220 - Live at the Chevalier Theatre in Medford, MA (2018) | My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

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This is exactly right. Isn't some far off concept? It's already here. Next starts now.

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selling a persona of confidence and care, patients trusted him. He wore cowboy boots in the operating room

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and became sought after by patients. He promised to heal them. Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies.

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What's up, Boston? What's up, Boston? Wow! Fucking night three! Oh my god! Three!

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Night two, show three. Oh, yeah, no, that makes sense. I feel a little insane. Oh, I'm absolutely over the edge, for sure.

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We've done five nights in a row. Is that right? I don't know. It's been a crazy week.

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My dress smells so bad. Oh, I can't even. If smells were colors, I would look like Pigpen right now, for sure.

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There would just be a cloud. It's one of those aura photos. And I'm like, oh, I'm so mysterious.

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And I just smell. I stink. I stink. I stink. My undergarments are begging for mercy.

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Here's the thing. If you want to start like a side business, figure out a way to make Spanx deodorized in some way.

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Because, you know, us ladies on the road, and we know there's a lot of us out there,

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you can't just wash your shit all the time no and I personally think washing something in a hotel sink

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is grosser than just wearing it five days in a row hard to tell hard to tell I didn't tell you this

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but when we were in New York we got hotel rooms that had separate bathtubs which is the only way I'll take a bathtub

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if there's not a shower just rinsing other people's bodies into it which now I've learned

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the bathtub is the same fucking thing because when I got out of the first night,

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we would get you. I didn't think about it. I know. You don't need to explain. I came out with someone else's body glitter

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all over my fucking body. What? Swear. Swear. Someone went to a fucking rave or something.

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Or like Rebecca Romijn after she played that one part in that one movie. Exactly.

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Blue sparkles. Came out and I was like, I didn't put anything sparkly in the bathtub.

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That's hilarious. Never again. What if someone got a hotel room just so they could fill a bathtub with sparkles and then get into it?

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Then I want to be their best friend. My family won't let me be myself. I had to go into New York City and have an anonymous bathtub experience.

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Yeah. That's really funny that up until that point you thought that the bathtubs were very sterile.

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I know. Sterile environment. No, I know. I feel foolish. What are you going to do?

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Look. Listen. This is how we learn and grow. That's right. Slogan number one. Keep your eye peeled for all the other ones.

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If we're doling out advice to traveling women, may I say? And we are. And we always are.

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That's the point of this show. I would suggest having a hardcore homework podcast so that you don't have time to get into drugs and alcohol while you're on the road

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because you're sitting in your hotel room working on a story that you've changed five times.

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In an hour. Poor Stephen. Stephen, can you get me pictures of... Oh, no. Tim! He's not here.

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He's not here simply because he can't leave his... He can't deal... You can't work with us on the road.

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We're insane. Literally, every five minutes. Never mind, I can't do that murder.

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It's fucking horrible. Can I do this one instead? You have to check with him to make sure the other one's not doing it.

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Wait for the okay. You get the okay, and then you change your mind immediately. Yeah.

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Just keep asking and asking. Yes. Poor, poor Stephen. He likes cats, and he likes Georgia's cats, and that's about it.

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You know how sometimes we're like, I really love looking at crime scene photos, and Karen

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doesn't, and some people do, and some people don't. Well, he just has to look at photos for us to pull for the live shows.

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It's very sad. It's so sad. Just like you just realized bathtubs are dirty, I just realized how sad life is for Stephen

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because of us. It's too bad we don't pay him anything. It's all volunteer. He's like our intern.

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That not true Just like how Vince was like people always say to me like it so nice that you help them out on the road And he like I get paid Yeah motherfuckers we pay him I not like husband do this thing for us please We like can we hire you

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Because we're going to ask a lot of you. Exactly. And we don't want to feel bad about it.

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We'll pay you more than average so that you do way more than expected. But we're having a great time. This is not complaining. No.

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Oh, God. Seems like it's important to say. I wonder if I should tell my story from last night.

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Oh, wait, first, let's take a look at some outfits, because we didn't do this last night,

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and it was absolutely heartbreaking when we realized it afterwards. I think the only important thing, I have a dress on, there's cheap shoes.

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Everyone knows this by now. But, Karen, let's talk about your dress. Well, okay.

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I, uh, thank you. Oh, thank you. No, don't. You don't have to. Thank you so much.

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I ordered this randomly off of Land's End, which is a catalog that actually cuts clothes for people who wear clothes.

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Like human people. Human people who wear clothes. Not like hanger bodies? Not hanger bodies, not teens.

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Just a lady. Maybe a lady who's got her own farm in upstate New York. I don't know.

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A person that just wants to be in. but so I ordered this dress because I was like that's a pretty pattern that's fun

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and then it came I tried it on miraculously it fit I was just like god damn you Lanzen

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thank you it's fucking established in 1864 or whatever and then as I'm trying it on I'm like

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what do we have here yeah pockets I didn't even know it was like my birthday surprise

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from Land's End they were all sewn sometimes they do that for I don't know why so no one gets in there before you do

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it's like all sewn up but I was like oh my god look at how deep those pockets are

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I go so deep. Those are her cough drops. Those are my cough drops. It's like they knew that Marge, who owns a farm upstate,

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is not going to go to wherever she's going to wear this dress to and not need pockets.

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Yes, we all need fucking pockets. We all need pockets. And you know, someone sent us this,

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but I love this idea that they stopped putting pockets in women's clothes because they didn't want them to carry concealed weapons.

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What? Yeah. That's what I heard. It might be a rumor. Ladies. But I love it. Let's get back to our roots, you guys.

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Carrying concealed weapons. Yeah, tell your story from last night. Okay, so let's see.

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Last night, at the end of last night, last night we did two shows here, which were both amazing.

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You guys are amazing crowds here in Boston. Yeah. So good. We've seen you riot over sports,

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so we were kind of nervous. That people are going to get mouthy. But everyone's been amazing.

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And so just, they've really been great, great shows. But of course, after the second meet and greet,

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and we left her after midnight or whatever, we get home. Wait, first we go through the drive-thru at Kelly's.

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At Kelly's. You guys. Jesus, why don't we have that? I mean. California. I got a fucking yes

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we did it you don't want to talk about your order? no it was really good but I was telling these guys

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I had roast beef bad dreams afterwards you can't just eat a big handful of roast beef at like

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1am and then be like everything's fine goodnight bad things happen you were in it

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we were escaping things I was there with you. It was very, very real and scary. Yeah, we were escaping roast beef.

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There was a roast beef tidal wave. Like the molasses flood, but roast beef. Yeah.

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So we're like, right, we finally get to the hotel. We split up our food, and we're walking through, and we all say goodnight.

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These guys get off on the floor under mine. I get off on the floor and then I'm walking down the hall and I hear the pitter-patter of little feet behind me.

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And I'm like, if this is someone that was at the show. So I just start running up the hall.

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I was so fucking close. I was like 15 feet away from bed and roast beef and like feet up.

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And I hear them running too. Oh no. Chasing you. So I stop and turn around and they all stop. It's like four girls. They go like this like from the show

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I I assumed they could have been staying there and just having some fun I don't know what was going on, but I just went good night

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Maybe I'll meet you at a later date, but fuck no am I gonna talk to you right now?

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Oh my god, you have french fries getting cold. My eyes were bright red. I couldn't feel my feet anymore

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I was just, I was so tired. I have the light flu. No, it's fine. Maybe I shouldn't have told that story.

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It seems very Mariah Carey 99. That's not how I meant it. But this isn't. This is my favorite murder of the podcast.

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Yeah, this is the podcast, my favorite murder. That's Karen Kilgariff. That's Georgia Hardstart.

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Yes. We very very happy to be here with you Very happy to be on the run And especially that um not like how Brooklyn was serving canned wine at the live show

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That got loud because did you guys know that in a can of wine, here's a fucking insider tip that says it on the fucking can.

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Uh, it's two and a half glasses of wine. It's not a can of wine and like a can of beer.

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They didn't tell anyone that. Yeah. It got drunk, the part of the show. And Vince has a theory that when they make a drink this special where it's like,

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my favorite murder can of wine, where people are like, well, I have to have one.

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I mean, like everyone's just going like, I wouldn't normally, but give me four cans of wine, please.

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I'm going to go off tonight. It's happening. Yeah. Should we sit down? Well, let's do it.

00:12:47

You guys How cute is this Tiny table How cute is this table It's the tiniest table

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It's just the littlest table This table is a set piece From the new PBS series The Miniaturist

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You may have seen it When you guys came here Probably for the Price is Right Live that was here

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In this theater We still have to get information about it We haven't found out about any of the...

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Was Plinko there? I don't know. Did people win actual money? Did somebody drive a car onto the stage?

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That can't happen. That would have been the best. Yeah. The huge wheel. Did they have a miniature size of the huge wheel?

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Hence, maybe the table. Was it this? We pull this off and it's got all the numbers.

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One dollar. Who goes first? Oh, tell them what this is. This is a true crime. Oh, this is a true...

