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[Assistant] But churches filled up fast, as did the yards around them. As the population of Europe swelled, space began to disappear at an alarming rate. At first, graves were simply moved closer together, like the parking lot at your local mall. Smaller spaces meant more occupants, and that was good for business. But it only worked for a while.


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[Assistant] After that, they started stacking coffins on top of one another, opting for the vertical approach. But this meant that the churchyards were literally rising in elevation as earth was filled in between the growing graves, sometimes as high as 20 feet.


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[Assistant] Greyfriars Cemetery in Edinburgh, Scotland is a horrific example of this problem. It used to be a depression in the ground, but over time it's become more of a hill. With more than half a million recorded burials, the elevation has literally risen over 15 feet, introducing problems that are unique to a graveyard so old and so full.


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[Assistant] According to reports, there's such a high concentration of human remains there that on especially rainy days, remnants that aren't sealed within a casket have a tendency to float to the surface, bursting through the mud like white teeth.


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[Assistant] All of this left cities in need of some serious creative thinking. In some places, the solution they chose was a drastic one. In France, for example, the government actually had to step in. Churchyards had gotten so full that they would often collapse outward, spilling soil and human remains onto the streets.


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[Assistant] Walls were built around them, but they rarely worked. The dead were getting out of hand, so to speak.


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[Assistant] In 1786, they removed all the bodies from Holy Innocence Cemetery in Paris and moved them to a series of unused stone quarries that became known as the catacombs. Today, it's estimated that the catacombs hold close to 6 million bodies.


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[Assistant] Sometimes though, it wasn't a lack of space that ruined a cemetery, but a lack of popularity. That's the fate that awaited the cemetery built on the former property of Sir William Ashurst in the north end of London.


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[Assistant] Named for the small hilltop community that once existed there, Highgate Cemetery was established on the grounds of the old manor house, which had been demolished and replaced with a church in 1839.


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[Assistant] At first, the cemetery was very popular. Karl Marx is buried there, as are many relatives of Charles Dickens and Dante Rosetti.


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[Assistant] But when the owners lost money and fell on hard times, the graveyard was left to the elements. Monuments and crypts became overgrown with vegetation, and sometimes trees would sprout up right through the graves themselves.


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[Assistant] Highgate is a wonderful example of what we all imagine a haunted cemetery might look like. Filmmakers and authors have been drawn to it for decades, tapping into its arresting visual atmosphere to create works of gothic horror and fantasy. It was even the inspiration behind Neil Gaiman's beautiful novel, The Graveyard Book.


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[Assistant] But while there are plenty of stories about the history of graveyards throughout Europe and America, cemeteries have always been known for something darker, something less tangible than what we can see above ground. Perhaps it's all those neat rows of bone-white headstones, or the notion that hundreds of bodies lay waiting beneath our feet.


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[Assistant] Whatever the reason, it's in the local graveyard more than any other place that we find rumors of the otherworldly and unexplainable.


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[Assistant] Inside those walls, between the pale stones and dark trees, almost everyone has heard tales of those who refuse to stay in grave.


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[Assistant] Just south of Chicago, between the curving arms of I-80 and I-294, is a graveyard known for a level of activity unusual in a place of the dead. Bachelor's Grove Cemetery isn't big, there are only 82 plots there, and many of those have never been used, but that hasn't stopped the stories.


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[Assistant] It's said that the famous gangster Al Capone used to use the pond nearby as a dumping place for the bodies of those he killed. Other rumors make reference to the satanic rituals and meetings that have taken place in the graveyard over the years.


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[Assistant] But there are those who swear they have seen unusual things there.


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[Assistant] The most famous sighting has been called the White Lady, the ghostly image of a woman that was said to appear only during a full moon. In 1991, the Chicago Sun-Times featured a photo of the White Lady on the front cover, taken by a researcher on one of her visits. The woman appears to be semi-transparent, sitting on a tombstone near the trees, and dressed in white.


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[Assistant] Other visitors have seen glowing orbs, apparitions, and even vehicles and a farmhouse that seemed to fade in and out of existence. The site is off limits to visitors now, but it's remained a favorite haunt, no pun intended, of ghost hunters across the country.


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[Assistant] In 1863, an outbreak of smallpox moved through a Civil War POW camp in Columbus, Ohio. The camp held close to 10,000 Confederate soldiers, and thousands of them died from the epidemic. As a result, the Camp Chase Confederate Cemetery was formed, an unusual site so far north into Union territory.


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[Assistant] Miles away in New Madrid, Missouri, a Confederate sympathizer sent his young daughter north to avoid the destruction of the war. Louisiana Briggs settled in Ohio and eventually married a Union veteran, but she apparently never lost touch with her southern roots.


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[Assistant] It was said that later in life, she would often visit the Camp Chase Cemetery, where she would place flowers on various graves there. She wore a white veil each time she went in an effort to hide her face. Nevertheless, she acquired a reputation in town as the Grey Lady, and was known for her passion for the old burial ground.


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[Assistant] She passed away in 1950, but flowers would still appear regularly on the graves there. Visitors to Camp Chase have heard the sounds of a woman quietly weeping, while others have seen the figure of a woman in a veil. Something drew Louisiana Briggs to that location. That much is clear. According to the stories, though, it seems she's never left.


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[Assistant] Across the country in Connecticut, yet another graveyard place hosts to a mysterious story. Mary Hart was born in New Haven in 1824 and lived a very modest life there. She was a corset maker and machine stitcher by trade, working hard to support her family.


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[Assistant] On October 15th of 1872, Mary fell into a death-like state from unknown causes. She was only 47, young even for the late 19th century, and this tragedy rocked her family to the core.


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[Assistant] By midnight, Mary had expired and her grieving family set about to arrange for a quick and immediate burial. There was a lot of pain and I can imagine they just wanted to move on.


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[Assistant] It's said that Mary's spirit still wanders Evergreen Cemetery, close to the site of her home on Winthrop Avenue. And over the years, more than one story has been told about drivers pulling over to pick up a hitchhiking woman, only to have her disappear.


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[Assistant] Others say that Mary was a witch, although you didn't have to look far in the late 1800s to find a woman who had been accused of something like that. According to the stories, local college students have frequently visited Mary's grave, which is said to be cursed. Anyone who visits her grave at midnight, according to the legend, will meet a horrible fate.


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[Assistant] As a result, most people refer to her today as Midnight Mary.


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[Assistant] There are no records of New Haven College students who have died after visiting Mary's gravesite. But whether or not the stories are rooted in fact, it hasn't stopped them from spreading.


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[Assistant] South Cemetery in Portsmouth, New Hampshire is really a collection of many smaller graveyards. It's the site of the oldest burial ground in town, dating back to the 1600s.


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[Assistant] And it's a wonderful mixture of styles and centuries. Together, the Old Auburn Cemetery, the Proprietor's Burial Ground, Sagamore Cemetery, and Harmony Grove all combine to showcase everything from Egyptian-styled sarcophaguses


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[Assistant] To winged skulls and Victorian funerary imagery.


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[Assistant] It's a peaceful place and much of the grounds have been planted with flowering trees, creating a park-like atmosphere.


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[Assistant] But that wasn't always the case. In the 1700s, South Cemetery served double duty as both a graveyard and the site of several public executions. All of them were hangings, and more than a few of them were women, and the reasons were often tragic.


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[Assistant] The early 18th century was a very different era from our own, and the law books were filled with rules that might seem barbaric or cruel by today's standards.


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[Assistant] Provincial laws of the time required capital punishment for a wide assortment of crimes. Close to 600 of them, in fact, including murder, rape, abortion, bestiality, burglary, treason, and counterfeiting. Another capital crime, though, was known as concealment.


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[Assistant] If a woman found herself pregnant outside of marriage in the mid 1700s, her life was effectively over. Social stigma, loss of employment, fines, and even physical punishment were all expected to follow upon discovery of adultery and the possible resulting birth.


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[Assistant] And so to avoid this fate, it had become common for women in that situation to hide their pregnancy and then abandon the baby to die of neglect and exposure.


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[Assistant] And that was the practice in crime known as concealment. And it was the very situation that a woman from Southampton, New Hampshire found herself in during the spring of 1768. Ruth Blay was 25 and split her time between teaching in the nearby towns and working as a seamstress.


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[Assistant] In their eyes, that didn't erase her crime of adultery or the stigma that was sure to follow, but it did mean that she hadn't killed the child.


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[Assistant] She'd been afraid, and so she had buried the baby beneath the floorboards of a local barn, most likely the site of one of her traveling classrooms. And that, she thought, was the end of it.


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[Assistant] But what Ruth didn't know was that some of her local students had watched her. They didn't see the birth itself. They didn't feel her pain and loss and fear and hopelessness.


