Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
167: The Davenport Files
43 Plays29 days ago
We've covered the Fox sisters, but have you heard of the Davenport brothers? In the days of the rise of spiritualism, people flocked to see anyone claiming to see beyond the grave. Or better yet, to interact with the spirit world.
So when Ira Erastus and William Henry Davenport came on the scene with their cabinet of curiosity, many were curious themselves. Names big and small set out to see the brothers, including a certain famous mystery writer and massive magician, the cameos are just plentiful!
Leaving a trail of awed crowds, angry mobs and even some imitators, they blazed their way into the history books as two entertaining dudes. So watch out for smoke and mirrors, the stage is set for intrigue, many musical instruments and a show that's BOUND to be a blast! Wink!
Darkcast Promo of the Week! The Haunted and the Strange Podcast
Check them out!
And check out our partner promo! Stay safe with Birdie!
We are Birdie ambassadors, personal safety alarms made for women, by women. We are excited to offer a promo code below for 10% off your purchase at www.shesbirdie.com now, thanks for partnering with us Birdie!
Promo code: castlescryptids15 for 10% off your order
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Podcast and Hosts
00:00:03
Speaker
Darkcast Network. Indie Pods with the Dark Side.
00:00:28
Speaker
And you are listening to Castles and Cryptids, where the castles are haunted and the cryptids are cryptic as fuck. And I'm your host, Alanna. And I'm Kelsey. And it is episode 166. Welcome back or welcome new people. Wait, 167. I was just gonna say, we just did this. And I had 166 on the mind. Okay. Well, it's an episode.
00:00:57
Speaker
We're back. We're putting it out back very shortly after we record this also, because you know, that's what life is around this time of year. As we were just talking about off off air, if you will. ah Hectic, chaotic, expensive. Yeah. And we're Canadian. We don't even the one thing we don't have to deal with. We already got rid of right now because we already got through our Thanksgiving.
Seasonal Reflections and Anecdotes
00:01:24
Speaker
But Cassie's got like a million birthdays also apparently in November. What the hell, man? What's that all about?
00:01:35
Speaker
no
00:01:38
Speaker
Yeah, that's a lot. I wish everything was just a little more spread out. It would certainly be easier. Right. yeah The only thing I know is that according to a recent recent mini episode of the 10-ish, the least common birthday is February 29th. That's obvious, but also most of the most common ones are, or not, yeah, February 29th, the leap year one, you know. Pat says February 28th, so his is very close. um But September has like the most common birthday months. It's weird.
00:02:16
Speaker
Who knows? well ah guess people People getting bored in January? What's up? I think they were also applying or getting busy around the holidays.
00:02:27
Speaker
ah or happy Happy New Year with a stranger. Well, New Year babies, yes. Conceived on New Year's, yes. yeah Oh my.
00:02:40
Speaker
What are you guys getting up to on New Year's? wow i That's so funny. You just reminded me. Talk about birthdays that I got home and Pat showed me a video that said, um, my spirit animal was a dolphin because my birth month is March. And I was like, wait, what? I think you mean a seal. Cause I love seals. They're a little less.
00:03:06
Speaker
are dolphins aggressively rapey or did i just hear that somewhere uh no it's dolphins dolphins and otters oh sorry about it um yeah and i was like also i'm the seals are fatter i need to be like a they're so cute when they're like going like this they're like like doing the worm to right because they're just so like so So clumsy on land. Yeah. Oh, man. Anyway, um we're here. We're back. There was a very long episode last week, so we hope you enjoyed it. Yeah. Even if it did end up coming out a little bit later, as I was mentioning to Kelsey, I was having tech issues with things that I maybe just don't understand very well.
00:04:06
Speaker
so so it's okay we're still figuring it out probably partially user error and then my computer was dead and then i was like oh so it's coming out so i messaged on instagram and by the time i talked to my brother he was like i think i'm halfway done like he wasn't even done our episode it was so long kelsey it was almost three hours yeah we're like a marvel movie right oh my god Hey, some people like it i and I always hear that. You can always fast forward. Yeah, pop us in headphones and you can take us with you. well you do I used to love listening to podcasts while I was doing ah like laundry or the dishes or and cleaning my house, stuff like that. It's like, yes, take us with you while you go grocery shopping.
00:05:01
Speaker
I did think I said something like, yeah, you can clean your whole house or something. um Yeah, you could do a deep clean of your house in three hours listening for a last episode.
Engaging the Audience and Promotional Strategies
00:05:13
Speaker
Great for vacuuming. I don't know what to tell you. um yeah But yeah it yeah, it did end up being long. My story was quite long. I think this time mine's a little bit shorter. Okay. It's a lot more like,
00:05:27
Speaker
ball listical form
00:05:31
Speaker
o I'm excited. it' all It'll be a much lighter episode this week than last week. We wanted to, you know, we don't like doing ah too too heavy of episodes all in a row. Which is always why we kind of bounced back and forth between True Crime and The Paranormal, which I think was officially your idea and I think was probably a very good call. Yeah, I think it.
00:05:58
Speaker
It kind of gets going and I don't know, I enjoy a lot of the topics we do on the paranormal ones. ah Sometimes listening to one that's all true crime too is like I can find that hard to like even listen to like all day at work or something. I'm just like I need a break. Yeah, it's a lot and then they can tend to bleed together when it's just true crime.
00:06:24
Speaker
so Or to be fair, listening to one podcast all day, because I literally can listen to pods all day at work, like eight hours can be a lot without breaking it up. Yeah, so I couldn't do it. oh Yeah. but Oh, shit was we gonna say. Oh, you just said at the paranormal.
00:06:42
Speaker
podcast Podcasts. I don't know, but um I was wearing um my sweatshirt on my way home when I stopped to ah by the liquor store for a recording tonight.
00:06:54
Speaker
And I was reading my keep it weird podcast sweatshirt, which was like, Oh, what's that? Is that a podcast you listened to or something? I was like, Oh yeah, it's a paranormal podcast. Like I'm into those things or whatever. And she's like, Oh yeah, me too. Cool. And I was like, kind of shy. Like, well, yeah, I'm so into the, me and my friend kind of have one. Yeah.
00:07:16
Speaker
I know it's like putting yourself in the dating world you're like this is so nerve-wracking yeah yeah should we print out business cards I almost felt like I wished I had one because like people don't always remember the name off hand right so if they don't go yeah in their Spotify right away I've like I think one person was like just put it in my phone for me or whatever yeah so it's that kind of thing but I think it was when we first started, I had somebody at work ask me almost every time they saw me what the name of the podcast was. And I was like, okay, like, are you gonna listen or not? Like clearly you're having problems. You remember have a podcast and I've told you the name of it 15 times. So either look it up immediately or let's move on. Well, maybe it is hard to find, right? Yeah. So I guess sometimes I do try to send people like the link if they're like, what is it again? Yeah.
00:08:13
Speaker
It's even like a one day on her lunch break. I was like helping her look it up. I was like, oh my God, like just I can't anymore. We need a business card with the thing that, uh, what are they called? were The QR code? Yeah. Hover your phone over. Yes. Um, exactly. Yeah. My sister-in-law has a QR code that's for her.