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Say my line. Do you want it? This is a true crime comedy podcast. We like to warn people because we also should define,

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sometimes there are people that come to these shows with people who really like the podcast.

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They've never heard of the podcast before. We like to call those people drag-alongs.

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They don't know what's going on. They're just trying to be supportive of their friend or mate.

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They got offered free dinner, and they're like, fine. Fine, I'll do this thing with you that you keep talking about that I don't understand.

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Fine, I'll sit next to you while you cry and do weird shit. We thank you for doing that.

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We thank you for being here. Supportive. But we do want to warn you that this is a true crime comedy podcast.

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So we're talking about murder. We're talking about death. We're talking about the darkest, worst shit that society has to offer.

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But we also do it in a comedic way. So we make jokes and make each other laugh while we do it.

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And sometimes that can be kind of a difficult combination for people who don't understand or might not want to give us the benefit of the doubt.

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So for those people who are offended by that combination, you should probably get the fuck out right now.

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And we say that with so much love and thoughts and prayers. Yes. So many thoughts and prayers.

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Yeah. Which heals everything. there was a woman last night who didn't get the fuck out

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she stayed even though her friends who dragged her along told her that this was a murder mystery show

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it's just like murder mystery theater just come we walk out and they're like so those are the costumes?

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what era is this set in? I don't understand am I going to get tapped on the shoulder

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and then I have to guess? and then I fall over dead whose murder are we solving?

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and what is a podcast? Yes, exactly. You're saying it's on my phone? It's already there?

00:15:41

I don't know. I don't like to tap buttons too much. It's icky. So what we're saying is welcome.

00:15:49

Welcome. Yeah. Welcome. Thanks. Yeah. Sure. This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace.

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Yes, please. Don't we all kind of need that? like the eye of an expert? Yeah. Where should I put this? And also what should I move here and

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It is you. Yes. All right. So like I said, let's see what you landed on. Yeah. I landed on

00:19:20

a great one, meaning a horrible one, but wow, I had never heard of it. But it got to it through a lot of horror beforehand.

00:19:29

I can't talk about that in front of all these people, one of those. Sure. You guys have a lot of those here.

00:19:34

Yeah. Thank you. Really no shortage of horrible things happening in the state of Massachusetts.

00:19:42

Like the spelling of your state. Seriously. Dude. How many T's and C's do you people love?

00:19:50

You guys want all the S's? Jesus Christ, you can have them. But this one is one of those ones that I hate and love

00:20:01

because it's such a time and place. It takes place in the late 70s when everything was great.

00:20:07

Go outside, go play, tell it's dark. You know, don't lock your doors, everything's fine.

00:20:13

And then this thing happens and it changes everything forever. This is the murder of Mary Lou Arruda.

00:20:20

Yeah, totally. This is the one I landed on because, fuck. All right. Okay. So there's this town called Rainham.

00:20:32

I wrote it as Rainham. Is it Rainham? Okay, Rainham. Listen to how it's spelled.

00:20:40

Ready for this? Yes. R-A-Y-N-H-A-M. That sounds like a yoga teacher's name. That Y doesn't need to be in there.

00:20:50

She's vegan. You know it. So Rainham is a town in Bristol. Are you all right? Are you just going to pronounce it both ways the whole time?

00:21:00

I forgot. Well, you see it phonetically. You just say it even though it's wrong sometimes.

00:21:06

Sure. And that's how you get a podcast. Worcester. Worcester. Yeah. Oh, we've learned all your lessons.

00:21:16

Now we're just scary. Yeah. So it's a town in Bristol County, Massachusetts, located just 32 miles south of Boston and 22 miles northeast of Providence, Rhode Island.

00:21:30

Where everyone keeps telling us to go. Back in the late... What happened? It looked like you were going to tell them when we were going to go.

00:21:40

And they were just like, no. Back in the late 70s, Raynham was a small, safe bedroom community

00:21:49

with a population of about 8,000 people. That's not a lot of people. But then an event occurred

00:21:57

which changed life forever there, as it always fucking does. One resident said it was like

00:22:04

someone ripped the canvas of the Norman Rockwell painting, which I think is such a symbolic thing.

00:22:10

Okay. All right. September 8th, 1978, about 4 p.m., 15-year-old Mary Lou Arruda.

00:22:18

She's a high school sophomore, sweet baby angel. She was on the cheerleading squad, normal girl.

00:22:23

She gets on her bike. It's an orange 10-speed. And she heads down the one-mile ride from a friend's house toward her home along Dean Road.

00:22:32

At the time, it was like a dirt road surrounded by beautiful forests. I'm sure it's turning into fall. You know, lovely, idyllic place.

00:22:40

about half an hour later uh a boy finds her bike on that road and takes it home to her family's

00:22:46

house like it's such a small town that it's like this is mary lou's bike i'll take it there and of

00:22:51

course her family's like this isn't fucking right and immediately call the police to report her

00:22:55

missing um thankfully rain and police department aren't like police departments that we talk about

00:23:01

all the fucking time that we're like i bet she just ran away goodbye yeah thank god they weren't

00:23:07

fucking like that. And this is actually a really interesting story because it really is a great

00:23:11

example of how police should be. So police officer David Bonaparte, he immediately sounds the alarms

00:23:20

when he hears what's going on. Most police departments at the time require at least 24 hours

00:23:25

before declaring a person missing. But Bonaparte was a rookie officer who hadn't even yet been to

00:23:30

to the police academy, and so he went against conventional wisdom immediately. He was just like, you know what, I'm a cop too.

00:23:40

I've watched so many episodes of Beretta. I have this, you guys. I have it. Don't know how that works, but that's what I read,

00:23:49

and I wrote it. Yeah. That's how we do it. That's how I do things. So his quick reaction, along with the action of the rest

00:23:56

of the police department, and a lot of people think ended could have been a long career of a potential serial killer.

00:24:04

Within minutes of Mary Lou's abduction, then-chief Peter King, so Chief King, he's the chief and the king.

00:24:12

I bet he got so much shit for that. He and his department preserve the crime scene

00:24:18

on that fucking dirt road. They go there, they gather evidence that probably wouldn't have been around the next day

00:24:24

because, you know, drivers and all this stuff. So they got photos of the tire tracks.

00:24:31

So next to where her bike was found, there was a tire track that looked like it had accelerated away.

00:24:37

So they get photos of the tire tracks, and they note that the tire tracks show abnormal wear pattern.

00:24:43

And also nearby, they find a Benson and Hedges cigarette butt. Those are the kind my mom used to smoke.

00:24:50

Aww. Benson and Hedges Lights 100s. And we'd walk down to the store and buy them for her.

00:24:58

How much did they cost? Do you remember? No, we just, it was probably three bucks or something.

00:25:02

It was whatever she put into our hand. Such a wonderful time. This is that time.

00:25:10

This is that time. This is the exact time. It's also the same time that Aegis' that's our corner store.

00:25:15

It was a mile away. And they also had a gas pump out in front. And that's usually where we got gas.

00:25:20

And I remember one time my mom was, the guy came out to pump the gas. And my mom kind of like looked and then she rolled up the window and lit a cigarette at the gas pump.

00:25:30

Oh, no. And she's like, oh, here's how I'll solve the safety of the exterior issue of blowing us up.

00:25:37

Jesus. He just fucking hot boxed my mom's Benson and Hedges lights 100. With children inside of it.

00:25:46

Yep. Yes. Oh, the olden days. Times were so much better then. No, they weren't. They were terrible.

00:25:53

Yeah, it wasn't good. It was great for adults. They could do whatever the fuck they wanted.

00:25:58

I mean, they partied like fucking crazy. They did. All right. So they also found a cigarette butt.

00:26:02

They picked that fucking thing up. They're like on it. And they're also able to immediately get statements

00:26:08

from several witnesses who had been driving in the area. And they reported seeing a green car with a black racing stripe

00:26:16

driven by a man with dark curly hair and dark-drammed glasses. They saw him drive by multiple times.

00:26:23

A few people did, and they also saw that car driving away. Someone was like, I saw something bulky in the passenger seat.

00:26:30

So they think that that's the person who abducted Mary Lou. An extensive search is conducted for three days in the area where she was last seen,

00:26:39

including hundreds of police dock searches. So they're fucking searching the wooded areas.

00:26:43

On September 10th, police circulate a wanted poster containing the sketch of the driver

00:26:48

and a description of the bright green car. I couldn't find the sketch anywhere, which fucking sucks, because I just want to see that.

00:26:57

And I wanted Stephen to have nightmares for days. What if we just start telling Stephen to look up, like, surgery photos and shit?

00:27:09

Stephen, can you get me a picture of a brain being dissected? It's personal. I need it for the show.

00:27:15

You know, I don't actually need it. Just airdrop it to me. So then on September 13th, police get information about a dude,

00:27:24

and along with that dude, a photo, and they're like, oh, shit, this guy looks just like the composite sketch.

