My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 403 - Thrive & Survive

Episode Date: November 23, 2023

This week, Karen covers the 1982 Alpine Meadows Avalanche and Georgia tells the story of William Chester Minor and the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary.For our sources and show notes, visit www.myfavoritemurder.com/episodes.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What a life these celebrities lead. Imagine walking the red carpet, the cameras in your face, the designer clothes, the worst dress list, big house, the world constantly peering in, the bursting bank account, the people trying to get the grubby mitts on it. What's he all about? I'm just saying, being really, really famous. It's not always easy. I'm Emily Lloyd-Saini and I'm Anneli Young-Rofi, and we're the hosts of Terribly Famous from Wondery, the podcast which tells the stories of our favourite celebrities from their perspective. Each season we show you what it's really like being famous by taking you inside the life of a British icon. We walk you through their glittering highs and eyebrow raising lows and ask is fame and fortune really worth it. Follow terribly famous now wherever you get your podcasts or listen early and

ad-free on Wondry Plus on Apple Podcasts or the Wondry app. 🎵 Hello! Hello! And welcome to my favorite murder! That's Georgia Hard Star. That's Karen Kylgera. This is Thanksgiving who can now talk about her favorite bridge procedurals again. Oh my God, we're back.

I was like, thank God it wasn't gonna talk about it at the top of the show now that the strike is over. Jesus. The actor's strike is finally over. Congratulations to Fran Dresher and all of her negotiating powerhouses who went in, got those actors a deal. Hell yes.

Now we can talk about television the way we're supposed to on this true crime podcast. Our passion, truly, when it comes down to it. It's not like I could read a book. I was just going to say, I was going to say, I was going to be talking books, I can talk about. I do have one this week, but that you, so many fucking books I can talk about. I do have one this week, but that means it's really good because. It broke on through.

I want to talk about it. Yeah. I have been making a list in my notes app since the beginning of like shows that I'm like, well, and boobies and show them. I'm like, we can talk about it again. I'm going to tell her that she should watch this

and I'm going to tell her, I've been watching that. And now they're so dated, kinda. I know, well, season two of this full premiered, like truly, I think it was the day after the writer's strike began. That's right. And it's such a good show made by such great people

with so many hilarious actors on it. And I know that must've been so heartbreaking for Chris's draw to just be like, well, there's my second season of my show, I can't speak of. Same with the first season of Michelle Bhutosho. Surprise of the thickest. I was like, I can't wait to talk about that

and like the day of, I mean, it's gotta be nice to not to have to do the rounds of like fucking press all day, but still. I bet if they had to pick though, they'd be like, give me them rounds. Sure. Because I actually saw people talking about survival of the thickest on TikTok, and I got so excited,

and then I wanted to come and talk about that. But it's the same thing as talking about it. So we can now all fully endorse our favorite television, movie, premiere, whatever we want. I have one that like I want to scream it from the rooftops is like one of the best shows I've ever seen on TV. The second season came out. It's like top three with like, or like, a recent shows with like Fleabag, I'd say. Reservation dogs? No, that's not it, but I do love that show. But the second season of our flag means

death with Tyco TT. And how do you say his name, Reece? Reece Darby. It is one of the most beautiful shows I've ever seen. Like, yeah, it's these two men, these two pirates in love. There's so much love there. And it's just so heartfelt, gorgeous, I cried at the end. Like, I can't recommend a show enough. You know what's funny? Is I watched the first season and I did not watch the second season? Well, it came out so quietly

in the middle of the fucking strike. Thank you, that's right, I'm gonna put it on my list. It's like not on you, I feel like. Good, thank you, finally. Okay, what do you have? Well, I just recently, and this is an old one, but it just is funny because I just realized I was looking for things. I've watched everything out of Norway, Sweden, Iceland and Finland. Mm-hmm. I just saw, oh, I can get all the seasons of Flight of the Concords because there's not a moment of that show that I don't love. And it's so funny that that's because ReStarBee,

the way he goes about playing that manager and how earnest he is and how he makes them say, present and like do the roll call and say, present. It's so positive, so positive. They're at the New Zealand consulate or whatever they're supposed to be. It's just like the funniest best. Yeah. And the songs are just so good.

I'm the Hibapha Potomans. My lyrics are bottomless. That's right. Oh my god. Oh, that's fun. Okay, so that's a good, this is a good, like I feel like recommendations corner for people over Thanksgiving weekend.

Oh yeah, who like need a comment because they're all funny shows. You need like a comedy break from their devastating night with their families. Just me, anyone? I was getting, we're not spending things camping with my family, so no, I'm just kidding. I love the, you're at the point where you're just like,

look, it's gonna be devastating. Also, there's cranberry sauce. So let's just do this thing. Let's get into it. Oh, but I was gonna say, did we, I don't think we were able to talk about how unbelievably great Nate Bargazzo was on SNL. Were we?

It's funny because I had on my list to talk about voygenius this past week for us on SNL. That's how I did too, look, look. Voygenius on SNL right there. Where? Where do I end the, like Jill? They know, they were so fucking good. And I just picked, I saw them up there. It was like seven women on stage or six women on stage. And I just thought to myself, like if I were a

six-year-old girl watching this right now, my life would have been different. Like I just think it was just life-changingly epic. So great. It's like, look, none of those people are looking for old gals to say, we think your band is neat, of course, but I swear that feeling like the suits and the rock and the fucking lighting and just how good they are, it was just, I just felt so, I guess, proud. But also exactly that thing of, you could find it, the GoGo's first album came out, I think I was 11. So you had to really go out of your way to be like girl bands and that vibe of like female power.

Together and like none of them are the lead singer. That's, that was so cool too, where it's like you each contribute what you can and what you have and it's just like all good it's all good it all works so well so great but then I did start paying more attention to SNL because James Austin Johnson went on to it and I just love him as a performer and he he's an LA comic, repping. But then I thought, I saw an interview with Nate Bargazzi before I understood that he was the host.

And I thought he was somehow, he got cast as a cast member. And I was like, that's so weird. He is like a touring gigantic comic. It made sense, because it was like, oh, that's right, they have to get people who can do comedy, but aren't actors that'll get in trouble in that way. Right, right. So good.

So good. Just did so good. That's another one where you're just like, oh my god, that same feeling of. Like proud. Yes. People lie in my proud. It has nothing to do with me and I've no right

to feel this way, but boy, am I proud. I feel like we get that sometimes from people when we meet them. No brag, but full brag. I know this is weird, but I'm proud of what you guys have done. You know, we're rich. I've been with you from the beginning, and that feels good. We can take this out if it sounds too braggey. I don't think it does because I'll say this to bring myself down a notch. Anytime anyone says that to me, I immediately start to cry, because you would have to get a pair of pliers

and rip my dad's teeth out to say anything like that freely, just as a free admission on the sidewalk. For some reason, from your dad? Yeah, being proud, saying anything like, I'm proud of you, or this makes me, when we had whatever our first big wave that was over success, my sister made my dad call me and say those words exactly. Because that's like a weird, I think like when you have him

a grunt parents, as my father did, you don't have a lot of time to be fucking around in emotional shit. There's not a lot of room. There's not enough resources. Nobody, it's like, no, you have to go get a job, we're not gonna talk about feelings. So he's not totally used to it. So I just really love that the fact that everybody

is being raised in a way these days where it's not that big of a deal. You can be like, hey. Well, it's such a vulnerable thing for a dad. I think the reason my dad does actually say that all the time and even said it when I was just like, a fucking piece of shit, like juvenile delinquent. I'm proud of you and I was like, you sure?

Cause I just got out of rehab. So like, I don't know, it's like I'm proud of you. You're getting out of rehab. Okay. All right. It's because his immigrant parents didn't fucking do that. And I like, he knows how much it, you know, affected him. And so he's sure to do that.

What's up, Marty? Marty. And Jim, Jim did it though. He did it. He does it. He knows, like, he's like, eh, everything was fine, but okay. I'll concede this one point. Like he'll have the discussion while fighting vehemently

that they all had a great time. And everything was fun times, which, you know, that's another yet another coping mechanism. Anyway, we won't talk about his problems anymore. This is a true crime podcast. I love dissecting parents problems. It really is. Like, how did they ruin you and why?

How is it not your fault? Right. What were their parents doing that dictated kind of some of these things that make no sense now, much in the same way that like the kids of today are just like wire boomers like this and wire gen Xers like this. And it's like because the people who made us this way, you never see or hear from.

You know your grandparents that are so wonderful and lovely to you, they were terrible parents to your parents. Yes. My mom was, I think mad for a long time of how good my grandma was to us. She was like, yes, that is not the woman I knew. Same. My mom was like, well, must be nice now. This is like shit. I think the idea is you forgive them for who they were

if your parents. That doesn't mean you can't have your heart. But that's the idea, I guess, right? Yes, for sure. And that in that moment when you're like, your feelings are valid, you are right, and you have your reasons, as my therapist once said. And you're not wrong. Exactly. But then that also, because everyone's parents did a version of this, of course,

some way, way, way worse, or just not even around. But because essentially the parent wound is eternal, you can know that anyone else you talk to has some sort of thing like that. Like everybody loves to be like, no, but I'm fucked up. And it's like, but the big zen discovery is you're not comparatively speaking, you're right in the pocket. Yeah. Because everybody got a thing when they were too young to have a thing. Totally. And acknowledging it, you mean how to baby before they were too young to have a baby? Hmm.

