True Weird Stuff

Today's True Weird Stuff - Nazi Farm Part 2 In Nazi Farm, Part 1 we discussed the origin of Colonia Dignidad, the Nazi religious cult established by Paul Schäfer in Chile. In this episode, we dive deeper into Colonia Dignidad's relationship with Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet. Schäfer's alliance with Pinochet's regime led to Colonia Dignidad becoming a place where Pinochet's enemies would be brutally tortured...or worse.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Nazi Farm Part 1 Paul Schäfer was a Nazi who, after World War II, would go on to become a minister. When Schäfer was accused of abusing two young boys at his orphanage, he fled to Chile and started a community called Colonia Dignidad. Though this 53-square-mile compound looked peaceful on the outside, Colonia Dignidad was a horrific nightmare. Violence, abuse, forced separation of families, and an alliance with a Chilean dictator were just a few of the ways Paul Schäfer maintained control over his Nazi cult with an iron fist.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Order of the Pug The rise of Freemasonry in 18th century Europe led to conflict within the Catholic Church. Their disdain of these secret fraternal orders led to Pope Clement XII banning Catholics from joining them. However, that didn't stop a group of Catholics from creating their own secret society, one based on loyalty, trustworthiness, steadfastness...and wearing a dog collar. This group was known as the Order of the Pug.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Revisiting A Killer Pool With Sheri feeling under the weather this week, we thought it'd be a good time to re-release the first episode of True Weird Stuff. Sheri shares the details of growing up with a neighbor down who was as nice as could be...until the day he snapped and went on a killing spree.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Killer Eyes Fritz Angerstein was a German mass murderer who killed his wife and 7 other people on November 30 and December 1, 1924. For centuries, people wondered if it might be possible for the human eye to record the last image it saw before death, leading to the practice of forensic optography. Even though it would eventually be debunked, forensic optography was admitted as damning evidence in the trial of Fritz Angerstein. It claimed that his face and an axe were the last images his victims saw.

Today's True Weird: Murder Farm (Airdate 5/23/2025)

Today's True Weird Stuff - Mammoth Feast (Airdate 5/16/2025) In 1901, an expedition team in Siberia discovered a nearly perfectly preserved mammoth locked in permafrost for 44,000 years. Various tales of the consumption of mammoth meat have been around for centuries, but none like the Explorers Club's 47th Annual Dinner in 1951. The exclusive meal was rumoured to have included a host of exotic delicacies, including pieces of 250,000-year-old woolly mammoth meat. It wouldn't be until decades later that examinations of a sample of the meat from that legendary dinner would solve the mystery, once and for all.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Adam & Eve Declassified In the 1960s, the CIA classified a book called The Adam and Eve Story. The book claims that Earth undergoes catastrophic events approximately every 6,500 years, leading to the destruction and rebirth of civilization through disasters like pole shifts and mass extinctions. The book became declassified in 2013, but even then, only several dozen pages were made available...and the reason the CIA has kept the details of this book secret is still unknown.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Casket Girls In the 1700s, the French colony in Louisiana had a population problem: there weren't enough women. And so the French government rounded up and shipped over hundreds of women across the Atlantic to marry male settlers and help “civilize” the growing colony. The women carried what little belongings they had in small wooden trunks that looked like mini coffins, which is why the women were known as the Casket Girls.

Today's True Werid Stuff - Doomsday Clock: 89 Seconds To Midnight Created in 1947, the Doomsday Clock was established by a group of atomic scientists to represent to the public the likelihood of a human-made global armageddon, whether it's the looming threat of nuclear war, bioterrorism, or cyberwarfare. Over the years, the Doomsday Clock has found itself inching closer to midnight, and January 2025, the clock was set to 89 seconds before midnight...the closest it's ever been to doomsday.

Today's True Weird Stuff - The Arkansas Ghost January, 1929. A man named Connie Franklin moved to Stone County, Arkansas. The alleged 20-something began courting a 16-year-old girl named Tiller Ruminer, and on March 9th, 1929, the two were on their way to obtain their marriage license when a group of men attacked them. Tiller survived the brutal assault, but Franklin was tortured to death, and his body was burned in the woods. Months later, a pile of ashes and charred bones was discovered, leading to a bizarre moment in history that included Connie Franklin himself testifying at his own murder trial. And thus, the tale of the Arkansas Ghost was born.