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[Assistant] All they saw was a young woman placing a body in the space beneath a loose board. They saw a crime. And so they reported it.


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[Assistant] Ruth was soon arrested by Isaac Brown, the local constable, and was quickly brought to trial. A jury of 16 was formed, all men, of course, and they soon ruled that the child had died by violence after birth. Ruth, they said, was a liar and a murderer.


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[Assistant] Ruth was held at the constable's home until she could be transported to the jail in Portsmouth. But she was still recovering from the birth and so she remained there for over a month while her body healed.


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[Assistant] By July 19th, she had been formally accused, and two weeks later she was brought before the provincial court. She pleaded innocent, of course, but no one listened.


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[Assistant] Her final trial date was set for nearly two months later, toward the end of September.


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[Assistant] I can't imagine how lonely she must have felt. How hopeless. Ruth didn't have a chance. I think it's safe to assume we knew that. Society wasn't kind to women in her position. And when you add in the dead infant, well, Ruth was pretty sure how it was going to end.


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[Assistant] Her trial began on the afternoon of September 21st of 1768, and a little over 12 hours later, the jury handed down their verdict. Guilty. She was, according to their instructions, to hang by her neck until dead. But not just yet.


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[Assistant] No, the Royal Governor of New Hampshire, a man named John Wentworth, issued three consecutive reprieves postponing her execution. He said it was to give her more time to prepare herself for death, but I can't help but wonder if it was really just one more punishment. Rather than walking to the gallows before the end of September, Ruth would have to wait three long months.


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[Assistant] Just before noon on December 30th, over a thousand people gathered at Gallows Hill in South Cemetery. It had snowed earlier that day.


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[Assistant] And now a cold, freezing rain was covering everything in a layer of ice.


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[Assistant] Sheriff Packard, the man presiding over the execution, had Ruth placed atop the back of a wagon, a rope draped over her head. Parents stood with their arms around their children, children who craned their necks to catch a glimpse of the woman who was about to die.


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[Assistant] There are rumors that a pardon was on its way from the governor, that Sheriff Packard was in a hurry to eat his lunch, and so he rushed the execution rather than waiting for the governor's letter to arrive. At noon, the horses pulling the wagon were driven away from the tree, and Ruth Blay fell off the back, where her body swung slowly at the end of the noose. She died moments later.


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[Assistant] Those same rumors say the governor's stay of execution did arrive, just moments after Ruth's body stopped moving. But there's no record of a pardon. Instead of freedom, Ruth was given an unmarked grave, about 300 feet north of the small pond in the middle of the cemetery.


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[Assistant] Today, visitors to the pond reports anomalies in their photos.


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[Assistant] Ghostly images, orbs, and indefinable shapes. Some say their cameras stop working altogether.


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[Assistant] According to local legend, a pair of glowing lights has been seen there on more than one occasion. And some think it's Ruth, along with her infant child.


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[Assistant] Between the places most familiar to us and that vast expanse of the unknown sits the graveyard.


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[Assistant] It has represented the beginning of a journey for countless cultures across the history of mankind. From the Egyptians to the Khans, from across ancient Europe to modern America, the cemetery is a constant thread tying us all together.


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[Assistant] Philosophy aside, these are places born out of loss and filled with deep emotion. And so it's no wonder that so many stories exist of the ones who refuse to stay buried. Maybe ghosts are real after all, or maybe we just wish they were. Perhaps it's both. One final note.


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[Assistant] Midnight Mary, the New Haven corset maker who fell into a coma at the age of 47, was buried on October 16th of 1872. That night, after the funeral was over and her extended family had traveled back to their homes, Mary's aunt had a horrible nightmare.


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[Assistant] In her dream, she saw Mary still alive in her coffin, scratching at the lining in an effort to get out. She was screaming and moaning with desperation, and the image of that stayed with Mary's aunt long after she awoke. So much so that she managed to convince both her family and the authorities to exhume Mary's grave.


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[Assistant] After the coffin was removed from the earth, the men opened it up. What they found inside would haunt them for the rest of their lives. Mary's corpse had moved, her hands were covered in blood, and many of her fingernails were broken.


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[Assistant] The reason was clear after examining the coffin's lid. The cloth lining had been shredded.


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[Assistant] Apparently Mary had finally awoken from her coma.


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[Assistant] Some of the most powerful local legends one can find are rooted in the nearby cemetery. Maybe that's because these places are home to real actual people who have passed away, making any story about them feel more real.


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[Assistant] Or perhaps it's that simple chilling fact that beneath these stone markers lay human remains.


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[Assistant] But sometimes it's not so simple. And to explain what I mean, I've put together another story that I know you'll love. Stick around through this brief sponsored break, and I'll tell you all about it.


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[Assistant] Josie had been just 17 years old. She was in her final year of school hoping to be done in the spring of 1876. But all of that hope ground to a halt in October the year before.


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[Assistant] They say she had simply been cutting through the woods on her way to school. Maybe it was a shorter route and she was in a hurry, or perhaps she just loved walking beneath the wide branches of the tall ancient New Hampshire elm trees. She took her reasons to the grave, although with all of that hope and promise as well.


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[Assistant] When they found her body along the edge of the woods that evening it was a gruesome sight. She had clearly been killed in a different location and then dragged to the trees to hide the evidence. There was a trail of blood-smeared grass that pointed them to the exact spot. Following it wasn't hard, and at the same time, I imagine it was horribly difficult.


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[Assistant] Her cause of death was also pretty easy to figure out. Josie had lost her head, which explained all the blood that covered that trail she'd left behind. The people who found her split up and wandered the woods looking for the rest of her. It took a long while, but they eventually found it.


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[Assistant] According to the stories, Josie's killer was actually easier to find than she was. He was a nomadic laborer named Joseph LePage and had only been in town for a few days.


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[Assistant] From the outside, he seemed like a hardworking, honest family guy, but there had been rumors of a darker past. Some had whispered about a murderer back in Vermont, while others painted him as a criminal in hiding.


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[Assistant] Whether or not those rumors were true, Josie's death gave them life. LePage was arrested, and he eventually confessed to the crime. It took two years for the court system to finish its work, but in 1878, LePage was hanged in front of the New Hampshire State House.


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[Assistant] Josie found rest much sooner. She was buried in her family's plot over in the Buck Street Cemetery, just a couple of blocks from where she'd been murdered.


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[Assistant] But the town didn't stop there. They had a memorial constructed on the exact spot where LePage had murdered her. It's one of those tall, four-sided stone towers that tapers to a decorative point about six feet off the ground.


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[Assistant] And it has a plaque on it. It tells visitors that she was murdered on that very spot, but her body and head were deposited in different locations. Locations that the townsfolk marked with two smaller stones.


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[Assistant] Which means if you visit the monuments, you can follow the instructions on it to see just where Josie was found. Both places.


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[Assistant] In a twist of ironic justice, no one seems to know where the grave of her killer Joseph LePage seems to be. Researchers have looked for it, but they always come up empty-handed.


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[Assistant] And there you have it. Josie Langmaid will forever be memorialized by four separate stone markers, while the man who killed her has been lost to time. And perhaps that's the way it should be.


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


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[Assistant] 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 our 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] On the southwestern corner of Iceland, just to the south of the city of Reykjavik, is a small peninsula that juts out into the cold waters of the North Atlantic. It's known as the Alftanes Peninsula, and although few people live there, the local government recently decided to connect the small stretch of land to the town of Gardabeir, a suburb of Reykjavik.


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[Assistant] In 2015, however, construction on the new road was brought to a halt. Standing in their way was a massive rock, 12 feet high and weighing an estimated 70 tons. According to Highway Department employee Peter Mathiasen, the rock has presented an unusual challenge to his department's construction project. Now, you have to understand something about Iceland.


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[Assistant] Much of the region is a vast expanse of sparse grass and large volcanic rock formations. The ground boils with geysers and springs, and the sky seems to be eternally gray and cloudy. So it's important to recognize that there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of these volcanic stones along the construction route.


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[Assistant] So what could possibly be so important about this one particular stone? Why would the highway department go to such lengths, even covering the expense of hiring a crane, just to move one stone to a safer location?


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[Assistant] In the late 1930s, another road construction project in the same area of Iceland was planned to cut straight through a hill known as Elfhole. From the beginning, though, the project was met with challenges. First, the money for the project ran out, and when funding resumed a decade later, construction encountered even more challenges.


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[Assistant] The machines that were used to cut through the hill started to break at an unusual rate. Tools were damaged and lost. In the end, the road was simply built around the hill to avoid the digging altogether.


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[Assistant] When the road was due for updating in the 1980s, the notion of demolishing the hill was brought up again, and more machinery was brought in to drill through the hill.


