The Bennington Triangle - With filmmaker Yuri Baranovsky (”The Summoned”)

1945. Southwest Vermont. Betty Rivers, a hunting guide. Vanished in a forest. That he knew probably better than anyone. And he was never found. Over the next five years, at least four more people would disappear There are no known connections between the five victims, except that their. Disappearances are strange. Very strange. And this all happened within the quaint towns and friendly people. Of the Green Mountains in Vermont. This location has become known as.

The beginning tent triangle, a term coined in 1992 by Vermont author Joseph A Citroen. From my early introduction to this strange tale, I notice that there are always comments and articles about the triangle that reference the area's folklore. Including UFO's. Bigfoot, like crypts. Ghosts, curses and more. Seeming to suggest that these disappearances could be paranormal. This is a study of strange oh hello. Welcome to the show. I'm Michael May and today.

I have a very special guest, Uri Bernoff I did say that. You got it? Yeah, I was. I was curious. I do not know if. You've ever said it before, you know. Oh, I've said it to myself just in case I haven't talked to him. And I have to say his name. I need to make sure I say it correctly. So you are a filmmaker? Yes. And most recently, you have the movie that you wrote and produced called The Summoned, which is available, I mean, pretty much everywhere.

Everywhere, yeah. Amazon Prime is where we send people. And it's just for. Rent. As of this. Record, you can actually buy the hard copy DVD, which I think one person has. But what is. What is a DVD? It's a sort of mini disc. That it's a it's like a laser disc, that kind of a record. Yeah. But instead of using a needle, it uses. That's right. So bear with me. Just a second. I'm going to have to do a little bit of housekeeping. OK. This one. This one take.

Well, thank you. Everyone who has tuned in so far. I'm having a blast on the show. I've already got more episodes lined up and more amazing guests. Please subscribe rate and review. You know, the typical spiel and if you like the show, please visit our Patreon page, which you can find through our website a study of strange dot com. We're new and just getting the hang of this podcasting stuff, but we do have additional content for members for members only on Patreon.

And as of this episode, we've got a special giveaway we're doing on Patriot, and you're just got excited so please check that out as well and follow us on social Instagram. That's where we are. That's where a study of strangers. And yeah, please. Give us a shout Housekeeping. That was beautiful. Listen, that's your. Podcast host now. Oh, man, I feel like that's the worst I've done so. No, no, no. That was it. You're making me nervous. That's why So let me ask.

You before we get into today's episode. Yeah. Your career. Mm hmm. I think I'm correct if I say you've done mostly. Comedy stuff. Yeah, I would say I lean into comedy. Yeah. So Horror Movie was the first horror I had ever written, actually. And was it just because the opportunity came, or were you interested in horror and scary things? I love murder mysteries. Yes, but I horror. I don't even really watch that much horror.

The director is a friend of mine, and he wanted to make a movie during the pandemic. And he was like, I want to make a horror movie. You know, they sell easier. It's easier to to get money and and so he he asked if I would write it and if our production company would produce it. Yeah. So it was and it was tough. It was a it was a new experience for me. And it's a different you know, they have it has it's like beats that you have to hit that are horror beats that I had to learn. And yeah.

And I still think it's it's comedy leaning and plays. Yeah. Well, look, I've. Always said that the best men were the best comedy writers, the best comedy actors. Those are the people I want to basically do every job because I think comedy is so much harder. Right? And has you have to use so much more of yourself in it. And, and so I always appreciate when people cross genres Hollywood doesn't like people doing. I know in the rest of the world. It's just like, oh, you're a good storyteller.

I tell a story. I agree. I it's so bizarre to me. Someone was like, you know, what's your favorite genre, right? And I'm like, I don't I just like telling stories. Like, whatever I'm interested in, like a story that I get into, I'll write it because it fascinates me. So I don't really have. But comedy is probably. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Number one. That's great. And I thought of you for this episode because I'm. Well, yeah, because your podcast called A Study of Strange.

And what is this episode called? This is the Bennington Julie. Yeah. I thought of you because I thought of you because of the Jimmy's. No, no, no, no. It is. It is Vermont. I went there for a film festival, and it was like a magical fairy tale. What? What film festival? Uh, very. Memorable one, I guess. Yeah. Do I remember the name? No, it was actually I guess it was. It was like a, like a TV festival because our pilot was in it. Yeah. Call Benj, but I.

I don't remember the festival. I remember the town, though. Yeah, it was great. Do you remember what the town was? No, it's what I found out. In New England, is they all have the same name. So in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine. Right. They all have Londonderry. And. Yeah, yeah, in Somerset. They all they all have the same names because they were not creative at all. And. Yeah, it was like fall there and it was perfect. It was just. Yeah, I was like, is this real? Yeah,

it was. We'll get into that in a little bit because I'm going to comment on the area a lot. But I have some personal experiences. I'll bring up. But I did think of you for this episode because you're. Smart, and I'm not saying that just to like, you know, unlike. Your other hosts or guests. Yeah, right. Right. Unlike all the other ones. Especially Tim Donahue. Yeah. No, tell him I said, dear. He does know Tim, everybody. So I'm not just I'm not just making that joke for no reason.

So, no, I thought of you because I wanted someone that could. Especially talking about like multiple genres here and cross genres. Today's episode is not a a singular mystery, like a murder mystery or a person that did a lot of weird things or evil things that we're going to, like, dove into and try to solve today. I'm going to tell. The main basis of what the Bennington Triangle is and why people think weird things.

Happen. But then I'm going to go into just a. Lot of different short little stories. About folklore. And I love folklore. Yeah. So I'll I'll tell. Everybody about why we're going to do it like that in just a second. But yes, today a lot. Of pictures on this computer. Oh, my God. It's like that's the triangle. That's the story. Well, it's under I got yeah, I. Gathered the triangle.

So as you can already guess, everybody and you listen to the two, the intro today, we're talking about the Bennington Triangle, and I've been wanting to talk about this or use it in some form of creative expression. Somehow, and I haven't had the right project to do it until now. And I mentioned in the intro, which Erie has not heard, but I do have an intro that the Bennington Triangle term was coined in 1992 by Vermont author Joseph a city row. And you'll hear his name a lot today.

I can't praise his work enough this dude studies and writes about folklore, folk tales, spooky things primarily in Vermont and New England, which to me just sounds like an awesome life. If someone's interested, they're just sitting around studying and writing this stuff. It sounds amazing. So I'll provide a lot of links to his books. He's not the only source for today's episode, but he is the primary source. So I'll I'll make sure that the show notes are full of all sorts of links for him.

I'm guessing you've never heard of the Bennington Triangle? No, I was just thinking about that. Yeah, I never, never heard of it. I will tell you on my way here to your house. Yeah, I was driving, and we live pretty close to each other. And there's a street near my house that has two lights that have gone I don't know what happened to them, but they're like, they're blue. The street light is this intense blue. Something broke. Or maybe they're I don't I'm not sure, but it's the very blue.

And I was driving and, you know, I stopped at a stoplight or whatever, and I was staring kind of at the street, and I saw a woman in an all white, flowy dress just staring into a tree, just she just she was just standing still staring. And I was like, I don't know if that's a ghost or not. And I thought that was a nice. Nice lead in So Far Away. It was. She was just like she was, you know, I was on site at one side of the street, and she was just like.

Oh, no, I. Mean, how far away from the tree? Oh, she was maybe like a foot away. She was just staring into the trees. So interesting, you know? Ooh, spooky. Cool. Yeah. So, you know. So just for you because you haven't heard this yet. So there are. A series of disappearances that make up the basis of the Bennington Triangle, you know, its own little lore. Yeah. And they happen. It was at least five people disappeared between 1945 and 1950 and they're quite bizarre circumstances.

And literally in the news of the time, because I've looked up old newspaper reports from those years, people thought they were strange even back then, and sort of connecting these little disappearances together because of how weird they were. So this isn't just. A folk tale that kind of grew over time, which can happen with a lot of things this is actually like right at the time it was happening, people were calling out that it's strange.

But don't you think that at that time people always they like they thought everything was strange. You know, that's like the when the UFOs or. Alien, I feel like. Everything that like, oh, I don't know. That's weird. Maybe, maybe may. OK, well, that's my that's my piano. There is a mystery that will lead to some stuff in the forties. And fifties. That things are weird. So that's. You just solved. It solved. I'm going to go. Yep.

Calling it a. Triangle is that's always I always get a kick out of that. So Bermuda is probably where that term started. A triangle basically defines an area where a lot of weird phenomena happens and it's an overused term, but people think that there's like inter-dimensional doorways or, or, you know, strange dimensional breaks and space and time. Is that are there other triangles? Oh, there are. There's way too many. Of them if you just like. Google triangles.

Because ever since Bermuda people have just been using. It. Oh, I don't know that. And you can even see from the photos I have up on my screen, like the Binnington one is, is undefined. Josephus Tetreault, who, who sort of gave it that name in the early nineties. He wasn't like, if you follow this exact route, it's just more like this is an area a lot of people after that have started trying to come up with their own definitions. But as you can see, there is various ones.

And I honeymooned in the Bermuda Triangle. You did? I did, yeah. And did anything happen? No. No. Were you hoping. No, it's the Bahamas. You don't think. Yeah, I guess that's true. Yeah, but it's it's. An area where there's rough seas because the ocean gets much shallower. There's a, you know, cold air mixed with the hot, warm ocean. It creates weather patterns that are very dangerous for planes and boats. So a lot of natural stuff happens there that I think causes things to happen. Right.

I don't mean to sound like I'm complaining about triangles because I am the target market and someone writes an article and deems a new triangle. I'm going to read about it. But most of the time, it's it's just bullshit. Yeah. But the building to triangle does have a lot of weird stuff.

And what we know about it is that it's centered around Glastonbury Mountain, which is in kind of southwest Vermont, and it's got the Green Mountain National Forest, because it's the Green Mountains, sort of the mountain range there, and also the surrounding area around Glastonbury Mountain, which borders the city of Bennington, towns like Shelby Woodford. And depending on how you define the actual borders, it also could include Arlington and Stamford, which is all.

Southwest. Vermont. And this also includes the ghost towns of Glastonbury and Somerset which we will get a lot more into because they are central to. This all the ghost. Towns. Now, the Bennington Triangle is. Widely known nowadays, but when I first heard about it and started reading about it maybe ten years ago, it wasn't as well-known as it is now. Now you're starting to see it in podcasts and documentaries and tons of articles in this kind of genre.

And just to clarify it, yeah, the only disappearances were between four. And I know we'll talk about that more. There are as. Anywhere else, there are people that go missing. Sure. These five and I say at least five because some people include some other disappearances, disappearances, experience. So that's nice. Yeah. Some people include other people, disappearances, into this group. But it's primarily it's almost like Jack the Ripper has the canonical five, right?

This has like its own little canonical. Canonical five of like the main people that they assume. And it's all because they were never found. Strange circumstances, bizarre sightings and things OK. Now, when I came across the triangle, I was intrigued because these cases were weird and unsolved. So of course I was. However, I mentioned in the intro that to the casual reader, there are usually comments when you read about the Bennington Triangle that bring. Up local folklore and legends.

And these comments usually appear in the last paragraph of an article, and they're usually very vague and short, not a lot of detail, and they usually bring up. UFOs Bigfoot. Like monsters. There is a thing called the Bennington Monster, also Native American curses. And for a while now I've been trying to find those details because this is what I do for fun, you know? Where are these writers getting their information from? Why are they saying UFOs and monsters and stuff?

Are they just copying each other? They like? They are, yes. And the thing is, I couldn't find a lot of detail at first. And online resources, newspaper archive, all the other tricks that we use to research things. I just can't find anything. So I asked myself. Are these just missing people? As sad as it is to say that and not strange? And are these comments about folklore or just clickbait? Like, are they just there to to read an article? The answer to that is yes.