00:08:35
Speaker
like hairdressing and everything it takes you I think to her website and everything where you can book online so if her clients don't know about it she gets them to scan it and then next time they can just book their appointment online instead of like she gets so many uh like text messages and messages through like instagram and social media about like hey do you have appointments
Exploration of Spiritualism and Psychic Phenomena
00:08:56
Speaker
available and then she's trying to like find appointment where if they have the thing is she can she has all these drop downs it has all the pricings on there and people book their own slots and and oh because it's not kind of through a salon directly or whatever no this it's all just her so yeah it's a lot easier if people can just gotta be your own secretary yeah yeah it's very frustrating uh i imagine yeah yeah i'm excited about what we're
00:09:30
Speaker
talking about today although I don't even kind of know what you're talking about now I know what our general theme was we picked but it was that's about all mine I think was one of the I think it was last time we kind of did like spiritualists and mediums I had come across a little paragraph that talked about uh some other ones and I just like saved the names to be like oh if we revisit this topic I at least have a couple that I could like look up and see uh if I wanted to cover another one of these so yeah this ended up being one of those and I was hoping that you hadn't heard of them. What other episode was that? Like with when we, like what did you cover in this spiritualism? Was it the one with the sisters and stuff that we did? Yeah.
00:10:25
Speaker
okay Yeah, that one. You get the Fox sisters who did come up in this, I guess. They were kind of inspired by them. It was fun. I like them, yes. I think they were the ones born in New Brunswick and then went to New York. okay Yes, no in the the New York area, yeah. Okay, mine's more on the psychic side. I ah would say, well, spiritualism too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:10:55
Speaker
I forget what the definition of that one is sometimes, you know, with like more on the medium side with the communing with the dead and stuff, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. I got some of that. Okay. Okay. I'm ready. I was like, maybe I misunderstood the assignment, but then I'm like, no, it's going to be great. This one I thought was interesting too, because this is a pair of brothers, which I feel like doesn't happen quite as often as, uh,
00:11:23
Speaker
TV would lead us to believe. sandwi yeah We've been watching so much Supernatural. I'm so sorry. As as per usual. But yeah, there's a few shout outs in this one for sure. I was like, oh, I know that name. I know that name. that well That's a famous person. i was like That's so fun when you start to yeah recognize things almost when you're like,
00:11:50
Speaker
i know this from this and this from this yeah so cool um so this is the davenport brothers um davenport yeah so fancy i'm sure that's a brand or a old-fashioned name for a couch like a chest or field or something i've heard before it did sound vaguely familiar so yeah maybe that's why i recognized it recline on the davenport you know yeah a The family was from Buffalo in Western New York. oh and new york um The brothers consisted of Ira Erastus Davenport, born in 1839.
00:12:42
Speaker
o Long, long time ago. A Victorian era. and then younger brother William Henry Harrison Davenport was born in 1841.
00:12:57
Speaker
And they had a younger sister. I think her name was Elizabeth. I only saw her in a couple of sources. um Don't know a whole lot. That's giving such Elizabeth Olsen getting overshadowed by Mary Kane, Ashley Vimeson. I think her name's Elizabeth. I don't know why. No, wait. She's probably really good, actually. And very talented. Yeah, right. We just haven't discovered her yet.
00:13:26
Speaker
She's too young. she will oh because She will skyrocket to fame at another point decades after her older sisters do. That's right. It's not her time yet. Your 15 minutes will come. Yeah. Gordo, lay down. Be chill, dude. Be chill. Go over there. You're so strong. How are you so strong? Dean just literally called someone Gordo the other day because, you know,
00:13:56
Speaker
He was a hunter named Gordon, who's the black guy who turns into a vampire. He was like, come on over here, Gordo, or something like that. Amazing. El Gordo. El Gordo. So yeah, I think there's a little bit more you can find online about their family, but ah their father, Ira Davenport Sr. was a Buffalo City police officer. And then their mother, I think she was probably just stay at home, ah mom helping raise the family. Her name was Virtue Honey Set.
00:14:33
Speaker
which people just don't name people virtue anymore my face who were like her first name was virtue and her last name is honey set like honey is in the food and then s-e-t-t honey set oh My name is Chastity Honeypot. That's amazing. So close. I'm a Southern Bale.
00:15:04
Speaker
um There's a couple different versions about how they got into their performances that they were doing. um Yeah.
00:15:17
Speaker
um Most popularly, kind of goes that ah starting in 1854, less than about 10 years after the spiritualism movement had taken off in America with the Fox sisters, as you talked about.
The Davenport Brothers' Rise to Fame
00:15:33
Speaker
they're from New York too, or like they lived in New York as well.
00:15:37
Speaker
Yeah, i because of this members of the Davenport family reported that Ira, the oldest had begun to levitate and that the brothers claim to be able to communicate with various spirits. um There's also stuff about them like holding seances and stuff going on with Elizabeth and everything but it's almost every source says something totally different so oh no it's really hard and I didn't want to go through everything so
00:16:14
Speaker
Yeah, it's a pick and choose your own adventure at that point. It really is. The one podcast that I listened to, the Spill the Mead, the girls always kind of framed it as a history gossip podcast because a lot of stuff obviously is really debated in history, so it could be really boring to be like, well it could be this, or it could be this, or it could be this.
00:16:35
Speaker
it could be this one so like that seems to fit let's go with that you know yeah it's like disclaimer you know we don't know for sure these yeah yeah so Most of the things did seem to state that it was starting in about 1854, that they started um claiming to be able to commune with spirits. yeah and Within a year um of this, there was a spirit guide named John King that convinced Ira Senior, the father, to allow the boys to perform for the public.
00:17:12
Speaker
And this they started doing at about 16 and 14 years old. And their first the show dad was against performing.
00:17:24
Speaker
Didn't really seem like he was against it. Just like it didn't really enter his mind being a cop that like his kids could do this, but as like a career path, but ended up. Yeah. Yeah.
00:17:42
Speaker
and It's just like you said, allow to perform or something. I was like, Oh, yeah. Mostly they're like, are we going to make money off it? And then pretend they don't want to make money off it. Yeah. Or whatever.
00:17:56
Speaker
So at 16 and 14 years old, their first shows were introduced as the brothers working with spirit power rather than tricks or being magicians, which was, I think it ran into something saying that magicians was only as like a concept wasn't really a thing quite yet.
00:18:19
Speaker
the Like maybe they had sorcerers and stuff, but not Close hand magic. but Yeah. Their shows involved spirit knocking or tapping, which I think is what you talked to about with the Fox sisters. It's very common. Yeah.
00:18:39
Speaker
Yeah, and their shows later evolved into musical instruments that would actually play on command and fly around the room, which obviously that's crazy, became very popular. Let's go. Any ectoplasm? Like some of these ladies went real hard with ectoplasm, quote unquote, and rabbit
Controversy and Skepticism Surrounding the Davenports
00:19:03
Speaker
parts. Oh gosh, I can't remember what her li her name was, but there was... ah Gross.
00:19:09
Speaker
Yeah, people, yep. We'll do some things for their 15 minutes of fame, I don't know. People still do. Have changed a whole lot, yeah. It's like, like and subscribe. Yeah. Well, well I will go to Yellowknife and drink the sour tote cocktail, won't you? I will not. Okay, okay. Ressa did it.
