“CREATING A TERRIFYING URBAN LEGEND” and More Horrifying True Stories! #WeirdDarkness

A dying woman swears there's a prowler downstairs, but what her husband finds in the dark kitchen is a timid little ghost who can't remember why he's come. Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/OTR CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)… 00:00:00.000 = Show Open 00:01:30.028 = CBS Radio Mystery Theater, “The Forgetful Ghost” (January 23, 1978) ***WD 00:46:42.148 = Philip Marlowe, “Grim Echo” (February 14, 1950) 01:16:14.347 = Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, “The Ghost To Ghost Matter” (May 18, 1958) ***WD 01:41:29.916 = The Black Mass, “Ash Tree” (December 18, 1963) ***WD 02:11:43.744 = Michael Shayne, “Big Voice Means a Big Body” (May 07, 1945) 02:42:36.427 = Beyond Midnight, “The Yellow Room” (June 06, 1969) ***WD 03:13:43.776 = MindWebs, “Desertion” (February 18, 1982) 03:44:37.897 = Mystery In The Air, “The Marvelous Barastro” (August 07, 1947) 04:13:52.519 = Molle Mystery Theater, “Follow That Cab” (April 19, 1946) 04:43:19.587 = Show Close (ADU) = Air Date Unknown (LQ) = Low Quality ***WD = Remastered, edited, or cleaned up by Weird Darkness to make the episode more listenable. Audio may not be pristine, but it will be better than the original file which may have been unusable or more difficult to hear without editing. CUSTOM WEBPAGE: https://weirddarkness.com/WDRR0688

When the Hale-Bopp comet swung past Earth in 1997, thirty-nine people put on matching black shirts and brand-new Nikes, swallowed a lethal mix of barbiturates and vodka, and lay down beneath purple shrouds to die — certain their souls were about to board the alien ship they believed was hiding in the comet's tail. EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/heavensgate READ or DOWNLOAD the full transcript of this episode: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/343j2ju2 FEATURED STORIES IN THIS EPISODE: Following an anonymous tip, police enter a mansion in Rancho Santa Fe, an exclusive suburb of San Diego, California, and discover 39 victims of a mass suicide. The deceased–21 women and 18 men of varying ages–were all found lying peaceably in matching dark clothes and Nike sneakers and had no noticeable signs of blood or trauma. It was later revealed that the men and women were members of the “Heaven’s Gate” religious cult, whose leaders preached that suicide would allow them to leave their bodily “containers” and enter an alien spacecraft hidden behind the Hale-Bopp comet. *** PLUS, the creepy true-crime story of two men who were caught trying to steal the body of the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. But that is by no means the end of this story full of twists, turns, myths, and conspiracies. CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…00:00:00.000 = Heaven’s Gate, Part 1 00:00:53.808 = Show Open 00:02:37.373 = Heaven’s Gate, Part 2 00:04:59.269 = Heaven’s Gate, Part 3 00:09:37.695 = Heaven’s Gate, Part 4 *** 00:23:22.776 = Stealing Lincoln’s Bones, Part 1 *** 00:44:45.437 = Stealing Lincoln’s Bones, Part 2 *** 00:57:58.687 = Show Close *** = Begins immediately after inserted ad break LISTEN ON PODCAST APPS: Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.com/wdapps *No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast* SOURCES and RESOURCES: “Heavens Gate” by Rolling Stone: http://bit.ly/WeirdDarkness2D7tbeZ, Ranker: http://bit.ly/weirddarkness2UIsK4O, and History.com: http://bit.ly/WeirdDarkness2G3uqfN “Stealing Lincoln’s Bones” by Troy Taylor: https://www.americanhauntingsink.com/stealing-lincolns-bones (Over time links may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.) WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness. Originally aired: November 28, 2021 Weird Darkness runs from the 1997 mass suicide of the Heaven's Gate UFO cult outside San Diego to an 1876 counterfeiting gang's attempt to steal Abraham Lincoln's corpse from his tomb in Springfield, Illinois.It opens with the discovery, on March 26, 1997, of thirty-nine members of Heaven's Gate inside a rented mansion in the San Diego suburb of...