00:27:30

His name is James Cater. He is a 32-year-old dude. He's a donut maker from Brockton, Massachusetts.

00:27:38

I know, you don't want to cheer now because I just ruined it for you. But also, donuts.

00:27:43

So this fucking absolute piece of shit, he had once attacked a 63-year-old woman while she was at a cemetery at her fucking dead husband's grave mourning.

00:28:00

Come at her with a chair leg, but she had escaped. What the fuck? Just the leg or a whole chair and he only beat her with the leg?

00:28:08

Don't. I don't know. Okay. I pictured breaking up, but that would make more sense.

00:28:15

I pictured him being, and then, but. How far did he move with the chair? That's all I want to know.

00:28:20

Yeah. Not important. Then, this is important, a decade before Mary Lou's abduction, in 1968,

00:28:29

Cater had pled guilty to assault with intent to rape, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, and kidnapping.

00:28:36

when he had abducted a 13-year-old Andover girl who he had run off the road while she was on her bicycle.

00:28:43

Fuck. And then he forced her into his car, drove her about 30 minutes out of town into a wooded area.

00:28:51

She had fought him off and run, but he caught up with her, and then he had tied her to a tree

00:28:57

where he had strangled her until she lost consciousness, but when she woke up, he was gone and she got free and escaped.

00:29:03

He had served a prison sentence for this. He had pled guilty. He was like, I fucking totally did that.

00:29:13

He served a prison sentence, but was, of course, I don't know how long he served.

00:29:18

Wait, I could probably put math in my brain. Do it. We'll give you 30 seconds for quick math.

00:29:25

I need six years. He served a prison sentence, but was released four years ahead of schedule.

00:29:32

Here's the thing. When prisons are full, get the people who attack children out first.

00:29:38

That's important. There's so many people who had a minuscule amount of pot on them that just need to stay behind bars.

00:29:43

Please keep them in. Anyone of color, please. What a white dude. Yeah, the white dudes that fucking try to rape children.

00:29:51

Right. Being fucking sarcastic. None of that should have been sarcastic Sorry Okay Okay so he had a schedule It terrible

00:30:06

And in 1976, he had started hanging around the Bridgewater area because he was going to therapy.

00:30:12

Where the hospital is? Yeah. It's the director of the Bridgewater Hospital, everybody.

00:30:22

Great job. We love your facility. I hear great, really creepy stories coming out of there.

00:30:30

Yep. Yep. Which I guess is near this place. So two years fucking later, Mary Lou disappears while riding her bike home.

00:30:42

Yeah. Guess that motherfucking therapy didn't work. The day after Mary Lou disappeared, this fucking dude, James Cater, had gotten married to an 18-year-old.

00:30:54

So he was, I know, he was 32, he married an 18-year-old, and I had to check if either she was an Avon lady or from a place called Avon, Massachusetts.

00:31:07

You guys have a place called Avon, Massachusetts here. Did you know that? I didn't.

00:31:14

Is that where they invented all the wonderful products? No. I was like, there's no, I was like, I'm not going to get that wrong.

00:31:23

I'm not going to be like, from Avon. I was like, that's not a place. It's a place.

00:31:28

It's a place. Also just the idea of an 18-year-old Avon lady where she's like, I don't give a shit.

00:31:35

I'm doing it. So the day after Mary Lou just appeared and they got married, then they left the country on a honeymoon.

00:31:46

A week later, when he returned on September 19th, I guess someone was like, the police totally think it's you.

00:31:52

You should go talk to them. Because he went into the police station with his new 18-year-old Avon wife

00:31:58

and his lawyer. And when he walked into the police station, he looked so similar to the composite sketch that one of the officers, Chief Lou Pacheco, said,

00:32:10

you're not going to believe this, but our composite just walked into the station.

00:32:16

Oh, shit. He was just like, um, hey, everybody. The guy's here. The guy's here. He gave, so Cater gave permission for police to search his car.

00:32:28

Guess what kind of car he had? A bright green 1976 Opal with a black racing stripe.

00:32:33

Actually, we have a photo of the car, I think, somewhere. We can take a look at it.

00:32:37

That's Mary Lou. I know. That's the car. It even says Opal on the side of it. Wow.

00:32:44

I mean, I hate his guts. That's a sweet car. Yeah, it's not the car's fault. No.

00:32:52

But bright green with black is a little too Frankenstein for me. Maybe a nice rust orange.

00:33:01

Okay. And we'll talk about it later. Sorry, we'll talk about it later. It's none of your business.

00:33:08

Thank you. That's awesome. Thank you, Stephen, too. As well. The right front tire had excessive wear, just like in the photos of the tire at the scene.

00:33:20

Inside the car they found wedding gifts, but also two cartons of cigarettes. Hey, guess what kind?

00:33:25

Benson and Hedges. That's fucking right. and two pairs of dark rim glasses in the glove compartment.

00:33:31

He went there with everything that they knew about him. Jesus Christ. In the trunk, they also found copies of the Boston Globe

00:33:44

and the Boston Herald newspapers both open to articles about the disappearance of Mary Lou Arruda.

00:33:52

Just confess. Yeah. Yeah. It's like he was basically confessing with things as opposed to words.

00:34:00

I mean, this dude, and you'll see, he's truly the biggest piece of shit in the fucking world.

00:34:06

Also, his alibi for the day was total bullshit, of course. But he denies any involvement.

00:34:12

And he, but, okay, you can turn that off. Thank you. Oh, want to see a picture of him?

00:34:21

Yes. He sucks. We have a photo of him. Ew. I kind of was, in my mind, was picturing more of a Jim Croce type,

00:34:31

which I know is a deep cut. I don't know what that is. I don't know who that is.

00:34:36

Jeez, operator. It's a 70s thing. You wouldn't understand. But that looks like Paul Sorvino in a bad wig.

00:34:44

Still don't know. Really? Yeah. Come on. I don't know. Mary Sorvino's dad? Yes. Really?

00:34:50

Yeah. Oh. Yeah. He was actually one of the original detectives on the first Law and Order, like the first couple seasons of Law and Order.

00:34:56

Oh, all right. Way back when. Deep cut. Right. Karen's new podcast. Thank you. Where I just list names of people no one knows.

00:35:06

We'll call it the loneliest girl in the world. Okay. Thank you. You can take that down because he sucks.

00:35:16

Okay. All right. So sadly, then. Wait, sorry. That fucking guy had an 18-year-old wife?

00:35:23

Yep. I hate things. I do, too. This is the podcast that's basically called, like,

00:35:30

Why the Fuck? Yeah. What the fuck? You know? Very sadly, nine weeks after her abduction,

00:35:37

on November 11, 1978, Mary Lou's body was discovered in the Freetown Fall River State Forest.

00:35:46

Freetown Fall. Her body was discovered by a couple boys who were out fucking dirt bike racing.

00:35:53

I know. And probably never went dirt bike racing again She was fully clothed and had been tied to a tree while standing up That right Exactly the way he

00:36:06

His other victim was, yeah. And the cause of death was ruled by the medical examiner's strangulation by ligature or positional asphyxiation,

00:36:17

meaning that he had tied her to a tree, including her neck. and when she had passed out, she had choked to death because of the weight.

00:36:26

It's fucking awful. So, let's see. And it was determined that she had died the same day she went missing.

00:36:35

At the trial, this fucker's arrested and taken to trial. At the trial, James Cater testifies on his own behalf.

00:36:42

He acknowledges his guilt in the incident of 1968. That is fucking identical to this one.

00:36:48

But he stated he was rebuilding his life since the release from prison in January 1976.

00:36:55

So it wasn't him. And FBI expert William Bodziak, who would later testify about the shoe print at O.J. Simpson's trial,

00:37:05

was an expert witness about the tire track found on Dean Street in Rainham in this trial.

00:37:12

There's like all these expert witnesses and all these fucking people come in and it's just insane.

00:37:18

In June of 1979, James Cater is convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

00:37:27

But wait! Don't applaud! Okay. Supreme Court Judicial Court overturns that conviction in 1979.

00:37:35

And the following one they also fucking overturned in 1985, his other first-degree conviction,

00:37:43

because testimony... So they'd gotten all this eyewitness testimony saying that they had seen this car,

00:37:50

and remember they were telling them what they saw. Then they hypnotized all those people, because that's what they did in the fucking 70s and 80s for witnesses.

00:37:57

Remember all that hypnotizing? Yeah, it was great. And so they were saying that the hypnotized witnesses that were used to identify the make and license plate of his car

00:38:08

shouldn't have been used in his conviction. and so then that third trial comes in 1992 that one fucking ends in mistrial again he is retried

00:38:22

in 96 where his fucking attorney joseph um kroski said that mary lou had actually been the victim

00:38:28

of cult activity it wasn't him because there was all kinds of it was satanic panic times and there

00:38:35

was all maybe some weird cult activity you guys fucking know uh not that you guys are

00:38:41

Satanist. I didn't mean it like that. You might be. I mean, maybe you are. Maybe you are.