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[Assistant] After the first drill broke, another was brought, but it stopped working too. After that, the workers refused to bring any of their tools near the hill out of fear that they would be lost or broken by the Holdafolk who guard the place.


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[Assistant] Iceland is a culture teeming with references to this invisible society of human-like creatures. In a recent survey, more than half of all people in the country, 54%, said they believed in the existence of these creatures. But who are the Haldifolk?


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[Assistant] According to one Icelandic folktale, the hidden people can be traced back to Adam and Eve. According to the legend, Eve had a number of children whom she hid from God.


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[Assistant] But God, being omniscient and aware of everything that happens, found them anyway.


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[Assistant] In the story, God declared that what man hides from God, God will hide from man. As a result, these children of Adam and Eve vanished from sight and have lived alongside humans ever since, hidden from our eyes.


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[Assistant] Wherever they came from, Iceland is apparently filled with them. They are described as being the same size as humans, usually clad in 19th century Icelandic clothing, which is often described as green and simple.


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[Assistant] The people of Iceland have another term for these creatures, though. They don't use it as often because they feel it's not as respectful as the hidden folk.


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[Assistant] When we think of elves, most of us imagine the little people who help Santa Claus in his workshop at the North Pole.


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[Assistant] We picture tiny people with pointed ears who wear tall, pointed hats, but that vision of elves is actually new, dating back only to Victorian-era fairy tales, when French stories of fairies were mixed and confused with more ancient tales of elves from the Celtic, Germanic, and Scandinavian peoples.


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[Assistant] The oldest records of something resembling elves are from Anglo-Saxon England and medieval Iceland, though some records do exist in Germany as well. The characteristics are consistent across the continent, though. Elves were described as human-like, that they were once divine creatures of some unknown origin, and that they were very, very dangerous.


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[Assistant] In Norse mythology, elves were mainly thought of as females who lived in the hills and mounds of stone. The Swedish elves were said to be beautiful women who lived in the forest with their king. The Scandinavian folklore described them as fair haired, dressed in white, and dangerous when offended.


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[Assistant] In fact, in many folktales, elves were given the role of disease spirits. An elf could inflict horrible skin rashes on the one who offended them, and the term was called an elven blow. The only way to calm and satisfy them was actually to visit their homes, often large stones in the forest, and leave them an offering of food. Elves, you see, were dangerous.


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[Assistant] Now, at first, elves were simply thought of as mischievous pranksters. Anything odd that happened during a person's day could be blamed on the elves. A tangle in a person's hair was called an elflock, and birthmarks were referred to as elfmarks.


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[Assistant] Elves had a darker side, though. Much like their cultural counterparts in other countries, such as Hobbes, Leprechauns, Hobgoblins, and Trolls, elves were known to be highly dangerous. In fact, a deeply common thread through all cultures is just how easy it is to offend them, and how terrible the consequences might be if that happened.


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[Assistant] One such tale was that of the changeling. According to legend, elves would invade the home of new parents and swap out their infant child for a small elf. While the human baby would be wonderfully cared for back in the home of the elves, the surrogate that was left behind, the changeling, would be fussy and unhappy.


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[Assistant] In Iceland, there are tales of holdafolk who kidnap adults who are then taken back to the hills to work for the hidden people.


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[Assistant] In their place, the Haldifolk leave emotionless, hollow copies of the ones they take. It was said that if someone you knew underwent a severe personality change, becoming depressed or listless for example, it was because they had been replaced by the elves.


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[Assistant] It was also believed that elves could enter the dreams of a sleeping person and inflict nightmares upon them. In fact, one of the German words for nightmare, albdrucken, literally means elf pressure.


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[Assistant] But what if these were more than just folktales? If so, that might explain the incredibly similar stories that exist among the Native tribes of the American Northeast.


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[Assistant] In 2011, a non-profit housing developer in the United States began the final stages of their plan to build a 19 million dollar, 120 unit construction project known as The Villages.


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[Assistant] Everything about it looked promising. It would generate roughly 1.5 million in tax revenue for the town of Montville, Connecticut. It would create over 100 construction-related jobs. And once completed, it would provide affordable housing to scores of local families.


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[Assistant] But because the Villages project was a non-profit endeavor, the development company applied for federal funding to offset the costs. As a requirement for the funding process, the developer was required to complete an archaeological survey of the 12.2 acre parcel of land. And that's when they hit a snag.


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[Assistant] The proposed building site, it turns out, encroached on Mohegan tribe property. The Mohegan people were an offshoot of the Pequot tribe, originating in the 17th century in Connecticut. They have deep roots in the area there, and naturally parts of their historic past are still present.


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[Assistant] Among the sensitive archaeological sites that the Mohegan tribe claimed were at risk were Mohegan Hill, Fort Shantok, and Moshaps Rock, among others. None of those historic sites are unusual in any way. But when the Tribal Historic Preservation Officer for the Mohegans presented their case to the Federal Housing and Urban Development Department, there was one complaint that stood out among all the others.


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[Assistant] Creatures, they claimed, lived inside Mohegan Hill. The construction project threatened their very lives, and unless it was stopped, the little people, as they would call them, would disappear, leaving the tribe unprotected from outsiders.


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[Assistant] The Mohegan people have long believed in the existence of creatures who they called the Makaiwasug, the Little People. The stone piles on Mohegan Hill were said to have been built by them long ago and served as protection from the outside world.


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[Assistant] These Makaiwa Sug have remained inside the hill ever since, guarding the stones and protecting the tribe.


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[Assistant] These were powerful creatures that could protect and preserve the people. But if ignored or treated poorly, could also bring great harm and chaos. Naturally, the Mohegan people became very good managing their relationship with them.


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[Assistant] One of the most prominent Mohegan tribe members of the last century was a woman named Gladys Tantiquijan, who passed away in 2005 at the age of 106.


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[Assistant] She was a 10th generation descendant of the Mohegan chief Uncas, a prominent colonial-era leader, and was also a tribal medicine woman. Her role included maintaining her tribe's knowledge of the Makaiowasug and how to interact with them.


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[Assistant] According to her, there were even four non-negotiable laws for dealing with the little people.


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[Assistant] First, serve and protect their leader and matriarchal deity, Granny Squannet. Second, never speak to them in the summer months when they are most active. Third, never stare directly at one, or else the creature will become invisible and steal your belongings. And finally, leave them offerings from time to time.


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[Assistant] And so to this day, the Mohegan tribe continues to make offerings to these creatures in hopes that they will continue their role as protectors and guardians.


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[Assistant] The vast majority of people in the world don't really believe in the existence of elves or hidden people living in the bones of the earth. One explanation as to why Iceland is different, though, actually has to do with the Vikings.


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[Assistant] When they conquered a city, the Vikings had real-life enemies to focus their hatred on. When they settled in Iceland, however, no one else was there to be defeated. Perhaps the Haldifok provided the excuse they needed to feel like conquerors in a land with no native inhabitants.


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[Assistant] Other scholars believe that elves represent our connection to the Earth of old. They are a sort of primitive environmentalism, a reminder of the way life used to be before urban sprawl and manufacturing left its mark on our world.


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[Assistant] Whatever the reason, our ancestors firmly believed in these otherworldly beings who could curse or bless them at will. Elves served as an excuse for the unexplained, a solid ground when nothing else seemed to make sense.


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[Assistant] So we might laugh it off today from our modern point of view, but centuries ago, elves literally gave people an opportunity to hope, or a reason to be afraid.


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[Assistant] Oh, and remember Peter Mathiessen, the highway department employee in Reykjavik, Iceland? He's made it very clear to journalists that he doesn't believe in elves. But that doesn't stop him from telling an odd story to those who ask.


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[Assistant] Apparently his family came from the northern side of Iceland long ago. There, in the wild north country, the family claimed to have had a protective elf who brought good fortune to them. When they moved south, the family elf remained behind.


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[Assistant] Peter recalls going on a camping trip in the North some years ago. Before he left, his father asked him to go and pay his respects to the elf and to thank her for the help she had given to his family.


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[Assistant] Not being one to believe in the old stories though, Peter forgot the request.


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[Assistant] The next day, despite an overcast sky and wet drizzle, he woke up sore and blistered by what he described as something like a sunburn. He could barely stand, in fact.


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[Assistant] Spirits in the rocks beneath our feet certainly offer some amazing stories, and I hope you've enjoyed this tour through some of the most mysterious on the list. But we're not quite finished just yet.


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[Assistant] Stick around after this brief sponsor break to hear one more tale of magic in the hills.


