Weird Darkness: Paranormal & True Crime Stories

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It Has Been 65 Years Since The Alien Abduction of Betty And Barney Hill Sep 16, 2026

Show notes

Get the full story in my book, "Two Lost Hours: The Betty And Barney Hill UFO Abduction, 65 Years Later" at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HJY8N8CT
Sixty-five years ago this week, a Portsmouth couple drove home through the White Mountains and arrived hours later than they’d planned; the story of what happened in that gap became the template for the modern alien abduction narrative, and the psychiatrist who drew it out of them believed half of it.
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*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Originally aired: September 15, 2026
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL
On the week of the sixty-fifth anniversary of the Betty and Barney Hill UFO incident, Weird Darkness retraces the September 19th to 20th, 1961 drive through New Hampshire's White Mountains that became America's first widely reported alien abduction account, from the light over Route 3 to the Project Blue Book file, the hypnosis tapes in Dr. Benjamin Simon's Boston office, the Zeta Reticuli star map, and the sixty-five-year fight over what any of it means.It opens at 10:05 PM in a Colebrook restaurant, as Betty and Barney Hill of Portsmouth start the last leg home from Montreal in a 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air with their dachshund Delsey in the back seat. South of Lancaster, Betty spots a light below the moon that keeps pace with the car past Cannon Mountain and Franconia Notch, and two miles north of North Woodstock it comes down over the highway; Barney walks into a field with 7x50 binoculars and sees figures in shiny black uniforms watching him from a row of windows before he runs back to the car shouting that they're going to be captured. Two sets of beeps from the trunk bracket a thirty-five-mile stretch of road neither of them can remember, and the kitchen clock reads after five when they get home, two hours later than the drive should have taken.From there the episode follows the paper trail: Barney's scuffed shoes, a dozen shiny circles on the trunk lid that send a compass needle spinning, a torn dress dusted with pink powder, and Betty's September 21st call to Pease Air Force Base that produced Air Force Information Report 100-1-61, a document that never mentions the figures Barney saw. Hayden Planetarium lecturer Walter Webb interviews the couple for six hours for NICAP, two IBM men work out the missing two hours in November, and Betty begins five nights of dreams about small men with Jimmy Durante noses who examine her aboard a craft. Barney's health collapses into ulcers, hypertension, and a ring of growths on his groin, and in December 1963 the couple lands in the Back Bay office of Dr. Benjamin Simon, a Second World War Army psychiatrist who hypnotizes them separately over the following months while a tape recorder runs. Barney describes wraparound eyes that pushed into his brain and a cup placed over his groin; Betty describes a needle in her navel, a book of symbols, and a map of stars, which an Ohio schoolteacher named Marjorie Fish will later spend five years matching to Zeta Reticuli with beads and thread, until the Hipparcos satellite's measurements pull six of her fifteen stars out from under it.The episode closes with the case's long tail: folklorist Thomas Bullard's finding that the Hill account defines the typical abduction and that every later case is measured against it, the Boston Traveler leak of October 1965, John Fuller's bestseller The Interrupted Journey, the 1975 NBC film with James Earl Jones and Estelle Parsons that aired sixteen days before Travis Walton vanished in Arizona, Barney's death from a cerebral hemorrhage at forty-six, and Betty's decades of skywatching in New Hampshire fields with a life-size alien bust named Junior in her house. Simon told the Today Show in 1975 that the abduction did not happen; Kathleen Marden, Betty's niece and the keeper of the hypnosis tapes, disputes one of his letters as a forgery; Martin Kottmeyer traces Barney's wraparound eyes to an Outer Limits episode that aired twelve days before his first session; and the dress, tested by chemist Phyllis Budinger, yields mildew and a protein residue nobody has explained. The Portsmouth Historical Society's betty & barney exhibition runs through November 2nd, 2026, two feature films are in development with Demi Moore and Colman Domingo attached to one of them, and the state's Historical Marker 224 on Route 3 in Lincoln still confines itself to what can be documented, and no third witness has ever come forward.

