Hey everybody! Welcome back to another episode of Crypto Cocktail Party Show where we have a few drinks, share a few laughs, take a dive into the unknown. I'm your host Dave, joined as always by my wonderful co-host Sarge. How's it going handsome? What's up motherfuckers? This is going to be our first proper episode together in a while. In like three weeks. Yeah, this is going to be insane. This is a good time. It's a good time. I missed you. I hated that you were gone. I know, I hated it too.
But we did a little Halloween special together. That was fun. We did. We did because I needed it. I really needed it. Happy Veterans Day you motherfuckers. Oh yeah, it's coming on Veterans Day. Happy Veterans Day everyone. All my brothers and sisters. Yeah, thank you to Sarge for your service, I guess. Sorry about gas prices. Really thought we had that locked down. No, I have a cousin who's in the military. I actually have a few friends and stuff.
And they told me that they fucking hate being told thank you for your service. Is that like across the board? You know, I feel like people recognize like how fucking weird it is that like they just met somebody who was like, yeah, you know, I was totally willing to die so that you could eat Fritos. And so like it's uncomfortable for people like they don't know what to say. And so like thank you for your service has become like this default thing. And so for me, it's not that I hate it.
It's that I don't know what to say afterwards. So we always joke like you're welcome for your freedom. But obviously, I'm not going to say that to like a real person. So I feel like if you did, I just say thank you. They'd be like, I think they'd be fine. If they're the type of person that goes out to people and says thank you for your service, they probably expect that kind of response back. Yeah, like, yeah. But I so typically I just say you're welcome.
Or I actually what I try to say, because I don't even want to say you're welcome. Like I didn't fucking give you a freedom. Don't thank me, thank George Washington. So instead, I'm like, you know, thank you for supporting us or something like that, something along those lines. So you basically like the opening band at a local show. Just like, yeah, thanks for that's exactly. Yeah. Thanks for coming out. Appreciate it. We played all the hits tonight. Thank you.
Like at least for me, like I feel bad for the for the fucking guys that like didn't see combat. And I don't mean like, no, I don't mean like, I just feel because like, what are they? You know what I mean? Like, yeah, I mean, like I manned a radar for six years. So now you're welcome. You don't have to thank me. Like in my case, like at least I did combat missions. Like I didn't experience any like fucking gunfights or anything like that. You know, we were.
But like the moment that we got murdered, I was like, OK, finally, I can I can be like, yeah, yeah, I saw some shit. You're welcome. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It wasn't bad. I mean, I played Halo for the most part and Call of Duty. But yeah, I was out on missions. I was, you know, out in out in sector hanging out with the Iraqis. So but I feel bad for the guys that like didn't have that because like, what do they say? I don't know. I've never been in a situation like it.
But the closest I've come to it's awkward. Yeah, it's awkward. I used to work. You live in Philly, so you're close. Yeah. Well, when I back living in New Hampshire, I used to work in the in the Fox Run Mall twice. I was there as a manager at Hot Topic, if you can't tell by looking at me and also the the manager of a journey is again, if you couldn't tell again, both make sense. I would have managed a hot topic, too, but I didn't have enough piercings.
The Fox Run Mall is right next to Pease Air Force Base in Portsmouth. Yes, I know it very well. Yeah. So we'd have like people come in all the time, like on their break and stuff like that. Obviously, like in their fatigues, like they're fully. Yeah, yeah. And then I'd go to the what's it called? I'd go to the food court on my lunch breaks to get like some pizza or something like that.
And you'd see like these just like a lone soldier just like eating this fucking food court Chinese food and have in the span of like 20 minutes, like five white ladies just like come up like, thank you for your service. Like, you'll never finish a meal. I'm just trying to eat my fucking lo mein, like leave me alone. You can see the frustration. It got so bad.
Like in the beginning, I used to wear my uniform like on my way to drill, you know, because in the National Guard, we go to training one week at a month. So I wear my uniform on the. I remember those commercials. They were never two weeks a year. It was always like three weeks at the at the least. And it was always like five fucking days, not a weekend. But anyway, I would wear my uniform there so I didn't have to get changed when I got there.
And then I stopped doing that because I could never get through a fucking meal. And it's again, I'm not ungrateful. Yeah, I just want to eat in my head. I was like, dude, if it was my lunch break from peas, I would just have like a like a like a go bag of just like civilian clothes because I could not. I couldn't handle it. That's too much. It's rough. That's why I hope this show never blows up and no one really knows my face looks like because I would.