I think that's fucking first and foremost. Are you accusing Janet of being an unwed mother? No, because she was like almost 41 she had me, so that doesn't even count, you know what I mean? Oh, shit. She has no excuse. Yeah. Thanks, Kibbing.

This is your content. Thanks, Kibbing. This is your content. Thanks, Kibbing. You won't go, but you'll do it right here. Thanks, Kibbing. Are you eating hot dogs alone? That's cool. Thanks, Kibbing. Okay.

I mean, there's more, but we can do it next week instead. This podcast could be a whole recommendations corner. Oh, give us a recommendation, just so we know where we are. Okay, not a TV show. Great. But a book, a book I'm listening to, that I'm, it's one of the ones that I'm halfway through and I'm recommending it anyways, because it is so good I don't care how it ends. Another one of those. Sure. It's called The Future by Naomi Alderman. And it is a, right now in the middle, it's a pre-apocalyptic, strong female techie girl leads. And the apocalypse is coming.

There's fucking tech billionaires that you hate. There's also like culty vibes. It's just like this adventure leading up to the apocalypse. It's like really exciting. It's so good. I love the characters. I highly recommend it. I applaud your bravery for being able to read fiction about an impending apocalypse, where

literally they're like, hey, there's a volcano that's about to go off in Iceland, where they're like evacuating this, I believe it's a southwestern part of Iceland, where the blue lagoon is, where I hope to go someday. And then there's also volcano going off in Italy. Oh, and the whole flood's in Italy too. I've been crazy, right? There were those floods. We're acting like weather was also affected by the right, the actor's strike.

We could. No, it is very like, there is a lot of like, because it's like maybe 30 years in the future, so it's not that far away. She references the pandemic in 2021. You know what I mean? Like, oh, okay. It's so it's scary, and it's also like, there's no aliens coming down. It's like our own man made fucked up niss. That is the reason that apocalypse is coming, which is like, yeah, so it's hard. That doesn't scare you orders. Yeah, but you don't think I love having anxiety. You don't think my baseline is I need anxiety to like thrive and survive. Shit, dude.

I mean, then, you know what, then thrive and please survive. I don't even want to survive the apocalypse that much. So like, I don't even know what I'm... Well, you know what, let's not decide right now. We can survive. We cannot decide it doesn't have to be today. Like is it spiders? The no, I'm good, is it mold?

Then yeah, that would be cool. Wait, wait, a spider, a fuck. Yeah, it's the worst fucking idea. You just said there would be a ton, like every day, you're like, hey, I just got a cobweb of my mouth and it just builds and builds until they're everywhere. Did you read about those people, like maybe 10 years ago who bought a house and then it turned out like infested in a way that like spiders were coming out of the walls.

No. And they had to fucking leave and like sued the past owners who didn't tell them that. What? It was infested with spiders in a way that they were unable to get rid of them like. Are you thinking of the movie or a Kenophobia? Because you weren't allowed to talk about it. That movie, I just ruined me. That movie was legit awful when there were spiders coming out of the shower head.

And then when they were in the slippers, I didn't shower for a long time after that movie. When I was like, eight, my mom was like, you got a shower and I'm like, but I can't. Yeah. It's like, no, you have to monitor our fucking Entertainment lady because that's what needs to be happening thanksgiving Leave your kids unattended with the weird aunt, but you don't really talk to them All right, let's do this Let's actually do this podcast. They're trying to get through this. It's Thanksgiving. Let's just give it a minute.

I know, sorry. We're here with you. It's Thanksgiving. Hey, what's up? I love your room. It's so cute. This is our podcast network. Exactly right, media highlights.

This week, Rose Hernandez's guest, OnGhosted, is actress Rachel Tru. You know her from the craft. The iconic spooky movie of 1996. Erin and Erin have a new episode of this podcast will kill you about lymphatic filerite assist. Also known as elephant eye assist, not elephantitis, which we've all thought this entire time.

I so want to jump in and correct you, but it's not that. It's not, it's elephant eyeists, which causes part of the body to come grossly enlarged due to a lymphatic blockage. We've been pronouncing elephantitis incorrectly for hundreds of years. It's because of breakfast glove. I blame the breakfast glove. Okay.

Oh, over on Lady to Lady, Babs, Tess and Brandy are joined by comedian and Emmy-nominated daily show writer, X-Mail. And lastly, we want to give a shout out to our own in-house graphic designer, Vanessa Lylek, in addition to brand new merch design. She's created the art for the show, Bury Bones, and Infamous International, which we love.

And so she has our brand new merch design, everything is fun and wearable. It doesn't scream, I'm wearing podcast merch. There's no F words on anything. It's really cute. I love the little heart. It's sweet. It's really sweet, little heart, MFM, and their stars on things, which I of course I love. So check everything out at my favorite murder.com. And we hope you love it too. Yeah, we just wanted to give Vanessa a shout out because it's so fun to have an in-house graphic designer that then goes like, oh, I have ideas for your merch.

Yeah. And we're like, yay, let's see him. And then truly it was like looking through. I was like, is this a catalog? Like what are we looking at? Yeah. Because it was like so good. Hearts and stars are like, do you know me?

Oh my God. My lucky charms. We should just do a whole line of lucky charms. MFM merch. Moons, cards, moons, stars, clover. I actually recently bought a box of lucky charms. There's a new thing, I think it's unicorns. Ooh.

Vince bought a box at Halloween of the chocolate. What are the chocolate lucky charms that they have for Halloween? Count Chocula. Count Chocula and he was like, have a bite. And I was like, okay, then I ate the rest of his bowl and drank the milk out of it, which I haven't done since I was a kid. Like, that shit is legit. That shit, blueberry, Count Chocula,

and there's another Franken. Is there a mummy? Oh, Franken. Uh, boo berry might be the mummy. There's Frankenberry, I think. Frankenberry, that's it, yeah. But anyway, that shit came out when I was like nine. And it'd be like, part of your daily balance breakfast.

That's it. No, it's not. It's not. It's not. But those ones, we never got to get that cereal unless we were on like summer vacation. There was a special reason to do it. So then it was like way over.

Way over. The way a reason I was being an adult, I feel like. My special reason is everyday a sugar cereal day and I have four boxes of it on my counter. I can have any kind I want whenever I want. But make sure you have it with oat milk, so it's healthy. You know what I have is a small glass of orange juice, two pieces of toast cut diagonally, just like the commercial. Right, be like, hey, no one made me toast.

Yeah, I had to get these Cheerios myself. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The holidays are always kind of a disaster for Noah. And it's not because his family celebrates a weird hodgepodge of Christmas and Hanukkah. It's that visiting them is half the problem. His mom's always too busy, his sister only cares about work and know what never really got along with his older brother and sister-in-law.

So where does that leave him during the most magical time of year? Looking for love in all the wrong places. Christmas is Annika, Meet Kutes podcast available on Wondery Plus, starring Amy Cideris and Noah Galvin tells the story of how Noah, in his quest to fight loneliness during the holidays, meets super sexy Eric, his dream man. If only it were that simple, Eric's in an open relationship, and Noah's not sure how he feels about polyamory, but Erich's really great, so much so that it forces Noah

to re-examine some strongly held beliefs about what it means to love and to be loved. Because if he doesn't, this Christmas Susanneka is just in to be the most solitary yet. Then Christmas Susanneka on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Christmas Susanneka exclusively the Wondry app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Chris Miss Susanneka exclusively on Wondry Plus. Life was anything but easy for Prince Harry.

From losing his mom at 12 years old, to being hounded or lentlessly by the press, he endured the constraints of being a part of the royal family. So in an American actress' stole his heart, Harry seized his chance to make the break shock the world. Even the rich, Prince Harry, a podcast from Wondry, shows how a young prince, running from his grief, discovered how he and his family had been living in a world ruled by detachment and duty. Even the rich brings you the stories behind the lives of the rich and famous from pop culture's

superstars to the greatest family dynasties. It's a show about power, how you get it, how you keep it, and what happens when you nearly lose it all. Learn how Harry phases an archaic institution that he desperately wants to escape. Follow even the Rich on the Wondering app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge even the Rich, Prince Harry, add free right now on Wondering Plus. Okay, should I start? Sure.

Let's get to the business of true crime podcasting right now because that other part is a highly contested portion of our show, the first 15 minutes after eight years. Still getting complaints about it. Love it. We love the interaction. We love hearing opinions. We love entertaining other concepts and then going, yeah, you know what? No, we're going to do it our way.

