00:00:00
This is exactly right. It's here. The participating U.S. Taco Bell locations for a limited time only.
00:00:34
While supplies last, contact Store for availability. Your husband is not who you think he is.
00:00:38
Your body is not what you thought it was. Your identity is formed by a secret history.
00:00:44
I'm Dani Shapiro, and these are just a few of the stunning stories I'll be exploring on the 14th season of Family Secrets.
00:00:52
He kind of shoved me out of the way and said, move. And he went out the front door and he jumped in a car and drove off.
00:00:57
And that was the last time I saw him. Listen to season 14 of Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:01:29
It's like a talk show, but going 30 miles an hour. New episodes every Monday on the Exactly Right Network.
00:01:34
Listen to Do You Need a Ride on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:01:56
Hello. And welcome. To my favorite murder. That's Georgia Hardstart. Thanks. That's Karen Kilgariff.
00:02:03
You're welcome. And here we are again. That's right. Here we are in the same room for the first time this year.
00:02:10
The vibes are off the charts. This time it's really happening. This time it's personal.
00:02:16
Can you handle it? Can you handle it? Frank's here as well. That's right. Kind of.
00:02:22
He's milling around. He's a little bit too interested in Georgia right now. And licking the couch.
00:02:29
Hi, Frank. He's got anxiety issues and it shows. Maybe he smells the same on me.
00:02:35
Maybe he's like, we're kindred anxiety spirits. He's like, hey. Hey, I recognize the panic in your eyes.
00:02:40
Racing thoughts? Sleepless nights? Licking a couch constantly? Oh, I know you. Oh, yeah.
00:02:47
I see you, sister. I see you licking that couch. That's right. How crazy was it in The Great, which is a great show, when she was pregnant and had to eat
00:02:56
handfuls of dirt. And I've heard of that. That's a thing when you're like low on some mineral,
00:03:02
right? Yeah. I think there's a mineral issue that you could probably take with a nice centrum.
00:03:07
Nowadays. You know, yeah. Not back then. No. Back then you actually legit had to eat dirt.
00:03:12
The combination of the costumes, the setting, and then the fact that it's real. Yeah. Like,
00:03:21
cause I was like, when season two started, I was like, what's going to happen? And I'm like,
00:03:24
Oh, it already happened. You can look it up on Wikipedia of what happened to Catherine the Great.
00:03:29
Many people go to college and learn about this intentionally. This is actually taught to us in public high schools, but I forgot.
00:03:37
I mean, I had no idea. And I'd gone there. I was busy. I was busy that day. I just wish someone had approached learning in a different way for me.
00:03:48
With cursing and sex. Yeah. And kind of like these are real people. Oh, right. Yeah.
00:03:53
Yeah. And 19 years old or 17. Right. What the fuck, man? Speaking of shows, because it's still a pandemic, so that's all I'm really doing.
00:04:04
Oh, we're just snapping right into that. Oh, I don't know. We don't have to. No, no.
00:04:08
Go for it. I just wanted to say that there's a third and final season of the Ricky Gervais show, Afterlife.
00:04:14
Oh, shit. Where his wife, the whole show's premise is that his wife had died of cancer.
00:04:18
That's not a spoiler. And him getting through the grief of it. It's not a spoiler.
00:04:22
It's not a spoiler. It's called After Life. Correct. After Her Life. But this is the third and final season.
00:04:28
And we watched it literally in one night. The whole thing? And I don't cry at things.
00:04:35
And I was fucking bawling at the end of it. No, that show is really beautiful. It's really, really real and honest.
00:04:41
Yeah. Is our friend that brilliant British actress, the tall blonde woman who was the sex worker in the second season?
00:04:49
Is she in it? She's not in this season. She gets talked about and referred to, but she must have been filming something else.
00:04:54
Well, because she had her own show. Right. Which we've already talked about. But, oh, that's, I mean, I'll miss her, but also that's okay.
00:05:01
But, I mean, what an incredibly done show. It's just, it's so, it was so beautiful.
00:05:06
Oh, I can't wait. Yeah. Thank you because, well, I did an extended Christmas vacation where I stayed up north for an extra month.
00:05:13
Yeah, you did. And I was in a house that didn't, I couldn't figure out. It had streaming services.
00:05:19
it had all the stuff I couldn't figure out how to make it work so I was watching a month's worth
00:05:26
of regular tv oh and oh it's like a time machine you were in it for real it was it was like going
00:05:33
back to the 90s when I used to just watch the Jamie Foxx show because that's the only channel
00:05:38
I got yeah the WB or UPN I can't remember which one they were on but yeah it was very I did I
00:05:45
it was a lot of like I'll just watch Law and Order I'll just watch that's fine it's easy
00:05:49
It's on. You can start in the middle of it. You know, when you're eating a quesadilla or whatever, it's like not a big deal.
00:05:54
It always it always good It always good It always when you seen before So it not like surprises But then there I love the and I talked about this with the That Messed Up ladies
00:06:05
on their show, but like I love a Jim Gaffigan walk-on. Oh, yeah. There's so many like New York actors and comics that have bit parts on Law & Order from the
00:06:15
90s. It's so great. I love it. And that's what That's Messed Up, the Exactly Right Podcast is all about.
00:06:21
We didn't mean to do that deep plug, but if we have to do it, let's fucking do it.
00:06:27
That's fucking right. You know what? If we're going to do a deep plug, we've already made the announcement on our social media, but we haven't gotten a chance to talk about it together on this public forum, our podcast.
00:06:39
You and me face to face. And to say we now are, we have joined with Wondery and Amazon Music to be on their platform and we're super stoked.
00:06:51
It's really cool. It's a really big deal in our lives. Like celebrating deal, like celebration deal.
00:06:59
Like it's been in the works for a long time. It's been hard and harrowing. But at the end of it all, it's so rewarding.
00:07:07
there. It's like, it's still exactly right. Nothing's changing. We're not, you know,
00:07:13
nothing's changing. They're going to help us to grow. But that doesn't mean you have to pay for
00:07:18
anything. It's everybody's number one concern, of course. And so don't worry about that part.
00:07:23
So it's like, you can still get it on any platform. One read just gets to put it out a week early
00:07:28
because we're working with them. That's how deals work. That's how they get it. That's the bonus for
00:07:33
them. But other than that, it's completely the same. So it's very exciting. And we're super
00:07:38
excited because then we get to make even more podcasts for Wondery, which if you know anything
00:07:44
about podcasting, they are the stalwarts of the podcasting business. They have been doing it
00:07:51
maybe the longest. Yeah. And the wellest. For sure. Like A plus work for almost 20 years.
00:07:58
Yeah. And this is just a big deal for you and me. I think I can't wrap my head around it. You know, we started this podcast in my one bedroom apartment because we liked talking to each other about true crime. And we've just we've built fucking business out of it.
00:08:17
And now we have opportunities through Exactly Right to help other people that we admire and that we think are talented grow their own podcasts.
00:08:26
And also all the employees at Exactly Right are so fucking incredible and talented that we get to, you know, we get to keep hiring rad people to work with us.
00:08:35
It's just it feels really lucky. I feel like there's a woman part of it, too, that like two women in any industry is, you know, has to work a little harder to kick down doors.
00:08:46
And we did it. I'm proud of you. Thank you. I'm proud of you, too. Thank you. Well, you know, here's the thing.
00:08:54
When we started this, we do say that that's our party line of like we didn't know and it was just this little thing or whatever.
00:09:01
But then once we started to know that it was becoming a thing, it was our intention, very intentional decisions we began making to make that network and to make that network the way we wanted it to be and to do business the way we wanted to do business.
00:09:19
And, you know, we thank you guys who listen and who have supported us all along, because I think you know us well enough to trust us for the intentionality and the consciousness that we bring to what we do and how we do it.
00:09:37
And there's, you know, when announcements like this come out, it's like, who knows what can happen?
00:09:43
But basically the direction we are, we have now turned to is incredibly exciting and has so much potential.
00:09:52
Yeah. It's just going to be really amazing. It truly feels like we're now in Barney's.