I do have to tell you a funny story about Peace Air Force Base before we get started. This is my favorite story ever. It is about my grandfather, who is a fucking badass. This guy, he just like he's always been my superhero ever since I was a little kid. I spent a lot of time with him because my parents worked a lot. And so anyway, so back in the 40s, my grandfather had his pilot's license and he is just before he deployed to Germany at the very end of the war.
And so he's on he's on Camp Edwards out in Cape Cod. For those of you not familiar, Camp Edwards is where I've spent much of my military career, but also there's a lot of runways out there. And so back in the day, you could just kind of steal an airplane. As one does. It's so my grandfather hopped in a little airplane, a little military aircraft with his buddy.
And he flew up to Peace Air Force Base one day just because he felt like it because there was a coffee shop there that he really liked at the base. And so yeah. And so he steals this airplane and lands at Peace Air Force Base, just as he's like getting towards the coffee shop, he sees his commanding officer. And he had no reason to be at Peace Air Force Base. So immediately turns around, gets back in the plane and just flies back to Massachusetts. That's pretty good.
I thought for a second, I thought for a second you were going to say he was driving from peace to the coffee shop and he saw his commanding officer in a plane like tailing the car. You mother fucker. You can't just steal government property like that. That would have been good. The planes are side by side. He just like slides down in the seat. So it looks like the plane's flying itself. Oh man. The autopilot from fucking what is airplanes just to fucking inflatable. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
But yeah, my grandfather is my absolute hero. I never got to steal an airplane. So, you know, there's still time. I was gonna say we've got plenty of time, bud. All right. Well, fuck. I'm sorry if I'm wheezing and I breathe in a lot. There's forest fires all around me. And yeah, no, that same thing. Same thing here. There was, there's been forest fires everywhere. So yeah, in Pennsylvania and in South Jersey, there's forest fire.
So my city right now, you walk outside, it looks like a post-apocalyptic world. It's almost like, it's almost as bad as the wildfires last year when the smoke came in from Canada or. Oh God. Yeah. So my, my lungs are, uh, needless to say, they're not great. Okay. Um, uh, Sarge, are you ready to dive into today? I am still ready. You made a motion like this is a visual medium. I know. I always do that. No one can see me. Just the camera. I get it.
You're used to making your little fun TikTok videos. I'm sorry. I'm taking a break. I, you know, I started for a little bit. I started coming back and then I was like, you know what? I need a break again. So um, but yes, I am. I can see you on the camera and I feel like everyone's watching and they're not. It's just me, but hey, I'm your biggest fan. So it doesn't matter. Um, all right.
So in, uh, so we have the, uh, so Sarge and I, Cryptic cocktail party, we have the distinct honor of being, um, part of the, uh, I guess the influencer community, uh, for a new TCG coming out for anyone who doesn't know what TCG stands for. It stands for trading card game. And that is the new TCG Cryptid Camp. It's being run in part by, uh, Erica Fett, who you may know from the Camp Cryptid podcast. So I'm super excited about it.
And in honor of us being invited into the Cryptid Camp, uh, camp, I guess, uh, I figured this week we would begin our journey as Cryptid Camp counselors by covering a Cryptid slash folkloric creature that I've always wanted to cover, but I just haven't gotten around to it. And coincidentally, not only is it one of the first prototype cards that they ever released to the public parts of its story kind of mirror some of the stuff happening in our country right now.
So I figured, Hey, what better time than now? Right? Would you say what's on fire? Uh, kinda. Uh, so, so today's search, we're going to be headed to the great state of Maryland. Uh, you're a Ben, I've never been, I don't think I've ever been in Maryland. Oh yeah. I've definitely been to Maryland. Uh, I've been to Baltimore, um, and I've been to parts that aren't terrible. Um, I saw Edgar Allen Poe's, uh, grave site, which is fucking cool. Oh hell yeah. I've been to Maryland a couple of times.
Yeah. Well, for those who don't know, uh, Maryland is famous for a few things. Uh, one of which being crabs, blue crabs. Uh, there's a, they have a broke ass version of clam chowder called cream of crab soup, whatever the fuck that is. And it's also home to one of the worst things to ever happen to French fries since the whole freedom fry nonsense. And that is old Bay seasoning.
Um, it's, it's, it seems like Maryland doesn't have much going on, but, uh, but one thing that it does have that separates from all the other states in the union, those other states, they don't have what I can only describe as a nightmare half reptile, half bird, one eyed metallic beak tentacle monster known as the snally gaster. Are you familiar with the snally gasser? Your face says it all. I am, I am not. Okay. The snally gaster? You know, the snally gasser, it's a fucking nightmare, dude.
