The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 203 - The Sodder Children
Episode Date: September 2, 2016Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds examine the mystery of the Sodder Children. SOURCESTOUR DATES REDBUBBLE MERCH...
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Hi! Jose's not into it. He's like not a fan. Oh boy. Not a fan. That's what I was
worried about. Where are you going buddy? What's up, hoser? He's lost weight though.
Yeah, he really has. Dude, he had a big fucking belly. He had like a jiggly
belly. He doesn't have it anymore. He's still a big cat. Huh? Yeah. He's all the
very American cat. Listen, he's all muscle. You're listening to the dollop. This is a
bi-weekly American History podcast. Each week I read a story from American
history to my friend. Gareth Reynolds who has no idea what the topic is going to
be about. Fairly robotic. Sorry. Sorry that I'm a pro. Sorry that I walk on set
and I know my mark and lines right away. Okay. Gareth Reynolds who has no idea
what the topic is going to be about. God, do you want to look who to do? I'll do one bottle.
People say this is funny. Not Gary Gareth. Dave, okay. Someone or something is tickling people.
Is it for fun? And this is not going to come to tickling podcasts. Okay. You are queen
fakie of made-up town. All hell, queen shit of Liesville. A bunch of religious
virgins go to mingle and do what? Praying. Hi, Gary. No. This podcast is brought to you
by our sponsors on Patreon. I want to thank each and every one of you. Thanks
also to everyone who has sent in their addresses because that doesn't happen
very often. So stuff's going out. I just finalized all the paperwork. So the new
merch guy is sending out stuff. New merch guy. 1895. Alrighty. George Soder was born.
I should probably check the name. It could be Soder. Whatever. Gives a shit. Yeah.
George Soder was born. Soder. S-O-D-D-E-R. How would you pronounce that? I would say
S-O-D-R. I'd say S-O-D-R. George S-O-D-R. George S-O-D-R was born in Sardinia,
Italy. Okay. Where they make sardines. Right. Wow. That's where the sardine factory
is. He immigrated to America in 1809. You ever shared a space with someone who
eats sardines casually? What does that mean? I've had to work with
people at times who enjoy sardines. Like they're just snacking on sardines? They
will snack on sardines. Like out of a can? Out of a can. Out of a can. So they just
crank open a can and eat fish bones like they're Fritos. Yeah. Yeah. No, those
people shouldn't be allowed. I agree. I agree with you. Good night everybody.
Thanks for listening to the podcast. That was good. A sardalop. George immigrated
to America in 1908 at the age of 13. Okay. Like many kids come into the U.S. at
that time. He was on his own. Okay. Just a fucking 13-year-old out. So weird.
Getting ready to go. Must be fun. And Pennsylvania he worked on railroads bringing
supplies to the workers. Yeah. See not fun. There I am being wrong right away. He
moved a few years later to West Virginia where he got a job as a driver. Okay.
Soon he started his own trucking company hauling dirt and freight and coal. Then he
met Jeannie Capriani. All right. Who had come to America from Italy when she was three.
Alone. Yeah. Alone. Mama. Get to work. Okay. So they fall in love. They get married.
Okay. They have sex. Whoa. That's presumptuous. It was a good marriage. Okay. And when I
said they had sex I really mean that because they had 10 kids. Oh. So there were
some soldered daughters. There was a lot of soldering going. A lot of soldering
daughters. So they had one every other year from 1923 to 1943.
Oh. Just fucking banging them out. Banging them out. Regimented too. They bought a home
in Fayetteville West Virginia. Well they had to buy something. Well they had. They were
breeding like rats. It was either that or dig a giant hole. Sure. How you guys like
in the hole. Oh boy. So Fayetteville is mostly an Italian immigrant town in the Appalachians.
Okay. Right. So it's for whatever reason that times you're like let's go to West Virginia.
Sure. This place. Right. A local lawman said the Suttors were quote one of the most respected
middle class families around. Okay. Nothing to see here folks. Right. Regular story about
a bunch of Italians moving to the mountains. George had opinions. Very opinionated man.
Okay. Pretty much about everything whether it was business or politics or the wind.
