The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 489 - Trapper Nelson

Episode Date: July 13, 2021

Comedians Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds examine Florida's Trapper Nelson.SourcesTour DatesRedbubble Merch

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buy American History podcast or each week I, Dave Anthony, I like men and women, read a story from American history to my friend. Gareth Reynolds who has no preference either will go either way who has no idea what the topic is going to be about. Here we are we're back in the studio weird it is weird isn't it? You feel uncomfortable? I do. Is it because you're looking into my blue eyes? Yeah you've got those steely blue eyes and the rum smell is strong from that direction. Yeah I picked up the rum smell over over the lockdown. Are you doing rum scents? The new scent from rum? Yeah yeah I'm home

home brewing. You're home rummin'. I'm home rummin'. You have a rum tub. Yeah I have that's right I have a rum tub. I was looking at a house that had a rum tub. Oh the rum tubs are great. They're great. Very very like 1800s. Stained. There's yeah I feel the smell is strong. Get in the rum tub. But yeah it is a little weird. It's all weird. You know what you know who love who loves a rum tub? Oh we're dogs. Yeah for sure. Yeah that's where the dog came from. That's right there. But it is weird it's we're in the weirdest phase of this thing. Yeah. Where I'm like I've thought everyone was crazy the whole time but now you're just like like everyone's

crazy. Everyone is in charge. It's crazy. Out of their minds. And just saying things that are just like not true. Not true at all. Everyone. It turns out that a pandemic is the greatest gaslighting that can ever happen. It's like it was like we it's like America's a computer and we ran a diagnostic and we're so full of viruses that we're like we need a new laptop this is just like not functioning anymore. This whole thing is fucked. Yeah that's right. And called it quote is jam-packed. Jam-packed? I'm the fucking hippo guy. Okay. My name's Gary. My name's Gary. Wait. Is it for fun? And this is not going to come to Tiggly

podcast. Okay. This is like an. And a five-part coefficient. My room's a place. Now hit him with a puppy. You both present sick arguments. No sleep though hippo. That's like no hippo. Action part. Hi Gary. No. Is he done my friend? No. No. Ronda. Ronda are in the car. November 6th, 1908. A year of our Lord. Jesus Christ. You know one of the wise men brought rum scents. I know. Oh I know. Through the fourth wise man. Now that people hear about the fourth wise man. They dip. They dip the baby in Jesus and rum a lot and they just go ahead. That was how people used to drink liquor back then. They didn't cry. The baby come out. I'll do another. I suppose I'll be baptizing again. I'm not driving. Vincent and Natyquitz. Pleasure. Let's just

hope that's it. It could be Natyquitz. He was born in Trenton, New Jersey. His father worked in a factory. His dad only spoke Polish. Okay. When Vince was young he would go shopping with his father to make sure store owners didn't take advantage of him because he didn't speak. Now that'll be a million dollars. Here you go. One, two, three. I'm low. Is that Polish? I don't know. I was just hoping it was. This is where the hard work for me comes in. Yeah. I'm trying now to find what I would call it half-ass. Thank you. That's what I trade for. It's a good student. He was very, very good at math, but he drops out

after the eighth grade. Why not? It's the early 1900s. Sure. That's pretty good. His mother died when he was 13. Can you imagine how great it would be to drop out in eighth grade? I was allowed to drop out in eighth grade. I mean, I know it seems like I did, but I didn't and man would I have given the option presented with the option of foregoing high school. Yeah. If I could do it all over again, I would get my GED early. Yes. Yes. So his mom dies when he's 13. Okay. His dad remarries. Vincent is older brother Charlie. He's older brother. I had, some things said it was his brother. There was an article in the paper that said it was a stepbrother,

so I'm not sure, but whatever. Okay. But they didn't like their stepmother, so I assume it's not his mom, but it could be his mom. He might not like his mom. Sure. I don't like your mom. I love my mom. What are you talking about? Vince would often run away and hole up in abandoned factories. Okay. Like any 13-year-old. Sure. Yeah. It's just what you do. Absolutely. Yeah. The state at this time paid a bounty. If you told me that I could drop out of eighth grade and live in a factory, there's, I mean, literally it would have been, I'd have been like, yes. And honestly, there's so many abandoned factories in America. Like that's almost

like that's not true. Thing. To bite your tongue, sir. You could just fill them with 13-year-olds. Well, I think we're getting back to where the story starts now. You know, just fill the factories with teenagers and then get a washing stuff. That's an idea, right? Nobody's ever done that. So the state of New Jersey this time was paying a bounty for groundhogs and... This country is just phenomenal. It's just... It's just... It's everything you want and don't want. It's just the greatest big shit pile ever. It's amazing. This country's like a McRib you shouldn't be eating. It's just too delicious to stop. I always just think

about how this... There's a groundhog bounty. No, America was just like... That's a throwaway line in this. It has a groundhog bounty. America was just an animal holocaust, like the beavers, the squirrels, the groundhogs. Everything. We still are, though. I mean with the way that we are still pushing our parameters further and further, like we obviously don't give a shit, but now it's less... It's now less because they're pests than it's more because of capitalism. But back then it was just like there was always this public enemy number one animal vermin, like critter, whatever it was. And it was just... It was a big festival that just

go and murder the things. The winner gets to eat them all, you know, whatever it was. Or just have them. Or just have them. Or no win. Peltz, you could do groundhog peltz. Yeah. Make yourself a nice groundhog jacket. Sure, you know, this is made from 800 groundhogs, this long coat. Summer's still living. Yeah, so Charlie and Vince spend the summer trapping groundhogs. Okay. Then they also started trapping muskrats and otters near Lake Carnegie. Okay. When Vince was 17, he got a job work in construction. They were built in the Pulaski Skyway. He also this time had an affair with a married woman. Okay. How

old is he? He's 17. Okay. She breaks his heart and she goes back to her husband. Right. Vince's sister, quote, that was the day he also smashed up the family car. Hmm. So he had a rough... That was a rough one. Sure. He had a rough day. Okay. So... It's tough. It's... Hard to date married people. Yeah. So as happens in these situations, it's called pulling a geographic. It's like, I'm gonna get the fuck out of here. Okay. What's it called? Pulling a geographic. Okay. That's new, right? What? The term geographic? No, it's an old term. Hmm. You just haven't heard it. Hmm. But that's a term. I dropped out in eighth grade. So Vince, his best friend,

John Dykes and Charlie, started hopping trains. So they're doing the hobo business. Sure. They cross the country. They're trapping as they go. They're trapping as... Is this the story of Hoboken? That was good. Thank you. Proud of you. Yeah. My jokes must be bad because the last two episodes, are we allowed to do that? Yeah. Okay. Shaking hands. Oh, I have COVID. Oh, I do too. I have a better one. I have Delta. Oh, that's good. Yeah. So they're tra... As they travel, they would stop, they get off the train, they'd trap, they'd sell the hides and then keep going. So that's how they're making their money on the trip. Okay. All right. And they're also gambling.

They're doing a little playing some craps in the cars. Sure. Which is just standard. Of course. You have to. Is there an easier place to roll dice than a moving train? No. I can't take a one. Nope. Ah, snake eyes. Wait, seven. So Vince seemed to be alone when this happened, but he's down near the border. He crosses the Rio Grande as he's setting traps. Okay. So he's in Mexico. Now, Mexico's in the middle of a civil war. They see this dude because they're like, here's a gringo. Is he selling guns? Because a lot of people are going down there selling guns. So they just arrest him. Right. By the way, that should be the policy when a strange white man comes to your town from now on. 100%.

100%. Arrest. Then ask some questions. Always. Then evaluate. Always arrest first. Yes. Arrest first and then evaluate. So they didn't have any evidence on them. They put them in jail. And he's in jail for weeks, but he is, he's a big dude. He's 220 pounds, six feet two. Okay. And he eats like fucking crazy. What does it mean? He eats a lot. He eats so much food. Okay. And after a while, he's eating so much food, though, like we cannot afford to keep this guy. I like the idea that a prison is like, he wants more. It's like, well, it's not like Oliver. Like, you know what I mean? Like just, I mean, he's your prisoner. I think you're in the power position to be like, yeah, we're not going to give you another sandwich.