But there was one place left to turn, and that was the man that coined the term Beddington Triangle in 1992, Joseph Cetera. So I've read a lot of his work. He's the expert in these legends, the lore, they are real and hello plain flying overhead. When you say they're real, well, I mean real in the sense that like. Stories do exist and there is more detail still not a lot, but there is more detail than just being like. Oh there's people say there's is a Bigfoot up there. Right?

It's like, OK, but who said that? Why where? It's the story behind it, OK? And there is more information out there. Still not enough, but there is more. So what we're going to do today is I'm going to share the details of the main missing persons accounts that create this legend. And then we're going to dove into some of the local folklore. And you listeners and you, Larry Yunus. Larry David, me. What is wrong with me tonight? How drunk are you? I'm not I'm not drunk at all.

That's the. Sad thing. Maybe I'm just tired. So then we'll dove into some of the local folklore. And you. Yes. You're a yes and listeners. Yes. You all can decide if there's anything, if the folklore, if the legends, if they have anything to do, even if just from a metaphorical sense to the disappearance is of these five people. Now, I'm a history nerds or we'll dove in a little bit of that as well. And if you know anything about New England, it is the birthplace of American horror.

If you think about gothic American literature, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, Washington Irving, even Stephen King and H.P. Lovecraft this is the spot, and there's a reason for it because as beautiful as the place is, like you were just talking about. It's spooky. It's old and spooky. It is old and spooky. And new places aren't as scary you know? I mean, like you were newer cities. Oh, no, no. Yeah. You're missing that kind of historical aspect to it. Yeah.

And even L.A., like, it's. Yeah, it feels. Good to new, to new. To new. And hopefully my perspective of this strange story can be interesting because when I first heard about it, I can't remember exactly what it was, but it was probably around the time that I went and stayed at my wife's family's house in southern Vermont. And I fell in love with the place. I mean, like you were saying, it is. So. Beautiful. And I'm from Florida. Originally, I lived in l.a.

For 20 plus years and I didn't realize that something so like Norman Rockwell and quaint Americana. And so light, so many white people. That's true. That's true. But I didn't know that places like that existed. Yeah. And Vermont and other parts of new a New England like northern New York and New Hampshire and Maine and even parts of Massachusetts and stuff, they're lush there. The towns are stuck in this, like, prewar style. There's farmers markets. There's local historical societies, a.

Little local pie shop. A little local pie. There's what do they call them? General stores? Yeah. Yeah. And like most little towns. And like the, you know, the main street runs, right? The middle is swimming holes. Yeah, it is. It's so old. Fashioned in such an amazing, beautiful and, like, inspiring way. But again, as beautiful as this place is, it is. Spooky. It's true. Dun dun dun.

That's it's where I think I feel like whenever you hear about serial killers or people disappearing, it's usually in places like that. There is something to say about remoteness. Remote, lonely. Road. Yeah. And we'll get. Into that with some theories about the disappearance, the disappearances of these people, because they could have just disappeared. There's not a lot of people around. It's rugged terrain, it's forests right.

And maybe that attracts serial killers to places like this because it's less people to witness something. Yeah. Yeah. Way to make it creepy. As we were going, we were already great, but stuff is all right. As my guess. I haven't heard the details, but it's the serial killer that is. That is one of the theories. Theories. So this is how it started. On November 12th. 1945. Sorry, I'm doing a good job of getting it out. November 12th. 1945, 74 year old hunting and fishing guide Mary Rivers.

It's a man. I thought it was, I thought it was. I know. A fishing. Guide especially in Vermont and in the 1940s mini. Eddie River at. So many took a group of four hunters up the mountain and near what they called a long trail in Vermont. The long trail is one of the oldest if not the oldest hiking trail in the US and it travels almost the entire length of Vermont up into Canada. I like the name because it's so on mandatory wow that trail. Long long let's put up a sign. Yeah. Good name.

Yeah. Oh I have it written here. 200 over 250 miles. That is a very long, long trail. So on the way back. Rivers got ahead of the group not by very much, but ahead of the group. And he vanished very quickly and he was never seen again. So authorities were. Called soon, but sorry he fell in the hole. That's my guess. There you go to the right. Yeah. I guess a lot of very logical conclusion to come to and. Authorities came and they searched because. Other people are going to think of holes, too.

That is that is totally natural. Now, Mighty Rivers was. Old but he was in excellent health, even had a good doctor's appointment, I think two weeks before. And they're like. Oh, my goodness, you're fine health. You sure you're in tip top shape? They searched for a few hours, but because Rivers knew the area super well and because he knew about survival in the wild, and because he had good health, they stopped after a few hours and they waited there like he'll turn up. Well, he never did.

So when he didn't show up, they searched more and about a month or two of searching, nothing was ever found. Some research that I came across, mentions of rifle cartridges. They found not unspent rifle cartridge. I don't put any stock in that because it's like it could have come from anybody. And there's a lot of people that hunt in that area, but they think it could have fallen out of a pocket or whatever. But they found no other evidence.

I have question. Yes. How far ahead of the group was he? That is a good question. So think again. There's some time here there are some discrepancies, but not a not super far, just like minutes ahead, if that makes sense. I don't know visually how to. Sure, sure. Share that with my arm gesture. I know, but not super far ahead. It was just a bit of have they turned a corner? He's gone. OK, now.

I can't figure out the exact spot that happened in these days, but it does appear to be near the Glastonbury Mountain, their domain, the main point of interest and south of where the former town, the ghost town now of Glastonbury exists. And this is right in the heart of what is considered the triangle. So Rivers is, I mean really great name for. As. The first person to disappear in the Binnington Triangle. Yeah, OK.

So the next missing person is Paula Weldon and this is easily the most famous, inconsequential of everybody that went missing. And I just realized I wanted to make sure we were recording. We are. Yeah. That's good. Yeah. So Paula Weldon, easily the most famous, inconsequential she was only 18 years old and she disappeared about a year later on December 1st, December 1st 1946. She was a sophomore at the Bennington College and she set off from Dewey Hall for a hike on the long trail.

Now there are a lot of witnesses that saw her leave to hike. First is Louis Knapp, who lived near to the trail and he gave her a ride to the place that she wanted to start the hike. People saw her after that though. But yeah, I thought the same thing when I first read. About this then around four. P.m., Ernest Whitman, a Bennington Banner employee, gave her directions. Oh, he did it. Banned him. Even even more.

Even more so she was alleged to have been seen on the trail by another couple out who were also enjoying the hike on the trail. Yeah, maybe they were not. They were not. But they may have been the last to see her. So what they say is that she was about a hundred yards in front of them and they were walking and they could easily see her. She was wearing a red parka suit. So she stood out in the forest and they turned a corner and sorry, she turned a corner.

And then when the couple turned the corner, just moments later, she was gone. And they didn't just immediately go, Oh my God, a missing person. They just found out later she went missing. So of course there were lay the story to the authorities that that's probably it's probably around that area where it happened. And yes, it is very spooky. So Monday afternoon, it's school day this is when they noticed something's a mess. People people realize Paula has a return to school.

So the college called the sheriff's department and word spread really quickly. 400 students, faculty, townspeople, sheriff's office, everybody went out looking for her. They found no shoes, no dropped dorm room keys, no notes, no handkerchiefs. You know, not that she would have carried one, but just nothing that would have pointed to where she was or what could have happened. And they ended up putting up a $5,000 reward for information, but still.

Nothing. Now, Governor, at that time, Mortimer Proctor, another. Great name, fantastic. Was notified of the search. And since no one was getting in anywhere, he actually called in the FBI and they helped. Also, authorities in New York and Connecticut, their police officers and divisions also came out and helped in the search. And, of course, a psychic was brought in as well because that's what you do. But none of that stuff helped. They even brought.

Him in the. Psychic, not even the psychics, crazy. They had airplanes, choppers, thousands of people they searched for about a month and nothing. No evidence was ever found. Sorry. Deep hole was a deep hole. Yeah, I honestly could be OK. There's just one hole that they occupied. It's all the same hole. Now, books and stories have been based on Paula's disappearance.

And of all the people that we will discuss related to the Bennington Triangle, she's the only one I can find that is still listed on Vermont's active missing persons list. The other people are not on there, which is interesting. Her roommate later reported that she remembered Paula saying that she was depressed, she wasn't feeling well for a few few days. And some of the accounts say that her roommate said, oh, you should go take a hike. It'll make you feel better.

Some accounts say Paula herself was like taking a hike will make me feel better. And then no one saw her. Some people speculate that she left with a boy or did wasn't getting along with her parents and ran away. But all of her personal effects are in her dorm room. Her money or checks, everything was left. So she's not going to, like, run away with a guy without any of her stuff. Also, her family her friends, no one knew that she was dating anybody. So I don't really think that's a valid theory.

And she was seen. Hiking by herself. Right. So chances are she was out in the woods in the Bennington Triangle when this happened. Now, what happened after Wheldon disappeared is that her case inspired the state of Vermont to form its own. State police force. There were other. Reasons they did this, too. But the Wheldon case directly did influence the decision to make it state to the sports. Oh, because they had like city. They had city and county sheriff's office. Yeah.

But no, they didn't have a state police operation. And still, to this day, one of the main responsibilities of the state police in Vermont, and it makes sense for that state, is search and rescue. So that is one of the main, main reasons that they formed it. So that's why she is a consequential. Interesting. Missing persons case. Now. Next. This is the story that actually got me kind of hooked on the benefit in trying. The next person that disappeared is a guy named James Tedford.

I'm saying. Tat t e t f o r d. Even though it's usually spelled. Teddy Tedford, often. Even in old newspaper. Accounts, I found his TED. I've also seen it without the T or the D so there are some like variations on how people spell it. I'm using T because one of Joseph A Citrus Books refers to him as that, and that guy researches the hell out of these things. So that's what I'm going with now. Tedford was a veteran of World War One.

A lot of accounts say it was World War Two, but he was way too old for that. He was a World War One veteran, and he was living in the soldiers Bennington Soldiers Home in Bennington, Vermont. So Tedford is the third person to disappear. And it was exactly three years after Weldon to the day, December 1st 1949. Tedford was a resident of the Bennington Soldiers Home, and he had been in St Albans outside of St Albans. It's a city in northern Vermont.

So almost all the way from the bottom of the state to the top of the state, and he was visiting what is usually called relatives, but it was actually his wife and other relatives. So he and his wife were separated. They lived in separate places and that's who he was visiting. His relatives helped him get on a bus. Oh, did I tell you his age? No, I imagine old. I think he's oh, I didn't even. Write it down, so it's going to test my memory. I think he's 68 or 69. So Tedford was visiting his wife.

They get him on a bus in St Albans. The bus comes down the state south and by the time he gets to the last stop in Bennington, he's not on the bus. No one saw him get off the bus. No one saw him talking to anybody. And legend has it, his suitcase was still up above his seat in the luggage thing. And there was a like bus time charter bus ticket left in his seat. So it seems like he just disappeared and. Hole in a hole he just fell in a hole at all. Hey, listen, yeah.

So he supposedly vanished into thin air. And again, this is the story that was like, wait a second. This is different because it's not just somebody hiking in the forest. Where a million things can happen, like falling into a hole. So this is what is what is going on. Yeah, no question. You bring it up. Yeah, well, I. Was going to say, you know, I feel like when you're in a bus, you're not really looking at what strangers are doing. You know, you're not like, oh, there's one person who came up.

Oh, there's another person that went off the bus. You just sort of in a daze, right? So, yeah, he could have just wandered off or. Yeah. So I'm going to bring up something I'm going to tease. This is my Ts for the end of the episode. Is I actually want to end the episode on some stuff I learned about Tedford disappearance at the end of the episode. OK, and almost almost. Verbatim one of the notes I put in that is I wouldn't pay attention to somebody.