That's right. This story that I'm going to tell you right now, Georgia. First of all, someone named Claire de Angelia suggested it to us over on Instagram. So thank you Claire. Are you doing good over there? I was a nun. I was someone else. Got it.

So this story takes place in late March of 1982, where at Alpine Meadows on the northwest side of Lake Tahoe. Do you ever go to Alpine Meadows? No. In the 80s. No, we didn't do Tahoe. Not Tahoe people, yeah. In California, Lake Tahoe is a very specific place to go in the summer and the winter, but

it's mostly for the really ski, ski-based people. And boating people? Yes, boating people. My friend Alicia Gonzalez once yelled at her boyfriend who invited her to go to Tahoe and she screamed, I'm not white at him. Which is one of my favorite lines of all time. Alicia Gonzalez. That's how I kind of felt from Urban. I was like, well, Jewish people don't go there. Right. Right. Skying families were just a very specific set, I think.

Yeah. My dad tried it with us because he had nothing to do with us every other weekend. We were with him, you know, it was like, oh no, what do I do with these kids? And, you know, someone always cried at the end. Yeah, it's like, I don't know. I think you have to start young with parents who know it and get it. Yeah, and you don't have to rent your fucking jacket from ski lodge or whatever. And also, there's nothing more said at the end of the day.

Those rented like bib overall, snow pants that like you've been going down a snowy hill on a disc a bunch of times because you took your skis off, and now you're just soaking wet. Yeah. Because nothing's waterproof. The whites of your eyes get sunburned if you don't wear fucking goggles or whatever. I'm positive I've told you this story.

And then I swear to God we're gonna, oh I did start, that's why we're talking about this. The first time we ever went skiing in Tahoe of the outfit that we rented, the one thing I got to buy and keep were mirrored varnay sunglasses, not the brand name. And my sister got the same ones as I did. And so I could see myself perfectly in my sister's sunglasses. And I was so distracted by my own image that I didn't listen to anything that the ski instructor said when he was like pizza and french fries or whatever.

Like teaching you how to stop and everything. So we went to go down the bunny hill the first time and I just had no idea what to do. And then I got to the bottom. I was like thanks so much. I'm be taking these skis off, gonna go find my mom in the lodge. That's a lodge, but you know you looked great.

At least you knew you looked great in those sunglasses. I really did. I had a kicky, cute haircut, some fun bangs. And I was like, this is going great. And then I was like, except for the part where I don't know how to ski and now we're skiing. Anyway. Okay. So that's a little background for everybody. It's a lot of background for everyone. It's March. So it is like early spring. And basically everyone's flocking to the area because they're trying to get in their last few runs of this season but What they don't know is there about to be hit by an unprecedented early spring storm

Which will end up being a devastating event that both changed and claimed lives This is the story of the 1982 Alpine Meadows Avalanche. Ooh. The main source I'll be using today is the 2021 documentary Barried, the 1982 Alpine Meadows Avalanche, which you can watch right now on Netflix. I saw it trending on Netflix and I was like,

oh, that's weird, that's the story I'm about to do. I don't know which came first, but the documentary is from two years ago. So that's a good family Thanksgiving watch. I don't know why I'm insisting on bringing up Thanksgiving over and over again. Got to. It's because it's current. You love current events. I really did.

I'm sure I didn't watch it because the idea of an avalanche makes me so claustrophobic that like, I just can't even, it's scary. Of all the disaster stories that we've told, is that you're a worst one? Yeah, I wouldn't even go in a changing room. Like, if I'm going to try on clothes, I wear a skirt and like a thin top

to like just throw on by a mirror. Just do it right there on the floor? Yeah, I don't, I'm like, that's how claustrophobic I get, is I can't go in and change your room. So the idea of an avalanche and being unable to move is a nightmare for me. I, it's so true. So there are going to be some parts

that I'm going to then point out before I describe them to you because I can handle it. Yeah, okay. It's awful. So, it's Wednesday, March 31st, 1982. And this late spring storm has been dumping huge amounts of snow onto the slopes at Alpine Meadows between six and seven feet of snow have fallen since March 27th when this storm first rolled in.

So, that might sound like good news for people in ski business, but the amount of snow and fall has slowly become not great to bad to overwhelming. And the storm has brought gusts of wind up to 100 miles an hour. The local roads are barely passable. There's only a few ski lifts still running because of the storm that's rolled in.

So I think most of the time, and this is just guesswork, because I don't ski, and I have not spent a lot of time at resorts. But I bet you that snow itself doesn't stop the ski lifts from running because people are like, no, I love it. We want to go.

We love snow, whatever. So they probably wait until things get, you know, bad. Or it's like they allow the like professional people up there, because they can handle it maybe. I'm sure there's some sort of line of demarcation where they're like, oh, this ski lift is swinging back and forth so badly that we can't have this anymore,

but maybe not. It was the 80s after all. Yeah, maybe. No seat belts. So there are multiple ski areas up in this part of the state that are being affected by this severe weather, but it's creating a particularly dicey situation at Alpine Meadows because it is classified

by the US Forest Service as being an A-level avalanche area. So if you're looking from overhead down at Lake Tahoe, Alpine Meadows is over on the left, and it's basically at the base of some, I want to say mountains, but it just goes right up behind them. And it's like basically like super steep right there, and it creates a level avalanche conditions. And in fact, the Reno Gazette Journal reports that, quote, at the time, the resort recorded the highest number of avalanches annually of any ski area in the United States. Well, so, yeah, Alpine Meadows was basically kind of known

for being at least at risk for avalanche. So because of that A-level classification, the crew at Alpine was always on a diligent avalanche control program that required daily maintenance of the ski slopes. And this maintenance, it doesn't sound serious when I tell you what they used to do, but it was treated very seriously. So each morning, members of the ski patrol, they would break off into teams, and then they'd head up into the mountain to what are called starting zones

Which are the spots the resorts avalanche forecasters have pinpointed as being particularly high risk for breakage and slides And then the crews basically go up they try to beat nature to the punch by triggering many avalanches before a real You know major one can happen and march of, it's reported Alpine Meadows has around 300 of these starting zones. So it's an enormous task. They basically have to go out and try to trigger avalanches every day. I just hope those people got paid well. I thought, isn't a great job. No. Well, it's the early 80s. I don't really know about their pay.

I think minimum wage is the same as it is now. Yeah, I think they've they've been able to keep minimum wage where it was in 1982 but because it's ski resort this team the ski patrol is made up of majority young outdoorsy guys who live for skiing so So the idea of getting paid anything at all, let's row on gear, head up to those starting zones and use rifles, explosives, and even military grade ammunition. Whoa.

To blow up packed snow is probably a dream come true. Yeah, kind of. It would be a good place for itself when you're that guy. Not to generalize, I'm sure there were some shy poets in there as well. But for the most part, they're just like, yeah, give me that stick a dynamite, I'll be right back. So this storm on this day that we're talking about is creating a lot of work for the

ski patrol, trying to just keep pace with the snowfall. So normally they'd go out and do it once and they'd be done for a while because it doesn't snow that often because it's accumulating. They have to basically keep up with it. Plus, whiteout conditions are making it not only hard for them to see their starting zone targets, but very dangerous if not impossible to access them. So it gets to the point where their normal avalanche prevention routine is being basically impacted by this storm that just kind of won't quit.

And as members of the ski patrol work toward the resorts ridge line, Alpine Meadows beloved mountain manager, a 40 year old man named Bernie Kingry, is working in the summit terminal building, which is at the base of the slopes. So this building is a three story wooden a frame building just like you see everywhere in like the snow areas. And it houses, among other things, a lift control room, administrative offices,

a ski school, and locker rooms for the staff. So Bernie is not only an avalanche expert in his own right, but he is the captain of the ship that is Alpine Meadows. So right now, his job is to figure out how he's going to keep his staff safe as more and more snow dumps onto the area, and they need to go out and do this avalanche prevention work to keep everybody else safe. As this day is going on,

it doesn't take long for Bernie to realize that they have to shut down Alpine Meadows and most staffers will need to go home until the mountain can be stabilized and all of the avalanche mitigation tactics have been used. So to do this, Bernie will ask a skeleton crew, a ski patrolers to stay on, to continue carrying out the avalanche control

measures, basically, as the storm goes. And they'll blast the starting zones, and then a few of them will be tasked to basically warn drivers against entering the area. So they have to kind of protect anywhere the snow might come down from the mountain. So, you know, they want to make sure people aren't like, hey, what's going, can we still ski over there? Whatever. So, of course, this is 1982's, it's a pre-cell phone era. Most Alpine Meadows employees basically find out that they're closing the place through word of mouth. Oh, cool. So, just like, you know, you probably have to go up, if somebody's up at the top of the mountain, get up there and tell them, or if somebody's coming down, it's like, remember to tell them when they get back or whatever. Go to the hot dog stand and let them know.

