to explore the oldest in America, there's only one place to go. It might be bright and sunny, but don't let that fool you, because time has left a mark that can still be felt today, thanks to all the tragedies that have paid a visit.


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[Assistant] It seems there's one more rule that history wants us to remember. The older our cities get, the darker their shadows become.


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[Assistant] When they needed a name for the place, they turned to the calendar.


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[Assistant] It was a journey that had been at least five years in the making. Back in 1560, King Philip II of Spain had put Captain Pedro Menendez de Avalaz in charge of a bold mission to sail to the New World and help the Spanish treasure ships settle on the best route home.


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[Assistant] Now, the Caribbean and eastern coast of Mexico were practically on another planet to most people in the 1500s. But to Menendez, it was familiar and understandable. And weirdly enough, it was part of his family. You see, his son was also a captain of a Spanish ship.


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[Assistant] But in 1563, that sun's ship was lost at sea, somewhere off the coast of what would now be South Carolina.


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[Assistant] He made multiple requests to go search for his son, but the king refused. And then in 1565, Menendez was tasked with sailing to the coast of Florida to set up a colony there while also preventing the French from gaining a stronger foothold. Knowing it would also give him a chance to look for his son, Menendez agreed.


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[Assistant] So when the coast of Florida came into view on August 28th of 1565, it was a major victory for his mission. Menendez wanted to give the new settlement an auspicious name, and it just so happened that August 28th was known to Catholics as the Feast of St. Augustine. From that moment on, the settlement had a name.


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[Assistant] They weren't the first humans to live there on the coast of Florida, of course. Archaeologists can trace human settlement there back at least 15,000 years. So when Menendez and his 800 settlers came ashore, they were far from alone. In fact, the nearby Tomokua people numbered over 200,000 strong.


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[Assistant] But the arrival of Europeans changed that, mostly through the unintentional introduction of new types of disease. It's estimated that within the first 30 years of St. Augustine's settlement, over 75% of the Tomokua people were dead, thanks to smallpox and other deadly epidemics.


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[Assistant] As the decades passed by, St. Augustine grew, but it also found itself in a constant tug-of-war battle with the French and the English.


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[Assistant] Keep in mind, St. Augustine's founding in 1565 makes it the oldest continually occupied settlement of European origin in the New World. And that means that it was always there, an object of desire for any superpower looking to take control of Florida and the southeast of North America.


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[Assistant] And it should go without saying that because it was Spanish in origin, it was also deeply Catholic, while the French settlers to the north, as well as later English invaders,


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[Assistant] We're all Protestants, and in the late 1500s, that religious divide between Catholic and Protestant was one that inspired a lot of competition and hatred and spilled more than its fair share of blood.


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[Assistant] By 1821 though, after bouncing from Spanish hands to the British and then back again, the United States acquired the eastern portion of Florida in a deal with Spain and quickly began to absorb other parts of the region. And finally in 1845, Florida became a state in the Union.


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[Assistant] But that didn't mean the road ahead was smooth. In fact, it was paved with the horrible treatment of former enslaved peoples and conflict with the local Native American peoples. And no story captures that struggle more than the tale of Osceola.


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[Assistant] Chief Osceola was actually born Billy Powell in the territory that became the state of Alabama. While his heritage was mixed, his mother was Muskogee Creek and raised him in that tradition. But sometime during his childhood, he and others migrated to Florida. And over time, he became part of a movement within his people known as the Red Sticks.


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[Assistant] The name came from the two foot long war clubs that were used in Battle by the Creek. And as a group, they had war in their hearts. While their larger mission was a lot more complex, the Red Sticks basically focused primarily on resisting the European American invasion of their lands and the forced assimilation of their people into those cultures.


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[Assistant] They were a firewall, a line in the sand, and it's honestly hard to blame them. Everything they knew was being eroded away, and they wanted to fight back.


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[Assistant] In the early 1830s, Osceola and the other leaders of his community refused to be removed from the area by American agents. Tensions continued to build and violence became more frequent. But in 1837, General Thomas Jessup offered a bit of hope. Peace talks.