00:19:39
Speaker
Anyway, and it's a little gross. I could not imagine anything worse than a, like, liquor that has a toe instead of a freaking, what's it called, worm? Tequila worm. Oh, so gross. Okay, well, if we go to Newfoundland, though, you could get screeched in, then you just have to kiss the cod. That's a little less gross. No, thanks.
00:20:08
Speaker
you love the moonshine in vegas we'll try it those were a tiny shots i'm not it was good though they were yummy yeah turn my phone down anyway um Anyway, the brothers' big break came after sort of a dare from an audience member at one of their New York shows. This attendee, ah yeah they suggested that the brothers what should perform their quote-unquote seance with the spirits while concealed inside of a box like a wardrobe.
00:20:50
Speaker
ah um And that that would help. I think I read somewhere it was like to separate them from the instruments um so that people would like believe them more. I don't know. It didn't really make sense to me, but. It's totally the birth of the magician's trick. It's like, look over here while I'm getting in this box. Yeah.
00:21:17
Speaker
And what's his face on the rest of development when he's like, I'm going to go in this Jesus cave and I'm going to get resurrected. And then God, don't they like almost bury him for real? I don't know. He's probably like, I made a huge mistake. Job.
00:21:33
Speaker
um But with this like audience suggestion, ah they became their most popular and what they're actually like well known for is the Davenport spirit cabinet that they toured with. And like with that suggestion, this whole thing that they become so well known for was born.
00:21:55
Speaker
This is sounding a little familiar, whether or not it's just that I've heard someone use a cabinet before. I don't know, but interesting. I'm intrigued. Yeah, it kind of looks like if you picture like a stagecoach, like carriage kind of thing, and it's got doors and it's kind of got the ornate wooden designs and everything, and they're going to be sitting in it. Oh, so it's big. oh state Yeah, it's pretty big.
00:22:22
Speaker
Okay, not Dibbic box size. No, this is like pretty big. Okay. So the brothers introduced this wooden cabinet into their act. It stood at about six feet tall and was perched on two foot tall supports.
00:22:42
Speaker
It was decorated with designs of these vines and the fleur-de-lis. Okay, that is sounding like Cinderella's coach almost now. Yeah, it kind of does when you look at pictures. It does look nice. fancy There were three doors that opened. There was like a a middle one that would hold all the instruments um now, and then on each side, the brothers would be sitting on a bench ah and like with all the instruments in between them. And I think there was wooden like walls in between them and the instruments, so supposedly they couldn't touch them.
00:23:27
Speaker
Oh, right. Yeah. And the brothers were separated as well. Everything's up. See, no trap doors here. No hidden things there. Yeah. Getting that vibe. They would sit inside the cabinet positioned at either end. And yeah, kind of like a stagecoach is set at the either end. And then instead of like an empty space in the middle, there's a separate kind of area with instruments. ah Each seat that they would sit on had two holes that were drilled through and then hanging inside the middle of the cabinet behind the doors that separated the brothers, hung various instruments, including bells, horns. I think some stuff even said guitars and trumpets. Like they had a whole lot of stuff going on in there. Yeah. This is so elaborate. Yeah, it was like wild playing. I love it.
00:24:23
Speaker
ah So this was the routine so from the they did other stuff like they still did the knocking they still did some other stuff but this was like the big draw um once they got well known for it. That they were like making all these instruments play and stuff like this is yeah.
00:24:43
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. So there's some stuff you can look up about some of their other acts that they also did. This isn't the only thing they did, but it is kind of like the big finale showstopper. No, I would love to see it because it's so much harder, you know, was but ah for me, I like trying to envision something then like seeing it played out in a movie or something. Yeah, apple I get it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You get the kind of visual impact or whatever. but Sounds pretty crazy. Yeah, so I do kind of have a rundown on how the act kind of went. Oh my gosh, I feel like I'm watching The Prestige. Yeah, that's what I kept thinking of when I was writing this. That's such a good movie. Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Legacy and Impact of the Davenports
00:25:30
Speaker
Hugh Jackman. Oh, okay. Right? Yeah. yeah
00:25:33
Speaker
Yeah, it's Hugh Jackman and it's a Christian Bale. Christian Bale, yes. Yeah. I recently watched it again. I was like, God damn. Oh, very rewatchable. Very rewatchable. Because you're like, what happened? Oh, yeah.
00:25:51
Speaker
um Okay, so the act kind of goes like this. The brothers would first select audience members, of course, to serve as a committee. This committee together would tie the brothers up with ropes. This is while the Davenport's were seated on the benches with their feet in front of them, like inside the cabinet. The committee members- Okay, so these aren't audience plants that they need to have. They're just regular audience. Maybe. I don't know. Okay, okay. There's some debate about
00:26:27
Speaker
ah o how many people traveled with them and how often they were seen at different shows so sure sure sure some audience members may have been slightly more informed yeah prepped okay okay um yeah so these committee members hold on my whole thing just scrolled crazier oh no
00:26:56
Speaker
um yeah they'd sit on the benches with their feet in front of them and the committee members would tie this rope around their legs just below their knees down to
Audience Interaction and Future Plans
00:27:06
Speaker
their ankles and then the remaining rope so I think it was started at one brother the remaining rope was brought over to the other brother I think through like small holes drilled like that would pass through the walls inside the cabinet and then the end of the length of the rope was used to tie the bottom of the legs of the other brother. um Once that was done, there were shorter ropes that were used to tie the brother's wrists to the holes in their benches. So like they were... Yeah.
00:27:41
Speaker
They have passed a rope through essentially a glory hole to tie to the other person's legs. I'm like, what? Yeah. Am I picturing this right? Okay. All right. just me On my understanding. Yeah. um Of the few pictures I saw of like the cabinet. um And the ropes is very like um later magician Harry Houdini kind of vibes or sir yeah um headed their to So then the wrists are tied together and then the wrists are like tied to the benches so they can't move from the benches. And with the brothers secured inside the cabinet, the doors that like showed the brothers to the audience would be closed and the crowd would be left in awe as within moments instruments would begin to play from inside the cabinet while the brothers are they werere tied up.
00:28:37
Speaker
ah Yeah. ah It's the how are we playing the instruments? Yes. Well, we're all tied up. Classic, classic gag.
00:28:50
Speaker
uh a couple of sources said that some instruments were even tossed out of a little porthole window that was at the top of the middle door where the instruments were housed yeah um why them mother um by the spirits of course leta it's the spirits they're the ones playing the instruments okay um I also saw it yeah something in one of the last sources, I'm not sure if it's true or not, that ah they sometimes hands and feet would stick out of this porthole, um as well that we're also supposedly the spirits, so interesting.
00:29:33
Speaker
i mean All right. And I feel like the their feet ah just stick it out. They're just like, so easy to do. sorry The The magician, the gu the guy that unmasks all the other magicians to come out and be like, oh, it was, you know, the assistant. Well, just like, come on, we all know when they cut the woman in half, it's not they don't cut the woman in half. There's two assistants, right? It's like that kind of thing. Yes.
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah, well, we'll get to it. there There might be some stuff that gets figured out. oh So the instruments were said to be played by the spirits who accompanied the Davenport brothers. um At the end of the show, the doors would once again be open to reveal each of the brothers still tied to their benches.