Yeah, go to all the main places where you're hanging out. But word gets around. And eventually, they start calling the employees that were supposed to come in that day, including 22-year-old ski-lived operator Anna Conrad. She's from Glendora, California, but she goes to UC Davis. Was Glendora near Irvine? No, I don't think so. I think it's near Pasadena, isn't it? You just think it sounds nice?

I've just seen it when I look for estate sales, so it sounds familiar. Oh, yeah. So Anna's from Glendora, but she goes to UC Davis, which is two hours away from Alpine Meadows, and Anna's an active member of the UC Davis ski club. She's taken survival training courses. She's passionate about the outdoors and about skiing.

And that's why she went up and took the job at Alpine Meadows. And of course, she is thrilled to have the day off, because her boyfriend, Frank Eatman, is visiting her for spring break, because he also goes to UC Davis, that's where they met. So Ann and Frank passed the morning, cooped up inside, which is like, the phrase cooped up by disagree with.

I know, they're fine. You mean my absolute dream to be snowed in with my boyfriend and just like sitting around? Yeah. The greatest. They're like college kids, they're not cooped. Yeah. They're, there's no cooping here.

No. So they hang out with some of Ann's friends, they're not coups. Yeah, they're there's no coping here. So they hang out with some of Anna's friends, they play some board games, they, you know, try to stay cozy in the cold weather. But by the early afternoon, they both want some fresh air. So even though it's terrible whether Anna and Frank decide that they're

going to go cross country skiing, that'll cure their cabin fever. But Anna needs to grab a pair of ski pants out of her work locker so their first stop will be at Alpine's summit terminal building, which is a mile away from her rented cabin. So it's all very walking distance. Neither Anna or Frank are aware of this increasing avalanche risk that everyone at Alpine is dealing with that day. When they arrive at the summit terminal building, Bernie's giving careful instructions to staffers, Jeff Skover, Tad DeFelice. Todd. And Randy Buck, who broke my heart.

He broke my heart. A Y Randy. Doesn't Randy Buck sound like a guy who you like, unoversoed that? Yeah. You like, wait, what? Good old Randy Buck. You said you didn't have a girlfriend, Randy. Randy?

God damn it. So these are the guys that are going to be tasked with guarding the main access road and turning back any visitors or people coming close by. Also there's 22-year-old Beth Moro who assists Bernie with his avalanche control duties. So Ann and Frank say hello to the group and they go up the staircase to the second floor locker room. And as they do, Bernie picks up the phone and he dials the assistant director of ski patrol 32 year old Larry Haywood. And then so what happens from here on is because

Larry Haywood tells the story in the documentary. Uh oh. Yes. So in the office, an urgent cry comes over the radio. It turns out it's ski patroller Jake Smith. He's been blasting up in the blast zones on the mountain range and he is headed back on his snowmobile and when his voice comes over the airwaves he's screaming one word over and over, avalanche, avalanche, avalanche, avalanche. Oh my God. So Bernie on the phone tells Larry hold, and then he puts the receiver down, he picks up the radio mic and asks Jake where, but there's no response. And seconds later, the summit terminal building begins to shake violently. So violently, everyone in the room can see the building's steel beams bouncing up and down. And then there's a loud hissing noise, but before anyone can process what's going on, there's a horrifying bang, everything goes black.

Jake's kind of a hero, right? Because while he's zipping away, freaking out, he's still able to fucking give them at least a couple seconds warning. That's amazing. Yes. Entirely a hero. And like basically came back down

to make sure he could do that. Yeah. There's a writer named Jennifer Woodleaf who wrote about this event and she describes the scene at Alpine Meadows saying, quote, the mountain unzipped itself all the way around. Ooh, I got the chills. That's right. It's a really great descriptor.

It is. It puts that picture in your mind where it's just so much snow fell all at once, like how big that thing was. So despite the staff's best efforts to manage this snowfall during the storm, an enormous avalanche has flown down slope at an incredible speed, picking up trees, rocks, and debris along the way. Some sources put the breakage at 1,000 feet wide,

which is about the length of a cruise ship. Holy shit. Horrifying. The tree thing is always crazy to me about avalanches where it's like, same with tornadoes where it's like, it just picks cars up. It's just picked trees up.

No big deal. Oh yeah. Rips them right out of the ground and boulders gigantic boulders. I forgot about them. So this enormous mass of snow has smashed straight into the resort's base area and swallowed several buildings and chair lifts, including the summit terminal building.

All across this large ski area, power and telephone lines are ripped away. When word spreads and avalanche has engulfed Alpine meadows, the staff who are not on site, the people who had that day off or who are called to say don't come in. And the locals who live in the area mobilize. They all grab shovels and run over and start digging themselves. Soon there are about a hundred volunteers, furiously shoveling snow and yelling for survivors. The first three people are found and it's Jeff Tat and

Randy who by some miracle. So worried about them. I know, right? They were all fine. They're basically somehow miraculously okay. Oh my. And they found them. And they found them. The three men tell the searchers who was inside the summit terminal building at the time of the avalanche. So now the team knows they're looking for Bernie, for Beth, for Anna, and for Frank. So did the building get like collapsed or is it just buried? When the avalanche came through, it blew out the walls and the windows. So it was just basically like what was there was not there.

Trying it down. Holy shit. Okay, Got it. So then two Alpine's meadows staffers come in and report that they saw three people buried by the avalanche in the parking lot and that one of those people is a child. So these people basically witnessed these other three people getting caught in the avalanche. And the three people are soon identified as a Ureca-based surgeon named Leroy Bud Nelson

and Bud's 11-year-old daughter, Laura, and then a man named David Hahn. The three had ventured out of their nearby condos also to get some fresh air, like, because they had been cooped up because of a storm. So it's a terrifying situation with multiple people buried in the snow, and of course time is of the essence.

Larry Haywood, who was on the phone with Bernie and the call went dead, he rushes to the site and later says, quote, if you're buried in an avalanche and assuming you're not even killed in the trauma of buildings coming apart, your potential for survival is really low after 30 minutes. I mean, it's really low. Wow. And, quote, and that is true.

The Tahoe Guide website reports that, quote, depending on the consistency of the snow, just 40% of avalanche victims survive 15 minutes after being buried. Holy shit. And rates drop precipitously after that. So it's sorry to tell you this, kind of worse than maybe you ever thought because it's not just that you're caught in it, but you have to get out quickly. So I never knew that. I know.

I mean, I don't know. I guess I just didn't think about it, but that shocked me when I was like, oh my God, that's so fast. So over 100 volunteers are using probes and shovels to search for survivors, but the weather is unrelenting. The snow is incredibly dense, and it's also filled with debris, and they have acres of terrain to search.

They're also working with limited equipment because all of Alpine Meadows avalanche rescue supplies and the closet they are kept in has been destroyed. So that's all within the damage. So these volunteers are forced to make do with the chainsaws, the shovels and the cables that the locals who have showed up and supplied them with.

They basically, it's just whoever brought something. That's what they were using. And thank God, the people that lived nearby understood that they were needed and showed up for it because it was a horrible job to do and they did it and came together. And it was probably dangerous, right? Because you probably get another avalanche

if you're fucking with the avalanche, right? Oh yeah, no one could tell you they weren't going to. I mean, anything is kind of possible. It's just like they're just out there in the elements now trying to help anyway they can. And it's not easy work as the hours pass, searchers face the fact that they're much more likely to find a body than they are, find a survivor. Before the end of the day, a group of searchers finds a mangled snowmobile, and then they immediately recognize

that it's Jake Smith, the one who radioed in, warning everybody. And as searchers canvas the area, they pick up an avalanche beacon signal nearby, they begin to dig, and tragically they find Jake Smith's body. It's immeasurably difficult for the searchers who find him because they're also his co-workers. And the staff and the crew at Alpine Meadows, they had their own little culture and their own,

you know, their off-friends, and they all lived right by each other. It was like, you know, they were on the mountain together. Jake is really popular. He's a beloved staffer at Alpine Meadows. He was adored for his kindness and a sense of humor. And he was only 27 years old. There was a young ski patrol, ski patroler, I guess we'll call him, named Lanny Johnson, who was also part of the tight-knit community at Alpine. Was great friends with his co-workers, and he's there when they find Jake and he would later say quote, when something like this happens and you dig your friend out of the snow, and you're solidifying this reality that he's dead, all you can do is block your feelings out. You have a job to do and you shut that stuff down.

Yeah. Because this is like they have now, I believe five more people to find or eight more people, including the three people in the parking lot, and just this huge, like where do you go? How do you start? Oh, it'll just a massive white in front of them. So as the search grinds on, the Alpine Meadows staff

and volunteers become more and more physically and emotionally exhausted. It's terrible conditions, tough work. The power and phone lines are out and as the sun goes down, the entire resort goes dark. There's no heat and there's not much food. As the hours continue to pass, the searchers are afraid they won't be rescuing. They'll be recovering. So the next morning, Thursday, April 1st, the weather finally starts to clear. And as good as that news is, there's now an extremely high risk of another avalanche

happening because of all the snow that piled on during the storm. Since the weather has improved, the ski patrol heads up to those starting zones again to try to stabilize the mountain. Lanny Johnson, an avalanche forecaster,caster Jim Plain packed some dynamite and they get in a helicopter and they go up to the bridge line. Lanny says, quote, I would sit in the front and I would tell Jim went to throw. Jim would light it off and throw it until we were out of them. So they're just lighting sticks of dynamite from a helicopter and throwing them out to try to like pre-trigger it.