But instead like many, he wants more bologna. So, I don't know what we're going to do. Let's let him go. I think he's like a walrus human. So they, they release him. More chum vids. They let him go. He'll eat him raw. He loves him. He's like a bear. So now he's on his own. His, it sounds like they released him because of how much he could. They couldn't afford to feed him. So Joey Chestnut goes to jail. He's able to get out in this. Yeah. Yeah. He ate through the bars. He's a real champion. He chewed through the wall. He's a real champion. Don't make fun of Joey. That's an American hero. That's an American hero. So he, so Vince, sorry, Charlie and his buddy, John Dykes are back. They go back to New Jersey.

I don't know what happened there, but. Okay. So he goes to California and he tries trapping in the Mahoney Desert and that doesn't work. Pretty soon he's broke. He's starving. He has nothing. He's not finding a lot of life in the desert. No, weirdly, weirdly. So he goes back to Trenton and pretty soon the three dudes, once again, hop a train and they head southeast. And this time they end up in Jupiter, Florida in September, 1931. It's great that we've got a planet city in Florida, of course. Well, Jupiter is now my, my uncle was a huge drug dealer. This is Saturn, Michigan. If you've been here, it's got the rings. My uncle John was a huge drug dealer and he ended up in Jupiter, Florida, like living across the

canal from Burt Reynolds. Like it's a very rich, super fancy community now. But back then. It looked like he was from Jupiter, so. He did, didn't he? But back then it was just a very, not very populated, just wild sort of Florida. There's like 300 people living there. Okay. So that's what they end up in. Charlie and Vince decided when they got there that they should have a new last name because their last name was too complicated. People couldn't say it. You, you include it. Yeah, of course. So. And they picked Nelson. Okay. Much easier. Is this the story of Nelson, the twin singers? Yeah. Oh my God. I've never wanted to hear this. Vince quote. It just seemed to me that if people have a hard time

pronouncing your name, you ought to do something to make it easier for them. And let's, can we just bottom line this as the immigrant American experience? Thank you. Just, we've bludgeoned you into shame. Yeah. No longer. I'm sorry. I can't say your name. Can you change that? Yes. I am Jacobs. I'm actually on the side. I'm on the side of changing the name to make it easier to say. Well, of course you are. Yes. I mean, my name was changed. So why shouldn't everybody else? What was your name? There's two versions. One is O'Neill, but um, I know, but they, they used the first name of one of the people is the last name. I don't know. So just like it became Anthony. Okay. Don't seem that complicated. Don't worry

about it. Okay. Well, they didn't want to be Irish because being Irish here was a nightmare. Well, not at all. They set up, uh, they set up, so they set up a very crude hunting and trapping camp. Okay. They bore a well. They built the lean to, I had a dream. I bored a well recently. Oh yeah, we all do. We, there's a very common dream. Okay. It means you're a fucking idiot. Well, it was a well, well. So Bessie Dubois and I think John Dubois, they own a local restaurant. Uh-oh. Quote, one night, this scrawny fellow and the very muscular Vince were eating dinner at the same table. It's like Jake and Elwood. When they asked what was for dessert, my grandmother brought out a large lemon meringue pie. The

little guy sliced off a sliver and Vince. Oh, I have the right. Garfield at it. He ate the rest of the pie. He did like Garfield. Yeah. Well, then you got to do the thing where you take the one slice and then you take the rest. That's what he did. You got to do it first. You've got to do it to Garfield. Yeah. That is phenomenal. Okay. So are we, I'm hoping that we're in the early stages of the eater story. It's not an eater story. I mean, there's a lot of eating. There's definitely eating that happens. Okay. So, um, I was a little bit tensioned between the three guys. And one morning Vince goes out trapping and Charlie wakes up and he comes out and he tells Dicus that he's leaving and he wanted, quote,

my share of the business. Okay. And he wants it now. Easy to do. For sure. Well, we have a bank here, so I don't have a problem to dole that out. Dicus says, well, I'm only going to give you 50 bucks. And Charlie, quote, I told Dicus he had 15 minutes to give me my fair share or I was going to kill him. It's, it feels sudden to me. It escalated very quickly. I felt like we were doing okay for a minute. And then one morning your friend wakes you up and says, you have 15 minutes to give me my share or I kill you. Yeah. And that, and that's the share you're saying is not enough. Well, yeah, right. Yeah. No, who needs coffee when you wake up to that? So Dicus responded by just, he just kept cooking.

He's like, okay, whatever. Charlie then got a shotgun, said times up and shot Dicus in the head. What was Dicus? So Dicus clearly did not take this. He was not taking it seriously. Seriously. He should have taken it more seriously because he doesn't have a head now. Yeah, I would certainly, if you were in that situation, and again, it's dark, this is a dark point. This is, yeah, we have a dark point I'm about to make, but I would wait for the breakfast to be done cooking and then I shoot him. So then I could just, sure, that makes sense. Hey, I got to play the food. But again, he wasn't really thinking. Yeah. No, he just very spontaneous. So it's going to be strange when he comes back from his little trapping

expedition. Well, you know, I don't even, I even, I didn't find anything about that. What I found was that Charlie then got in his car, drove 15 miles to the West Palm police station, walked in, told the death sergeant and he just killed a guy named John Dicus. And then he wrote a confession. And in the confession, he said, quote, finally, I just had enough. It'd be great if we just went back to this system of murder, turn yourself in. Yeah. Way easier. So, so what Vince is going to come back to is going to be a very strange. Yeah. Well, I, I assume there's nothing about what Vince found, but he must have come back

and just, yeah, well, this is one guy's dead and one guy's gone. This is not how I left this breakfast is ready. Unbelievable. Look right. Oh my God. Canadian bacon. So they arrest Vince also. Charlie and Vince are both. Well, he'll be out. He'll be out in two days. We're out of bread, sir. We don't know what to do anymore. He's a whale man. Yeah. So Charlie pleaded not guilty. Vince gets out of. Charlie pleaded not guilty. I don't understand how you write that confession to murder and then go, but I didn't do it. I mean, if you're writing in a confession, well, I just had enough. You're done. Yeah, it's over. You're fucking done. Your honor. I still didn't kill him.

Yeah. I mean, I was just, you know, up to, up to here, up to my eyes. So I just, I killed him. I plead not guilty, your honor. That is a shot him in the head. Completely innocent. I didn't do it. So I'm going to find the fellow who did though. It's me. Case closed. Not guilty. Charlie did regret killing him, but he told the reporter, quote, but what good does it do to cry about it? I mean, I guess not guilty considering his emotional state is the right plea because it's, I mean, it's not how you plead. It's how do you feel? Not guilty. He, but he sounds like he would have rather of pled who gives a fuck. Yeah. Yeah. Can I plead who gives a fuck, your honor? No, you cannot. Okay. What about two options

really any who's will be? No, then by the way, that one's copywritten. So back off of that one right away. That is yet to share. I've heard that from other people. So they have a trial and at the trial, Charlie breaks down and cries during the testimony and was prosecution. Like, this is really fun. Like he confessed to it. He's crying. It's pretty much a layup. And then Vince testified and he testified against his brother. Charlie's had Vincent told him to leave the camp and that he was shocked, but he agreed to and that he didn't really remember the killing. And then Vince testifies. Dicus was doing all of his share of the work and Charlie was the guy who was the slacker, bad guy, lame and

the problem. Right. Charlie gets life in prison. At the sensing, he told Vince he would come back and kill him. And then he told the judge the same thing. Okay. So that's, by the way, if you get life in prison, it's time to have a little fun on the way out of the court. No, if you get life in prison, it's, it's a, it's a free pass to say whatever you want, anything you want. I'm going to kill that judge. I'm going to suck his neck blood. Okay. Take him away. I will eat your guts, your honor. I will eat your guts. All right. I'm going to eat your guts. I'm going to love it. I'm going to video it. I'm going to send your family and say it's, mmm, spaghetti is the email subject. Okay. Well, you're going

to jail. I'll eat you. I'll eat you and everyone important to you. Okay. Go ahead and take him away. He is going to jail for life. Goodbye. Apparently you don't understand what, life in jail. I spent most of the time talking about how he's going to eat the judge's next stringy gutty pieces. Okay. I love my son too. I really should have conceived this better. Take care. Uh, yeah, I'm gone. So Vince is now broke. He's 24. He's alone in Florida. Okay. He goes back to New Jersey for a little bit. He works on a farm, but then he's like, I like Florida. Uh, so he moves back and he pitches camp on the origin of, I'm probably going to say this wrong, of the Loxahatchee River, right where the swamp feeds water into this big, deep pool.