It's not good. It sounds like, it sounds like you asked an Australian to name an elephant. No, it's a, it's so, so the snally gaster, uh, well, I guess the story of the snally gasser AKA the Schneller guys, AKA the Schlangen geist. That's my favorite Schlangen geist. There we go. Is that actually, that's translates to a snake spirit. We'll get to it.
Uh, so this actually all begins way back in the 1700s when German immigrants made their way to the good old us of a now these settlers, which eventually became to be known as the Pennsylvania Dutch brought with them a rich tapestry of folklore, myths and culture as any good immigrant does. It's why we should allow them into our country periodically. I feel like, yeah, I agree. I mean, like you can't go around telling everybody you're the greatest country in the world.
And then they're like, oh cool. Can I come in? And they're like, no, nah, dude, sucks a suck nerd. Among these legends and myths were stories of monsters, winged creatures and like spooky ass ghosts. Uh, actually initially the snally gase, uh, initially the snally gaster was more like a ghostly apparition, like a, like a, like a, like a vaporous shape that would just like appear to people.
But over time, the German settlers in the Appalachian region, and especially those in Maryland, they started combining some of those old, like Germanic folklore stories with new local fears, uh, about like the untamed wilderness and the unknown of living in like in a new land. It's now the gaster began to evolve from just like a fucking, like a fuck boys vape cloud to just like a straight up like nightmare. Like like the evolution of this thing is fucking wild.
So it started out as like a, like I said, like just like a ghostly cloud. So the descriptions of the snally gaster, it kind of now changes depending on who you ask and like where in the region you ask it. But Sarge, if based off the name alone, snally gaster, I want you to tell me what you think this thing would look like. Oh man, with no, with no context whatsoever. Snally gaster is a guy wearing an Adidas tracksuit. You're too far south. You're thinking Jersey, you're thinking Jersey, right?
But hear me out. He's got a scally cap. Okay. In the 1700s, in a giant nose. And he says, he says, what's going on guy to everybody he runs into. You're describing most people outside of dives in Brockton right now. Yeah. Okay. All right. What's going on guy? What's up kid? Uh, you know me just, uh, just doing my snally gaster shit. I'm going to start saying that whenever I do anything.
When I, when I know I'm about to do something that is just deplorable, you know, you know me, I'm just on that snally gaster shit. So like I said, the description of the Sally gaster inside, I'm just going to tell you right off the bat. You are so far off. It changes depending on who you ask and we're in the region. So it's basically just like a chimera of all the worst things just smashed into one creature.
So the most common description of it is that it's a large scale covered beast with a 20 foot long tail wings, four legs with claws that are said to be glowing hot metal that will just fucking like ruin your whole world. Has a metallic beak lined with razor sharp teeth and a tongue that resembles octopus tentacles plural, not just one tentacle. It's a full on, uh, and it has a large singular glowing eye in the middle of its head. It also says that some descriptions give it horns.
Either way doesn't matter. It has wings. So this fucker is airborne and it's a nightmare. How you feeling? You look upset by this description. I just feel like the name isn't really doing it. Like this thing could be called the doom dragon or like, I don't know. I just feel like snally gaster is a guy outside a dive bar in, in, uh, Brockton offering to show your girlfriend his Schlangengeist. But instead what we got is this monster that I feel like I've seen in a D and D session.
Yeah, it's very, um, it's very bold. It's very boulders gate. Ask. Okay. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like it's not ideal. The Nate, you're right. I don't give it justice, but you know, Schlangengeist is kinda, that does not also give it the name it deserves. Well, that's what, that's what the snally gaster calls his penis is the Schlangengeist. The Schlangengeist got it. So the, now the snally gaster was to, was believed to be a predator. No fucking shit.
I would guess that metal teeth and everything. It was a, it was said to swoop down from the sky and grab livestock. And every so often I was like a little treat to itself. Some people now in this sense, the snally gaster represented the dangers of the new world that lurk just beyond the safety of home and a reminder of just like how perilous the wilderness was for like those early immigrants.
Well that's why I like on, on maps, on old maps, if they didn't know what was beyond a certain area, they drew a monster. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Why not? Fuck it. Oh yeah, we're time jumping now. Okay. Spoiler, spoiler. We're, we're time jumping. The Snally gaster had been part of like the local folklore in the region for over a century, but between 1909 and 1903, that changed real fucking quick.
