My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark - 411 - 8 Years, 1 Episode

Episode Date: January 18, 2024

This week, Georgia covers bicycle bank robber Tom Justice and Karen tells the story of the “Unsinkable” Margaret Brown. For our sources and show notes, visit www.myfavoritemurder.com/episodes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is exactly right. My favorite murder. Hello! Hello! And welcome to my favorite murder. That's Georgia Hardstar. That's Karen Kilgarif. This is the eighth anniversary of my favorite murder. Holy shit.

What a random year. Almost a decade. That's quite a long time for a podcast. Yeah. This is, yeah, Vince, Vince in this podcast go and neck and neck for my longest relationship. Hey. How do you feel about eight years? That means I was, I was 35 when we started. I was a baby. I mean, I think that we were babies. I think true crime as a kind of podcast topic was a baby. Yeah. I think the whole idea of all of it was in its much younger phase.

Yes. I don't know. I think it's fascinating. At this point, I think we have been through the rain to a degree where it's just like, yeah, we get it. Like, it's an amazing thing to be on like this level of a learning journey that's public and totally transparent and at times embarrassing but very fulfilling ultimately.

Very. I don't know how do you feel about it? It's just always surprising to me, you know, A, to be successful. That wasn't in my fucking, because I prepared you for total downfall. I just mean up into that point. It was like, well, I don't know what I'm gonna do

with my life, you know, so I keep having it still remind myself that like, you did something. So that was nice. It's also weird always to be like, you know, because I do a lot of inner child work, so to go back and be like, you're gonna be fine, but then also be like, but I can't explain what your career is gonna be because those words don't exist yet podcasting and all this stuff. So cable television. Exactly. So yeah, I don't know. It's funny that

Exactly. So yeah, I don't know. It's funny that eight years is a small percentage of my life, but have been the most monumental and extraordinary and life changing and dynamic more than the rest combined. You know, it's very humbling. Very, very humbling. Oh, constantly humbling. But also, I think we packed a lot into eight years that I think maybe made it feel,

because in some ways it does feel like 20 years. Definitely. What with all the project? The simultaneous projects we felt the need to do. Well, if eight years of your life and eight years of my life, it's actually been 16 years, you know? In the same way we both wrote a memoir,

we really both wrote half a memoir. So that means it would be four years? Yeah. So the memoir took four years to write. Both of us, let me do math real quick. So podcast math, podcast math. We're podcasters. Of course we're gonna,

if I can make shit up. You see those chick talks, so those are different. So good. We're podcasters. Of course we're gonna make shit up. You see those chick talks, those are different. Yeah, so good. Anyway, what's up with you? Well, I think one great way for us to celebrate our eighth anniversary is by acknowledging the fact that our best friend Paul Giamatti won a Golden Globe, which was so great.

I mean, who deserves it more? Who deserves all the awards more in terms of acting and performance, but then even better is afterwards, he just went to the inn and out in Westwood and got some food and sat inside. Didn't do the drive-through actually went in there so then that picture showed up on social media

which is so cute and great. National treasure and friend of the podcast. FOP. That's right. I know you have a corrections corner. I have a I stand corrected, maybe corner. I guess the thing that this podcast is you learn a lot about yourself. You've learned so much about ourselves, right?

Yeah. Absolutely. It's taken eight years for me on this podcast to realize that I say the word milk weird. So we covered I covered Harvey Milk and there was just people going, what's milk milk? And then now I can't stop saying the word milk. It's milk. Right. But that's the California accent. Okay. Yeah, it's a regional. Milk. Right.

Milk. You say it that way too. Okay. Yes, it's the California A that we put into words that have eyes. Yeah. It's MELK is how I say, Malk. Harvey Malk. Harvey Malk.

So that's, yeah. My corrections corner is connected to yours. I think that that's input from, it's like, yeah, guess what, we're not Ron Burgundy. We weren't trained, news people. Wow, we don't our vocal exercises in more months before the show. We have accents. Sorry.

Yeah, we have hotcasters. We have accents and vocal fry. That's right. Sorry, not sorry. But also a real corrections corner from that episode is you and I were talking and actually, I'll just read over on Blue Sky social. I don't know if anyone in our audience is over there,

but it's the new Twitter. It's the Twitter that it has 43% less white supremacy. You might wanna come and join everybody, but someone named M. Frederick M, that's their handle at Blue Sky social, they wrote to me and said, the person who was in the Briggs debate with Harvey was Dr. Sally Gehrhart, not Anne Cronenberg.

So I think when you and I were discussing it, I brought this person up. I think you were going, oh, I think that's this person. I of course agreed. And then this person is saying, Anne Cronenberg was the lesbian motorcyclist who worked as Harvey's campaign manager.

Gearhart was a speech professor at San Francisco State. Okay. And actually Dr. Selle Gehrhart started one of the first women studies programs at a university in the country. She was extraordinary. I went and read a Wikipedia page after M. Frederick M. sent that in also with the note afterwards that said great episode of MFM. So kudos. And I read all about Dr. Sally Gerhardt's life and amazing. Like, please anybody that is interested in women's

studies, feminism, anything like that, please go look up and read about Dr. Sally Gerhardt. She was doing it early and often, such a badass, really incredible, right there at San Francisco State. It blows my mind that women's studies wasn't just something that was always in taught in school. Like, you don't realize how recent that had to be forced as a subject. Everything is recent and the reason we don't know it

is because, and I think not to get into anything like this that I clearly don't have an education about, but what I observe is the whole idea, like the reason they're going after critical race theory and colleges or any kind of like black studies, that kind of stuff is when you don't know the history, then you don't know when it's being taken away. You don't know how recent it is, so you don't appreciate it to go, hey, this needs to be

protected. You don't know the story. So you're basically taking it for granted. And those kinds of things with either women's bodily autonomy, any kind of race theory, any kind of teaching of the historical facts of this country, like it's so important to keep it public and available because people need to know it shouldn't be censored. I mean, it's just so insane that it is being censored.

That it's actually relevant to today. It's not history. It's like current. Well, now more than ever, now that history is it's like current. Well, now more than ever. Now that history is, once again repeating itself anyway, there's other people that can speak on this, and I'm sure there's many podcasts that you should listen to,

but it just makes me think of that where yeah, it's like, that's an important thing to talk about. Also, my friend Dave Messmer, my, one of my oldest friends, and truly one of my favorite people on this planet, specifically called me to say how much he loved that episode and how much it meant to him. Oh my God. Yeah, so great job on that one. Thank you. That means so much to me.

Really truly. Truly does. Yeah, me too. What do you got to it's just our first recording back from Winter Break. In some ways, I'm still on Winter Break because I'm still here with home gym. Yeah. I'm watching him watch basketball, golf, and football while I actually listen to and watch TikTok myself.

It's very modern setup that we have in the living room. The new guys. Yeah. And then we make fires and fight about what we're going to have for dinner. And I was supposed to come back obviously after our crisis break was over, but I'm like, no, I need a little more of this. It's actually doing me a world of good. Oh, good. Yeah. LA is the same. I can tell you that right now. There's nothing you've seen

it all here, but I hear it's very cold in Los Angeles. I mean, yeah. In a way that would make everyone else, at least I just every winter. How for it's 60 degrees out. Right. And then they laugh and laugh at us. Especially the rest of the country. There was a insane snowstorm in Lubbock, Texas. Did you see that?

No. Like a blizzard, I think that this is my TikTok information. But yeah, I have a show I can recommend for you that I think you like your dad will won't understand But your niece will love to Because I think it's made for her But me like more than twice or age is like I love this you know, there shows that like are not for me But I love them. It's on Netflix. It's called school spirits

It's basically if my so-called life, if the main chick was a ghost trying to solve her own murder at school, and all takes place at high school, it's like all the spirits that have died at school, all band together and try to help her solve her murder. And this, you know, it's very charming, but also like dark obviously. And I like finished it so quickly, I highly recommend it. That sounds great.