00:09:59
We're in Saks Fifth Avenue of podcasting. It smells like perfume. expensive perfume and people are like oh do you want to get do you want to get the perfect blouse
00:10:11
with that pair of jeans that's that expertise yeah it's amazing yeah it's a huge opportunity
00:10:17
i could cry if i keep thinking about it but i thought you didn't cry i don't i said i could
00:10:23
cry possibly probably i like that on almost every episode you need to talk about how you don't cry
00:10:29
right yet you did this one time right it's like a monumental thing that i have to point out every
00:10:34
time instead of just doing it and being fine with it. But like, I want you to know, like,
00:10:37
if I'm crying, it's because that's how important it is to me. Oh, Station Eleven. I fucking balled
00:10:42
at the end of it. I'm only halfway through because again, regular TV for the past month,
00:10:48
regular TV. Right. But I love the way people are raving about Station Eleven on social media.
00:10:55
So good. It's such it's gorgeous. Yeah, that's a good show. Yeah. uh well let's see i'm oh i could tell the story of getting locked out of the of the place i was
00:11:06
staying at which was it was kind of awesome because it was right it was the day before i
00:11:11
was supposed to leave yeah and we had to record a mini so yeah and we had a small window to record
00:11:17
it like usually it's like can we push it can we push it and everyone can push it everyone meaning
00:11:21
me and steven and you yeah but this time it was like no we have this two hour window like we have
00:11:25
to do it then. So we're getting all ready. I have all my stuff upstairs ready to go.
00:11:31
I just, uh, I just thought real quick, well, cause you know that when you leave, like you
00:11:37
stay a place for an extended period of time and then when you start getting ready to leave,
00:11:41
you start, you just go through room after room, make sure you didn't leave a charger
00:11:44
in the wall. Make sure your socks aren't behind the bed or whatever. And so I'd been doing
00:11:49
that all day and I thought, Oh, the garage, they had a pool table in the garage. So I
00:11:54
I was like oh I didn go out there that much But when my family came to visit me several times I know they brought stuff out there So I was going to do a check through So conscientious of you
00:12:06
Right? Like I'm the adult with it, you know, in the rental house. I go out there.
00:12:12
The door closes behind me. It's locked. And I at first was like, oh, it's just a it's just a little lock.
00:12:19
You know, it's like a little turn, like one of those little things you turn. And it didn't seem like it wasn't certainly wasn't a deadbolt.
00:12:26
So I was like, this is fine. I'll figure something out. You'll figure you'll learn how to pick locks real quick.
00:12:32
I'll just kind of. Well, because we used to have like lockable doors, like the push in locks at our old house.
00:12:39
Yeah. That that my sister and I would go get a butter knife and you twist it and pop that lock open and then grab the curling iron and like, don't lock me out of the bathroom.
00:12:47
We can't. So that gave me the belief and the confidence that I was like, this is only going to take me a second.
00:12:55
And you're in a garage with tools and shit. You're in the best place to break in.
00:12:59
But it turns out this garage has, I think it had a Phillips head screwdriver that helped me not at all and nothing else.
00:13:08
Everything else was just kind of like a nice rental house garage. Yeah, a pool table room.
00:13:11
So there was nothing extra. Yeah. So I messed with that door for an hour and a half.
00:13:19
And meanwhile, I was not wearing shoes. I was not wearing a bra. And I had not brushed my hair that morning.
00:13:26
I'd just been drinking coffee. And then finally, I had to go outside. Because also, I was way the fuck out in the middle of nowhere.
00:13:36
There was other houses around me. I hadn't seen anybody on the street. It wasn't like there was people around.
00:13:42
And thank God I heard a car coming. It was a neighbor. And I had to go out to the end of the driveway and wave sheepishly with my arms, kind of keep my arms crossed, but wave.
00:13:54
Like holding your boobs. Hold my self-bra. Yeah. And then wave a person down, the nicest man who was like, he rolls his window down.
00:14:03
He's like, hello. And I'm like, I just got locked out of my rental. And he's like, oh, no.
00:14:08
And we figure out he knows Ellen. My friend who was the person who lived in town and who got me the friends and family rate in the first place.
00:14:18
So he left a note on her door. And I was like, thanks so much. Well, she told me she was leaving town that day.
00:14:25
So I was like, that's not going to help. So I just went. And after a while, because I tried every door, that house was locked up so tight.
00:14:33
They should never worry again about anything. I literally was like taking the screens off the outside of windows to see if I could.
00:14:40
It was crazy. finally a security guard drives by i do the same shame wave like hey it looks weird i because also
00:14:49
at one point i was wearing a knit black knit cap you look like a burglar i was dressed exactly like
00:14:54
a burglar the braless burglar yeah that's like that strikes again yeah that's how she gets like
00:14:59
freaks you out and then she steals all your stuff so i have to wave this guy down and he
00:15:04
in all his like full-on biker mustache. Like he was a biker. Yes. And, but he was driving it like a RAV4.
00:15:13
And I was like, hi, I locked myself out. You know those Harley guys love a RAV. On the weekends.
00:15:19
He's got to drive like a safe looking security car. He jumps out and he's got every house's house keys on a chain.
00:15:26
Which seems dangerous, but I'm happy for him. He's security. Yeah. And you want it at that point.
00:15:32
Yeah, right. It's like the best thing ever. He let me ride in. It was the greatest.
00:15:36
But I had been standing out there so long. I told you this. I got a sunburn. Like it was that because at one point I just started staring at the sky.
00:15:45
Like I was like, well, now I've completely blown off Stephen and Georgia. They're like sitting on the Zoom waiting for me and I'm just not there.
00:15:52
But you've never not. We figured something was wrong. Yeah. Because you've never not like been like, hey, I need this many more minutes.
00:15:58
Right. And then when you called me, I was like, oh, fuck. I start. I usually text.
00:16:03
Hey, sorry. I started plucking my eyebrows. Now I'm late. But yeah, no, it was it was hilarious because also but barefoot, there was all kinds of walking around the house, which was like is kind of a little bit on a mountainside.
00:16:16
It wasn't great. It was ridiculous. And I had a nice conversation about cats. A shocker.
00:16:24
And then, yeah, figured figured you'd be around. Should we do Exactly Right News?
00:16:34
Absolutely. Yeah. It's slated to ladies' one-year anniversary of joining Exactly Right.
00:16:39
They've been around for much, much longer. They're a very legendary, old, unstoried podcast.
00:16:45
But for their Exactly Right one-year anniversary, their guest this week is Georgia Hartstart.
00:16:51
Hey, that's me. It was really fun. I told them the story of punching a girl at soccer practice when I was a kid.
00:17:01
And we had a lot of fun chit-chatting. Awesome. Yeah, that was great. Great fun.
00:17:07
And then on this week's episode of Parent Footprint with my cousin, Dr. Dan, hosts Elizabeth Taylor and Alex Shapiro, who, of course, host the True Beauty Brooklyn podcast, are his guests.
00:17:19
Also, we've been recording new fan cult videos. And now if you're a member of the fan cult, you get to vote on like some of the question topics, like go to the fan cult if you are a member and you can see the new videos and then you can see also the ways you can interact and have a say in what we talk about on those.
00:17:37
That's right. Tell us what to talk about. Oh, my God. There's a new MFM animated video by Nick Terry, of course. It's on the Exactly Right YouTube channel.
00:17:45
channel it's did you watch it i haven't watched it yet oh my god it is he is every fucking time
00:17:53
he a genius he really the greatest he nails it so hard i laughing at my own shit It like the best So go watch it The episode called The Chainsaw Chicken based on an old hometown
00:18:07
It's just incredible. We love you, Nick Taylor. We love you, Nick Taylor. There's a bunch of
00:18:11
other episodes. I mean, yeah, all of them are there. So please watch. Also, we just came out
00:18:15
with, you know, the poetry fridge magnets that came out that were very popular in the 90s.
00:18:21
Well, there's now a My Favorite Murder version of those with all the words that we like to use on this show.
00:18:28
And you can buy those magnets and then stick them on your fridge and put together your own phrases.
00:18:35
I have fuckity fuck fuck on mine. And then all the names of my animals. I got one for free, if you can believe it.
00:18:42
And then there's also other magnets and classic designs that are new. So go ahead and put those all over your fridge.
00:18:48
If you please. see business it's about business we're business ladies at the end of the day what do you want
00:18:55
it's a business we've built here yeah um well should we get into it let's do it i think you're
00:19:01
first i am okay introducing taco bell's new jalapeno citrus salsa with bright citrus real
00:19:08
red jalapenos guajilo chiles usually you add sauce to the food but when the sauce is this good
00:19:14
The food is just there to get the sauce to your mouth. That rolled quesadilla, not a rolled quesadilla anymore.