It's about a hundred yards wide. Okay. My mind, I'm thinking Gilligan's Island. Sure. Or sure. One guy, one guy at Vincent's Island. This is a nice, uh, it's the place, uh, it's the last place a motorboat can go on this, on this river. Uh, then, then you have to switch to a canoe or whatever. Right. Um, and then he changed his name. Okay. Keeps the last name still Nelson. Well, first name to be fair, to be fair, he's picked the last name too. So first name, Trapper, Trapper Nelson. Okay. So yeah, he should have gone with Keeper. Uh, Trapper, I mean, I told you the story about how I want, like I wanted to be called Spike when I was a kid. Like I legally wanted to change my name. Like seven

and I was like seven, eight. And I was furious when my mother told me no. And I was like, this is the more bullshit. The more you go through history, the more you realize how awesome odd names are. Yeah, right. Yeah. Like Spike Reynolds. Yeah. Great name. Great name. Said I got stuck with Gareth. You changed it to Gary and my life's been a name hell ever since. Well, that's your own, that's your own. You're completely orchestrated by you in every way. You're fighting against the tide. You did everything to bring that upon me. You're going to drown. You're fighting against the tide. It's really all you're doing. Okay, Spike. The depression is now on. Okay. Um, he made money spearing fish

and selling them. Okay. Spear Nelson way better. Yeah. Uh, you know, people are hungry and they ate whatever they could catch. Okay. In this, a friend quote, we ate manatee and sea turtle. The sea cow tasted like pork. We ate sea turtle in steaks and soup. It was against the law, but we had to live. Right. Okay. Uh, so then Trapper in this little plot of land that he is, that he is set up on. Trapper Nelson. He plants a bunch of fruit trees. Okay. Including pineapples and oranges. I mean, there's tons of fruit trees. Sure. He built a very elaborate hand pumped irrigation system. Okay. Sets traps all over. Author James Snyder quote, his aim was to strike a sustainable balance of raccoon, otter and

bobcat. Okay. Possum and skunk came with the territory as well and would fetch lesser amounts. Gators, he would catch mainly for food at first. Trapper and Nelson ate everything from possum to catfish to Gator made. His favorite food was gopher tortoise stew. Oh my God. Wow. A friend say he ate everything except for buzzards. Okay. It's interesting. Gators. He, he sold this. He sold the skin for shoes and purses. Uh huh. For raccoon pelt, he'd get $2.50. Sounds about right. An alligator, $3. A worm free otter pelt up to $15. We have all learned a lot about otter pelt, which is disturbing. I love it. Baby, this one's got worms too. Oh, they're all over you. God damn it. I love a nice just

worm filled otter pelt. I like to know that the worms are, I like, it's called a worm jacket. That's right. And it's a warmer code for the winter. Well, you, you put them on and they scratch you. It's like a, oh, it's great. I love it when they go through your skin and treat it like dirt. I call it a living jacket. It's awesome. It is lovely. Look at my back. It's like a golf course for tiny balls. It's upsetting. He, uh, he also caught and sold rare animals to zoos. Like he would catch panthers and I mean, it wasn't, it didn't happen a lot, but he, he would. Right. Must be tough to not eat them. Uh, he built a pit for alligators and another one for poisonous snakes. To trap them or to just, just have

them around, I guess. Okay. Sure. I mean, the poisonous snakes, you're going to want a pit of that. Uh, you don't want them running around. No, no, for sure. In a pit. Yes. And you don't get rid of them. You keep them near you. In a hole. In some sort of hole. Exactly. Because we all know they can't. That's the best thing to do. Yes. What could go wrong? Nothing. Uh, Vince testified. Sorry. Trapper. Uh, sorry. I moved everything down. Uh, accident. I was going to say, he went back to, um, so people start hearing, right? No. Word is out that there's a Tarzan like guy living in the jungle. Well, and we're off. And we're off. So. Oh, society. What will you do now? What weird shit? Tarzan is really popular at the

time. This is good. Okay. So people are like, let's go get a look at the Tarzan guy. So they get him boats and they're going up to see him at the camp. Now he had a flock of guinea fowl that lived in a tree near his dock. And so whenever they started screeching, Trapper understands. Yeah. He's one of the, I mean, he is a little Tarzan. It's a doorbell. Yeah. Right. Hey. Uh, and then he'd come out in his outfit being hunting boots. Okay. Shorts. All right. And a pith hat. Okey-dokey. So, and that's it. Okay. Well, I mean, he's, I guess he's checking the boxes. That would be, oh, I get to see it. Oh my God. Geez. I mean, I would go check out this person. Yeah. I mean, he is, yeah, why not? I mean. He's our crocodile Dundee.

Here's the, here's the pith hat. Oh, he's sometimes wore a bandana instead of the pith hat. But there he is in the pith hat. Oh yeah. Yeah. You know, it's odd because it's a choice. Now it feels like pith hats do need shirts now that I see it. Look how, look how ripped he is. He is ripped. He's ripped. Ripped. He's got the, he's got the, the things, what do you call these down on the side? Oh yeah. Yeah. He's got those little like pistol abs. Yeah. The pistol ab thing. It's not like, he's, he's like, there's dudes that pay tons of money at the gym to look like that. Yeah. And all you need to do is just put your brother in jail and have birds be your doorbell. Straight forward. That's how you get your abs. Oh, it's very straightforward. So, so that's what

he, that's what he comes out as. Vince is, he's very good looking. Very good looking. Sure. But he smelled from all the killing and whatnot. Sure. Right. Of course. He, he built, he, he kept his clean clothes in a separate building. Oh, that's how you know you stink. When you have a different abode for the wardrobe. That's how you know you have BO. Oh, I should probably build another building. Well, if I'm gonna have to change, it's gonna take a little while. I gotta go to my other property. That's why I keep my clothes. I keep them in the non-death smelling hut. You smell me right now, right? Yeah. It's quite pungent, isn't it? It's terrible. You smell like a dead thing. Well, I've been rolling around in seawater with wild animals all day. So it's not good. But what I

would suggest is give me 20 minutes. Okay. I'll go through my proper procedure and then I'll go to the house that doesn't smell like me and I'll put on some clothes. What about bathing? I'll be bathing once I go into the house where my clothes are because I don't want them to stink. But I want to be clear. I'm not bathing for any other reason that I need to keep that apartment sterilized completely. Have you thought about just not constantly killing animals so you don't smell like death? I've thought about it, but that would really change my lifestyle. Other people suggest that maybe a fragrance or something like that. But again, I think that would worry the animals. I'm trying to get my pheromones give off while it is pungent and strong. I know it's

pungent. Yeah. For nature, it's great. I mean, that's how you get the birds to obey you, the alligators to stay in their pits and the... You want a rip? Nope. You know, some people say that you could find the spirit molecule if you've smelled my armpit. I don't want to do that. Give a rip. I don't want to. Take a couple puffs. There you go. Lay down. Lay down. Lay down. Lay down. Let it happen. Let it happen. Let it happen. This is BO Iowaska. Lay down. Lay down. Have the vision. Shh. Take the trip. If you see a dragon with keys, take the keys. Go to the dungeon. Open the door. There's just a dark hole. You have to get a golden cube. You have to get a golden cube. I only see darkness. Smell again. Take another rip, boy. You'll finish the mission, proper.