00:30:24
Speaker
right and then at the very end of the act the doors were once again closed briefly and then finally open to reveal that the men had were free of the ropes and the ropes were like gone so duta don okay uh i did like this um
00:30:49
Speaker
this was quite fun it was from american hauntings a Yeah, americanhauntingsinc.com. They had a cute little write up about one of the performances. It says, on occasion, a spectator a spectator from the audience would be invited on stage and would be seated between the brothers in the cabinet. A few moments after the doors were closed, the man in the center would be often tossed out of the box with his coat gone, his neck tie around his leg, and a tambourine seated on his head.
00:31:24
Speaker
uh someone would fling open the doors and the davenport's would be found tied up just as they were before uh it also said that the davenport's also performed a dark seance on stage asking members of the audience to be present to ensure that no trickery was involved the brothers were securely tied to a table on the stage and the lights were turned out soon after ghostly forms began to float about on the stage what Of course, when the lights were raised again, the brothers would be found or would still be bound like to the table. So he did a lot of stuff with ropes.
00:32:02
Speaker
um ah they
00:32:06
Speaker
Early bondage. Yes, I don't know. I don't know where I was going with that. 50 Shades of Davenport. Yeah. Yes. No, I shouldn't say that they give, ah they apparently give the BDSF community, you know, like they're not very representative from what I've heard. No, it's very, very bad. Do not follow the books or the show. No, not very consensual. Didn't we talk about on Patreon that was written by like a super Mormon? I think we've talked about it a few times. Yeah.
00:32:42
Speaker
But if we haven't enough for your, you just turn back into Patreon because we get into all of our opinions there. Yeah. oh yeah
00:32:57
Speaker
so fun um Yeah, so that's one of the write-ups they had about one of the performances. There was many magicians and skeptics alike who tried to begin debunking this routine ah to some success, like some more so than others, and after many tries, apparently many.
00:33:15
Speaker
ah not just magicians but like other performers were able to replicate parts of the act and I guess like at the time because people that hadn't seen the show but that had maybe heard about the show didn't know what the Davenport's necessarily looked like so sometimes these debunking routines were performed in front of the public so sometimes people thought that those people that were ah reenacting what the Davenports did actually were the Davenports. So there was some stuff about that too, which I thought was kind of funny. They're like, yeah, there some of them got so successful at it, they were basically imitating the Davenports and touring that way. Having stolen their act. Yeah, there's no way they're gonna go viral enough that you'll just know. Yeah, I mean, it's like the 1850s.
00:34:13
Speaker
It just doesn't... oh Yeah, and I guess some people went a different way um once they figured out exactly how the Davenport's did it. They often confronted the brothers during their performances, ah even pushing their way to get picked as part of the committee um or as volunteers in their act, and they would like harass them and like follow them from city to city trying to get picked in every single performance.
00:34:42
Speaker
um so they could keep revealing them to the public as frauds oh so not the first groupies as i was gonna say there's new they're very bad they're still debunking them man yeah yeah not the kind of groupies some people had yeah this is like they were like oh i'm into spirit like i would i want to say harry houdini is one of the main ones i could think of that's like had a contentious relationship with spiritualism where they're like oh it's all hooey and then like someone when they love dies or whatever. And then they're like, well, no, I really want to talk to them again. And then, you know what I mean? They want to play again. It's like they changed their stance. so ah So they had been at this point, they had been touring successfully in the US for about a decade um with the war and everything happening um and stuff going on in the US. The brothers turned their sights on Europe starting in 1864.
00:35:42
Speaker
And this is when things started to go downhill definitely for them. um
00:35:51
Speaker
Yeah, Europe was like a different thing altogether. Not every audience... It would have been fine if it weren't for you meddling Europeans. And your dog too, no. Yes, my little dog too.
00:36:06
Speaker
Not every audience was convinced of the spirits playing the instruments, i most notably at this show that happened in Liverpool and where the selected committee
00:36:21
Speaker
The selected committee included a pair of engineers who ended up tying the brothers up in a knot and with the ropes called a tom's fool or tom fool's knot.
00:36:35
Speaker
ah oh Which I liked that the articles always made sure to put that the spirits didn't know how to untie these knots. And eventually the brothers had to be cut free because the instruments never played. And every time they opened the doors, the brothers were still tied up. Uh, the Cause the knot. It was too complex. Yeah.
00:37:03
Speaker
There was, I was watching a lot of Unsolved Mysteries and there was a case where a guy was tied up and it was supposed to be a suicide. And it was also like, well, why would you tie yourself up? Put an anchor around yourself and then shoot yourself in the head so you fall off your boat. It was very convoluted. And and I'm sorry, yeah I got a little distracted thinking about people tying themselves up for no reason.
00:37:28
Speaker
okay um yeah so because the instruments never played and the act didn't work the crowd turned into like this crazy angry mob but and ended up like rushing the stage and ripping the cabinet apart like they broke the entire thing no they took pieces of it away and basically disassembled the whole thing and it was gone uh well the brothers ended up fleeing i think even the city oh Oh my god. yes so and like um ah Yeah, it's actually kind of crazy. um Yeah, I guess the gentleman PT Barnum ah became aware of this incident and even wrote about it. yeah he's He's the first or the second, I guess the Fox sisters would be the first shout out.
00:38:25
Speaker
and The second is P.T. Barnum. There's others. um More name dropping? Oh no. yeah ah He included this Liverpool accident ah in his 1865 book, The Humbugs of the World. I'm not sure if that was funny. Kind of being like, oh. So this is called the Liverpool accident because it happened in Liverpool. I don't think it has a name, really. oh I thought you just said Liverpool accident and I was like Liverpool accent? What? The Liverpool. Well, that's what I just said as like what I called it, but it's not like a name thing. It's just like Liverpool show. I don't know. But this was not the only of their shows to go wrong in Europe.
00:39:15
Speaker
And the brothers had a history of the audience actually turning violent, or the brothers even being fined and imprisoned because of their shows. I'm sure there's quite fun books. People have done their research really well and you can read I'm sure a lot about those failed shows. I don't go into it a lot. Oh wow. But like too many to cover, hey?
00:39:42
Speaker
like ah Yeah, there's quite a bit like they talk about like the ones where um the the like there I think it was the same guys that did the Tom's Fool knot that they couldn't get through in Liverpool. I think they're one of the ones that started like following them and going to all of their shows and being like, these people are frauds and we're going to prove it by them not being able to untie these and then other people hearing about it and being like, Kate, we're going to tie them up in this knot.
00:40:15
Speaker
We're going to tie them up this way and it's going to be too tight and I don't think I have it but there was even ah something I read that said that on multiple occasions the brothers after being tied up by like one of the committee members um They had to put a stop to the show because the like bindings were too tight and they were saying they were being injured and the police like came on stage and like assessed them and were like, no, you're fine. Carry on with the show and like close the doors. And then when the show failed, then the mob attacked. Oh, yeah.