THE OUTER LIMIT: Will Earth Fail Its Final Test? | #MidnightInTheMacabre Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

Test pilot Steve Weston chased something impossible at the edge of Earth's atmosphere and returned ten hours later – yet only with enough fuel for ten minute flight. He returns, convinced he has an urgent warning to save Earth. Is it delusion from his time in space – or something we must all pay attention to in order to preserve humanity?
EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/mitm-outerlimit
SOURCES and RESOURCES: “The Outer Limit” by Graham Doar (“The Saturday Evening Post” December 1949 / X Minus One)
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Midnight In The Macabre (MITM), originally aired: September 15, 2026
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

THE CONVERSION FACTOR: A Truck Stop Waitress Holds The Missing Equation | #RetroRadio Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

A physicist who has spent five years and twenty million dollars chasing one missing equation leaves his attaché case in a highway diner, where the seventeen-year-old at the cash register reads the twelve pages inside and understands every line.
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/OTR
CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…
00:00:00.000 = Show Open
00:01:30.028 = CBS Radio Mystery Theater, “The Conversion Factor” (September 22, 1978) ***WD
00:45:12.953 = Radio City Playhouse, “Reflection” (January 01, 1950) ***WD
01:14:57.212 = Mercer McLeod’s The Man With The Story, “Blood On The Doorstep” (1946-1947)
01:29:08.386 = Sam Spade, “Missing News Hawk Caper” (July 18, 1948) ***WD
01:59:52.584 = The Sealed Book, “Broadway Here I Come” (June 17, 1945) ***WD
02:29:21.088 = The Shadow, “The Drums of Doom” (March 19, 1944) ***WD
03:00:16.061 = Sleep No More, “Conquerors Isle” (November 21, 1956) ***WD
03:28:50.328 = BBC Radio 4 Spinechillers, “The Boy Who Cried Woof” (December 24, 1984)
03:43:36.519 = The Strange Dr. Weird, “Devil’s Cavern” (April 03, 1945) ***WD(LQ)
03:55:30.259 = Strange, “Deja Vu in France” (1955)
04:10:23.699 = Suspense, “Dark Tower” (May 04, 1944)
04:39:06.093 = The Creaking Door, “Vagrant” (April 29, 1965) **WD
05:08:21.600 = Show Close
(ADU) = Air Date Unknown
(LQ) = Low Quality
***WD = Remastered, edited, or cleaned up by Weird Darkness to make the episode more listenable. Audio may not be pristine, but it will be better than the original file which may have been unusable or more difficult to hear without editing.
CUSTOM WEBPAGE: https://weirddarkness.com/WDRR0774

FIVE MISSING WOMEN, ONE OLNEY HOUSE: The Hard Drives Inside 417 W. Chew Avenue | #WeirdDarkNEWS Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

Philadelphia homicide detectives are working through 50 hard drives pulled from a boarded-up house in Olney where a violent pornographer lived for two decades, and among the 70,000 videos is one they believe shows him strangling a woman to death – while five women tied to the address remain missing and not a single body has been found.
SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/horschhouse20260911/
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

Jacob Coxon Says AI Could Kill Us All, But Is His Viral Warning A Political Setup? | #WeirdDarkNEWS Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

A 27-year-old who spent three years building AI at two of the industry's leading labs quit on a Tuesday and said the people he'd worked beside privately expect the technology could wipe us out within the decade. The man in charge of keeping Anthropic's AI in line replied in public that he was right about the fear. But how frightened should we really be?
SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/coxonwarning/
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