Today's True Werid Stuff - Reliving The Black Eyed Kids In 1996, reporter Brian Bethel said he had an encounter with two children that left him terrified. Sitting in his car in a parking lot late at night, Bethel was approached by two young boys whose eyes were as black as coal. In the decades since Bethel shared his story, others have claimed to have similar encounters with children with pitch-black eyes asking for help, or asking to enter the person's home. Are these haunting run-ins an urban legend, or do you have reason to fear the black-eyed kids? (NOTE: This was originally released as episode #31. We're re-releasing it with a newly added Post Mortem discussion).

Today's True Weird Stuff - Another Icepick To The Brain Rosemary Kennedy was part of the powerful and highly esteemed Kennedy Family. Rosemary was born with intellectual disabilities at a time when children with special needs were highly stigmatized. When she was 23 years old, Rosemary's father ordered her to have a lobotomy. The procedure left her permanently incapacitated, and her family would keep her mostly hidden from the public for the rest of her life. (NOTE: This was originally released as episode #29. We're re-releasing it with a newly added Post Mortem discussion).

Today's True Weird Stuff - Headless Valley The Nahanni Valley in the Northwestern Territories of Canada is a beautiful area that's home to strange and deadly tales, including the story of Frank and William McLeod. The two brothers set off into the Nahanni Valley in hopes of discovering a fortune in gold. Years later, their skeletons were found at an abandoned camp...and their heads were missing. Hence the reason the area became known as the Headless Valley.

Today's True Weird Stuff - The Last Duel The most famous duel in American history was between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr in 1804. The premiere way of settling disputes and upholding unwritten codes of honor, the act of dueling would gradually fall out of favor over the 19th Century. However, dueling was still commonplace in Southern states like South Carolina. That is, until a duel in 1880 between Colonel E.B. Cash and Colonel William Shannon forced the state to ban the practice.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Jill the Ripper In 1888, the people of the Whitechapel district of London were terrorized by someone on a ruthless killing spree. Over 100 suspects were named, including a woman named Mary Pearcey. In 1890, Mary was convicted of brutally murdering her lover's partner and child, and Mary was sentenced to death. The brutal nature of the killings would lead to a theory decades later that claimed Mary Pearcey was the was the infamous Jack the Ripper.

Today's True Weird Stuff - Mirror, Mirror Margaretha von Waldeck was the real-life inspiration for Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Born to a noble family during the Holy Roman Empire, Margaretha's mother passed away when she was 4 years old. Her father, Count Philip IV, would go on to remarry a woman named Katherina von Hatzfeld. Katherina despised her stepdaughter, and had Margaretha sent away. Though beautiful and poised to make a name for herself in the history books, Margaretha's short life would play out like a fairy tale...minus the happy ending.

Brain In A Jar Phineas Gage was an American railroad foreman who survived a traumatic brain injury. In 1848, an iron rod shot through his skull and destroyed a chunk of his left frontal lobe. Though he survived the accident, the damage to his brain drastically altered his personality. Gage's story became a catalyst for modern neuroscience, which has advanced to the point scientists are now able to develop a brain in a jar.

Today's True Weird Stuff - The King's Rhinoceros In the 1500s, King Manuel of Portugal gifted Pope Leo a beautiful, white elephant as a gesture of obedience to the Vatican. Unfortunately, the majestic beast passed away after only two years. To make up for it, King Manuel tried to ship Pope Leo a rhinoceros named Ganda; however, the rhino met its demise in a shipwreck before it could make it to Rome. The only good thing to come from this debacle was the immortalization of Ganda by an artist who created a sculpture without ever having seen a rhinoceros.

Today's True Weird Stuff - The Appetite Tarrare was a French Showman in the 1700s who had an insatiable appetite. His eternal hunger terrorized him to the point he literally tried to consume everything: live animals, garbage, inanimate objects, and even human flesh. The curious case of the 100lb Tarrare baffled even the greatest medical minds, and the medical findings of his autopsy were the definition of truly weird stuff.