00:40:48
Speaker
and it sounded like multiple versions of the cabinet were like ripped apart by the crowds on multiple occasions and shows so there's a lot dang if you go into it it's actually kind of wild yeah for sure like it's a very weird like reminds me of the modern guy that unmasked the magician's tricks versus this like old-timey Oh, like these aren't necessarily tricks. It's entertainment or it's, you know, yeah, whatever. I mean, half of it is the, okay, is this entertainment or is somebody actually for real? And I think that's the thing that's the appeal of like psychics and medians and stuff. But but ah play disco I didn't really mention it, but they did have a former minister um that toured with them a lot. I think when they were in
00:41:46
Speaker
I think for sure when they were in Europe, I'm not sure about the US, who basically was like, everything you're about to see is the work of magic and spirits and everything. He's their promoter, their MC. Yeah, basically. yeah He would like introduce them.
00:42:06
Speaker
um Nice.
00:42:12
Speaker
So after that Liverpool show, the brothers ended up leaving England and began touring in Paris and even Germany. ah whoo We do know that while in Paris, another one of their shows went so wrong that police had to intervene.
00:42:33
Speaker
I think this might have been the one where they tested the ropes and everything and then the crowd rushed the stage again. ah And the police were still there when this happened and they actually ah kind of compelled the brothers to actually refund all of the admission money um back to the crowd because they had not been able to perform. Really?
00:43:04
Speaker
oh my god that's weird and also i can't distract it because gorda was flicking his tail and then all i could see was it coming out of your hair and it looked like medusa for a minute where like one of your curls was like alive and he was moving behind you
00:43:28
Speaker
I think it's just movement. There was a spectator that rushed the stage and he put his hand on the bench around where the ropes were wound and he ended up touching this spring that ah bent the bench in the middle and caused the ropes to fall to the feet of the captives. So he had basically like uncovered unintentionally uh maybe how they were doing the trick which also caused some some problems with the show right um yeah
00:44:09
Speaker
So while this was going on, obviously like the the fame around the brothers ah grew for better or worse. and There was a lot of people that got a lot of popularity just for people thinking they were basically hacks. ah And many skeptics and believers continue to show interest in the Davenport's, which is where I get to probably two of the biggest shout outs and name drops of Then, ah this is the argument arguments surrounding the brothers between Harry Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Doyle. Oh, I knew it. All right. They always pop up in these stories. Oh my gosh. Yeah, it's actually kind of... Jafos' daddy. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
00:45:04
Speaker
It's so funny, like yeah, until I started listening to podcasts, I never knew that they were both kind of in and out of the spiritualism phase and shit. like world Yeah, so Sir Arthur Conan Doyle became a fan of the Davenport brothers and was very public about his belief in their abilities, often defending the brothers, their act and their character, saying like they weren't liars and they wouldn't lie about that kind of stuff.
00:45:37
Speaker
yeah ah Doyle himself had an interest in the spiritualist movement and the more positive beliefs of the religion um like mostly that with the absence of hell and a continued existence after death the living may be able to speak with the dead which is what the Davenport's were like saying that they were communicating with them and like they were playing musical instruments for them a
00:46:10
Speaker
and And with after yeah the aftermath of World War I, spiritualism saw a huge revival. There was a cool thing. This was from redex.com. And that was just like a little bit about like Doyle's, Conan Doyle's
00:46:37
Speaker
I don't know, history with spiritualism? And how it kind of came about. I know Pudy had a personal history with it as well. So yeah, that's interesting. Yeah. um So Conan Doyle envisioned himself as a missionary for the spiritualist religion and even traveled to the U.S. to give lectures on the subject. His path and subsequent conversion to the spiritualism cause or spiritualist cause began in the late 19th century but was reinforced following his son's death shortly before the end of the Great War.
00:47:12
Speaker
seeking out an opportunity to reconnect with the spirit of his son. He hired mediums and arranged a seance to be conducted. During one of these interviews, he claimed to have made contact in which his son had asked forgiveness for a disagreement they had had before his death.
00:47:31
Speaker
and yeah uh doyo believed this disagreement involved matters of spiritualism something he and his son had not seen eye to eye on before his death so yeah um it was like pretty personal for him he believed uh then most most of it was true and people had these abilities yeah it seems like that's what helped it become popular is like it's
00:48:02
Speaker
I guess the first time and whenever it has its resurgence, it's usually when people are at war, like, yeah, what's this one? The Civil War. That's right. Then America. yeah So that's like one of the first times we actually hear about it. And it's, you know, people are like, oh my gosh, you know, they're bereaved and lost a loved one. And yeah, i see that kind of binds everyone together, even if they're on different sides of the conflict or whatever.
00:48:31
Speaker
Yeah, we talked about that with like Ouija boards and everything too. They became really popular at that time for that. Right? Yeah, you don't think how like they're older than they seem but also younger somehow. It's crazy. Yeah.
00:48:50
Speaker
ah weird So we can't talk about them without talking about ah the side of the skeptics, um which the Davenport brothers attracted plenty of as I've kind of touched on. um But they did attract the attention of famous magician and escape artist Harry Houdini. um I mean, he's just up in there.
00:49:13
Speaker
right ah Houdini had spent many years in the spiritualist circles, joining in seances and observing miraculous feats, all with the eye of a skeptic, and in his time he had proven many mediums as false, and he had now trained his eyes on the Davenports.
00:49:34
Speaker
Okay, this is his skeptic era. Yes. I feel like I've heard of this. He has such a up and down relationship. but Often, yeah, like you say when someone's family members dies, then they like almost become more open to it because they're like I would do anything to like speak to them again you know it's just that right yeah yeah's the hope that like they could ever speak to them again yeah and I like that hopefully like yeah like the kind of faith that we have that it's got to go on in some fashion and so I love those stories when people are like
00:50:11
Speaker
I'm sure that ghost was like my grandma or whatever or your kids like, Hey, grandpa. And like, it's creepy, but it's also comforting. yeah Yeah. Um, the rest of my segment kind of jumps around a little bit. ah Hopefully it's not, not overly confusing.
00:50:31
Speaker
um In the 1920s, Houdini had set out to write a book about the origins of the spiritualist movement and revealing the falsities within it. He admitted during his research that he actually believed that both the Davenport brothers had passed away.
00:50:50
Speaker
um This is again in the 1920s, but this was incorrect. William Davenport, the younger brother, had died actually in 1876 in Australia at the age of 36 while they were doing one of their tours um after contracting tuberculosis of the lungs. So yeah, it was like quite sudden and obviously like I didn't think people were still dropping a TB. Jesus. No, he died at the age of 36 in 1876. 1876. Okay, I did hear the age 36 because that got me because I was like, I am 36. He was 36. He died in 1876.
00:51:43
Speaker
That's rough though, damn man, it's too fucking young no matter what the century. Yeah, um yeah it was very ah abrupt and obviously ended the Davenport Brothers shows. ah Houdini during his research for the book, he believed both of them has passed had passed away, but he had learned that Ira at that point was still alive and he was willing to talk to Houdini.
00:52:07
Speaker
So um it turns out after William's death, Ira had attempted to revive their act um to like no success. Nobody was really interested in going to see them anymore. He kind of tried to revive it with a couple people that had toured with them before as like opening acts and people who had been associated with them before, um but nothing ever really took off. So he didn't keep up with it.