It's so dangerous. It's like dangerous in every direct. I had the opportunity once to go into a news helicopter and I was like, um, no thank you. Look, you been in a helicopter? No. I don't think I ever want to be in a helicopter. So we're going to Hawaii for Christmas. Oh. And Vince wants to take a helicopter over a volcano.

Do you have any Xanax? I don't have Xanax. And then of course I research like helicopter crashes in Hawaii. And it's like, well, actually, they're very under reported because the companies pay out the family. You know what I mean? And they'll say, I don't know if I can do that. We'll decide right before I step on. You know what I mean? And they'll say, I don't know if I can do that. We'll decide right before I step on. Yeah, I would say if you're gonna do it, you better have some my ties and you better, you know, get right with God.

You should definitely stop doing research in between. You think? That's for sure. That's my personal opinion. No, it sounds like it's like a challenge. It's terrifying. All I'm saying is, because look, there's people who are like, I went to helicopter, I loved it.

Good. God bless you. I was standing next to a new helicopter, and I turned to the producer next to me, and I was like, you want to do this, because I absolutely don't want to do this. And she was like, I'd love to do it, and I'm like, great.

And it was not, I never thought about it. I didn't think it would be an issue. It was not that. And then the moment I was like, supposed to do it, I was like, I will be suffering the entire time. Were you bummed that everything was fine? So you actually could have gone on it and I would have been fine.

Not to say, I wanted them to crash. I was bummed I wasn't proven right by a horrible crash. Georgia, I think too many. Too many things. Yeah. Okay. So in the early afternoon, when they get all that done, it's deemed safe. Volunteers are able to then continue the search in the resort's base area. And that is when, sadly, they find the body of 11-year-old Lauren Nelson. She was close to where her father was discovered the day before. This searchers also locate 22-year-old Beth Morrell. She was a hundred feet away from where she

last sat with her coworkers in the summit terminal building. Oh my God. So that also kind of gives you a sense of the power of the snow moving like that, but then also just that idea of like, it kills me to think about that communal feeling that they all had, like hanging out in that building, trying to problem solve. It was part of the job.

This is what they did. They love to do it. No, that's so tragic. Yeah. Then the volunteers find the body of 22 year old Frank Eetman, who was Anna's boyfriend, who came to visit her. Lanny Johnson will later say quote, when we pulled him away, this was the first time I got what I call face time. If you want to minimize PTSD, when you go to a scene, minimize face time.

He did not look happy as a matter of fact, he looked horrified. And it was frozen in that position. But at the same time, I had a job to do. Stuff the anxiety, don't pay attention to it, you're working. Face time. I mean, that's just it is the people that were like the seasonal crew at Alpine Meadows were not prepared. No.

I'm sure not trained to be digging for the bodies of their friends and co-workers. I mean, it sounds like they're soldiers, but soldiers are trained to deal with that. Yeah. Holy shit. So Lanny does his best to bury his emotions, and instead he turns to logic because he realizes that Frank was found in or near the employee locker room and that means Anna could be somewhere close by. So he starts yelling, Anna, Anna, if you're in there we're coming to get you, just like if she's there and can hear him.

But Lanny's theory doesn't pay off the day ends with no more discoveries. Now it's Friday, April 2nd, two days have passed since the avalanche, but that break in the storm is ended and now more severe weather has rolled in. So at this point, nearly nine and a half feet of snow is fallen at Alpine Meadows. Wind gusts are picking back up. The wind is now between 75 and 125 miles an hour, and it's hammering that dense snowpack on the ridges above the resort.

Once again, the cruise in a tough spot, not only do these conditions make it nearly impossible to conduct a search for the remaining missing people, but again, they hamper the ski patrols avalanche control measures. So with each passing hour, the avalanche danger builds. But the search continues for Bernie and Anna. Among the volunteers that have shown up to help people dig and search, there are a few rescue dogs.

And these are the early days of using dogs in search and rescue efforts in avalanche, search and rescue efforts in the US. And so for a while, these dogs that were at least here, they didn't seem like they were being helpful per se. One dog found someone's lunch in the snow, another found a mouse, so it would be like the dog would indicate everyone would get excited and then it wouldn't be the thing they wanted. And so of course, they're like, oh, these dogs aren't that useful.

Yeah. Also, the scene itself is so chaotic. The dogs are picking up on a million cents. They can't focus. Like, there's things where things wouldn't be or shouldn't be. So it's not like a normal situation. But early that Friday, a German shepherd named Bridget gets super excited. And her handler, Roberta Hubert, thinks she's found something.

Roberta is insistent that the searcher should check the area Bridget is hitting on, which isn't far from where the summit terminal building once stood, but because of the other dogs kind of hidden myths records at this point, there's not a ton of belief the rescuers go over there and dig and dig where Bridget indicated upwards of 15 feet into the snow but they don't find anything and the weather is making everything worse. So as they're out there trying to dig and do all of this it's like a blizzard basically. The winds are raging it's really hard to see and worried that another avalanche could happen at any moment. Forecaster Jim Plain makes the difficult decision to call the search off for the rest of

the day. And he says, quote, my training is screaming at me, you got to protect the rescuers. So I made what very honestly is the most difficult decision I've ever made in my life. So they're having to manage their own crisis and their own like horrible disaster scene. Just crazy. So, yeah. Yeah. Now, it's Saturday, April 3rd.

There's a full-blown blizzard raging outside. The search can't resume. Snow falls throughout the following day. There's now over 12 feet of newsdote. 12 feet. Holy shit. Over one story of news snow on the ground, and this winter storm is being called the worst in the history of the sea areas.

Yeah. So it's like horrible combination. So on Monday, April 5th, which is five days post-Avalanche, the weather is still bad, but manageable enough that searchers can finally reconvene at the base of Alpine Meadows and start work again. And Roberta Huber brings her dog Bridget back to the scene and they go back to the same area. Bridget indicated two days earlier and Roberta will later say, quote,

Bridget wasn't fooling around. She was on full alert and she went right into that hole. So once again, the volunteers start digging and digging and digging, but there's nothing there. And at first they think Bridget hit on something random again, like dirty ski sock that's down because there's lockers down there. And then they see it. A hand pops out from the icy hole. Then it vanishes so quickly that one of the researchers yells,

did you see that? The group keeps on shoveling until they find Anna Conrad and she's alive. Five days. Bridget was right. Bridget was right. Bridget! There's a moment of absolute euphoria when Anna is pulled from the snow. The crew wildly cheers. Some people cry. They all cried.

But there's no time to waste. She's been buried alive for five days. In the snow, she has a serious concussion. She's confused. She's dehydrated. She's hungry. She has very bad frostbite. Yeah.

She's covered in bruises. Of course, they call the authorities, Anna is loaded onto a helicopter, she's flown to a nearby hospital. And reportedly, her first request when she, like, can speak and is okay, is for a beer. Yeah. Which I love. She earned it. How did she survive five days? I don't know, but a beer. Yeah. Which I love. She earned it. How did she survive five days?

I don't know, but with that, Anna Conrad becomes the longest survivor of an avalanche in US history. Holy fuck. She beat the odds. And Bridget Locating Anna becomes the first time a dog has located and saved a living person from an avalanche in North America. That girl! That's a very good girl. It's a real record-setting kind of incredibly against the odds moment.

Roberta would go on to say that on the night of Anna's rescue, quote, Bridget got a steak. Yeah, she did. Oh my god. So Anna's survival really is nothing short of a miracle. She was buried in a two by five foot space under a bunch of lockers. Jesus. These lockers created an air pocket around her and saved her life. And Anna has talked about these five harrowing days

extensively over the years. She doesn't really remember much about the moments right before the avalanche, but she says, quote, everything went black. When I woke up, I was in a black hole. I couldn't see anything, but I could move. I wasn't pinned, but there wasn't a lot of space. I couldn't stretch out. I couldn't remember what I'd been doing. I had no recollection of where I'd been. My head just pounded. I had a serious, serious concussion. I didn't seem to be hurt anywhere else, but it hurt to move because my head hurt so badly." Hi, baby.

End quote. So Anna would go on to say that while buried in the snow, she could hear noises from above. This included the ski patrols avalanche blasts, and at one point, she could hear Lanny yelling her name, which is so awesome. She actually says that she yelled back at the top of her lungs, but no one could hear her,

but she never gave up hope that she'd be rescued. She says, the thing that I cannot understand, that I can't explain, that was a gift that was given to me, is that the entire time that I was in that hole, I never, ever remembered that my boyfriend, Frank, was with me. I always felt positive that I would be out of that hole to make sure I could communicate with him how much he meant to me.