The only thing. Or the wind. Yep. Okay. The only thing he would not talk about was his
childhood in Italy. Well that explains the wind arguing. Right. Probably had a pretty
dark past. He never told anyone why he had left Italy alone at 13. I assume he pulled
off a hit. Okay. We never find out in this. Nope. We don't know what happened to this
childhood. Nope. Okay. I think it was a hit too Dave. Yep. Buddies. In 1945 a stranger
came around the house and asked if they needed anyone to haul anything away. Just a guy looking
for work. Sure. At one point he went around the back of the house and looked at two fuse
boxes and said this is going to cause a fire someday. Interesting point. George thought
it was a weird comment. Okay. Especially because he just had the local power company come out
and check all the wiring and they gave it a good report. Okay. Just a few days later
a life insurance salesman came to the door. Okay. Well that not not into the chronology
of this. George told me he was not interested in life insurance and the salesman became
enraged yelling. What do you mean you know my life insurance. Your goddamn house is going
to go up and smoking. Your children are going to be destroyed. You're going to be paid for
the dirty remarks you've been making about Mussolini. Well what the fuck Mussolini. What
did he he's George is just walking around chatting up Mussolini. This is Mussolini time.
This is the he's it but he's and he's pro Mussolini. Yeah this this salesman clearly
is pro Mussolini and George has been talking shit about Mussolini. Oh okay. This is like
an Italian guy. This is an Italian Italian life insurance guy and he's upset that George
has been talking smack on Mussolini. Okay. And he says your house is going to be destroyed
right. And your children right. Classic salesman. Yeah that's how you close. That's that's
the foreign dirt on the carpet of the 1940s. A lot of life insurance guys will just threaten
your family's life. Well would you we have two packages available or would you like me
to burn your son in front of you. I'm sorry. We have two great packages available today
or I could just burn your sons on your in your floor. What. No I don't know. They will
be burned. Okay I don't want to. I don't want anything. I'm going to burn all your babies.
Can you move. Can you move your car mind. I'm parked in. I'll take the first. Yeah oh
so sorry. And by the way I am. I would never burn your babies. Okay. Sign here. Okay.
I'll burn your baby. What. The last page too. Alright so obviously that's a weird tactic
if you're an insurance salesman. Right. Yeah we agree. But George was known for being allowed
about his opinions of Mussolini. Okay. And pretty much everyone in the town knew how
he felt about Mussolini. Everyone in the town is pro Mussolini. Well they're all Italians.
Yeah it seems like a lot of people in the town are pro. Right. He very much did not like
the dictator. He would often get into intense arguments with other members of the town's
Italian community. But George didn't take the threats or comments from the two guys
who came by his house very seriously. Just thought there were a couple of loons. Right.
And then just before Mussolini's. Well done. And then just before Christmas a couple of
older Sotter boys saw a man parked in his car along the local highway staring very focused
at the younger children in the family as they walked home from school. Never good. On Christmas
Eve the family opened some of their gifts and everyone went to bed. Oh no. Wait on Christmas
Eve. Yeah. The hell they opened their presents. Well they didn't open them all. They opened
some. A lot of people open presents on Christmas. A couple. Yeah. Just to be fun. They opened
up a couple. To have fun. And then the kids go to bed early and then they do the rest
of the stuff. And what did the parents do. They fuck. I thought so. And then the phone
rang. It was 12 30 in the morning. Jeannie got out of bed and answered it but it was
a wrong number. It's saying. Hey. Not gonna be able to make a bye lady. Listen. I'm in
some deep shit here in Prim. Prim Nevada. These guys are going to take my thumbs. I've offered
all the gifts. I don't know what's happening. I don't know but it'd be great. It'd be great
if that's okay. So answers it. It's a clearly wrong number. A woman was asking for someone
who did not live there. Jeannie said she could hear lots of laughter and glasses clinking
in the background and then she hung up the phone on the person. So Jeannie goes back
to bed. Right before she saw lights that all the lights are on downstairs and the curtains
are open and the front doors unlocked. Okay. And her. This has Santa written all over it
by the way. One daughter Marion was sleeping on the couch. So Jeannie went and turned off
all the lights and closed the curtains and locked the door and went back to bed. I have
a feeling that door is going to get opened again. Then just as she started to fall asleep
she heard a loud bang on the roof followed by a rolling noise. Dude are you fucking.