Else. Yeah. So but now I do have some information, so I'll share it at the end of the episode. The next person was the first to vanish was the roughest story for me to research because it dealt with a child, a kid who was eight years old, his name was Paul Jepson and this is in 1950, and his parents were the caretakers of the town dump. Now I bring this up only because one of the things I learned about staying in Vermont as many times that I had is in the town where my family lives.

There's no, there's no. Trash disposal. You are in charge of putting your trash in your car, taking it to the dump. Interesting. It's there. Small towns. This is quaint. This is, you know, rural most of the state is very rural. Right. And so I could see the caretakers of a dump actually being somewhat important, kind of well known people in town. It's not just like, oh, the people at the dump. It's like. Oh, the Jacksons. Like, people are going to know their name. Yeah.

Paul Jackson's mother stopped to feed and or move pigs, depending on what story you read. And she left Paul in the truck just very nearby. And her tasks. Weren't going to take very long, so she left him in the truck. When she did it, she finished her job. She came back to the truck and Paul was gone. Yes. So some accounts say that his mother her jobs were taking her about an hour. Other accounts say just like minutes.

So I don't know what to believe, but obviously we know that Paul wasn't there and he had disappeared so he was also wearing a red jacket, which is obviously similar to Paula. Well, did his mother called for help immediately and of course, people it's a child. People showed up quickly. People showed up with dogs to help search. The Coast Guard was even brought in to help.

So nothing has ever been found and there are a lot of reports that say the dogs lost his scent at a certain corner of streets with streets and a certain corner of streets. Which I stupidly did not write down in my notes here. But some legend say that the dogs lost the scent at this corner. And that's where Paula Wheldon was last seen. Hmm. I cannot find anything to back that up as being truthful, but that is a story that probably started immediately.

People believe finally the last person of the group that went missing, it's free to linger. Now, this happened only 16 days after Paul Jeppeson went missing in 1950 and it was on October 28. And Frieda Langer was 53 years. Old in the first game of November. Right. First guy. That is a good question. Let me double check. Yeah, November went missing. The last part of the. It's like the second. It's all like the second half of the year there's not quite. Well October and December only. Yeah. Yeah.

So very, very good, very good observation. So hang in there paying attention and. A crack. This. So free Dillinger was 53 and she was with her cousin, a guy named Herbert Elsner. He did it and they were camping. I mean maybe. And they were camping in near the Somerset Reservoir on the east side of Glastonbury Mountain. Now one morning they decided to go on a hike. And. Much like many rivers, I should point out this out as free Dillinger she was a hunting person. She was an avid hunter.

That is a. Better way to say that a hunting person, she knew the the area, she knew the woods she knew the terrain very, very, very well and in very good shape as well. And at my age now 54 doesn't sound super old anymore. No. So during this hike with her cousin, it was about 3:45 p.m., she actually went, she accidentally tripped and fell into a stream so she got wet. They were only about a half mile from their camp.

So she told her cousin, Wait here, I'm going to run back to camp real quick, change my clothes, I can be dry and come back and meet you. She did not return Eleanor. Her cousin made his way back to the campsite eventually, and there were other people that were out within that had stayed at the campsite and discovered that Frieda had never come back.

So at this point, because of the other disappearances and we're super recent to this, authorities were quick to start a major search and they didn't want to quit until something or someone was found. They were very determined. But two weeks, five searches later, helicopter aircraft, hundreds of people volunteering. Nothing was found. On May 12th. 1951. So what does that seven. Seven months later. Frieda was found three and a half miles from camp and her body say that differently.

She was found three miles from camp and they could not determine a cause of death from her body was in such bad shape. Oh, yes. And this is in an area this is the strange part that the searchers had searched really, really, really, really well. So thoughts so far. So she's the only body that. They found. She's the only body out of. The main group of the main group that. Jerry. Spooky. Spooky stories. Yeah, it's spooky.

Yeah. Yeah, sorry. No, no, no. You know, I think these are all, like, except the dude on the bus. They're all, like, in deep forests. Like, I think it's hard to. I mean, even with, you know, I feel like people even now, with more advanced technology, they'll sometimes. Oh, what happens all the time? I mean, even on autobiography, Cold Case, it's on murder, trying to find a way to plug my own. Yeah. We did a lot of missing persons cases, mainly because of COVID.

We had to find things that we could do locally, but it's amazing how many of these things happen in areas where you think, oh, well, obviously they're going to be found. And then you get out there on on your feet even just to film and walk around like we did. And it's like. I wouldn't find anything. Right, right. So that it's a valid theory that that we will discuss at the end of the episode is just the natural aspect of it.

And that's why Tedford kind of doesn't fit with the main five, even though he's always put into it. We'll get into that too. The other thing is like, yes, she disappeared in October right? Yes. Which is the fall. So, you know, lots of leaves in the ground, things like that. And then they found her in May. And also. Snow. Don't forget, this is the hunt. They are terrible, terrible winters there, right? So, yeah, yeah.

You know, at that point, it could have been like if she had tripped and hit her head and got knocked out and then died, an animal could, you know, like, yeah, yeah. I feel like it's all fairly reasonable. It is. It is. I think one of the weird things about her case as well is how far away she was from camp. Even though she knew the area, she knew the forest, she knew the hiking trail that they went on. Yeah. So that part is definitely strange.

Yeah. But, you know, there's, you know, she's heard a sound, heard there were like there's like a wolf or something and she fled and. And also you can get turned around, you can get you can get turned around even no matter how well, you know. Like, you know, experts often are the ones because they're confident full will be the ones get into trouble. All right. Well, she could have. Absolutely. Yeah. Now, there are some.

Other people that went missing that that others include sometimes into the Bennington Triangle. Story. I'm going to try to do those just really, really quickly, just so everybody else hears about them. And you can form your own decision. There's a woman named Betty Frazier and. Betty I think she's. I honestly I think if I remember correctly, if you research Bennington trying on Wikipedia, I think she's included in that main group. They have six instead of five. So she disappeared on May 5th.

1948. And she had been at a bar and she was walking home on foot and so her husband reported her missing, which he never came home. Initially, the bartender, a guy named Troy Rogers, was implicated in her disappearance because someone in the bar was like, oh. The bartender drove her home. So he became a suspect, but he had an airtight alibi. Police even tried to, like, map out and time out and, like, take his route he would have taken.

And it didn't line up with his with what would have actually had to have happened where they knew where he was with his alibi, if that makes sense. So he he did not do anything the last sighting of Frazier was by a neighbor who reported seeing her walking unsteadily along the road. I think they. Even commented like she was in a trance and Frazier's body was discovered a month later on a forest trail 17 miles away. The case was. Closed as death by misadventure. I don't know how official manifest.

Yeah, well, I've heard that before, actually. Have you? Yeah. Yeah, I've heard of death by misadventure. I think it's. Just. Someone gets drunk and. And wanders away. To something great. Yeah. And I think. For obvious reasons, I don't include her in the main group because I do think she got drunk and stumbled away. That seems exactly. Though. What happened? Logging for 17 miles. Is 70 miles. She could have gotten a ride. She could have hitchhiked. She could. And also, this could be, you know.

Now, if she had been murdered, I think they would have found evidence of that. But that doesn't mean that someone with not great intentions picked her up for it. Right, right, right. We just don't know. And we also don't know anything about her home life. I'm sure some people that have researched this stuff out there know that. And feel free to write me at a study of stranger gmail.com if you know more about this, here's. What I want to know.

Now, you mentioned like people who saw this person last. I want to see if they appear in any of the other stories, you know, like banner guy. Yeah. Yeah, there was Banner Guy. Yeah. And for the other cases, you know. Yeah. Well, I guess just listen, I'm going to say so. So just a couple others here. Yeah. There's Carl Herrick. He was before that he was in 1943. And this disappearance is often overlooked in discussions about the Bennington Triangle.

Because a body was found much like Betty Frazier as well, and a definitive cause of death was given so Carl was hunting with his cousin. Henry, another cousin hunting together a. Lot of cousins. Of cousins. They found his body after he went missing and they had searched for a few days and he had his gun nearby, but no bullets had been discharged and they did an autopsy and they determined that the cause of death. Was squeezing his. Ribs had punctured a lung.

Now I found squeezing to be a bit odd. So I did some research into. This because. One of my first thoughts was could he have just fallen and like the same kind of thing, which I think is a possibility. But then I started thinking, what about a bear? Like, does a does a bear just hit and bite or does a bear just like. They hug. Like a bear. Hug? And so I actually looked into.

This and I ended up finding an article on the by the Cumberland Times, and they mention the hair case because this was in 2013 that they wrote this. But they said that Herrick was found with scratches and bear tracks nearby, which I had never read before. When I was reading about it. So I found that really interesting. So I do think that the bear might be a solid option if they are in fact. Correct in their report. Maybe a bear killed all of them. There's a bear was there a bear on the bus?

Maybe a bear was on the bus. But had a little hat on so people thought it was human. Look, bears got to go visit relatives sometimes, too. So, you know. A couple more mentioned exclusively that I found by Joseph Citro and one of his books that I have not even tried to corroborate yet, but I'll bring up is in Burlington no excuse me. And The Burlington Free Press. They had an article on.

October 25th 1980. One of reporters named Sally Jacobs says that two years after Paula Weldon disappeared, a trio of hunters from Massachusetts vanished near Glastonbury. Their disappearance. Like all the other ones, is still a mystery. It's unsolved. So that's all. The detail I have. I have no other detail of that yet. I actually do want to spend a little more time seeing if I can track down anything about that. And then another one from the Bennington Banner, your favorite newspaper.

They made reference to a 13 year old Bennington boy by the name of Melvin Hills, who is lost in the same area in 1942, also in October. Again, I can't find any more information yet, but these missing persons. They weren't to the end or the beginning of. The high strangeness. Of the Bennington drag of but. Surely other people disappeared. You're going to talk about, aren't you? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was going to say like, why is that? Why is that the cutoff?

No, I think it's a look a lot of people. Have gone missing. You can everybody can research this because there are the active missing persons cases in Vermont are online. So anybody can look it up. It's not as many people as you think. I actually thought there'd be like. Hundreds of. Thousands of missing persons cases that are open that they're looking for in the area. And it's not it's actually far fewer. So this is a lot of people to disappear in that area in that time frame.

And again, these are the ones that are the most mysterious. So some of them might be like Sally. What was her name? Sally Armistead. Sally Fields. Betty Frazier. Someone completely different than what I was saying. Betty Frazier drunkenly stumbling away. There's probably a number of cases like that that's like, look, she got drunk and fell down a ravine and. Right. You know, but so it's not it's not strange enough to be included in the weirdness of the Biddington triangle.

So there's two components or perspectives I guess you could say about these missing person cases is, one, they just went missing. They fell into a hole like eerie, like to say. They found a. Home or two. Like all these articles bring up, there's some kind of connection or tie in with local paranormal supernatural occurrence. So before we settle. That, let's consider some history. And let's also learn about these legends lore. You know, where did they come from? What are they?

All of that kind of fun stuff. I've got a button now. That's like history nerd. Alert. Like. I love folklore. I'm Russian, and Russian folklore. Yes, insane. And so. Well, I. Was I actually am going to bring up something about that in a bit because vampires will come up today and in obviously in Eastern Europe. They have big I'm a. Big, big vampire. So we have like forest trickster spirits and people leave milk and cookies. And you were. You were born in the Ukraine.

I was in Kiev, yeah. Nice. So when we left. Yes. So we will talk about that for sure. So most people know that the early European. European, European Union opinion, but most people. Know that the early European and specifically English British roots in North America, where communities developed in New England and New England. Oh, that's why it makes sense to put together pit pilgrims, Plymouth Rock, yada. Yada, yada.

