Mysteries and Histories
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163 episodes
* FROM THE VAULT: In 1992, 14 year old Misty Copsey went missing from Puyallup, Washington after visiting a fair with her best friend. Despite many clues pointing in multiple directions, there's never been any trace of her found.
* In August 1979, a resident of Tok, Alaska found a decomposed body at the side of a quiet country road. Investigators were soon able to pin down his killer, but One Eyed Jack, as he would come to be known, has never been identified.
* FROM THE VAULT - For centuries we've seen multiple different iterations of women being accused of witchcraft, of having too much power, men screaming how they must be stopped; the most famous of which is the Salem witch trials. But do you know the full story?
* In 2014, Lars Mittank travelled to Bulgaria for a week away with friends. An unfortunate encounter means he gets a burst eardrum and is unable to fly back home to Germany, being left alone in a foreign country... what happens next has never been explained.
* FROM THE VAULT - in 1917, the Radium Luminous Material Corporation started producing luminous paints called Undark, with companies quickly realising how helpful luminescent watch faces would be for the military. Hordes of women were employed in factories, tasked with the painstaking job of painting the watches... only as we all know, radium and humans do not mix.
* In the 1930s, plans were made to build an institution for intellectually disabled children, sold to parents as a haven, with around the clock care and training programmes. Of course, none of the promises came to fruition and it's soon-to-be 6000 residents would be found living in squalor, ignored by the outside world.
* In January 2002, Rachel Cooke was home in Georgetown, Texas for the winter break when she decided to go for a run, as she did every morning. Only on this day, she never arrived home and it's widely believed she was the victim of foul play. What happened to Rachel?
* In 2002, Joanna Yeates had just moved in with her boyfriend in Bristol, England. She was just starting her adult life, having graduated university and beginning her first job, before it was cruelly ripped away from her when she was home alone for a weekend. Here is her infuriating story.
* We all know historians often refuse to acknowledge queerness meaning there's a whole beautiful rainbow out there in history that has been missed. There have been 40+ monarchs in British history, so statistics tells us that at least ONE must've been gay right? Let's find out.
* In 1946, 18 year old Paula Jean Welden decided to go on a Sunday afternoon hike in the Glastonbury mountain in Vermont. And then she just vanished into thin air, no sign of her has been since. But the strangest thing is, she wasn't the only person in the 1940s to disappear under those circumstances...
* In 1988, 17 year old Mark Haines went for a night out with his friends, ending with his body being found on the train tracks the next morning. Police quickly brushed it off as suicide, then misadventure, leaving Mark's family to investigate on their own. Finally in 2024, it looks like justice may be around the corner.
* Today we've got a four-in-one episode, with a number of cases of mass hysteria throughout history: the meowing nuns, the june bug epidemic, the shrinking penis epidemic and the jell-o factory hysteria.
* In 1976, a corn farmer in Benton County, Indiana came across a heavy box in his field - and soon found a human body inside. Despite immediate investigation, police still have no answers as to her identity or killer 47 years later. Who was the box lady of Benton County?
* In 2002, John Darwin got in his kayak and went off for a paddle in the North Sea... and then never returned, assumed dead. 5 years later, he turns up at a London police station claiming amnesia. But of course, that's not what happened.
* In 1936, a teacher decides to take 20 schoolboys on a trip to Germany on his own... what could go wrong? Everything it turns out, after deciding to take them on a hike to the highest peak in the Black Forest.
* It's been over 40 years since the body of an woman was found on the strip in Las Vegas and finally in 2023 she was identified as Gwenn Marie Story, but her identification sadly hasn't shed any light on who was responsible for her death - who killed Gwenn?
* Since 2007, 23 feet have been found on the shores of the Salish Sea in Canada and the United States, most found inside trainers/sneakers and hiking boots. What's going on?
* This is a huge part of British and Canadian history which is rarely spoken about now, but a piece of history which has undeniably had a massive butterfy effect on both nations today. Thousands of children were taken off the streets of London and sent to homes in Canada for labour... and as you can imagine, there wasn't much love.
* Julie Hogg disappeared in 1989 after a pizza delivery shift, her mother calling to wake her up the next morning for a court date to find there was no answer. Despite her family's insistence that Julie would not have run away, police fail to investigate properly... and three months later, mother Ann finds her daughter's remains behind the bath panel. From that moment on, she embarks on a mission to see her daughter's killer behind bars, but it's not going to be an easy journey.
* In the early hours of August 23rd 1994, Beth-Ellen Vinson was on her way to work when she disappeared, her car being found abandoned on the side of the road. A week later, her body was discovered nearby but to this day, there are no answers. Who killed Beth-Ellen? What was the motive?
* In Franklin County, Maryland in 1982, two mushroom hunters came across a steamer trunk in woodland. Curious, they go to open it and find the decomposed body of a woman who remains unidentified 41 years on. Who was the Cheerleader in the Trunk?
* Releasing over a million balloons at once sounds like a pretty spectacle right? What could go wrong? Well in 1986, the residents of Cleveland would find out.
* Today I've got some updates for you in some massive cases from over the last few months. This is what we hope for in the world of true crime, new information bringing us one step closer to solving a case or identifying a person.
* For a whole decade between 1984 and 1994, elderly couple Bill and Dorothy Wacker were harassed by an unknown assailant, with Dorothy even being physically attacked on two occasions, sending her to hospital. But there was never any sign of the perpetrator and police eventually decided Bill himself was responsible. But was he?
* On Christmas Day 1929, residents of Germanton, North Carolina were disturbed by multiple gunshots over at the Lawson residence - and when they arrived to investigate, they found a scene that no-one ever wants to witness: an entire family killed by their own father. We've always known who's responsible for the Lawson family murders, but the big question is: why? Why did Charlie Lawson do it?
* From 2010 to 2018, rumours were flying around Toronto's gay village that there was a serial killer on the loose, targeting muslim men in the area. Despite these cries, no-one seemed all that interested in investigating... until in 2018 something undeniable happened. Here is the story of the victims of Bruce McArthur.
* Sarah Ottens was murdered in her university dorm in 1973 and after an investigation, James Hall was arrested and charged with the crime. But then a decade later, Hall was exonerated for the crime. Was he truly responsible? If not, who did kill Sarah?
* When in 1984 751 people in The Dalles, Oregon, suddenly contracted salmonella after eating at a number of salad bars, the authorities put it down to poor hygiene of the food handlers, despite local residents suspecting the involvement of the Rajneeshees, a cult of 7000 people who had overtaken a nearby ranch. This is the tale of everything that happened before and after.
* In May 1968, a man came across the remains of a girl who would go on to become known as Tent Girl. 2 decades later this man would be telling his future son-in-law, Todd, the story who found himself unable to get it off his mind. Todd goes on to dedicate his life to reuniting Tent Girl with her name and her family, becoming one of the founders of DoeNetwork and changing the face of true crime forever.
* In 1991, 18 year old Nicola Payne set off on the 6 minute walk from her boyfriend's house to her parent's house, a walk she had done countless times before... and then she disappeared. Over three decades on, numerous arrests and a failed trial later, Nicola's case still remains unsolved. Where is she?