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[Assistant] They said there was pirate treasure buried there. Some of the people even claimed to have watched the pirates bury it in a secret place. It was rowed to shore and dragged through the forest to be hidden away. And as all pirate stories seem to tell us, eventually the people who knew where it had been hidden were dead or gone.


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[Assistant] Now, you'd think that having watched the pirates hide the treasure, the people of Lin would have simply gone and retrieved it for themselves.


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[Assistant] The trouble was, before they could manage that, an earthquake rocked the area in 1658. The place where the treasure was believed to have been kept was sealed by falling rocks.


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[Assistant] Over the years, the hiding place took on a bit of a reputation. They called it Dungeon Rock and claimed that deep within, a treasure of immense value awaited those who could dig it out. But for nearly two centuries, that legend stayed unconfirmed.


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[Assistant] In 1852, though, a stranger moved to town with a plan to change all of that. His name was Hiram Marble, a spiritualist from New York who arrived with a mission. According to him, one of the pirates had come to him in a dream and revealed the location of the treasure. All he had to do was dig it out. Sounds easy, right?


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[Assistant] So he purchased the land that contained dungeon rock, built a home nearby, and started digging. The trouble was, it was a slow job. From what I've read, he barely managed to cut through a foot of rock each month, meaning the process was slow and painful. And it was frustrating too.


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[Assistant] According to the legends, Hiram had a medium on call who would reach out to the spirit of the dead pirate, an outlaw named Thomas Veal, and ask him questions to help in the search. Cheer up, Marble, the spirit once told him. We are with you and doing everything we can to help.


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[Assistant] Apparently, that didn't include actually digging with him, so that was all left to Hyrum Marble.


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[Assistant] Oh, and so was the cost of the job. This had become his occupation, so he had to live off of his savings. And over the years, that nest egg began to dry up. So, like any good American, he turned his hobby into a product and started selling tickets to visit the cave.


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[Assistant] By the mid-1860s, the job had become a family affair. Hiram's son Edwin was working alongside his father in the cave, helping him tunnel toward the legendary treasure at a faster pace. They say that by 1864, the two men had managed to dig over 130 feet into the rock, but still no breakthroughs.


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[Assistant] Four years later, Hiram passed away. He died poor and frustrated. The pirate treasure he had learned about from the spirit world had eluded him. And even though he gave everything he had to find it, it just wasn't enough.


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[Assistant] His son, Edwin, carried on the work though. He kept digging and the tunnel kept getting deeper. But still, there was no secret chamber or pocket of space down below where he might find the treasure. And 12 years after his father died, Edwin did the same, just as poor and just as frustrated.


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[Assistant] It turns out though, Edwin had a sister. But she never picked up the shovel and kept the work moving ahead. She had her hands full with all the tourists who wandered up there to see the legendary dig site. More so because of the tunnel than the treasure it was supposed to contain. I've read that she charged her visitors 25 cents for a glimpse inside.


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[Assistant] Over the years, the people stopped flocking to the hill, and the property was bundled up in the Lynn Woods, a large patch of wooden parkland between Route 1 and Route 129. From what I've seen online, there's a metal gate across the entrance to the cave, keeping visitors out. A quarter doesn't buy you as much as it used to, I guess.


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[Assistant] Oh, and one last thing. Both Hiram and Edwin are buried up there on Dungeon Rock. They had funerals up there as well. They spent so much of their lives on top of that hill, I guess it's only fitting. Still,


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[Assistant] I find it a bit ironic that after nearly 30 years of cutting through the rock, the only things we're absolutely certain are buried up there are the bodies of the men who did the digging.


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[Assistant] This episode of Lore was researched, written, and produced by me, Aaron Manke, with 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. You can learn more about all of those shows and everything else going on over in one central place. Grimandmild.com


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[Assistant] And you can also follow 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] Folklore is a living thing. In many ways, the stories we tell and the lessons we pass on are like a tree. There are branches that reach out into generations and cultures, sometimes in obvious ways and other times reaching surprising new places.


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[Assistant] One good example of this would be the folklore surrounding small, fairy people that we've discussed here before. Pukwudgies, trolls, goblins, puka, and dozens of similar variations are scattered around the world with amazing consistency and reach.


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[Assistant] How or why is something we'll probably never know, but it shows us how folklore can spread, how it can migrate, and how it can build upon the past.


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[Assistant] At the same time though, folklore also has roots, and they run deeper than we might expect. Some stories that we still whisper about in the dark today have crossed the lips of people for centuries, and in some cases millennia. When I hear a story for the first time, or discover a new collection of tales that have been widely distributed, I often stop and ask myself the same questions.


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[Assistant] Where did it come from? What lies at the bottom of the narrative? What are its roots?


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[Assistant] Outside of Halloween, there is no other time of the year, at least for European cultures, where folklore rushes to the forefront of everyone's lives with such significance, such power, and such ease as the Christmas season. And rightly so, there is so much to unpack and explore.


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[Assistant] The tree, the gifts, the food, and the nocturnal visit from a stranger, one who has seemingly stalked our lives all year long, and yet we blindingly welcome into our home. And if there's one lesson that folklore has taught us over the centuries, it's to beware of strangers, because they aren't always who they seem to be.


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[Assistant] When we think of coal in our stockings and food and drink left out for a visitor, we rarely pair those ideas with the image of a woman flying through the air on a broomstick. But in Italy, there are those who still tell the story of La Befana.


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[Assistant] Befana's story has been told since at least the 13th century, originally connected with the Christian feast of Epiphany. But while many people have never heard of her, the details of her story are eerily familiar.


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[Assistant] During her visit, Bafana was said to enter homes through the chimney. She is typically depicted carrying a basket or bag full of gifts, but is also known to leave behind a lump of coal or a single stick for children who failed to behave during the year.


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[Assistant] Before leaving each home, Bafana would sweep the floor with her broom, something scholars see as a metaphor for sweeping away the deeds of the previous year. And then she would eat the food left out for her, oftentimes a meal of sausage and broccoli. A side note, cookies and milk sound so much better, don't they?


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[Assistant] Interestingly enough, Bafana is not the only Christmas legend with a passing resemblance to a witch. In the German Alps, there have been stories of another female figure dating back to the 10th century. Some call her Perkta, or Berkta, and later Bertha.


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[Assistant] Jacob Grimm, while researching his Deutsch mythology, theorized that she was one of the ancient Germanic mother goddesses. She and her sisters were said to have taught humanity the art of agriculture, spinning wool, and cooking.


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[Assistant] Because of her role in teaching humanity the basics of home management, Perkta's meaning began to shift over the centuries, turning her into the punisher of those who worked during the holidays, failed to feast properly, and, much later, hunting down the lazy. And what better time for her to conduct an end-of-year review, so to speak, than Christmas.


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[Assistant] Just how did Perkta dish out her punishment on the people of Germany?


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[Assistant] Well, a hint can be found in her other popular title, the belly slitter. During the twelve days of Christmas, she would travel through the towns and inspect people's behavior. If they had followed the rules and done right in her eyes, they were rewarded.


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[Assistant] If they had not been good though, she was known to have a very nasty side. Anyone disobedient enough to warrant punishment, adult or child alike, would have their stomachs ripped open.


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[Assistant] Perkta would scoop out whatever might still be inside, pull out the full length of their intestines, and then stuff the victim's belly with garbage, straw, and rocks.


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[Assistant] Now, while a stomach full of refuse might seem a little over the top, that distinction actually goes to another ancient female in folklore. While stories of Grilla, the mythical giant goddess, are far outside the common narrative of Christmas for many of us, for the people of Iceland, she is still a whispered source of dread among children.


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[Assistant] One of the earliest mentions of Gryla dates back to the 13th century collection of Icelandic mythology known as the Edda.


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[Assistant] According to the many stories told about her over the centuries, Greela possesses the ability to locate disobedient children. She can do this year-round, so they say, and because of that, she was often used as a parental tool to coerce children into doing what they were told.


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[Assistant] It was in the Christmas season though that Greela became even more monstrous. That was when she was said to climb out of her home in the mountain and make her way toward the towns. She would hunt far and wide for all the naughty children and then take them back to her cave. There, she would cut them up, place them in her stew and devour them. According to the legend, she never ran out of food.


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[Assistant] There have been other stories of strangers told throughout the centuries, but not all have happy endings. In fact, there is often more loss than gain when it comes to the visits of some of these legends.


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[Assistant] In Northern Alps, stories have been told for generations about the traveling stranger known as Belsnickel. Considered to be one of the helpers of St. Nicholas, Belsnickel travels ahead of the Big Red Man and dispenses his own form of Christmas cheer with physical abuse.


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[Assistant] Descriptions of Belschnicko liken him to the wild men of old, with torn and dirty clothes, fashioned from animal skins and furs, and a face that is covered in a snarled, filthy beard. Some stories report that he wears a mask with a long tongue protruding from the mouth.