Yeah. The kids these days have such good, such good TV that's made for them. It's the kids these days. Like it's totally made. It's so smart. It's like no one's being spoken down to as a teenager or 20 something.

It's like, we know you're with it. We know you're smart. Let's get to it. It's really good. School spirits. Well, I think the days we know you're with it, we know you're smart. Let's get to it. It's really good. School spirits. Well, I think that days of speaking down to quote unquote, like teens has to be over because you just have to admit they're smarter than us.

There's just no, there's no arguing that. There's so much knowledge that you have access to now. It's no wonder none of us can sleep. Yeah, for real. For real. All right. Do you want to get into the exactly right corner? Exactly right. Of it all. Sure. Hey guys, we have a podcast network called exactly right. We're

real proud of it. Here's some updates about it from this week. And this is our first one of the year. So, hey, happy new year. Hey, over on, I saw what you did, million Danielle are back in 2024 filling our weekends with brand new cinematic double features. This week's includes the double feature Goodwill Hunting from 1997 and the Boone Doc Saints from 1999. Wow. What's the through line for those two movies that living in the late 90s was pure hell and a man's world like you wouldn't believe. living in the late 90s was pure hell. And a man's world like you wouldn't believe. Did you watch, there's a documentary about Y2K somewhere that just came out and it's so,

oh, it's like, oh wow, it's so dated and you feel so dated. It's really, you should watch it for sure, but it is like, oh yeah, time and place hardcore, like everyone who wasn't there should watch it to know what we were fucking dealing with all the time. I want to see that. You definitely should see it.

And then, oh my god, drag superstar and someone were fans of over here at exactly right, Jackie Beat. Joins, Ross, on Ghosted by Ross Hernandez to chat about all kinds of spooky stuff, please check that out. You'll fall in love with Jackie Beat, like we have. I mean, I've told so many stories about my first writing job was with Jackie B and it was one of the best experiences. And then if you just go see Jackie perform in real life

because whether she's doing her own indie show or whether she's in the original Golden Girls with all our friends, Jackie is a true visionary. A juniorly. Yeah. And then over on Buried Bones, Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, they're gonna cover the murder of Maria Bickford in a Boston boarding house in 1845.

Ooh. And we're working to get the merch store restocked after the holidays, but it's still got lots of cozy sweatshirts from MFM. This podcast will kill you and bananas and more. So go to myfavormutter.com and check that out. My sister said that she got the MFM in the heart sweatshirt. She said it's the softest sweatshirt she's ever owned.

She loves it. And then lastly, and this is, you know, this is sad news, but it's what was meant to be, Steven and Sarah have decided to end the podcast after nine years of podcasting together. And their last guest was Georgia Hardstark. They chatted about Doddy Mimi, Mo, Cat Ownership, all of it. That's true. Oh, it was heartbreaking.

It was like so better sweet to record that, you know, wishing them well. Perkest! Georgia, the start of a new year is the perfect time to get around to all those things that you've been putting off, like installing the award-winning Simply Safe Home Security System. Hey, maybe you've heard about Simply Safe that are worried about setting it up. You can either set it up yourself with interactive guidance from the Simply Safe app, or have a highly trained technician do it for you. SimplySafe offers comprehensive protection for the whole home with advanced sensors that not only detect break-ins, but fires, floods, and others rats to your home. With their 24-7 live guard protection, monitoring agents can actually see, speak to, and confront intruders in your home. The other day, Vince and I woke up in the morning to find at our locked gate rose petals

just scattered. Like, we had a goth stalker. It was like, what is going on? I went on my app and like, we wound slowly through the video and found that it was a squirrel. And the peace of mind. I screamed, grabbed at a tentative Vince. Like, I found a stalker. Just the peace of mind. We scream, I'm a ton of divins. I found a locker. Just the piece of mind.

We wouldn't have been worrying about that for months. Yes. So keep your home and family safe for the never in the new year. As a listener, you can save 20% on your new system with a fast protect plan by visiting simplysafe.com slash fave. Customize your system in just minutes at simplysafe.com slash fave. There's no safe, like simply safe. Good bye.

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Is it you that first this week? Okay. So yeah, I go first this week and I'm going to tell you it's a pretty wild story of someone who wanted their life to be a little more interesting, a little less ordinary. And so picked a, we'll say career path or hobby that isn't something you hear about every day and did it in a very special way. And broke the law a lot while they did it.

This is the story of one of the most prolific serial bank robbers in recent history. It's a story about a man with dreams of being extraordinary and how falling short of his goals caused him to unravel. This is the story of Tom Justice, the bicycle bank robber. Wow. And yes, Tom Justice is his real name, if you can believe it.

So the main source he is in today's story is a 2019 article from Chicago Magazine titled The Bicycle Thief, Wr by Stephen Lecker, who I think we've mentioned in the past for sources. And all other sources are listed in the show notes. Ready for a second bank robber? So much. Okay, and yes, he's kind of hot. So like, that adds, you know, there's not a lot of photos of him out there. So it's hard to exactly tell, but you can tell he's like got something going on. He's like, he's got a hot spirit as he robs banks. Exactly. Okay. So Tom Justice is born in 1970. He's raised in the Chicago suburb of Libertyville. He's got a sister, his mom and dad are like

married throughout his whole childhood. Like everything is normal. Happy normal childhood. Tom's dad, Jay Justice, is an athletic maybe veteran who wants his son to follow in his footsteps and be like a jock essentially. But Tom tries every sport from basketball, baseball, all the things and he is not great at any of them. And so he's 13, summer of 1983, thinking that sports just aren't for him.

But then this girl, he has a crush on, invites him to go see a bike race at the Ed Rudolph Velodrome in Northbrook, and I guess Velodrome, it's an arena for track cycling, and they're banked. So they're like, you know, around a curb, you've seen that, like in roller derby. Okay. So he goes just because he has a crush on this girl and then to his surprise when he sees the cyclists whipping around that banked track and those crazy curbs, they're elbowing each other, you know, on the straightways

at 50 miles per hour, fighting for first place. And he's like, what is this? I'm obsessed. I need to do this. Yeah. So a week later, the velodrome holds a race for kids age 12 to 14, which to me is just like asking for broken bones, especially the 80s. Although I feel like in the 80s, that's where you're basically putting in time all day long to be like to race professionally as a writing your bike was kind of what you did. Oh, yeah. That's all there was guys back then a writing your bike was kind of what you did. Oh, yeah, that's all there was guys back then is writing your bike. You know what, to rove you around in a big SUV? No, it was, yeah, like, stranger things

is not joking about how much those kids are on their fucking bikes. Yeah. Okay. What if stranger things was joking this whole time? They're not. All right, so he shows up in full professional gear. He already sets himself apart from the other kids

who are on like, you know, tiny shorts and t-shirts. But then he really sets himself apart when as the race begins, he completely crushes his competition. Tom has finally found a sport he can excel at and both he and his dad are super excited about it. So he's finally found a sport he loves. That's great. Also, just as a person who lived through this era, I felt very bad for boys and knew many

boys who weren't good at basketball, football or baseball and it was devastating. Oh, yeah. You only had those three things to choose from and if you were medium to not grade at them, it was not easy for boys. Definitely. Yeah, definitely. So from this point on, Tom trains relentlessly. He races every Thursday.

His free time is spent either a school or biking around town and becomes like part of his identity, which happens when you're really into a sport at that age. The classmates even state in their school yearbook that in the future, they expect to see Tom, like, you know, those, where do you think he'll be in the future? And it says, quote, on the cover of a Weedies box with his bike.