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[Assistant] So on October 21st, with a white truce flag flying over a fort near St. Augustine, Osceola and over 80 of his followers arrived to discuss their future.


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[Assistant] Instead, Jessup sprung a trap, and every single one of the red sticks present were captured and imprisoned. It was cowardly and dishonorable, but it also perfectly demonstrated the prevalent attitude that most Americans had toward Native Americans.


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[Assistant] But even in death, that attitude of disrespect continued. It's said that Whedon decided to take some trophies before Osceola's burial, and along with stealing a number of the man's possessions, he also removed his head, which he kept for years in a jar that he put on display.


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[Assistant] Clearly, a city as old as St. Augustine has had a chance to collect all manner of atrocities and horrible stains. Terrible moments like the betrayal of Osceola serve to remind us that no matter how far people venture out from their home, no matter how hopeful they might be as they start something new, human nature always follows them.


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[Assistant] After more than 450 years, though, St. Augustine's dark secrets have been pushed just out of sight, hidden behind a more modern facade.


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[Assistant] William Watson lived in St. Augustine during the two decades that the British controlled the city. And because the military was such a large part of life there in the 1760s, he wanted to set up a hospital to serve them.


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[Assistant] He didn't start from scratch though. Instead, he found an old building and just converted it, adding on here and there as needed.


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[Assistant] When completed, there were two wings, an east wing and a west wing, naturally, that joined at the central house, where an early version of a pharmacy was set up. Then for a while, it provided essential services to the British forces around the city. But the years weren't kind to the hospital.


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[Assistant] In 1818 a fire destroyed the West Wing, and five years later the building was abandoned by the staff for better facilities. By 1895 the East Wing was gone as well.


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[Assistant] That old central house with the apothecary stuck around though, and today, serves as a medical museum. But not all of the relics are on display.


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[Assistant] Back in 1821, an old water pipe beneath the structure burst, and a work crew was called in to repair it.


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[Assistant] The men opened up the foundation in search of the damaged segments, but as they exposed more of the soil beneath, water flooded in and turned it all into a soupy mess. And then, slowly, things began to float to the surface. Human bones.


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[Assistant] Workers at the time assumed it was a Native American burial ground, although we should remember that it was just a guess. A century later, an actual documented Tamukuwa site was discovered not far away, casting doubts on the graves beneath the old apothecary. Today, most historians think the bodies were victims of an early outbreak, killed by typhus or smallpox.


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[Assistant] Visitors to the remains of the hospital today have frequently reported an overwhelming sense of oppressive evil in the space. While there are no stories of moving objects or flickering lights, some have left the building with unexplainable scratches on their arms, while others have claimed to hear mysterious voices in otherwise empty rooms.


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[Assistant] Elsewhere in the city, other signs of its contentious past can still be found. Two ancient cemeteries seem to be in a tight contest for the title of the most haunted, and they stand on opposite sides of that age-old religious divide.


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[Assistant] As I mentioned earlier, when the city was first founded, the Protestant split from the Catholic Church was still a very painful wound.


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[Assistant] So when burial grounds were set up in St. Augustine, they reflected that division, one being Protestant and the other Catholic.


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[Assistant] The old Huguenot cemetery, an old French term used for Protestants, there are stories of the ghost of a girl who died centuries ago in an outbreak of yellow fever. The legend says that her body, like so many others, was simply dumped in the street and then buried in a pauper's grave.


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[Assistant] With no way to confirm the tale, we'll just have to take the legend with a grain of salt. Although what is clear is that people today still see her, floating among the trees near her gravesite.


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[Assistant] Another resident there is more well known. John B. Stickney was a judge who served the city in the 1800s, but was also killed by yellow fever, passing away in 1882. Decades later, his family decided to move his remains to another location. But when they opened the grave, they discovered that the body had been looted.


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[Assistant] Even today, despite the judge's remains no longer being there, people still report seeing him wandering through the graveyard at night. Maybe he, just like the city he once lived in, has a problem with letting go of the past. Or maybe it's just folklore. I'll let you decide.