TO DIE IN THE OLD WEST: Quick Triggers and Quicker Deaths Sep 15, 2026

Show notes

The Wild West wasn’t all shootouts and saloons – but when danger came, it carved legends in blood, bullets, and bone.
EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/ToDieInTheOldWest
READ or DOWNLOAD the full transcript of this episode: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2p9b8rax
FEATURED STORIES IN THIS EPISODE: The Wild West, where no matter how tough and rugged you might be, you can never defeat Old Man Death. And he was creative in how he dispensed his touch. (To Die In The Old West) *** Charles Howard Schmid Jr. charmed and befriended the teenagers of Tucson, Arizona in the 1960s — all while brutally murdering three young girls. (The Pied Piper of Tuscon) *** One of the lesser-known crytpids is something called the Hidebehind, a mysterious creature that stalked 19th-century lumberjacks, preying on those who let their guard down in the forest. (The Hidebehind) *** Brianna Maitland left her dishwashing job and was never seen alive again. Despite various theories and sightings, Brianna's disappearance continues to baffle investigators and haunt her family, who still hold out hope for answers and her safe return. (The Vanishing of Brianna Maitland) *** In 1906, explorer Robert Peary claimed to have discovered a mysterious island he named Crocker Land, but was it a genuine find, a calculated deception, or something even more bizarre? (The Myth of Crocker Island) *** Lyndia Morel's quiet drive home took a chilling turn when she encountered a mysterious craft and experienced a baffling episode of missing time. Was it a case of alien abduction? (The Lyndia Morel Incident) *** In May of 1963, a bizarre creature terrorized Centreville, Illinois, prompting over 50 calls to the police from alarmed residents. Descriptions ranged from a "half man, half woman" to a "half man, half horse." (The Centerville Monster)
CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…
00:00.00.000 = The Foreboding
00:01:31.179 = Show Open
00:04:10.280 = To Die In The Old West
00:19:01.581 = The Hidebehind ***
00:21:49.186 = The Pied Piper of Tuscon
00:26:56.983 = The Lyndia Morel Incident
00:41:06.311 = The Vanishing of Brianna Maitland ***
00:48:52.055 = The Myth of Crocker Island
00:56:42.239 = The Centerville Monster ***
00:58:30.243 = Show Close
*** = Begins immediately after inserted ad break
LISTEN ON PODCAST APPS:
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.com/wdapps
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
SOURCES and RESOURCES:
BOOK: “Giants, Monsters, and Dragons: An Encyclopedia of Folklore, Legend, and Myth” by Carol Rose:https://amzn.to/3VpnkKk
“To Die In The Old West” source: Quinn Armstrong, Weird History: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2p884ck2
“The Hidebehind” source: Astonishing Legends: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4nj3h5en
“The Pied Piper of Tuscon” source: Bernadette Giocamazzo, All That’s Interesting: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4dzvmspf
“The Lyndia Morel Incident” source: Marcus Lowth, UFO Insight: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4v8yewbr
“The Vanishing of Brianna Maitland” by Troy Taylor (used with permission): https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2d6fbz5h
“The Myth of Crocker Island” source: Kaushik Patowary: Amusing Planet: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/bdz38sce
“The Centerville Monster” by Troy Taylor (used with permission): https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/4h8wpeee
(Over time links may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Originally aired: May 29, 2024
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

SIDERS CASE: Grandfather Ruled Incompetent, Not Restorable; Dismissal Expected | #WeirdDarkNEWS Sep 14, 2026

Show notes

A forensic report found Gary Siders Sr. incompetent to stand trial and beyond restoring, the prosecutor stipulated to it without objection, and the same two lawyers who expect his case dismissed within weeks have now been appointed to defend Brandon Henderson.
SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/SidersCase20260911
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

THE SUPER OPENER: The Can Opener Punched A Hole In The Universe | #MidnightInTheMacabre Sep 14, 2026

Show notes

The Pilton Super Opener opens a can in no time at all, and nobody at the company, least of all the man who designed it, can say where the can disappears to in the process.
EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/mitm-superopener
SOURCES and RESOURCES: “The Super Opener” by Michael Zuroy (“Worlds of If” Science Fiction magazine from August, 1958)
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Midnight In The Macabre (MITM), originally aired: September 14, 2026
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

CHRONICLES OF THE BLACK DEATH: Pus, Pee, and Plague Doctors #WDRadio Sep 14, 2026

