Home Depot's 12 ft. Skeleton decoration first premiered in the fall of 2020 and sold out immediately, the nationwide obsession fueling an underground black market. Memes and tweets made 'Skelly' the hottest Halloween fad of the last three years, and for some reason, the internet's biggest crush. For this episode, we will not only explore how the craze around this big old bone daddy unfolded, but we will also take you through our centuries-long bizarro relationship with human skeletons, both the fake and the very real, and we will consider the role they have played in the development of dark humor, the kind that made Skelly a massive star.

Become a Patron or subscribe on Apple Podcasts to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Tell us your teenage tale on our Urban Legends Hotline!

Get your tickets for our live show with You're Wrong About

American Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith
Sound design by Clear Commo Studios
Research Assistant: Riley Swedelius-Smith
Producer and Editor: Miranda Zickler
Voice Acting by Will Rogers
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 12 ft. Skeleton

American Hysteria explores how fantastical thinking has shaped our culture – moral panics, urban legends, hoaxes, crazes, fringe beliefs, and national misunderstandings. Poet-turned-podcaster Chelsey Weber-Smith tells the strangest stories from American history and examines the forces that create the reality we share, and sometimes, the reality we don't.

Society & Culture

Personal Journals

History

Philosophy

Places & Travel

How do we warn people 10,000 years in the future about nuclear waste sites that will remain extremely dangerous for longer than human civilization has existed? When language, symbols, and technologies are lost to time, how can we get our message across? Atomic Priesthoods, Radiation Cats, Forests of Thorns, manufactured folklore, these are just a few of the unorthodox ideas of government-sponsored academics trying to answer this baffling puzzle.

Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Or subscribe to American Hysteria on Apple Podcasts
Find us on Instagram @americanhysteriapodcast
Leave us a message on our Urban Legends Hotline or get your mitts on some merch at americanhysteria.com

Sound Designer and Associate Producer: Riley Swedelius-Smith
Producer and Editor: Miranda Zickler
Voice Actor: Will Rogers and his daughter Zoe
Written, Produced, and Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Talking to the Future: Nuclear Semiotics

For some context for our upcoming series that we have not yet revealed, we will revisit excerpts from our past episodes: Horror Movies pt. 1, The End of the World, and Alien Abductions pt. 1 and 2. We encourage you to listen to the full episodes!

Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Or subscribe to American Hysteria on Apple Podcasts

Sound design and Production by Riley Swedelius-Smith
Edited by Miranda Zickler
Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith

Check out our new merch line Folk Devils United
Leave us a message on our Urban Legends Hotline

Thank you to our sponsors:
Factor’s delicious, ready-to-eat meals make eating better every day easy. Head to factormeals.com/americanhysteria50 and use code americanhysteria50 to get 50% off.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Context Clues: Going Nuclear

Amanda Montell is the host of the podcast Sounds Like A Cult as well as the author of the new book The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, a collection of personal essays on various cognitive biases, those flawed ways of thinking that were very important for early humans but now cause all kinds of problems in our technologically advanced world. Amanda explains why these cognitive biases originally existed, how they manifest in the personal and political, and what we can do to understand, combat, and maybe even harness them to our advantage.

Get a copy of The Age of Magical Overthinking
Follow Amanda Montell and her new podcast Magical Overthinkers on Instagram

Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Or subscribe to American Hysteria on Apple Podcasts
Head to americanhysteria.com to get merch and leave us a message on our Urban Legends Hotline

Producer and Editor: Miranda Zickler
Associate Producer: Riley Swedelius-Smith
Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Magical Overthinking with Amanda Montell

Sarah Marshall joins me to chat about how, in 1968, one unsuspecting young woman’s bustline almost caused a stock market bust when thousands of Wall Street employees became obsessed with watching her walk to work. I also tell Sarah about an absurd 20-year-long craze called Girl-Watching that taught "genteel" men the "refined art" of covertly checking out women, as well as the avant-garde artist and feminist responses to the treatment of Francine Gottfried who would come to be known as the Wall Street Sweater Girl.

Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Or subscribe to American Hysteria on Apple Podcasts
Head to americanhysteria.com to get merch and leave us a message on our Urban Legends Hotline

Producer and Editor: Miranda Zickler
Associate Producer: Riley Swedelius-Smith
Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Francine and the Wolves of Wall Street with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

In the late 1950s, an organization known as SINA started a campaign with the mission of clothing naked animals for the sake of decency. Today we will look at this bizarre moral crusade and its leader, whose life you'll have to hear about to believe.

Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus content
Or subscribe to American Hysteria on Apple Podcasts
Find us on Instagram @americanhysteriapodcast
Leave us a message on our Urban Legends Hotline or get your mitts on some merch at americanhysteria.com

Sound Designer and Associate Producer: Riley Swedelius-Smith
Producer and Editor: Miranda Zickler
Voice Actor: Will Rogers
Written, Produced, and Hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The 12 ft. Skeleton

Download our free app to listen on your phone