00:19:21
Now it's a sauce shovel. Taco Bell's jalapeno citrus salsa. Get it with any item on the cantina chicken menu while it's here.
00:19:28
The participating U.S. Taco Bell locations for a limited time only. While supplies last, contact store for availability.
00:19:33
Your husband is not who you think he is. Your body is not what you thought it was.
00:19:38
Your identity is formed by a secret history. I'm Dani Shapiro, and these are just a few of the stunning stories I'll be exploring on the 14th season of Family Secrets.
00:19:49
Just then, we felt the plane turn in the air, so much so that the bags that were under people's seats just kind of flew into the aisle.
00:19:58
Each week, we dive headfirst into the complex power of secrecy, how it shapes our identities and relationships, and how it ultimately can reveal to us our truest selves.
00:20:09
my daughter, she's pretending she doesn't know, but is trying to cook and feed me
00:20:13
and keep me alive because I wasn't eating anything. And me pretending like everything was fine.
00:20:19
He kind of shoved me out of the way and said, move. And he went out the front door
00:20:23
and he jumped in a car and drove off. And that was the last time I saw him. Listen to season 14 of Family Secrets
00:20:28
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Every story has a point
00:20:36
where it's balanced on a knife's edge. That's where we begin. For some, it's a confrontation no parent ever expects.
00:20:44
They finally admit, we're here to take your children. The department has taken custody and we're here to take your kids.
00:20:49
It was just shock and horror and desperation. For others, it's surviving the unthinkable.
00:20:56
As they're having this gun battle, thousands of feet up in the air, many of the bullets start to puncture the aircraft.
00:21:03
I thought we were going to die then. The Knife is a podcast about real people whose lives were upended in an instant
00:21:10
we talk to the people who lived it unpacking what happened how they got through it
00:21:16
and what came next and on our off-record episodes we go even deeper into the reporting
00:21:21
and answer the questions you can't stop thinking about new episodes drop every Thursday
00:21:26
on the Exactly Right Network and the iHeart Podcast Network listen to The Knife on the iHeart Radio app
00:21:31
Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts All right. Well, then my story this week was suggested to me while I was on my extended vacation by my friend Janet Ramazzi, mother of Mary and Sophie, all three who listened to this podcast.
00:21:49
so hi everybody hi romansi ladies and because it takes place in san francisco and i was up there
00:21:56
so it's like it's kind of it's a hometown i never knew existed that's about the san francisco
00:22:02
chronicle newspaper which has been yes the our newspaper of note along with the examiner full
00:22:09
props to the examiner i don't think that one exists anymore but oh are you doing the zodiac
00:22:13
killer no i never heard of it what if i just unrolled this thing it was like it's four hours
00:22:19
long. No, this is actually, it's about the murder of San Francisco Chronicle founder,
00:22:25
Charles D. Young. Oh, this is fucking nutso. I'd never heard anything about this. You know,
00:22:32
we're now in Kate Winkler Dawson territory. This is very historical murder time. Okay.
00:22:37
I'm going to give my sources. The first one is an article from the San Francisco Chronicle
00:22:41
by writer Gary Kamiya. There's the New York Times archives from 1880. There's two articles from the
00:22:50
archives. Then there's a digital book from Google Books that's written by Charles F. Adams that's
00:22:57
called Murder by the Bay, Historic Homicide about the city of San Francisco. Then there is the San
00:23:03
Francisco Chronicle archives from newspapers.com. And it's the actual article by Charles DeYoung
00:23:10
about Calick. Then there's the Wikipedia page about Charles de Young, the Wikipedia page about
00:23:16
Isaac Smith Calick. And then there's the Charles de Young obituary from the New York Times archives
00:23:22
in 1884. Okay. So I will tell you, it starts in 1876. So this is like just past the minor 49er
00:23:31
era of San Francisco, where it basically gold mining, like up in Sacramento, Sutter Creek and
00:23:37
stuff brought all that money down into San Francisco, but it also brought all the miners
00:23:44
and then a bunch of crooks and a bunch of people that were going to steal your money
00:23:48
and a bunch of like, it was a gritty town. Okay. So this takes place in 1876 or, or this is this one of the starting points I should say.
00:23:59
Um, because the. That's when a very charming and boisterous pastor named Reverend Isaac Kallick moves from Kansas to San Francisco.
00:24:08
And he takes a job at the Baptist Metropolitan Temple. So this redheaded, red bearded, 240 pound preacher captivates a congregation of up to 5000 members every Sunday, which is the largest in the city.
00:24:25
And he soon wins over the hearts of many San Francisco believers. So much so that in August of 1879, the newly formed political faction in the area called the Working Men's Party nominates Calick to run for mayor.
00:24:41
Okay. So what the faithful of San Francisco don't know about Calick is that he isn't necessarily, hasn't always been, I should say, the pious man of God that he presents himself to be in the pulpit every Sunday.
00:24:56
Back in 1855, he had found it necessary to move from Boston, Massachusetts to Kansas to escape the bad reputation that he'd gotten for himself as a boozer and a gambler and a little loose with the ladies in his East Coast congregation.
00:25:14
Amen. Right? Callick never quit these less than holy habits. He just was able to conceal them better in Kansas to the point where he'd even started a political career there, becoming a Democratic leader in the Kansas state legislature.
00:25:30
Now, he's moved to San Francisco, hoping to rebuild his political career. But there's one man who stands in the way of his plans, and that is the editor in chief of the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper, Charles D. Young.
00:25:43
So basically up until this point, the Chronicle had supported the Working Man's Party.
00:25:49
But in the summer of 1879, the de Young family and the Chronicle jumped political ships and they started backing the opposing party, which was called the Honorable Bilks.
00:26:00
Cool. Cool name. When the news of Calick's nomination for mayor got to Charles de Young, the owner of the San Francisco Chronicle, he vows to compel Calick to decline the nomination.
00:26:14
So he doesn't like it. He doesn't like anything about it. And he's not into it. And I think maybe he'd done a little research.
00:26:22
Right. So a couple of days later, Charles DeYoung calls Calick and tells him to his face over the phone to step down from the mayoral race. And of course, Calick refuses. So Charles threatens to reprint a story of Calick's Boston scandals in the Chronicle.
00:26:41
Yeah. So Callick tells Charles to go ahead and then issues a vague thread of his own, saying that he can share equally terrible stories about the DeYoung family.
00:26:51
But Charles isn't scared at all. So on August 20th, 1879, the Chronicle releases its first in a series of disparaging stories about the Reverend Isaac Callen's past.
00:27:04
so the first article details um his many quote two intimate relations with several married and
00:27:13
unmarried members of his flock one of which actually led to a trial where 10 jurors found
00:27:19
him guilty of adultery although he was never sentenced there was another story that was a
00:27:24
quote escapade an escapade with one of the tremont temple choristers in boston and a third was about
00:27:31
a failure to pay his debt. So all of these scandals, as de Young says in the article,
00:27:37
lead to Calix being, quote, driven forth from Boston like an unclean leper. So essentially, it's now it's just like a battle is waging in the newspaper against this man.
00:27:49
De Young then publishes at least two more stories about Calix immoral exploits, including one that accused even Calix deceased father of sundry immoralities.
00:28:01
Just vague and being immoral vaguely. You know, just, yeah, he's just kind of a bad guy.
00:28:06
Yeah. Sundry. So Charles is now satisfied that all the bad press will destroy Kallick's reputation for good.
00:28:13
But for Kallick, this war has just begun. So let me just tell you a little bit about Charles D. Young and how he got to be the head of the San Francisco Chronicle.
00:28:21
He was born in 1846 in Louisiana. He's one of eight children. He has five sisters and two brothers.
00:28:28
And the younger two boys are Harry and Gustavus. And around 1854, their father dies, leaving their mother to care for eight children on her own.
00:28:39
So soon after, the whole family moves to San Francisco, where eight-year-old Charles gets work as a newsboy to help support the family.
00:28:47
So it's real serious. You know, everybody has to pitch in and get a job. So, of course, this is 1854 San Francisco.
00:28:55
So it's about as rough and dirty as it possibly can be. The quote here is, the great bulk of the population of San Francisco consists of gamblers, whiskey dealers, and miners who come to the city to dissipate their gains made in the mountains.
00:29:10
So it's a little bit like Vegas or Reno in that way. Or the Wild West in a way. Yes, it's completely the Wild West.
00:29:16
Yeah. Like there's a lot of gunplay in this story. Sounds fun, to be honest. So growing up in this environment makes Charles a particularly tough kid.
