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Heart Starts Pounding(2022–)
November 3, 20225 Seasons · 188 Episodes
Returning Series
Crime
Mystery
Talk
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Overview
Explore the darkly curious with host Kaelyn Moore.
Created by Kaelyn Moore
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Explore the darkly curious with host Kaelyn Moore.
2024
Come with me on my trip to one of the most haunted cities in the world, New Orleans. Which ghosts haunt the St. Louis Cemetery No. 1? Could Marie Laveau truly influence the legal system with her voodoo? And for as hard as I tried, did I actually see a ghost?
Women dropping dead inside of temples, a haunted limestone mine, and a mysterious orb of light attacking locals. We're doing a taste of Indian history and folklore by sampling one story from each category.
A ghost ship. The Button Man. A shark that threw up a major clue to a murder. Today we're talking about Australian urban legends and the terrifying truth behind them.
Before there was Pablo Escobar, there was Griselda Blanco, a woman who left the slums of Colombia to become a billionaire boss of the cocaine trade. If there's one thing Griselda knew, however, it's that the high couldn't last forever.
What happens when a man tries to keep one of the deadliest creatures on the planet as a pet? Or when an Ohio man who has kept over 50 lions in cages in his backyard decides he wants to unleash them on the town? Today, we're talking about the deadly consequences of people trying to keep wild animals as pets.
In 2011, Sandra Clifton found her perfect match on a dating site. Handsome, charming, successful--David Hendy was everything she wanted. The only problem was... David Hendy didn't exist
In 2015, Robert Hendy Freegard disappeared with Sandra Clifton. Robert's shocking past is uncovered in the search to find her, including the story of a woman he held captive for a decade.
When Juliane Koepcke boarded flight 508 with her mother on Christmas Eve, 1971, she knew the airline they were flying had a horrible reputation. She never imagined that she'd be the only person of the 92 on board to survive the flight.
A brain disease caused by a routine treatment, a deadly medical mixup during a medical trial, and a doctor hell bent on proving he can give patients cancer. Today's episode has 3 stories about what happens when you run tests on unsuspecting patients
Rule #1: We Hate The Rich. Rule #2: Death is the only thing that awaits he who betrays this group. Rule #3: Never trust a woman, not even your own mother. This is the story of the Chijon Family, South Korea's most infamous gang, and the woman they kidnapped who lead to their undoing.
The legend of the Burned Woman, the Black House, and the ghosts of Lecumberri prison. Today, we're talking about the folklore, myths, and legends stemming from Mexico City.
The waist chop, slow slicing, being thrown to the beasts, and more. Today, we're traveling back in time to check out 8 of the most brutal execution methods from ancient times.
The haunting of the Gray Man, The vengeful Witch of Yazoo, and the man who made a deal with the devil. Today we're exploring the horrors of the gothic south.
The ghost sightings of the Knickerbocker Hotel, a woman makes a final attempt to contact her husband on the other side, and an actress whose premonition proved fatal. Join me as we discuss the ghost stories of Old Hollywood.
From her tragic childhood, to her meteoric rise to fame, all the way through the scandal that ended her career. Who was Clara Bow? And why is her story so relevant today?
Can films be cursed? What about specific roles? Today we're going to look into the story of a curse that was placed on Hollywood in the 1800's, and the ripple effects that may have had.
Hollywood's first whodunnit. Two young starlets, an angry mother, a scorned valet, a corrupt DA, and the dead body of one of Hollywood's most prolific directors. What happened to William Desmond Taylor, and who knows more than they're telling?
Two terrifying legends from deep within the Canadian wilderness. The first is about creatures in the woods that possess your mind and make you crave human flesh, and the second is the mystery of an entire village that vanished one night
A demonic presence from a dream that appears in real life. A ghost that knows people better than they know themselves. And a little girl who thought her friend in her basement was just imaginary.
What's true and what's exaggerated in the Netflix show Baby Reindeer? And what does the real woman behind Martha think about it? We're also going to dive into the story of a woman who has been relentlessly stalking other women in Venezuela for 7 years, and share some stories that listeners reached out with.
What if I told you the most sought-after hit man in Houston in the 90's wasn't really a hit man? He worked for the police. Gary Johnson spent his career working with members of his community who thought they were hiring someone to kill their loved ones. They were other police officers, churchgoers, and parents. But they all had a dark side, and they all wanted instant gratification. And now, Gary is the subject of a new movie streaming on Netflix, HIT MAN.
As we begin our Dark Summer Series, We're investigating three stories of deadly amusement park rides.
The story of what happened to Klaus Schleke and Bettina Taxis one fateful night in 1987, and a twist you won't believe.
We're exploring three tales of horror from the backwoods for this episode of Dark Summer. An army of the undead in Hawaii, a Cryptid in the woods of Wisconsin, and a strange man on the edge of someones property.
Bonnie Bickwit vanished with her boyfriend from a summer camp in Upstate New York in 1973, during a summer where a serial killer was terrorizing the area. And in 1991, Jared Negrete was left behind by a troop leader on a hike, and then never seen again. The last photo left of him may hold a chilling secret.
The 1904 Olympic Games were considered to be the darkest games in history. A mad scientist was able to run experiments on athletes while the games went on, runners were given poison to enhance their performance, and people were stolen from all over the world and forced to compete
We're continuing our descent into Dark Summer with a look at some of the most haunted, summery resorts in the world. Would you dare stay a night in the most haunted room at the Hotel Del Coronado?
We're looking at two cases of people who believed they were answering help wanted ads for summer jobs and were never seen again. The cases of Margaret Ellen Fox and The Jack Family
Lights of a ghost plane that illuminate a New Jersey forrest, the legend of a hermit who lives in the woods in Maine, and a woman found at the bottom of a lake in New York. These are three urban legends with some terrifying truths behind them.