So like he was a cycling guy. In 1987, when 17 year old Tom is a junior in high school, he's selected for the Olympic training camp in Colorado Springs, and he spends a summer writing and training with the US Olympic cycling team, performs really well. His future is looking very bright for Olympic gold. When he heads back to school that fall,

it's for a senior year in 1987, his confidence is high. He's super popular because he's cute. He's got this like swoopy bangs of the late 80s that were so hot. Also, that's when all the late 80s is when jocks were kind of going out of favor. Right. And then it was like, could you be in a band? Could you be from France? Like then it was like,

are you interesting and exotic as opposed to just being standard? Right, right, exactly. He played it perfectly. He did. So all the girls have crushes on him, he's elected senior class president. It's like one of those like, you know, when you peak in high school kind of things, which I wouldn't know anything about, but you hear the stories. So Tom gets accepted to Southern Illinois University

where he plans to study philosophy, train really hard, and hopefully reach the Olympics, which back in that, I don't know if it's still this way, but cycling for the Olympic, for men, you didn't get accepted and go until you're in your late 20s. Oh.

So it's not like, I feel like a lot of the sports now, it's like you're 18, you're very young, but I think it's like you have to be so freaking good that you have to practice until you're late 20s to be Olympic good. Yeah. So he goes to college, but when he gets to college, everything changes and remember, so this is 1990-ish, this is like peak Gen X.

So what happens to him, he stops giving a shit. And he attempts to be cool and fit in with his new classmates by blowing off classes to drink and party. He switches his major three times, falls off his training regimen. So he kind of becomes, you know, what is the word? A college student? Just a standard college student. It's like maybe I don't want to live my life for this one specific hobby. Yeah, like he loses focus and he's just like over it. Also, I think it's like if the dad was kind of pressuring him or this was some sort of if you don don't do this, then that's one of those things

where it's like, now I'm gonna go to college, smoke some weed and suddenly be like, oh, I could have been doing this the whole time. Yeah, totally. A little bit. Yeah, a little taste of freedom and then you're like, goodbye. But he does start a cycling club at his own,

but he's better than everyone, so he doesn't really get a lot of practice. You know what's fun? No, it's like, she's, everyone has a tricycle over here. Maybe he also assumes he's talented enough to coast because he does think eventually he'll make it to the Olympic team, so he kind of just doesn't try very hard. So it takes him six years to graduate,

but he finally dies in 1994 and probably moves to LA to once again train with the US Olympic cycling team. His girlfriend that he met Laura comes with him, but he kind of falls short of everyone's expectation, so he sent back to Chicago. And he kind of just didn't apply himself, obviously. But he still wanted it. He came have both.

Also, Pete Jennings. That's right. That is truly, you weren't supposed to try. Everything had to be effortless. And if you dedicated yourself to something you were worse than a nerd. Totally. It was a real catch 22 back then. That's interesting. That's a good point. So back in Chicago, Tom and his girlfriend, Laura, get an apartment, his Olympic dreams are dead or at least on hold. So he gets a job as a social worker caring

for unhoused people grappling with mental health issues, which is fucking admirable as hell. But he wants something bigger, and it doesn't provide him with the same thrill, obviously, and not the same praise either, that being a star athlete gave him when he was biking, so he goes looking for his next big thing. He considers some out-of-the the box professions like being a priest.

Okay. I guess God is the biggest cheerleader for that. It is a bit in the box though. It is a bit in the box. It's literally and figuratively. But he also thinks about working for the DEA, being a helicopter pilot, an underwater welder. He's just hallucinating jobs.

He's just kind of like, what's the weirdest thing I can think of, I'll do that. Yeah. Like, what's something that I think of at a party and someone says, what do you do? They'll be like, whoa, and think it's really cool. Yeah. You know, a lock picker, but he doesn't know.

Who did you make that one up? No! Thank you. A lock picker, everybody's sweet. Right? I think it's called a locksmith, I don't know. Yeah, or-pick, everybody's sweet. Right? I think it's called a lock-smith, I don't know. Yeah, or a burglar. Either way.

Right. So in 1998, Tom has yet to plan himself firmly in any one career path. So he goes from one job to another, Laura wants to settle down with Tom, maybe have some kids. He's just like super not into that, like that idea of that suburban boring know, suburban boring, normal life that most people have. He wants to be special and he wants to stand out. So that's when he gets his

most out of the box idea yet to become a bank robber. Like it's not even like a shit I need money, it's like I need to do something that makes me feel alive and defines me and makes me interesting. Interesting job. Some people are like, I wanna be a baker or chef or some people are like, I want to work in an office and he is like, I wanna be a bank robber. It checks a lot of boxes. It does. So on October 20th, 1998, Tom goes to a wig shop

by himself a $50 wig. It's got black braids and bangs. And then three days later on October 23rd, he goes to his parents house, grabs his bike and the bike messenger bag. He pedals to the nearby American national bank. It finds a little hiding spot and puts on a button-down t-shirt tie and khakis over his biking spandex to kind of give himself a normal look, puts on his wig, a baseball cap, and sunglasses and a blazer, and then he leaves his bike by the fence and heads to a nearby pay phone and calls the police.

And he tells them that there's a man with a rifle walking around in this area in the woods across town. And that way he ties up one of the few cops that are on duty that evening, not the worst idea. It's malevolent and brilliant at the same time, like kind of evil, but good criminally. Right, he found something he's good at. Then he makes his way inside the bank

and up to the counter, he pulls an index card from his wallet, shows it to the teller so she can read it, but doesn't give it to her, which is smart, because it's got a spinker prints and stuff on it. And he had written on it, this is a robbery, put all of your money in the bag, slides a grocery bag across the counter, and the teller loads it up with the cash in her drawer,

all of it, $5,580, which in today's money is, I don't know, because I didn't look it up, but. I'll check Georgia. Oh, yeah, wow, right. 5,000 in the, it's the early 90s now. 98. 98. $5,000 in 1998 would be maybe $50,000 today on the contract.

This is a big reveal. Do you want to do a guess? Yeah, I'm going to go closer to like 22. It's $10,590. Jesus, never have I been so wrong. We were wrong. All right, still a lot of money. He walks out casually, finds his bike,

gets back into his spandex, steps the cash in his disguise and his messenger bag and then rides off on his bicycle. That's his getaway car. So he is using something. He did train a lot for this job if you think about it. And also, I think that idea, like that turn of like going from a person with weird braids and a khaki outfit on into a like a bike looking guy is such a switch that like I think

that's kind of genius. Because bike looking guys do stand out. When you're in the full spandex and the clip on shoes and the aerodynamic helmet, you know, right. People will go look at that guy. Look at that guy and that guy's doing his hobby. That guy isn't getting away from anything even if he's going fast.

It's like, it's a good mind trick. Right, also like look at that guy, cycling seems like a very expensive hobby. That guy doesn't need a robber bank. Right, right. So he goes to his childhood home and hides the cash inside a gym bag in his childhood bedroom closet. This is the most satisfying adrenaline rush. Tom has felt in ages and it's made all more satisfying by the fact that his parents

New next-door neighbor Pat Kerry is Libertyville's chief of police. Oh, so he's like, what's up after he like Rob's a bank? He's hitting levels of dopamine that some of us will only read about in our lives. Very true. So several months go by. And but Tom's too afraid to spend the money. He's afraid to be traced back to him, which is, I don't know if that's true, but probably.

So he decides just to give it away. He takes two twenties for himself, just kind of as a souvenir, and then puts the rest into different brown paper bags and throws them in various dumpsters and trash cans around the city so that the unhoused people rummaging for recyclables will find it. Huh. Yeah, so like, okay, he's just doing it for the thrill.

Kind of, I wish that money would go somewhere else more directly. It's in the garbage is not. But remember, he worked with the social services for UnHouse. I think he knows spots around town where it's definitely gonna be found. Oh, God, okay. I think he's putting it in places to be found,

not to be thrown away. Right, right. I'm just saying it's a big chance and he better have that schedule. That's true. At his apartment. So, you know, I think the plan is for it to be found. That's his point.

So hopefully it's it get all found. And it's not in a landfill somewhere. It does help him justify his actions a little, you know? And the robberies were really never about the money. Anyways, he didn't need the money. He needed a thrill. And that thrill sustains him for the next year. But by October 27, 1999, the thrills weren't off.