Oh, God. That's your boss. Oh, yes. I'm sorry. I really want you to find this golden cube. Get under there. Get under the undercarriage. Sniff the tateland. Find the golden cube. Here. Are you okay with all that yelling? That's him. That's him. Yeah. And the guy on the left, the left is a, he was like a teenager. So teenagers would hang out there. That's always a cool guy. And they would like, when a grownup hangs out with kids, I'm always like, this guy's cool. Well, all the kids, like they liked it because he was like, he liked the kids to hang out and jump and swim in the water and like, you know, the kids would have like competitions who would go up the highest and like, it was just like a place of people. Anyway, whatever. Yeah. And there would be

some scrutiny today. So James Snyder, quote, when author James Snyder, he wrote a book about him, quote, when dogs got downwind of him, they could catch the scent of Wildcat and bark themselves hoarse, which embarrassed both trapper and the dog owners. So, so he just smelled like he smelled so much like an animal. Dogs were like, we found one. Yeah. He's like, no, that's me, boy. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Interesting. He's very friendly. Everyone likes him. He would show off his animals. Like I said, he had the he had a barrel filled with rattlesnakes as well as the pit. So that's just a rattlesnake. That's just a pure rattlesnake barrel. And then he's got the snake pit. Sure. So sure to go. He gets up every morning. And the first thing he does for exercise is chop

firewood. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. He had to get a custom made ax because his hands are so huge that he would break ax handles of normal axes. He would have accidents. Wait, so I don't understand the his hands are so big that and probably he's just so massive and strong. Right. But whatever it is about the handle, he because it comes up more than once that his hands are gigantic. So he's just smashing. So whatever. Yeah. So he's smashing axes. Okay. He's a bit of a bunion. He would drink water right out of the river. He would just walk over and put his face in it. They say you're supposed to. Yeah. That's where the any of those parasites, they're not dangerous. Not at all. And animals just follow him around. So he's got dogs that follow him around. Those raccoons that

follow him around. So it's just like a little, you know, it's an interesting situation. It's an interesting situation. Now people start coming to see him and he would drape a big indigo snake around his neck, which I think I had a picture of. Did I show you that? No, you didn't show me the indigo snake that was around his neck. Does that come from the barrel or the pit? Do we know? Oh, I don't think I have it around his neck. I just show you the picture of him with it. I'm holding it. No, I don't think an indigo is poisonous. I might be wrong. Someone's going to for sure. It was a live snake you would put around his neck? Yeah, it's a live snake. Different, different than what I was picturing. People would come up and

to see him now, people that come up in boats and they and they bring like a picnic and then he ate their food. That's great. I wouldn't mind getting there. They would be like, hey, do you want a sandwich? And they would eat the whole sandwich. Like he was like, he would just devour everything. He's a yogi bear. Yeah, he's a yogi bear. Hey, this picnic basket's empty. I have no idea what I did. But then he says, he says, all these people are coming. Oh, wow. Oh, there is a snake there. Oh, he's got a bobcat. He's holding a bobcat in the Jesus position. Yeah, that's right. That's how they come. That's the Jesus bobcat. Yeah, that's how they're made. I died for your sins. You'll never hear the end of it. That's funny. He's got like a dealer hat on because he also

lived a gamble. Yeah, well, that's crap. Train craps will do that to you. Anyway, he realizes these people want to come see me because there's got to be some money in this Tarzan thing. So there are some school teachers that boarded with John and Bessie Dubois, who were the people at the restaurant, talked about the pie. Yep. So he would go there and eat once in a while. Quote, he would order a pie and he'd eat the whole thing right in front of me. So he would just sit down and eat a whole fucking pie all the time. Sure. But I mean, when you like, when your work is what his like, you can just do anything. And you're and honestly, if all it's like, if you're constantly working out, you just eat tons. Yes, you just do. Yes. But so he started

helping Michael Phelps Olympic diet. Yes. Whereas like, I think you got the number wrong. No, he eats like 8000 calories a day of McDonald's. You're like, what? So he starts helping the teachers that board with the Dubois with grade math papers at night. He's grading math papers at night. He's really great. So these are all A's. I don't know math so much. I left school at eighth grade. It's probably because they were ladies and he wants to be around ladies, but he's quote painfully awkward around the ladies. Yeah, but he's because he's used to like, I mean, you know, he's like his life as animals. Yeah, his life is why farmers only got created. Yeah, that's right. That's exactly why farmers only got created. People are like, I'm talking to cows all day.

I don't know how to relate to a female. So, so how's your corn crop this year, ma'am? I live like near a mall. Do you expect a lot of harvest? No, I work in a Arby's. Oh, you have the meats? Yes, we have the meats. I on my farm also acquire multiple meats, but it is before they are killed and cut. I own. Okay. Sex would be something I'm for. I'm running. Okay. Yeah, I'm running far fast. Farewell. Yes. Take care. Okay. Well, that's why I don't come to town. Yes. Yeah. So local fishing boat starts bringing tourists up there to see him get a look. Okay. People on vacation. Boy Scout groups start making the trip up there in 1937 and like staying for a couple of days. It's like, you know, Boy Scouts get away.

Sure. And then the next year, Trapper built cages and puts animals in them. Okay. And he makes a sign that reads Trapper Nelson's Jungle Zoo and Garden. Here we go. And now he puts in a docking fee and an admission fee. Okay. He has the alligator pits. So the capitalist snake bit him. That's right. He has alligator pits. He sells tortoise shells. Okay. He sells pineapples and fruits. Uh-huh. He sells orchids like he's got a whole thing going on. Sure. He, kids would come and he would wrap the indigo snake around the kid's neck as part of a show, like show and tell or whatever. He basically has an operating zoo. Right. A guy who went there as a child said, quote, I can still remember people buying baby alligators in little boxes made out of palmetto leaves.

Can we just take a moment of silence for the genocide of baby gators who clearly are no longer with us and I mean, imagine giving a child a baby alligator. Then what? Then where does the story go? Well, yeah. I mean, cool beginning. Yeah. Terrible ending. Oh, but there's, yeah, there's no doubt that like, I mean, you know, it's, it's not a durable. These things grow. Oh, they grow quickly. You'd be like, boy, it's the same thing. Like when people would get like monkeys, you'd be like, yeah. Okay. Now what? Now what? Yeah. You're fun. Yeah. They got a wild animal in your home. Yeah. He built a driveway using sand for people to drive in. There are so many people running over snakes that he had to put up a sign that said attention, don't run over

snakes. Okay. Wow. People are like, there's a lot of speed bumps to get on this property. Well, people would see the snakes and purposely run over them. Oh, it's hilarious. Let's kill all these animals. Nature's ours for the taking. So he's always putting on a show. A girl was visiting when trappers saw a large alligator swimming by the dock. He didn't say anything. He just jumped in the water and then rode the alligator until it was able to break free. Wait, wait, there's an alligator swimming by the dock. Yes. Is it swimming? I mean, what is it called? I guess it's swimming. Yes. He jumps on the alligator's back and then just rides it until the alligator is able to get away. Until a get away from what? Him. Oh, okay. He rode the alligator. And he was basically

saving the woman from. No, he was putting on a show. He's showing her. There's no, no one's in danger. Hey, I can ride alligators. I can ride, I'm an alligator rider. Right. Sure. Okay. Ladies love that. No, no, I know. That's how I met my third wife. Yeah. Another team, Jim Carr would later write, quote, I was talking to him up by the alligator pit when we heard shouts from the pool of alligator as those in the water. Where in your pit of them? There's a bunch of them right there. Oh, right. The pit. Sorry. As those in the water frantically swam toward the dock, Trapperer knocked off his pith helmet, ran to the dock and dove in. You know it's serious when the pith helmet. So when the pith helmet comes up, it's biz nice time. My God.