00:38:45

I'm not judging you. I'm kind of judging you. He promised the jurors that they would hear from a witness who saw more than 20 people

00:38:54

carrying torches into the dark woods around the time that Mary Lou had been killed.

00:38:59

He promised. I don't think he did it. So four fucking times this guy goes to, like, multi-week trials,

00:39:07

and Mary Lou's family, the whole fucking community, the police officers who are all, from what you read,

00:39:15

horribly touched by this fucking case and want to get this asshole put where he fucking belongs.

00:39:22

More than half a dozen motions for appeals, and they all included putting the family through the crime scene photos,

00:39:29

traumatizing testimony by all the witnesses, all these bullshit theories. It would become the country's longest-running court case.

00:39:36

Whoa. He's finally fucking convicted on December 22, 1996, at his fourth trial and sentenced to life.

00:39:46

Yes. They can cheer now, right? Yes. Okay, good. That's upheld in 2000 and 2007,

00:39:53

when he tries again to fucking get retrials, and the Supreme Court of Massachusetts are like,

00:39:58

fuck you, dick. Are you fucking serious? No. If only that's what they said. I'm saying it for them,

00:40:06

because you know that's what they all wanted to fucking say. Okay, the fucker, James Cater,

00:40:13

finally dies from cancer in January 23rd, 2016. Whoa. That's recent. Very recent.

00:40:21

But there are some, what happens in the town of Rainham, there is some like, at least,

00:40:29

everyone's trying so hard to uphold the memory of Mary Lou and they never forget her.

00:40:35

they refuse to let her memory be forgotten or let people say, like, that doesn't happen in our town.

00:40:40

They won't fucking let people do that. So the annual meeting held by the police every year to review policies regarding missing persons,

00:40:48

there's this meeting, and right now the chief, Jim Donovan, who's the chief now,

00:40:53

he was 10 years old at the time of Mary Lou's disappearance. He begins his presentation every year by recounting her case and saying, quote,

00:41:02

her memory drives our vigorous pursuit of missing persons. Her youngest, Mary Lou's youngest sibling,

00:41:09

who turned five the day that her sister's body was found, I know, was influenced by the investigators

00:41:15

who never gave up every single fucking time there was any kind of motion or any trial.

00:41:20

The investigators never gave up. They always were there in full force. She remembers that, and she becomes a special operations sergeant

00:41:28

with the Massachusetts Department of Corrections. Yes, she does. Yes, she does. Amazing.

00:41:33

Yep. Another sibling, Joseph, he served as the driving force behind the creation of a soccer field

00:41:40

in Mary Lou's memory on King Philip Street in her honor. So people would never say that this sort of thing can't happen in this town.

00:41:47

She wants people to remember her. And she's on a plaque in the police station. There a fingerprinting program for children that named after her And she even has a street name Mary Lou Court And her mother Joanne when he died when Cater died her mother said

00:42:10

quote, I do believe in a heaven, and I do believe there is a hell, and he's going to rot in it.

00:42:17

And that's the story of Mary Lou Arruda. Wow. God damn it. Thanks. I mean, that's such a beautiful thing,

00:42:29

that a small town can kind of kick ass that way, and the police force can kick ass that way,

00:42:35

and then kind of almost set that standard. Right. That's really cool. It's nice because we hear so many of these stories of, like,

00:42:40

they didn't do anything for three weeks, and we have to be like, why don't you do it?

00:42:44

It's so frustrating every time, even though that was the standard, and it was the way things were done, and it was the rules then.

00:42:49

So you can't get mad at that. But when it's done in a way that it should be and helps convict this dude who had a pattern,

00:42:57

an exact pattern of the way he did things. There's no fucking way he would have stopped doing it.

00:43:00

No, not at all. So, I mean, potentially they fucking stopped a serial killer. Yeah, it's amazing.

00:43:05

Yeah. Good job, Rainem. Yeah. Nice. Summer is fun, but it can also completely destroy your routine.

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00:46:40

Fuck. Just for fun. I'm super into disaster here in Boston in the metro area. Shit.

00:46:51

I know. So there is a guy named Bruce Twickler who's basically the expert on the Great Boston Fire.

00:47:01

And he's written a bunch of stuff. He also is making a movie about it. And so I watched this talk that he gave.

00:47:08

And a lot of people who are from this area have no idea that Boston had a fire that was on par with the Great Chicago Fire.

00:47:18

I'm not from here, and I don't even know it. That doesn't make any sense. This fire is in the top five hugest fires in United States history.

00:47:29

Holy shit. You guys. Congratulations, everybody. Pyros. It's really funny, though, because as he was talking in the beginning of this talk that he gave,

00:47:40

he also is talking, and it's something that you never think about, but in the 1800s, just all of America was constantly catching on fire.

00:47:49

That's all it did. And at one point... Everything was made of matches. Everything was...

00:47:54

Why would they build buildings out of matches? They didn't know, you guys. It was crazy.

00:47:59

It was built of matches. Which is in fire, everything. And then fireworks on the day that it was finished being built.

00:48:05

Why? This made me laugh out loud. In the gold rush time, which was 1849, 1850, in San Francisco,

00:48:16

like in 1851, San Francisco caught on fire and almost burned entirely down. It was the hugest fire.

00:48:24

That was May 3rd, 1851, I believe. And May 3rd, 1852, all of the buildings they rebuilt burned down again.

00:48:34

What a bummer, man. I know. Except the insurance people are like, okay, all right.

00:48:43

So, yeah, this was just a huge issue all over the country, and especially in Boston, because Boston, as you all know, is super old.

00:48:52

And as it grew, the streets are insanely narrow. Like being from California, being in like in downtown Boston or like in the city center of Boston, it makes me want to have a heart attack.

00:49:07

It's like this is insanity. Get away from me. Very narrow. Adorable, but. Old and narrow.

00:49:18

And at the time, of course, because everything was being built up and whatever, they would just build and there was no coding.

00:49:29

There was kind of like no rules. And it was like, well, if things go well and everyone gets rich, put up another building.

00:49:35

Put them right next to each other and then make the street four feet wide and then put another building right over here.

00:49:40

And the other thing was they had, I'll get into it. I'll explain it to you. So here's the thing.

00:49:46

So the first issue is if you've watched movies that take place in that time, like what's the fucking Leonardo DiCaprio movie?

00:49:54

Thank you. The Gangs of New York. That's not what they said. In the Gangs of New York, you see this.

00:50:01

The fire departments used to be mostly volunteer. And they were it was basically just like clubs of people who decided we're going to be in charge of putting out fires.

00:50:10

And there'd be a bunch of different ones. and they would all run to the fire with their water, and they would get there,

00:50:17

and then they'd all start fist fighting about who was going, because there was a thing the insurance companies did.

00:50:22

They called it first water. So if you were the fire brigade that got the first water on the fire,

00:50:30

they would give you a couple dollars, which was in today's money, $17,000, and what they called a hog's shed of beer, which is 63 gallons of beer.

00:50:42

Yes. So if you should have just put the beer on the fire. No fucking way. Immediately start a fight. So essentially a fire would break out. The alarm would go off.

00:50:55

All these dudes would come running over with their water and then start fist fighting.

00:51:00

And then the building would burn down while they were all fist fighting. This was very,

00:51:04

very common. I'm not an insurance, but that sounds like a bad idea. It's not a good plan.

00:51:09

It's not a good plan. But this is just how it was for a while. So you think that's going to fall?

00:51:15

Yeah. I need it, though. I know. Okay. Because, of course, we're using the smallest table.

00:51:21

This is actually, Stuart Little donated this table to us. It was so nice. So nice of him.

00:51:28

So a man named Josiah Quincy used to be the mayor. Sure, you can cheer for your old neighbor.

00:51:36

I mean, mayor. He was the mayor. Early neighbor, too. He was also your neighbor because the buildings are so close together.

00:51:42

Everyone was your neighbor. It works. Oh, I live around the corner from him. Josiah Quincy, the mayor of Boston, tried to reorganize the fire department in 1826.

00:51:55

And they got so mad at him because it was such a political, it was basically kind of mafia shit.

00:52:01

And he was like, this needs to stop being dudes fighting in the street. And we should probably get a little bit more organized.

00:52:08

and the other part of that too was they had these things, bucket brigades, where you had to, if

00:52:14

something in your neighborhood was on fire, you had to go stand in the bucket brigade and they

00:52:18

would just pass water. That's how they got the water to the fire and if you didn't stand in the

00:52:22

line, you'd be fined a dollar. So the whole system was not good in terms of putting water on fire.

00:52:30

They just kept fucking it up. Josiah Quincy tried to fix it, but he made so many enemies reorganizing the fire department that he lost his next election because they were like, fuck you, dude.

00:52:43

This is our little club. But they ended up using, you know, no longer using bucket brigades.

00:52:50

They started using these steam engines to pump the water onto the buildings. and

00:52:56

so okay, but this story is mostly about a man named John Damrell so he is a Boston native

00:53:05

he was an orphan as a child, he spent his teens being an apprentice to a master carpenter

00:53:11

so he knew a lot about building, he also learned a lot about business and in 1857

00:53:17

he is elected to the Boston City Council, he makes a lot of connections politically

00:53:22

and in 1858 he becomes a professional fire engineer. And at 28 he rises very quickly.