If you're an American, you went to school in America, you probably heard a lot about this. And the pilgrims and a lot of other immigrants to New England were Puritans. And this is only a CliffsNotes version of this. But I do think it's actually important when we think about local law and stuff like that. So Puritanism is a religion that broke off from the Church of England based on the theological work by John Calvin. This is like the 1500s through the mid to late 1700s.

I only vaguely know about this, but I'm pretty sure Puritans believe in pretest a nation which is like, you are born going to heaven or hell. It doesn't matter what you do, you're just got already decided what's going to happen to. You seems weird. Why? Why do anything that I don't? And it is weird, especially because they were so strict about that too. It does seem very weird, but yeah, they're very strict. Apparently they were more colorful than just like the black outfits in the big buckles.

They did dress in different, different garb than that, but. That's the way we think of them. They also were big. Proponents and supporters of education, but only for men of course. And they actually helped set up Harvard College. So how did they feel about Jews. If poorly? I mean, I can't imagine very well. Yes. Yeah. I mean. We we will briefly mention the Salem witch trials in New England. Sure. So if that's going on with other Puritans. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And this is a it's not it's not a good not a good. Thing for anybody else. So Puritanism in New England, I would imagine this is my own kind of thinking about how the way the world and history works, but their beliefs there, the way they systematically set up governments and local cities and counties and colonies and everything else that's going to start blending and mixing in with the native population and then the local law of Native Americans.

And so that's one of the interesting things I think about New England is like you have the original, not the original, but like the first major European settlers and all of their beliefs mixing with native legends as well. Yeah. And again, beautiful place, but super. Creepy also a lot of forests. Tough winters. I cheered. I didn't even think about Thanksgiving when I was writing this like Thanksgiving. Everybody's like, Hey, we're starving over here. Can can you. Guys help us?

You seem to know what you're doing now. Yeah, the. Winters are terrible, super humid and buggy in the. Summertime. It's a beautiful. Place, but it is kind of rugged. And and I do think that kind of goes into, you know, whatever at the time, the zeitgeist of the time and living and again, Lower Salem Witch Trials happened, which hysteria was not just in Salem. That is the biggest place for the one most well known, but other areas in New England also went through their own little witch hysteria.

Who hasn't has anything in their lives. Yeah. In Vermont specifically, you have mountain ranges like the green mountains where Glastonbury is, Glastonbury is. Roughly. 4000 feet. It's like 300 feet. So 3700 feet. That's a better still rounding. But around that, which is a pretty big mountain for that area, it was a remote area. It was hard to get to. Even the Native Americans, apparently they didn't live around that. Mountain. Because it was too tough to, too difficult to live there.

But apparently they did use the area for burials, not like a very specific burial ground, like in a book or a movie, but like just the general area. That's where they sort of saw it as a spiritual place and they would use it for burials. There are. Stones structures, strange stone structures that it's hard to say strange stones structures. Around this part of New England. There's, I think over 200 of them in Vermont. And they cause a lot of controversy in the archeological world.

What are we talking or what do they look like? It's like little now. I don't have. A picture of a map, but it's like a almost like Celtic, but kind of like the foundation of like stone. Cabin. And the controversy lies in the fact that some people think native populations were using it as like a solar calendar and other people think they were Celts. They were, you know, Europeans that have come over thousands of years before, and people are still studying them and debating them.

And they are there's still no explanation of what they are. Still no explanation there. I'm sure there's a lot of theories but I've seen them in some like documentary TV shows and I've seen a bunch of pictures of them. I want to go to them. I've been near them in Vermont. I've never gone. I want to go. Yeah, the area also does have a lot of bear, a large cats. A lot of people think the Catamount used to exist in Vermont, which hasn't been seen in a while.

That's basically a Jaguar so I just wrote down a note Legend of Sleepy Hollow, because I think that's just such a great example of like Gothic storytelling in that area. Now, to get even more specific to the Glastonbury Mountain area, Glastonbury, the town was formed in 16 excuse me, 1761. And no one really lived. There.

I mean, some people came in and out, but again, it's a tough place to live and the long trail that we've been talking about today actually runs kind of along the border of where that town used to exist. They built a town, but everyone was like, No, thanks. Yes, exactly. Until after the American Civil War, as the population started growing because of the timber business so people set up like housing and kilns and everything else, you need to log and create a logging company.

But because it's up the mountain, there are no roads, so they built a train track. So from Bennington to Glastonbury, there was a long train track that was used just to haul lumber in and out. And it was actually very steep, like so steep that it was kind of a marvel to have this very steep train track. But however, by 1889 the train stopped because like we do as humans, we cut down all the trees. So no more trees, no more lumber business. Everything shuts. Down, no trains anymore.

Buildings start falling into disrepair. But then there was an idea to turn the area into a tourist destination. So they rebuilt the old housing complex for workers into a casino slash resort, and they converted the train into a trolley to kind of bring guests up the mountain. But they only did this for. One summer in 1898 because the fall of the same year, rain wiped out the trolley tracks. So the whole place was obsolete because you can't get there's no roads.

So everything falls into disrepair again. Population just keeps dwindling. And at one point in time before it was a quote unquote ghost town. One family, all of its members made up the entire like town government. So like the mayor and the treasurer and the. You know, whatever, they're all it's all just one. I want to want. To see a movie or TV show. But. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. Now, there were two murders. During the early years of this town of Glastonbury.

You would you would expect so. And part of me. Feels like the best place to murder someone. Oh, absolutely right. And part of it wasn't even going to bring it up. I was like, no, that's actually really. Interesting history, thinking about how many, like, weird disappearances also happen. Like I will bring them up. In 1892, a guy named Henry McDowell murdered Jim Crawley, and Henry McDowall ended up going to the waterbed the asylum. However, he escaped soon after that and then disappeared.

So what were you going to say? What about the asylum? What was that? Oh, just. Just like it. It's so Americana lore, right? It's like, Oh, that's true. He killed someone and he went to an asylum and then he escaped from the site. That just feels like so well. So what is it about. Asylums back then? You always hear stories about people going to it, and they escaped. Like, did they lock the doors? Like, what is going on? The word asylum is creepy. Oh, yeah. You know, yeah.

The moment you hear asylum. Yeah, like, I don't like it. Yep. I have a question. Yeah. So there was other were there other ways to get to the town other than the train? No. So when the train was washed, the track was washed away. Was there anyone left in the town? Yeah. I mean, people again. They lived there. There was even that family that lived there. So there's there had to be, like, trails. But no, like road. Like you can't bring a cart up.

You got to, like, either ride a singular horse or hike out. This is what I think. Again, if anybody knows. Wants to correct me, please write me at a study of stranger Gmail dot com, and I will correct that. We'd like to hear from the family who lived there. Please. Yes, please. Descendants of the family there, please. Email. Yeah, that would be amazing. I would love to do an interview with this. Now, on opening. Day of Vermont's first. Ever official hunting season.

In 1897, a guy named John Harbor, who lived in the town of Woodford nearby, was mysteriously. Murdered at a camp in Bickford Hollow. Which is actually near where our first disappearance happened. He was hunting with his. Brother. And boom, mysteriously dead. They don't know. Who did it. He just died. There's like not many details. It's basically like he was murdered and it's like, all right. But yeah, I don't know. His brother. I'm sure they talked to him I think he found him.

I didn't write the whole story because I wanted to make this so brief, but I think the brother found him, which he did. He could have done it. Hey. Could have done it. There's no DNA back then. Now. I'm sure they don't have people analyzing fingerprints in a remote area. And I don't know, so just died. Yeah. So but he was he was murdered right there in the area. So Glastonbury has now been a ghost town for. Near a hundred years. Do you want to go run it with me? Yeah.

Oh, I do go. Right, absolutely. Yeah. Like, we can make it into a nice place. I feel like you can look the way the long trails right near there. People love to hike. People vacation in Vermont. Just a plus. Great place to go. Murder someone. Great place to murder. You and I have been talking about, like. Where's the perfect place to murder somebody for years now? We've just found it. You can still find the the, like, foundation of I think the casino resort is still there.

I've seen videos online that people hike to it. There's a stream, you know, a little stream and town, but it's mainly like luckily the forest has grown back, so it's mainly just all growth and stuff to get to. So there's no buildings left. I think just foundations. I think just foundations. Yeah, it's pretty cool. In fact, I think this is the now that I. This is great radio. Everybody was going to say, you guys should see this. This is amazing.

So that's the boardinghouse they converted into like the resort. Oh, yeah, guys. Oh, there it is. The trailer. Oh, yeah, yeah. What a cool photo. You guys really missing out on this you're going to have a website. You have a website? Yeah. Yeah. So you should put these up. Oh, I mean, you know, he knows what he's doing. I know what I've seen. Look, I'm. One of my previous episodes. I have a murder mystery of Julia Wallace. I do the same thing where I'm like, you want. To see the thing?

And I, like, turn it, and I. Like that you have a photo that says, man eating stone and I don't mean it's right there, man eating stone. Not a man eating a stone, but a stone. That's man, you were nice. Nice so we know the. Missing persons reports. Now, you know some of the history. It's time for the local legend. Finally, it's only taken us, what, like, 4 hours to get here? There's no format to this episode today because I just go in over. And I keep interrupting you every five. Seconds.

No, that's that's perfect. People don't actually want to hear me talk. I'm doing the show for people, so I came. In here making converts. No. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going. To ask what. You want to hear about. I'll give you a list of stuff you get to pick likes and things, OK? It's vampires. Ghosts, UFOs, monsters. There's also some Civil War and KKK stories to share and Native Tales. So I'll take Native Tales for two. 200. This is short.

This is going to go quick because all these kind of tales, they're just passed on. So it's all like anecdotal. So somewhere up on Glastonbury Mountain, the Abenaki, I think that's the local tribe. And hopefully I'm saying that correctly. I think am they believe that there was a stone pathway that would lead up the mountain. And when you touch the stones at a certain spot on that pathway, it would send you into another world and you would never return. Nice world or bad world, I guess.

I guess so. But nobody. Ever returns. No one ever returns. But I do find that interesting relating to, you know, disappearing people on the mountain. Now no one is sure. Of the need. And this is such a nerdy saying that of course I would look up. So I don't know if this is interesting or not.

But no one is sure what they actually what the natives actually called Glastonbury a mountain, because there are other mountains that like we know the native names for at Glastonbury, no one is quite sure but there is some anecdotal evidence that they called it the place where the four winds meet. And the reason I wanted to call that out is it's just nerdy history and I like that.

But a lot of people talk about how confusing it can be to hike that area because the wind does come at you from every direction. So it adds to this disorienting effect of thinking. You're aware of what direction you're walking, and none that actually does have an effect on like your internal mapping capabilities of what your head is thinking. So I found that really interesting. Some say the natives said that the mountain was. Coerced I cannot find specifics to that. That is just one of those.

Again, quick little anecdotes of early mountains curse. Don't go up there. The Abenaki say that you should never travel on that mountain. Others say that it was a burial area. And these tales, as far as I've been able to deduce, are just tales. So I can't corroborate them again. A call to action. If anybody knows. I do want to learn more about this. I've spent way too long researching it. It would be nice if someone just told. Me some more details about that. So that is the very short.

I want to hear more about the magic rock. That sounds. Well. I do. Too. And I'm sure, again, these are all oral tradition so I don't think there is much else besides like there is a magic stone pathway that leads to our native sound. Like a picture. Man eating stone meaning stone. OK, yes. So that's my going theory that there's a magic there. Yes. You probably do a different dimension.

So like those people touch the stone and they're in a new dimension, but it's so similar to the one they lived in. They are just in a dimension where they don't disappear. Maybe some weird like maybe Hillary wins in their world. Yeah. And then, you know, but in our world, they just. Yeah, and look you can, you can kind of like laugh at that idea. But a lot. Of people believe these quote unquote triangles, again, that they are interdimensional.