00:52:36
Speaker
um A lot of the rest of this is according to Houdini um stating that Ira wished to come clean about what they had done in their earlier years and saying in an interview with him that Ira had admitted to fakery and even showed Houdini the trick they used to escape the ropes inside the cabinet. A trick which reportedly even impressed the famous escaped artist So yeah, I mean, even though other people, I guess previously had like figured out what they were probably doing, I guess it was still impressive to Houdini like decades later. That's not the Penn and Teller show where they assess the magicians and if their tricks are good. My parents like that show. Yeah. I've seen that a couple times. It's not bad. I definitely would watch more. I just
00:53:33
Speaker
Um, don't know where it is or whatever. good
00:53:37
Speaker
Uh, in regards to their trick of making musical instruments fly around the room, which I guess they were still doing. Um, so they were having ones where they would fly around the room and then separate ones that would play inside the cabinet. Um, so when asked about it, um, according to Houdini, Ira reportedly responded, strange how people imagine things in the dark.
00:54:03
Speaker
saying totally totally in everybody's head but but oh my god okay gas lighter you were just like yeah it works i work so no yeah I have a little bit more from redex.com again saying despite the findings of Houdini's book released in 1924, entitled A Magician Among the Spirits,
00:54:35
Speaker
ah Doyle ended up staying true to his beliefs that Houdini and the Davenport brothers' abilities did in fact come from supernatal a supernatural place.
00:54:46
Speaker
so I mean, they go back and forth trying to convert each other. It's actually kind of funny. But Doyle's like, nope. but And Houdini's like, I'm not magic. And Doyle's like, no, you are. You have magical abilities. And he's like, I really don't. I was just going to say, yeah, Scully and Mulder, but maybe not. Yeah. Yeah.
00:55:12
Speaker
yeah i He, Doyle, went on to compare Houdini to the Davenport brothers stating, I'm quite sure that if the Davenport brothers had done their performance as if it were a conjuring trick and had never told the honest and unpopular truth that it was of psychic origin that they would have amassed a comfortable fortune.
00:55:34
Speaker
um Yeah, don't really know what that means. so Yeah, I was a little confused also. ah Likewise, Houdini said that Conan Doyle is sincere but deluded. Burn. It's an eighteen. But O'Doyle rules! I'm sitting. Despite these disagreements, a close friendship eventually developed during this period, and each spent considerable time trying to convert the other.
00:56:06
Speaker
ah Conan Doyle often arranged meetings for Houdini with mediums and likewise Houdini went about disproving their spiritual abilities and neither persuaded the other to budge. I mean, it's so cute though! I know! Because they say someone will be friends even though they disagree. i I do like that it said that they eventually were able to develop a friendship, which I appreciate. Yes!
00:56:37
Speaker
yeah so it'd be sad for the fact that obviously you're ah going to be different from any one of your friends you're not going to agree on everything yeah you should still be able to be friends oh that's so funny just like still try to like kind of disprove each other for a long time yeah they just go back and forth it i guess um i do want to kind of look up more about them but i was like oh they they probably there's probably so much about hubadini that like uh i was literally hearing about him to like this week i don't know i you know i listened to a bunch of different podcasts some of them are like
00:57:19
Speaker
guess this fact like the wiki the wiki hole one it might have been that one where someone was like hey who did he died this way and i'm like is that true because he had a weird like you know he got punched and then a few days later the appendicitis and all that kind it was like Well, probably didn't help that this guy, they let the like frat guys in his room when he, after he did a show in Montreal, and he was like, what, you could take a punch to the stomach? Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. Fuck you, dude named Jocelyn or whatever his name was. I was like, his name was Jocelyn. Anyway, um yeah. And then like, well, it's not until like he does a show like the next day or something that he like collapses in Detroit, but like Jesus Christ.
00:58:09
Speaker
Well, he was a he was an icon, Houdini. yeah um All I had was that oh apparently after he died Houdini died in 1926, Conan Doyle approached his wife Beatrice with a message that Houdini would communicate with him soon. ah Those words, however, like whatever Houdini was supposedly going to be telling to him,
00:58:35
Speaker
ah would never come and four years later in 1930 Doyle himself would die and Houdini's wife Beatrice would never hear what supposedly her husband was trying to tell her from the afterlife according to Doyle. I remember hearing that there was a signal like that the ah your husband and wife had agreed on or something and ah Yeah. She was supposed to wait for or he was supposed to. Yeah, and Doyle himself, I guess, died before anything was ever passed along.
00:59:10
Speaker
um But it was Houdini that wanted the signal from the afterlife, right? He was like convinced he could talk to his wife or something. ah Houdini was already dead and supposedly going to be trying to pass along the signal to his wife.
00:59:29
Speaker
Okay, so they had like a code word or whatever. Something. I don't know. It didn't didn't say okay i remember hearing something like that that. They had like a phrase they were going to use. Okay, probably. ah Shortly after Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's death, this Nino Pecorrero came out in public to recant his psychic abilities in an attempt to make an honest living after the ghost business had hit a depression. Pecorrero had previously claimed responsibility for Doyle's initial conversation or conversion to the spiritualist beliefs and had claimed to speak to Houdini after his death.
01:00:15
Speaker
um Oh, really? Yeah. But he didn't say what Houdini said? No, but he did say he was he was a fraud at least. ah Oh, okay. And then he was like, as Houdini appeared and just said, by the way, I'm dead, but I am a fraud. No, not that Houdini is a fraud, that he was a fraud. This Nino Picarero guy, he came forward and said he is a fraud.
01:00:44
Speaker
I get so confused with it, I'm sorry. Because I know that he was into it for a while and then wasn't, so I'm always like, wait, when was this? Yeah. In 1951, I guess London passed the Fraudulent Medium Act. The Act worked to criminalize people who pretended to act as spiritualist mediums for money for material profit. I know I had no idea.
01:01:14
Speaker
It seems so progressive for the time. Yeah, 1951. Apparently the act was later repealed in 2008. So I guess that's not a thing. Repealed? Yeah. What? Yeah, I can't believe they repealed it. But this is bizarre. They're like, we need we need to stimulate the economy, make more jobs. Let's let people pretend to be mediums for money a again. Yeah. what Wow, I don't know. There are the the mediums like the purported like mediums that you go to that are what I think it described at the other day is like, you get the cold reading ones versus the hot reading because
01:02:00
Speaker
you know there's the ones that just go oh i see an important male in your future or in your life or whatever and like of course most people are like yeah my dad or whatever right it's like yeah but um yeah i don't know just it's just weird there's like a whole law about it yeah it'd be interesting to look into that more i think oh my god we should do an episode on like yeah strange laws I do have a little bit from Wikipedia. No, just kidding. Oh, it was a little bit more about the Davenport's. In 1998, there was a skeptical investigator named Joe Nickel, who discovered the Davenport scrapbook that I guess was in the museum at the Lilydale, what are we... Lunch meat? Yeah, right? The Lily Dale Spiritualist Assembly. Yeah, they're like a meat company. Yeah. Lily Dale. Anyway. Somebody who like was part of the Lily Dale family. Anyway.
01:03:13
Speaker
Someone I worked with. um Apparently there was a scrapbook that was found in 1998 at the Lillie Gail Spiritualist Assembly. um but And this nickel examined the newspaper clippings, personal notes, and photographs from the scrapbook. And he concluded that Arthur Conan Doyle was correct about Ira, the Ira Davenport, endorsing spiritualism in private.