He surfaced just behind the gator, grabbed its tail, pulled it toward him, grabbed its snout, and clamped it shut with his big hand. With much thrashing and splashing, he manhandled it to the shore and carried it and lowered it into the gator pit. Wow. That is not easy to do. That is fucking crazy. It's crazy. That's all crazy. It's crazy. It's crazy. It's completely crazy. The gator's like, what the fuck is happening? Well, the truth is, it's like, alligators, well, they are so dangerous. They do have a cut. Like, it's not like, I'm not saying I could do anything to stop an alligator attack. Well, they got two things. They got the tail and they got the mouth. And the mouth. And the tail, it's like, if you pull their tail, they're like, the hell's going on here? This isn't

how we do things. And then if you just hold their mouth shut, they're like, but still impossible. Yeah, it's just, it's not what you would do. Kids started bringing him small animals. Oh, good. So he's missing the tip of his thumb and tell kids, quote, one time a boy brought me a rattlesnake in a sack. And when I reached in to grab it by the neck, I missed and it bit me right there. So he would tell kids that. Okay. He said it had to be cut off. But witnesses who were there said he had sliced, he did get bit that way, but then he sliced it open and sucked the venom out. And then he kept talking to the kids. So he's doing like a show thing. Excuse me, kids, I don't want to interrupt. Let me just take a quick rip at this event. Anyway, nature is intoxicating.

But after a little while, he became lightheaded and started falling over. I guess drinking isn't the right idea either. I can't drive a bit of venom. They rushed him to the hospital where he was for six days. When the doctor needed to hear the story five more times. He was there for six days. Six days. No one knows why the thumb tip was cut off. It could have been something else, but that was his story. Sure. By 1940, the rich people who stayed at the Jupiter Island Club started hearing about Trapper. Have you heard about this guy? He's wonderful. He's unbelievable. He's basically an unkempt ape man who lives in the middle of nowhere. He's got a sandy driveway with a bunch of snakes. I was telling Darcy, we've got to head up there. You've got to see things

like this when they're about. I love nature just as long as I don't have to be around it. The founder of the club started bringing boatloads of people up. The founder said, quote, there he'd be in his shorts and pith helmet, usually with a couple of black snakes draped around him. So it's exactly what they wanted to see. You think he knows they're coming? Yes, he knows. Now, these are fans of people. The club owner would entertain guests like Catherine Hepburn, the heavyweight champ. I love all your alligators. I love your snakes, too. Also, heavyweight champ Gina Tooney, now. Hey, you got these animals. Did you need me to box? Can we punch a snake or whatever? Maybe I'll go in there and beat up the water. This is good practice, right? We hit the alligators.

Go over there and beat up the snake pit and punch a bunch of them. All right, champ. All right, champ. All right, put the blanket over him. Champ's not ready to talk anymore. If we put the blanket over, he thinks it's night. He goes to bed. Sleepy. There we go. It's night time out here. Tooney said trapper's hands were, quote, that his own hands were, quote, like a lady's alongside trappers. Okay. So he's talking about a heavyweight champ. So many rings and bracelets. I don't know what it is. Every time I put it right near there, just look at the nails. So now fancy people are talking about this guy, trapper, living in Florida, in the jungle, in New York, London, Paris. It's like he's like a thing. You've got to get a look

at this guy. He's in the middle of nowhere. It doesn't even give a shit. He's a wonderful, wonderful. He's unbelievable. He's eating all the things we'd find delicacies, you know? Weird eggs. Get there, sir. What won't we eat? It didn't hurt that he wrestled alligators and was super good looking. Right. And read every day the Wall Street Journal. What? Who is this guy? Every day he read the Wall Street Journal. What the hell is going on? Well, he noticed there was development happening in real estate stuff. Still. Still. If you open your own, like, weird menagerie, you're not normally the guy who's like, oh, no, we're the Stonks. What's the S&P doing? So the ladies are super in a trapper. Some ladies, like President Monroe's, like,

great-granddaughter or something, like they would cruise up there and stay with them for a couple days. They always said she came back with a smile on her face, meaning. He showed me the specials. She got a raccoon, you know what I mean? Trappers camp became a place that local teens could make money. Okay. So they would sell him fish for two cents a pound. Young Louis Freeman found an albino possum that he quickly bought. Glenn Mayo sold him rattlesnakes for a buck of foot. Okay, sure. Yeah. Just like Joanne Fabrics. Ellis Robuck sold him turtles for 25 cents each, which he ate. He did other stuff, but he ate the turtles. I'm not crazy about this turtle diet, Wrinkle. Yeah. Bessie Dubois, quote, he got so he couldn't eat regular food anymore. I mean,

he was so darn used to raw possum and such that his palate couldn't take much else. Raw possum. It just doesn't seem like the animal you want to be eating raw. It's not that you'd want to be eating anything raw. There's this thing in Wisconsin. I forget exactly what it is, but it's like every year they have to put out a reminder that you should not be eating raw ground beef and sandwiches, but people in Wisconsin are like, I was raised on it. It's good stuff. People are just eating raw beef. What? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How? You know. You know how this country is. Again, what are we going to do? It's just, this is it. This is it. That's where we live. Jesus Christ. Just lean in. It's over. You're

not in much time. The casino's closing. Just have some fucking fun with the house money. In 1938, a boxing promoter from nearby, it was also a fighter party. He came to Trapper with a fight offer. Soon a fight was being promoted between the wild man of the... We want your odor to fight deodorant. Of the Loxahatchee and an old Texas boxer named Tiger Long. The Palm Beach Post called Trapper a half mountain man and half Mr. America. They wrote fake stories about him running barefoot to West Palm Beach every day for training. Mm-hmm. In reality, he was just punching a flower sack filled with sand near his cabin. I would take that story. I mean, I don't know. That's a good story. Yeah. You don't need to do

too much. The fight turned out to be very quick. Quote, he fainted once with his left hand and when Trapper dropped his glove, the guy popped him right on the button. Trapper was knocked out and retired from boxing. He dropped... I mean, what boxer's first move is to lose the glove? Oh, no. No, I don't think he lost the glove. Oh, he didn't. He just dropped his glove. You put his glove down. Oh, he dropped... Oh, I get you. I thought it slipped off. And you're like, hey, I thought those were tied up. So Trapper started having trouble with a neighbor named H.J. Hardy Miller. He was getting more and more upset that cars and hikers were crossing his land to get to Trapper's zoo. Sure. He's like, I didn't know my neighbor was going to be a zoo

guy. Yeah, I'm out in the jungle. I didn't realize there'd be a zoo guy. On top of that, some of Hardy's goats kept getting trapped in Trapper's snares. Sure. So Hardy blocked a bridge that led to Trapper's place with logs. Okay. The old-timey hoarding is just like when, you know, logs. Yeah. Logs will do it. Good luck to you and your goddamn cars. I've got lumber in my corner. Well, it looks like someone locked up your bridge. What you going to do now, Trapper? Checkmate. Logs. Trapper removes the logs. Oh, damn it. I forgot you could move. The fatal flaw was I could move it there, but never thought about it being removed. You could move it both ways. Yeah, yeah. They go, yeah. It's movable for all parties. Yeah,

they don't get stuck there. They take them right out. They are movable. Yes. So after that, Hardy put up a barbed wire fence across his property, but then Trapper removed that. Turns out fence is very similar to lumber. Can also be moved. Then he put a huge pile of palmetto roots. Good luck with this. What are you going to do? Move it. I don't think so. He moved it. Oh, damn it. What can't he move that I could move? So Hardy set the bridge on fire. Aha. You can't go backwards and undo fire. Trapper asked the county to fix it. They refused. So he fixed the bridge as best he could. And then soon after, there was a massive explosion that shook houses six miles away in Jupiter. Hardy's goat house had been blown up.

Parts of goat were all over the place. Well, so Hardy goes and gets the sheriff's deputies and shows them the crime scene. So if you look around here, you'll see a lot of goat heads, legs, and inside pieces. Again, this is all, I believe, relative to the explosion. It seems all related. And now I'm not a goat man, but could it have been a goat fart? A goat what? Fart. A goat farting, you think did all this? No, no, clearly not. I mean, that's why some of them are charred. There was an explosion. I saw it. There's no two ways about it. Could they have done it? Did the goats have an explosive, a plastic explosive? I'll stop you right now. These are goats. They are not. I know they'd like to eat anything.