In 1970, a woman's body was found in the Isdalen Valley of Norway. She was badly burned though no trace of a fire was found near her, all of the labels on everything she owned had been removed, and traveled with fake identities and disguises. Who was this woman, what was she doing in Norway, and what happened to her?
Today, we're going to Poveglia, Italy's most haunted island, to hear stories of plague victims burned alive. Then, we're going to hear about a double murder in 1991 that shocked the entire country.
On April 8th, astrologer Danielle Johnson took her own life, and killed her fiance and youngest child. It wasn't until someone found her twitter feed that it became apparent she was fearing the coming eclipse.
Pennhurst is often referred to as one of the most haunted places in America. It's not surprising, considering it was a mental asylum that opened in 1908 and was known for torturing, experimenting on, and holding captive it's patients. Today, we're going to dive into that dark history ad the stories of the ghosts that still linger inside.
Real life horror stories coming straight from listeners. We dive into stories of astral projecting, creepy toys buried in a backyard, evil imaginary friends, and more.
Two stories of the most cursed cemeteries on earth: Recoleta Cemetery, where the ghost of a teen girl torments visitors, and Stull Cemetery, said to be a portal of hell.
Basements are not just eerie, sometimes they hold secrets we may not want to know. Today, we're looking at 3 stories of people who experienced absolute terror in their basements.
Legend says that a witch was murdered at Hex Hollow, and on Halloween Night it turns into a portal to hell. But locals know there's a lot of truth behind that legend.
This past July, Russ McKamey (owner of the World's Most Intense Haunted Attraction, McKamey Manor) was arrested for attempted murder. McKamey Manor is known for being an attraction where guests are physically and verbally abused. They can have teeth extracted without novocain, be buried alive, have their worst fears preyed upon amongst other things. Though guests are given a safe word to quit the experience, it is rarely respected.
The Lemp Mansion is considered one of the most haunted places in the country, all because of the Lemp Family that used to live there. The tragedy that befell them makes them one of the most "cursed" families in American history.
Let's Look into the legends, folklore, and history of the Halloween holiday. What does the devil have to do with jack o' lanterns? Who is the real headless horseman and where is he buried? And what stories were told around a fire at an All Hallow's Eve celebration thousands of years ago?
The Stauffer family was accused of adopting a boy from China for social media clout, only to abandon him when it got too hard. What's the real story behind their decision, and what does that say about other families that put their children all over youtube?
In 2019, a 25-year old man walked into a pub in Ruinerwold. He told the bartender that his father had kept him and his 5 siblings underground for the last 9 years, and told them they were the only people left in the world.
Have you heard about Baba Yaga who lives in the forrest in Russia and eats children down to the bone? What about the witch in Mexico who is responsible for men's disappearances to this very day. Today, we're diving into three scary tales of Witches.
From ghostly hitchhikers and terrifying truck stops to suspicious looking roadkill and strange noises in the dead of night, these stories will keep you on the edge of your seat. Whether it's an eerie sense of being watched or bizarre encounters with the supernatural, truckers share the scariest moments they've had while driving through the darkness. Buckle up and join us for a ride into the unknown -- it's going to be a long, dark road.
From the Mandela Effect, to a bunch of concerning Instagram accounts of AI generated children, to a mysterious curtain from Norway, we're looking at the craziest internet mysteries that were solved this year. In this episode we cover The Fruit Of The Loom Mandela Effect, Celebrity #6, and SmartSchoolboy9.
When a case goes cold, it's easy to lose hope that it will ever be sold. But sometimes a leap in technology, or even a deathbed confession, can help families get the closure they've been looking for.
Enjoy this rendition of Charles Dickens' ghost story "To Be Read at Dusk", and happy holidays!
What was HSP's most downloaded episode? What was my favorite episode to make? Which one scared me the most? This is the Heart Starts Pounding Wrapped Report!
2022
Amy Archer-Gilligan was one of America's first female serial killers, killing up to 60 of her patients with her "special" lemonade...
Have you ever wondered if the sound outside your door at night was really a ghost? In this Episode- Kaelyn hears from two listeners with chilling haunted house tales, and Leo gives a little bit of their take on it
What if I told you there were a bunch of people in the Navy in Groton, Connecticut who believe their military homes are haunted? And that some of those people believe it's a result of the ancient and mysterious land they live on?
On Christmas Eve, 1945, a fire broke out in the Sodder family home destroying the entire house and taking five of the nine children with it. Shortly after the fire, and due to some VERY strange evidence, the father of the family started to believe that maybe the children were actually... kidnapped.
On Christmas Eve, 1942, a devastating fire broke out at a schoolhouse in Babbs Switch. 36 people died in total, and every person who was at the schoolhouse that night was accounted for. Except for one person- 3-year-old Mary Edens. Her aunt remembered passing her out of a window to someone, but no one knew what happened to her afterward. Until 30 years later, when a woman shows up at the Edens home claiming to be Mary. She's welcomed in with open arms, but is she really who she says she is? Something starts to feel off to people in the community...
2025
When John O'Keefe's body was found in the snow in January of 2022, there were more questions than answers. Eventually his girlfriend, Karen Read, was charged with his death. But as the case unraveled in court, dark secrets, illicit affairs, and police coverups came to light, proving that the truth would be hard to find.
I sit down in the Parlor of the Rogue Detecting Society Headquarters with my good friends Tank and Investigator Slater for a chat. They tell me about some of the cases that keep them up at night, and we chat about Slater's work investigating abuse cases within the Boy Scouts and Catholic Church.
7 people hiked up a mountain in August of 1993, but only one made it down alive. What she saw up on the mountain had rendered her completely speechless and has mystified the world for over 3 decades.
In 2016, Jonathan Cruz went on a four day killing spree inspired by the movie "The Purge". In 1985, Mark Branch wanted to live out his fantasy of being Jason from "Friday the 13th". What causes some people to be inspired by horror movies to commit horrible acts of violence?