So something hit and it went. Right. Rolled down the roof. It is Santa. Is he hurt. Then
she went to sleep. And a half hour later she wakes up but this time from the smell of smoke
and she went into the office and saw the fuse box was on fire. So she ran and woke up George
and George went into the office but the fire had now engulfed the entire room. Jeannie grabbed
their two year old daughter Sylvia who was sleeping in their room and then woke Marion
and told her to take Sylvia outside. Marion ran out. George ran and woke up 23 year old
John and 16 year old George Jr. And they ran out of the house. The older boys hair was
actually sinned. Sinced from the fire as they ran out. Good. Which is a cool look. Cool
look always. Michael Jackson pulled it off. Now all those people were on the bottom floor
of the house. Okay. Top floor. Where it's where the five other children. Yeah. That's
what it's like wrangling 10 kids during a fire. Oh it's easy. I don't know. It's like
you've never done it. Well not 10. So Jeannie ran to the staircase but it was already engulfed
in flames. She yelled up to the kids. Outside they all yelled up to the kids but there was
no response. George broke a window. He sliced a large cut in his arm. So he's bleeding.
He's peering in. He couldn't see anything through the smoke and the fire was now throughout
the entire downstairs. He knew that Maurice, Martha, Lewis, Louis, Jenny and Betty were
up there probably crouched in the bedroom somewhere hiding trapped because of staircases
on fire. So George ran around to the side of the house where they always kept a ladder
propped against the house. Well that's convenient. It was not there. Then he thought he could
drive one of his trucks to the side of the house and climb on to the top and get into
the upstairs window. So he ran to his trucks. Neither one of them would start. But they
had both been checked the day before and were perfectly functioning. Dave I think there's
foul play here. What are you talking about? I don't know. There's no ladder. I don't know
what you're talking about. Both the trucks don't work. The door being opened. Marianne
sounds like an asshole. This is the fucking point. He's a fucking dick. He's a real jerk.
So Marion ran to a neighbor's house to call the fire department but the operator would
not pick up. What? Another neighbor was drinking at a tavern and looked out and saw the flames
and then he tried to call but also the operator would not pick up. The man then jumped in his
car and drove to Fayetteville where he found the fire chief. The fire chief then sent out
the alarm. Now I guess fire alarms back then were pretty different. The way you put out
the word was it was known as a phone tree system. A phone tree system? Uh huh. So one firefighter
would call another who would call another who would call another and so on and so forth.
So literally playing telephone. Yes. Okay. I heard there's a tire down in the forest.
Alright, let me call Barry. Hey, Barry, it's me. You're not going to believe this. There's
a cat. It's a chess shire. It's down near the old wood area. Yeah, what's going on?
Yeah, I'm going to go back to sleep then. Alright, listen, I got to call more people.
Hey Ted, I got crazy news. What's that? There is a new squire in town. He's signing autograph
near the wood chipper. Let's go put him out. Okay, hold on. I got to call a couple more
people. Okay. Hey, Andy. Yeah, I got amazing news. What? Well, you're not going to believe
this. Yeah. There's a dead umpire. What? Yeah, let's go get him. He's made a wood. Okay,
hold on. Let me make one more call. Okay. Hey, Lou. Yeah. Got some crazy news. We're
going to need your help on this one. What's going on? Well, I'm afraid to tell you that
we have to go and help some people because of a right. Get ready for this. This is big.
This is big. This is big. Is it a rhyming crisis? Yes, in in sorts, but everybody's worried
because there's a big a big. Yeah. I liar liar. It's me. Come put me out. Okay.
Look, improv is hard. Sometimes. All right. So one guy's calling another one guy's calling
another until they're all notified. The Fayetteville fire department was two and a half miles away.
They got to the solder house at 8am. Perfect. Right on time. Just seven hours. So where's
the fire? Did you guys put it out? The fire at consume the house in just 45 minutes. Right.
Well, the thing that fire moves quickly. Yeah. Yeah. So they were a little bit late. Obviously,
at that point, Georgian genie considered their five children dead. Right. Fair. They were
completely inconsolable. Though when they looked through the remains of the smoldering
house, they could not find any sign of their bodies. The chief said it was probably so
hot that the bodies were completely cremated. It's a little silver lining for you. So the
next day you can just kind of pick which area you want to spread. Right. Yeah. So the next
day the state Centennial newspaper in Fayetteville reported quote the entire structure with the
burned bodies of the victims was a heap of rubbish in the basement tin roofing and other
materials were removed and part of one body was found. Okay. A West Virginia that didn't
happen. Oh, wait. Oh, obviously. So there was no body. They did not find a body. Okay.