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[Assistant] According to the legend, which spans centuries in both Germany and the American state of Pennsylvania, Belschnickl would enter the home of a family and scatter nuts and sweets on the floor for the children to collect. And then, with their backs to him, he would lash out with a switch made of hazel or birch, whipping their backs and leaving red marks.


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[Assistant] And Belschnickle isn't alone. Another traveling stranger from the same region, one who has seen a rise in popularity around the globe, is a creature known only as Krampus. At first blush, Krampus sounds similar to many of the other strangers in folklore around Europe, but what sets him apart is truly frightening.


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[Assistant] It is said that Krampus visits the homes of children during the Christmas season, but he doesn't have a dual nature. There's no reward or special treat when Krampus comes to town. No, his sole purpose and passion in life is to dole out punishment on children who have failed to obey and do their work.


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[Assistant] Like Belschnigl, he too carries a switch, but in most stories there are more than one.


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[Assistant] Apparently he beats so many children that he needs a few spare branches, so he carries them in a bundle. In addition, he is often depicted wearing chains and some form of large sack or cart, because ultimately Krampus isn't interested in beating children. He wants to take them.


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[Assistant] When he arrives in each legend, we are greeted by the appearance of a wild demonic creature with long horns, cloven feet, and a twisted face. After beating the disobedient children, Krampus chains them up, tosses them into his sack, before vanishing as quickly as he came, taking the children back with him to hell.


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[Assistant] The origins of Krampus are still unclear, but some scholars think that the legend predates Christianity. Instead, they believe that the story has roots in an ancient alpine myth of a horned god of the witches. Even the switch, his weapon of choice, might have been a carryover from the initiation rites of witches, where the novices were beaten and whipped.


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[Assistant] Far from forgotten, festivals are held throughout Europe to this day that feature many of these legends. Events like Krampusnacht in Germany and the Bafana Festival in Urbania attract tens of thousands who dress in masks and dance and celebrate.


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[Assistant] Like Halloween, these are instances where monsters and strangers have been embraced and elevated to something of a children's story. Which is ironic when you understand the roots.


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[Assistant] Stripping away the details, Krampus has, from a 30,000 foot view, more than a passing resemblance to Pan, the Greek horned god of nature, shepherds, flocks, and mountains.


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[Assistant] Along with his musical flutes, Pan was also known for robbing the innocents from people, usually through sexual means. In a culture that saw the threshold between childhood and adulthood as the loss of virginity, Pan figuratively stole people's children.


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[Assistant] And when you think of it that way, it's more than easy to see similarities, not only between Krampus and Pan, but between Pan and a character that Disney has helped us all fall in love with.


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[Assistant] Peter Pan. While he might be able to fly, has no horns and is missing the cloven feet that Pan sports in every image and statue, Peter Pan fulfills the role perfectly. He arrives at night, carries a flute and lures our children away to another place.


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[Assistant] In 1284, the German village of Hamelin was struggling with an infestation of rats. Now, I've only seen a few rats myself over the years, but I also don't live in a densely populated urban area like New York City or London.


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[Assistant] But in medieval Europe, from what I can gather, rats were as abundant as squirrels, only bigger and more disease-ridden.


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[Assistant] It's hard to imagine the impact that an infestation of rats could have on a town today.


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[Assistant] If we found a half-eaten bag of flour in the cupboard, there's a grocery store down the street where we can get more year-round. But in the Middle Ages, food was grown locally and used throughout the year. If rats ate and ruined the food supply, there was little a town could do. Rats meant death in many instances.


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[Assistant] According to the story that has been passed down through the centuries since then, a stranger entered Hamelin in the spring of 1284. He was dressed in colorful clothing, possessed what we might call today a silver tongue, and claimed of having a very unusual and also timely skill. He was a rat catcher.


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[Assistant] As a profession, rat catching dates back centuries, but it's rarely been a safe and sanitary job. The risk of being bitten or contracting some disease carried by the rats has always been a hazard for the job.


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[Assistant] And while the exact nature of their involvement has been up for debate for decades, most scholars agree that rats have been a key player in the spread of plague, particularly the Black Death of the 14th century.


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[Assistant] And there were few truly effective tools at their disposal, which made the job that much more difficult. Some rat catchers used a special breed of terrier, while others made use of traps. But the most effective tool for centuries was the most minimal and inexpensive of them all.


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[Assistant] Bear hands. And seeing as how most rats preferred to stay hidden inside dark places, this was a risky technique. The motivation, though, was the meritocracy of it all.


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[Assistant] The more you caught, the more you earned. And while there's no documented proof of this rumor, it has been whispered for centuries that rat catchers would sometimes raise their own rats in captivity, and then turn them in as part of a job, inflating the numbers.


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[Assistant] This allowed them to pad their paychecks when business was low, but it also earned them a shady reputation.


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[Assistant] As a side note, one of the most famous rat catchers in London's history was a man named Jack Black, who claimed that his black tan terrier was the father of all the black tan terriers in London, and who pioneered the art of breeding rats and keeping them as pets.


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[Assistant] He even wore an outfit made entirely of scarlet cloth with a big wide sash across his chest that had two cast iron rats on it. He was probably also a riot at parties, but I can't confirm that. It's just a hunch.


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[Assistant] The man who walked into Hamelin that June wasn't any less of a character, if the legends are to be believed. He wore an outrageous outfit, although his was reportedly one of multi-colored fabric that was known back then as pied, which was typically a sort of blotchy pattern. And he carried a tool that no rat catcher claimed to use. A flute. The mayor of Hamelin trusted the man.


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[Assistant] Maybe it was the not-so-subtle illusion his appearance made to the ancient stories of the god Pan, a deity who tended flocks of animals and played a flute. Maybe it was the man's marketing ability, that silver tongue and outrageous outfit. Perhaps he over-promised and won the mayor's approval.


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[Assistant] Whatever the reason, this stranger was said to have struck a deal.


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[Assistant] The mayor though? Well, he was desperate. Sure, they haggled over the price, but in the end, the stranger won. The exact amount of money differs from version to version of the story. But in all of them, it's an exorbitant sum. And that's the point. Hamelin was so desperate they were willing to overpay for a solution. Then, he got to work.


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[Assistant] According to all the stories, and even the children's tales we were raised on, the piper picked up his flute and began to play. As if driven by some magical force, all of the rats in Hamelin scuttled out of their hiding places and began to crowd around him, streams of them, thousands of them, all writhing in a mass at his feet.


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[Assistant] Then, when it seemed like they had all come out, he marched out of town and down to the Visa River. The stories say that he was beyond successful. Most accounts say that all but one of the rats drowned in the river that day. Hamelin's troubles were over. For a while.


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[Assistant] You see, the piper returned later to collect his money. He had done the job they had hired him to perform. The rats were gone.


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[Assistant] But for some unknown reason, the mayor refused to pay him.


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[Assistant] The stories don't say why, but we can speculate. Maybe it was because the stranger didn't return with any of the bodies to show for his work, as was the custom for rat catchers. How could they pay him per head when there were no heads to count?


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[Assistant] At any rate, the mayor turned the stranger away, and the man, clearly taken advantage of, stormed out of the village. But now before turning to face the people of Hamelin and proclaiming a curse on them.


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[Assistant] He would return one day, he said, and when he did, he would have his revenge.


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[Assistant] Remember, this is a story that's been passed down for over 800 years. Most of what we know about the real events is pure legend, based loosely on scattered reports of a stained glass window in the church there in Hamelin.


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[Assistant] The window itself was lost in 1660, but there are drawings of it that predate the destruction, as far back as the 14th century. And the earliest mention of these events is a 1384 entry in the Hamelin Town Chronicles.


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[Assistant] The events were recorded, of course, because the stranger did return. According to the story, though, he had changed his clothing, trading in his colorful robes for the uniform of a hunter.


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[Assistant] Gone was the salesman, the stranger was back for vengeance.


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[Assistant] While the adults were all in church on June 26th, a stranger strode into town and began to play his flute again. This time, rather than crowds of writhing rats, it was the children who clambered out of the houses.


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[Assistant] They flooded the streets, gathering around the strange visitor.


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[Assistant] And then, when they were all present, he marched them out of town, never to be seen again.


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[Assistant] There are, of course, a number of morals to this story, but one that has stuck with us for centuries remains ever true. Never trust a stranger.


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[Assistant] Folklore is full of strangers. In many stories, it's flat out amazing just how much freedom people have given them in their lives. Even stories of someone as benign as Santa Claus have an element of danger when you view them from outside the cultural fishbowl.