In August of 2013, Brandon Lawson made a concerning 911 call, and then was never heard from again. However, just a few weeks ago, there was a huge update in the case. Get the full story in this episode.
In 1978, Steven Kubacki went skiing near Lake Michigan and vanished without a trace. Danny Filippidis was heading to his car to grab his phone when everything went dark. What happened to these men, and do the strange areas where they were last seen have anything to do with their disappearances, and their even stranger reapparances?
A street in Turkey that swallows people whole. A lake full of mysterious bones in India. And a changeling in America. These are times that the legends were true
In March of 2023, an office manager at a dentist office in Colorado received a package that would make her blood run cold. It was cyanide, and it was addressed to her boss, whose wife had been in the hospital with a strange illness...
In 2019, a photo of a liminal office space spawned a whole genre of horror called The Backrooms. But what are they, and what entities lurk inside? And are they a real place where some people actually get trapped?
In part one of our series, I chat with Corinne and Sabrina from the Two Girls One Ghost podcast from inside the most haunted Airbnb in Salem, Massachusetts, The Henry Derby House. We talk about the dark history of the house, how it was involved in the Salem Witch Trials, and the entities people have reported seeing inside.
In 2024, over 600 bodies were found buried in shallow graves on a compound in the Shakahola forest. Paul Mackenzie had told his followers if they reduced their food intake, they would meet Jesus. This left many with the question- how did things get this bad?
Does the devil stalk the Isle of the Dead near the Port Arthur Prison? And what supernatural force keeps people out of cell 17 at Old Melbourne Gaol?
Dentist by day, con man and serial killer by night. Glennon Engleman manipulated the women around him to kill their loved ones in a get rich quick scheme, leaving a trail of devastation in his wake.
A man disappears in the middle of a race. A woman walks into the woods and is never seen again. And a small town called Portlock swears there is something evil stalking them in the woods. Some say there's something supernatural happening in the 'Alaskan Triangle'.
Has the Martin Family's car been found in the Columbia River? What happened to the Brazilian poisoner who tried to kill her husbands family? What is Hantavirus, the incredibly rare illness that killed Gene Hackman's wife? I'm opening my mailbag today to ask some of your burning darkly curious questions
On December 22nd, 2010, a man named Michael Faherty was found in his home nearly burned to ash. Nothing else around him had been torched by the fire, however. The official coroners report read: Spontaneous Human Combustion.
The North Sea has the internet talking about how scary it is, but did you know people have been terrified of the sea for Centuries? Let's take a morbid tour through the history of the North Sea and talk about creatures from legends, the lost city that supposedly sits at the bottom of it, and the disaster known as the Byford Dolphin Incident.
A man sees someone who might not exist on the Appalachian Trail. Someone is lead into the forrest by strange lights, and one woman smells something decomposing coming from a closet on her campus... These are Listener Stories, sent in from you guys.
In 1957, a man approached a young girl in Illinois and asked if she wanted a piggyback. That was the last time she was seen alive. And in 1971, a man known as "DB Cooper" hijacked a plane, stole $200,000, and disappeared without a trace. Both of these cases involved shocking confessions that were made with dying breaths.
For 20 years in Tennessee, a mysterious woman appeared on the doorstep of single mothers, claiming to be a social worker. She would then disappear with their children.
For 20 years in Tennessee, Georgia Tann ran America's biggest black market for children, trafficking over 5,000 kids. We cover how she built her business, and how some children eventually found their families.
Let's look at three of the scariest legends from Brazilian Folklore: Corpo Secos that rise from their graves, Pisadeiras that creep into your room at night, and the mighty Mapinguari that stalks the rainforest.
In 2018, 11 people in the Chundawat family were found dead from what looked like a ritual sacrifice. It left the public with questions: was the family corrupted by a evil guru? Was this a robbery gone wrong? Or was there something even darker at play?
Today, Morgan and I share our favorite scary stories from Reddit. Which ones haunt you the most?
Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, Japan, isn't just the largest U.S. military installation in the Pacific-- it's also one of the most haunted. From shadowy figures trying to enter through the gates to abandoned buildings that drive occupants to the edge, and the chilling laughter of ghostly children, Kadena's legends are as eerie as they are enduring. But are the hauntings rooted in the base itself... or in the haunted history of Okinawa Island beneath it?
A strange man stalks two women on their camping trip. A strange dog has been caught on a loop for hundred of years at the foot of a mountain. And lights that have no source, and no explanation. Today, we're taking a trip through the Appalachian trail. Bring your flashlight.
In 1989, the body of a woman was found hog tied off the side of a road in Richmond British Columbia. What followed was one of the longest coroners inquest in Canadian history. An inquest that would say the woman had died by an unknown event. Although she was found with her hands and feet tied with nylon behind her back, although she had told police that for 7 years she was being harassed by an unknown person, a jury of her peers wasn't convinced that any crime had taken place... But how could that be? Well, today we are going to get into the very, very complicated death of Cindy James.
In 1989, the body of a woman was found hog tied off the side of a road in Richmond British Columbia. What followed was one of the longest coroners inquest in Canadian history. An inquest that would say the woman had died by an unknown event. Although she was found with her hands and feet tied with nylon behind her back, although she had told police that for 7 years she was being harassed by an unknown person, a jury of her peers wasn't convinced that any crime had taken place... But how could that be? Well, today we are going to get into the very, very complicated death of Cindy James.
What kind of illness turns deer into stumbling, soulless shells of themselves-- bodies wasting away, but never truly dying? Or drives healthy young men into violent frenzies that leave them strapped to hospital beds, terrified of water? This week, we're diving into the terrifying world of zombie illnesses-- real diseases that hijack the brain and erase what makes us human.
The internet freaked out last month when the haunted doll Annabelle was taken on tour around the country. Stories started circulating of buildings burning down in her wake, prisoners escaping, and even that she went missing at one point. But what was really going on, and why was the Annabelle tour such a spiritually chaotic event?