00:53:35

He's very smart. He knows business. He's well connected. And he's all about, he's really into safety

00:53:40

and he understands the way that buildings are built in Boston that it's basically just like one big fire trap.

00:53:47

And he dedicates his career to trying to fix that because he knows about the other horrible fires around the country and he wants to make sure that doesn happen to Boston So when he 28 he becomes a captain in the fire department

00:54:07

And so that was about eight years after they changed over to steam engines. Things were a little less wild, a little more organized,

00:54:16

and kind of the city was in charge a little bit more. Then in 1866, he is promoted to chief engineer of the fire department.

00:54:25

Shit. In the fire department. They're the competitor for the fire department? Yeah, yeah.

00:54:33

They fought so hard, but they brought potatoes to all the fires. It didn't make sense.

00:54:40

So, Damerill successfully lobbies to win the right to make building inspections, to start enforcing fire codes.

00:54:50

So, because everything inside every building was made of wood, of course. And then, you know, they would do things like, just have one exit.

00:54:58

There was lots of buildings that were built that just had a single central staircase.

00:55:04

And that was the only way you could get out of the building. So, if the fire was on the first floor, goodbye.

00:55:08

That was like, that's it. It's so funny, the shit we think of as like fucking commonplace.

00:55:14

Like, I want to inspect your building. And they're like, no. No way. MYOB. It was a very MYOB time back then.

00:55:22

What is that? Mind room. Thank you. Mind room is. You said it last night and everyone laughed.

00:55:28

And I was like, I'm not going to ask what that means. Oh, you can always ask. Sorry, I just have to shorten things because we're really pressed for time.

00:55:39

Okay, so one of the other campaigns that Damerill really was invested in was getting more water available and more fire hydrants put in around the city and also replacing the old leaky water mains.

00:55:58

So they were like the original pipes that they had laid down, like, that the pilgrims had fucking put in the ground.

00:56:04

They were still there, super leaky. The water pressure sucked shit. And he was like, so here's the thing.

00:56:10

As we build all these tall boxes of tinder directly on top of each other, we need to be able to pump water if something catches on fire.

00:56:21

And obviously it would make sense that the water board would be like, oh, what a great point.

00:56:26

They're like, no, absolutely not. There was a guy named Nathaniel Bradley that was on the water board.

00:56:32

and he told Damerill that the water supply was fine and it's not worth the money to rip up the streets

00:56:37

and replace the old pipes. And spoiler alert, he was wrong. And also a lot of these building owners

00:56:44

were insured to the gills, so they didn't give a shit. They were just like, it's kind of fine if it burns down.

00:56:49

I'm good either way. So they didn't want to spend the money to fireproof them and nobody wanted to spend the money

00:56:55

to replace any of these water mains. Okay, so on Sunday, October 8th, 1871, Oh, that's the day of the Great Chicago Fire.

00:57:06

It lasts. I wondered what the fuck I was doing. I was like, why am I talking about that now?

00:57:15

Third show. The Great Chicago Fire. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Where am I?

00:57:23

The Great Chicago Fire lasted for two days. 10,000 buildings were burned down. Holy shit.

00:57:29

It killed 300 people. It destroyed over three square miles of the city. It left 100,000 people homeless.

00:57:38

And they say there was more urban damage in that city than there was in the entire Civil War.

00:57:45

Oh, my God. It was that bad. And actually, when I lived in Chicago, we went and saw a play called The Great Chicago Fire.

00:57:51

So actually, I know tons about it. We don't have time to talk about it now. But there's one amazing part where most of the citizens, the fire got so strong and so hot that everyone was pushed into Lake Michigan.

00:58:04

They just had to go stand there and stand in the water to like to cool off and to get away from the flames.

00:58:10

It's super insane. So when that happens, Chief Damerill takes a trip to Chicago to find out what went wrong, what the problems were, and just so he could learn and take that back to Boston and make sure it didn't happen here.

00:58:27

I feel like everyone should be listening to this guy. No. The guy who's trying to get people not killed in a fire.

00:58:33

But you know, it was something like his beard wasn't long enough or some shit like that.

00:58:38

We're just like, no, I'm damning over there with his hardly any facial hair. Why don't you marry a fire if you love it so much?

00:58:46

Oh, are you scared of a little fire? I'll punch you out. So what he learns from the fire chief in Chicago,

00:58:56

And there was also a Civil War general that had actually been brought in to help during the fire,

00:59:04

like to help control it and then keep civil order afterwards. And so they told him all about what went wrong.

00:59:11

And they said, of course, everything was insanely dry. The entire city, of course, was made of wood.

00:59:17

There were really stiff winds. The fire alarm was delayed. And the firemen were misdirected as to where they should go in the beginning.

00:59:26

So the communication was really bad. And most of the roofs of the buildings there were mansard roofs.

00:59:34

And so mansard roofs, you've seen them. They are the ones that basically it looks like the top of the roof has like a cuff on it of wood.

00:59:44

So even if the front of the building is masonry or brick, the top of the building just has the driest fucking shingles of all time.

00:59:52

And it's like eight feet of it. and so most of the buildings at the time that was like the style had that type of roof And so when a building catches on fire when the top goes up like that and then all the top of the buildings are wood the building each one catches the next one on fire

01:00:11

And so that's what happened there. They also did a thing, they tried to do a thing to stop the Chicago fire, which was, they thought, you know, sometimes in a wildfire happens, the firemen go out and they start a fire and back burn.

01:00:25

so that when the wildfire hits, there's nothing to burn and it just goes out. Well, they thought they were going to do that in Chicago by blowing up buildings.

01:00:33

So they went into fire and just started blowing shit up. You'd be like, okay, then this can't catch on fire.

01:00:43

Well, of course, then it's rubble and then all the woods exposed. And it was like tinder.

01:00:46

It just created, it was like presetting your campfire logs up and, you know, a little triangle.

01:00:54

and it of course did not work at all. It made it worse. And they used gunpowder.

01:01:00

So there's a stiff wind and a firestorm and then you know what we're going to do?

01:01:07

Blow gunpowder into the air, guys. Five, six, seven, eight. Holy crap. Yeah. So D'Amherl comes back to Boston.

01:01:18

He makes a report about everything that he learned about the Chicago Fire. He puts pressure to get a new firehouse built in the new downtown area.

01:01:27

That was the one that was just being built and getting popular. And to make more water available down there.

01:01:33

And he also tried to get a building code instated to stop those mansard roofs from being used on new buildings.

01:01:39

He's like, we just don't need it. It doesn't even look that good. Also, let's not blow up buildings in the case of a fire in the future.

01:01:48

And he is told, look, I wrote it right there, to mind his own business and to stop exaggerating the needs of his department.

01:01:57

Oh, yeah. You're being hysterical. So in October of 1872, there was this is also one of those things where it's like the combination of just all these horrible things that happened.

01:02:16

There's a horse flu that comes down through New England from Canada, and all these fucking horses get super sick.

01:02:29

And it debilitates the entire fire department's horses. They're especially trained and extremely strong horses

01:02:38

that can pull those insanely heavy steam engines that they pull from fire to fire.

01:02:44

Well, all those horses are like, oh, can you get me some horses? I'm tired. I'm tired.

01:02:51

So Dameril, when that starts, he's like, oh, fuck. Okay, we have to hire 500 extra men because we've got to go back to the days of pulling our own steam engines around

01:03:04

because we don't have any, because all the horses are up in bed. They got better.

01:03:08

They got better, by the way. At first, I thought they all died, and I'm like, now I have to fucking tell everybody all the horses died.

01:03:14

That's not going to go over well, but they didn't. Oh, good. They got better after when no one needed them.

01:03:21

Okay, so on November 9th, 1872 at 7 p.m., we're on the corner of Kingston and Summer Street,

01:03:33

and it is a building. It's a commercial storehouse. So there's a book called The Story of the Great Boston Fire

01:03:43

by a man named Charles Coffin, and it was written. He was actually a witness. He was there that day.

01:03:49

And he describes the contents of the building. He says there's bales of hay and boxes of dry goods in the basement

01:03:55

and on the first floor. No. Yeah. The second and third floor are stores of paper and muslin.

01:04:02

Jesus. Yes. Was it like first year anniversary? Yes. That's what the store was called?

01:04:08

That was the name of the store. Paper and matches and such. On the fourth and fifth are rooms full of hosiery, gloves, tape, muslin, thread, and trimmings, shreds of materials, for making skirts and corsets.

01:04:28

So the quote is, Tinder above, Tinder below. Which is what everyone's going to do tonight after the show.

01:04:38

Am I right? Am I right, you sexy motherfuckers? Okay. So it truly is just like a fire waiting to happen.

01:04:50

There's a spark in the basement at 7 p.m. The fire starts down there. It all goes bales of hay.