I didn't remember that I had seen Bernie and Beth minutes before this happened. I never had the inkling that all of those people were most likely dead. Oh my God. So in a way, it's good that she was just in the space that she was in, and she wasn't also just burdened with the bigger picture. Right. She probably didn't panic, and that really saved oxygen. Am I just making that up?

I don't know. I mean, it could have. It could have. So shortly after Anna's rescue, the searchers finally locate the res beloved captain Alpine Meadows mountain manager, Bernie Kingry. He is found 60 feet from the summit terminal building wreckage with his hand clenched in a fist as if he were punching upwards through the snow. Oh my God. I've launched Forecaster Jim Plain later says, quote, we all looked up to Bernie. We loved Bernie. He was our guy our fallen leader

I always thought it was fitting that he was the last one found. That's how he would have wanted it Oh and quote so sad in the coming days weeks and years the survivors of the Alpine Meadows Avalanche have to deal with the unspeakable grief and trauma as well as the physical injuries that they sustained. Alpine Meadows staffers and some volunteers who responded to the scene deal with nightmares, anxiety, survivors guilt, and PTSD. Jim Plain says, quote, I do believe we did our best.

We fought at heart and we still lost. Oh, So sad. But there are bright spots. After the disaster, Anna Conrad continues to bring a sense of hope to the community as she recovers. She will lose part of her right leg and the toes on her left foot due to frostbite. But only 10 months after that, Anna will get back on her skis using a prosthetic leg. Wow.

She eventually graduates from UC Davis. She starts a family, she continues skiing, and eventually she begins to teach ski safety at another Northern California ski area, Mammoth Mountain. Wow. Anna has said, quote, I don't believe in holding back because of something that has happened in my life. With the loss of my leg and toes, things aren't as easy to do, but it doesn't stop me. Bad ass.

So that normally would be the end, but then Marin included some avalanche safety tips. Do you want to hear them? Of course I do. I always love to end my stories with like an awesome quote from a survivor or person that was through it and that Anna quote was so good. But this is kind of fun too. If you're someone who enjoys outdoor window activities,

not it, seriously like of our audience, we're talking to maybe 25% of the people here. Are you an indoors person? Yeah, indoors kids. Anyways, if you like outdoors activities, you probably are aware of how to protect yourself in avalanche-prone areas, but just in case you don't know, here are some tips. The first tip is taking avalanche safety course. Oh, Karen, thank you for that one.

Thanks so much. But also, be sure to always research the area that you're gonna go ski or snowboard in. Has it had any avalanches lately? Are there any active alerts from the US Forest Service avalanche center? Be sure to look out for any warnings about elevated danger levels and current snowpack conditions in the local news

or at local information centers. So they do wanna be like me and obsessively look for the worst possible scenarios. Yes. I think that is an inarguable safety tip. Yeah. Do your research, figure out the risk factor, and then make your decisions going from there. And if you need it, especially if you're going to cross-country ski or do skiing, I don't know,

a pie or whatever, bring essential equipment like an avalanche beacon, a collapsible probe, collapsible shovel, avalanche airbag, and if you wear a helmet, it not only protects your head from injury, but it can also create an air pocket for you. Oh yeah. Never don't wear your helmet. Finally, when your skiing or snowboarding,

be sure to travel with a group and be a big nerd and talk with that group through a potential communication plan and maybe even a rescue plan. Okay. And bring a dog. Bring Bridget. Oh my God, get Bridget. See if Bridget's for you that weekend.

Anyway, that's the story of the 1982 Alpine Meadows Abilance. Holy shit, that was exciting and scary and tragic and terrifying. I know, all the things. It's just horrifying and God, 1982 seems like so long ago now. It was. It was actually. like so long ago now. It was. It was actually. Changing directions as we like to do. Okay. This is an old time you won. It starts in 1857, your favorite period. I love that era in fucking England. Your favorite place.

Is this borderline Victorian England. Holy shit. Have you been watching bodies on Netflix? I haven't, but I've heard about it. The time traveling murder mystery that starts in Victorian England. Mm-hmm. You'll love it. It's very interesting. Okay. So my story today is about a man who is instrumental in giving us the Oxford English Dictionary, which is our most complete record of the history of the English language, which I'll get into. But before he helped with this immense project, he killed a man.

This is the sad tale of William Chester Minor. My main source for the today is a book that you may have heard of. Originally, the book was called The Professor and the Mad Man. But that is now a title that the author, Simon Winchester, isn't comfortable with, you know, because the word Mad Man is antiquated and offensive in regards to mental illness. So the name of the book is now the surgeon of Crothorne by Simon Winchester. But I think most people remember the book, the professor in the madman. Right. It's a good book.

Anyways, that's all to say that. In 1857, a group of British academics and intellectuals propose an ambitious project to create a better dictionary than what is currently available. And you're like, well than what is currently available. You're like, well, what is currently available? What's I was going to ask that, actually? Right, and I was curious, too. It's prompted, in part, by this desire that they want like regular people, common folks, to be able to read the Bible. But also, there are no real standards around spelling and meanings. So they want people who aren't intellectuals to be able to read the Bible and understand it and for them to communicate better.

And just to demonstrate how badly a fuller English dictionary was needed, the first solely English dictionary, which was Robert Cardre's atail alphabetical, published in 1604, only had around 3,000 words in it. He was like, we're just gonna do top 3,000. Let us know your votes. What would the Buzzfeed article be like? I saw the top 3,000 words and I almost died. And they're all from the Bible.

The Black hole. And we're recent dictionary made by Samuel Johnson in 1747, so still a fucking hundred years ago, still only had around about 43,000 words in it, which doesn't sound like a lot, but that's not enough. It's not enough for how I need to express myself, no way. Just try that.

Those just had words also. So the idea for this ambitious project would give a full history of the English language with all the words, their origins, their uses, and how those uses had changed over time. So it was really almost just like making a yellow pages for words. And kids, the yellow pages is an old book we used to get for free. Oh man. But I don't think about that one. Because we're from Victorian England too.

It was a booster seat. The project changes hands and stalls out multiple times for the first 20 years. So it's just kind of an idea. It's slowly being built, but it is a huge undertaking. So it's like one person's idea as opposed to like a company that makes big books or something. Yes, it's British academics and intellectuals. They want to make it.

So in 1879, and then named Dr. James Murray takes over the project, and he brings it to Oxford University. Hey, which dedicates resources to creating a new dictionary and becomes the publisher. So this is where it really gets legs. This is where it really firms up. This is where it gets called the Oxford English Dictionary. Now it's all making sense to me.

Now it all comes together. Words are important. Dr. Murray works in a little building on the Oxford University grounds that he names the scriptorium. He sends out a call for English-speaking volunteers. Obviously he can the scriptorium. Oh. He sends out a call for English speaking volunteers. Obviously, he can't do this on his own. It ends up being more than 400,000 words. Oh, okay.

So that one that I talked about was 43,000 words. Yeah. So clearly it's a big undertaking. So it's way bigger. Yeah. So he calls for people to help him. He asked for them to send In quotations from books that demonstrate the uses for various words So the whole thing of like use that in a sentence

This is where it comes from and just mail that in from your home. Yeah, okay Just start like all your you know you rich people have these like libraries like find words that are interesting to you or that are like That you have in this book from you know the 1600s and tell me the use of it and where it's from and blah blah blah you know. No my answer would be like it's your job you do it. I have to I have to tend to the sheep. Yes yes intellectuals who have a lot of time on their hand who are not shepherds that's right okay I get it. So he does this by getting pamphlets to booksellers to put inside the books they sell. So almost like, you know, when you get a bookmark at your favorite independent bookstore, Copperfields, Petaluma. Hey, skylight. Los Angeles. Yep. So they put

it in the book. So Dr. Murray thinks the project will take 10 years to complete. This is idea. But after the first five years, the first section of the dictionary is done, and it only covers the word A through the word ant. And that's five years. Shit. So shit. Exactly. I'm sure that word was in there. Over the next 10 years, thanks to the help of lots of volunteers, the work starts to move a bit faster. One volunteer in particular has made more contributions to the dictionary than anyone else, like star people over here. He is a Dr. W.C. minor, a surgeon living in Crothorn, England. One evening, Dr. Murray is entertaining a guest at the scriptorium.