A young girl vanishes without a trace in the Alaskan wilderness. A camper loses 10.5 hours on his camping trip with no memory of what occurred in that time. And a young couple goes to a secluded part of a camp site, only to run into someone they're not expecting.
In 2011, a 24 year old woman vanished from a Disney Cruise that was heading back to LA. And what at first seemed like an open and shut "man overboard" case quickly started to seem like something much darker. Leaving us with the question, does Disney know more than they're saying??
Mysterious disappearances, lost shipwrecks, the Lake Michigan "Stonehenge", strange lights above Lake Erie and more. There's something strange happening in the great lakes. These lakes in North America are much bigger than you would ever imagine, they hold about a fifth of the entire world's freshwater. But they also hold some of the greatest unsolved mysteries. They are quite literally full of secrets.
From dodging serial killers, to fake ride share drivers, to finding someone in your room in the middle of the night, today we're talking all about terrifying close encounters.
In 2014, while looking for two missing hikers, Lisanne Froon and Kris Kremers, in Panama, officials came across a digital camera in the forest that they believed belonged to one of them. The photos they found on that camera were disturbing, to say the least. And they held terrifying clues as to what happened to the missing girls.
Summer is the perfect time to visit an amusement park, but for every park that's open and bustling during the warmer months, there's one that's fallen into disrepair and sits there abandoned. But what causes this to happen? Well, sometimes a series of horrible accidents cause the public to lose faith in a park, and ticket sales plummet. Sometimes, a once in a generation disaster occurs and an entire city must evacuate, leaving the park inside empty. And other times, a park somehow winds up built on an ancient graveyard, and unexplained, supernatural events scare the public away. Today, we're talking about River Country, Pripyat Amusement Park, and Lake Shawnee Abandoned Amusement Park.
This story starts with a police officer who was investigating a suspect in a missing woman's case. When the officer went down into the man's basement, he found a secret, locked leather door in the far back corner of the room. Now, to understand what was in that room, and who that man was, we need to start all the way at the beginning, and go deep into the Göhrde Forest where in 1989, multiple bodies were discovered deep within the woods.
In 1966, three children vanished without a trace in Australia, and no one knows what happened. It's a mystery that still plagues the country to this day, and may credit it as the reason people started locking their doors there. But today, we have a much clearer picture of the crime, who might have been responsible, and there's even been updates on the case as of this year.
The idea of a "Ghost ship"-- a ship that is floating completely off course with its crew mysteriously gone or dead, has become more ridiculous over the years. Sure, maybe back in the day, with a lack of GPS tracking and communication a whol crew could vanish, but that could never happen today. Right? The Kaz II which has been coined "The Ghost Yacht", perhaps a more modern version of a ghost ship, and the fate of those three men-- Derek Batten, James Tunstead, and Peter Tunstead-- still remains a mystery to this day.
From a recent and tragic double murder in Devil's Den State Park, to a hiker entering a time warp, to unknowingly encountering a serial killer while camping, today we're talking through all the terrifying and mysterious national park stories.
Lost media, TV urban legends, and the moments kids' networks never wanted you to see. This episode investigates the rumored Nickelodeon "destroyed tape" from Legends of the Hidden Temple, real broadcast signal hijackings (including the infamous Handy Manny incident), and a haunting stop-motion short known only as "The Butcher". From grueling game-show sets to vanished DVR recordings, we dig into how media disappears and why people won't stop looking for it.
At 4:47 AM on August 18th, 2025, after 280 hours of torture streamed live to thousands of viewers, Jean Pormanove died in his sleep while on camera. The official cause of death was cardiac arrest. But what really killed him was a system perfectly designed to monetize human suffering, to turn degradation into content, to transform a vulnerable man's destruction into entertainment. The streaming continues. The algorithm watches. And somewhere, another Jean Pormanove is typing his first message to this mother: "I feel like I'm being held hostage." The question isn't whether this will happen again. It's happening right now, the only question is whether we'll keep watching.
From a woman's mother in law attempting to kill her with latex gloves, a near child kidnapping where the biological parents were doubted, to having to take matters into your own hands with your stalker, these are all real Reddit Scary Stories so dark they could be True Crime Documentaries.
In 1929, bodies were turning up all over Dusseldorf, Germany with one horrifying thing in common. It looked like someone had bitten their necks, and in some cases, tried to drain them of blood. Immediately word of a vampire spread throughout the city, but that did little to stop the attacks, which would eventually point back to one of the most depraved human beings that we've covered on this show...
HSP Presents: The Timekeeper Ep. 1 "It's Just a Game." 17-year-old Charlie (JUDAH LEWIS) shows up to his job at Funland to find his co-worker, Blake, dead and the building on fire with an ominous message scratched into the break room door: Tick Tock. Believing the message may be connected to the 13 Keys video game Blake was playing, Charlie tries to learn more about Jacob Fairchild, the game's creator. He and Gama (Arjun Athalye) discover a copy of 13 Keys on Blake's computer. Charlie chooses to play, against Gama's wishes, starting the clock and giving him 24 hours to find the 13 keys hidden in the game. If he fails? The Timekeeper comes.
What would happen if you read an ad in a newspaper for your dream partner. They're rich, they're beautiful and they are looking for someone to share their life with. Would you answer, or is that too good to be true? Well, in 1906, dozens of men around the country had that exact problem, except when they answered these ads and went to go meet their future wife, they vanished without a trace.
After the video game behaves weirdly, Charlie and Zama pay a visit to Zoe (Chandler Kinney) to try and figure out how it works. Charlie storms out when Zoe's boyfriend arrives, but calls on them for help once he comes to believe The Timekeeper is somehow watching him play.