Reports started coming in from all over Maryland of giant wing creatures with a metal beak swooping down from above, snatching livestock, buzzing houses, like a drunk pilot, probably your grandfather. All the while this thing is just like, he didn't drink though. He didn't drink though. So he was just fired up on caffeine. Well, either way, this thing was just screaming nonstop into the night sky. And I mean like literal screaming. I don't know what it sounded like.
No, that also sounds like my grandfather. Okay. Fair enough. He was an angry man. I loved him for it. Now I don't know what it sounded like, but I am Matt. You ever see that video of like that pug who was trying to get his nails clipped and it's just screaming. That's what I kind of think it sounds like sort of, you know, the one talking about. See I was immediately thinking of the screaming goats. It's well, this kind of actually this pug kind of sounds like that. It's not far off.
Like imagine if you see this giant metallic fucking evil dragon with molten claws and then it's just like, ah, ah, or like the little frog. You know the one I'm talking about? Oh, the adorable little frog. The angry frog. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like. I feel like it's probably more aggressive than that, but it's way funnier to imagine it just being like, yeah, it's like Mike Tyson's voice. Like I would never make fun of the man to his face, but his voice is adorable.
Now one of the most famous sightings came from a local farmer who said the creature just like straight up obliterated his lifestyle. Like all of it, like just absolutely slaughtered. Like everything he had and it left huge claw marks on trees and structures around the property as well as like when it ever was seen over like other local municipalities, like just just leave claw marks. Now these stories caught the attention of the media with the Washington Post covering a majority of them.
Now at this time, the Washington Post wasn't like what it is now. It wasn't WAPO. You know what I mean? Like it was just, yeah, it was just in the area. And with these stories coming from somewhat credible sources, like farmers, townspeople, police officers, which is wild to think that in 1909 that was your credible sources.
And with the description of the creatures being so vivid, other national news outlets started covering the stories and kind of grew what was like local folklore into a real living threat that was like actively fucking up whole communities in the area. Jesus. And now because of all this new found fame, people did what they did best. Can you guess what we Americans do best when there's a threat to our community? I want you to guess. An armed mob with guns and torches.
So there was that and to add fuel to the fire, the Smithsonian Institute, like the Smithsonian Institute, they got involved offering a bounty for the creature for either capturing or killing the creature and giving them its hide. And here's where things get good. President Theodore Roosevelt, avid adventurer and hunter that he is, was rumored to have almost canceled a diplomatic trip to Europe to gather up a posse and try and hunt this thing.
But there's no evidence that he actually made any attempt to actually do it. But there was talk that he did actually was like, fuck this trip. World War One is about to pop off. I don't have time for this shit. There's a snout, the gasser running around. That's what happens is without question the most American story we have told on this show. It's quintessential. And what better time to do it than Veterans Day, which I did not even know was tomorrow because most people don't.
They only care about us when there's a war on. Yeah. You're not much good to us besides that. So, yeah, if CNN doesn't have at least one night vision footage clip, no one remembers that they are veterans in America. Now, thank you for your service. Now over time, this, this wave of sighting freedom, this wave of sightings and monster hunting died down as they always do.
And for a little time, you know, mum was the word from the sally gasser for like a first a little while that is until the 1930s, specifically 19. Oh my God. Specifically 19. Why can't I fucking say this word specifically? 19. What's the matter? Schlangengeist got your tongue? 1932 when things started to ramp up again. What's different about these sightings, though, is that they introduce a new element to the sightings moonshine still see this is during the time.
This is during the age of prohibition in the U.S. a time where I would not have thrived and more than likely I would have gone blind from bath bathtub gin within like the first year. But all same. Well during this time, there was a shit ton of illegal distilleries hidden in the remote areas of Maryland.
People moonshiners claim the sally gasser was attracted to these sites for one reason like or another, and in the late 1932 reports came out that a sally gasser had fallen into a vat of boiling moonshine mash and died when discovered. All that were left of the of the beast was like its bones. But obviously no evidence was ever produced to confirm this story.
And many believe that these 1930 sightings were just part of a hoax or some sort of like tactic by moonshiners as a ploy to keep police and prohibition like agents away from their stills. Or they're making high content alcoholic beverages and just getting fucked up on their own supply and see in all manner of pink elephants. It could be that. But I'm going to go with the previous one and say that they just started talking shit to make sure to try and keep people away.