Sure, but that doesn't mean they're explosive. They're not fireworks. These are goats. Did you feed them dynamite? I did not. I said that, look, you're trying to find out why they exploded on my end. It makes no sense. I would not explode the goats. They were my goats. I'm just saying, it looks, by the way, the way the goats are blown up, it looks like the explosives may have been inside of them. That's what I was about to say. It looks like maybe one of your goats was a bomb with fur or whatever it is that they have on it. What is it? Wool or hairy fur? Yeah, I guess haired, probably. Well, I'm telling you that I did not light any goats on fire. No goats. There's no goat bomb. This is simply, I would be great if you went and interviewed

Trapper, the guy who's insane, who lives next door. Who's bridge I burned down? Sure. Well, I tell you, when you said goat bomb, my mind really got cranking, and I'm going to have to look into goat bombs. Great, good, great work. Well, they can explode. No, I've been so clear with you that- Well, you did say goat bomb, which is not a phrase I had heard before. He blew up my goats. He blew my goats up. This man next door, named Trapper, with catcher's mitts for hands, blew my goats up because I burned his bridge because I hate him. Now you're talking about Tarzan? Yes, yes, Trapper, Tarzan, Vince. Everybody loves Tarzan. I'm aware. God damn it. Okay, we'll see you later. I don't think you should be going.

So Trapper is arrested on suspicion of using dynamite illegally. We're going to need to get elephant handcuffed. And he's put in jail. But then Sheriff's look for evidence. They search his place. They can't find any evidence. Look, we can't find any evidence, plus we're out of cheese. We've got to let him go. He goes to trial and they find him not guilty. There's just no proof whatsoever. I mean, wouldn't you be like, the proof is duh. He did it. Trapper starts buying land. It's very cheap, less than $10 an acre. Swamp land is going for two or three dollars. During the Depression, people couldn't pay the taxes, so they had to sell their land. And he's just amassing tons of land. This is what we call our business model in

this country. That's right. He was friends with the judge who sent his brother to life in prison now? Of course he's friends with that guy. You know, we should keep in touch. It's not great, but let's keep in touch. The judge was one of his fishing buddies. He came up and played in a regular Saturday Night Poker game at Trapper's. Trapper wouldn't play in the game. He was like the house. What a weird roll. It's like showing up to a pickup game game, like I'll ref. I'll ref. I'll be the ref. I got a whistle. I'm cool. A bunch of legal types from the courtroom and court had they would come up to his place and play on Saturdays. Man. So a lot of people think Judge Chillingworth gave him land. He also would compete with Chillingworth to buy land like there

were two guys trying to buy up a bunch of land. His brother better never find out about this for like he already wants to kill them both. Yeah. World War Two breaks out and Trapper wants to avoid the draft and being having to go to war. And he thought he found a way when he met Lucille G. He thought marrying would keep him from being drafted. Well, I mean, it's like pick a war. Now a lot of friends, a lot of his friends did not like Lucille because they thought she was after his mom. Did anyone say like, hey, just because you're married doesn't mean you won't be drafted. Nobody jumped in ever with the information. No, it's not that. No, it's not how it works. So he gets drafted in 1942. Boy, I'm married. Shit.

In the military, he was reprimanded for cutting his military trousers into shorts. Oh, man. You got ape man here. He's not going to listen. I can't find these thighs. I mean, of all the meticulousness you feel when you when you get like into basic training the next day to be like, I'm going to turn my pants into shorts. It's like they're not wired to fathom what they probably didn't notice. They're probably like, we can't actually see what he did. It's so egregious. We are unable to fathom and process what he's done. Now, Lucia was supposed to take care of the camp and animals. What the hell? Yeah, but it's not like your neighbor's fish. Local said she was mainly focused on entertaining men from Camp Murphy,

which was nearby. So she's just fucking all the soldiers. She's supposed to be feeding the animals. Now, I'm not sure where Chapper was, but he got hurt exercising and and then they sent him to Camp Murphy. So he's now he's nearby. I just had sex with my wife, but she said it was cheating. But when he when he gets sent to Camp Murphy, Lucia is gone. He finds out she's gone and just has left the animal. She left. She ran off with an army colonel. So Trapper keeps going AWOL to take care of his animals, which is yeah. And so he keeps getting in trouble. The army then, and like they see value in him like he is a jungle dude. They see value as far as him being a soldier or some other jungle guy. They see value in whatever he is. But meaning they feel like because of

his name and his notoriety, he's good for the army or like there's another play here. Well, I think they think he's good for the army, but they also think like this guy knows the jungle. He knows right things that normal soldiers. Okay, right. Yeah, right. We've got Tarzan. You can wear shorts now, eight boy. So it's fine. They create a whole new job for Trapper that's never been for. It's MP scout, military police scout. So for the rest of his time in the army, he is outside the base around it looking for spies near the base. That's his like seems like a really loophole job. It's super loophole and weird. Like they didn't know like they recognize like he had a value, but they had no application for it. So they were like, you will find spies that are animal spies.

See if any of the birds are trying to figure out what's going on with us. So he eventually gets out of the army and so now I don't know if he was doing this while he was in the military after, but anyway, this is now what his zoo camp place is. Two guest cabins, a 100 foot long boat house. We're gonna go stay in the zoo. A diving board, three row boats for rent, a new parking lot, a metal roofed chicky hunt. A chicky hunt? A chicky hunt is like the... Chicky hut. Oh yeah, hunt. Chicky hut. That's the grass covered roof thing. And a pistol range in case you want to do some shooting. Sure. Okay, so he has now full on, now he's got a full... It's a thing. Boy Scouts would come and

stay above the chicky hut at night, like an area up there. He would take the ladder away so they couldn't get out and sneak around at night. Okay, great. So your boys are just... Not a fire hazard? No, not at all. No, and certainly, yeah. I mean, you know how kids are, they never change their minds. It gets still, every morning you get up and chop firewood. Now that meant he was creating tons of firewood that was not being used. So it was purely an exercise. Well, you could buy firewood? Sure. And I'm sure you used a little bit, but he was making more than was being sold and used. It's just not often that you hear someone's producing too much firewood. So after a while, he had such a massive pile of firewood, someone called it, quote, a freight train without wheels.

So there's just a massive... There's a wood problem. He's got to start putting them together. Is this how Lincoln Logs started? This is exactly how it started. So alligators now became a protected species because their population was in decline, because people were doing stuff like giving away babies and dragging them out of the water and riding them. Yeah, keeping them in pits. Yeah, having pits. So Trapper now spent time trying to get gators to come and hang around his river banks so tourists would see them. Like he would hang posses from the trees so they would know that there was food there to eat. Right. For visitor excitement, he would sometimes cut off the head of a gopher tortoise, drink its blood, and then lecture about how great wildlife nutrition was.

If I go anywhere and the person who I've paid admission to is vampiring blood out of an animal, I'm calling it. No, it's like a jungle Aussie Osborn. He's fucking biting tortoise heads off. That's right. It's a delicious tortoise head. It's lovely. It's just like what kid wants to see that? Hey, so I'm going to take my son home now. This is crazy and not what we wanted. So I'll see you later, guy. What the fuck just happened over here? What if he ate the head or spit it out? Oh, I mean, no matter what, like just someone drinking blood. Imagine just watching someone just drink blood. I just don't. It's just a problem. No, no. What? No. No. He had one gator that he really liked named Stumpy. Stumpy was missing a foot and a lot

of his tail had been bitten off by another gator. Probably by Trapper. I ate his tail. One time Stumpy went missing and so Trapper spent days hunting him down to get him to come back. Come here, boy. Come home. Come home. The wealthy, famous people were still coming. In 1940, GOP presidential candidate Wendell Wilkie came, Gary Cooper, Dupont's, Kennedy's. It's top of the top. Yeah, that's amazing. Dupont's. Yeah. All the locals were gossing about ladies who went up river and spent the weekend with Tarzan. In the 1950s, he's just hustling. He's shipping animals to zoos and wholesalers. He's selling pelts to Sears Robuck. He sold mail loader orchids. He grew sugar cane and would sell pieces to visitors. He'd rent rowboats, fishing poles.