Tom needs his next fix. So following the same strategy, biking to a hiding spot, and putting on a disguise that joined the teller, the note card, making off of the cash. Tom stills $3,247 from the Northern Trust in Lake Forest. Like last time he steps brown bags full of 20s and hundreds and scatters them in alleys around the city for the N-housed to find again. So, you know, he's tightened it up. This hull, however, also has a lot of $2 bills in it. So knowing that his superintendent of his apartment building has two kids who like to play

in the courtyard, Tom hides all the $2 bills in the surrounding bushes and watches as the kids discover the money. They're laughing, they're making a game out of it, and he's just thrilled to watch. Like, that's what he gets out of it. That's amazing. I know, right? Yeah. So Tom's regular life meanwhile drags on.

It's really boring for him, of course, as it is for all of us. Sorry, I just read it. No, Tom, I don't want to be like, it's boring for him. Because it's like, it's not like he's smarter than us. Like, we fucking know it's, well, he's lived this life where, right. I mean, lives of boring, we all know that. No, he's lived this life where he's had a lot of

kind of almost moments, right? He was almost on the Olympic by-sling team. So there's a level of shame there, but there's also that level of like, I was so close. Yeah, you tasted it. Yeah. So then regular life would be a little planar and grayer in the day to day because you're comparing it

to these kind of peak moments and experiences you had when you were young. Yeah, I can't all be podcasting and fucking velodomes and shit. I don't know. Yeah. Talking about myself now. Okay. So Tom's depression actually grows deeper.

He has one thing to keep him going, which is the quiet satisfaction of having pulled off two successful bank heists. He got away with, like, you think a lot of people would be like, I'm good on that for 50 years. Let's go. I got away with it. Who the fuck? That's insane. That's huge.

You're so right. And then you're keeping this secret about yourself. Yes. Is the ultimate cocktail party drop in? You can't tell anyone, not even your girlfriend. It would drive me insane. I would tell on myself and be in jail so quickly. I would have to.

Yeah. Yeah. That's the biggest speed of this entire story is that he didn't tell on himself. Because, man, you should have gone to the Olympics for that. Because how? How do you do that? So he's 29 at this point, and nothing else in his life gives him that feeling. So on January 14th, the year 2000, the millennium, Tom hits his third bank stealing 2,599 from LaSalle bank in Evanston.

This would be his last heist of the season because icy road settled in so he couldn't write his bike anywhere, which is like, oh, it's seasonal. Bank robbing is seasonal. Bicycle bank robbing is seasonal. Right. Yes. If he was a snow plow bank robber, it would be a totally different story. It still be seasonal.

So this kind of just leaves him stewing in his depression. He really does take a hit. He gets the idea that maybe he hasn't lost his chance at the Olympics. He still has his category one standing in cycling, which I guess automatically qualifies him for the Olympic trial races in California. So he still is like trying to chase that dream. If he can place, he'll be right back on track. Laura, his girlfriend isn't totally keen on it,

but Tom's mind is made up. She loans him, her mom's car, and he drives off to Southern California, promising himself he will buckle down, focus on cycling, and try not to rob anymore banks. I so relate to that. That's what I say to myself every week. Come on.

No more. Get serious about cycling. I mean, is there anyone we know that has robbed a bank in their life and will just never know? Or anything similar? Maybe. What secrets are you just standing around keeping? Yeah.

Like if you had to think of which of your friends has robbed a bank, you know, like who would be the highest on that list? And is that offensive or is that like a compliment? I have the answer, it's Scotty Landis, of the podcast bananas, don't you think? Because he's slick and he's a mastermind. He is.

And he's like, oh my god, it would be a great cover. Like you could see him having the perfect cover that way. He uses a banana instead of a gun, for sure. Oh my God, Scotty, the bank robber. Okay. So he moves into a house in Sanita, California with an old cycling buddy and a bunch of military roommate guys and a three-legged dog named Foxtrot, which seems

like an important detail. Yeah. And he dives right back into training. He basically, he trains his fucking ass off, gets super strong, like he's on it. He's actually applying himself now. However, the routine gets routine and boring. And so on February 15th, 2000,

Tom breaks his leaving fast and robs a bank in Incinitas. It would be the first of a fast and furious run on Southern California as he hits another bank in Salano Beach on February 29th, a third in incinitas on March 1st, a fourth in San Diego on March 15th, and then a fifth and sixth. That's two in one day on March 25th in incinitas and Carl's bad. So he is going for making up for last time. Yeah, there's no winter break in California. Southern California. Yeah, there's no winter break in

California. Southern California. No, you can do it all year round in your shorts. Enjoy. Like all the robberies before, he just keeps the pocket change for himself, hides the rest, in alleys and dumpsters and portapoddies by the beach so that I'm house people will find it. He's just doing it to do it. Yeah, it's great. Like that's a lot of doing it to do it. Banks. So Rob. Yes, it is. Like he's really dedicated to a thing

that he doesn't seem to give that much of a shit about, ultimately. Yeah, yeah. The robberies help break up the monotony of his training, but soon everything crashes down around him because he wakes up one morning. With back pain so bad, he can't move. He's basically over-trained himself

to the point of severe injury. It takes him weeks to recover, which means he has to miss the Olympic trials and it's just the nail and the coffin of his longest-held dream. So it's over and out. There's no like fallback cycling for him anymore. Yeah.

Which, you know, that could be devastating. But at least he has bank robbing to fall back on. So when he heads back to Chicago in the spring of 2000, he feels like he's a total failure. Laura finally dumps him because she's like, you're not the same person anymore. I'm just done with this. And then he moves out of their apartment

and into a room in an apartment in the Ukrainian village in Chicago. And his roommate, at Burley, 230-pound man named George, is a cop. So he just kind of gets off on that too. Sure. He needs it closer than just next door. He needs it in the house. Yeah. So Tom is now single, unemployed.

The Olympics are not happening for him. So over the course of the next three months, Tom Robb's another six banks in Interant Chicago, bringing his total tally at this point to 14 banks. During Halloween of 2000, Tom picks up another addiction when he tries cocaine for the first time. Yeah, not as thrilling as bank robbing. He's obsessed with the high, he tries ecstasy at a club a few months later, and from that point the high. He tries ecstasy at a club a few months later.

And from that point on, he's doing ecstasy every weekend. And on top of robbing banks and bouncing from one high to another, all under his copper mates' nose, which I think is a little thrill. The next year, 2001, Tom gets an opportunity to buy one of the most coveted bikes in the cycling world, which is a steelman. And it's made in Redwood City, right by you, right? Hey. I mean, not really, but in the Bay Area. Yeah. Okay.

So there's this expert named Brent Steelman, who works out of garage, and he makes just 50 bikes a year. The wait list to get one is a mile long, be like the best in the biz. And the shop manager at Tom's local cycling club called Higher Gear tells Tom that someone is selling their used steelman. Like it's really hard to get a new one. So Tom jumps with a chance to get one, but it is a bright orange color, which is like not great for a getaway vehicle, you know. No. So you guys it. And so from the outside, it seems like Tom is living a normal life.

He cycles recreationally. He goes back to school at DePaul University for his masters in education. But behind closed doors, Tom's drug use is getting totally out of control. His frequent ecstasy and cocaine use is leading to higher and higher doses to achieve the same high. Oh my god. Which leads to him going into deeper and deeper depression. And it isn't long before he either backs out or fails out of grad school. And by Halloween 2001, he's resorted to smoking crack. So things are not going well. I know. So his sister, Jennifer,

assumes that he's dealing drugs since he always has cash and cocaine on hand. And he wants to assure her he isn't a drug dealer so he brings her into his bedroom, closes the door, and finally is able to admit to someone he's been robbing banks. Sorry, how long had it been thus far? This is like 2001 and he started in 1998. So, oh yeah, a couple of years. It's like a four-year, secret, three-year secret. Yeah, yeah. She, of course, can't believe that her brother is a bank robber. I would be very shocked as well. But then he asked her if she wants in and if she could help him and she's like, no way, it's, you know, I can't believe you asked me and walks out.