Show notes

During the Black Death, medieval Europeans bathed in vinegar, slept on rotting straw, dumped waste in the streets — and still couldn’t figure out why everyone was dying.
==========
HOUR ONE: During the bubonic plague in the early Middle-Ages, those who became sick and were even suspected of having the plague, were forced to relocate to a quarantined island – Poveglia Island. The gruesomeness that took place there still continues today, with the island being illegal to visit – and reportedly, very haunted. (Inside Black Plague Island) *** We look at some of the bathing – and lack thereof – that took place during the bubonic plague, as well as some of the beliefs they had about diet and how it might protect from contagion. Some of the ideas of what people thought could protect them from the disease are nothing short of shocking. (Living With The Black Death)
==========
HOUR TWO: About 80 years after the black plague began, a different plague came upon England – a fatal one that would cause you to almost instantly perspire to death. (Death By Sweat) *** Most everyone is familiar with the plague in Europe in the early 1400s – but in the early 1900s it struck again. This time in San Francisco. If you’ve not heard that before, it could be because the U.S. government tried to cover it up. (The Plague of San Francisco) *** Of all the imagery that comes to mind when hearing the words “bubonic plague” the most prevalent is most certainly that of the doctors – and the odd, bird-like masks they would wear. Why they dressed that way is interesting – but what the doctors did while wearing those suits and in their labs as they tried to battle the illness is absolutely horrifying. (Plague Doctors) *** And it probably comes as no surprise that something so deadly and horrific as the black plague would leave behind some residual paranormal energy – and boy is there a lot of it. (A Plague of Ghosts)
==========
SUDDEN DEATH OVERTIME: We look at some of the bathing – and lack thereof – that took place during the bubonic plague, as well as some of the beliefs they had about diet and how it might protect from contagion. Some of the ideas of what people thought could protect them from the disease are nothing short of shocking. (Living With The Black Death – CONTINUED) *** Europe just could not escape plagues of any kind – for example, the plague that made you, against your will, keep dancing until you dropped dead. (The Dance of Death)
==========
SOURCES AND REFERENCES FROM TONIGHT’S SHOW:
“Inside Black Plague Island” by Cheryl Adams Richkoff for Graveyard Shift: https://tinyurl.com/v85y7k6
“Plague Doctors” by Melissa Sartore for Ranker’s Weird History: https://tinyurl.com/rmap5d8
“Death By Sweat” by Melissa Sartore for Ranker’s Weird History: https://tinyurl.com/vqpvgrz
“The Dance of Death” by Melissa Satore for Ranker’s Weird History: https://tinyurl.com/u6kdwgp
“The Plague of San Francisco” by Melissa Brinks for Ranker’s Weird History: https://tinyurl.com/sbaht69
“Living With The Black Death” by Genevieve Carlton for Ranker’s Weird History: https://tinyurl.com/tcbo9af,https://tinyurl.com/sfkjhrg; and Kellen Perry for Ranker: https://tinyurl.com/u4bxkuf
“A Plague of Ghosts” by Erin Wisti for Graveyard Shift: https://tinyurl.com/tm2cxzr
==========(Over time links seen above may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for material I use whenever possible. If I have overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it immediately. Some links may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)
==========
"I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness." — John 12:46
==========
WeirdDarkness®, WeirdDarkness© 2026
==========
To become a Weird Darkness Radio Show affiliate, contact Radio America at affiliates@radioamerica.com, or call 800-807-4703 (press 2 or dial ext 250).