01:04:56

Just the driest shit you can find. So the fire starts down there. No one notices because it's 7 o'clock at night and it's the weekend.

01:05:05

And so it's going and it's raging out of control. And the elevator shaft is made of wood.

01:05:13

So what they also don't know is as that fire starts going, it also goes up straight up the center of the building simultaneously.

01:05:22

It's like, we can do it. So the only time anyone notices that this fire is in the basement of this building

01:05:32

is when all of the windows of the basement blow out. Surprise! Hi, happy birthday.

01:05:38

And that's when people are like, what's this we see here? and smell. And so people start running up and down the street yelling fire. Now at the time,

01:05:49

they did have fire boxes um on the street There a lot of people who don know about this And because my dad is was a San Francisco fireman for about 40 years yeah that right he an American hero I known about this since I was a kid but you don really notice

01:06:09

them until you start looking for them. They're like freestanding little boxes on the street.

01:06:14

They kind of blend in with like a lamppost or whatever, but they just say fire on them,

01:06:18

and you can walk up and open them and pull it, and a fire truck will come to that box.

01:06:23

They should tell us about those, I feel like. I feel like they don't want people pulling a box, but...

01:06:29

Well, what if there's a fire? Yeah. And I don't know those exist. And I can't get my phone to call...

01:06:35

I can't get my phone to recognize my face to turn on so I can call an ambulance.

01:06:40

It's me. It's me. Just because I have a face mask on. You can't tell. You just refuse to take your Batman mask off?

01:06:49

They'll know. It's me. But every story... My dad would tell me, or I would tell him stories like,

01:06:55

oh, my friends got stuck, and they were in this weird neighborhood, and they didn't know.

01:06:58

He goes, pull a box. That was my dad's solution to everything. Go just pull a box.

01:07:03

There'll be a fire truck there in two minutes. Well, now I know, and now we're all going to pull one tonight.

01:07:08

Yeah, pull a box if you need to. While we're waiting for our Tinder date. And tell them Jim Kilgariff told you to do it.

01:07:14

And then I'll give you his phone number later, and he will love it. Pull a box. Pull a box, Jim.

01:07:19

But he used to also say that, too, And he would hear stories of people getting lost in bad neighborhoods or whatever.

01:07:25

You've got to pull a box. I'm doing it. Do it. But then you do have to deal with the firemen who show up and you're just standing there with a smile on your face.

01:07:34

Well, I'm going to run. That's the trick. That's the one part you didn't think of.

01:07:39

This is not for pranks. Oh. Okay. Also, of course, please clean your lint traps if you don't know already.

01:07:46

And we're coming up into the holiday season Water that motherfucking Christmas tree

01:07:54

And do not leave the lights on at night No one needs to look at that shit They're sleeping

01:07:59

People who leave their lights on all night Their Christmas lights or their lights lights?

01:08:05

No, no, no, the lights on the Christmas tree That light the Christmas tree on fire

01:08:09

That then light the curtains on fire And then your house is on fire A solution? Be Jewish

01:08:15

Be Jewish! Please be Jewish. Won't you please be Jewish this Christmas season? Think of others.

01:08:27

Selfish Christian assholes. No, we let the menorah burn out. It's fine. Oh, yeah, you guys like to put actual flame right in your front window.

01:08:37

Real fucking flame. Yeah. You don't even use them lights. Okay. Okay, so it's 7 o'clock when this fire starts in the basement.

01:08:45

Okay, great. Oh, that's what I was talking about. So back then, only cops could pull a box. That's my favorite phrase now. They had to have a little key. So the beat cop that had the key to that firebox had already passed and was out of earshot, I guess. So everybody's running up and down the street screaming fire, but that doesn't matter until somebody actually pulls the alarm.

01:09:08

So it takes 45 minutes for the fire departments to actually get there. That's too long.

01:09:15

Because once they get the alarm, it's way too long. Once they get the alarm, they have to start pulling their steam engines themselves.

01:09:23

That's for God about the horses. The horses are in bed with thermometers in their mouths.

01:09:28

With the thing on their little heads. Yeah. Their little horse heads. Just watching soap operas.

01:09:34

so it was but of course Damerill had hired all those extra dudes so at least they had people

01:09:44

also Coffin the man who wrote that book said also little boys would run in and help the men pull the steam engine

01:09:51

get out of here Timmy you're not helping no all the 8 year olds can come in and try to do something

01:09:58

well the 8 year olds probably had jobs they threw down their cigars and ran over to help

01:10:03

Thank you! That's so good of you. Okay. But then, they get there. They've got their steam engines.

01:10:18

They're all set up. And, of course, the fucking water pressure's for shit, because they didn't replace any of the pipes.

01:10:24

So it's like, the water pressure basically was set up for when they were, like, two-story buildings.

01:10:28

But this is a six-story building. So it's just kind of, like, pissing out. and not really working out so great.

01:10:36

And then the winds kick up. Ooh. So what happened with this first building is the basement,

01:10:46

the windows blew out, the fire was going up the center, and then the people on the street, the witnesses said

01:10:52

that when the fire came up out of the basement, it shot straight up six stories and caught that mansard roof on fire.

01:10:59

So the entire building was entirely engulfed by the time the fire department got there and then started catching the other buildings on the roofs on fire.

01:11:10

And then they can't get the water up to the top. And the majority of this fire is going north.

01:11:17

They're able to get enough. Damerill gets on the scene. He starts sending different fire companies in different directions.

01:11:25

So he's like, you go five streets that way and you start putting out the fires that way.

01:11:28

And he was trying to basically like control the, um, this, this size, obviously.

01:11:33

See, if I were him, I would have been like directing people by going, I told you so.

01:11:37

I told you so. I told you so. And I told you so. And I told you. You should have fucking listened to me.

01:11:43

I told your alderman. With your eight-year-old fucking workers. Nobody fucking listens to me.

01:11:48

And your goddamn sick horses. Get away from me, Jackie. But no, he's a noble man and he starts, he's kicking into business.

01:11:56

and he also this was crucial he immediately immediately sent word to every city within 50 miles of Boston asking for them to drag their steam engines because there's no horses, truly.

01:12:14

And all these cities responded. They say 27 different towns in the area responded and brought.

01:12:21

I know, right? Everyone's like, get in there. Also, some from as far as Connecticut and New Hampshire.

01:12:30

Yeah, great job you guys. Great job your ancestors. High-five your grandma when you get home.

01:12:37

So, a real problem they started having is that crowds, of course, begin to accumulate around the mass fire that's broken out.

01:12:47

Because there's people that are running out of houses holding like one statue of the Virgin Mary and a washboard.

01:12:53

That's literally in that book by Charles Coffin. Those were her prize positions.

01:13:04

Shit, what a life. I mean, not the most fun life. Unless she loved laundry. Sure.

01:13:10

We don't know. She loved the Lord. But there's looters, of course. So there's people trying to run out with the three things they could grab.

01:13:19

Then there's people trying to grab shit they didn't grab. And then there's people who are just standing around like they had nothing else to do on a Saturday.

01:13:26

And so there's just all these human bodies. It's just like a mass of human bodies.

01:13:34

Within four hours, this fire has traveled a mile straight into the heart of Boston's business district.

01:13:41

And they say that sailors on the coast of Maine could see it from their ships. It was that huge.

01:13:49

Then Damerals called a city hall. Oh, we should probably put up. I bet there's at least one picture, right?

01:13:56

That could kick us off. Okay, so here's this is the scope of this fire and this it goes by how by where it started

01:14:05

Which is up there? No, no down there Yes, 7 p.m. Hold on shut up. You don't know I know

01:14:15

It starts here. Yeah, right. Yeah, and it goes like that. Yeah, and that's when everyone's like oh look at the fire

01:14:22

And then it's like and the winds go that it's like oh my god, Connecticut you go this way New Hampshire

01:14:29

Save our docks or whatever the fuck But then damerel gets called to City Hall because

01:14:39

The mayor wants him to try the thing that he knows is gonna work great What gunpowder blow up some buildings?

01:14:46

And he's like it's nay it doesn't work and of course they don't listen to him and

01:14:52

And so they start trying to blow up buildings, and that's why the fire, they were doing it up on the north side, thinking they were going to contain it at the top,

01:15:03

and that's why the fire then spread out like that, is because they were blowing up buildings,

01:15:09

and it got so bad they stopped, because they were like, oh, I guess you're right about the gunpowder thing.

01:15:16

They're like, we made it. This is crazy. John, I'm so sorry I didn't listen to you.

01:15:22

so at 2.30 a.m. they were blowing up the buildings they stopped that an hour later

01:15:30

several buildings blow up on their own because no one turned the motherfucking gas line off

01:15:37

guys guys we've got to get this organized at some point somebody somewhere and it's not John Damerle

01:15:47

I think it's like some genius citizen what they start doing is they find the biggest pieces of material they can find and soak them in water.