So he feels really guilty about it and then he's like, I feel't believe you asked me and walks out. So he feels really guilty about it. And then he's like, I feel bad. I need to rob another bank. That'll solve it. Yeah. He hits the Northview Bank in trust in Mundaline the next day. And at this point, he's robbed a total of 20 banks and has stolen a total of $93,903, which at the end of this, when we see how much he totally takes,

well, guess how much it is in today's money. But instead of getting it away like he used to, he's using more and more of the cash to buy drugs. So there's still a part of Tom deep down the inside that knows what he's doing is wrong. And so he declares he's moving back to California to try grad school again. he wants to become a teacher. He says, but of course, when he does, he moves to Walnut Creek in Northern California in early 2002. He just keeps robbing banks and getting away with it. But on March 7, 2002, Tom hits his first snag.

It's crazy that it took this long for him to like have a close call. Yeah. He robs the Union bank on Main Street in Walnut Creek, usual tactic. But when he's fleeing an 18-year veteran officer, Greg Thompson, sees the spike messenger, the spike guy in Spandex peddling away on his orange steelman, and he has a gut instinct. And so he pulls the bicyclist over and it's obviously Tom. He never says his name to the officer. He stops. He complies when officer Thompson says like,

hey, can I just look in your bag? Tom's like, sure, I just have to unclip. So he like tells him something about the pedals needing to be balanced. So he clicks a second need to click my other foot and onto the pedal, which isn't true. He ends up just fucking bolting onto his bike. Yeah. Officer Thompson hops back into his got card

and follows alerts other officers. Another cop sees the same biker, follows him to a parking lot lined by a fence that separates it. From a steep bank that delves into a dense, thick, it below, but when they get to that fence, Tom is nowhere to be found. Once back of a rives, they pass through that fence, Tom is nowhere to be found. Once back of arrives, they pass through the fence, down into the brush, where there's a

creek at the bottom, they walk along it with canines, like everyone's searching for him. They search for him for six hours until dark, but no one finds Tom. However, they do find the bicycle. So finally, Tom comes out of his hiding place, which had been a small two-foot-wide, 11-foot deep hole beneath a bridge upstream that an animal had burrowed. So he'd been fucking shivering in his spandex down there for six hours. I hope he wouldn't get caught by a canine. Fuck. I mean, I don't know. I respect this guy's dedication, but getting into a hole that was already there would never, that's not an option when I'm trying

to get away from the cops from robbing a thing. I hope whoever made this isn't taking an app in it right now. I mean, and then just the spiders, it's like, the spiders. Just the desperation, it's like the same thing, there's movies and stuff where people get into a log. And I'm like, absolutely not.

I would rather be in a jail cell with no bugs and spiders than like something like that. What did someone tell us that when we were in who I doing our show, that the lays all had like spiders in them because spiders were really in the... Oh, okay. Spiders and the ice.

I'd rather go to prison for a bank robbery than meet a spider face to face. Yeah, no thanks. No, thank you. So he comes out, he had taken a bad fall down the embankment, he lost his bicycle because they didn't the process. But he's safe for now, but knowing the police have probably found his bike,

he knows it's just a matter of time until he finds him because it is a rare bicycle. So Tom packs up his belongings and heads back home to Chicago. So meanwhile, even though he's not a detective, this bank robbery case drives one of the officers detective Sean Dexter crazy. I think they all maybe feel a little foolish for letting him get away. So he follows every possible link he can find starting first with the bike. So he's doing this on his own time and he's like, I'm gonna fuck and track this guy down.

He has a check for prints, but gets no hits. He traces the make of the bike, discover it, it's rare. But the original seller doesn't hang on to the records for very long. So they have no way of finding out who it was originally sold to. You know what, Steeleman is not a narc, and that's great news. And he's like, I don't hold onto my records.

Yes, you do. You have to. Just like, I'm sorry, burn everything. Yep. Good job, Steelman. Yeah, no snitches in the fact and cycling world. But the people at Steelman's though, they do agree to post a photo and notice about their robbery on their website in case someone else wants to come forward and snitch.

We shouldn't be the fanning steelman. They might be great people who cooperate with every law. Oh yeah, Steelman, if you're offended, we have no idea what we're doing. It's been eight years and we just are talking off the top of our head about stories we're telling each other. Yeah, we're true crime podcasters. We're going to allege everything. We're true crime podcasters.

We're not going to say a ledge. But what Officer Dexter doesn't know is that the FBI is already investigating a series with bank robberies in the Midwest that all seem to have been committed by the same person. And here's the thing about bank robbers and the law. They have to give them these names, and they're all a little ridiculous, like based on some silly thing about your MO, they'll call you whatever bank robbery name you are.

So because Tom, when he goes into Robert Bank, kind of puts his hands in like a bit of a namaste and gesture, they call him the choir boy. So that's his spank robbing name is the choir boy. Okay, to the FBI. That April 2002, a month after the robbery and walnut creek, the walnut creek police get a call from the manager of higher gear,

the Chicago bike shop where Tom Cycling Club was based, he knows who last bought the bike. It was Tom Justice. Oh, so there are some marks in the bike in the bike cycling community. Yeah. Yes. So meanwhile, Tom is sensing that something is about to go down. The walls were closing in on him.

So he flies down to Tijuana, Mexico, long story, but he has a weird run in with the cartel when he tries to get a fake passport. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Yeah. So then he books it and flies up to Oakland where his old roommate and friend Marty lives. This isn't the cop though. He just confesses everything to Marty.

Like he needs to fucking tell someone. Marty provides him some comfort, but ultimately what Tom wants to do before the cops close in on him is have one more dinner with his parents. He's like, I know it's going down. I'm just going to go home and like, have a normal dinner with my parents and see what happens. I know. So he flies back to Chicago, returns to his parents' house and waits for the inevitable. At about 5 p.m. on a workday in May of 2002, Libertyville police chief and neighbor to the justices Pat Kerry gets a call from the FBI asking about his neighbor's kid, Tom Justice. Pat can't believe it that a serial bank robber, the FBI is looking for, grew up right next

door to him. He goes home that evening to find Tom's car, because the FBI were like, hey, have you seen him lately? Have you seen his Because the FBI were like, hey, have you seen him lately? Have you seen his car? He's like, no. Goes home that evening. And Tom's car isn't his parents driveway. So the cop obviously is a narc.

It's kind of part of the job. And tells the FBI. So that evening, as Tom drives off from his parents house with his Tupperware of leftovers, several cop cars follow him, pull him over. And the officers pull Tom out of his car at gunpoint and arrest him. It doesn't take much time in the interrogation room for Tom to give a full confession.

It seems like it's almost a relief for him. He owns up to 26 bank robberies in all, which is even more than the FBI had pegged him for. It's across Illinois, Wisconsin, and California. His total loot amounts to, okay, and this is a four year 26 bank 16 city spree. Okay. It was only four years that he did fucking 26 banks.

That's crazy, right? Yeah. And his total loot amounts to $129,338. So the year is 2002. So $129,338. So the year is 2002, so $129,338. And today's money, that's fucking 20 years ago. Yes, it is. It's 23 years ago. Yep, there you go.

So let me... You were just... You were subtracting for those, the COVID blank out. Yes, I was. Thank you very much. So how much are you going to go in for that? Oh, because inflation has really exploded. And also greed flation.

So let's add all of that together. I'll say $350,000. Okay. I'm going to go, I'm going to go $400,000. Alejandra? $224,000. Goddamn it. We keep going over.

Same mistake. We're rusty. We cannot go on prices, right? We can't run. All right, so Tom, he's now 31 years old. He pleads guilty and ascends to 11 years in prison. His parents ask him why he did it and he doesn't have a good answer for them.