00:29:25
And he's very intelligent and really street smart. He never shies away from a fight.
00:29:30
And as he gets older, he makes a habit of carrying a revolver with him everywhere he goes.
00:29:35
Which kind of sounds like that was relatively common based on this story that I read.
00:29:41
And only this story. But at the same time, he has a very soft spot for his mother.
00:29:47
So he's a real gun-toting cowboy sweetheart. Okay. So he's not interested in school.
00:29:54
Amen. But he trying to make life as easy as possible for his elderly mother and the rest of his family So he focuses on work and he ends up landing an apprenticeship at a local printing office
00:30:06
And then soon after, in 1859, when he's 13 years old, he starts his own paper called The Holiday Advertiser.
00:30:14
What's up, 13? Yes, he's doing it. You can tell he's one of those 13 year olds that like he wore, he probably wore like a
00:30:23
little vest every day and had kind of a scratchy voice and was like. Had a timepiece with a pocket watch.
00:30:29
Yeah. I also love that his mom is called elderly. I bet she's 38. You know what I mean?
00:30:33
Like back then it was like. She's 38. She looks like she's 70. She can't walk. That's right.
00:30:38
And she's fucking had it. Yeah. Basically here. She's been exhausted by children.
00:30:43
Right. And by gunplay. And by her love of gold. So he fucking starts his junior high newspaper.
00:30:56
Yeah, it's like a zine. It's just like, you know what? So here's what he does. He's a businessman and a badass.
00:31:04
Once he gets the holiday advertiser off the ground, he turns around and he sells it.
00:31:08
Right? And then he joins forces with his brother, Harry, and he launches a new daily newspaper.
00:31:14
Now, this one focuses on the happenings and gossip in San Francisco's theater arts scene, and it's called The Dramatic Chronicle.
00:31:23
Fun. Right? Yeah. I mean, because you have to imagine in this era of San Francisco, there was tons of theaters and shows because all the minors are there to spend their money.
00:31:36
Right. Right? It's like, it's all about that. And he's like, so-and-so sleeping with so-and-so.
00:31:41
This person got fired from this and they're fighting with that person. Yeah. How fun. It's a gossip column.
00:31:46
And then one shows at eight and one shows at ten. Check your gun at the door. So they get enough advertisers and they release the first issue of the Dramatic Chronicle on January 16th, 1865.
00:32:00
At this point, Charles is 19 years old. So they've launched the Dramatic Chronicle.
00:32:05
So that newspaper's popularity grows. And then Charles and Harry enlist Gustavus, their other brother.
00:32:11
In just four years, they transform their little drama gossip rag into what will become the journalistic juggernaut of its time and beyond the San Francisco Chronicle.
00:32:23
Holy shit. So they basically take that and they just are like, no, we're going wide and this is going to be like the city paper.
00:32:29
Wow. Their impressive office building at the corner of Kearney Street and Bush Street becomes the paper's first headquarters.
00:32:36
And in a few years, the San Francisco Chronicle grows to be worth $250,000. But this is in the late 1860s.
00:32:47
Oh, my God. It's the equivalent of $6 million in today's money. Holy crap. So they're rich as fuck.
00:32:53
And they fucking do it. They start their own teen newspaper business. Wow. Oh, not like they're teens and they start a newspaper.
00:33:01
They're the teens, yeah. This is sassy. I mean, what if Sassy was a newspaper? I should have kept my copies of Sassy. I swear to God.
00:33:11
Absolutely you should have. I got Sassy first a dish because my mom, there was some magazine drive and my mom signed me up for,
00:33:20
it was supposed to be like Teen Vogue, but at the time it was new and they just never came out with
00:33:25
it. They were like, no, you're getting Sassy. Sorry, Sassy. Yeah. And I was like, great. I love it.
00:33:31
Oh my God. So Charles de Young is a man with strong opinions, good for a newspaper man. He's also open and honest, if not outright aggressive, in exposing the ills of his enemies' pasts through the use of the Chronicle newspaper.
00:33:47
And this comes in handy as the success of the Chronicle earns him political clout. So he starts using his publication to support candidates for various political offices when he likes them and disparaging the candidates he doesn't like.
00:34:00
and his sharp tongue earns him some enemies, but he isn't afraid of them in the least.
00:34:07
In fact, he's reported to be, quote, proud of the notoriety that he had obtained and proud of the
00:34:14
personal danger as a legitimate element of that notoriety. Wow. That's from the New York Times
00:34:20
archives. So this is like other newspapers talking about the newspaper and the newspaper owner.
00:34:25
When the news man becomes the news. Yeah, man. I just kind of like that idea that if you're going to start this business, that you have to be like, yeah, I'll fight you.
00:34:37
It's like, oh, no, this isn't some intellectual endeavor. It's just like, no, we're fucking going for it.
00:34:44
OK. Okay. So another element of San Francisco in the 1870s, but which by now it's the 1870s,
00:34:51
there's a lot of racial tension because there are 30,000 unemployed citizens because there's a big
00:34:57
recession in 1877. This is going to sound very familiar to you, but the poor white contingent
00:35:03
begins to focus their blame on Chinese immigrants who they claim are taking their jobs.
00:35:09
And so the Working Men's Party exploits this racist blame mentality and promotes themselves as the blatantly anti-Chinese party.
00:35:19
Wow. So they vow to bring back jobs to the poor white people. And here comes the Reverend Isaac Callick with his charisma and his speaking skills and his popularity.
00:35:30
He ends up being the perfect choice to lead this cause. So Charles de Young's disdain for Callick isn't just about a seedy pass.
00:35:39
It turns out the last mayoral candidate, mayoral, mayoral, mayoral. Who knows? Nobody knows to this day.
00:35:49
So I'm going to go ahead and put an I in there and say mayoral. It feels better.
00:35:53
Sounds right. Candidate that the Chronicle endorsed was Andrew J Bryant You may have heard of his street Oh yeah Bryant Street So he won the mayoral election in 1875 but then quickly fell out of favor when the recession came
00:36:09
Right. So Charles de Young is basically kind of has a chip on his shoulder about who he picked for mayor and the control that he may or may not have in politics.
00:36:20
May or may not. Mayoral may not. So basically, de Young prints insult after insult about Reverend Kallick for all of San Francisco to read.
00:36:31
In one passage, he writes, quote, at the head of the list of communist tyrants, stands Kallick, the mock minister traveling Mount Bank and carpetbag demagogue who wants to be mayor, but not because he is fit, but because he knows himself to be unfit for the pulpit and is probably an atheist and a blasphemer at heart.
00:36:52
What's up, minced words? Don't do it. It's like, take this down. And then he just starts ranting about all the different ways he can slam this guy.
00:37:01
So in response, Reverend Kallick delivers several rage fueled speeches calling all of the de Youngs, quote, the hyenas of society and, quote, hybrid whelps of sin and depravity.
00:37:15
In one speech, he even claims that if he's elected mayor, he vows to, quote, kill the San Francisco Chronicle.
00:37:22
He's going to murder the newspaper. He can't murder the newspaper. He's pissed. OK, but DeYoung is unrelenting.
00:37:30
He threatens that if Calick doesn't step down from the race, that he'll publish the transcript from Calick's Boston adultery trial.
00:37:38
This is like clickbait central, but it's oldie fashionie newspapers. This is a Twitter feud.
00:37:43
Right. So Kallick, he's not letting up at all, except for he only has the one bit, which is basically calling the family trash and saying the mother is a whore, essentially.
00:37:54
So he tells an audience he's speaking to one time, the DeYoungs are the bastard progeny of a whore conceived in infamy and nursed in the lap of prostitution.
00:38:05
Wow. So it's on. Yeah. It's on. Yeah. Okay. So the next day after that speech, August 23rd, 1879, Charles de Young hears about these comments and he loses his shit. He grabs his revolver. He marches out of the Chronicle office. He has his carriage driver take him to Calick's church. Around 10 a.m. Calick walks outside where he's greeted by a young boy. The boy points to the carriage on the street and tells Calick that a woman inside wants to pay him her respects.
00:38:36
So Kallik happily walks up to the carriage, but before he can grab the door handle, Charles DeYoung pulls back the curtain and fires a bullet at point-blank range right into the left side of Kallik's chest.
00:38:49
Holy shit. The horrified Kallik stumbles backwards, clutching his wound as Charles stands and steps closer and fires another shot into Kallik's thigh.