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[Assistant] The Tolomado Cemetery is a little newer than its Protestant counterparts, but just as legendary. Although we're not exactly sure when it was established, we do know that an old Spanish mission once stood nearby, and the cemetery is marked on a map of the city from 1737. And it has equally compelling stories, too.


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[Assistant] One burial there is that of a young boy named James Morgan. Like many kids of his age both then and now, it's said that he loved to climb trees, especially an old oak tree right there in the cemetery. But one day, James slipped and fell out of the tree, and died as a result of his injuries. His family buried him right there beneath the tree, and purchased a number of other plots around it, planning for the future. But not all plans are meant to be.


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[Assistant] Another local family suffered their own loss in the early 1800s, according to the man who recorded the tale.


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[Assistant] Colonel Joseph Smith wrote about being invited to dinner with a younger couple not long after he moved to St. Augustine. But before he could arrive, he was notified that the wife had suddenly fallen ill and passed away. So instead of a dinner, he arrived for a funeral service.


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[Assistant] Honestly, for as tragic as that sounds, it's not unusual for the early 19th century. No, it's the burial that was odd. Colonel Smith recorded how the body of the dead woman was dressed in her finest and then seated on an elaborate chair, which was then carried by the pallbearers from the house to the graveyard.


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[Assistant] As they entered the cemetery though, they passed under a low hanging tree, and Smith tells us that one of the branches caught the dead woman's forehead, slicing her pale skin. Amazingly though, blood ran from the wound, and when it reached her eye, something else happened. She blinked.


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[Assistant] Immediately, the woman was carried back home, placed in bed, and a doctor was summoned. Like many of the illnesses of the day, it seems that the symptoms had made it seem as if she had passed away, when in reality, it had only been a deep sleep or a coma. In time, she recovered.


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[Assistant] And I would have to assume that Colonel Smith finally got his chance to go over for dinner.


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[Assistant] Sadly though, it wouldn't last long. Six years after her first death, she passed away again. This time though, instead of a swift burial, her husband decided to allow her to lay in state for seven days. Just to be sure.


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[Assistant] It seems that even in a city as old as St. Augustine, the past is never really far away. But not all of the tales that haunt the place are buried in the darkness of the earth. In fact, if the stories are true, the most frightening one comes from a very unlikely location. Right where the light shines the brightest.


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[Assistant] A lot of the stories about St. Augustine are defined by its location, specifically the Florida coast. In fact, the coast features heavily in the very first stories about the arrival of Captain Menendez. It's said that he searched the coastline for shipwreck survivors, mostly looking for his missing son.


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[Assistant] And although he never found him, the story teaches us something essential about St. Augustine.


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[Assistant] The coastline there was treacherous. Between the underwater terrain and the constant tropical storms, the coast posed a danger to passing ships. Heck, on New Year's Eve of 1782, just one evening, at least 16 ships ran aground as they were trying to sail into the harbor for shelter from a storm.


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[Assistant] Honestly, it was a busy bit of ocean. And as the years went on, that traffic only increased. Thanks in part to the Gulf Stream, which flows up the eastern coast of North America and helped ships cross the Atlantic more efficiently. If a ship was heading back to Europe, chances were good it had to pass right by St. Augustine.


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[Assistant] And then there were the military invasions. French, British, you name it, the city was constantly being approached by foreign powers. So pretty soon, after the settlement was established, a series of wooden watchtowers were built along the coast, as a sort of early warning system.


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[Assistant] In fact, we're pretty sure where most of them were located, too. Thanks to Sir Francis Drake, the English privateer who invaded the city in 1586. Not only did he make off with the military payroll and a bunch of weapons, but he also managed to map the city's defenses for future purposes.


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[Assistant] But as the centuries passed by, many of those watchtowers fell to ruin and vanished. But not the northernmost tower.


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[Assistant] That one was closest to the city center, and over the years it saw frequent use.


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[Assistant] By the mid-1700s, it was torn down and replaced with a stronger stone version, although still serving more as a watchtower than anything else. It's not until the 1780s that records list it as a lighthouse, but that change was likely what saved it from fading away like the rest of the towers.