He tells them he just quote doesn't know why and it's just something I did. Should I get that? There's things in my life that I just did. Sure. And also how about I'm a dope of me to addict. I'm an adrenaline addict. I need certain levels of stimulation that maybe other people don't need. Definitely. Yeah, that's gotta be a thing, right? I think it is. Yeah. Your brain produces something. He didn't know about bungee jumping. So sad.

He serves nine years and there was released in 2011. He goes back to cycling, but only around town and at the Velo dream track now. Instead of robbing banks, he gets a job at a local donut shop. It's a boring existence for Tom, but he gets to go on knowing that for a drone track now. Instead of robbing banks, he gets a job at a local donut shop. It's a boring existence for Tom, but he gets to go on knowing that for a while. His four year, 26th Bank, 16th City Spree,

was one of the slickest and most prolific bank robbery sprees in recent American history. And that is the story of the bicycle bank robber, Tom Justice. I'm pretty pissed off that the bicycle bank robber has served more time than many of the rapists and murders that we talk about on this show. That is a great point. That is really something that should be looked into. God forbid you touch their money.

Right. Or humiliate them. Yeah. Well, that was great. Thank you. I've never heard of that in any them. Yeah. Well, that was great. Thank you. I've never heard of that in any way. Yeah, yeah. Fascinating.

He needs like a cartoon or something. Yeah, you know, like on adult swim. Tom Justice. The Bicycle Bank Reber. Bicycle Bank Reber. The holidays are over. The new year is in full swing and reality is setting back in. Whether you already feel back on track or you need a little nudge getting into the swing of things,

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which probably why Alejandra and Hannah paired these stories up because this is another person who lived large in their time. And I got the idea for this because of course I was on TikTok and there is a creator named Mind of Marissa and they just tell you kind of like it's like a two-minute covering something fascinating. And some of the subjects are fashion history, Titanic, the Guil d'Age, museums, whatever interesting stories. So Marissa was doing a TikTok that came across my 4U page that was about this person I'm

going to tell you about, and I had just recently done the baker from the Titanic. And so when this one came up, I was like, oh wait, this gives me the idea to also cover this person because I love talking about the people who survived the Titanic. And there are many myths about this woman. I'm gonna tell you about today. Legend has it, she was born two months early

during a tornado in Missouri. It said that she was an aggressive, uneducated wild child who grew up to be an even wilder West showgirl. They say she accidentally burned her family's fortune in the kitchen stove that she was once saved from drowning by Mark Twain himself and that she saved herself from the sinking Titanic with only a fur coat, a corset, and a cult revolver. Her legend is so big and persistent, you may already know who I'm talking about. It's the unsinkable Molly Brown.

And while all of these stories about her are extremely embellished, if not completely untrue, there is some truth to some of these claims, except for the one her name wasn't Molly. Her name was Margaret. It wasn't Molly. Wasn't her nickname. It wasn't her given name. She never went by Molly at any point in her life.

The twisting of the facts about her are oddly unnecessary because the truth about her real life is arguably just as amazing as her mythical one. So I'm going to tell you today the unbelievable life story of the unsinkable Margaret Brown. A lot of it. So the sources in this story are Molly Brown unraveling the myth by Kristen Iverson and also from the Molly Brown House Museum's website.

There's all kinds of articles on there. And the rest of the sources are in our show notes. So we start in 1867 in Hannibal, Missouri, where Margaret Tobin is born. And at the time, Hannibal's a noteworthy town because it sits on the Mississippi River, it's an important trade and transportation hub. It's not a huge town, but it's also not an isolated town either. It feels very connected to the rest of the country. And it's also Mark Twain's hometown, which is probably how that other kind of mythical fact about her started. Historians don't think Margaret ever crossed paths with Mark Twain in any meaningful way. it's possible that their extended families may be interacted at some point.

But Mark Twain was 30 years older than Margaret. So it's pretty unlikely. Margaret's parents, John and Johanna, are both Irish immigrants. John works for the Hannibal Gas Works, which is one of the largest employers in Hannibal. And Johanna stays home and raises her and John's seven children in a very modest cottage where the family keeps a cow,

several chickens in a small garden. The Tobins don't have much but Margaret's childhood appears to have been happy. She and her siblings play in the nearby woods. They watch river boats float by on the Mississippi. The Tobins are very plugged in with a like-minded group of progressive and politically active Irish immigrants their abolitionists and it's even rumored that when he lived in Pennsylvania, John worked for the Underground Railroad. They also have a progressive view on education. So Margaret goes to school until she's 13 years old, which is at that time the Margaret goes to school until she's 13 years old, which is at that time, the late 1800s,

excellent for a working class girl. But then, of course, she has to start helping out financially for this gigantic Irish family. So she starts working in a local tobacco factory. We don't know what her job duties are there, but it likely involves stripping tobacco leaves for hours on end. Unsurprisingly, Margaret doesn't like this job. It's hot. The work is growing. She barely makes any money.

And Margaret's ambitious. She's smart and she's ambitious. And she has big dreams for herself that involve getting out of Hannibal. So when she's 18 years old, she moves with her brother Daniel to leadville, Colorado, which has a booming mining industry at the time. Did I collect lead? I bet they collect lead. No, gold, actually. They love gold.

She finds work in a department store. And although she's finally doing what she wants, she does get terribly homesick. But Margaret dreams of reaching a level of success that would change the Tobin's lives for the better. And she would later write, quote, I long to be rich enough to give father a home so that he would not have to work. I used to think that the zenith of happiness

would be to have my father come to his home after a pleasant day and find his slippers warmed and waiting for him. It was a little thing to want, I thought. Of course, we could have had his slippers waiting for him in those days, you will say, but father was too tired when his work was done to enjoy any comfort.

His life was bound by working and sleeping. So she just wants her parents to be happy, whatever that means. So in the 1880s, the easiest way for a woman to transcend her social class, of course, was to marry up. Margaret's not going to do that. Instead, not long after moving to Leadville, 19-year-old Margaret meets 31-year-old minor, James Joseph Brown, people call him JJ. They meet at a church picnic. And like Margaret, JJ is the son of

Irish immigrants. He is tall, charismatic, very intelligent. And he's particularly fascinated by engineering. He wants to understand how minds actually function. But despite his ambition, he has no money. Margaret would later say, quote, I wanted a rich man, but I loved Jim Brown. She and JJ eventually marry, they have two children together, Larry and Helen, and the Brown spend their first years of marriage struggling to get by, but JJ's intelligence is recognized by his bosses in the mining industry, so he's promoted up the ladder.

Then they slowly begin to live more comfortably. And then in 1893, JJ becomes the super attendant of a mining company called Ibex. And he uses his engineering skills to access a very hard to reach area in one of Ibex's mines. And it nets Ibex a motherload of gold. In fact, one Colorado professor examines this mind and is reported as saying, quote, it is practically a lake of ore. So yeah. So basically they strike it rich in every way. And Ibex rewards JJ Handsome Lee. He has given 12,500 shares of stock in the company and a seat on the company's board. Wow. Yeah, so now the Browns have finally made it.

They celebrate by traveling the country. They tour the American South. They travel up the East Coast. They enjoy a stopover for a month in Chicago. By the time they returned to Leadville around Christmas of 1893, they have become local celebrities. And then in 1894, when Margaret's in her late 20s, they move to a mansion in a wealthy Denver neighborhood.

And that's when Margaret gets to move her parents in. So she's finally achieved that goal of giving her parents a life that doesn't revolve around working their asses off While Margaret's doing that J.J. is accumulating serious wealth as a major stakeholder in Ibex and eventually as the operator of the mind himself So he really does make it big But despite the Browns shift in circumstances Margaret who has always been politically progressive the Browns shift in circumstances, Margaret, who has always been politically progressive, is becoming frustrated with the world around her. She is deeply disturbed by how her fellow man in town around her, how little they have.