00:38:58
Then he jumps back into his carriage and orders the driver to pull away. But there's a hitch in his plan because there's a working men's party rally taking place nearby.
00:39:09
So when they hear the shots, they rush over. They surround DeYoung's carriage. The mob's ready to pull Charles from the carriage and kill him in the street.
00:39:19
He fends them off by threatening to shoot them. So he's waving that revolver around.
00:39:24
Finally, basically, the crowd doesn't retreat until the police come, arrest Charles, and take him away.
00:39:31
So Kallik's life hangs in the balance for the next nine days as a team of doctors and surgeons work to repair his wounds.
00:39:39
Competing papers report in favor of Kallik because, of course, it's their rival that actually participated in this attempted murder.
00:39:50
The shooting's called Cowardly and Cold-Blooded. And, of course, the working men's party is furious, especially Kallik's son, Isaac.
00:39:57
He issues a statement saying that he's confident his dad will recover and become mayor, adding, quote, if DeYoung does not hang, then help me kill him.
00:40:08
Whoa. Yeah. So it turns out Kallick does recover. No. Yeah. And he does it in just in time before the election.
00:40:18
The press surrounding the shooting helps boost Kallick's votes. Yeah. And he ends up winning the 1879 election and becomes the new mayor of San Francisco.
00:40:27
Nothing makes you more popular than surviving a fucking crazy ass shooting. Yeah.
00:40:33
And like coming back. And coming back and being like, hey, don't you think that was unfair?
00:40:40
If that can't take me down, nothing can. Vote for me. Vote for me. I can't be murdered with bullets.
00:40:46
That's right. Meanwhile, Charles DeYoung posts a $25,000 bond, gets out of jail, flees to Mexico, and hides out there waiting for the whole ordeal to blow over.
00:40:57
Yeah. Yeah, it is. So this is very Wild West. Yeah. I mean, it just. Yeah. It can't be.
00:41:05
They must have had dirt in the streets. Oh, yeah. I'm imagining. Cobblestones and dirt.
00:41:10
And horseshit. Horseshit. And it's just like, it's rough times. That's right. Okay.
00:41:15
So five months later in January, 1880, Charles returns to San Francisco. He comes back and he's the editor in chief of the Chronicle again.
00:41:24
He still is going to face a trial for the shooting. But in the meantime, he sends a reporter out to Boston to gather evidence that supports the claims that he initially made against Kallick.
00:41:35
So he wants it like on record. He wants the proof that he wasn't just saying your mom's a whore like Kallick was.
00:41:42
He's like, no, this guy is a bad guy. The adultery, the failure to pay debts, his all around bad pastor behavior.
00:41:50
But in the evening of April 23rd 1880 while Charles is working late into the night at the newspaper office Calick son Milton is sitting at a bar on Market Street brooding over his drink Been there
00:42:05
Done that. Brooding over a drink. He's got, as my dad would say, a pretty good heat on.
00:42:12
And he's got a five-shot revolver on his waistband, and he's got revenge on his mind.
00:42:17
This is the son. The son of the Reverend. Okay. His name is Milton, which is my favorite where it's like Milton's going to have his revenge.
00:42:26
Milt. Good old Milt's going to take care of it. He's wearing a sweater vest and he's going to have his revenge.
00:42:31
His name is Milton. So later that night, Charles is talking to an employee whose last name is Reed.
00:42:37
The office door swings open and Milton Kallick walks in the door. He points his gun at Charles and fires his first of five shots.
00:42:46
He misses Charles. Charles takes cover behind his employee. Oh, not cool. Uh-uh.
00:42:53
I think HR would have something to say about that. And then Milton fires his second shot.
00:42:58
The bullet comes close enough for gunpowder to burn Reed's face, but Milton had missed again.
00:43:04
Oh, my God. So Charles runs for the back exit. Milton follows closely behind, firing off another two shots that don't land.
00:43:12
So there's a chance that back then everyone had a gun, but no one actually knew how to use guns or shoot them.
00:43:19
He was stewing over a couple drinks, not just one. Oh, no, I think he had a bunch of drinks.
00:43:24
Yeah. So he's just like, boop-a-doo-ba-brook as shit. He's just like, are you over there?
00:43:29
I see. Why are there four of you? My eyes are crossed. Charles takes the opportunity to duck down and reach for his own revolver.
00:43:37
But before he can grab it, Milton unloads his last shot and it's actually through Charles's face.
00:43:45
He's killed instantly. Charles DeYoung was 34 years old. So while all this is happening, there's a group of DeYoung haters in a nearby bar.
00:43:56
And when they hear the gunshots coming from the Chronicle building, they rush over.
00:44:00
And then when they get there and when they see Charles de Young brought out on the stretcher with like the sheet over him, they all start cheering and celebrating in the street.
00:44:11
Oh my God. So he really did have a lot of enemies. You know, he was a controversial character.
00:44:17
Charles' funeral is held two days later on April 25th, 1880. While his friends and family mourn the loss and celebrate Charles' impressive and controversial life,
00:44:27
Callick's supporters boo and hiss the funeral procession as it passes by. Guys, let the family mourn.
00:44:34
No, they can't. So Milton Callick is promptly arrested after the murder and his trial is held in January of 1881.
00:44:43
208 witnesses provide their testimonies over the course of 22 days. So because they were at the Chronicle, all of the employees were there.
00:44:52
They all saw what happened. They all were able to tell the story. And they all were like, yes, it's clear he did it.
00:44:59
Milton's gun had clearly fired five shots while Charles's gun was never fired. It looks to be an open and shut case.
00:45:06
Until the end of the trial, when Milton's father, now Mayor Reverend Isaac Callick, takes the stand.
00:45:12
As the prosecuting attorney questions Mayor Callick, He notices the mayor clanging two small metal objects around in the palm of his hand as he's speaking.
00:45:23
Finally, unable to ignore the distraction any longer, the attorney asks the mayor, what's in your hand?
00:45:30
The mayor stands and says, these are the two bullets from DeYoung's murderous weapon, which were extracted from my body.
00:45:38
And then he turns and hands the bullets to the jurors. Oh, my God. What a power play.
00:45:45
Also, it's his murderous weapon, except for DeYoung didn't kill him. Right. Murderish weapon.
00:45:53
Murderesque. The jury deliberates for a few days, and then they find Milton Kallick not guilty of the murder of Charles DeYoung by reason of extenuating circumstances.
00:46:04
Damn. Mm-hmm. To make matters worse, one of the employees who testified to witnessing Milton murder Charles is hit with a perjury charge and ends up serving a stint in prison himself.
00:46:14
What? So now a free man, Milton Kallick skips town for a little while to let the dust settle on that whole ordeal.
00:46:21
When he eventually returns, he works as a lawyer in San Francisco until his death in 1930.
00:46:29
Wow. Yeah. His father, Isaac Kallick, serves two years as a mayor, then opts not to run for re-election in 1881.
00:46:38
He returns to his pastor job at the Baptist Metropolitan Temple for another two years.
00:46:43
Then he leaves that job in 1883. He moves to what was at the time Washington Territory.
00:46:50
It hadn't become a state yet. He takes up farming and he stays there until his death in 1887.
00:46:56
So in 1884, Harry de Young commissions sculptor F. Marion Wells to make an eight and a half foot bronze statue of Charles de Young at his grave in San Francisco's Odd Fellows Cemetery.
00:47:09
Then Harry takes over operations at the Chronicle, and he ends up running it for the next 50 years.
00:47:15
Wow. And the Chronicle is eventually built into a huge and well-respected publication, winning numerous Pulitzer Prizes and becoming famous for its writers, its columnists, and most importantly to me, its movie rating system that appeared in the Sunday edition of what they called the pink section, which was the entertainment section.
00:47:37
I was reminded of this in the Wikipedia page, but this truly is the best movie rating system there ever has been and ever will be.
00:47:47
And actually, and I found this in the Wikipedia page, Roger Ebert said the exact same thing.
00:47:54
Roger Ebert said, quote, the only rating system that makes sense is the little man of the San Francisco community.
00:48:00
Chronicle. So basically, this is the movie rating system. There is a tiny man sitting in a movie
00:48:06
theater seat. And the man is either sitting up out of his seat applauding. So it's like his butt
00:48:12
is like raised up three inches from the seat. That means he fucking loves this movie's going crazy.
00:48:19
That's one review you can get. Then he's just like sitting up really straight and clapping.