But it but it does kind of make sense considering like after 1932 sightings kind of just stopped again and I'm sure it's just a coincidence that prohibition happened to have ended in 1933. So I'm thinking it probably has a lot more to do with them being like stay away from the stills, the sally. What is it? Oh, sally gasser is going to come down and get you if you touch my alcohol. Don't drink it.
But this isn't the first or only example of the sally gasser being labeled as a hoax or being used to frighten people for some pretty fucked up reasons. The the sally gasser has what some would call a complex and layered background, a.k.a. maybe some racist shit going on. Yeah, this is racism in America. No, that's crazy. It's going to get we're not racist. So from here, it's going to get a little bummer for a minute. I'm sorry. But it's it's history. So history is fun, right? You don't.
Yeah, it's it's you know, it's it's really fun. Like 1939, Germany is. And then, oh, no, we're going far back in American history. This is like 1860s America. We just did a great job. So so so in the antebellum south, which I just learned today, the antebellum means like pre-war and then in America, that means like pre-Civil War. Fun fact.
Yeah. So in the antebellum south, various legends of ghosts, monsters, curses, what have you were used by those in power, i.e. slaveholder plantation owners to create the impression that the wilderness was dangerous and supernatural as a means to control and deter enslaved people from escaping. And the legend of the Snallygaster was not immune from being used in this way. Of course.
Yeah. So escaping from enslavement and running into unknown woods or mountains already seems like an impossible feat. Now throwing a winged, one-eyed, metallic beak, tentacle mouth monster that just happens to also live in those woods and mountains. And you're going to be slightly less inclined to want to go in there. You know, I mean, this is really par for the course for slaveholders because they tried other mythical beings in the Bible to justify being awful.
And I guess when they were like, well, the Bible's not working, let's invent a molten dragon creature with a hard to pronounce name. Here's the thing. The Bible's fake. Snallygaster is real. So. Okay. Fair enough. You make a good point. Now, they pretty they pretty much like put it in the enslaved people's heads that while you may be able to avoid the master at night because he's sleeping or something like that, you can't really avoid the supernatural, if that makes sense.
Yeah. So they kind of use that as a tactic now. But that was the seventeen hundreds. What about like the sightings in like nineteen oh nine through nineteen thirteen? You know, like what does that have to do? Well, one thing I may have left out was that many of those original reports from the time seem to imply or just straight up say that the snallygaster only praise at night and specifically on black people. Now, god damn it. God damn it.
You know, this is just some mongo fucking Klansman riding around with like a torch, blowing fire at people because he's got moonshine in his mouth. God damn it. It's not Spring Hill Jack or the devil of the dunes that we talked about the very first time he came on. No one's blowing fire.
And we're going to get to it now on February 12th, 1909, which just happens to be the same day that the NAACP was founded, a newspaper called the Valley Register had a headline about the Snallygaster that read, quote, The colored people are in great danger, end quote. And then went on to say that, quote, This vampire devil only attacks colored people. It is seldom seen during the day feeding at night only.
And the strange part is, is that it seems to prefer colored men to colored women, though it attacks the latter at times. End quote. There's more of these, but if you want to say something, get it out now. So the Snallygaster is essentially like Jim Crow, Alabama, really just targeting black folks. Well, all right. I wrote this down later on in the script, but I will say this. The Snallygaster wasn't invented for this. It was used by white people.
So you can say whatever you want, but the Snallygaster, its origins aren't specifically to disparage and to control the African-American black community. Yeah. Neither were the police, but that's eventually where it went. Well, I mean, that's not, I think they kind of were. The police specifically, I think were used for that. I'm sorry. I meant the constitution. No, that too was also invented too. Yeah. Fuck. No. Why is America so fucking racist? Why can't I have a cryptid that's just bad ass?
It's a doom dragon. Then there has been a lot of like a controversy over the Snallygaster recently, which is weird because most folkloric and or cryptid, I mean, a lot of them can date back. Like the fucking Mothman was born out of a fucking legend about a native American chief getting murdered. I mean, like it all kind of goes back to us white people being just the worst puck wudgies, all of that stuff. The, the legend of Mount Chikora. Would you just call me? The curse. I'm sorry.
The curse of Mount Chikora. Yeah. So another article written around that time included a statement from an eyewitness that said that the Snallygaster was quote, an omen of ill for colored voters who deserted the Republican party in the presidential election and quote, with other outlets reporting. And I hesitate to say this, but this is the quote, quote, this is the headline. White bird preys upon Negro children after dark. End quote. Yeah. It's not great.