She continues to empathize with working class people because, of course, she was married to a minor herself. She knows what that is. If her husband didn't like look into engineering and basically discover this, this mother load, then she would be in the exact same position. She knows it and makes her feel helpless. She wants to enact real change in the community. But as a woman, she doesn't even have the right to vote at the time. But she doesn't sit idly by. She takes her family's new wealth and sets up soup kitchens for miners' families. She gets

involved in the women's suffrage movement. She advocates for children's rights and literacy. She raises money to build a local hospital and eventually a Catholic cathedral. She's also credited with being behind many important firsts, including Denver's first ever animal shelter, as well as the city's first preservation project after she advocates for saving local journalist and writer Eugene Fields' house from demolition. So she's all about it. She's in the community, making it better for everybody else. And she also works with a Colorado judge named Ben B. Lindsay

to establish the first juvenile court in the country. So basically making sure that kids are represented and protected. There was a man named Thomas K. Hill who knew Margaret personally, who wrote that quote, her wealth never seemed to change her one Iota. She was always democratic and kind. This was the keynote of her personality. So, in 1909, Margaret's in her early 40s, and she and J.J. decided to separate after 23 years of marriage. Oh no, I don't do that.

I know. Well, they don't divorce, according to author Kristen Niverson, quote, their children complicated financial affairs and strong Catholic faith, kept them closely connected. So, you kind of, I think, back then couldn't divorce. Right. Really without being super scandalous. Still, their separation becomes front page news. And there's rumors about JJ's infidelities. Yeah. The San Francisco examiner directly implicates Margaret in the failure of the Browns marriage. Sure, yeah, do.

Right. I mean, who else's fault would it be? They write, quote, the prime cause of the trouble has been the JJ Brown dislike society. Perhaps no woman in society has ever spent more money or time in becoming cultivated than has Mrs. Brown. So right there, how dare you better yourself for your circumstances? How dare you work to better other people's circumstances, and it's your fault what your husband does. But the end of Margaret's marriage does jumpstart an exciting new chapter in her life. She receives a $700 monthly allowance

per her separation agreement with JJ. And that's worth, do you want to guess? Okay, 719,09? Yeah. I'm gonna say, 2600. 25,000. Yeah, did I mean that? Did you mean 26,000? Probably. Probably not that I know the answer.

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Look how close I was, holy shit. So she's getting the equivalent of 25 grand a month. A month. That's too much money. It's so much money. So she begins to travel the world. She eventually becomes well-versed in French, German, and Russian. And this is also when she embarks on her most infamous trip across the Atlantic Ocean, the thing she's known best for. So the story begins like this. In 1912, 44 year old Margaret is in Europe when she gets word that one of her grandchildren is very sick.

So she goes in books, a first class ticket on the ship that would get her back home the fastest. And that ship is the RMS Titanic. Did you see that thing that was like, here's how much each room would have costs on the Titanic? Like, it's more than a first-class airplane ticket. I'll tell you. Oh, I bet. Right now, it's like 50 grand in today's money.

Yeah, I bet. It was just so luxurious back then. It was just pure insanity. Totally. So Margaret Brown boards the ship alone, which was very unusual for women at the turn of the century. She is apparently very happy with her accommodations.

She has a luxurious room. She enjoys great meals. And according to an article from Mental Floss, quote, she used the ship's gymnasium and favored the punching bag as she enjoyed boxing as a form of exercise. Hell yeah. We fucking love this woman. I mean, clearly she is a true hero. So of course, we know this is all leading to the night of April 15, 1912, when the Titanic

collides with an iceberg and begins to sink into the freezing waters of the North Atlantic. Margaret will later tell a reporter, quote, the whole thing was so formal that it was difficult for anyone to realize that it was a tragedy. Men and women stood in little groups and talked, some laughed as the first boats went over the side, all the time the band was playing. After a little while, I helped put some women into a boat. I remember the last woman. She was French. She was very excited. I spoke to her in French and helped to put her into the boat. Somehow, I did not seem to care about the thing of being saved. We thought that the ship was so big that it could not go down for a day at any rate. A first person account of what that was actually like for the

first class passengers.. Passengers. I was gonna say citizens, but thank you, passengers. Very different than what it was like for the people down below, as we know. Yeah. But it's so, so wild. I'm just thinking about that of like, nobody's panicking, so you don't think it's a big deal.

And we're like, you're about to die. And then like, no, they don't know that. I think it's gonna be a day, so yeah, like, just hang about to die. And then like, no, they don't know that. I think it's gonna be a day. So yeah, like, just hang out on deck the whole time. Yeah, and also I think probably it was very uncouth to panic or shurty more ash. You know, right?

It would be in a society pages type of shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Margaret ends up spending so much time either loading other women onto the lifeboats or... Also, this was the one where I said that there were 5, the lifeboats or, also this was the one where I said that there were 5,000 lifeboats. And it was like 500 or something. I got that number so crazy wrong.

Anyway, so she's actually spending her time helping women get onto those boats, either that or just standing there like staring and trying to take in what was going on, that she almost misses her opportunity to evacuate on her assigned lifeboat, which was lifeboat number six. It's only when she's off the Titanic that the gravity of the entire situation begins to set in. And she would later say, quote, I knew how cold the water was and I felt that if I were to be drowned, I wanted it over quickly."

So Margaret removes her life jacket. It's actually called a life belt because it may have been something different, but I changed it to life jacket because I didn't know what was going on when I first read their research. But she basically takes it off to go like, well, this is where we're at, like trying to accept her fate. Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Which I think is probably all the stages of grief, right?

Or just, you know, going through it or shock or whatever. Yeah. But then she quickly shifts into crisis mode and realizes that if she rose that lifeboat, it'll keep her warm. Ah. So she starts rowing the lifeboat and she starts telling everybody else, we all have to row this thing so that we stay warm. And she says, quote, I rode because I would have frozen to death. I made them all row. I saved their lives." End quote. So Margaret becomes the spirit of lifeboat six when the man who is technically

supposed to be in charge of lifeboat six starts to freak out basically as anyone would, but six starts to freak out basically as anyone would, but she's forced to take action knowing that Morale has to stay high in that situation. And she would later explain saying that the man, quote, began to complain that we had no chance. After he told us that we had no chance, told us many times, and he explained that we had no food, no water, no compass, I told him to be still or he would go overboard. Then he was quiet. You want to see no chance?

Buddy, seriously, shut the fuck up. What are you doing? But like, everyone has their different reaction. So that guy gets to have that reaction. But then you got to get checked because not in lifeboat six, no. So, life boat six and many others in the water that night are saved by a boat called the Carpathia. As this ship heads toward New York with hundreds of Titanic survivors aboard, Margaret gets to work. And before the Carpathia even arrives at the port,

Margaret has raised $10,000, which is over $315,000 in today's money for these survivors of the Titanic who've lost everything. Holy shit. She's just doing fucking crowdfunding on the boat that saved them. Yeah, and also it's like this is a coping mechanism

that is like the part of humanity that keeps us all alive, which is there are people that go into those situations and they're like, we need to get some stuff done. We can't stand and stare. We can't talk about how bad it is. We got to do something. God bless.

God bless. Thank you, Margaret Brown. So she uses her foreign language skills to communicate with the survivors who don't speak English, but need help getting medical services that need to connect with their family somehow. And as soon as the Carpathia arrives in New York City, reporters go look for Margaret Brown to get her first hand account of the disaster because they know there's a bunch

of rich people and she's like a society maven or whatever. So they go find her. And when a New York Times reporter asks if she slept the night before, Margaret says, quote, no, why should I? There was work to do. I left the carpathia at three o'clock this morning. There were many women there who might have to look out for. Yeah. So in the years to come, Margaret holds her experience aboard the Titanic closely alongside her grief for those who died. I mean, that trauma of that. She basically uses all of that energy, though, to chair something called the Titanic Survivor's

Committee. And according to the Encyclopedia Titanic, a website, she, quote, presented a silver cup to the captain of the Carpathia and a medal to each Carpathia crew member. And in later years, Margaret helped erect the Titanic memorial that stands in Washington, DC. She visited the cemetery in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to place wreaths on the graves of victims and continue to serve on the survivors committee. She was particularly upset that as a woman, she was not allowed to testify at the Titanic hearings. In response, she wrote her own version of the event, which was published in newspapers in Denver, New York, and Paris.