00:48:23
That's the second one. Then he's just sitting attentively and watching but not clapping.
00:48:28
That's the third one. Then he's asleep. Then the chair is empty. Those are the five ratings you can
00:48:35
get. Wow. In the Chronicle. And no joke. It's like I took it for granted. Everyone in the Bay Area
00:48:41
took it for granted because you would just go through it. It'd be like, oh, no, the chair's
00:48:46
empty. Like that's so complicated, though. Well, but visually, yeah, it's complicated to hear it
00:48:52
described. It makes sense when you see it. Visually, you get it immediately. Oh, my God.
00:48:56
It's a little man that looks like Wimpy that I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for him.
00:49:00
I see it in my mind. And he's either loving a movie like he's going apeshit or he fucking left.
00:49:06
Or he's sleeping. It's the greatest. And that is the story of the murder of Charles DeYoung, the founder of the San Francisco Chronicle.
00:49:15
Wow. I have never heard that. I had no idea. I'd never heard it at all. And I'm from there.
00:49:20
Yeah, that's wild. Wow. Great job. Thank you. twists and turns and dusty roads. Dusty old roads.
00:49:30
Dusty old roads. Your husband is not who you think he is. Your body is not what you thought it was.
00:49:36
Your identity is formed by a secret history. I'm Dani Shapiro, and these are just a few of the stunning stories
00:49:43
I'll be exploring on the 14th season of Family Secrets. And just then, we felt the plane turn in the air.
00:49:51
So much so that the bags that were under people's seats just kind of flew into the aisle.
00:49:57
Each week, we dive headfirst into the complex power of secrecy, how it shapes our identities and relationships,
00:50:03
and how it ultimately can reveal to us our truest selves. My daughter, she's pretending she doesn't know,
00:50:10
but is trying to cook and feed me and keep me alive because I wasn't eating anything.
00:50:14
And me pretending like everything was fine. He kind of shoved me out of the way and said, move.
00:50:19
And he went out the front door and he jumped in a car and drove off. And that was the last time I saw him.
00:50:24
Listen to season 14 of Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:50:32
When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands.
00:50:40
I vowed I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves.
00:50:47
We always say that, trust your girlfriends. Listen to The Girlfriends. Trust me, babe.
00:50:54
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. How much do you weigh, Wanda?
00:51:04
Right now, I'm about 130. I'm at 183. We should race. No, I want to leave here with my original hips.
00:51:10
On the podcast to match up with Lalia, I pair prominent female athletes with unexpected guests.
00:51:15
On a recent episode, I sat down with undisputed boxing champ, Clarissa Shields and comedian Wanda Sykes to talk about Wanda's new movie,
00:51:21
Undercard, the art of trash talk and what it really means to be ladylike. Open your free iHeartRadio app, search the matchup with Aaliyah and listen now.
00:51:29
Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports Network. This isn't historic, but so recently I was looking up just for fun,
00:51:40
locked room murders or locked room mysteries where someone's murder in a room that by all
00:51:47
intents and purposes, no one could have gotten into. And I came across the story I'd heard about.
00:51:54
It's the mysterious locked room murder of Greg Flanagan. And there's this great,
00:52:01
you know, long Vanity Fair article written by Mark Bowden. And it's a great article
00:52:07
in a really crazy, weird case. It's a mystery, but it's not. Okay. So the Locked Room Mystery
00:52:14
is essentially a murder is committed. There's no explanation for how the perpetrator was able to
00:52:20
get in or out of the crime scene without getting caught. And here's a pretty, pretty crazy one.
00:52:26
It's very Agatha Christie, this whole concept. Yeah. Yeah. So September of 2010,
00:52:33
55-year-old Greg Flinneken is living in Lafayette, Louisiana with his wife Susie.
00:52:39
The couple had married when they were young, divorced, went their separate ways, and then 15 years later, got married again.
00:52:46
Isn't that sweet? Yeah. They're very much in love. And Greg is the vice president of OGM Land Co., which is an oil company he started with his brother Michael.
00:52:57
And the company is doing really well. So Greg has this kind of weird schedule, work schedule.
00:53:04
So a lot of his work is conducted two hours away in Beaumont, Texas. So on Monday mornings, he drives out to Beaumont, checks into this hotel called the MCM Elegante Hotel.
00:53:19
Sounds elegant. Elegante. Elegante. It must be very elegant. And he stays in Beaumont until Thursday, going to work every day there, and then drives home and spends a weekend with his family.
00:53:32
And Greg is this kind of like, he's like this kind of salt and pepper, attractive, like handsomely rugged looking dude.
00:53:41
Looks like he's in good shape. Greg has been working the schedule for 10 years. He always stays at this elegant hotel.
00:53:50
It's like his place. He seems like a creature of habit. He could rent an apartment in Beaumont but he likes the simplicity of staying in a hotel and has kind of a ritual when he goes there which I totally appreciate So his ritual when he gets back to the room after a long day of work he always tired
00:54:09
of course, so he likes to watch a movie. So he gets on his bed, props himself up with two pillows, watches a movie, eats a candy
00:54:17
bar, drinks a soda and smokes cigarettes. Like that's his ritual. on september 15th 2010 greg is staying in room 348 at elegante he speaks to his wife suzy multiple
00:54:32
times throughout the day which is normal for them he spends the evening like he does every other
00:54:37
evening when he's in the hotel tonight he's eating a reese's crispy crunch bar drinking a root beer
00:54:45
smoking his ciggies and watching iron man 2 so just hanging out on the bed in his pajamas
00:54:51
The next day, Susie calls, but nobody answers, which is weird because Greg is known to always answer the phone when Susie called, even if he's in a meeting, which I love their codependency.
00:55:02
You know what I mean? Like, speaks to me. At around 930 that morning, Susie calls Greg's office and finds out that he's not there.
00:55:11
So, of course, she panics and two coworkers go to his hotel room. Nobody answers the door there.
00:55:16
And so management lets them in and they find Greg dead on the floor. And he's face down on the rug with a cigarette in between his fingers like he collapsed while walking across the room.
00:55:28
The police arrive and notice that there's no blood in the room. There's no obvious wounds on his body.
00:55:34
And there's also no sign of a break in or struggle. Nothing is missing from the room.
00:55:38
He had including his wallet. He had a stack of hundreds in it. It's still there.
00:55:42
So police don't suspect it's a robbery gone wrong. Because of the circumstances, everyone assumes that Greg's cause of death is just natural causes.
00:55:51
And it turns out Susie was like, well, yeah, he never exercised and he never went to the doctor.
00:55:56
So we kind of always figured and he ate whatever he want. He wasn't, you know, unhealthy, but he kind of lived the life he wanted to live.
00:56:03
So I think no one was really surprised by it being natural causes. And then police speak with guests who were staying at the hotel as well.
00:56:11
No one reports hearing or seeing anything unusual. The night before, in fact, a maintenance man had been in Greg's room around 830 that night.
00:56:19
while Greg was alive because he had tried to microwave a thing of popcorn and had blown the
00:56:25
fuses in like the whole hotel. So the maintenance man had to come up at 830. He was alive and wild.
00:56:32
So natural causes seem like the obvious reason. But Greg is transported to the medical examiner
00:56:38
just for the basic autopsy. Dr. Tommy Brown examines Greg's body and finds only two marks,
00:56:44
a one-inch abrasion where his face had hit the rug, and a half-inch laceration on his scrotum.
00:56:52
According to Vanity Fair, the article, the, quote, sack itself was swollen and discolored,
00:56:58
and around the room was a small amount of edema fluid. The bruising had spread up through the
00:57:05
groin area and across the right hip. So Dr. Brown theorizes that the wound to Greg's scrotum
00:57:11
was most likely caused by a hard kick. So when Dr. Brown opens Greg's torso up, he finds something he's not expecting.
00:57:20
It's a total mess. There's a lot of blood and internal damage, even though there's just that one little laceration outside.
00:57:26
There are small lacerations to his intestines, his stomach and liver. He also has two broken ribs and a hole in his heart.
00:57:34
Dr. Brown theorizes the injuries to Greg's chest and his body were caused by being beaten or crushed to death.
00:57:40
Oh, my God. Then he surmises that Greg bled to death in less than 30 seconds. And Dr. Brown rules Greg's death a homicide.
00:57:50
So when lead detective Scott Apple finds out that Greg was murdered, he is very surprised by it.
00:57:55
Homicide doesn't line up with the evidence in the room. And Greg's body doesn't show any outward signs of being beaten or crushed.