The newspaper reported. Oh, okay. So there were the newspaper was just lying. Yep. Alrighty.
The West Virginia police inspector went through the burnt home remains and declared the fire
was because of bad wiring. Uh huh. Okay. The coroner's office issued five death certificates.
But there was no body found. And Jeannie was having a hard time understanding how the kids
could have died but not left bones or anything else. I mean something. Anything. There were
parts of appliances left. So why not parts of the children? Yeah. That's a weird thing
to say. But sure. But I think we've all thought that at some point. Thank you. There's parts
of the appliances. Why not parts of children? I've asked that at Sears before. I've been
thrown out of Sears for asking that before. Yeah, I would. I would. I remember correctly.
I was naked. But yeah, I've said it. I don't think you should go to Sears. I'm not allowed
to. I can't. I don't even have the option. Yeah, that's actually fair. Yeah. So not even
a choice anymore. I'd love to go. It's funny. Okay. Sure. Yeah. Right. Um, so Jeannie started
doing her own experiments. She burned animal bones. Okay. First chicken bones and then
beef joints and pork chop bones. Beef joints, huh? I love smoking beef joints. What's happening
right now? How do you know one's smoke? Oh, yeah, get out of that suitcase. Fucking Jose.
Look at no cats in suitcase. God, he's so weird. If we got to Australia, you say pops
out. Hello. What would happen? All right. Well, it's crazy, but Jose's with us tonight.
Yeah, but we'd also be Johnny Depp. Oh, yeah. No, it'd be terrible. Well, not to mention.
I mean, you know, he's he's already immigrated here. How many we got to be careful. So she's
burning all these different bones. And every time there are his bones left after the fires.
So Jeannie spoke to someone who worked at a crematorium who told her the bones will be
left after bodies are in a fire for two hours at 2000 degrees. The solder home was burned
in 45 minutes. Yeah. People asked the fire chief why he had not just driven hot to the
fire the moment he heard. Well, come on now. There's a reasonable explanation for that.
He said he did not know how to drive the fire truck. Exactly. The chief did not a drive
the fire truck. Move on conspiracy theorists. He didn't know how to drive it. Okay. So he's
waiting for someone who could drive it. Obviously. And that took seven hours. Of course it did.
You know how much you need to sleep if you're doing that work? Yeah, when you think about
it, it all makes sense. If you and if you don't think about it, that's better. Right.
Thank you. Well, not. Hmm. Rumors started that the chief had found another body in the
ashes, one that was not a family member. What's what is happening? That's that's exactly the
right question. What is happening? A telephone repairman came by and told George, Hey, you
guys need any phone work? Oh, whoa. What happened? You know, I could put a phone right over there
on those ashes, ashes there. I got bad. I got worse news for you guys. I'm gonna have to
run a whole new line. Yeah, this one's fucked up. So this one doesn't look good at all.
This one's just boing. Okay, I think I found some dog bones. Look at my boss calls. If
you could give me a really good, you know, give me like a 10. No, I'm not giving you
a 10. Yeah, but I'm helping you. I'm trying to put a phone in Europe and Europe. Five
of my children may or may not be dead. What have you tried calling them? I don't have
that's this one I'm talking about. I'll give you a seven. Okay. Thank you. So a phone man
comes by and he tells them that the phone lines have not been burned. They've been cut.
All right, Dave, I'm gonna go on record. I think there's something suspicious about this.
You jumped a lot of conclusions. Thank you. George also wondered how the power had been
on downstairs just before the fire broke out if the if the wiring was faulty. Right, okay.
I mean, okay. Yeah, that one's a little right because like it would seem like a my head faulty,
you know, you could have sparked, you know, whatever. Then Sylvia found a hard rubber
object near the house. George looked at it and said that it was a napalm pineapple bomb
that were used in warfare. What? Is Mussolini behind this? That's a really good question.
A woman came forward and said she'd seen the dead son or children looking out of a car
as it passed by the burning home. Well, lady, hi, thanks for swinging by. Valuable information
we could have had. Anyway, that's all I have to say. Sorry, it took so long. I was just
I had to make so many pies because obviously it's Christmas and I was making a lot of pies,
but your children were not burned in the fire. They were kidnapped. Can I ask you a question?