There's some kind of energy vortex that we don't understand that does take you into a different dimension. A lot of people I've heard in the Pacific Northwest, we like Bigfoot. They think he's an interdimensional being and it could be some sort of area where something like that. But so it is an interesting thing that you just because it doesn't. Sound like you're saying that like I've read a lot about it sounds like you're just like thinking about it, which is really enjoyable.

I have a whole. Yeah, yeah. I like I had this an A on a late night debate with my wife. I was like, I had this like, what if instead of people dying when we die, we just like dimension travel. So to us, we don't know, you know, we're just like we wait because, you know, sometimes you wake up from a dream and like, yeah, god, that was crazy. It was so realistic. I was 70 and I died. And so I'm like, well, maybe we just never die. We just constantly dimension travel through our own bodies

in a different timeline. That's interesting. That's interesting. If anyone knows more about that. Right. To us. Yes. A study of strange emoticons. OK, you just. Gave me an idea for an episode. Actually. Yeah, I know one about. Like, theories of what happens when we die, because a lot of people, you know, there's there's questions about what is actually what is consciousness and like energy has to move and it's like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. There there is some science and stuff to that.

That it's like a game or like a what's it called oh. A simulation. Simulation, yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of like. Yeah. The End of Men in Black. Do you remember when it's like they're looking for the universe or whatever. And the little the little necklace. Thing they said, yes, yes. And at. The end they like zoom out and we're in a universe that they. Know. Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah, that's yeah, like, yeah, yeah. It was fun stuff. OK, so next.

Up, we have their powers, we have ghost, we have UFOs, we have monsters, we have. KKK. We have. I don't know why like that. The KKK are part of it. It's like they were real. They were? Yeah. Like they're part of the legend line up. And then the mysterious. It's just like there's because outside of just local legends, I do think what happens there for real affects the. Way people believe about things that are happening. So that's why I think it's important to include stuff like that.

So do you want to know. About I mean, yeah, you want to know about the KKK? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, hey, the better. You understand? Exactly. As recently as 1927. So luckily that it is a. While ago now, clans persons were not afraid. In fact, quite proud to march in the parades. Of Montpelier, Vermont, the 4th of July parade, specifically some say that in the mid 1920s there were 14,000 KKK members in Vermont. And you don't think about Vermont as being a hotbed of gay members.

So as we talked about earlier, a lot of white people. Yes. Yeah, that is it is true. It is not a very diverse place nowadays. Now there are. Some that say those numbers were inflated by the KKK. There may have only been a few thousand, but still that's a few thousand. Too many. Yep. Now the numbers did die out at the end of that decade. It was very nationally like the numbers of KKK really started out right at the end of World War One into the 1920s, and the numbers started dwindling again.

I oh, I'm sure there's a lot of depression. They can afford the sheets that's it. Yeah, I can't, I can't. Be a member anymore, guys. I can't I don't have enough seats. So what's interesting, what I found. Interesting and kind of fun is there is a conspiracy and this is so KKK, you're going to be like, Yeah, of course, this is what they thought. But they thought that the Catholic Church in Burlington was storing tons of ammo and guns in their like basement or in their chapel or something.

And they were doing it because they wanted to take over the government or fight the KKK members. The Catholic. Church. Yup. Catholic Church, yeah. Oh, because they hated Catholic. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Forgot it first. Yeah. Yeah. They're not Protestant. Yeah, you are. Yeah. So a KKK. Group broke into. The church one night to steal the arms, but of course, they found no such thing. So one of the. Gentlemen, you and on vibes? Yeah, one of the gentlemen. Nothing changed.

Human nature does not change. I say that. All of that. What of? The men decided to start stealing crucifixes. And other church. Memorabilia things which I just love. You have this organization that thinks of itself as being religious and being Christian. And yet you're breaking into a church and you're stealing a crucifix. Yeah. So that's good on you there. Now, there. Was a statewide meeting of the Klan at a farm on the outskirts of Montpellier in 1925, and the crowd grew to 400 people.

No, excuse me. There were 400 automobiles so. That means there's even a lot more other people. Catholics in Montpellier were the targets of cross burnings at their cemetery and throughout town. And sort of fascinating. I didn't yeah. I mean, I knew that like when Kennedy ran, they were like Catholic. Yep. But I didn't realize the KKK was so against Catholics. I I think they're against anybody. That's not them. I mean. That's, that's it. And it's, that's one of this story just.

And you just need a hug. Everybody from. You yeah. Everybody needs to come down and have a chill out. Yeah. No, but I find it really fascinating. I'm glad you think it is, too, because that's that's kind of the whole gist of it is just like this thing happened in Vermont where you don't expect the Klan. Right. And it was strategy. It was a strategy from them. They did. They were trying to influence politics and government. So they did send people up to be like start organizing, start investing.

They're still doing that, guys. By the way, I wanted to talk to you about something. Yeah, I have this this pamphlet, so you should read it. So, yeah, there's your KKK do you? I'm going to suggest. We go immediately into a very quick stop also. So we're just because the election. Yeah, yeah. Please. A lot of people. That live in the northern United States might on vacations down south visit. Civil war battlegrounds. I actually I've never done that. I've always wanted to or I would like to.

I may have on a job but. No nice this. But as it turns out, they don't. Need to go down south. Because there was a battleground. In Vermont and most people don't realize the. Town of. St Albans was actually claimed for the Confederacy for I think 12 minutes if I read the the story correctly so on October 10th 1864. Around 20 October again woo hoo. That's that's interesting you're you're picking up a lot you're picking up more. Stuff than I realize. So yes in October.

Some 20 young strangers started appearing. In St Albans, Vermont, and apparently they were disguised as various different business people like horse traders or preachers. And I think some of them even did claim to be tourists or hunters coming up for to hunt. But of course. They weren't there for a vacation or for a hunting season. When they were talking to locals about hunting, they were actually trying to borrow guns and they were also assessing. How to best.

Escape town should they need to as well. When they were talking about horse trading and stuff like that, they were led by a 21 year old Southerner named Bennet Young. And their plan actually did come to fruition and they sort of jumped out at people one night or one day and they shouted, We're Confederate soldiers, we've come to take your town, we're going to have all your money and if you resist. We will blow your brains out. So they actually did get into a bit of a. Skirmish.

Some people were shot. I think only one died, which is still bad, but thank goodness it wasn't more than one. And after that, 12 or so minutes they actually had to escape town. But they. Took money, lots and lots. Of money, and they were able to escape into Canada and St Albans. I don't have a map up, do I? Know St Albans is relatively far north, so it wasn't like a dreadful hike into Canada right now. In Canada, they were actually caught early. Some of them were and they went on trial.

But Canada decided. This is out of our jurisdiction, what can we do? So they had to release them and give them. The money that they had stolen from the town. Oh, they didn't like give them to the States? Nope, nope. They were released and the money was given back to them. And they had apparently $80,000 on them, which in. 1860 money. Lots of money. Is a lot of money. So they, they did quite. There were taken. After, you know, I didn't, I didn't.

Like it was it's less confederate and more like 20 dudes decided to be bandits and it. Kind of is, it kind of is. But they did say they claim the town for the Confederacy and all that kind of stuff. And it's again an interesting story that I think does feed into you know, local beliefs and law and thoughts and. Things like that. Your listeners are in Canada, your relatives might be these people. Please write to us. Yeah. OK, so wait, where where's my little list here of other things?

Ghosts for sale, ghost, ghost for 600. It's a longer episode than he actually intended it to be. I'm the thing is, I'm fascinating as a person, so, you know, all of good. Yeah. My rating a. Three and a half hour. Yeah. Do you want to hear more of your a please. Subscribe in. Woodstock, Vermont, man named Gillespie Cab. I've only picked this because I saw his name. I think I'm going to read this one. That's great. He was an inventor.

And this is 1851. And to give you a hint about how many, I don't have any specific ghost stories that we know that he shared, but he experienced so many ghost encounters that he invented a wrapping machine. Essentially. It's almost like I imagine it is like a little piano. So it has little keys. And would have different sounds.

And the different little wraps it would make would communicate with spirits and what I find interesting about this is if you heard my spirit photos, episodes, you know that spiritualism started in upstate New York not far away from this around the same time. So the idea of communicating with spirits was very much part of in the zeitgeist, especially in that geographical region. Another little town here, Manchester, Vermont. That's where I went. That's where the.

Yes, that's I was there just a few. It's beautiful. Yeah, it's an amazing one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I go through Manchester every time. I'm so cute. So in 1769, that's so old for the United States. You my get. The Equinox. Hotel has been a destination for guests, including people like Abraham Lincoln's family. And they would go up. There they say Abraham Lincoln's ghost. He might he might be under the same tent.

So there have been claims of paranormal activity from President Lincoln's wife Mary Mary Todd Lincoln. Whether you're a fan of ghosts or you're just like. Beautiful Vermont stop by the Equinox Hotel in. Manchester, or so this. So yeah. No no people's claim they see Mary Todd. Lincoln is still open yeah since 1769 wow. And stop by the wonderful bookstore in Manchester which is one of my favorite bookstores. In the world. Great name of great breakfast places. Yeah.

There's a place in the second floor that we don't know what it's called, but it was delicious on the main street yeah. It was there at the bookstore on the second floor. No, no, I never. Much different place. I don't think so. Get out now. There's a place. Called Emily's Bridge in Stowe, Vermont. And this is. I didn't write the whole story down because there's a lot of different variations of it. Again, trying to make this kind of quick to go through a different things.

Yeah. Yeah. This is a little far outside the Bennington Triangle, but just if anybody talks about Ghost and Vermont's, they always talk about this bridge. And people have reported all sorts of strange occurrences, like they drive their car. And this is one of the famous Vermont covered bridges. So people drive their car through. They'll come out the other side. There'll be scratches along the side of the car.

Or they're here like knocking or pounding on it or footsteps in this story is that someone named Emily hung herself or was murdered on it. There's all these different versions of this story, but that is kind of like the most famous haunted place. I loved the. Idea. Like, I always like to think about ghost stories from the ghost point of view, where Emily is just like wandering the tunnel back and forth.

And then she sees occurrences like, and she's like running alongside and knocking, like, hey, hey, let me out me like that. Tammy Yeah, she's actually. You do what's right. That's right. That's all. So in Brattleboro. Which is a place I drive through every time I'm in Vermont as well, I know it very well. There's a castle like estate, and it was once the Vermont Asylum for the S.S.. Yeah. Got to throw an asylum in here again. It's called a. Retreat. Now, it is still in existence.

So for the insane. Yeah, of course. Yeah. It was founded in 1834 today. There are 58 buildings on a thousand acre property. Yeah, it's huge. And only 20 of the buildings are actually modern. So a lot of that history, a lot of that energy, you know, of old things. And there's this tower that looks. Like a castle. Keep kind of. Saying that was. Built between 1887 and 1892 by the patients of the asylum and they stopped work on the tower because too many patients were jumping off to commit suicide.

Today there are still sightings of people jumping off the tower, but when people go to investigate nothing's there there's no body. Again the ghosts are like I've jumped 17,000 times. With somebody just, I. Just want to know what's happening. There's a, this is a great story I came across and I'm probably not going to tell it nearly as well as I should or as I read it, going to nail it. But a deer hunter got lost in the woods in Vermont and it got late.

It was getting dark, it was snowing. So it's hard. It's even harder to see and get out of the woods and he stumbled upon an old rock wall and he started following the rock wall until he reached an opening. He goes into the opening and inside on the other side of that rock wall is an old cemetery. And this scared him not because apparently he was afraid of ghosts or anything, but he thought, if I'm going to freeze to death and succumb to the elements I don't want to do it in a graveyard.