00:58:03
And there's no sign of an altercation at the hotel room. And no one at the hotel heard anything in the hallways or anything like that.
00:58:10
So Apple considers that maybe Greg had been beaten to death somewhere else and then his body was taken back to the room.
00:58:17
But it doesn't make sense because someone would have heard or seen something in that case.
00:58:22
Plus, Greg was found with that lit cigarette. So no one would have gone to the trouble to put a lit cigarette or a cigarette in his hand.
00:58:29
Yeah, that doesn't make sense. So Apple focuses on trying to find a motive. So maybe there was someone who wanted Greg dead.
00:58:37
But it doesn't seem that way. Everyone loved Greg. He didn't hear to have any enemies.
00:58:43
Susie described her husband as a kind and intelligent person who lived an honorable life.
00:58:50
She said Greg couldn't even tell a white lie and people respected that about him.
00:58:55
Apple also finds that Greg was never at the hotel bar. He didn't socialize with anyone. It's not like, you know, he's a partier.
00:59:01
Apple looks into the possibility that Susie had hired a hitman or maybe Greg's business partner, his brother Michael, had done so.
00:59:09
But once again, he finds that those are dead ends. Both Susie and Michael loved Greg very much.
00:59:15
So Apple looks into the hotel maintenance records again because, you know, the maintenance man had been in his room when he had broken a circuit, blown a circuit, whatever.
00:59:25
So it had affected the power in multiple rooms besides Greg's. He called the front desk to let him know what happened. The maintenance man is sent to his room to reset the breaker.
00:59:34
And it turns out when Apple looks into the maintenance man, he finds out that the man is a sex offender.
00:59:40
So Apple theorizes that perhaps the man punched Greg's scrotum with a screwdriver as some kind of sexual assault.
00:59:48
And that's what caused the internal injuries, maybe. But this angle doesn't pan out.
00:59:53
It just doesn work They just trying to put something together The other lead is about some electricians staying in the room next to Greg At the time Greg was murdered a group
01:00:05
of electricians from Wisconsin are all staying at the hotel for months while they worked on a
01:00:11
refinery expansion. And on the night Greg was killed, three of the electricians were in the room
01:00:17
next to Greg's partying. They had been questioned on the day that Greg's body had been found. They
01:00:23
all said they hadn't heard or seen anything. But Apple keeps going back to these three electricians.
01:00:29
He knows that they're known to get drunk together and party. He theorized that the men were drinking
01:00:36
when maybe when Greg blew the circuit, maybe the men knocked on Greg's door, were pissed about it.
01:00:41
Some words were exchanged and then a fight could have broken out in the hallway. Then maybe Greg
01:00:47
was kicked in the scrotum by one of the electricians who was probably wearing steel-toed boots,
01:00:51
You know, just this far-fetched theory. And then Greg went back to his room and collapsed.
01:00:57
But the theory doesn't make sense. Again, the cigarette found between his fingers and no one heard anything like that.
01:01:02
Right. So in November, after a few months of no answers, Greg's family announces a $50,000 reward.
01:01:09
That leads nowhere. And so Susie hires a man named Ken Brennan, who's a former police officer and DEA special agent now working as a private detective.
01:01:21
He's got like a really strong New York accent. It seems sounds kind of rad. In April, Brennan meets with Apple and they go to the hotel room where Apple tells Brennan everything he knows, like they're going to work together on this case.
01:01:36
Brennan says that Apple's theory about the electricians is the most plausible. And they start looking into this angle further.
01:01:43
They re-interview the electricians who had been staying in the rooms throughout the hotel.
01:01:48
One says he heard rumors about a gun going off in one of the rooms, but he isn't sure if it's related.
01:01:56
And Apple and Brennan go back to Greg's hotel room and scour the area for a bullet hole.
01:02:02
They check the floor, the furniture, the walls, but they don't find anything. And then according to Vanity Fair, just as they're about to give up, Brennan, quote, notices an indentation in the wall alongside the closed door that leads into the adjoining room.
01:02:17
Ooh. The indentation looks like a repair job. They decide to go into the adjoining room where the electricians had been and look at that side. There's a hole that lines up with the one that goes into Greg's room. It had been patched with toothpaste.
01:02:35
Oh, that's like an old college dorm room trick. Right. Like, yeah, you won't get caught or like...
01:02:42
Right. Any kind of, if you have a pin prick in the wall, you cover it with a little toothpaste.
01:02:46
Yeah. So it turns out it is a bullet hole which had traveled through the wall of 349 where the dudes were partying and had exited through the adjoining door to room 348, the exact spot where Greg had been sitting, propped up watching Iron Man 2.
01:03:05
He got shot through the wall. Brennan and Apple go back to the medical examiner, Dr. Brown, with their findings.
01:03:13
He's like, that's impossible. He was not shot. There's no way I wouldn't have seen that.
01:03:19
He had seen no evidence of a bullet hole. But as they look over the autopsy photos, they realize that the bullet had entered Greg's scrotum.
01:03:27
And according to Vanity Fair, Dr. Brown hadn't realized it was a bullet entry because, quote, the scrotum was soft and pliable.
01:03:35
It had folded over the entry wound, making it less obvious that it was actually there.
01:03:41
God, that's so, that's just so odd and like. And like, what are the chances? Yes, completely.
01:03:49
After entering the scrotum, the bullet had bounced around inside of Greg's torso, damaging organs as it went.
01:03:57
And the hole that had been found in Greg's heart had also been a bullet hole. Oh my God.
01:04:02
So it entered a scrotum, went through his body and did at his heart. So everything now makes sense to them. When Greg was shot, he was smoking a cigarette in bed. After being shot, he got off the bed and moved towards the door. He probably just had this sharp pain and didn't know what it was. So he gets up to go to the door, but he falls face first to the ground and dies before he could make it, which explained why he still had a cigarette in his hand when he fell.
01:04:28
Dr. Brown's now convinced that Greg died of a gunshot wound, not of a beating or crushing.
01:04:34
So Brennan and Apple decide to re-interview those electricians who had been in 349.
01:04:40
They first meet with Tim, and he tells them that he doesn't know anything. But after detectives tell him what they know and that they know something happened, Tim confesses.
01:04:50
On the night of September 15th, the three men were drinking in the room. At some point, Lance asked Trent to go get a whiskey bottle and his nine millimeter pistol from his car.
01:05:01
Trent comes back and Lance takes the gun and starts playing with it. And the gun goes off accidentally.
01:05:08
And a bullet hit the wall behind them. They didn't go check to see if the bullet had struck anyone.
01:05:14
I mean, what are the fucking chances it would have? Right. But still, the chances are good.
01:05:20
It happens all the time. don't fucking play with guns you fucking idiot absolutely why is that a thing why can't men just
01:05:28
be like hey i like hanging out with you instead they're like go get my gun i have to play with my
01:05:33
gun in front of you yeah my loaded gun guns should have breathalyzers i mean good lord i know it just
01:05:42
shouldn't be yeah anyway yes um they didn't go check instead lance freaks out wraps the gun up
01:05:49
took it back to the car. Trent went back to his room. They were all really upset about it And Lance and Tim used toothpaste and toilet paper to fill the bullet hole in the room Then went to the hotel bar and kept drinking They say they didn know anyone had been hurt until Greg was found the next morning
01:06:07
They freak out and Tim thought Lance had killed the guy. Like they obviously could tell what was happening.
01:06:14
Lance gives an attorney the gun. Then the attorney looks at the original autopsy and is like, no, he got beaten to death.
01:06:22
So you didn't actually kill him. So you don't need to go forward with that. So Lance figured he was clear of all wrongdoing.
01:06:29
You know what I mean? Yeah. So the electricians stay at their job until it's complete.
01:06:34
They go back home to Wisconsin. They don't tell anyone what happened. Before leaving the station, after being questioned,
01:06:40
Tim calls Lance in front of Brennan and Apple, tells him that he'd confessed after officers told him that Greg had died from a gunshot wound.
01:06:49
Lance refuses to believe it. But then Tim tells him it's true and he should contact his attorney and detectives.
01:06:57
So the other guy, Trent, corroborates what Tim had said and Lance Mueller is arrested.
01:07:02
And finally, the locked room mystery of Greg Flanagan is solved. So in October 2012, 48 year Lance pleads no contest to manslaughter.
01:07:13
He faces sentencing from probation to 20 years and he ends up getting sentenced to 10 years.