It's an American, a head librarian from Harvard. The Harvard librarian tells Dr. Murray that he had warned the hearts of many Americans by specifically referencing the contributions of this Dr. Minor person in the preface to the section of the dictionary that had already been published. So they put out the aether ant and he like thanks this Dr. Minor who he doesn't know but had kept sending in words and contributed a lot. Dr. Murray is confused, so the Harvard librarian, like, why are you guys so thankful for me? Thinking him, he's helped. So the librarian explains, Dr. Miner is an American, so that's cool. Who killed a man in London? Oh, so it's interesting that you're thinking him, essentially. He does live in the town of Crothorn, but he lives there as a patient in what was then known as the

Broadmore Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Oh, Broadmore's back. Here it is again. Who is legendary that place? Yeah. So let's talk about this WC minor. William Chester Minor is born 1834 in Seylawn, a former British colony, which is now Sri Lanka. His parents are missionaries, which is like,

and he is a part of an aristocratic American family who have been in Connecticut since the mid 1600s. So they're pinkies out, highfalutin. These are ski people. Right? Definitely ski people. Ski people. Like, ski like season people. They do not rent, they own their own ski people. Skipping people. Like, ski like season people.

They do not rent. They own their own ski pants for Shale. They don't have a fucking Shale. But Willow's family belong to the Congregationalist Church, which grew out of Puritism. Is it Puritanism? So when William is three years old, his mind died just sorry you just mispronounced. Oh, Puritanism. I thought you were like, oh yeah, them. I know you're like, good job making conversation. Which grew out of Puritanism. So Aschicken imagine it's very conservative. Yeah. So when William is three

years old, his mother dies of tuberculosis, or what was then called consumption. And his father quickly remarries, and William has six half siblings from that marriage, though some dying childhood. So, the mission accommodations are rustic. The library is full of books, and the school is excellent. So, William gets a good education, and the family travels extensively, particularly to Southeast Asia. William grows into a man whose friends describe him as sensitive and highly courteous, very bookish, very gentle. He attends Yale Medical School. And the process is different from modern medical school.

I feel like it's probably a lot harder now than it was then. I would imagine so. Yeah. You just watch a lot of like, disactions back then, and then you're like, you're a doctor now. And then you just like, inhale, uh,

what is it? What's the stuff that you're like, ether? Yes. Oh, that's what curious George inhaled. Remember when, I don't know what did you know.

That's my favorite part of that book. When he, inhales ether, and then is like, xed out, his eyes are xes, I don't remember that at all. Were you thinking of the Nick too? And they're like, I was thinking of the Nick and I could not think of the name. Got it. Right shot. So I switched to curious George. Next obvious conclusion. Curious George. Oh, oh, oh, oh, man. Not great. Is there ether in that? You're drinking out of.

Okay, it takes around the same amount of time. So after all his education and apprenticeship, it's 1863 and he's 29 years old when he becomes a doctor. The Civil War is underway, it's about halfway through. So William joins the Union Army as a surgeon. After a year or so of working at an Army hospital in New Haven, he is sent to the front in Virginia,

and is thrust for the first time directly into the extreme violence going on. It's chaos, it's misery. Welcome to the Civil War. It's the Civil War. So Simon Winchester writes, quote, The bones in the first eight tents were unforgettable. The screams and whippings of men whose lives had been ruined by cruel new guns and infaracious and ceaseless battles. Some 360,000 federal troops died in the war, and so did 258,000 Confederates, and for everyone who died of wounds caused by the new weapons,

so too died from incidental infection, illness, and poor hygiene." And quote, so like rough, not okay. There's a reason that in many of our other favorite pieces of fiction, there's always a ex-civil war doctor who goes on to become whatever, blank, alcoholic, or addict, or whatever, because those doctors saw a lot of horrible shit and had to manage. And then just come home, like there was no such thing as PTSD or... No, there... No. That's a modern invention. Yeah. That's right. Wow. So the particular battle he is sent to, the Battle of the Wilderness, which already sounds

like a bad time. Has all the hallmark gruesomeness of a Civil War battle? It's fought in dense forest and brushed, so all the fighting is essentially hand-to-hand that face-to-face thing you were just talking about. Yeah, I'm not good. Right? But there's an added horror, and that is a massive forest fire that breaks out in the middle of the battle, so injured soldiers are burned alive. Oh, God. So he's this kid from a aristocratic family, he goes to become a doctor and suddenly

is seeing these horrors of war. I'm sure there's so many stories like those. This particular battle, and in the Civil War in general, there is a huge problem with desertion, because there is an actual fire to run from in the Battle of the Wilderness, desertion rates are particularly high. There are various punishments for desertion, but one of them is for the deserter to have the letter D branded into his skin. That can't count though, if they're right. Your surroundings are on fire?

Like, that's crazy. And guess who they made? Brand these soldiers. The doctor? That's crazy. And guess who they made brand these soldiers? The doctor? That's right. The doctor who has taken an oath of taking care of his patients, they force them to brand these horrible poor soldiers. So William is forced to brand a D on the face of an Irish soldier who fought with a special Irish regiment for the Union Army. So it's like an Irish dude who's so prejudiced against joins the army, fights for you on your side is branded a deserter and you have to fucking brand him with that. Like it's just it's time to go back to Galway and be like, Hey, what's not very cool over

there? No. So obviously this situation is worse for the man who gets branded, let's say, but as a gentle person and as a doctor, this experience is highly traumatic for William. After the battle with the wilderness, William is sent to posts and cities, treating soldiers and hospitals. While he's posted in New York, people start to notice that his behavior is getting a little eccentric. He spends the bulk of his free time in the company of sex workers, which I think at the time, you know, was really taboo. And he's taken to carrying a revolver with him, even when he's out of uniform.

He begins to be outwardly paranoid about his fellow soldiers and says he can hear them whispering about him. He complains of vertigo and headaches, which to me sounds like a concussion. Or PTSD. There's like a million things it seems like it could be. Yeah, but the concussion thing can also change your personality in a really drastic way. So like, who knows if that happened, but yes, all the things. By 1868, William is 34 years old.

His colleagues, friends and family know that he is unwell and doctors are recommending that he be treated in with they at that point refer to as an asylum. At the time he's not given a particular diagnosis, he agrees to go to the asylum but feels terribly ashamed and he asks that the army keep his condition a secret. He's sent to St. Elizabeth's hospital in Washington, D.C. and spends 18 months there just a long time. Yeah. So it sett sounds up. The doctors allow him to go for walks in the grounds and in a countryside, but his fears and delusions never

really go away. When he's discharged from the hospital, he's also released from the army. Liam can't practice medicine anymore, and it's 1871 when he's 37. So he decides to go to Europe, try to relax, and to paint, and to see the sights. Remember, he comes from a family of means essentially, so he's able to do that.

Which sounds great. He travels by train to various European capitals, but by the end of 1871, he returns to London and runs a room in Lambeth, which is a gritty working class neighborhood. So it's interesting that he chose, he had the means to stay wherever he wanted, he chose there. But it might be because this is one of Victorian London's most active red light districts. And William seems to get most of his social and sexual fulfillment from sex workers, so he seems to fill out home there. So unfortunately, William's mental health deteriorates further, as soon as he's moved into his room in Lambeth.

His landlady says that he seems anxious and frequently asked her to move the furniture in his room around to prevent break ins. He tells his landlady that he is particularly worried that an Irishman will break into his room and kill him. So he's having flashbacks to when he had a brand that Irishman. Throughout the winter of 1872, William wakes up to see

a menacing figure in his room, and on multiple occasions, he goes to Scotland Yard to report this. He reports that members of a militant Irish national group have been breaking into his room and hiding in the rafters. Of course, such Irish militants didn't exist at the time, and were fighting against British colonialism, which, remember, he grew up in. Right. So it's likely that William's paranoid delusions involved Irish freedom fighters, having a vendetta against him personally.

So about two in the morning, on February 17th, 1872, William wakes up in the middle of the night to see a man standing at the foot of his bed. William has started sleeping with his revolver under his pillow, so he grabs for it, and as he does, the man runs out of his room, down the stairs, and outside into the cold London night. And so William runs after him. He looks down the road and sees a man around the corner from the boarding house. So thinking it was the man that he supposedly saw, William shouts at him and then fires his revolver four times.

Oh. Of course, there was no man in William's room. There was a real man outside in the street and the man that he a shot is named George Merritt. George works at the Red Lion Brewery, Shabbling Cole and he and his wife, Eliza, have six children ranging from a year old to 13 years old. And Eliza's pregnant with a seventh child.

Oh, no. The doctors try to save George, but his carotid artery has been severed, and his spine has been broken, and he dies. So William is arrested immediately. He doesn't make any attempt to flee. He's holding the revolver when the police approach him. He goes willingly to the police station insisting now.

He realizes he shot the wrong man and that there was someone in his bedroom, which he insists upon, and that that person is still at large, but it's clear that he's having delusions. Shooting's are extremely rare and London at this point. So this incident attracts a lot of press attention, and because William is an American soldier, it also causes a bit of a diplomatic stir,

so it's covered widely in the papers in both London and the United States. So William's trial begins too much later. In April, he's found not guilty for reasons of insanity and a sentence to be treated at Broadmore. There's no timeline to the sentence. It's one of those, quote, intel her majesty's pleasure being known,

which basically means he's to be held indefinitely. Broadmoor is England's psychiatric hospital that treats violent offenders. When William is admitted in the spring of 1872, it's quickly determined that he poses no immediate threat, and so he's assigned to a somewhat more comfortable cell block. I'm sure it helped that his family had money, too, right? Then the next line says, also because he has money.