01:03:42
Speaker
And that Houdini was also correct about the Davenport um having their public spirit phenomena be the result of trickery. So, kind of was like, oh, both both were true. Like, um yeah, I guess I really- Are the No, they're long since dead. Oh, sorry.
01:04:06
Speaker
they made this scrapbook um or this scrapbook was made by somebody but it wasn't really reviewed until 1998 I guess okay yeah you did say 19 something and before that I thought 18 so i um I missed the vote I'm sorry uh Yeah, so I guess like Ira, even though they were using tricks to do their act, um Ira the older brother still kind of believed in like spiritualism and everything, like privately, even though they were using tricks for their show. So yeah. Yeah.
01:04:47
Speaker
Yeah, because it doesn't negate something just because you're like, oh, I'm a ghost. Doesn't mean that ghosts don't exist just because you're pretending to be one. Just that kind of thing, I guess. Yeah. Very, yeah very interesting, though. um One of those ones, if you don't do it the deep dive, then you're just going to get the, oh, it was this or it was a hoax or whatever. you Like you get a one sentence thing. So it's really interesting to hear.
01:05:12
Speaker
someone kind of go through it and be like, okay, here's the nuances. And yeah, some was fake or some was not, which sometimes is the case. Yeah. According to Nickel, taken as a whole, the evidence of the scrapbook does indicate that Ira Davenport was a practicing spiritualist, or at least pretending to be, although he and his brother used trickery to accomplish the effects they attributed to spirits.
01:05:41
Speaker
Um, and I guess, he believed, he just faked it for everyone else.
01:05:49
Speaker
Okay. I thought this was sweet. In honor of his brother, um because it was the younger brother that passed away, the older brother Ira had ordered a magnificent ah memorial for him on which was carved a representation of their ropes, the cabinet and other seance props they used in their show.
01:06:14
Speaker
Okay. Yeah. right um As William had died in Australia, apparently, and like I'd say unfortunately, the cemetery officials in Sydney would not allow the monument within the cemetery grounds. So it was placed outside of the cemetery instead. Oh, really? um I should have tried to look up pictures of that because that sounds interesting. I wonder if it's still there.
01:06:40
Speaker
Why was it so offensive? I don't know. It just said they wouldn't allow the monument within the cemetery. So it was like placed outside the cemetery. Hmm. Yeah, weird. Yeah. And then um Ira, the older brother, he ah passed away. He was living in New York. It didn't really say what he was doing. But he passed away in 1911 at the age of 71.
01:07:10
Speaker
I can't remember if I ran across how he had passed away, but... Right. yeah Well, yeah at the age of 71, you assume it's something fairly natural. Hopefully. Yeah. I just thought it was... A motorcycle accident. Could have been. No, I don't think it was anything like that. but I thought it was kind of sad that like his younger brother passed away when he was 36 and then...
01:07:39
Speaker
Like he lived longer without his younger brother than he did with him. Like doing the show. Yeah. That's kind of depressing. Yeah. Yeah. Cause he was, Ira was 71 when he passed away and then William was only 36 when he passed away. Stop saying that I'm 36. I don't want it. You're not going to get tuberculosis of the lungs though. In Australia.
01:08:10
Speaker
oh my gosh sorry i know i know i know it's just one of those years where it's like life is too fucking short people uh people do get sick before they're too old which is unfortunate when they ask for sure yeah oh my god you guys i'm depressing um shout out to the uh lady at the liquor store to supply new my cider today, who's probably gonna listen to our podcast. Yeah. Cause she saw my, uh, keep it weird podcast t-shirt or whatever it was. This is why you need merch people. I need more sweatshirts.
01:08:52
Speaker
I'm just saying that like my mom didn't and my cousin didn't make me with those shirts that we have that say castles encryption. So I love you guys. Oh,
01:09:04
Speaker
Um, that was amazing. It was also ah like long enough ass story that I don't know if we might just make this one in the episode. I like, what do you think? You probably could. Yeah. as well I didn't think it would be this long, but it ended up that way.
01:09:27
Speaker
Yeah. Like fucking fucking fruit fly. Jesus. Gross. It was on my glasses. No, that was really good. Like kind of had to be a long one because you couldn't. Yeah. on to Short and stuff. There was quite a bit I left out. I think I ended up like my last three sources. I was like, I'm tired of reading about stuff. And I didn't even didn't even go back to them. I was like, no, I'm done. No, no, no, no. I get it where I'm like, I don't know how to be done yet. I'm like, I'm focused. Yeah, exactly. So I'm sure people can read the book. But it was really intriguing. That was like, it's just enough to make you want to go like
01:10:03
Speaker
Okay, well, what the fuck else did they get up to, you know? Yeah, there was quite a few books that um I ran across that have been written about them. Apparently they're like people are very divided about them. You either kind of like them or apparently like you hate them because a lot of things like said when you tried Googling them, it was like um the ones like the the um like brothers that divided Europe or and stuff like that for like headlines it's crazy yeah yeah I don't love sensationalism headlines sometimes I've heard a lot about covered about like say the Menendez brothers case and I thought that was really good coverage on different podcasts and then you get the ones you know the Netflix stuff that's like
01:10:59
Speaker
monsters and you're like how is that title not even biased like i don't know you're just like sometimes you just want to listen to a little bit of a deep dive because people can be a little more context and you feel a little bit more informed not that we are f freaking you know journalists or anything but my gosh like yeah it's hard to sift through all the shit that's on the internet so i always appreciate when you bring me a little case and it's all succinct and i can be like okay Yeah, it's there it's very hard to do. I don't think I appreciated how hard how hard people have to do.
01:11:36
Speaker
my yeah i'll click into something and i'll start reading and be like oh this is like different information then sometimes you get to something that they put in and you're just like okay that is so wrong it's just like okay i have to disregard everything you just said i'm not even gonna read i've read 10 sources and yet you guys said yeah this thing you're like i don't know but it'll be like something wild like i ran across stuff saying like ah some of them had died like a decade wrong and like
01:12:08
Speaker
all that kind of stuff and I was like nope like updates a yeah yeah like everybody says this and you were the only one saying this like no I can't yeah i no i've heard Yeah, but there is, it does seem like there's quite a few books. I got a lot of ah stuff that popped up trying to get me to buy books about them on Amazon. So I think there's some stuff out there. um It's probably cool. I think the magicians and that kind of stuff and like shows and um and routines are kind of interesting to read about.
01:12:44
Speaker
so that's mentioned the magicians when you said magicians i went oh yeah that's a good show oh but really good show slash book series yeah oh my gosh um yeah no that was a really good story i don't think okay i feel like i've heard of stories where they had cabinets or something but i really don't think i knew that so yeah i think there was there's other people that use spirit cabinets i guess there's also um even a knot uh that was named after them called like the davenport knot or something um when i tried looking it up i couldn't really figure out exactly what it was but um and i was like it is directly for a couch or something um yeah it does talk
01:13:38
Speaker
About them, when you look up the Davenport knot, it's like made popular by the Davenport brothers, Ira and William. Really? Well, the only thing I remember like that was the one, one lady I remember covering doing, why were we doing playboe bunnies? But I was doing a bunch of the playboe bunnies that like died and stuff, which is depressing. Oh, yeah. It's like the one they named the person.