01:07:19
After the judge tells him that he had just gone to authorities or at least checked to see if anyone had been hurt after he fired the gun, he probably wouldn't have gotten in trouble.
01:07:29
But he didn't. And that is the locked door murder mystery of Greg Flanagan. God, it's just a tragedy all around.
01:07:40
It's like there's so much to lose. There's so much to lose. He was 55 and, you know, living his life.
01:07:49
Also just random and crazy. Yeah. Yeah. Like what, what, like what the chances I feel like are one in a million that they would hit someone who was sitting in an exact fucking spot.
01:08:03
Yeah. And like not even hit him in the arm, like hit him and killed him. Yes. Within moments.
01:08:10
Yes, exactly. Like the, the, the odds are insane. And also just, just in one second, everything changes and everything.
01:08:20
And they don't know, but they also didn't ask. Like you shoot a gun through a wall in a hotel.
01:08:26
Yeah. I would have somebody check on it. I would call down. Absolutely. And be like, hey, we fucked up really bad.
01:08:31
Yeah. But that idea that you're kind of like, I'm sure it's fine. Right. I mean, even I hate to say that because, you know, there's no malice.
01:08:41
That was just a stupid drunken mistake. Totally. it's really it's tragic and yeah that's that's what happens when you play with guns yeah absolutely
01:08:52
god should we do a couple fucking arrays sure i'll go first you want me to go ahead okay
01:08:59
um this was emailed to us it starts fucking hooray i quit drinking two years ago today
01:09:07
i obviously didn't know that nine weeks into sobriety the entire fucking world would shut
01:09:12
down and I might lose my business and home. I've been hilariously pissed at myself for my terrible
01:09:17
timing. But just imagining where I might find myself today after those months in quarantine
01:09:22
with fear, anxiety and booze makes me so fucking relieved. So cheers to pushing 50 and coping with
01:09:28
the pandemic, menopause and this hellscape we call home with the help of medical science and
01:09:34
the world's greatest friends, not alcohol. Oh, nice. No. Wait, who wrote that? I didn't sign it.
01:09:42
Oh, Anon. Anon. Alcoholic Anonymous. Amazing work. And you know what? It's so it's such a good point to make that, like, everybody gets to have their escape however they need it.
01:09:54
We all need our oblivion, as my therapist likes to say. But it does add to it. You know, alcohol is a depressant.
01:10:02
And the idea that that person is appreciating, it's almost like it's good to practice doing hard things.
01:10:10
it's good to practice doing the thing you don't want to do because then the next hard thing is a
01:10:16
little bit easier because you do it i love that yeah that's that's actually a quote from my cousin
01:10:21
stevie he's the one that said that that's a really great point though too it's like i get grumpy that
01:10:26
i have to do the things i don't want to do but the things that i know will help me like not drinking
01:10:31
and exercise but yeah you practice those and then the big things come that are even harder to do and
01:10:37
you're, you've, you can believe in yourself. It's like challenge practice where you're just kind of
01:10:41
like, then you can, then everything doesn't feel so overwhelming. If you're kind of like, all right,
01:10:46
this isn't, it's like when we were texting earlier, I'm like, it's not the hardest thing
01:10:50
we're ever going to do. We can do it. Yeah. Which is, you know, that's like, I stole that from
01:10:54
someone else too, where I was complaining about going to the dentist. Cause I didn't come to the
01:10:57
dentist in a long time. And the person who said it to me, I was like, it's not the hardest thing
01:11:02
you're ever going to do. And I was like, yeah, so you're right about that. Oh God.
01:11:05
My first one is from Anya from Twitter, Anya underscore 0515. This is from back in November.
01:11:15
I printed these ones up and I have them just sitting on my desk. I know. They're so minor old.
01:11:20
They're evergreen. Yeah. So Anya says, my fucking hooray is that yesterday I got to open a production of RNH.
01:11:28
What does that mean? RNH is... Rodgers and Hammersteins. Cinderella, in which I play Cinderella.
01:11:35
showing all the children of color in my community they can be whatever they want to be.
01:11:40
Oh, my God. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That is beautiful. Congratulations, Anya. That's incredible.
01:11:47
I hope that run of Cinderella was amazing because, yeah, I bet it's over now. All right.
01:11:53
My last one. This one's called Fucking Hooray, now featuring Tearaway Pants. Oh.
01:12:00
This is from Megan. My fucking great is that my boyfriend, who I spent all of Christmas Day roasting for wearing tearaway pants, ended up tearing off his pants in front of my whole family to reveal nice clothes and then propose to me.
01:12:19
How good is that? Oh, I'm so jealous. Oh, good. That's such a, oh, that's the best.
01:12:25
So how did he propose to you? Well. Whoosh. Tear away pants. He showed up all sloppy and I had to give him shit for looking sloppy.
01:12:35
He knew that would bug her. Yeah, what a good move to like, hey, Megan, in front of the whole family.
01:12:41
Hilarious. He knows how close I am with my family and enlisted the help of my mom to make it absolutely perfect.
01:12:46
Love it. He also picked out the ring all by himself and showed it to my mom, whose response was,
01:12:51
you literally found Megan in ring form. God, congratulations, Megan. High five. High five in tarot pants.
01:13:01
This is also Twitter from Roman Danvers, RM Danvers. My fucking hooray is that after two years and seven months of not speaking I saw my parents and we are now on track to having a better relationship They also told me that they were proud to have me a trans man as their son
01:13:20
Oh, God. Right? Chills. Congratulations, Roman. Oh, my God, Roman. What an incredible name, first of all. But oh, my God, two and a half like that.
01:13:30
Also, just the ability to stick in and keep trying with something that hurts so bad and is so difficult is the amount of strength that shows.
01:13:44
Because it is all about repair work, as we know, in the long term. And that is an incredible accomplishment.
01:13:50
And it really says something about Roman's parents, too. Yeah. And it's such a it's such a mature.
01:13:56
It's a much like it's mature to decide that you don't need a relationship with people who have hurt you.
01:14:01
But it's just as mature to decide that you want to work through those things to have a different and better relationship with someone.
01:14:09
Yeah. Yeah. He killed it. Yeah. Congratulations, Roman. Guys, great fucking arrays. Keep sending them in and then we'll read them in three months.
01:14:18
We'll read them when we read them. they were in a drawer mine had to simmer in the drawer a little bit to just get to the perfect spot they had to age lightly lightly aged perfectly aged Oh my God Um yeah I think that it for us right Yeah You guys all of this epic stuff we couldn fucking obviously do without you
01:14:36
We're nothing without you. We're nothing. And we appreciate you so much. We, we are huge fans of yours.
01:14:42
Yeah. So stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Goodbye. Elvis, do you want a cookie?
01:14:48
This has been an Exactly Right production. Our producer is Hannah Kyle Crichton.
01:14:56
Associate producer, Alejandra Keck. Engineer and mixer, Stephen. Ray Morris. Researchers, Jay Elias and Haley Gray.
01:15:04
Send us your hometowns and your fucking hoorays at myfavoritemurder at gmail.com.
01:15:08
And follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at myfavoritemurder and Twitter at myfavemurder.
01:15:14
And for more information about this podcast, our live shows, merch, or to join the fan cult, go to MyFavoriteMurder.com.
01:15:21
Rate, review, and subscribe! Your husband is not who you think he is. Your body is not what you thought it was.
01:15:29
Your identity is formed by a secret history. I Dani Shapiro and these are just a few of the stunning stories I be exploring on the 14th season of Family Secrets He kind of shoved me out of the way and said move And he went out the front door and he jumped in a car and drove off And that was the last time I saw him
01:15:47
Listen to season 14 of Family Secrets on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
01:15:54
You know the famous author Roald Dahl. He thought up Willy Wonka and the BFG. But did you know he was a spy?
01:16:01
Neither did I. You can hear all about his wildlife story in the podcast, The Secret World of Roald Dahl.
01:16:08
All episodes are out now. Was this before he wrote his stories? It must have been.
01:16:12
What? Okay, I don't think that's true. I'm telling you, the guy was a spy. Binge all 10 episodes of The Secret World of Roald Dahl.
01:16:20
Now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Joy is essential and it's also elusive.
01:16:28
But now there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence.
01:16:34
Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Hoda Kotb. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting, and moving on-air chats.
01:16:45
Open your free iHeartRadio app, search Joy 101, and listen now. Joy 101 with Hoda Kotb is presented by CVS.