Like, how creepy is that? And then he thought he heard something that sounded like music. And he's looking around and then he saw this woman who was singing and he sees her through the snow and he's it's snow is falling. And he's looking through and he can see that she's wearing a white dress, but nothing else. No store, no, no, no coat, no snow. Things just out there in a white dress, singing and she doesn't see him at first.

And finally she kind of looks at him and he tries to talk to her and she doesn't reply. And then she lifts her hand and she points and he turns to look at where she was. She pointed nothing Sarah turns back and she's gone. And there's no footprints in the snow where she had stood. And the man decided to walk in the direction that she was pointing. And eventually he stumbled across a road and was able to get picked up by a family small farmhouse. And so the direction kind of saved his life.

And the farmer he's talking to feeds them, gives them coffee, gives them food, and then gives him a lift home. And on the lift home, the farmer says because he had shared the story, said, don't tell stories like that. There is no graveyard in the forest. You're going to freak people out. So again, the story goes that this man. Yeah, it's a good story. The man, apparently, once the snow thawed out, he decided to try to find the graveyard and. Couldn't find it.

So he went back out, went through the same path, the same road, couldn't find it. No graveyard. Existence said. Graveyard. That graveyard has been dead seven years. Graveyards been dead for 25 years. Don't go bury in the graveyard. In the graveyard. There's a Russian folk creature named Alexi and Alessi. Is it tricks? It's a trickster. And so it gets lost. Gets you lost and you, like, see things. And it plays tricks on you and things. Yeah, that's to me, that's probably a last.

Oh, yeah, yeah. There you go. All right, so we have. What do we have left? We're vampires. You want to do vampires? Sure. So this one is this is. Good because we're getting up to our first recreation scene. Finally. Yeah, this episode has been so much longer than I expected. Again, because you're fast. And so. So in New England in the early 1800s, the early 19th century. There was this interest and interest is the wrong word. There was this interesting connection.

That people were making between consumption. Which is tuberculosis. I only know it because of, you know, the cowboys would always get consumption. Yeah. But consumption and vampirism and so typically what would happen is someone in New England who had died of consumption and then if his family members or her family members also got consumption they would think vampire. So they would dig up the body, they would find the heart and they would burn the heart. They would pull it out and burn it up.

And that was a way to stop other people from getting the consumption. So to work. Oh yeah. Yeah. So there's a couple instances of this on October 9th, I mean, there's probably more than this. These are just some examples. On October 19th, 1890, the Vermont Standard published an article about vampirism in Vermont and. The article, detailed. Narration is really what. Sells. Yeah, yeah. The article detailed an event from 1830.

A man named Corwin died of consumption and he was buried in Woodstock, Vermont Cemetery. Six months after the burial. Corwin's brother also got it so they couldn't the doctors were like, Man, I don't know. I don't know what the cure is. I tried digging up the. Body and burning the. Heart. Yeah, that's exactly what they did. Some people from Vermont Medical College blamed vampires. And they dug them up. Boy, they said they when they found the heart in the body, they claim it was full. Of blood.

And they burned it publicly so everybody could see. Another example from the same area happened in 18, 17. A Dartmouth student named Daniel Ransom got consumption, and shortly after he died on February 14th, his father grew concerned that his son had become a vampire. So the father had his son's body exhumed. They took out the heart and they burned it. Now, this practice was all over. New England, apparently loved way more than it should have. Been due if you die.

Do you I mean, do you have an. I mean, kind of. Yeah, OK. That would be pretty cool. Publicly after publicly is the only way if you're just doing it by yourself. I have not seen the point yet. So this also. Caught the attention of Henry David Thoreau. Famous American literary. Scripts are coming out. And we're going to do a little recreation. You're going to read Thoreau. And this is what I imagine something something happened. And please, how. Old was Thoreau in this?

OK, this is I think this is. 61 when he was writing about this. I have. Should I look him up? No. You know what? I'm just going to do something. Just pick an edge. Make a choice. Make a choice. All right, so here we go. Thoreau's cabin somewhere in Massachusetts. It's a beautiful New England summer day. And Henry David Thoreau sits on the porch of his small but elegant cabin writing a stack of papers full of musings, notes and drafts of stories

are piled next to him. A delivery man. Walks up to the. Cabin. It sits in. A box with milk and eggs. Right by Thoreau's door. Good morning, Mr. Thoreau. Here's your. Order now. Thank you. What are you working on today? An essay about the importance of living in harmony with. Nature, I presume, or the goodness of. Man or the evils of slavery. Again, something new, I daresay. Oh, perhaps a biography? No, no, no. Vampires. Not to worry about mythical monsters, dear sir.

The savage of man is never quite eradicated. I just read this account about a family in Vermont. Several of its members have died of consumption. Just burn the lungs, heart of the liver of the last deceased in order to prevent any more from having it. Better safe than sorry. I always say yes. Science Perfect. Well done. Thank you. So, your last little bit. There is a quote. If something he actually actually wrote. Boy. Yeah. So good. Good on you. Good on you.

In order to prevent any more from having it. By 19th century language. You. Don't you don't want your doctor to recommend exhuming a body and burning. It's. No. No, it's. Isn't it? Yeah. You start doubting. Where did you go to medical school? This Vermont Medical College. What did you. What class did you take? Vampirism. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dr. Vampirism. So, yes. All right. That's our. That's our sort of vampire tie in there. Monsters, please. Monsters.

Is that the one? I think. I think we have. You might. Yeah. Yeah. I'm into UFOs. Yeah, that's a that's. I don't tell you. After this episode, I have to walk to my car, and my Michael Stewart has no lamps, so it's all. In pitch darkness. We used to have lamps, and then I shot him on That's scarier. Yeah. So for hundreds of. Years, Vermonters have been seeing. Odd things. In the. Forest. I Having been in Vermont just a few weeks ago. I've also heard. Some really weird things at night. It's.

Could you replicate them with your voice? Hi. No weird shit. So there's a. Lot of sightings. Honestly, if anybody is curious about Bigfoot sightings or bipedal creatures in Vermont, just Google. There's infinite, infinite amount of. Amount be game. Yeah. Maybe by. The episode. Taking a long time. I cannot talk. To Maybe they built those stone structures, you know? They might have. It might have someone.

Out there probably already presented that theory, but no, there are infinite amount of Bigfoot sightings in the area. Including in 1609. Samuel de Champlain, who Lake Champlain in the area has been named for. He her native American stories of an oversize, hairy man who would hide in the woods. And Champlain. He thought this is all to her and you didn't think it was. Poppycock. Now, historically. The first recorded encounter involved a man named Duluth, and he was part of Roger as Rangers.

I've heard this limerick. I was 1759. Now, why they were while they were retreating from a raid on an Abenaki settlement, the men were. Quote unquote, being annoyed. By a large bear that was throwing pinecones and rocks and things at them. And the natives apparently would call him We. Joke. Or wet skin or slippery skin. And apparently they would say that he had a family or there was a large population of these slippery skinned creatures in the area, and he would walk up right on two feet. Hmm.

Another little anecdote tale. Interesting story. As recently as. September 2003, a man. Spotted what he called a Bigfoot coming out of the woods along Route seven towards Glastonbury. Mt.. The area we're talking about. Mm hmm. It was around dusk. And he told officials about this, and everybody, of course, shrugged it off and were like, It's a bear. These things happened. Another Bigfoot guy telling us a story.

But this is not the first sighting of a Bigfoot like creature around the Glastonbury area, because there is a thing called the Bennington Monster. And the one story you come across a lot almost every time you read about the banding tin triangle of people bring up Bigfoot. They talk about the Bennington Monster. And the story behind that goes sometimes since the early 1800s. Sometimes it's the late 1800s. But there's a stagecoach in this part, and it doesn't change. It's full of passengers.

It's traveling, you know, somewhere near Glastonbury Mountain and it was forced to stop because something blocked the road or the road was washed out again, depending on the story you read. And the state secret driver noticed large footprints in the mud or snow and it was too big to be a man. And then suddenly the coach was. Attacked.

By a giant bipedal monster who hit the hit the vehicle, hit the carriage, knocked it over on its side before it ran off when everybody started yelling and trying to scared away. And everybody said it was around six feet tall, that black hair, and it was running on two legs. And I just realized when I do the do the running motion to you, the audience cannot see me. He's doing a running motion now. I love big foot stories and I can't wait to find an appropriate one to do on the show.

I think it would be so much so much fun. One of the things that makes me question the validity about a lot of these kind of stories, though, are those discrepancies of like early 1800s, late 1800. Right? It's like where where did this story start? Right. That's what I want to give me. The first time someone told this story and that's what I want. Stop. Just everybody saying. One of those guys is on a stage going coach and he was late. And they're like, What happened? He was like.

Well, there was a giant. Giant monster being attacked me. And yeah. However, there. Are some other interesting stories from the same time and saying interesting way too much to as early as 1879. The New York Times reported that two hunters had happened upon a wild man and the hunters had actually shot at this wild man, this animal creature on two legs. The animal actually got. Hit and. Cried in pain and it didn't knock him down, though. So the animal is now pissed off.

It turned around and it charged the hunters who apparently threw all their weapons on the ground and ran away. And 1867. There was another alleged wild man sighting. But this one's slightly different. This is a guy who would venture down from the woods to town from time to time. And pull off his coat. And expose himself. Sure. To women in Glastonbury. So somebody tells me that's not a it's not a Bigfoot like creature. I think that's. That's a hermit living in the woods.

And I like the idea that he was like periodically would come down to express himself like, oh, I should go down again. Yeah. I haven't been out since last Tuesday. I'm on my penis. Yep. All right. That takes us to the. UFOs you have uh, search function. So do you do you believe that the building Binnington Triangle is real? Do you think something supernatural happened there, or is that the ending of this episode? That's going to be the ending of it. OK, ok. I don't want to spoil it.

This is spoiler alert. All right, so July 2nd. We're on the UFOs now. 1907. I love this story, by the way. Yeah, it's a little before noon. And men we're standing on the corner of church and college streets in downtown Burlington, Vermont. 1987. That's when Bernie was mayor, right? Mm hmm. That's his first. Yes. Yeah. The city was big. Oh, I wrote down a joke. It was like, make joke about Bernie. I didn't even know it's like now. Burlington is a big city for Vermont, but it's not a big city.

Especially back then, it was 20 to 20,000 residents back then, quiet, peaceful town. And suddenly the whole area was shocked by an explosion. And the three men looked around and they saw this bright light. So what we're going to do is. Oh, yeah, oh, yeah. Here we go. Is we're going to give a. Potential reading of what happened. I think you're going to read. MAN one And the Bishop, you have a lot of, a lot of text on the next page. All right. So here's what might have happened.

Church Street in Burlington, Vermont. During the day, there's a loud explosion. So your house look and you read it the way you wrote it. I that's the way I spell. There's a loud explosion. There's a loud explosion. And the buildings on the street shake and rattle. Three men standing in the corner having a conversation. A shaken one of the men jumps into. The stream points at a giant light hovering 15 feet above the ground. Brook Oh, it's Thoreau, by the way.

It's a look at the ball of light hits the ground, then turns suddenly and hits a horse the. Horse immediately falls to the ground dead. The light turns again and then flies away into the sky. Later upon Church Street, it's now raining. No reporters interviewed interviewing some people who witnessed the event. And and this happened before the rain began. The rain started the second the thing flew away. It hasn't stopped since. How big. Was it?

Maybe ten or 12 inches in diameter, but it had a large halo around it. Another man, a bishop, pushes through the crowd to speak with a reporter. Pardon me. I don't know why you want to quote me. I am the. Bishop, OK? Oh, boy. You wrote me a monologue, huh?