Uh, so the Snallygaster is taking black jobs is what you're saying. No, unless you're saying that black people prey on other black children at night. No, no, no, no. I mean, that's what I'm saying is a Snallygaster has taken black jobs. The Snallygaster is, is, is, you know, the, the new boogie is the boogeyman of its time. Oh, cause like, gotcha. Cause the Democrats were taking black jobs and now it's before that it was a Snallygaster. Yeah. Uh, Jesus fucking Christ.
Now one source that I used for a lot of this was, uh, Atlas Obscura. They're really good. If you don't know that they're phenomenal. So good. Yeah. Uh, they had a quote from one of their sources, a book called Knight writers and black folk history by Gladys Marie Frye that for anyone listening that may be confused by what exactly the tactics being used here are, I think that this kind of sums it up pretty well.
Cause it's probably better than either me and you could ever, cause I know what's happening. You know what's happening, but how do you put into words what's happening? So they said, quote, the primary aim of such pressure was to discourage the unauthorized movement of blacks, especially at night by making them afraid of encountering supernatural beings from the post civil war to world war one.
The method helped to stem the black movement from rural farming communities to the S of in the South, to the urban industrial centers of the North. Basically what's happening here is that they're using the supernatural and the superstitious aspect of like the African American community and the black community to drive them from the South to the North. They want to get you all, everyone out of there.
So now it's probably no coincidence that around the turn of the century, you did see a lot of black people start like leaving the rural and mountainous parts of Maryland for urban environments like Baltimore and even further North. Yeah. So, and there are many more examples of this type of reporting on the sally gaster in the 1900s, but I think it's super important to note again that like the story and myth of the sally gaster wasn't created specifically for this purpose.
It's just us whites being whites and just using it to try and, you know, to our advantage. Crack is going to crack. Yeah. The legend had been in circulation for a while, just like the timing wasn't great for this story to be around. You know what I mean? Just makes me so angry. Yeah. Well, I mean, expand on that. How are you feeling right now about the sally gaster as a whole? And then also what it's being, you know, I feel like this, I feel bad for the sally gaster. Honestly, right?
Like, I can't imagine this dragon's like, no, no, no, no. I only like that version of human. But also like it just, it frustrates me anytime there's something to be afraid of that a group will will cling to it and then try to target people, like weaponize it towards a specific group of people. It's fucked up. Which if you just look through our history, it's something we've been doing forever. Oh yeah. It's happened to every marginalized group.
And it's so frustrating to me because it's like, this is, this is like a folktale, like a harmless fucking folktale. Yeah. And they're just going after people with it and being like, no, no, no, it's coming right for you. If you happen to leave your house at night to move to a better place. Yeah. Like, come on. No, this is so, so this is, I didn't even leave. I left out the, there's a whole portion of this. That's like the xenophobia of the, I mean, that was really big in the early 1900s.
Oh no, I'm talking about against the Italians. I'm talking about like the Germans who brought this here. Like there was Germans too. There was like Germans. Like I didn't put any of that in because let's put it this way. German Americans are doing just fine. Yeah. Yeah. No, they're doing fine. Yeah. Just like the Irish, the Irish caught it for a while, but they're doing okay. Yeah. But Hey, Sarge, let's, let's move on to, so why some people may have thought this little guy was a hoax.
We'll, we'll move on from our terrible history and you know, just kind of fucking. There's only so much awful things about this country that I can take in the, in the course of a day. Yeah. Especially cause I volunteered to die for it at one point. Thank you for your service. Yeah. You're welcome for your freedom. I'm sorry about gas prices. So we, we've, I think, I think it's like a common trope that immigrants are bad. And if you look across the world, this has just been a typical thing.
It's part of the reason why the Roma got shit on so much because they just frequently traveled. Just stop moving around. So that frustrates me, you know, but I also feel really bad about the Snallygaster because this is, this is like such a harmless little fucking folklore thing. Like is it harmless? It has talons made out of molten metal and a beak that has full on hentai coming out of it. So essentially it's just, you know, a predator drone. Fair enough. Thanks Obama. It's there to help.
This can all be traced back to Obama. Yeah. That's I've been saying that a lot recently because that was my favorite thing to say back in the day. It's so good. Now, like I said, we're going to talk about how this thing may be a hoax. And when I say hoax, I mean it like in like the pretty loosest of terms. So when the Snallygaster gained all that widespread attention in the early 1900s, like reports of sightings grew, which meant more stories to sensationalize and publish.