01:15:55

Huge blankets. Somebody gets their boat sails, and they start taking soaked pieces of material

01:16:03

and laying them across these roofs so that then when the sparks are going, those mansard roofs aren't catching on fire.

01:16:10

And that's the way they ended up saving the Old South Church. The old South Church is one of the only buildings that ended up standing in the area that it's in.

01:16:21

I don't know. It's downtown? Uptown. Is it downtown? Town. Southtown? Over in Northtown?

01:16:28

Town. It's in town. It's in the town. And people love it. It's such a great fucking church.

01:16:37

Oh, it's in the south part. South Church. and that is one of the turning points of the fire great is people being like hey how about

01:16:47

how about we put water on it how about stop contributing to the fire and try to fight it

01:16:54

like first first can i do my idea of taking all the old pine trees that we can find no

01:17:00

So the fire is finally brought. Oh, I think, is there, do you have, can you go to the next picture?

01:17:09

Let me just see what Steven pulled up for us. Oh, this is a before after. What? That's some rubble.

01:17:16

That says Franklin Street looking up before and then Franklin Street after. That's how bad it was.

01:17:23

No joke. And that's how, I bet that's probably the widest part of any street in Boston ever.

01:17:28

I've never seen one that wide. Crazy. Will you go to the next one? Oh, that's the panoramic.

01:17:35

Wow. I mean, nutso. That's bananas. And then, wait, there's one more that I really like.

01:17:43

Oh. They just sat on the rubble like, why didn't we listen to John Damerill? Oh, man.

01:17:54

I really wanted to blow this building up and now I regret it No buildings left 30 people were killed in the fire 12 of them were firemen who died in the line of duty

01:18:06

Which actually, you have to think, it's actually kind of a small, all told. Because Chicago had like 300, right?

01:18:12

300, yeah. So it's thankfully smaller, but still. Newspapers report losses up to $90 million in damage for back then,

01:18:21

which is over a billion dollars in damage today. But I bet some people are like, yeah, I totally lost my house.

01:18:28

Oh. I guess I better get a new house. Well, 90% of the buildings, 90% of things that looked like this were entirely rebuilt in two years.

01:18:40

Wow. And so one of the things that Bruce Twickler says in this speech that I was watching is he says,

01:18:48

if you went on a cruise in September of 1872, which was like a couple months before the fire,

01:18:53

a world cruise last two years. So when you got back in 1874, you would come back to an entirely different city.

01:19:00

Holy shit! Which would be amazing. You'd come back and you'd be like, why is that department store over there?

01:19:05

Things completely switched around. And the city did use all of this rubble to build Atlantic Avenue.

01:19:13

So go down there and you're actually walking on the rubble of the old city. So although John Damerle was initially hailed as a hero

01:19:23

among the firemen that he worked with and the citizens that saw him. And there's these stories of like,

01:19:28

he was like running up when they called him to City Hall and he passes by a little boy who's like,

01:19:33

my parents are caught in that building and he goes up into the building to try to find the parents.

01:19:38

Like he was incredibly heroic and incredibly brave and fought the fire himself and organized people and firing.

01:19:47

He just started firing people. Take advantage of this moment. You're fired. But he ends up losing his job as fire chief, and they blame him for the fire.

01:19:59

The only person who gave a single shit about fire safety in the city in 1872. And they were like, it's your fault because everything's political.

01:20:10

But he didn't give a shit. He goes into politics, and he becomes the city's first building inspector in 1877.

01:20:22

And Boston became one of the strictest fire code cities in the country because of this system that he set up.

01:20:31

All the ways, like the fire codes that are set up in Boston are because of John Darmel.

01:20:36

And that is the story of the great Boston fire of 1872. Amazing. That is bananas.

01:20:48

That was great. I was riveted. If there had been more table, I would have been on the edge of it.

01:20:53

Just hanging off the edge of it? This part, I would have just been staring at you.

01:20:59

But instead, I just kept doing weird things with my arms. It's hard to know where to put your body.

01:21:03

Yeah. Let's stand up. I think we have time for a home chat. Yeah, let's do it. Let me pull some things from places.

01:21:14

From here and here. Pull some Spanx out and down. There we go. There's a lot of signs tonight.

01:21:18

Yeah, people have ideas. Oh, wait. Put your sign and your hands down. Now you need to listen to me.

01:21:26

Not yet. If you're yelling right now, I can see your mouth moving. You're not getting paid.

01:21:31

I'm going to do my sister right now. Roommate. Roommate. That's how she does it.

01:21:39

I have to tell you the rules. And if you're yelling, you can't hear the rules. And there's been nights where people didn't hear the rules.

01:21:45

Clearly didn't hear the rules. And bad things happen. Yeah. So there's definitely rules and regulations for this part of the show.

01:21:51

We're like the fire marshals of hometown. And we're going to marshal the shit out of the hometown.

01:21:56

That's right. This is really important, and we would just really, we need it to be a local story.

01:22:01

Please don't think you're the fucking exception to the rule of any of these rules.

01:22:05

Massachusetts. Massachusetts, Boston ideally. We love an accent. I've asked fucking two nights in a row.

01:22:11

She has asked. People think it's not important. It's very important to me. your story needs to be concise you need to be able to tell it quickly and clearly there should

01:22:20

be a beginning a middle and an end it's better for people when they're listening when you get

01:22:25

up here it's very easy to kind of get overwhelmed and lose your place so you can't be too drunk

01:22:30

although we're not you can do what you want with your life um and oh just remember that everybody

01:22:36

hates you if you get picked so uh you have to tell quickly that's the key it's your night all

01:22:43

All right, let's see. Can I get the lights a little bit? Can we have the lights up?

01:22:46

Is that possible? I'm scared. I hate doing this so much. It's so awful. It's so, okay, yeah, yeah.

01:22:58

I hate this so, I don't know why I do it every time. It sucks. It hurts me and my soul.

01:23:04

Oh, Vince is right over there. Walk over to him. Thank you. I swear to God, if she says she's from Florida,

01:23:10

I'm going to punch her in the face. Oh, turn the lights down. I swear to God. You can turn the lights off before she sees everyone.

01:23:17

Oh, yeah, bring those lights down. It's so scary. You guys don't even understand.

01:23:20

I don't have an accent. Okay. Are you from Boston? Yes. I live here now. Come over to me and hug me.

01:23:27

Hello. Hi. What's your name? My name is Libby. Libby. Libby, everybody. She brought her purse.

01:23:32

I brought my bag. I brought my bag. Libby, where are you from? I am from Acton, Massachusetts.

01:23:39

it's about 40 minutes outside right by concord if you know the battle of lexington and concord

01:23:45

yeah we love that bell yes yes yes yes oh my god it's such a good bell yes and so this is fresh

01:23:51

actually this is a new nugget um my mom texted me friday night and said you never guess this so and so stabbed his parents and girlfriend and i was like I sorry what You can just text me that casually That a call That a phone call So I called her and so I guess this guy went with his I went to high school with him

01:24:10

He's 25 right now. He went to, he sought mental health help with his mom earlier that day.

01:24:19

He tried to get help. They sent him away. He goes home. He thinks demons are in his head.

01:24:24

He thinks demons are telling him to kill his girlfriend. So he strangles her. He's strangling her.

01:24:28

The dad hears her screaming. And so he goes in. The guy grabs scissors, stabs the dad in the neck.

01:24:35

His own dad or his own father? His own father. Stabs him in the neck. And then the girl's trying to help him.

01:24:40

So the girl stabs, the guy stabs his girlfriend in the chest. The mom walks in. He's freaking out.

01:24:46

And they finally, people came to help. And then they were like, oh, do you know your rights?

01:24:52

And he said, yes, I'm a murderer. And that was... Did you know him in high school?

01:24:56

I had some glasses with him. I never talked to him. I didn't think this would happen.

01:25:02

That's bananas. You know? I never saw it coming. No, I know. We never do. You know?

01:25:10

Yeah. And so the dad is expected to not survive. And the girlfriend and the mom are...

01:25:16

The girlfriend, I think, is supposed to make it. She's in critical care. The mom is okay.

01:25:20

Oh, my God. Libby. And he's in jail. He's being held right now for a psychiatric evaluation.

01:25:27

Yeah. Holy shit. Jesus. But he tried to get help before. Yeah. They let him go. Yeah.

01:25:33

Yes. That's a very good point. Very upsetting. You need to fund mental health. I don't know.

01:25:38

I don't know. Somebody's got to do it. There's so many fucking things wrong with this country right now that it doesn't get prioritized.

01:25:47

But yeah, as my mom is a psychiatric nurse, she used to rant and rave when they were defunding all public health.

01:25:54

And she would tell us like a lunatic prophet at the dinner table. In the future, there's going to be people walking up and down the street that need to be medicated.

01:26:02

They can't take care of themselves. They're out on the street. It's not it's not how we're supposed to be treating each other.

01:26:09

Some people need help. Yeah. And we need to give money to programs to help people with mental illness.

01:26:15

It's important. Sorry I hijacked your story. Thank you. Libby. Libby, everybody, that was amazing.