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[Assistant] Here's a story of a strange man who stalks our children year round, noting their behavior and secret desires, who then breaks into our home, eats our food, and leaves a few presents to prove he was there.


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[Assistant] For the people of Hamelin though, that stranger cost them far more than a plate of cookies. Their ill treatment of the man who came to town led them to the loss of their children. And as difficult as it is to believe, the story of Hamelin is true. Part of it, at least.


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[Assistant] Scholars are in agreement that the rats were a later addition to the tale, showing up about 300 years after the events were said to have taken place. But as far back as the records go, there has always been a stranger, a visitor from the outside, who leaves with the children.


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[Assistant] And although it's taken a very long time to figure out why, some historians think they have the answer.


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[Assistant] To understand the truth, they say, we have to understand the political culture that Haneland found itself in.


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[Assistant] In 1227, about 50 years before the events in Hamelin, a battle took place on the border between what was then the Holy Roman Empire and Denmark, pushing the Danish border north of modern-day Germany. As a result, a whole new territory opened up that needed colonists.


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[Assistant] Men called locators were assigned to travel the land and find volunteers to populate this new territory. They often wore colorful clothing. They were eloquent speakers. They were, in a sense, a lot like today's door-to-door salesmen.


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[Assistant] The empire needed farmers and craftsmen and soldiers to protect these new lands. But it was hard to find people willing to uproot their lives and travel north, especially when that new land was alongside a contested military heavy border. It was a hard sell.


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[Assistant] So when the locators came knocking, rather than shipping off a handful of adult volunteers, the townsfolk would sometimes get creative, instead of paying with their own lives. They would sell their children to these men.


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[Assistant] The proof, it turns out, is in the phonebook and on Google Maps.


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[Assistant] Many town names along the line between Hamelin and Poland bear a striking resemblance to town names from medieval Germany, oftentimes even showing up more than once. More compelling, surnames from the 1284 Hamelin town records still show up in phone books in Pomerania, a region of Poland along the Baltic Sea.


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[Assistant] The folklore, you see, tells a colorful story. One that's as easy for children to swallow as a spoonful of honey. But the truth that the story hides turns out to be far less palatable.


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[Assistant] An entire town desperate for a solution to their economic and social challenges actually sold their children off to recruiters hoping to colonize new lands.


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[Assistant] It's a plot reminiscent of M. Night Shyamalan's The Village in that these people constructed a fantasy around certain events and then passed that lie on to later generations in order to justify their actions and avoid questions.


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[Assistant] In the end, an outsider did indeed come to Haneland that day, but he wasn't the one who took the children.


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[Assistant] History is full of stories of mysterious strangers, and while many of them can be found in Christmas folklore, I hope that the tale of the village of Hamelin shows just how common they are in everyday life. And as you might have guessed, I have another favorite example set aside to share with you. Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.


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[Assistant] I'm going to be very upfront with you from the start. No one knows who he was. We don't know his name or where he came from. And we certainly don't know the purpose behind his very unusual, very extraordinary life. All we have are stories.


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[Assistant] If you lived in a small section of New England during the three decades between 1858 and 1889, you might have seen him pass by. At the very least, you would have heard the murmurs that rippled through your community in the aftermath of his visit. But by then, it would be too late, because he was often gone as quickly as he'd shown up.


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[Assistant] There were rumors, of course. Some said he was a French exile forced to live and travel in America. Why?


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[Assistant] Well, it was rumored that his English was pretty poor, but he could often be heard speaking in French. But on most of the rare occasions that he actually interacted with locals, he used grunts and broad gestures instead of words, perhaps because that's what felt most natural to him.


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[Assistant] Like I said, we don't know his name, but this mysterious stranger was witnessed by enough people that we can at least paint a compelling picture of what it might have been like to encounter him. There's even a photograph, and when the story is over, you can go and look for it.


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[Assistant] But let me warn you, seeing him will do nothing to answer the riddle of who he was. All you can count on is being unsettled.


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[Assistant] He walked everywhere he went, despite the prevalence of horses in his day. Roughly, his route is documented as a loop that passed through Danbury, Connecticut, before heading west to White Plains, New York. Then it was northward to Brewster, east to New Britain, and then back south again.


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[Assistant] It's not the most creative of nicknames, to be honest. But thanks to his leather coat, leather boots, leather, well, everything, and lack of any other identifying features, it's the best his contemporaries could do.


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[Assistant] Of course, there were all sorts of stories about him, but they were nothing more than legends. Some said he was a Roman Catholic because they thought they noticed he avoided eating meat on Fridays. Others said a French prayer book was found among his possessions after he died.


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[Assistant] And of course there were legends of a treasure too. Because here was a guy who walked in a massive, 365 mile loop without stopping for three decades. To pay for food along the way, people assumed that he would have to have a small fortune hidden away in one of the many caves that he used as a way stop.


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[Assistant] But of course, no one has ever found that imaginary treasure.


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[Assistant] After his body was found in 1889 in a cave outside the town of Mount Pleasant, New York, he was buried in nearby Austin.


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[Assistant] In 2011, his grave was opened and all remains of his burial were moved to a new site that was farther from the nearby highway. The hope was that they might find some genetic material that could be analyzed, but all they managed to dig up were coffin nails.


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[Assistant] Leatherman might not be passing through towns today, but his story still makes the rounds. If you've ever heard the 1998 Pearl Jam song of the same name, now you know the backstory behind it. A mysterious stranger on an unusual journey who wore a trail through the culture of New England so deep that it's still visible today. Any of us would be lucky to do the same.


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


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[Assistant] 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. I also make and executive produce a whole bunch of other podcasts, all of which I think you'd enjoy.


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[Assistant] 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 our 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] Today's episode of the Nate Land podcast is brought to you by DraftKings, Chime Financial, BetterHelp and Electric E-Bikes.


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[Assistant] Welcome to the NateLand. Hello folks and hey bear, welcome to NateLand podcast. I'm sitting here with, uh, we got it. We got a few today. Uh, I can't see out of these glasses. I can't either. So Aaron somewhere.


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[Assistant] Bates. All right. And then filling in for dusty.


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[Assistant] We had to double it up because no one could carry the weight of what Dusty brings to this. Two for one. Two for one. Greg Warren. Hi guys. John Crist. We'll try. We'll do our best. Yeah. Yeah. They're here. Uh, we, little surprise.


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[Assistant] I think, uh, for everybody listening, we are here in, uh, Paducah.


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[Assistant] Yeah, two thirds of the solar eclipse. I can't, yeah, you can't see. The glasses you can't see at all. Uh, uh, we're at McCracken High School in, uh, Paducah. Go Mustangs. We're on their football field. They let us come. We're in, this is the place, this is the number one place to be, right? It's the place to be.


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[Assistant] I thought it would be, it's, you definitely see people out, but it didn't feel like, I mean maybe there's a spot where people are traveling to. For some reason in my head I thought it'd be like Manhattan traffic out here.


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[Assistant] To be fair. Wha- yeaah. Just aggressive. Well, it's the- He didn't like it.


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[Assistant] This weekend, we were at, uh, Sacramento, where the Sacramento Kings play. And so we, we like, when we go to these places.


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[Assistant] Like, I like to wear a jacket, you know, like a king's jacket. We always go into the team style to see if we can get something. They had the best, you know, I always get asked, uh, what city?


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[Assistant] Is, is your favorite that, uh, is like would be a surprise. Sacramento's probably up there now. I never hear about Sacramento. It's awesome dude. They have trees downtown. So like you're downtown and there's just like a lot of trees. Sequoias, that's where the sequoias are. That's how low the bar is from.


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[Assistant] Well, it's just such a cool look. Okay. Instead of, you know, that's, that's what I mean. Oh, like in the downtown area. Like in the downtown area. So it'd be like downtown Nashville. If you looked at the skyline and you just saw like, it looked like a city was built in between trees. Okay. Okay. And, uh, so we go, awesome show. Everybody's wearing king stuff. Nick, no Vicky, he's out. Nick gets top to bottom.


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[Assistant] Pants, it looks, he's wearing the warmup stuff that they would wear. So Sacramento pants, things. Nick goes out and Nick's a Celtics fan. The Kings play the Celtics.


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[Assistant] They're, they're playing on that day we're there. Yeah. At, in Boston, obviously. And so they lose, I mean, right before the show starts, they, they in a heartbreaker. They were down 19.


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[Assistant] And they came back and lost by one in Boston. And so, uh, Nick says, Celtics fans, you're like, you're wearing all King stuff. Just who cares?


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[Assistant] Yeaah. They are? No, the Oakland A's are going to go play there. For a couple years. A couple years. Yeaah. They're going to play in their minor league team before they go to Vegas.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. There's some big games here at this Mustangs.