You could buy baby alligators and raccoons and firewood. He could still buy baby alligators. Firewood for sure. I'll give you firewood. Can I get... I'll pay you to take firewood. Can I get just 10 bucks of firewood and three raccoons? Yeah. And I guess... Any baby gators? You want to think... Yeah, throw in a couple of baby gators. All right, for here to go. That'll be cool. All right, that'll be 9.15. Pull it under the second window. So during a poker game he was hosting, Trapper was losing and he got up from the table and walked out the back door and returned with a handful of crumpled up dirty bills. He told a friend, quote, oh, I've got money hidden all over my pineapple patch. Is it ever been said... Is that like... There's certain sentences that you're like,

I don't know if it's ever been said. Like, I just don't think it's ever been said before. He's just burying in the dirt. He's just got... He's just... He's not like putting in bags or... It's like a dog with bones. He's just literally as like replicated animal behavior on a level where his bank is just holes in his pineapple area. He did help sick and injured animals. How much is it? I'll be right back. Hold on, I gotta find three holes. There's $2. That's $2. $2.50. He would help sick and injured animals if they needed surgery. He would do it himself. He would also use anesthesia. He sold skunks for pets after removing their scent glands. Oh, that's the... That's horrible. I've heard of shit like that. That to me is so messed up.

This all... By the way, this guy should not be removed. Like, should not be the stink judge of anyone. Wow. Yeah, wow. So all went pretty good until about 1960. The population on Jupiter had tripled between 1945 and 1960. It's being... There he's being developed. There's ocean front condos. There's gated golf communities. And suddenly he starts having issues. Hard to find animals, I'm guessing. Well, as if someone wanted him off the land. Oh, okay. First came government regulators. One made him get a 10,000 security bond to keep poisonous snakes. Okay. I'm going to go after to look through the pineapple area for a little while to get that money. Then they had him pay sales tax on visitors' fees. And then health inspectors came and told him... Our heads are

blowing up. So we're just trying to keep our brains and our bodies. Sorry, where do you drink the blood? Over there. Over there. But, man, I'll just let it run down me and then people can lick it off me for a nickel. Okay. Yeah. And there's blood everywhere. This is the gut pile. This is it. Various. I mean, some of these guts are three months old. Some are two months old. Hey, do any of you fancy some fresh fish? Oh, it's right here. Just put it... I put the fish in the chicken area. See how you got all these chicken breasts? That's where I keep the fish. Okay. So there's a bunch of fish there. Okay. You want a piece of gum? I'm kidding. That's a skunk stink maker fool. How do you almost say to stink from a skunk? What is this pile of possums here?

That's just... I'm just pretty straightforward. It's a pile of possums. What's your question? What are they for? Well, they're just a pile of possums. What do you mean? Okay, no, I wasn't sure. Just a pile of possums. Okay. I mean, for whatever. What do you need a possum? What do you need a possum body for? I don't. Well, you eat it raw. You eat the possum raw. No. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's like steak tartar, but it's possum tartar. I'm throwing up in my throw up. Oh, whoa, do that, the throw up pile. I keep all throw up right there. Do that. I use it for the slip and slide. I let the kids go down through the throw up, slip and slide, and then they go into the gut pile. Oh, this is like action park. Yeah. I mean, to each their own, but I call it gut island.

So the health inspectors come and they say the outhouses he had weren't good enough. So... Oh. And he doesn't have... Can you imagine someone saying, yeah, your outhouse isn't up to code. Your shit box doesn't work for us. So he has no running water, but he installs concrete bathrooms with running water. I mean, he literally... He is legit. I mean, I don't know how he did that, but that is... It's a project. I mean, that is really absolutely crazy. Yes. Yes. To figure out plumbing, I mean, as a novice or not, is fairly remarkable. But the toilets run on blood. These are blood rooms. There was a picture. I wish I could find the picture of the bathrooms, but there was a picture

of the bathrooms, but I can't find them right now. But they're like, it's crazy. Like that guy actually built that. Like that's fucking nuts. So obviously, they're sticking it to him. They're coming after him. So when he's done building the bathrooms, the health inspector comes down and says, well, those aren't good enough. And then they go, oh, and your sister for getting rid of animal shit isn't good enough. And he would basically every morning hose the cages down, which is basically what they do. I don't know. Go to... Bring a health inspector to a zoo. Yeah, I know. That's what I was thinking. Well, it's a lot of feces here, I found. I don't know what that's from. And more people, more and more people are coming, but now sometimes not the ones

he wanted. Author Snyder quote, gangs of teenage boys would foul his traps and sneak up at night and taunt the legend of the looksahatchie with some sort of right of manhood. So they were, you know, they were having the teenage boys like, go do this, fuck with them this way. And he's now over 50. Right. And he's still muscly, but he's got a gut. He's got to, he's working a dad bot now. It's not the same old... Yeah. Dude. Yes. He started changing his route in days when he would go to town to throw off vandals and robbers. Wow. Bessie Dubois quote, I think a lot of trouble had to do with him deciding to rent out his guest cabins to strangers. They attracted a pretty rough crowd. A family member said guests kept getting drunk and walking

on top of the gator cages. Quote, I remember one time a guy lifted the top and actually fell in. I think the gators were more scared than he was. Wow. That's a luxurious position to be in. So now we've gone from, which I guess is how it always works, right? You have, you know, locals and then, and then tourists and now just fucking idiots. Yeah. Right. Now that just the idiots are coming. Yeah. He wrote his brother-in-law quote, have closed my camp to all the public, including the crews. Now I feel a lot safer as it was a real risk in many ways dealing with the public. So he closed the road gate. He took down the rope swing and he took down part of the dock. And then he cut down trees so they blocked boats from coming up the river. Wow.

He put up a no trespassing sign and another that read, danger landmines. I mean, I look, yes, it's a great, it's a great lot. Can we just start putting those signs up place? The terror, look, whether it's real or not, I don't feel like walking on land for a little while. Is that fair? But also you could just be like, danger, wild everything. Snake pit. Imagine if you saw that danger snake pit, I'd be like, I'm not going there. It's so crazy. Danger landmines. It's just such a funny, like it's like, oh, well, you kind of believe it. You'd be like, well, that's totally. It's a really good lie because it's kind of right on the edge of where I would put him. Like I'm like, I could buy landmines. I can see him doing landmines.

That's the bathroom. Oh, wow. Yeah. No joke. No joke. I mean, it's impressive. I mean, the dude knew how to do stuff. So right. So now locals are like, oh, things have taken a dark turn up there. Right? Yeah. But it's also like, I mean, again, you, you know, he seems like he's been forced into this decision. Yeah. Well, yeah, it wasn't. Yeah. So he's got tons of land, right? He's been buying land forever. He has over 1100 acres. Oh my God. This is prime. Come get me. This is prime land. I mean, if you know what Jupiter Island is now, it's just fucking rich people. Right. So that, but also real estate taxes are going up. His county tax bill went up 350% in one year. And that's one way that developers get your property. He tried, he tries to get a loan. He's trying different

places and he's having a hard time. And finally he gets a five year. I've been banking with the pineapples lately. I don't have a regular bank. Is that a problem? He gets a five year, $100,000 loan with a 10% yearly interest. Wow. From a local businessman named George Offit. It's a shitty loan. Yeah. It's a fucking shitty loan. He had to pull, he had to pay full interest every six months or the guy would get all his property. Wow. What? It's a terrible loan. I'll sign this. This is pretty. Yeah, like most of it. If he misses one payment, the guy gets his property. Now, Trapper, when he gets a loan, he thought it was enough to live on and keep his land. He's like, this is perfect. So he fences in his four mile track of land with barbed wire to keep people out. Okay.