I was standing on the corner of church and college streets just in front of the Howard Bank and facing east, engaged in a conversation with ex-Governor Woodbury and Mr. Abe Buell, when, without the slightest indication, a warning that we were without the slightest indication of warning, we were startled by what sounded like a most unusual and terrific explosion, evidently very nearby.

My first impression was that it was some it was some explosive shot from the upper portion of the hall furniture store. I observed a torpedo shaped body some 300 feet away, stationary in appearance and suspended in the air about 50 feet above the tops of buildings. It was about six feet long by eight inches in diameter. The shell cover having a dark appearance with tongues of fire issuing from spots on the surface resembling a red hot and bonus copper.

This object soon began to move rather slowly and disappeared over Dolan brothers store. As it moved. The covering seemed rupturing in places and through these the intensely red flames issued one first seen. It was surrounded by a halo of dim light some 20 feet in diameter. There was no odor that I am aware of perceptible after the disappearance of the phenomenon nor was there any damage done so far as was known to me. I am also very high. During and. That's the way it actually. Happened.

So what was that? What were what did they? There's no. Airplane. I mean, there were airplanes, but I think there were like five of the entire country of. Very specific explanation. Very explicit. And that is a quote. From an article I. Guess I figured. Yeah, yeah. You right this. Yeah. I can't read too good is too good to get you get the objects. Behavior is very odd. It's not a meteor. It's not something else because it is stopping and moving and changing direction.

I'll tell you what I think it is, but I want to see if you have a theory first. I'm rereading it because I was so into the accent that. You know fully. About six intact parents with tongues of fire beginning to move rather slowly. I have no idea. So blew up. I think it's ball lightning. Oh, yeah. Right. So, yeah. And if people if you haven't seen Ball Lightning, I mean, not many people have.

It's very rare. Yeah. But we have this thing called YouTube nowadays, and there are videos of ball lightning. And I looked it up, I think a week ago when I was like putting together the outline for. This, and I'm like, Holy shit, I want to. Look it up. It is, it looks. And I literally just don't want to take the time to show you around. But it is, it is fascinating. Because it does look and it can look like various sizes.

I don't know if it can be various sizes, but it because it is light and it is sort of thing. Yeah, it can look big, it can look small and it moves in mysterious ways. And I'm like, man. That is like a what if the the. Interesting thing, the reason I wanted to put the whole explanation of this bishop guy down. Is Bishop Lady. Excuse me. Bishop Lady. Bishop person he bishop. Person mentioned specifically not smelling anything.

Sure. And this is what's strange because bald lightning apparently always have a very strong smell of sir sulfur. Oh, so the fact. That they mention that is, I think, very interesting. Just to consider for a second, I do think it was ball lightning. That's my own personal theory. But the fact that that that was mentioned by a witness does make me question that and I would be happy to be wrong. Now, it is worth. Noting that there are some other amazing UFO stories in the area.

New Hampshire, by the way, I think per capita has more UFO sightings than anywhere else except for Washington State vacation it's where they vacation. It's beautiful. I like it up there. No, but a lot. Of UFO sightings for how small Vermont is, how little of a population they have and a small the state is. There are a lot of UFO sightings, some of the most famous ones, because I don't think that one's super famous and it's just one of the most interesting ones. I came across.

But there's a place called the Concord Air Force Base, and I believe I'm getting my history correct here. There's the Betty and Barney Hill story. Do you know. That I've ever heard that it's. One of the most famous UFO stories out there, and I'm going to butcher it because I haven't looked at it in a while. Everybody, I apologize. I think it's the early sixties and they're in New Hampshire, but it's right next door and they're driving at night and this weird light thing flies over their car.

They watch it, they examine it, they see it. They even I think they even pull out binoculars looking at it from the car and they think they see like creatures in it or whatever long story short is there. It's one of those stories where there's missing time where they're driving and then suddenly they just like snap out of it and it's they're gone. 37 miles farther than where they thought they were.

And they later had memories of being taken aboard a ship and being studied and seeing creatures and all that stuff. And they did report it again, if I remember this incorrectly. Please send me a message that they. Reported it to the authorities. They passed it on to the people doing Project Bluebook at the time, and it just it became a very. Well known X. You've probably heard. They use it. It inspires a lot of TV shows and boats and stuff. So that's right there in the same sort of area.

There's also this story called the Bluff Ledge Abduction, which is outside of Burlington, Vermont. And this happened in 1968. So it's seven years after Betty and Barney Hill, so must have been 61. So it's to. Like camp counselors that are at a camp on Lake Champlain and the story goes that they're sitting down all the all the campers are with other people and they're off doing something else for the day.

So these two people are relatively alone and they see a light in the across the lake kind of coming towards them. It splits into multiple lights. Some of them shoot down of the water, some of them come up and the, the two people said that they. Saw through. These like lights that came towards them. They were ships and they could see into them almost like a window and they would see like creatures that look like us, but big eyes and whatever, there's a window.

And they started like pantomiming with the. Creatures in the. UFO. So if I, like, wave at you, the UFO. People be like, yeah, it's like wave back. But then they two were something happened to them in time. You know, there's this weird time. Things they became drowsy or something and disoriented and woke up later. And it was years later that these two people talked to someone that put them under like hypnosis and they retold the story and there were memories of being inside the ship. Mhm.

And so that is, that is Vermont right there. That's another relatively famous one. Again, I'm not going into all the details. This episode is not about this story, so I'm not getting all the details correct. But the gist of it is, is there and there are again weird things that happen in these areas. Yeah. So let's, I mean, let's. Go towards the end here. Let's let me get to where am I going to do this. And this like this is your first I'm going to just cross that one out.

You don't think it was UFO? I don't think it was your father's. I don't think it was the KKK. To be completely serious for a second, we don't have an answer. Why those the five people disappeared that we talked about earlier and most people see strange things when they look at those cases. Some of the strange things that that you can come across, which you actually pointed out a few of them, which is the time of day like time of day and time of year. They're all not the exact same.

But kind of similar later in the year. Most of them were in like the afternoon when they disappeared. There is a connection that a lot of people bring up with a red color red. However, when you really go into it, that only comes up in two of the. Stories, right? So it's not not a thing, but there are some like people that do believe don't wear red going on a hike up there and whatever. Yeah. And there's really no. Connection with those five people. To each other either. The area is.

The only thing that connects them. And even Tedford on the bus. They just. Imagined that the bus route would take them along that route that goes. Along. I don't know, but they don't. Know where he disappeared. It could have been before that, but the rest of them were within that sort of Glastonbury Mountain, right? Glastonbury Ghost Town area. So those are the connective things there, the folk tales, the legends, all those little stories that I chaotically have shared here tonight.

I, I just, I'm curious. And my question for everybody out there, especially you, because you're sitting across from me, is. Do you. See any connection between an areas, history, the folklore or the strange stories that happen to real cases of missing people? Even again, like I said earlier in the episode, even if it's like metaphorical or just a feeling or something or influences the way people think, that this could be something strange because of all the other strange things.

But yeah. What are. Your. Yeah, I think that's I think that's exactly right. I think that, you know, for the people who disappeared, I think that say it doesn't seem too crazy to me that people disappear in woods, in thick woods. And I think that, like, you know, we always talk about how like people who witness something, their memories of the event are like really messed up.

Almost immediately, my wife and I saw a car accident right in front of us and we were walking down half a block and were like, OK, so the green car hit the blue car and that and my wife is like, no, they weren't. There wasn't a green car, you know? And it was like we were like immediately wrong. Yeah. Yeah. And so people who are like, I just saw her and she turn right. It's like that could have been the time. There could have been totally different.

Like, I just think it's it's a reasonable that someone gets lost and wanders off or falls down a hill and breaks their leg and dies. And you know what I mean? So and but I think, yeah, I think when you live in an area that's full of lore, you naturally people naturally go, oh, well, you know, I said, don't go up to those mountain ledge.

Like, again, as someone who comes from like my culture so full of of those stories, like there's so many things that people our parents told us not to do because this happened, this happened and this happened. And so then when one bad thing happens, immediately go, oh, it was probably the vampire. Yeah. You know, like, of course, it's like it's confirmation bias, right?

And if you grew up with these stories and they're like part of the fabric of your society, then, yeah, it's very easy to create mystery out of almost anything. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a. There's a connectivity between and in areas lore and the way that people perceive things that happen. Right. And I can't put my finger on it, you know, especially in this case, I can't put my finger on it, but I just I do know and I do believe that that is something that happens.

And there are some. To. To make it about the missing people here for a second. There are some kind of common theories. And those common theories are something paranormal or supernatural. It's a weird area to triangle. There's inter-dimensional beings or doors. My second theory is it was the native theory. It was the one I like most. Yeah, it's a good one to touch something and they disappear. And it's it is interesting.

How that because I don't think people thought of that when these people started missing and they were like, these are strange disappearances. You know, I don't think people were thinking. Oh, the Abenaki talked about the glass to the. Man on the bus, and he looked up in the mountain and he saw the rock and he was focused on it. And then and the rock eight. Somebody hit. Him. No, but. It is an interesting local legend that does tie together I wish I knew more.

About that. Locally. Yeah, I know. I want to know. The other common theories are serial killer. I don't believe that at all because there's no commonality between the victims. Going to say that it doesn't seem like a. Serial. Now. Serial killers have usually a modus operandi. A type of. Way, way different. Yeah, it doesn't. The sort of monster aspect of, you know, some sort of Bigfoot like creature that, you know, someone stumbled across the wrong thing. Why not? Why a bear? Like why?

Well, that's the other that's another common theory, is just. Animal animals, some. Sort of bear or something. And, you know, it's not across it. Something the wrong way. And yet one misstep, and there you go. Right. Or it even could be a combination of things like starving, slipping, falling. You know, stub your toe. You can't walk any longer. And then a bear find you. And, you know, there could be a combination of things. Yeah. And also UFO's.

UFOs are usually tied to James Tedford, the guy in the bus, because he apparently vanished into thin air. So people think there could have been some sort of UFO flew overhead and chopped him up. Before I go and more into Tedford because I do want to kind of end on him my personal. Theory here is. I think people went missing. And and again, I think my personal take on this is that I was in the green mountains two weeks ago. I went on a very long hike and I was with a lot of people I was at.

No, I'm not much risk of getting lost or anything, but I was on a very common path. It's a popular path that people go to every day. There were other people hiking besides me and my family, and yet we wouldn't see people for a long period of time, even though we knew they were on the same the same hiking trail. The terrain is rough like it was. I my father in law was with us and he's like, that is that was not good for somebody that isn't good with balance.

And he and and that was like the easy family hike and it was still a tough terrain, right? They have to paint on trees like every ten feet so that you don't get lost because if you turn around and look at something, I would turn back around and be like, wait, where's the mark on the tree? Where's the dirt? And it's like, I'm. Feet away from it. And I would miss it. Yeah. And this is the summertime when it's, you know, when it's a little bit easier to get around out there, I think.

Anyway, it's not bug season. It's not mud season, which is a thing up in Vermont. It was the right time of year. And I would still kind of get disoriented on this hike. And we were staying near a lake like we were circling a lake and we would lose the lake and the lakes only like 15 feet away. And you can't see the lake. Right? And you can't hear it either, right? So I, I just think I don't care how good you are in the wild.

Accidents happen, you know, people get turned around, people get disoriented. It happens to the best of us. Yeah. So I do think since these happened on hikes and woods, that is my most likely theory. The kid, Paul Jepson, I don't know. I think he's a little different, too. He normally gets included with the group. That could be. That could have. Like gotten out and fell into a sort of dump like he could is that. You'd fallen into something.