A newly declassified FBI form describes a meter-wide red sphere with a white plasma core hovering in a backyard one evening, among dozens of glowing-orb sightings in the Pentagon's third batch of UFO files. SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/UFO-Batch-3 Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736 *No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast* WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

After her 24-year-old daughter died by suicide in Montreal, Kristie Carrier read the months of ChatGPT conversations on Alice's phone — and filed suit against OpenAI and Sam Altman. SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/openai-suicide-lawsuit Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736 *No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast* WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

When the luxury liner SS Morro Castle erupted in flames off the New Jersey coast in 1934, it left behind 137 dead, a captain's corpse that vanished before it could be examined, and a heroic radio operator whose criminal past suggested he may have started the fire himself. | #WDRadio June 14, 2026 ========== HOUR ONE: Jeannie Saffin already had a tough life, being born with a birth defect that stunted her mental growth, leaving her with the mind of a child, never getting married and having kids, never dating… but that all pales in comparison to how she died: bursting into flames for no apparent reason. Was Jeannie Saffin the victim of spontaneous human combustion? (The Spontaneous Combustion of Jeannie Saffin) *** Sometimes it’s easy to get a girl to go out with you – just be polite and ask. Some men resort to cheesy pickup lines thinking it will help their chances. But one man chose to call upon a woman in a very unusual way… by purchasing a gravestone. (Pitching Woo With a Tombstone) *** If a man demands his girlfriend give up the baby they conceived, otherwise he would no longer be with the woman – what is that newborn’s mother to do? Sadly, Emily Dunn made the wrong decision – with tragic results. (The Durbin Baby Murder) *** The transplanting of an organ is almost a routine procedure now in the 21st century – even doing a transplant of an arm or a leg isn’t uncommon. But when you talk about transplanting a living head onto a dead body – that’s when things get tricky. But Robert White thought it could be done – and even tried doing it. (The Man Who Wanted To Do a Head Transplant) *** Imagine getting onto a plane and once in the air finding out that the pilot wasn’t qualified to fly that kind of plane – and that he was only there because the original pilot wasn’t available due to being dead. That’s what happened in 1934 on the boat, the SS Morro Castle. And it was the beginning of tragedy after tragedy. (Mystery, Mismanagement, and Mayhem on the SS Morro Castle)========== HOUR TWO: In June of 2009 a man calling himself Peter Bergmann checked in to a hotel in Sligo Town. Five days later his body was found on Rosses Point Beach. But Peter Bergmann was not Peter Bergmann – so who was he? (The Peter Bergmann Mystery) *** Sharing stories from people who are frightened by a bump in the night or a strange shadow on the wall in their bedroom is one thing, but when you get professional ghost hunters telling of the scariest experiences they’ve had, you know it has to be some freaky stuff. (Scariest Experiences of Ghost Hunters) ========== SUDDEN DEATH OVERTIME: More of the scariest experiences of ghost hunters! *** I’ll tell you about that time when a dam failed – and because of it, people were legally allowed to marry the dead. And still do to this day. (That Time A Failed Dam Led to Marrying Corpses) *** Personal experiences of those who have stayed at the Wolf Creek Inn, plus some hard evidence, seems to indicate that spirits who haunt the place are not only benign in nature, but even protect the guests and owners from other malevolent spirits which roam there as well. (Haunts at Wolf Creek Inn) ========== SOURCES AND REFERENCES FROM TONIGHT’S SHOW: “Mystery, Mismanagement, and Mayhem on the SS Morro Castle” by Brent Swancer for Mysterious Universe:https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/56jb9c7j “The Man Who Wanted To Do a Head Transplant” by Gary Krist for the Washington Post: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/39d2k9pw “The Durbin Baby Murder” posted at Murders In History: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/c96z9kst “Pitching Woo With a Tombstone” from the New York Journal, posted at The Victorian Book of the Dead website:https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/utw6vh45 “The Spontaneous Combustion of Jeannie Saffin” by Brent Swancer for Mysterious Universe:https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/e6as67fn “That Time A Failed Dam Led to Marrying Corpses” by Kaushik Patowary for Amusing Planet:...