You guys want a razzleberry pie? I was going to say what kind of pies. What kind of pies
do you guys want? Another woman 50 miles away said she saw the kids the day after the fire
quote, I served them breakfast. There was a car with Florida license plate at the tourist
court, too. Cool. All right. A third woman also said she'd seen the kids this time in
Charleston at a hotel quote, the children were accompanied by two women and two men,
all of Italian extraction. I do not remember the exact date. However, the entire party
did register at the hotel and stayed in a large room with several beds. They registered
about midnight. I tried to talk to the children in a friendly manner, but the man appeared
hostile and refused to allow me to talk to the children. One of the men looked at me,
very hostile, and he turned around and began talking rapidly in Italian. Immediately the
whole party stopped talking to me. I sensed that I was being frozen out and I said nothing
more. They left early the next morning. Sounds like someone got their feelings heard a little
bit, right? Just a little personally. I mean, the real victim is me. I was made to feel
like I wasn't a part of a kidnap. I felt awkward. A year and a half later. Jeez. The Saunders
reached out to the FBI for help. Okay. Jay Edgar Hoover wrote back telling them that
it seemed like a local matter, so the bureau couldn't help. But the FBI did say if the
locals gave them permission, they would look into it. Okay. Let me guess. Fayetteville
Cops and the fire department told the FBI, nope, they were good. Right. Thank you. Thanks.
The Saunders hired a private investigator. Good. He learned the crazy insurance salesman
had also been a member of the coroner's jury that had declared the fire an accident. Wow.
What? This is like the game. A minister then told the investigator that the fire chief
had actually found a heart in the ashes, which he put in a dynamite box and buried at the
house. What? Okay. I've never seen you give up before. Well, I just don't even know where
to start. Right. I mean, he threw a heart, he buried a heart in a dynamite box. Who wouldn't?
Think of that out of context for a minute. I'd rather not. Pretty bananas. The years
passed and sightings and tips kept trickling in. One day, George saw a picture of some
kids in a New York newspaper and was convinced one of the kids was his daughter, Betty. He
hopped in his truck and he drove to Manhattan. Okay. Her parents wouldn't let George near
her. Okay. That's my daughter. I know that's my bed. That's why. That's my bed. I want
my girl. Excuse me, miss. I had to interrupt you, but your daughter, she's a man. What?
She's my daughter. Please go away. I had a Mussolini. Give me my baby. A dog burns at
180 degrees. Give me my daughter. Could you go? I will if I take up my baby. By the way,
there's a four or more where that came from. In 1949, the Sotters paid a pathologist to
come in from Washington, DC, who excavated the property and found some pieces of vertebrae.
Good. Good. You guys got Spinyard. Okay. That'll be $100. The pieces were sent to the Mussolini,
which checked them out and sent back a report from the report. The human bones consist of
four lumbar vertebrae belonging to one individual. Since the transverse recesses are fused, the
age of this individual at death should have been around 16 or 17. The top limit of age
should be about 22, since the centra, which is normally fused at 23, are still unfused.
On this basis, the bones show greater skeletal maturation than one would expect for a 14-year-old
boy, which was the oldest missing child. It is, however, possible, although not probable,
for a boy of 14 and a half years to show 16 to 17-year-old maturation. I've got the spine
of a 16-year-old. Things are pretty good. She's pretty sweet back there. Don't worry.
The vertebrae also had not been in a fire. Okay. The report went on to say, it is very
strange that no other bones were found in the allegedly careful evacuation of the excavation
of the basement of the house. The report also stated that since the fire was only 45 minutes
long, there should be bones and the skulls of the children. After the kids died, George
had brought in dirt and put it in the basement because he wanted to build a memorial there.
The report concluded that the bones had been trucked in in that load of dirt. He bought
dirt and they boned the dirt. He went and got dirt somewhere. No, he went and got dirt
somewhere, but he somehow, when he was getting the dirt, he got him a place where they were
the body buried. Wait, he coincidentally bought body dirt and then put it to make a memorial
only further confusing? Yeah, that's kind of what happened. I mean, I mean, you can't
dig anywhere in West Virginia. Yeah, honestly. Bodies. That's why it's called the dead body
state. Excuse me, I'm not paying for a spine. Oh, sorry about that. Oh, you know what? The
no spine dirt's over there, but that's why this is cheaper here because it's full of
spines. I don't want spine in my dirt. Well, the sign says the spine dirt. Well, I didn't
realize there were signs. Over there, the sign says not spine dirt. I want not spine. And
then that is skull dirt over there. Excuse me? There's kidney dirt. Pardon? There's
feet dirt. I got a lie. I'm interested in the feet dirt. Okay. Okay. The people feet.