And in 1964, he could barely make the first interest payment that year. He puts up land for sale signs all over the place. The next interest payment is due on August 24th and he's $11,000 behind. So he makes a deal to sell 200 acres to this real estate group. And then they're like, does anyone else have any claim on this land? And he's like, no. And then his ex-wife pops up and the lawyers say that there was never a proper divorce and she wants her share. So Trapper is so fucking mad. He wants to just kill the sale and walk away from it completely, but he can't. Now, on August 24th, this offer guy is in the courtroom at 1.30 and at two o'clock, if he doesn't have the money,

he could foreclose on all of his land. But Trapper, Trapper's lawyers or whoever cuts a deal at the last minute with his ex-wife and a couple of tortoises. They cut a deal at the last minute with his ex-wife. She gets $30,000 and two lots of land. So he sells over 200 acres for $32,000. He pays off Offit with 15 minutes to spare. Wow. That land became the River Bend and Turtle Creek Country Clubs. Oh, well, at least it went to like something. It's like a good project. Yeah, like a good cause. So after paying all the people off, he had to pay off. He is left with $63,000, but he has no debt the first time ever he's out of debt. And then he starts buying modern appliances. It was the first time he gets fridges and

freezers and he starts eating steaks that he bought from the store. Oh, wow. He's still trapped, but one of the problems was Davey Crockett was not as popular with kids anymore. And so Coonskin caps were no longer the item of the day. If you have those back, we got a lot of those. We got a lot of back orders on these. This is not good. We overbought. And then Trapper was different. He's changed. Quote, outsiders claim to see a dour slow moving husk of a man. Now, if you wanted to visit him, his even friends, you had to send a postcard and then he would have to write you back and set up a date. That's how I do it.

That's the way to do it. Yeah, it's the best. I mean, in many ways, it would be the best way to be, you know, just to like people, if you get postcards, you get to decide. Oh, to not have to get texts and emails all the time. I mean, imagine some guy just sending you. You know when you get a postcard, someone like, yeah. Just some guy constantly sending gifts of just SUP. SUP. Imagine that. Like for days on it. Days. It just keeps happening. Imagine that. And then you keep saying stop. Seriously, stop. And the guy just finds an unlimited amount of these SUP gifts. It's like there's millions of them every time I look. It's like there's so many. It's crazy. Every time I look and it's great. And it's awful because it

makes you laugh. It never ends. It never ends. It's been going on for days. Days and days. SUP. It's, in person, is way more digestible than it is every time I look at my phone and see I've missed four gifts. SUP. So he's also always got a shotgun nearby. He catches two hunters on his land with their guns and says, I'll kill you if you come back. So it's... SUP. Sure. SUP. He's alone. He's fucking... SUP. Yes, it's a weird. He's carved out a weird little life. SUP. Yeah. And he's living an existence that isn't compatible with the reality of capitalism anymore, right? I mean, it's coming. They want the land. Everyone wants the land. It's... Yeah, whatever. So an old friend goes to see him and he, as he gets close, Trapper steps out from behind a tree and he's holding

a shotgun. And his friend says, quote, Trapper, it's me. Your old friend, Dick. And Trapper says, quote, I don't have any friends. Go away now or I'll start shooting. By 1968, he's getting sick a lot. And this started after he started eating store-bought food and steaks. SUP. Oh my God. Jesus. Well, if you're just eating wild food and they... I mean, if you don't eat... SUP. I'll give you an example. We're coming back from a tournament. There's no food anywhere. I'm fucking starving. SUP. Oh boy. SUP. All that's there is in McDonald's. SUP. Oh God. SUP. We're literally in the middle of nowhere in the desert. So I go, fuck. What do I get here? I get fries. My kid gets the nuggets. SUP. Sure. SUP. And I eat a couple of the nuggets. SUP. Oh

my God. SUP. And it's... My body has literally ravaged for a week. SUP. Oh my God. SUP. I like my body's like, what did you do? Because I don't eat that kind of stuff. But I'm fucking starving. Whatever. SUP. No, it's good food. It's great food fast. It's not fast food. It's good food fast. SUP. If you don't eat it and then you eat it, you know... Those people know how bad it is, but if you eat it all the time, your body's like, here we go again. I'm ready for... I've been in this war for a while. But if you've never eaten it and then you eat it, your body's like, what the fuck is this? SUP. What have you brought in here? SUP. So he's getting sick a lot. Bessie DuBois, said he quote, was always complaining about

gas. Said he thought he had colon cancer. DuBois would see him because Trapper would use a payphone at their restaurant. So they're like the only people who are seeing him. Now a new deal is being talked about to sell his last 857 acres to Jonathan Dickinson State Park. The deal would allow him to live on 100 acres of land around his cabin and he'd be a millionaire for the sale. He told friends that he was excited to travel. So he's got, you know, things are looking up a little bit. He's excited to have all the money and travel, but he's still got the health problems. He now needs a catheter to pee. He thinks he has prostate cancer, but a doctor looks at him and is like, you don't, he keeps saying he has cancer. He keeps saying he has cancer, but the doctor is

like, you don't have cancer. Although he won't go to the doctor that much. So some people say he's miserable, but in letters he wrote to friends, he sounds pretty, pretty content. Okay. He knew he was going to be rich, but he still, he still doesn't like the developers and lawyers and a few of his neighbors. On July 30th, no one's seen him for a week or so, July 30th, 1968, someone goes up there and finds his body on the beach face down. Shotgun is a few feet behind him. Oh dear. The shell had gone through his abdomen and then up and out the back of his head. He had been dead for over a week. Guinea hands and raccoons had picked at the body. It's their time. It's payback time. Yeah, let's do this. Oh, he actually is very good. Blood. My ancestors waited for this.

Quote, what was left of the brain looked like mushroom soup. Oh, Dave, come on. Some people are going to eat mushroom soup again. What's your problem? I don't think they are. Well, they were, I should say. No, they're not. It's over. Jesus Christ. The more cream of mushroom. The body is in such bad shape. The pathologist didn't want to move it to do the autopsy, so he did it on a picnic table in the cheeky hut. Sorry that we have this area reserve for my niece's birthday. It's OK. Just go up top. OK. Soup. Sort of cake is that. Oh, that's mushroom soup. Yes. We'd love a buck. We've got a whole bowl. Oh my God. So there's no signs of cancer. He doesn't have cancer. OK. A jury rules it a suicide, but once he killed himself via abdomen.

Yeah. OK. So yeah. So once people hear the verdict, there's a lot of like, no. Right. There's no fingerprints on the gun. There's no footprints in the sand, meaning he didn't go there either. His footprints aren't there and neither anybody else's. Yeah. So that means somebody probably brushed it. I mean, usually or it could have been. He was there for a week and sure what it got blown away. Sure. His brother had threatened to kill him and he'd been out of jail for a while. Oh boy. And then the people like, why the fuck would this guy who understands guns so well shoot himself in the abdomen? The abdomen, not even the heart. No. The abdomen. Oh, I want to die over 19 hours. Real bad one. Want to really savor it. There's a lot of theories. The developers do it.

There are also people who sort of lived off the land and didn't like him because he had the property until he had this contention with those people. Anyway, there's lots of theories. A woman named Vivienne Leblanc went with her young sons to Trapper's property to look around. Post death. Yeah. On the drive back, her boys were a little too quiet in the back seat. So she looks back and they are playing with 30 sticks of dynamite. Oh, God. So maybe the goat. It's maybe the dynamite from the goat explosion. Oh, right. The land is sold off six months later to the park system. Okay. His ex-wife comes and demands her share. Sure. Well, she's earned it. But they're like, no, you already signed a fucking deal with the last gob of money you got, but they give her

5,000 just to go away because it'll cost that in court fees anyway. I need more goaways. Some of the land has developed. Some becomes part of the park. Years later, when doing some work on Trapper's house, Park Rangers found a bunch of hidden money. That was a good thing because they were underfunded. It was only a couple thousand dollars, but they used it to help fix it up. Today's Trapper's camp is a man attraction in Jonathan Dickinson State Park, his original building's gardens and cages are still there. Wow. Crazy. What a crazy... Yeah. It's such a weird... It's really strange when you have this business model that is so outside of business. It's strange. Because even in this, you're hearing about the

long-term sustainability of this project, it's unsustainable in many ways. It is unsustainable. But it's also weird to spend half of your life outside of society's hands and then spend the second half of your life under the gun from them. The main source was by James Snyder, Life and Death on the Luxahatchie, the story of Trapper Nelson. Also, article Trapper Nelson, a Remembrance and the Strange Life and Mysterious Death of a panther trapping gator wrestling. Well, man. That title. Tonya Melinausky on Narratively. Melinausky. And then the Palm Beach post had a really long article on him. Well. All right. We signed Gators. Yeah, well Gators said.