Today I'm sharing a special bonus episode from Clues, where Morgan Absher and I dig into the chilling mystery of Jack the Ripper. In 1888, a brutal killer stalked London's Whitechapel district, leaving behind mutilated victims, taunting letters, and a mystery that still grips the world. Jack the Ripper claimed at least five lives, and more than a century later, the clues he left continue to baffle experts and fuel debate. We're diving into the evidence, the suspects, and the chilling theories surrounding one of history's most infamous unsolved cases.
Imagine you hear a strange sound coming from your attic one evening. What is scarier? That it's paranormal? Maybe a ghost haunting your space? Or that it's a person, an unknown intruder watching you from inside your own home? That is a question that a family in the German countryside had to ask themselves a hundred years ago. But we would never know their answer, because after hearing strange sounds coming from their attic, the entire family and their chambermaid were found brutally slain inside of their barn. What was tormenting the Gruber family?
Charlie, Zoe and Gama head toward the coordinates Tim wrote down while he was playing the game, hoping to find him alive. Charlie keeps playing and finds more keys, but he can feel the Timekeeper closing in as his clock ticks down.
Step inside the legend of H.H. Holmes and the chilling labyrinth he built during the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. We'll follow a string of disappearances through the "Murder Castle" he built: a three story building with the sole purpose of killing as many people as discreetly as possible. Was Holmes a criminal mastermind, or has time twisted the tale?
Charlie and Zoe race against the clock as they confront the true horror of Shady Pines and learn the truth behind Fairchild's death.
A strange whistling in the desert. A suspicious man lurking for young hikers. A timeslip. A house whose inhabitant might not be living. And More. The spooky tales we received from listeners like you, with special guest Morgan Absher from Two Hot Takes!
Today, I want to tell you about a horrifying urban legend that haunted a community nearby the ruins of the abandoned Willowbrook State School in Staten Island for decades. Eventually, children started really disappearing from this community, so let's explore the real story behind the urban legend...
Last year, a group of adventurers with National Geographic were hiking Mount Everest when they saw a human foot sticking out of the ice. Now, it is not rare to see dead bodies on the mountain, there are at least 200 of them scattered around Everest, and many of them act as markers for trails, frozen forever in time where they fell. But this human foot in particular, had been on the mountain for 100 years and solved a century old mystery...
Today, we're discussing real terrifying encounters that people had with alleged cults. We're talking Scientology, people from a "church" showing up at your door to maybe kidnap you, and more. Joined by Amanda Montell, author of the book Cultish, and the host of the Sounds Like A Cult podcast.
Cold cases can sit on shelves for years without answers, but this year we've seen some amazing advancements in cases that police thought would never get solved. I want to tell you about three of them today, with twists that no one saw coming. We'll cover the Yogurt Shop Murders, and the shocking discoveries that led to arrests in the murders of Aliza Sherman and Doris Worrell.
Today I want to tell you about the dark origins of Christmas, before Santa Claus ever existed. We're diving into Frau Perchta, a Christmas witch who visited homes with iron scissors and a taste for porridge...whether she had to cut it out of you or not. We'll also cover the real Saint Nicholas and his disturbing miracles, and the demonic Krampuses who worked alongside him to drag sinners straight to hell. This beloved holiday is actually as dark as a Brother Grimms fairytale...
Today, I want to tell you about two winter mysteries that have haunted New York for over a century. The first is about Dorothy Arnold, who disappeared on a cold December day in 1910 after leaving a bookstore in Manhattan. And the second is about a devastating Christmas night fire in Staten Island in 1843, and the legend of the witch who started it.
What happens when beloved holiday entertainment crosses the line? From Disney's The Santa Clause hiding adult Easter eggs that horrified parents, to the 1997 Macy's Day Parade disaster NBC tried to erase, to Vincent Price's final grief-stricken performance that Disney deemed "unusable". These aren't just missing tapes, they're pieces of holiday history someone decided we shouldn't remember.
This week, we're exploring three of the world's most haunted castles-- and the dark histories that made them that way. At Windsor Castle in England, we'll encounter the ghost og a beheaded king who appears whole. In Austria's Moosham Castle, we explore the only male dominated witch trials. And finally, we visit Himeji Castle in Japan to meet Okiku, the servant girl whose ghost inspired one of the most iconic images in horror.
2026
One of my most terrifying fears is the idea that someone is watching me without me knowing about it. Or worse, that someone is inside my home watching me without me knowing about it. If that freaks you out as well, this might be a tough episode for you. Because today we are going to tell you about one of Japan's most horrifying mysteries, but at its core was a family who got a really bad feeling that someone was watching them.
Today, I want to look at two pieces of "lost media" with you all. One piece is lost because it was deemed too dark for the public to ever hear, and the other was lost when it was intentionally destroyed by the US government. That's right, we're going over the case of Timothy Treadwell aka Grizzly Man, and the Cavalese Tapes. So roll up your sleeves and let's dive into the darkness together.
In February 2014, Aspen socialite Nancy Pfister was discovered murdered in the closet of her mountainside home, sending shockwaves through one of America's most exclusive communities. This is a case of wealth, betrayal, a shocking confession, and lingering questions that remain unanswered to this day. Three people were arrested, but were any of them telling the truth about what happened that night?
In September 2001, a housekeeper discovered an unidentified man's body in a remote Washington motel room, no ID, no belongings, and a fake name scrawled in the guest book. For 17 years, detectives hit dead ends while an obsessive online community became consumed by one haunting question: who was the man in room five? This is the story of how thousands of strangers refused to let him be forgotten.
A face drawn in the fog of a bathroom mirror that looks exactly like you. A husband standing in the doorway who doesn't speak, doesn't move-- and swears he was never there. From djinn that fall in love through reflections to entities that mimic the people you trust most, these Reddit stories blur the line between what's familiar and what's something else entirely.