The Immortal Vampire of Royal Street Sep 14, 2026

Show notes

New Orleans high society adored the charming Jacques St. Germain, right up until they started asking why a man who claimed to be forty could describe the 1700s like he'd lived them. Now more than a century later people are still arguing over whether Jacques St. Germain was a con man, an immortal, or a true-life vampire.
EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/ImmortalVampire
READ or DOWNLOAD the full transcript of this episode: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2p9xjvjy
FEATURED STORIES IN THIS EPISODE: Was a New Orleans neighborhood home to an immortal vampire in the early 1900s? (Vampire in New Orleans) *** A young girl disappeared in Yosemite National Park back in 1981. To this day no one knows where she is, and some say a paranormal cause is to blame. (A Supernatural Disappearance in Yosemite) *** After Lori Erica Ruff's death, her husband discovered he had been married to a complete stranger. Because Lori Erica Ruff never existed. (The Woman Without an Identity) *** Was there a plot to murder Marconi scientists in the 1980s? (The Marconi Murders)
CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…
00:00.00.000 = The Foreboding
00:00:41.374 = Show Open
00:02:10.004 = The Immortal Vampire of New Orleans
00:18:58.982 = A Supernatural Disappearance In Yosemite ***
00:29:58.328 = The Woman Without An Identity
00:36:55.918 = The Marconi Murders ***
00:51:45.221 = Show Close
*** = Begins immediately after inserted ad break
LISTEN ON PODCAST APPS:
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.com/wdapps
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*
SOURCES and RESOURCES:
“Vampire In New Orleans” by Brent Swancer: http://bit.ly/2IrlOTU
“A Supernatural Disappearance in Yosemite” by Beth Elias: http://bit.ly/2v94zOB
“The Woman Without an Identity” by Stephanie Webber: http://bit.ly/2UBMIyO
‘The Marconi Murders” posted at The Unredacted: http://bit.ly/2VR1PRC
(Over time links may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Originally aired: June 16, 2020
LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL
This episode of Weird Darkness moves from a suspected vampire in early-1900s New Orleans to a teenager who vanished in Yosemite National Park, a Texas wife who'd stolen a dead child's identity, and a string of bizarre deaths among British defense scientists during the Cold War.It opens with Jacques St. Germain, a wealthy stranger who arrived in New Orleans in the early 1900s, settled into a mansion at 1039 Royal Street, and began hosting lavish parties for the city's elite. He spoke French, English, and Spanish, described centuries-old events as if he'd witnessed them, was almost never seen in daylight, and never ate at his own feasts. He also claimed descent from the Comte de St. Germain, the 18th-century adventurer and alchemist who told Casanova he was three hundred years old, and the resemblance between the two men was close enough that people began to wonder if they were the same person. A prostitute's leap from his upper-floor window, her story of an attempted bite to the neck, and what police allegedly found in his darkened second floor after he skipped town turned a rich man's eccentricities into one of the city's most enduring vampire legends.From there the episode heads to California and the disappearance of fourteen-year-old Stacy Ann Arras, who walked away from a horseback tour group at Sunrise High Sierra Camp in Yosemite on July 17, 1981, intending to photograph a nearby lake, and was never seen again. As many as 150 searchers, tracking dogs, divers, and helicopters combed the area and recovered only a single camera lens. The segment weighs the theories still attached to her case, from a runaway teen in flip-flops to David Paulides and his Missing 411 research, along with search-and-rescue volunteers who explain how wind, ridgelines, and dry ground can swallow a person's voice and scent within fifty feet.Next comes the woman who called herself Lori Erica Ruff, found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot outside her in-laws' home in Longview, Texas, on Christmas Eve 2010. Her husband, Blake Ruff, then opened a lockbox she'd forbidden him to touch and found the birth certificate of Becky Sue Turner, a two-year-old who died in a Washington house fire in 1971, along with the paper trail of a name change in Idaho in 1988. Investigators listed her as a Jane Doe for six years until DNA from her young daughter traced her to a Pennsylvania family whose seventeen-year-old, Kimberly McLean, had walked away from home in 1986.The episode closes in Britain, where at least twenty-five scientists and engineers connected to Marconi Electronic Systems and related defense contractors died between 1982 and 1990, many of them working on projects tied to America's Strategic Defense Initiative. Dr. Keith Bowden's car went off a bridge on tires someone had swapped for worn ones, Vimal Dajibhai went off the Clifton Suspension Bridge with a puncture wound on his buttock, Arshad Sharif tied a ligature to a tree and hit the accelerator, and Alistair Beckham wired himself to a power socket in his garden shed hours before Ministry of Defence men arrived to collect his files. Coroners returned open verdicts, Computer Weekly journalist Tony Collins wrote a book arguing the pattern pointed to a plot, and Margaret Thatcher's government called the whole cluster a coincidence brought on by workplace stress.

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