01:26:23

Thank you. Thank you. I tried. I tried to do that. You did great. Yeah. That was awesome.

01:26:29

That's the fastest hometown we've ever had. I also detected a little accent. Did you?

01:26:35

The first thing I said is there was no accent. I heard a little accent. Yeah. But I'm from Southern California.

01:26:44

You want to do one more? Okay. Okay. Hold on a second. You have to pick this time.

01:26:53

Okay. Karen's going to pick. Because it's sad. Hold on. Everyone is pointing. Everyone's pointing at you.

01:27:03

Okay, come on. Come on. Do you guys even know her? I feel like sometimes people will be pointing at someone from there over there,

01:27:14

and they just want the person to get picked. It's fun to point. It's so fun to point.

01:27:20

Holy shit, you guys are great. Joya. What is it? Joya. Joya, everybody. Hi. Joya, hi.

01:27:33

Where are you from? I'm from good old Cape Cod. All right. Hey, guys. Do you know everyone here?

01:27:40

No. No, I'm actually here by myself. Oh. That's fun. And this story is about my mother, who is very upset that I'm here by myself right now.

01:27:54

Does she hate her? She called me, and we were talking about her attack. Oh, wow.

01:27:59

And I was like, yeah, I'm on my way to Medford right now because I'm determined to get on stage and tell your story.

01:28:05

Well, let's hear it. So, all right. It's a little long. I'm going to try and fly through it.

01:28:10

1978, Milford, Massachusetts. My mother is 18. she's sleeping it's like quarter to three in the morning

01:28:20

she wakes up from this weird thumping noise and she wakes up, the only light in her room is

01:28:27

the green glow of her digital alarm clock and she notices her mother's cat anxiously

01:28:34

pacing up and down the keyboard in her room and she's like okay, what the hell, the cat's name was

01:28:42

Kitty, very clever and the cat's like, the cat and her did not have a good relationship.

01:28:48

They weren't close at all. And she's like, okay, I don't understand. So she gets out of bed and she notices that her

01:28:54

turntable was still going on a blank record. And so she turns it off, goes back to bed, like whatever.

01:29:00

Not long after, it's still like 3 a.m., she wakes up again. This time there's a figure standing over her.

01:29:09

A ski mask on, all black. He was wearing fucking spandex. she was half asleep so she was super

01:29:19

confused and she thought it was her mom standing there with her curlers like her mom would wear

01:29:25

her curlers to bed so she goes mom? it's not a young man is standing there and he

01:29:37

immediately goes for her throat he's choking her she's struggling and she's delirious because she's half asleep. Doesn't realize that this is real life. And he's got her

01:29:48

hands around her throat. He's choking her. She can't breathe. She just knows that she has to make a

01:29:52

sound So she starts screaming She starts muffled screaming He starts to beat her in the head with something And he didn have a weapon It wasn a gun or a knife It was a flashlight He was beating her

01:30:05

in the face with a flashlight. He splits open her mouth. She's just bleeding. She managed to get a

01:30:11

sound out because her bedroom was downstairs. Her parents, my grandma and grandpa, they're

01:30:18

like diagonal. They're upstairs, like diagonal from her. And my grandmother woke up, immediately

01:30:25

throws her hand to her husband and goes, kill him! She knew! She knew! And my grandfather,

01:30:39

Frank, he served in World War II. Bless his soul. He he's ready. He takes his leg,

01:30:47

He swings it out and slams it onto the floor like, fucker, we know you're down there.

01:30:52

I'm coming. Oh, shit. And the attacker is still on my mother. He, like, spidey mode, like, leaps back.

01:31:00

And he's like, abort mission. So he books it. He books it out the back where he came in, like the laundry room door or something.

01:31:06

And my grandfather runs. No, he doesn't run. He leaps down the stairs. He doesn't even touch a single step.

01:31:14

And he ends up in the doorway like this. In his underwear. In his underwear. Old-timey high-up underwear.

01:31:23

Yeah, like tall, tall man, just like, as my mother called it, gorilla mode. Yeah.

01:31:29

And he's like, where the fuck is he? And my mom, surprisingly, she doesn't really know how she fought him off,

01:31:37

how she ended up on the floor, but, like, face covered in blood, she's super calm.

01:31:43

and she just points and all she says is, some asshole. That's all she says. All she says.

01:31:55

And my grandmother's in there. She's crying. She's so distraught. And so my grandfather books it after this guy.

01:32:03

My mom believes that he hid in the boat in their backyard. And so my grandfather runs out to the street,

01:32:11

nearly attacks a jogger just innocently running at 3 a.m., you know, as one does, you know.

01:32:17

And he, so like, you know, man in his underwear menacingly chasing you. And the guy's like,

01:32:24

hey man, hey man, like, who the fuck? And so he's like, oh, sorry, just trying to catch a murderer,

01:32:29

I don't know. And so he doesn't catch him. But that same night, this intruder, this is the bummer

01:32:39

part of the story. He sneaks in to another home, uh, not far from their neighborhood.

01:32:45

And he beats a little boy in the head with his own baseball bat. Uh, the boy survived, but with permanent brain damage. Um, and so that's like, that's the sad

01:33:02

part. Um, afterwards, uh, my mother worked for the Milford daily news at the time. Um,

01:33:08

she sees the report and they, they released her name in the paper because she was 18.

01:33:15

So they were like, okay, yeah, yeah, we'll take your name. Yeah. Uh, we'll put it in there.

01:33:18

And, um, it just said like young woman attacked. So everybody assumed that she was raped and she started getting harassed in

01:33:26

harassing phone calls. Like people, people were calling her, um, just making, uh,

01:33:32

like mimicking this whole situation, making a whole like shabackle about it, whatever.

01:33:38

And so she was super upset. She did not go to the trial because she was still suffering from PTSD.

01:33:44

But this fucking dumbass. He was caught because they found his ID just out on the street.

01:33:54

He must have lost it when he was running away. And they caught him. I'm not sure how long he was sentenced for, but they got him.

01:34:05

My mother and that little boy survived. Oh, my God. We're good. Wow. Joy, everybody.

01:34:11

Thank you. Thank you so much. Oh, my God. Thank you. I love the Brooklyn show, by the way.

01:34:20

Tell your mom we say hi. Yeah. I will. Please. I will. Shit. Oh, my God. This podcast is so crazy because it tells these insane, we have, there's so many people who

01:34:32

have stories like these. So many. And we get to hear them, and we get to celebrate the people who survive

01:34:41

and the people who have to survive when people don't. And we're so lucky to be able to just support these women and survivors.

01:34:48

Yeah, and also I think there's kind of a message that I feel like maybe people didn't understand before,

01:34:54

that you're all kind of telling each other, which is that this happens a lot, and you can't get through it.

01:35:00

I think there's kind of an amazing, you know, kind of a resilient lesson that comes through all this stuff,

01:35:08

which is that I think when bad things happen to people, it makes people shut down or not talk about it.

01:35:13

And the way it used to be is you don't talk about bad things. And really what people are learning is you absolutely must talk about bad things, process bad things, share bad things.

01:35:24

Because when you do that and you process it, you become stronger for it. You really do.

01:35:31

And all the people that we've met that have told us these insane fucking stories are, you know, that's the story they're telling us.

01:35:37

That's why I'm even able to say it is because that's the story we keep getting over and over.

01:35:42

So, like, the idea that Joy is mom is just, like, told her that story. And it's, like, the family lore, you know, that's an amazing lesson.

01:35:52

And I think it's great for people to hear. And there are people out there who have been through it or are here to support you and want to be there.

01:36:00

as well. So we're really lucky that we have all these incredible people to support.

01:36:04

Well, and you guys are creating a community. I mean, it's incredible. It's like you're all

01:36:09

kind of letting each other know you're out there. And, you know, this started as kind of like,

01:36:14

oh, we like true crime. That's interesting. And, oh, I'm allowed to like true crime as kind of

01:36:19

like the first wave. Now it's this thing of like, we can do whatever the fuck we want. And,

01:36:24

you know there's a lot of strength in this community and we're so excited to see you guys

01:36:33

I mean selling out three shows in one theater is like an incredible it's incredible

01:36:42

yeah and we appreciate what you guys do we love being part of this community and fucking support women

01:36:50

you know we're here for each other We're a fucking force. Here's the thing. It's already happening.

01:36:57

It's already happening. And you guys know it's happening. You can feel it happening.

01:37:00

There's something else happening. There's shitty things happening in this country right now.

01:37:04

There's also incredibly powerful things happening in this country right now. That's what you have to remember.

01:37:10

You have to remember you have each other, that we all have each other, and that we are all already connected.

01:37:15

And that's amazing. And we're sharing each other's strength, and it's fucking amazing.

01:37:18

And let's do it. When you tell your story to other women who support you and have been through it it fucking incredible and we can do incredible things with that power Yeah Yeah So do that Do that Do all those things we just listed and also stay sexy

01:37:31

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My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgi

220 - Live at the Chevalier Theatre in Medford, MA (2018)

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