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[Assistant] We're on earth. Start, start there. Yeah. Okay. I usually only do the moon behind the sun, but that's usually when I go out. But it's, I thought if it's in the middle, yeah, I do a moon behind the sun. I do that every year.


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[Assistant] Whatever you need to do. Talk to your family. The moon should go, occasionally just be like, I'm gonna duck behind.


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[Assistant] Where'd you get your glasses from? The great North American eclipse, Knox County, Indiana. These are.


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[Assistant] I feel it's getting a little dark.


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[Assistant] The fun part is hearing the animals. You hear animals. There are bugs. It's not fun for me, man. Nah, it's PTSD. There's a bird that flew out there. I don't know if he knows. They'll land, supposedly. I think the animals know a couple days before it happens.


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[Assistant] Uh, well, you know, they had an earthquake in, uh, New York, New Jersey, New Jersey, and then, uh,


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[Assistant] I saw like one thing about like a dog and you see the dog like before the family even starts yelling the dog's like. He already knows. He already knows just a little bit before.


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[Assistant] The birds are fun. I mean, it is crazy. It's getting dark. I, uh, I saw some people like act like this is not a big deal. That's what I did earlier.


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[Assistant] That's what it is, Aaron. How much do you have going on that you go, oh gosh, an eclipse, I gotta deal with that right now, I can't.


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[Assistant] I don't know, I don't, I never believed the dog story, but yeaah.


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[Assistant] Because it's, it's up there. It's near the sun. Can you look at it when it's totality? Can you look without your sunglasses? Oh yea, you can, you can.


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[Assistant] Wait, is it light heavier? Maybe not double. He wants to be a double belt. No, I think he said he'll fight this fight and then fight the next one, which is, I mean...


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[Assistant] This is UFC 300. This is the, this is their big, big, big thing. The whole card is unbelievable. Uh, it's really, really great. And yeah, it's like top to bottom. We watched the whole, the whole thing will be worth watching.


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[Assistant] What did you find out about Christopher Columbus? You're like, he made two circles around the Gulf of Mexico and that's all he did. What if that really came? That's what we end up finding out.


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[Assistant] It looks like, well, it's dark. If you look back that way, it's dark. There's a plane. So it was interesting to see. There is, there was a flight. You think that's that Delta flight. So there was a Delta, there was a Delta flight. That might be it.


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[Assistant] And there's a Delta flight that was fought. You, people booked it to fly the, the, the path, the path. Yes. Everybody


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[Assistant] It's getting dark. It's, it's completely over. Can you get it with a camera? Wow. Oh, you got a camera at it. Alright. There it is. They know what they're doing. It looks so close. It's completely, it looks insane.


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[Assistant] It's, uh, if you're at home and you're going like, what is an eclipse? Yeah.


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[Assistant] Yeah, the moon is dead center of the sun. Wow. Do you hear crickets?


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[Assistant] Wow. Yeaah. I think that was that Delta plane. They put us on the side where all our backs are to it. There's two planes. And there's another one there. And they're flying there.


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[Assistant] That is... It looks more like a rock.


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[Assistant] I mean really crazy. I know we're not talking but.


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[Assistant] You know, if you put your glasses on, you can't even see it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't even see it. I tried to look earlier.


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[Assistant] It's, yeaah. I do think you see Venus, if that's Venus. You see...


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[Assistant] I tell you what, it felt like the sun did, uh. That is.


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[Assistant] I mean if you put the glasses on, it's barely a sliver and you're still, you're just, you're through.


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[Assistant] You guys alright. You think, Aaron, in a normal life right now you would, uh,


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[Assistant] And then be frustrated that the guy's outside looking and you're not inside. Let's go! And so you think you would eat the donuts. You'd eat one pack and then go, I'm not paying for both these packs. I'll pay for one pack.


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[Assistant] How do you gasp at the iPhone and then, and then this? Which one do you use more often?


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[Assistant] The sun. Hello, but this is just, yeaah. The sun is a great point. Much more often. Yeaah, the sun's involved. Yeaah, yeaah.


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[Assistant] This is your normal dusk. This is your favorite part of the eclipse. I think so.


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[Assistant] But if, did he have more with Andy? Like, does Andy in the act more where you were just not enough in the story to...


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[Assistant] I was a minor character. I was a minor character. Yeah, you were just not enough that you go. I mean, that's like my McDonald's, uh, uh, or- Louis Gomez? The Louis Gomez that took a bite out of McDon- Louis's burger. It was Soder. I told Soder to take a bite.


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[Assistant] And cause I was my idea for the prank, but then I told Soder, I go take a bite cause he was like sitting next to him. And then, so he took a bite of the burger and then Soder's, uh, yeah, cut out of it at the joke. I put him in the joke.


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[Assistant] But when I think of that story, I don't think, I know Soder did it.


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[Assistant] I just did it as, just on stage, you're like, you can't be mentioning too many. All kinds of other details. I tried it and I would say it, so my buddy, you know, then you're just like, I just need to say I took it and get to the point. Cause the point of it, you gotta look at the story and be like, does the point involve


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[Assistant] That. And it doesn't. The point of it is him thinking they did it.


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[Assistant] Yeah, they shouldn't even announce that when you do that. They still do that? I think so. Like, they should just go like, you know, cause they didn't feel, I mean, everybody on the other side is like, man.


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[Assistant] Cause I don't think they've had, we've got most of it. They didn't even get this one. And I do think we're done. I think like, I don't think I would go to that one. Cause I think you'd be like...


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[Assistant] We went all out. We went all out for that second one. I'll tell you, the one in Nashville though got way darker.


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[Assistant] Look, if we can, uh, I have a video of me hitting a golf ball during it. Uh, I will have to find that video if we find it.


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[Assistant] We're, we're put it in right here and you can see how dark it went.


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[Assistant] Completely dark. Cause I, I, like I hit, I hit a tee'd up, hit a golf ball, and you heard crickets, you heard, it was insane. It was insane.


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[Assistant] Yeaah, y'all will. Yeaah, 20 years, I mean, you'll be, yeaah, I'll be 65. Yeaah, you'll be Brian's age, and then... Yeaah. Yeaah. I'll be almost caught up to y'all now. I'll be there.


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[Assistant] Do they ever show documentation of someone going, this won't happen again until 2024?


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[Assistant] Like, you know what I mean? Like, when they say, well, like, they're saying 375, so the next one won't be for 375 years. So, I mean, in 375 years, are they like, we called this eclipse, are they calling them that far ahead? I think so.


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[Assistant] Greg, if it keeps moving an inch, I think at some point it's gotta get behind it.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. I tell you what, we are on a football field. We could all run a 40.


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[Assistant] Yeaah, they tell ya, if you can't make this one. There's a video clip.


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[Assistant] I think there's a picture, like a photo. Yea, what video are they having back there? You were there.


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[Assistant] So you would really go, if you stared at it the whole time, you'd wake up tomorrow, you'd be blind. I would say so.


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[Assistant] Well I can, let me, we can start now that the eclipse is...


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[Assistant] Well, I'm glad we did this. I hope I didn't feel like I was, uh... No. Well, the fact that you said that is weird.


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[Assistant] How long drive is it St. Louis? Three hours. Oh, that's not bad. Not bad at all. Would you like, you'd like us to meet more in Paducah for this podcast with you? Yeah, I wouldn't mind if we did a few here. Is this the first time on the road?


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[Assistant] Zanies. Zan- well, yeaah. Yeaah, this is, but this is, yeaah, this is the first podcast, really on the road outside, yeaah. Outside of Nashville.


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[Assistant] Oh, what do you think about earthquake, you know? You actually enjoy it because it's a massage. I've never felt an earthquake. You feel like it's a massage and you go, oh, I wish more of that happened.


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[Assistant] We'll get there. And then about this trip.


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[Assistant] Facebook Messenger. Yeah, they don't know. It's all text to them.


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[Assistant] Uh, Jen Holl- Holiday. Hey Bear, just got home from Nate's Sacramento show, which was awesome. At the show, I repeated the line as I laughed and had a flash of Aaron leaning in close and saying, enough.


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[Assistant] I only did it once and laughed even harder. Question for the pod. When you say things about the city you're in, good or bad, how much of it is experience versus research or even universal? Thank you guys for the quality and educational entertainment. Uh, yeah, we, uh,


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[Assistant] It's, you're just walking around if you see stuff. You, I mean, y'all used to do a lot more of that. Y'all did a very funny thing where y'all, I always thought that was a good idea. Y'all were driving around. Do you still do that?


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[Assistant] Yeaah, yeaah. See, I actually liked- I actually thought that was a good idea. We drove around. I actually thought that was a good- I think it's a lot of work.