I'm still interested. So I like I like what I hear. Two bucks a pound. I like everything
about this. Let's do this business. That's I assume that's how it went. I think so.
So okay, so that's how that's how the bones got there. The report caused more people to
wonder about the son or children. It was now becoming a national story. This led to two
state hearings being held in Charleston. In the end, the governor and state police superintendent
said the search for the son of children was quote hopeless and declared the case close.
Perfect. But George and Jeannie certainly weren't
done. Let it go. Right. You got five other kids or four or whatever. Whatever number.
I mean, you had 10 four and a spine. How many can you miss happy.
So they put up a billboard along route 16 offering a $5,000 reward and it had pictures
of the kids on it. They also passed out flyers. Then they up the reward to $10,000. Okay.
A letter came. It was from a woman in St. Louis who said Martha the oldest daughter was in
a convent. In 1967, a woman in Houston said that she overheard two men in a bar talking
about the fire. One said he was really one of the sons and his name was Louis. George
drove straight to Texas. But the woman who wrote the letter would not speak to him. Cool.
I only said letters. I don't talk to faces. Yeah.
So George and he was with another son. They went to the local law enforcement who told
them a little bit about the men, the two men that had been talking and they perfectly fit
the description of the solder kids. Okay.
This is almost 20 years later. Yeah. Yeah.
So they found the two men. They were the right age and they looked like the boys and they
were very friendly, but said, quote, I wish I could help you, but you have the wrong people.
We were raised by the families right down there in that house there. So the guys denied
that's who they were. Okay. Another person in Florida said the kids were actually at
a relative of Genie's house. With each tip that came in, George would get in his car
and drive to investigate. No tips ever produced results. 20 years later, in 1868, an envelope
addressed to Genie came to the house. In what year? 18, 1968, okay, right. It was the letter
was from Kentucky. I was starting to picture back to the future three for a second. Right.
This is where this ends. Okay. Cause that's where I'm getting most of my visuals from
what I'm playing with over here. It was the letters from Kentucky, but it did not have
a return address. Inside was a photo of his man in his mid twenties on the back was written
Lewis Sotter. I love brother Frankie little boys a 90132. Wait, what? I don't know what
that means. That's not what was written on the back. Okay. The boy did look like Lewis.
He had been nine when the fire consumed the home. So he would be 32 now. The man had dark
curly hair, dark brown eyes, the same nose and the same upward tilt of the left eyebrow.
So they hired another private investigator and sent him to Kentucky. Okay. That was the
last time they heard from the investigator. Whoa, what? The truth is out there, David.
They did not want to publish the letter, right? Or let people know the name of the town the
letter was from because they worried that someone would then harm Lewis or something
would happen to Lewis. Okay. But they did replace his image on the billboard with the
new picture. How do you hire a private investigator to look for a private investigator? That's
a good question. I mean that second private investigator. All right, who's the guy you're
looking for? If you once you start going down a private investigator wormhole, it's just
how you doing? We're looking to hire. So okay, I'm going to get I'm going to get warts and
all out there real quick for you before I get on the gig. So this has been going on
for a while. Three years ago, we hired a private investigator to try to locate my son. We don't
know if he came up with anything because he vanished. Oh, yeah, crazy, right? So like
in the thin air like poof, like in front of people, we just never heard from him again.
Okay, so again, there's a lot of shady stuff at long story short, I think five of my kids
are either dead or on the lamp. Anyway, he vanishes. We hire another guy right away.
Great guy, probably one of the better guys we work for. He went to look for him. Go on.
Never heard from him again. So we hired another guy to try to go find those two guys. Also
private investigator, great private investigator, great guy. Yeah, there's two out there right
now, not three. We're not we're not saying three or we hired a third. We hired a third.