One summer, a 24-year-old runner parker her car on a remote Wyoming road, left behind a to-do list with one uncrossed item "run" and was never seen again. Across the country, another woman was walking with friends on a well-traveled trail in the Great Smoky Mountains, went off ahead of her friends, and vanished without a trace. Today, we're diving into two backwoods disappearances, where the search parties found almost nothing, and the questions still go unanswered.
When villagers in a remote Thai forest heard screams echoing from the woods every hour for three straight days, they were convinced the legends of ancient spirits haunting those trees had come to life. In Taiwan, a woman and her young daughter walked into an elevator, rode to the top floor of an 11-story building, and seemingly vanished, feeding into the internet's most haunting urban legends, "The Elevator Game". And in England, a prisoner they call "Hannibal the Cannibal" has been locked in a glass cell underground for over 40 years, but how much of his legend is actually true?
Feral Children used to be the stuff of legends, but their stories are shocking, devastating, and real. Today, we're diving into multiple stories of feral children: the girl who was raised by her dog when her parents forgot about her, the legend of the wolf girl of Devils River, and the human experiment where a scientist tried to raise his son alongside a chimpanzee to unforeseen consequences.
Why have so many people described seeing the same scary entity in the backwoods of Appalachia? Something that looks human, but not quite? Today, we're talking about the terrifying entity people have been seeing in the woods for generations. "Crawlers".
Today, we're reading Reddit's scariest stories with KallMeKris and CelinaSpookyBoo. From glitches in the Matrix that defy all sense of logic, haunted houses full of vengeful ghosts, and a man showing up at someone's door at 2am knowing way too many intimate details about them. Some of these have explanations. Some of them don't. And honestly? The ones with answers are scarier.
Your terrifying stories are back, and they did not disappoint! From deep inside the Michigan woods, to a haunted church camp, to the backroads of Argentina, and a 2am parking lot encounter. Morgan from Two Hot Takes is joining us to read through tales that range from something inhuman in the trees to a dream that may have saved someone's life, as we try to figure out what is going on with you guys!!
In March 2000, 23-year-old Leah Roberts left a note for her roommate and took off on a solo cross-country trip. Nine days later, her wrecked Jeep was found by hikers at the bottom of a ravine in upstate Washington and Leah was not inside. What initially looked like a car crash started to feel more sinister as the investigation continued. More than 25 years later the questions surrounding what happened only grow darker.
A college student gets into what she thinks is her rideshare. A speech therapist spends years pretending to be someone's mother. And a backpacker in Singapore accepts a stranger's offer to split a hotel room...then never calls home. Three stories about people who slipped through the cracks. By the time anyone realized something was wrong, it was already too late.
In the summer of 1975, the bodies of young women began surfacing in canals along the edge of the Florida Everglades. To make matters worse, investigators blamed the victims for their own deaths. Today, we will cover many things the Everglades have swallowed. From serial killers to a doomed jetliner pulled from the sky, to a creature with over 600 documented sightings. The deeper you go, the stranger it gets.
In September 1991, a young mother in Arlington, Texas, Cynthia Gonzalez, left for a late-night appointment and never came home. Her car was found 40 miles away, and the investigation that followed would consume a legendary detective's career through serial killer suspects, failed polygraphs, and confessions that went nowhere. Thirty-four years later, a college classroom full of students at the University of Texas at Arlington, who weren't even born when she was killed, would find what everyone else missed.
Today, Slater and I are reading Reddit scary stories about close encounters with people who were not who they said they were. A man offers a woman her dream job, but the company doesn't exist!? A friendly neighbor starts knowing things he was never told. A first date takes a deliberate detour. And a hitchhiker carrying a small child through a Montana blizzard may have been one of the most dangerous predators in American history.
Today, we're covering three terrifying true urban legends: a South African schoolyard legend called Pinky Pinky with an unnerving connection to a real case in Japan, the history of Summerwind Mansion, which reveals more about its owners than the house itself...and the true origins behind the Red Ghost.
In 2003, 19-year-old Sonya Ivanoff was walking home from a friend's house in Nome, Alaska when a witness saw her get into a vehicle marked 'Nome Police Department'. Her body was found the next day. But Sonya's murder is just one piece of a much larger pattern. Since 1960, at least 25 people have gone missing or died under suspicious circumstances in this isolated town of fewer than 4,000 people, and the community has been fighting for answers that local authorities seem determined not to give.
In 2019, an anonymous photo of a yellow hallway turned into one of the biggest creepypastas of a generation. Millions of people have since built out the Backrooms. Hundreds of levels, from an infinite black ocean hiding a planet-sized creature to a children's birthday party run by entities that wear your skin. With a new A24 film brining the Backrooms to the big screen, we're going no-clipping into the most terrifying levels, the strange mythology of almond water and Greasy Marshmallows, and the chilling stories of people who tried to escape.
In July 2022, 18-year-old Mackenzie Shirilla drove her car into a brick wall at nearly 100 miles per hour, killing her boyfriend Dominic Russo and his best friend Davion Flanagan. What looked like a drug-fueled accident unraveled fast, and the Netflix documentary only tells part of the story. This week, we go deeper: the details left on the cutting room floor, the recorded prison call that changed everything, and the question that still doesn't have a straight answer.
In 1970, a man with no clinical training opened a "therapeutic boarding school" in the Maine woods. For forty-one years, students inside were subjected to organized beatings, forced fight rings, and psychological torture while journalists, state investigators, and even Congress failed to shut it down. Then, in 2010, one anonymous Reddit post did what none of them could.
They call it the golden age of DNA testing, and this year, two cases that police thought would never be solved finally cracked open. But the answers were nothing anyone expected. August 1990, Houston. A white Honda Civic sits abandoned at the end of a cul-de-sac on the city's edge. The keys are in the ignition, a woman's purse is on the floorboard, and blood is smeared down both doors. What detectives find in the woods beyond that car would become known as the Lovers' Lane murders, and the case would go cold for over three decades, broken only by a DNA hit decades later. November 1991, Placer County, California. A devoted young mother vanishes mid-morning while cleaning her sister's house, leaving her infant daughter crying in a high chair and her purse the only thing missing. There's no sign of struggle. No witnesses. Just a single cigarette butt on the walkway. When her body is finally found weeks later, the medical examiner makes a discovery more chilling than the murder itself.