01:14:09
Speaker
ah what okay it probably, I think it was like Hollywood Curses, you're right. And the one like that you see the bars and the backup, like a big transport truck, you'll see like a, you know, the ah the steel bar and it'll be like, yeah, red and whatever. And it's like, yeah, I think they like named the bar after her because the way that it was foggy and their, their car smashed into the back of a transport truck or whatever.
01:14:34
Speaker
Anyway, I don't know. It's just weird. It's one of the only ones some of these ones like kind of linger on. And when you're telling me these ones, I'm like, stuff I've heard about some of this. It's just weird. and Yeah. To get like, yeah, the background is always fascinating. Always. Yeah. The most likely thing I kind of ran across was that they weren't necessarily untying the ropes, that they were more likely ah while they were being tied, they were like holding their wrists and stuff in certain ways that
01:15:10
Speaker
uh would have slack and everything that they could like twist their wrists out and get their hands free and then probably get their legs free and then play the instruments and then they could like loop their wrists and everything back into the ropes the same way so that when they open the doors they'd be like we're still tied up uh and then you yeah yeah that they weren't necessarily maybe like untying the knots they were just like getting enough slack that they could like get the ropes to fall off and then they could like retie themselves which i think is like how how do you retire yourself up like that's that's kind of tricky so ah yeah that i don't know i've heard about the um ah thought or idea that if someone's like tying you up or if you can get some sort of slack or traction by like if someone's tying your throat to like
01:16:03
Speaker
I don't know, puff out your neck or whatever you can do to try and get a little extra leverage or like yeah to make the notes not tight. That's not tight that that works. But like, Jesus, you don't usually see it employed in every day. Like, I don't know. Yeah, I ran across a couple things that said that they were probably doing like that kind of thing. um Yeah, but I'm just i'm not. Yeah.
01:16:32
Speaker
I'm not sure about that little like trap door that they where that little like spring thing that collapsed part of the bench down um and released the thing. i'm not I'm not sure about that one then. Right. Whether whether you can call it some sleight of hand or just some sort of trick or some skill that they had from doing it so often. Yeah. Yeah, it's obvious they could do that.
01:16:57
Speaker
yeah yeah apparently whatever they were doing was enough to impress Houdini so maybe they were like untying themselves and retying themselves back up like over and over again in the cabinet every night and if you get a present Houdini I'm sorry you impressed me um right he was a pretty great guy all up until some stupid Quebec frat boy named Jocelyn punched him in the stomach
01:17:32
Speaker
Oh, Houdini. He lived very riskily. So I think that was kind of ironic. Yeah, that he like just kind of dies from. Yeah. The aftermath of different. Yeah, whatever. That was really fascinating. um ah Yeah, I enjoyed it.
01:17:55
Speaker
that maybe this is why we keep, we we find some fascinating ones and sometimes they're back in history and they'll be like to Kelsey, I'll be like, hey, we're like number two in the Good Pods history top 10 charter. Yeah, it's so, so weird. I don't think of us as a historical podcast. Hey, we don't have a manager. We don't know how to brand. I mean, a lot of stuff we end up talking about ends up being in history. Who knows? I like it. yeah I was like, I'm not offended.
01:18:25
Speaker
to be like number two in the top indie history chart. But it is kind of weird because normally we're like on the true crime one. So it was just. Yeah. OK. How many things can we incorporate what we got like movies and TV show reviews, book reviews? Can we incorporate cooking advice or something in here somehow? Just get on. I don't know if they have a top 100 list on Good Pods. I haven't been on there a lot because they're all of the.
01:18:55
Speaker
yeah the types of podcasts and then we can be on all the top 10 lists. Oh yeah, not mad about being like, oh, your podcast made the top 100 list. You're like, okay. And then I'd be like, oh, history. Okay, Kelsey. I've been talking about so many pirates and we've been doing so many castles that people are like, yeah, they're all castles, no cryptids. I don't know.
01:19:22
Speaker
Oh, I love it though. I love getting raided enough to be like, you're on, you know, I mean, I can't complain about being like, you're number two or whatever. It's very cool for sure. Yeah, I keep raiding on good pods. i I'd like to go on there, but I haven't been on there. My new phone doesn't have as much storage space and space and it gets very glitchy and it's like, I don't know how to run good pods. I'm going to close now. Bye. And I'm like, okay, really don't go on there. Yeah, I'll go in there to like rate some shows, but like I'll go and listen on Spotify cause it doesn't crash my whole phone as I was telling my brother. But anyway.
01:20:02
Speaker
still a good place to write and review so thank you guys for all doing that yes do it everywhere it really helps we appreciate it um i guess maybe we'll see you back here next time because we were thinking about uh you know maybe doing next week is like something else but i have my story still yet to tell so i think i might just draw it out a little and Have this one be your hour and a half episode for the week, you greedy bastards. No. Right? That just means I get to sit back and relax. I mean, and last week's episode was like almost three hours. We were like, no. No, thanks. I have problems.
01:20:53
Speaker
yeah um so catch you back for part two of this one psychic spiritual mediums oh my yeah for my part where i'm going to tell kelsey all about um um do i know yes i do oh Mine's oh I uh looked up some famous psychics and ended up some that uh were female and made some cool predictions and so I'm mostly going to tell you about someone who's called Baba Vanga. No I think that's how you say it. She's also been called the Nostradamus of the Balkans so ooh
01:21:35
Speaker
oh profits and predictions oh my it should be fun yeah wow hopefully not scary right so i guess we'll do that next time and then we'll get into whatever we decided the next topic was. because I had to look it up again because I couldn't remember. ah Egypt, true crime. Okay, well, yeah, we'll probably do that one after. Yeah, because we if we do, you know, whatever, we were like, we might have to take a week off, but if we can do this one as an extended episode, that's cool too. So we'll figure it out. We'll keep you guys in the loop.
01:22:25
Speaker
Exactly. We'll catch you next time. So keep it cryptic Thank you for listening to castles and cryptids We love all our listeners and appreciate every subscriber every new review every listen rate and download Our music is by Kobe off air and our cover art is by Antonio Garcia We are also a proud member of dark cast network where you can find the best and spookiest of all indie podcasts Follow us on social media where we are at Castles and Cryptids on mostly all of the things, now including TikTok. Check out our bonus content on Patreon. Cryptid clashes, video mini-sodes of your hosts making asses of themselves, Ask Me Anything, quizzes, other special episodes and more. Starting at just $2 a month, you can get 1-2 extra episodes depending on your level.
01:23:19
Speaker
We produce, edit, and research everything ourselves, and any support you can lend helps us to keep it cryptic.
01:23:44
Speaker
Yeah? Are you into cryptids? What about hauntings? Yeah, I've got a ghost for you. Oh, you like overworld the beings. Me too. Check out all these aliens. We have plenty. How do you feel about a good legend? Wanna hear about spooky happenings? Yeah, you do. Let us show you what we've got. Hey guys, grab a drink and join us, Amanda and Sean, every week while we dive into the strange and haunting topics that have piqued our interest. See you over at the Haunted and the Strange wherever you get your podcasts. Stay spooky.