Now this leads some historians to think that some papers, mainly the Valley Register, the one who did a lot of that racist shit may have been fabricating stories of the Snallygaster as a way to like boost sales. Their articles were like always wildly sensationalized and they relied heavily on super dramatic descriptions that would draw in more readers, more eyes, stuff like that. So like the New York Post. Yeah. Or the Washington Examiner or every other newspaper.
Yeah. But what I found out while writing this is that this type of writing paired with the fact that like newspaper hoaxes were a popular form of entertainment and publicity for the papers, kind of like national inquire type shit. Like it led tabloid media. Yeah, it led people to suggest that the Snallygaster legend was in part at least stoked more by financial reasons rather than like genuine eyewitness accounts.
So they think that like these newspapers, especially this one, was like just full on fabricating stories to try and like boost sales, which I mean, it makes sense. Why wouldn't you? I mean, right. It's 1909. Who the fuck's fact checking you? Do you even have fact checkers? Yeah. Like it takes five days for you to hear news from four towns over. Like it's no one's going to.
Well, it was like it was a popular trope back in the day to say that your political opponent had died because it took forever to to dispel that. That's great. We should go back to that. That's real funny. Like like Ben Franklin actually, Ben Franklin used that trope against somebody and he held it out for like a full year saying that the guy had been dead, even though like people kept saying he was alive. And then he finally did die.
And Ben Franklin was like, I commend his supporters for finally admitting the truth. That's so fucking good. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. No, with like with like the financial reasons and all that stuff, you add in the fact that there's no solid evidence that the Snallygaster has ever been produced, no remains or definitive tracks, and that paired with the over the top descriptions and like media sensationalism.
A lot of historians and even a lot of cryptozoologists pretty much agree that the Snallygaster was little more than like a hoax or a myth fueled by newspapers for profit. And I mean, it kind of was fueled more by trying to get black people out of the South. But I mean, profit was definitely part of it. But also, like it's it's just a folkloric tale. Like you know, I mean, like it was. That's what makes me so mad. Like I just want to enjoy a fun tale. And then I find out racism.
Yeah. But I mean, Sarge, god damn it, you fuckers. Stop ruining good stuff. We'll always have robot flowers, though. There was nothing racist about robot flowers. Nothing racist about robot flowers. We're always going to have the robot flowers. And for me, that's enough. But yeah, so there you have it, Sarge. That is the story of the Snallygaster. It's maybe we should have done this as our first episode as part of like trying to promote Cryptid Camp. But you know what? Fuck it.
I love the Snallygaster. The imagery is fucking wild. I'll send you a picture of what like artists descriptions of this thing. And it's a fucking nightmare, dude. I'm I. Here's the thing. I don't think the Snallygaster is racist. I think racist people tried to steal the Snallygaster. Yeah, it's like cultural appropriation. But for like cryptids. It's just like the racist people tried to steal the Don't Tread on Me flag. True, which makes no sense.
It makes me so mad because I love that flag so much. And I can't hang it anymore because people now think that I read the Bible and shit. The funniest thing about the Don't Tread on Me flag is that like you can't fly that and the Blue Lives Matter flag like the pro cop flag, because, you know, when you're going to get treaded on, you know who's going to tread on you. You know, definitely, definitely going to be somebody with a gun who's who's encouraged to use it.
Yeah. So it's the fucking it's wild. I love it so much, though, because it just shows like how in tune they are with their environment and the world around them. All right. Sorry. So that is that is a story. What do you think? Beginning to end, give me your thoughts. I'm sure you have a lot of thoughts. Maybe not. I fucking love this thing. I want it to be real so bad. And I hope that everyone who thinks it's it's going after black people, I hope it eats those people instead.
Yeah, because it wasn't like I picture the Snallygaster like having a big pride flag at its house. Yeah, it's a big Black Lives Matter supporter. It's got a Chay Gravera t shirt like the Snallygaster is all about. No, yeah, I get it. It's I would love of like the Snallygaster were real and it preferred white people because it knows that like it knows there's too many of them. I just I think that like it's it's not uncommon for the group in power to use folklore against a marginalized community.
If you look at it was used a whole bunch back in the day. Yeah, I mean, if you look at Vandyman's Land, which is now Tasmania, I believe it's now Tasmania down in Australia. That was that was really common. They would talk about the Tasmanian devil and the Tasmanian tiger and these like, you know, mythically terrifying creatures that are literally just, you know, small, soupy predators that live in the fucking woods.