On April 18th, 2014, a 14,000-tonne block of ice broke free above the Khumbu Icefall and killed sixteen Sherpa guides. It was the deadliest single disaster in Mount Everest's history. What followed wasn't just a rescue. It was a reckoning: a fight over $400 funeral payments, a historic strike, and the first time in ninety years that the world's most famous mountain went silent.
Across Appalachia, thousands of people keep reporting the same thing: a massive black cat in the woods that screams like a woman being murdered. The government says it doesn't exist, there are NO official reports of big black cats in the area. But the Cherokee had a name for what lives in those mountains, and its story is far older, and far more wicked, than a misidentified panther. Today, we’re diving into the stories of The Wampus Cat and Spearfinger.
A newlywed couple boarded a Mediterranean cruise for their honeymoon. Five days later, a teenager photographed blood splattered across a lifeboat canopy, and the groom was gone. His bride says she blacked out. Four men were the last to see him alive. What happened to George Smith puzzled his family for years until they finally started pulling at the threads.
Today we’re exploring the term that has been circulating online for the last few months, Alpine Divorce, and two cases where these “divorces” of sorts were life-threatening. In 2012, Toni Henthorn fell from an off-trail ledge in Rocky Mountain National Park. Her husband Harold said she slipped, but a ranger found a map that indicated otherwise. Thirteen years later, Arielle Konig was attacked by her husband, Gerhardt, on a cliffside trail in Hawaii on her birthday, but against all odds, she made it out alive.
In 1864, two ships wrecked on opposite ends of Auckland Island. A frozen, abandoned archipelago south of New Zealand. The Grafton's five-man crew built a cabin, held elections, and taught each other languages for eighteen months. Twenty miles away, the Invercauld's twenty-five-man crew collapsed into starvation and cannibalism, and the one sailor who fought to keep them alive was erased from every published account.
A rock taken from a ritual site while at summer camp finds its way home… even after being thrown into the ocean. A smiling man in a suit beckons two girls hiking toward a dark treeline. And a voice outside a tent whispers, "Are you inside, girls?" Kaelyn and Sylas read your creepiest true campfire stories: haunted camps, mimics, time slips, and the things waiting in the woods that none of you have been able to explain since.
On the morning of July 2nd, 1937, Amelia Earhart lifted off from Lae, Papua New Guinea, and flew into the most famous disappearance of the 20th century. The official story says she crashed into the Pacific and sank. And yet, evidence now shows the distress calls kept coming for days, the castaway campsite was discovered on a remote atoll, and a strange shape was spotted on Apple Maps in 2020. Now, with an expedition setting out to finally identify the object buried off Nikumaroro, the mystery of what really happened to Amelia may be about to break wide open.
In the summer of 1987, sixteen-year-old Theresa Bier rode into the Sierra Nevada mountains with a 43-year-old man who promised to show her Bigfoot, and only one of them came back. Twenty-four years later and a thousand miles north, twenty-year-old Madison Scott vanished from a crowded campfire party at Hogsback Lake in Vanderhoof, British Columbia, leaving behind her truck, her tent, and a mystery it would take twelve years to crack open. Two campsites, two missing girls, and the question of what… or who… was really waiting in the dark.
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2023
Pack a bag, today we're going to a spooky campground. In this episode, we hear two terrifying campground tales. The first one is The Tale of The Solo Traveler- a tale of a girl who learns something may have been watching her while she camped. And then we hear a tale from a listener of a time when their husband's intuition while camping may have saved them both.
This episode is about the supernatural things that happen around the time of someone's death, either leading up to it or right after. We read stories from people who experienced the unexplainable right when their loved one died and hear from two healthcare workers about a supernatural phenomenon that is common when someone is dying.
Writer Jeff Topolski (Brooklyn Nine-Nine) joins us this week to answer the question: Was Natalia Grace Barnett a murderous woman parading as a child, or a victim of terrible adoptive parents?
In the middle of the night, strangers ripped Zara from her bed and told her she was going to a troubled teen wilderness therapy program. Little did she know, the troubled teen industry would prevent her from going home for over three years.
A child with a deadly capsule. A rich playboy who lost his jaw and then his life. A fuel plant worker who absorbed more radiation than anyone in history. We're telling three stories about one of the deadliest forms of energy and the people that shouldn't have gone near it.
Imagine if the final words you heard from someone were so bone-chilling that they forever altered your perception of them. These deathbed confessions rocked families, changed the course of police investigations, and showed where the bodies were buried.
When Mrs. Kent learned of the grisly murder of her three year old son, she had only one thing to say. "Someone in the house has done it". What would follow would be the biggest whodunit of the 19th century. The Kent family would have their dirty laundry hung out to dry as London's top detective investigated them all for the murder of Saville Kent.
Spine tingling, bone chilling, and downright mysterious hauntings. Listeners share their own heart pounding tales about a headless cowboy, two separate ghost sightings in the military, and a girl who believes she may have gotten a sign from her deceased sister
Ghosts of Russian soldiers, red eyed creatures made from smoke. These are real life horror stories from soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq in the early 2000's who saw the unexplainable.
Four bodies have been recovered from Lady Bird Lake in Austin, Texas this year, causing many to wonder- is there a serial killer currently operating, and are these drownings at all connected to similar ones five years ago?
Can a ghost point to the person who murdered them? In 1897, Zona Heaster Shue's mother thought Zona's ghost visited her in the night with vital information, and event that infamously became the only time a ghost's testimony was used in court. Known as the Greenbrier ghost, did Mrs. Shue really see her daughters ghost, or was there something else at play?