He's also missing. So there is a third missing. There are three. No, there's not there's
three missing. Let me finish. Okay, then we hired two guys because we figured at this
point we're looking for three guys. We hired two guys is great team of guys. Yeah, they
say they're going to go down there. This is this is like Simon and Simon is like exactly
something. So they're going to go down there. They're going to find these guys. Yeah, we
know that they're dead. Those two are dead. We have full confirmation that those two are
actually dead. So good news. We still have three missing. We don't have five missing
because two are dead. I got to be honest. Can I Okay, let's just say we're at we're looking
for 16 private investigators and five children now. Well, actually, I you I stopped listening
when you said my five children are dead, which is like right away. Yeah, I don't know what's
happening, but I feel very cold and weird. That's where we need you. Okay, you're gonna
be perfect for this. Okay. And we want you to wear a recording device because we think
these guys might be getting sucked into some sort of wormhole. Okay, I'm just gonna blow
my brains out. Is that a thing I can do? I would like that. Yes, thank you very much.
Goodbye. Yeah. So they hid. Yeah, they still have the billboard up 20 years later. Good.
So they replaced the picture of new pics, Louis with the new pic. It's kind of just
like IMDB headshots. Yeah. It's exactly like that. George and Jeannie also hung the new
picture of Louis in their living room. Quote from George. Time is running out for us.
But we only want to know if they did die in the fire, we want to be convinced. Otherwise,
we want to know what happened to them. George died the next year. Jeannie built a fence around
the yard. She had only worn black since the day her kids vanished 20 years before. She
kept wearing black until she died in 1989. Then the billboard was finally taken down.
Okay. The kids and their grandchildren did not stop the hunt. The family came up with
wilder and wilder stories, one being that the mob had kidnapped the kids because George
refused to work with the mob. This is upside downtown. Today, Sylvia, who was two, is still
alive. Her name is now Sylvia Paxton. She's 73 and tries to stay out of the limelight.
She does not think her brothers and sisters died in the fire and spends what free time
she has available trying to investigate and solve the disappearance of her family. The
vertebrae that were sent to the Smithsonian and then sent back to George are gone. No
one knows what George did with them because they could get those checked for DNA.
Right. And then link it to figure out something. Get a lead. That's what they call it, right?
Get a lead.
Sure. Sylvia still speaks about her siblings in the present tense. But in all probability,
the kids probably died in the fire.
They did?
Yeah. What else would happen?
But wear the bones.
But it doesn't, just because Jeannie went and talked to a guy who works in the crematorium
who said that, that doesn't mean that that's actually...
But you would. You'd find teeth.
Not necessarily.
Oh, come on. You'd find teeth.
You don't know that.
You'd find a handful of teeth.
A couple of molars here or there, something.
I want you...
Now I want you to be a fire investigator and go in afterwards and be like, what are you
doing? I'm looking for a pile of teeth.
What do you think? I'm looking for a pile of teeth. Next week on Pile of Teeth.
Go watching Pile of Teeth on NBC.
What are you doing? I'm again searching through this rubble and ash for a pile of teeth.
I'm Teethman.
Teethman. Mondays on NBC.
Teethman. What do you think I'm doing? I'm looking for a pile of teeth. And then like
in the corner, it's hashtag Teethman.
On the next.
Check to us.
On the next Teethman.
What do you mean he ain't got no teeth?
I told you, there's no teeth.
Why am I here?
I don't know.
Hey, what's that in the corner?
That's the coroner.
That's a pile of teeth.
Next to the coroner in the corner. Teethman.
That one got weird.
On the next Teethman.
I love you Teethman.
Get away from me you whore.
Teethman.
These are the worst episodes of a TV show ever.
Not good.
It's a terrible TV show.
Teethman, I got you a puppy.
I don't want no puppy.
Teethman.
He's just the worst selling teeth he's interested in.
Surprise.
Hey Teethman, we found out it was your birthday.
Oh Christ.
On the next Teethman.
I told you I only want teeth.
I like Teethman.
I like Teethman a lot.
A little better.
All right, well.
So it's great.
That's called the Sotter Children Mystery.
Well I get the mystery part, I don't have the closure, but I'm going to just pretend
that they started a band.
Maybe the killers will write in and tell us what they did.
Oh, thank you.
Killers, if you're listening, and I know that you've been doing this for closure, if we
could find out what happened and where the spine is.
We just need to know about the spine.
Yeah, we can get you the first season of Teethman on DVD if that entices you.
All right, thanks for listening.
We saw in cars.
Thank you.