Wow. She couldn't testify. So they're getting half the maybe half the people's testimony because they just don't want women to. Oh my God. And like everyone is human. So everyone's going to go through a completely horrifying accident and traumatic event like that differently But that idea that like just her experience on her own lifeboat where the guy so we absolutely will hear from the guy that shut down and told everybody Let's give up now. Right. Which is like who knows what your reaction is gonna be if you're on an gigantic boat that sinks in frozen water

However, you wouldn't be called number one or two at the second to give your testimony. Yeah, like after surviving the Titanic disaster, Margaret's profile continues to rise. She stays devoted to humanitarian causes and political work. And in 1914, she runs for a seat in the US House of Representative before women have the right to vote. That's amazing. So badass. But then World War I breaks out, so she withdraws from the race and she heads over to France

to help serve and work with the Red Cross. She helps set up an ambulance system, stop with American volunteers and for her service and for many of the things that she does at that time, she'll later be awarded the French Legion of Honor. In fact, 1914 proves to be a particularly busy year for Margaret Brown, according to the Molly Brown House Museum website. She had, quote,

been in the news for her offer to lead a regiment of fighting women in the impending war with Mexico. What? Oh, yeah. She's solidly middle aged at this point, but she's like, you know what, I'll go. Fine, I'll take care of it. End quote. And then in April, she redirects her focus after learning about a worker strike at a mine

in Ludlow, Colorado, that has turned deadly. Twenty people will die in what's now known as the Luglow Massacre, and hundreds more will lose their livelihoods. The Luglow Massacre is considered a watershed moment in the history of U.S. labor rights, and in its immediate aftermath, Margaret steps in to help workers and their families. She not only negotiates the workers rights with the mind's biggest shareholder, JD Rockefeller, Jr., but according to the Molly Brown House Museum website, she also, quote,

established a Blue Cross nurse corps at the site of the massacre, donated a considerable amount of her own money and partnered with the Garment Workers' Union and the Women's Relief Association to provide necessary resources such as shoes and clothing. She's just like getting it done for her people, for the her community, and it's amazing. The original do-goodter influencer. The original helicopter mom, but for everybody and everybody in town. For society. Well, and also it's kind of like for her past. It's like she knows that would have been her future had this luck,

this ingenuity of her husband not taken it a different way. And the idea that she stays connected to that as opposed to like turning away from it and pretending she's always been rich and she has no responsibility is a thing to consider. Huge. Add marble. So in 1922 Margaret's estranged husband JJ Brown dies after a heart attack. He was in his late 60s and despite their separation, the two always maintained a level of respect for one another. And Margaret would say of him, quote, I've never met a finer, bigger, more worthwhile man than JJ Brown. Oh, my God.

Yeah. She never remarries. There are, of course, rumors, like when people said that she was romantically involved with a very wealthy French duke 20 years for senior, but she would deny those claims, saying, quote, me, marry that old geyser, never give me every time the rugged men of the West. Yeah, that's it. And quote, yes, Margaret, her life never slows down in 1925 when she's around 58 years old. She's a guest at the exclusive breakers hotel in Palm Beach, Florida, and a fire breaks out. And during the evacuation, she plays the role of heroin and escorts people to safety.

She'll later tell the Denver Post, quote, I was born under a lucky star, I suppose. She's like, this is just a hotel fire. I survive the Titanic. Follow me. Yeah. The exit signs right here. I'm following her. I'm following her.

I'm following her. For real. When Margaret's in her early 60s, she decides to pursue the theater. She starts taking acting classes in Paris. I know. She's just living. She's just living and loving. Oh, living in it.

She starts taking acting classes in Paris. And then in New York City, while she's living at the iconic Upper Eastside Women's Hotel, the Barbizon. And the Barbizon was this women's hotel known for residents like Grace Kelly, Sylvia Plath, Joan Didian, Lysinelli. God, take me there. Right? On October 25th, 1932, Margaret Brown is struck down by complications from an undiagnosed brain tumor. She dies at only 65 years old. She is buried alongside her estranged husband, JJ, in Long Island, New York.

And ironically, the myth of Molly Brown began before her death. Because in late 1930, Fortune Magazine runs an article about her incredible life. This is two years before she died. And the reporter called her quote, as legendary as Paul Bunyan, but as real as Pike's peak. Wow. Such a compliment. And then not long after that article came out, a writer named Jean Fowler learns Margaret's story and he's so inspired by her that he includes a chapter on her life in his book Timberline,

but he takes a ton of creative license and when the rights to Fowler's less than factual chapter are purchased by MGM and a radio show on his embellished Margaret Brown story hits the airwaves like suddenly it is like biographical, but actually it was more, she was a character in his book, but got it. And then from the radio show, a Broadway musical, The Unsinkable Molly Brown is born. And this show repeats the same myths about Margaret even changing her name to Molly because it was easier to say according to the show's writers. So it's a littley, I guess.

This stage production has followed up in 1964 by a movie of the same name, starring Debbie Reynolds, and this fully cemented Margaret Brown's transformation into the mythical Molly Brown. But Molly's over the top exploits don't hold a candle to the passion, the empathy, and the dedication that the real Margaret Brown demonstrated throughout her incredibly eventful life. And this is a final thought from the Molly Brown House Museum's website. It says, quote, the life of Margaret Brown spanned one of the greatest periods of change in American history. From her birth in a Mississippi River town to the Colorado mines and the stages

of New York and Paris, she had a starring role as a progressive reformer and a strong voice for human rights. Her actual significance was obscured by Hollywood and its manufactured moniker Molly, but the true Margaret Brown story eclipses the movie mythology, revealing the rhythms of life in a rapidly changing nation. While the Molly Brown myth exposes the stereotype of the Western woman, the true story of how she navigated a changing nation reveals an American story of great depth. And that was the true story of the insinkable Margaret Brown. Mmm.

Damn. Yeah, so inspiring. So good. And if you want to get all the details because obviously that was the most Yeah. Damn. Yeah, so inspiring. So good. And if you want to get all the details, because obviously that was the most Clist Notes version of Margaret Brown's life story, read Kristen Everson's book, Molly Brown Unraveling the Myth. And she has a website, christaniverson.com, IVERSEN. You can go get the book on there.

Cool. Yeah. Wow, great job. Thank you. What an amazing story. Maybe I'll try to be a little more like Margaret. You know what? It's like, don't freak out.

Just start rowing. Yeah. Keep yourself warm. What would Margaret do? Yeah. What would Margaret do? That's going to be only a thing. I'm like, in this moment, look around. What would Margaret do? Yeah. What would Margaret do? That's going to be only a thing.

I'm like, in this moment, look around. What action can you take? Right. What anything can you do when you're faced with hardship, which everyone is facing right now. I mean, it is hard out there. Everyone's going through the shit. And I think the Margaret Brown mindset

If you can pick yourself up and do a little something for someone else might help Definitely definitely and in the meantime Thank you for listening for those of you who have been here eight years Or one episode we appreciate you so much. It's kind of been the same eight years one episode I don't know. I don't think we've we it that much. It's been one long eight year episode. Yeah, thank you so much for being with us for whatever length of time you claim and stay sexy. And don't get murdered. Give me. Elvis, do you want a cookie? This has been an exactly right production.

Our senior producer is Alejandra Keck. Our managing producer is Hanukkahel Creighton. Our editor is Aristotle Acevedo. This episode was mixed by Liana Squilaccio. Our researchers are Marin McClauchin and Ali Elkin. Email your hometowns to my favorite murder at gmail.com. Follow the show on Instagram and Facebook at my favorite murder and Twitter at my fave murder.

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