Did something supernatural occur in Brazil in 1966? That's when two men were found deceased on Vintem hill wearing black suits and lead masks, with a note by them that read "4:30 PM be at the determined place. 6:30 PM swallow capsules, after effect protect metals wait for mask signal" We're going straight down the rabbit hole in this episode, into the world of the occult, seances, secret societies, and aliens. Buckle up.
You may have heard that "no one died at disney" but is that really true? Let's look into the deaths of Mark Maples, a 15 year old who died on the Matterhorn, Dollie Regina Young who died on the same ride, and Deborah Gail Stone, who was crushed on the America Sings Ride.
From explorer Ernest Shackleton crossing the Antarctic, to famed aviator Charles Lindbergh, many famous stories of survival have included a supernatural being come to be known as The Third Man. Who is this presence that gives guidance and encouragement in extreme survival situations?
What really happened the morning that Andrew and Abby Borden were murdered with an axe, and why is it still unsolved? Let's dive into the real story, full of the twists and turns that make that day one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in American history.
Let's take a modern, scientific lens to last week's Lizzie Borden case, and try to understand why someone would commit this crime. Dr. Amy Schlosberg and Dr. Meghan Sacks, professors of Criminology at Fairleigh Dickinson University, join me today to break down the case with what we know today about criminology. Together, they host the Women & Crime podcast.
Dangers inside of National Parks, both strangers and freak accidents. We'll hear about people who got the sense something was watching them, feral people potentially living in the parks, as well as horror stories of people falling into geysers and off of the Grand Canyon.
In 1984, an anonymous group in Japan known as The Monster With 21 Faces tormented police, poisoned candy across the country and kidnapped a man. To this day, their identity and purpose remain one of Japan's greatest unsolved mysteries.
A haunted ride at Disney, a mysterious man at a car wreck, and a haunted house being rented by college students. Welcome to the Heart Starts Pounding Campfire where we're sharing real-life terrifying stories.
The "Disney Dark Ages" was a period of time from the late 90's to the early 2000's that marked the bloodiest era in the Disney parks' history.
What happened the night of June 4th, 1960, when three teens were murdered at Lake Bodom in Finland? And why has no one ever been charged with the crime?
The manager of Harvard's Medical school was just indicted for selling human remains to oddities shops, but the history of Harvard's involvement in black market corpse dealings goes back over 250 years. Let's travel through the morgue, past the skeletons found in Harvard's walls, all the way back to the most high profile murder to ever happen at the school.
Witches in the woods, screams in the middle of the night, the most haunted piece of land in all of Appalachia. Bring a backpack, because we're going deep into the Appalachian wilderness to hear the most terrifying folklore around.
From drilling holes in your skull to eating tapeworms for weight loss, we're looking at some of the most morbid medical advice that's been given throughout history.
When Nasubi was cast for the Japanese reality show Sweepstakes Life in 1998, he didn't know he'd spend the next 15 months in a studio apartment with no food or clothes. All while 17 million people across Japan were watching...
We're diving into the two most haunted houses in DC, The White House and The Halcyon House. Who was the ghost that tormented Taft's staff, which first ladies are most often seen haunting the White House grounds, and who was the eccentric owner of one of DC's most haunted houses, The Halcyon House?
When Boris Weisfeiler embarked on a solo vacation to Chile, he never returned. What came next was a deeper and darker rabbit hole than anyone could have ever expected
Why did Boris Weisfeiler disappear in 1985. And did the cult hiding out deep in the Chilean wilderness have anything to do with it? Today, we're exploring the Colonia Dignidad.
We've all heard terrifying urban legends growing up, but what happens when they're based on real events... We're diving into some terrifying urban legends that ended up being true.
What happens when the system that says it'll help you instead uses you as part of their sick experiment? We're looking into two stories of people who were promised help, and instead become stuck in a broken system and faced brainwashing, torture, and imprisonment.
What happened to Joan Risch the last day she was ever seen?
Here's a good reminder to check every nook and cranny of your house tonight...
Can movies really be cursed? Today, we're looking at what's fact and what's fiction when it comes to The Wizard of Oz and The Exorcist being cursed.
A ghost who steals, ghostly wailing being heard in the night. These are terrifying stories from listeners.
In honor of Halloween, I'm sharing some of the most chilling tales I've heard this year.
In 2000, two Houston-area women named Mary Morris were murdered in their cars within a few days of each other. 23 years later, it's still not certain if the two were connected.
Human sacrifice has been a part of many cultures throughout history. But why did they do it? And more importantly, what was it like for the person being sacrificed? In this episode, we dive into ritual sacrifice in places like the Aztec Empire and Cahokia.
I'm joined by my friend Payton from Murder With My Husband to bring you two stories of disappearances we could not stop thinking about. In 1928, the world's third richest man, Alfred Lowenstein, vanished mid-flight. On Halloween night, 2002, Chris Jenkins disappeared in Minnesota, leaving many to wonder if there was a 'Smiley Face Killer' operating in the shadows.
On Thanksgiving Day, 1985, Susan Blount awoke to screams coming from her living room. What she would find remains one of the strangest cold cases in Texas today.
A woman loses the ability to move her arms, A man bursts into flames from seemingly nowhere, and one of the most notorious assassinations in history. What they all have in common may surprise you.
On the night of December 7th, 1946, a woman working the night shift at the Winecoff Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia smells smoke. A few floors up, a man is woken by cries for help. Within two hours, almost half of the guests will be dead.
A game of hide and seek takes a paranormal turn. In the spirit of the old Victorian tradition of telling ghost stories around the holidays, I present to you, a modern-day retelling of A.M. Burrage's ghost story, "Smee".
On December 7th, 1958, Ken Martin, his wife Barbara, and their three young daughters drove east of Portland to get a Christmas tree and were never seen again. What initially appears to be an accident, starts to feel sinister as more is revealed.