We got some favorable treatment. Yeah, that's how it works. Yeah. He gets two cells combined to make an extra large one. An American diplomat pulls some strings so that he can have most of his clothing and belongings moved in. He has his entire collection of books shipped over from New Haven, and uses his monthly army pension to order even more books from bookstores in London.

And pretty soon the cell is lined from floor to ceiling with books. He's allowed to spend some time outside each day and spend most of his time going for walks, reading, and painting. So, not the worst for him. Not the worst, but also it is broadmore, which is like, no, great, it's prison essentially. Over the next several years, William is generally at peace during the day, but his nights are still plagued by delusions. He wakes up terrified each morning, convinced that people have gotten into a cell and has sexually abused him or have forced him to sexually abuse other people.

So his delusions are a lot about sexual desires. When he was a younger child, he felt like he was possessed because he was obsessed with these things, but it was probably more likely because he's from this religious family, you know? Yeah, and the puritanism, which is like the craziest, most extreme, did you watch the movie The Witch? I started it.

It's so good. It's really good. But it is just about that. It's the kind of religion where you just can't win. You're never doing enough. You're never good enough. You're always bad. It's just such a drag.

Yeah. In 1879, when William was about 45 years old, he writes to Eliza, the widow of the man he killed, to apologize and to offer money to her family. Eliza accepts the apology and the financial assistance as well. Of course, if she wants to visit him, his doctor allows it, the first visit goes well, and Eliza starts visiting him each month. And then she starts taking book orders from William. And so each time she visits, she brings some, and he gives her money to buy more. I was going to say, I'm so happy to hear that he was giving her money, because he has it to give. and a woman being widowed pregnant with her seventh child

is the beginning of every Dickens story basically. Like, just here comes a very sad story. So the idea that it's not just him sitting there buying himself books, it's like he's actually helping. And then she's probably like, wow, thank God you're helping. I'll help you too. I mean, he reached out to apologize, which means like what he wasn't in his right mind. Yeah, he wasn't in his right mind, but when he was, he knew right from wrong, and he wanted to atone for that. So, right, it's amazing that she accepted it. Yeah, it is. So, incredible. So, in one of the books that she delivers, William discovers, a pamphlet asking for volunteers to help compile the Oxford English Dictionary.

And we're back. Because he already has such an extensive book collection at his disposal, William's able to get started right away. He works at a meticulous system, which is essentially his own index of words. It's an alphabetical list of every interesting word he comes across and it notes every reference to that word in each book in his collection. So he's basically

asked Jeaves from way back. And also he has a purpose that isn't being a doctor which is probably triggering to his PTSD. It isn't like his life from before. It's like suddenly you can use your brain in different ways and you can trust how you're using your brain. It's not scaring you or making up things that aren't real. Right. And it's like such a pattern. There's just like rules to this thing you're doing. It's not just like your imagination working. Right. Yeah. The team at Oxford realizes that this person, William, is their most valuable volunteer, and they can simply tell him

which were there currently working on, and he'll write back with a long list of useful quotations for that word. So they're like stoked that he's there, but they don't know where he's writing from, or what he's done, you know. For a while, the students to make William more peaceful and settled,

he's given more relaxed treatment. At one point, he asked for a while, this seems to make William more peaceful and settled. He's given more relaxed treatment. At one point, he asked for a knife to cut the undrimmed pages of some of his oldest books, because some handmade books used to come with some of the pages folded. And so you would have to cut along the fold to read the pages inside the fold, which is interesting. So he's allowed to have the knife, which is unheard of at Broadmore. So this goes on for about a decade before Dr. Murray learns the truth about who his favorite word Smith, William, is.

And so Dr. Murray starts to visit William. The tube form a friendship and Dr. Murray takes the train to Broadmore often to walk with William outside or to walk with William outside or to sit with him in his book filled cell. So William spends about 10 more relatively happy years working on the dictionary and visiting with Dr. Murray before his mental health deteriorates even further. The terrible nighttime delusions have never really gone away, but they began to spiral out of control again, you know, he's getting older. His strict religious upbringing, which he had largely stopped thinking about, comes back.

And he starts having the same obsessively guilty thoughts about a sexuality that he had as a teenager. He's also read with interest about the invention of air travel, but at night, this causes him to convince that he's being taken out of his cell and flown to distant cities to commit sexual acts against his will. So that's his delusion. Ultimately, it's him to self-harm and a very gruesome and upsetting way with that paper and I, he had been allowed to hold on to. So there's some general mutilation going on.

Genital mutilation, is that what you said? Up himself, yeah. Oh, yeah. For the next several years, Williams family in America go back and forth with authorities in England to negotiate having Williams sent back to the States. Finally, in 1910, the British home secretary, who is 35-year-old Winston Churchill.

Winston Churchill. Winston Churchill. Appro Churchill. Winston Churchill. Approves the request. Dr. Murray comes to Broadmore to see William off and sends him back to America with the first six completed volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary. Wow.

By this point, Dr. Murray has been knighted for his work on the dictionary, so he's actually Sir James Murray. William, who is now 76 years old, goes back to St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington, DC, and is given the relatively new diagnosis of schizophrenia, but I don't, it doesn't sound like a correct diagnosis to me. I have a professional. To you, yes, the professional me. The professional. That's just just that's not concurrent.

I feel like that is a, that is a real, very specific kind of thing that it's not just the delusions, right? No. Yeah. In 1919, when he's 85, William is transferred to a home for mentally ill, elderly people near his family home in Connecticut, and he dies a year later in 1920. The Oxford English Dictionary is completed eight years later. So remember that 10 years was supposed to take? In 1928, it contains more than 400,000 words and almost two million quotations. Wow.

No one knows exactly how many were contributed by William, but it was at least tens of thousands of them. Wow. Which is like, that's how it was created. It was like Wikipedia. With no internet. Right.

William's collection of books that he had can be found in Oxford University's famous Bodleian libraries, so that his books still exist. And that is a story of William C. Minor, who suffered tremendously, caused tremendous suffering, and left us with a legacy of language. Amazing. Again, that book that you should read is called the Surgeon of Crothorn by Simon Winchester.

Nice. Wild. Oh my god, almost two hours. Oh my god, this is a true holiday spectacular miracle. It's a Thanksgiving miracle. Also, I bet Simon Winchester's book is sitting on your parents' nightstand in their guest room with the old title. Right. Old title is still an effect because I'm almost positive it's on my dad's. Yes, absolutely. What the old one was called the professor and the madman's. If you see that, steal it from dad's. Yes, absolutely. And what the old one was called the professor

in the mad man's. If you see that, steal it from your parents. Yes, let's see where it's now. That was a really good dad book, but here's why this is great. I've never thought to pick up that book. Right. My dad's guest room,

because I'm like, I'm not interested in that. I was riveted the entire time. It couldn't be more compelling. And also just that idea of like a man who'd then kind of served after he served, continued serving and did a horrible thing, but not in his right mind, right? And like people contained multitudes. And I think that widow really, she's the hero of this. Eliza. We're just like, oh yeah, you can apologize, yes you can. And also, we can be friends.

And I don't know, I like that story. Good job. Thanks, you two. Thank you, everyone for listening. We appreciate you. We're thankful for you. We're so thankful for you. Don't forget, this is the beginning of the true holiday

season of trying to get stories out of your parents that they would never tell you when you were younger. And now you have to make them tell you of what things that happen in your town, things that happen in your family, and things that we would want to hear on the mini-sodes because there's a million stories that you'd want to hear. We were watching a JFK documentary the other night, and so I was thinking, ask your parents or your grandparents, depending on what you are, where they were when they found out that JFK had been killed.

Oh, that's right. Because I think that they all have PTSD from that day. For sure. And they don't talk about it, so you asking them that. So send us your hometowns of where your parents or grandparents were, the day JFK was shot at my favorite murder at Gmail. What if we turn like a bunch of things, givings into like parents and grandparents weeping

at the table? Yeah. I mean, that just might do the wild turkey talking now, not the actual. We just, I love that we don't think of a thing that's like, hey, what about your favorite Christmas tree or whatever. We're like, we need, we want to know when your dad was traumatized where he was, how old he was. What is wrong with that? Please tell us because it makes us feel better because then it's like, yep, get your dad in here. He's in this group too.

Yeah, that's the true, that's the true human experience. Yeah, admit your traumatized. Tell us how, make us feel better about ours. This is what we're all trying to do before we leave. This great magma-filled planet of ours. Of course, right. Also, stay sexy. And don't get murdered.

Good bye. Elvis, do you want a cookie? Ah! Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an exactly right production. Our Senior Producer is Alejandra Keck, our managing producer's Hannah Kyle Crichton. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Liana Squilachi. Our researchers are Marin McClashian and Ali Elkin.

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