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[Assistant] You say that anyway. It goes for everything. I think people do, uh, people, the one that they do, they're, sometimes they're an ass, they're having, they're having, a comic can have a joke about the bad town.


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[Assistant] So they will go and go, Hey, what is your town that you make fun of in this city? What's the redneck part of town? Yeah, if you have a joke about it, so then you say that town and everybody goes crazy. Uh, but yeah, it's, you know, on our and my shows we have, uh,


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[Assistant] Joey McCollough hosts the shows and he's really good about-


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[Assistant] Saying something about the town, Sacramento or whatever.


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[Assistant] I try to like, if I can, if there's something that pops up, there's been times like I had, like I've made fun of Birmingham's interstates or something once and that did great. And so it's like, if it happens, it happens, but I don't try to.


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[Assistant] I don't try to force it. It's hard. I mean, you're, you're kind of getting that city. You got a show. It's just, it's, it's, it's hard to, that's what I imagine y'all doing. That would be the point. It's a little too much.


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[Assistant] Yeah, yeah. But I mean, that's, we get it cause you hear it all the time, but the crowd is, likes hearing it. Sure.


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[Assistant] Uh, Elizabeth Hernandez, I'm going back listening to episodes with my favorite guests. My top four are Greg Warren, Vecchione, Leann Morgan.


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[Assistant] We're all friends. So no one's in, uh, no one would be a bottom four because it's, uh,


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[Assistant] Scott Scro- Crawford, Scott Crawford. I've noticed that Nate, I've noticed that Nate's thumb is hypermobile, which means he has a propensity to curve backwards by, beyond the typical range.


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[Assistant] The common name for it is hitchhiker's thumb. The medical term for it is distal hyperextensibility. I think I nailed that word.


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[Assistant] Yeah, that's for sure. But yours is... I'm straight up in that. Look, my toe... Yours is real distal. My toes go crazy. My dad's toe go crazy. We, our toes go... Our toes make a left turn like that. Yeah. Our right turn. Yeah. Our toes make em, yeah.


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[Assistant] Uh, Mead fam. Mead fam. That was rude of John Crist. Not to invite Dusty to his roasts. Okay. I used to be a Chris fam, but not no more. No, no, that's a little bit. That's the whole family. That's the Mead family.


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[Assistant] Is it? Switch glasses. It's the back half. Oh yeah.


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[Assistant] Uh, the Georgia Athletic Director was, he was there, he was at a, uh, tennis Georgia Tech Georgia game. And then he texted me, he's like, look at, look who we're playing. And I was like, and I bet it's hard for him not to yell, even as the Georgia Athletic Director, not go, go Jack.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. It was both of them, yeaah. Did you, I don't know this Ben Rich, you said you reached out to Ben Rector?


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[Assistant] He probably did with the, or he responded with the


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[Assistant] All the world's a stage. What's your role in the human race? What's your role? He's our mic guy.


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[Assistant] Answers are good. No, this is what I always say.


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[Assistant] I know you want to hear the old jokes and all that stuff.


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[Assistant] This is a, it's a lose-lose for comedians. Sometimes you can do a, you know, you could do an old joke. It's hard to remember them. Cause you're ever, when you're writing a new act.


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[Assistant] You have to get, like, there's like a fire cell going off in your brain of just getting rid of old material. Cause you gotta, because you just are on such search for new material.


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[Assistant] And with stand-up comedy, I understand, there's stories I think people like to hear me retell, but like it was the Olivia joke. When people shout out the Olivia joke, they're like, I'll do the Olivia joke. You say, well, you're yelling the...


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[Assistant] The whole point of the joke is that you don't know I'm gonna say Olivia. And I was there. Yeah. Yeah.


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[Assistant] Yeah, I forget, we were, there was a reason where it kinda worked out, where it was like, we could get on. And my buddy, Wyatt, got us on. Yeah, that was it. And then, uh, but, you wanna hear it,


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[Assistant] I, I, I, I understand what you're saying. I think there's, you could probably do some stuff where you could go like, hey, I'll do some of my old stuff.


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[Assistant] But it's just so much different than a song or anything because it's the surprise. Maybe you like the rhythm. I understand a long story can be fun to be retold because it's kind of a song kind of thing. It's like sing songy a little bit. So you'd like to re-hear it.


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[Assistant] But, uh, if you don't keep moving forward, your career, I believe as a comic, your career will stop. I mean, you're still going to have people coming, but you will not.


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[Assistant] You will never gain new fans, cause you're never gonna be writing. And that's the part. That's why I love stand-up, and that's why stand-up is in.


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[Assistant] I think such a great spot right now, if everybody keeps writing and moving forward, that's the, it's, I'm biased, but I think stand-up comedy is the hardest thing to do in all of entertainment because you have to create it, you have to write it, you have to perform it.


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[Assistant] And you have to keep doing it. And critique it after. Yeah, you have to, and you have to move. There's so much work that goes into it. That's why I, it's to, you know, it's to make, when you see a comic up there and you think like, oh yeah, that, I mean, that could be just funny and do that. It's the, the beautiful thing about it is like, it's,


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[Assistant] I mean, hours, a year and a half of just messing with these words and figuring it out and putting it together and piecing it together. It's a true, uh, and that's the show that you want to go to. That's the show, you know, it's like that's, yeah, I don't do a ton of like


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[Assistant] I kinda just get into my act cause it's like, you're like, this act is so hard to do.


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[Assistant] A corporate man. A corporate's a little different. A corporate, everything gets condensed. Yeah, everything gets condensed, and you will bring old stuff out. I do that. Because it's, you know, you're like, more than likely they don't know you, and you're, and it's, and maybe it's not the best situation, you need to be kind of rapid fire and all that kind of stuff.


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[Assistant] If you're, well, that was a, look, that's an old way that they did it. They, you know, before specials and before TV, which is, this is how new an art form standup is, is, uh, entertainers didn't, they didn't write.


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[Assistant] You know, I mean, they, you wrote an act and you did the act for years. I mean, dad, dad, when he, my, my dad's here is why I keep pointing. But when they started, it's like, you came up with an act, you did Seinfeld. That's why Seinfeld did it. He doesn't, you know.


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[Assistant] He didn't write, it wasn't this thing, it was like you write an act, you tour on it for almost the rest of your life. Because you're not on, they didn't have specials. That's what Seinfeld, when I asked him, did y'all do theaters, he goes, no one did, theaters weren't even a thing.


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[Assistant] You couldn't ever, it was insane to be like a comedian would ever go to a theater. And when he was at his peak.


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[Assistant] It wasn't probably Seinfeld TV show later before afterwards that he went into theaters for the first time. Really? Cause he was just doing comedy clubs. They weren't, theaters just weren't a thing. And look, now you're in arenas. And that's the


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[Assistant] That's what I love, man, I love stand up and I hope this is the next generation of stand up, is you can just do stand up. And have your stand up be the catalyst for whatever else you get, but you got it because you are a stand up.


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[Assistant] Stand up is the hardest thing. It's the, uh, I mean it's as a comic saying it, but I, but I just, it's, you gotta,


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[Assistant] I mean, you just gotta write everything and you gotta say it. That's, you know, it's, it's just a lot of stuff and you're in this room with just a microphone and you gotta entertain all these people and they have to be compelled to want to listen to you.


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[Assistant] And it has to be funny. You have to keep their attention. It's hard to keep people's attention. You have to keep their attention.


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[Assistant] Yeaah. So most of your gigs are more in like cafeteria settings now?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Remember being a kid and riding your bike in your neighborhood, the freedom it brought, you could do whatever you want. Well now you can bring that back as an adult with electric e-bikes.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's your e-bikes, Craig. They're good. They're awesome. Yeah. It's, they, uh, they're, they're unbelievable. It's like, you can, you can ride the bike, you can get a little tired. You can drive it like a motorcycle.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, recapture the magic of riding a bike by going to ElectricEbikes.com. Discover e-bikes that start at just $7.99.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, 789 dollars. Uh, but I mean like, you can do this like, if you're in a city dude, you just get one of these.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You would never have a car. They're good looking too, man. Yeah, they do look good. They do look good. We, uh, we love it. We take, uh, our e-bikes, we have them on the road and, uh, ride around the arenas. Financing is low as $49 per month plus saving. I mean, you save on gas, parking, maintenance. Yeah. I tell you what, parking.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Overlooked at what they should say for an e-bike cause you can just get, you can get right up front. You can get right up front. You're in front of the handicapped.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's a good thing. Uh, oh, Greg gets nervous. He gets scared. He's worried about it. Uh, you get 150 miles on one short. These kids.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, they got air pump, uh, basket. We got one with a basket. You use that basket more than you think.