Yeah. Yeah. And they would tell him these horrible stories that they're going to like eat you alive. And then you see what a real life and it looks like a dingo. It's just like this little tiny dog creature. I mean, Australians still do that to outsiders with the drop bear and stuff like that. Yeah. But which is fine, because Australia is arguably the scariest continent on the planet. It's all. Yeah. Fuck that place. I want to go so bad. It's all murder. Every creature there wants to kill you.
Even though even the koalas are like, I'll find a way. Yeah, there's nothing great about Australia, but I do want to go. But mostly to the coast. I don't want to I don't want to deal with that. Yeah. I mean, that's where the arts that's where all the cults and incest are. Yeah, I've seen Wolf Creek. I don't need that shit in my life. All right. Yeah. And that wasn't an attack on Australia. No, it is for me. Because for me, it is the whole bottom part of our country is all cults and incest.
True. But also. No, I was going to say Australia is founded by criminals. I think we kind of work too, in a way. But anyways, what Ireland was as well. So. All right, with that all out of the way, do you want to. Your story, look it up. I'm not lying. The island founded by criminals. I believe that. Is there anything you want to plug before I get into Shpil about plug and stuff? Yes. Saja Supernormal is still around and probably need it more now more than ever.
It's a coloring book about all all of the fun stuff that I talk about. But there's also some some digs at some political figures that we may not all be pleased with. So please get my coloring book at Saja's supernormal dot com. All one word spelled like it sounds, unless you're a weird person who would put a J in Sarge. That's weird. Sarge's supernormal dot com. You can get my coloring book. Nine ninety nine. Lots of fun. And then send me your pictures. I want to see the coloring that you do.
There's also like word searches and amaze. It's fun. Sarge, this is the first time you've plugged your coloring book and you haven't accidentally called it a comic book. I'm very proud of you. I think this is growth. This is growth as a human. And I'm very proud of you, buddy. Thanks so much for listening. Make sure you check out Cryptid Camp TCG dot com. Please check out Cryptid Camp. The cards are so cool and they're such great people. I follow them on Instagram. I love the stuff they put out.
Very excited to be a part of this group. If you want to learn more about it, like I said, hit up their website. There'll be a link in the episode description. If you like what you see and you want to, you know, back them on Kickstarter, get a booster box, a couple of decks, maybe whatever, you can head to Kickstarter dot com slash projects slash Cryptid Camp. It'll show you everything you need to know. I'm very excited about it. Super stoked. Sarge is very excited. His kids are excited.
You got 19 days. Actually, you know what? When this comes out, there'll be 18 days left to back them on Kickstarter. And then after that. Who knows? They were funded in they were fully funded in less than an hour when it launched. So that's amazing. Yeah. So I'm very hyped about it. I'm so excited. I love I love playing games with my friends when we're drinking beers. But I also my kids and I love to play games. We get very competitive, slightly antagonistic.
We are cool to each other in the spirit of competitiveness. So I'm very much looking forward to this. So I'm I'm going to make a bunch of like weird drunk Tim and Eric, Eric Andre style videos for take an Instagram after this. So you'll see some fucked up shit. But anyways, yeah, go be fun. Go support them. It's awesome. Like I said, Erica from came crypto podcast. She's in this. And that's the only reason like that's why I'm putting my confidence behind it is because her show is amazing.
She's amazing. She's a big supporter of our show, which is weird because she has like nine thousand times more followers. But hey, all I'm saying is that she put her faith in us to help try and spread the word to this. So I'm putting my faith in her to create a good product. And that's all any of us can ever ask for. You can find links to all these things in the link in our Instagram at Crypto Cocktail follows on TikTok Crypto Cocktail Party.
Sarge, you can find all of his social media in the same link underneath our Instagram. And also, once again, just to remind everyone, we are the twenty twenty four best pod cryptic podcast award winners. So award winning podcast. Yeah. So we don't I mean, we show a lot of things. And by that I mean, Narragansett drink Narragansett, you can see in the background. Drink Narragansett beer, God damn it. Yeah. Don't be a fucking goon.
So we don't we don't we we we only show things that we believe in, obviously. So we're not trying to fucking sell you some snake oil. But I mean, I just I can promise you we're never going to talk about fucking cryptocurrency. So yeah, unless it's cryptocurrency. Yeah, that would be just coins that have like Mothman books. All right. So with that out of the way, Sarge, would you like to say goodbye? I love you to the audience. Hey, you guys, may the blessings of Mothman be upon you.
And I love you. And also upon you.