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[Assistant] There were tense moments and tragedies over the decades that followed. One lighthouse keeper in 1859 fell off the scaffolding while painting the tower and died on impact.


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[Assistant] All those years exposed to the sea spray and tropical storms took their toll on the structure too. So in the late 1860s, funding was provided to replace it with a more modern version. Work began in 1871, and the city buzzed with excitement about the project. And that's the setting where the real tragedy took place.


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[Assistant] It's said that the lighthouse keeper at the time was a man named Hezekiah Petee, who lived there with his wife and four children. As the construction moved forward, he was right there, keeping the light lit while his children played with the children of the workers on the site.


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[Assistant] If you've ever been a kid around grownups building cool things, you can probably imagine the excitement they all felt each day.


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[Assistant] One of their favorite games apparently was to ride in the small rail car that was set up to transport supplies and materials from the dock to the job site. Whenever it wasn't being used by the workers, the kids would climb in and ride it down to the shore, where a wooden beam across the tracks stopped it from falling into the water.


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[Assistant] Think of it like a more mundane version of the minecars from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, but without the cult villains chasing after them, and I think you've got a pretty good picture of the scene.


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[Assistant] Three of the Petit children, along with the daughter of one of the workmen, all climbed into the rail car and pushed off. As the car moved down the track toward the water, it picked up the speed that made the ride so fun for them, and no one else worried, because they knew that the beam at the end of the track would stop them. Except the beam that day wasn't there.


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[Assistant] I won't describe the worst details of that tragic ride, although I'm sure you can probably fill in the blanks yourselves. When the workers heard the crash, they rushed to the scene, only to find the rail car and all of the occupants underwater, upside down. Only one of the children were saved, the youngest petite girl, while the rest were claimed by the sea.


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[Assistant] Unable to process their loss and grief, the family packed up and moved north, far from the shores of St. Augustine.


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[Assistant] But if the stories over the years are true, even though the family left the lighthouse behind, a part of them has stuck around.


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[Assistant] Since the 1870s, other lighthouse keepers have reported unusual activity inside the main house, where the Petit's once lived. In fact, the keeper who served there between 1953 and 1955 had to move out and live in the building at the base of the tower because he couldn't handle all of the unexplainable events there.


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[Assistant] Others have reported the sounds of footsteps on the second floor when the house was known to be otherwise empty. There have been unusual lights spotted through windows and the typical cold spots inside that are often associated with paranormal activity. But honestly, it's the stories that provide the most chills. Stories like this one.


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[Assistant] He had retired to his bedroom at the end of a long day and gone through his nightly routine with no unusual deviations. After climbing into the covers and turning off the light, he fell right asleep, and soon evening turned to the middle of the night.


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[Assistant] At some point though, he woke back up, his bed surrounded by darkness, and couldn't shake the feeling that he was no longer alone in the room. As his eyes adjusted to the light, he glanced around, and then caught his breath.


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[Assistant] There, at the foot of his bed was the ghostly vision of someone standing perfectly still, gazing with empty eyes at where he lay.


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[Assistant] The past has a way of fostering story. If folklore is a plant, then time is the water. Given enough of it, the seed will take roots, begin to grow, and eventually flourish. And if there's one thing St. Augustine has in abundance, it's time.


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[Assistant] At the risk of mixing my metaphors, I like to think of time as a sort of runway. The longer the stretch of pavement, the more opportunity an airplane has to get up to speed and take flight.


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[Assistant] In that sense, St. Augustine has one of the longest runways around. Over 450 years of time, in fact. And that's plenty of room for stories to be born, run their course, and then fade away as the world moves on to something new.


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[Assistant] But of course, not everyone can move on. The past isn't a winter coat that we can slough off and push into a closet. For a lot of people, the past is the present. It's with them every day, whether they like it or not. And that was just as true for the family of James Morgan back in 1877.


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[Assistant] If you remember, James was the little boy who loved to climb the large oak tree in the Tolomato Cemetery. After his tragic death, his family wrestled with how to move forward, fully aware that the past would never leave them alone.


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[Assistant] So, as I mentioned before, they bought a number of plots near the base of that tree, and buried little James in one of them.