There are kind of stories and I don't know how valid they are. That he had been talking about like the allure of the mountain or something like that before he disappeared. But to me, that seems a little bit like you're creating a story to give it a narrative to find a meeting where it's like it doesn't need a meeting and is a terrible thing. Yeah. There doesn't need to be this hidden meaning to it. That also I write, yes. I people. Create. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

That also could be I think that's that. And Tedford are kind of the two that don't fit the best of the five original ones because also he's a kid and look bad things happen. There are bad people. Maybe he got tired of waiting in the truck and got out of this place and somebody came and snatched him. Right like that. I could see as well. And again, rough terrain. Yep. Animals around like. There is a there.

Is an interesting story and a part of me didn't I don't want to go into detail because people that read about the beatings in triangle talk about it all the time. Now I feel like a few years ago you would never see it and now everybody says it so it's not worth going into. People can look this up if you want. There's a gentleman named Robert Singley in 2008 that was on a hike on glass and Berry Mountain and he got lost. He made it out all right. He was OK.

He was found the next day, but he got disoriented and the his story is really interesting to consider these other people because he thought he knew exactly where he was and yet he couldn't find his way off the mountain. So night came he had to spend the night like huddled against trees and bushes to try to stay warm. The next day, he just walking and walking along and he's finally find somebody who finds the trail and and has helped out. But he was on the completely opposite.

Side of the mountain of where he thought he was. Well, yeah. So that just shows you of like. A crazy. Place. This is a is a smart. Person that knows what they're doing and they end up on the completely wrong side of the. Mountain. So that's where I go. But I do think it's worth mentioning some more info about James Tedford, the old man that vanished on the bus. So by the time James was actually really reported missing, it was just over a week after the fact.

It was not right away. OK. And this only happened when the Bennington soldiers home where he. Lived called his wife. In northern Vermont to find out if James was ever coming back. Home. So by the time the police were involved, it was almost two weeks later and they finally got around to interviewing the bus driver and passengers. And you even said it earlier, I'm a passenger in a bus. I'm not paying. Attention for two weeks or two weeks of like, huh. And no one really remembered anything.

But again, two weeks. Later. Right. And the bus driver had some information, but he really didn't remember anything either. Some information did arrive. James was seen by a friend of his when the bus made a stop in Burlington, and his friend guessed that James got off the bus and never got back on. So he actually never even potentially came down through the Bennington Triangle down to Bennington and South Vermont. That is this guy's theory. Also, someone.

Said in some article or report or something that I read that the bus actually didn't have another stop between Burlington and Bennington, which is a pretty long drive because a lot of the reports are like, Oh, all the stops along the way. He was there until the very last. One, and then he was left, but he never got off. If it was. Burlington, to to Bennington, I actually do kind of give more validity to him getting off in Burlington. Right? Right. And just never going all the way to Bennington.

So that's it's a bit of information. On he just disappeared and. He just disappeared. And did he have like memory issues? Was he like. No, I'll get into that a little bit now. Remember, the other aspect of his case is that his luggage is apparently above his seat and there's like a ticket or a door or a basketball or something on his chair. I never saw that report. I've been reading every newspaper report I can find from the time. I don't see that mentioned anywhere. So I think that's one.

Of those games of telephone, local legends increases again. I could be wrong because I don't have everything yet. But if the luggage wasn't there. I think that gives again more validity to he got off. Yeah. Went missing. Somewhere. Yeah. So apparently Tedford was not in the best of health and he wasn't. Happy. Again. His wife, I don't know much about their relationship, but you can make assumptions. His wife lived in northern Vermont. He lived in Bennington.

That probably wasn't the most perfect situation for him. And yeah, I. Think he might have gotten off the bus and just wanted to change change in his life and left. And this is where I thought of his story. And I'm not going to give names because I don't want to tell a story. I'm not allowed to tell but I do have a friend who has a relative that committed suicide. And I remember him telling me the story and his uncle basically hung out with the family one day, seemed totally normal

totally happy, got his car. At the end of the day, I think it was a vacation because I think he had luggage. And stuff with him. Mm hmm. And he just drove away and they, like, did not go home where they thought he was going and went off into the woods somewhere and committed suicide. And it was just one of those things of like the way the story was relayed to me was like it was just done. It wasn't even like a sad thing. It's like, well, yeah, no, no.

Hang out a little bit. Then I'll go. It's just time. It's just time. Right? So you'd imagine someone late sixties visiting. He's a veteran, too, so maybe there's PTSD. You know, we don't know the psychological situation that he was in. It could he could have. Just been like, I don't want to go all the way back to Bennington again. Yeah, yeah, I've done. That same. Thing. I'm just going to get off and walk, wander somewhere and go. And again, it's like late end of the year. It's cold.

Yeah. If he, like, fell down somewhere or he just shot himself or something. Absolutely. His body could have been easily not discovered in fall. And if he's in Burlington, he's right by Lake Champlain. So there's bodies of water he could have fallen into. No one sees again. Yeah. Now, look, I'm not.

Saying the Bennington Triangle is in a place with strange phenomena or weird things happening or that I'm going to stop trying to figure out what's going on, but we can't just loop these things together to make a good story. Right? Without forgetting that these are also real people. Right? And that's that's I'm. Like the walking contradiction, because I love these strange stories. I love paranormal and supernatural things, but I also love to be like, well, wait. Yeah, hold on.

I mean, that's the problem of, like, all these murder podcasts. Yeah. And it's just like, it's like, everyone's so into it, but it's like these people lived there. Real people died, truly. And. Yeah, and so we just. We have to remember that. And obviously, I still like sharing these stories that's what I'm doing. But it's like we can't. And it does kind of bother me where, like, every story of a disappearing person up there is now like, oh, the Bennington Triangle.

It's like, this is a real person. I'm telling you, hang on. Just one second. Yeah, just one. One second. Yeah. Let's let's look at the folklore. Let's do all of that. Let's let's consider everything, right? And then that's kind of. My my ending start on it is we don't know. It. There are strange things I don't want to take away from the strange things, but I do think there are some very realistic non paranormal all. Yeah. Unseen paranormal. Sure.

Non non paranormal. Yeah. Let's hope that they are all living happily in another dimension. Yes, yes. Right. Bring it all back. Now back to. Your your big theory. Now, any final thoughts before we, we do a wrap up here. Uh, no, I think yeah, I think it's it's fascinating. I, you know, I was always I always loved the Bermuda Triangle. Yeah. And then I read more closely about it, and people are like, I mean, it's, you know, they're cherry picking stories. Yes. Yeah. Like. Yeah, dammit.

There's like the Amelia Earhart one. That's fascinating, right? All her, like, radio things. Yeah. But it's all fun to read about. But I as with all paranormal things I have, it's never like, no one ever has proof, right? And so it's like it makes me think our imagination is just very active and stories affect us and so, like, tonight, tonight, when I go to my car and drive home and park, I'm going to be like, fuck, I'm going to be, like, super hyper aware, right? Because it's all in my head.

And so, like, I think I'm I'm more likely to see something I'm doing well. Yes, yes. Than if it was yesterday. Yeah. You know. Belief beliefs strongly. Bias, confirmation bias. All those things feed into this. Just when you. Are scared walking into your house, make sure to look down because of. Holes, though. Yeah, that's a big thing. Yeah. If I disappear like, look for holes. You're going to be like, oh, ghost and spooks, and then you're just going to fall. Yeah, that's right. So distracted.

But I know this is all fascinating, and I like your final point. I think that people are that important. Well, thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. No, this is this. Has been a weird episode. It has gone on far longer than I thought it would. I thought this would be like a short episode. And we've talked our heads off. But it was because it's a little frantic, because I was like, I just want to share these. Like, there's a lot of interesting little folklore. Things. And I love stories immensely.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's. Kind of the difference of this is other people have covered the Binnington triangle, but the thing that always bothered me about this story is there's these mentions of monsters and stuff, and it's like. Well, wait, I need more of. The more about them. Like, don't just bring it up in a sentence. Yeah. Tell me. More. Do you, do you believe in any of the monster stories? Like, do you think Bigfoot Tribes? I don't know. About Tribes. I am.

It's funny, I again, I'm a walking contradiction because I love these stories, and all I want to do is talk about these stories and make movies of the stories and TV shows. But I don't believe in ghosts. I have a lot of experience. Yeah, I'm on another episode. One day we do some paranormal stuff. I have experiences, and I'm like. No, I just. I just debunked that. Like, immediately and I. Believe that there is life in the universe. I just don't know if UFOs are visiting us.

I think the universe is so vast. Yeah. How are you traveling here? Unless, like, I. Do think that, like, whatever. Yeah, I think, like, to me, UFOs seem fairly reason. Like they're within the realm of possibility, more so than, like, to me, if we find out ghosts, right? The ghosts are real. It changes everything. Yeah, you know what I mean? It's like everything we know about the world is now different. Yeah. If we see an alien, that's, like, OK, sure.

Like, they have technology. They have, you know? Yeah, we have budding technology that's going to, you know, look any other planet. So they found us, and they can travel fast, like, whatever. But ghosts today. Yeah, that's a good point. And that's the way I am with, like, something like a monster. I do think there are creatures that we haven't found yet or aren't aware of who have just escaped for various reasons.

So I do give sort of, like you just said, with UFOs being the realm of possibilities, I do think some sort of creature. Sure, maybe not. A Bigfoot, maybe it's something else. But I do think there are creatures that we do not know of. Yeah. Or only a few people have seen or know about. And, you know, that's I do think that that is still in the realm of possibility. The gorillas, they weren't even, like, confirmed until very recently. Like modern. That's true. Yeah. I can't remember.

The exact year, but it was like late 1800s or something. There's some story. I stumbled on about some woman that was like in Europe or Eastern Europe in the like 1800s, I think that they found who came out of the woods and was like this huge stocking, like, and it's like, there's like pictures of her. They like treated her terribly because they're terrible, of course. But I was like, why? They're like and they're still, I'm not sure what she was exactly.

And I'm sure if I look more deeply into it, it's probably like way worse, you know what I mean? It's like it was like probably. Something it's a human doing. Method work. Yeah. No, it's like some deformed, malformed human that was abused by people who are like, wow, she's a monster. Yeah, but but that one was I was like, but it made me think like, yeah, deep forests exists in their animals. Sure. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And look in the Green. Mountains, man, Vermont. It is.

There's a lot a lot of lushness it's not a lot of cities, small. Little towns, which means less human. Interaction, right? So that is that is a place that stuff could happen. Well, look, thank you so much. For for being with me for this long. Thank you. That was much longer episodes than I thought. Yeah. Good time. Do you want to give any final plugs? You have the. Summoned. The Summoned. Go see the summoned. You can go to run. H.G. Studios. Happy Little 18 Studios is my production company.

Go to Rachel G. Studios, I com. You can send us an email and say hello. If you want to make a movie, you can send us an email and say, I have money. Let's make a movie. Yeah, that's really cool. Yeah. Follow me on Twitter. You're you're not Twitter you're you Barnosky at UC Barnosky. That's it. I got. It. Good. Good job. You're doing better than I'm about. My wrap. Up. Well, thank you all. Thank you, Gary. Again. Up next, I think I have a really unique and interesting multipart episode.

Series that not many people know about that involves spies and murder and Strange Light in the Sky and also in New England. By the way. But it's a very dense story. So I may have to throw something else into the middle of that before I get to it, but stay tuned. It's actually I'm really excited about it. Thank you all again for listening. Please visit a study of Strange Dot com. Follow us on Instagram. At. A study of Strange and please. Again, check out our Patreon page.

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Are you giving one of us a yes? Yeah, I'm not going to tell. Which guest is it? Could be. You can hear them screaming now. I want to I. Also I do want to hear people spots on today's episode, any other episode as well, if you have details. We didn't like it. You did know mostly about your. Yeah. But also if you have ideas about. Future episodes, please email us at a study of strange anti-matter comic. One word. All right. Thank you, everybody. Thank you so much. Goodnight.