Badger Bizarre

It runs a 165 miles from Portage to Green Bay, and for over 300 years, it has never stopped collecting the dead.

War. Fire. Disease. Explosions. Murder. And beneath all of it — the stories that won't die:

A king once ordered a genocide to control it. A mill worker ran into a fire he couldn't survive to save it. A drowned chief who still wanders a cemetery in full dress. A boat that killed 9 people still missing in the mud a century and a half later. And of a corridor of water that has learned exactly how to keep its secrets, and only give up what it wants.

This episode, we follow the Fox River mile by mile. Through war, through fire, through true crime cases that never got a real ending, and the ghosts people swear are still walking its banks because of it.

The Fox River gave this valley its life. Scott and Mickey discuss some of what it took as well.

Hear the stories you likely have never been told about a beloved Wisconsin waterway, on Episode 65 of Badger Bizarre, "The Fox River: Corridor of Death."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Appleton Post-Crescent - Archives

Edmunds, R David - "The Fox Wars; The Meskwaki Challenge to New France"

Green Bay Press Gazatte - Archives

Heritage Hill State Park

Neville Public Museum

Oshkosh Northwestern - Archives

Portage Daily Register - Archives

Ripon Commonwealth Press - Archives

Winnebago Historical Society

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In the summer of 1994 in Baraboo, a fourteen-year-old boy named Chris Steiner went to bed early on the night of July 3rd, anxious for the upcoming July 4th Holiday.

By morning he was gone.

A week later, his body was pulled from the Wisconsin River.

The cause of death: accidental drowning. Case closed.

But the bones told a different story — one that authorities in Columbia County apparently never wanted to hear. It would take another missing child, another house, and forty-three hours of unimaginable horror before anyone was forced to listen.

Scott and Mickey discuss the case of the Baraboo Bonebreaker, both a tragic and heroic tale of a small Wisconsin town that thought it was safe. And about what the justice system gave, and didn't give, to the child who survived and the one who didn't.

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Baraboo News Republic - Archives

"I Survived" TV Show - Alan Hall - Executive Producer: Thad Phillips Interview

State V Joseph C Clark

Wisconsin State Journal - Archives

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On a quiet spring morning in La Crosse, a twenty-year-old woman was suddenly gone — dead of a heroin overdose in the apartment she shared with her boyfriend. What followed was a legal case that almost never happens: two men charged not with drug delivery, but with homicide.

At the center of it all is a law named for a basketball star who died nearly a quarter century earlier — a law that has since sent hundreds of people to prison across Wisconsin, and that raises questions we still don't have clear answers to.

Who is responsible when addiction ends in death? Where does love end and exploitation begin? And what does justice actually look like for a twenty-year-old girl who just simply dreamed of a life working with children?

Scott and Mickey discuss the case of Shelby Perkins, her tragic death and the controversial aftermath of it.

In the opening banter, we discuss Oshkosh going Hollywood, and an article describing some of the oldest cold cases in our state, going back hundred(s) of years!

All here, on Episode 63 of Badger Bizarre: "Shelby Perkins."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

LaCrosse Tribune - Archives

State vs Mitchell Perner - Justia Law

Superior Telegram - Archives

Therealaudz - Interrogation of Mitchell Perner - YouTube

Unsloved Murders and Mysterious Vanishings in WI's Haunting History - Up North News

Wisconsin vs Mitchell Perner/Cory Koopman - Police Report

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During the Minnesota Sioux Uprising of 1862, which created a stream of settlers fleeing their homes to get out of the way of an advancing warpath, a young mother protecting her small children became a national hero; the poster child for a loving, devoted mother.

A decade later, now living in the western Wisconsin community of Trimbelle, in Pierce County, that same young mother, Charlotte Lamb, started making headines of a different kind. Her family, as well as others in close proximity to her, began turning up dead. Investigations into her past in Vermont, as well as her actions in Wisconsin over the previous 10 years, created shock and horror when the scope of her potential actions came into focus.

Scott and Mickey discuss the case of Charlotte Lamb, a lesser-known name in our history, though just may have been the most evil of us all.

The opening banter entails a listener story that is strikingly simiar to a legendary story of the notorius Summerwind Mansion.

Hear it all, on Episode 62 of Badger Bizarre, "Wisconsin's Angel of Death: Charlotte Lamb."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

The Columbian - Archives (Vancouver, WA)

Easton, Augustus - "The History of St Croix Valley"

Family Search.org

Find A Grave

The Hamilton Spectator - Archives

Mower County Register - Archives (Minnesota)

Neosho Valley Register - Archives (Burlington, KS)

New York Herald - Archives

Pierce County Historical Society - Special Thanks to Jayne Hoffman

Reneson, Kaitlyn - "A Devil and Her Deeds," Minds @ UW

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On December 10th, 1967, a crowd was gathering outside of The Factory in Madison, as Otis Redding was scheduled to play 2 shows there that evening. The Factory was a newer venue in Madison, and Otis Redding was one of the fastest growing musical acts in the world, just coming off his renowned performance at the Monterey Pop Festival earlier in the year.

Otis never played that night, and the tragedy of why will forever hover over the city of Madison like a shadow, also launching Otis into immortality.

Scott and Mickey discuss what happened in Madison over Lake Monona, Otis' personal and musical journey that led him there, and his place in music history.

Hear the story of how one of music's greatest rises to superstardom ever ended on an icy Wisconsin afternoon on Episode 61 of Badger Bizarre: "Otis Redding."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Freeman, Scott - "Otis!: The Otis Redding Story"

Lauterbach, Preston - "The Day the Music Died" Memphis Magazine, 2007

Moe, Doug - "Soul Finale" Isthmus Cover Stories, 2017

Wisconsin State Journal - Archives

Songs: Music samples used under "Fair Use" legal doctrine Section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976 (17 U.S.C. § 107)

"Green Onions" - Booker T & the MGs

"These Arms of Mine" - Otis Redding

"Hard to Handle" - Otis Redding

"Sitting on the Dock of the Bay" - Otis Redding

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In June of 2007, police in Portage, WI were following-up on a tip regarding a missing persons case from Florida, when they found a literal "House of Horrors" in a local rental property. The sheer amount of abuse and torture, ultimately culminating in murder, created headlines nationwide, and led to numerous states reviewing and ovverhauling state laws in regards to foster care and oversite.

Although bodies buried in the back yard and tortured children locked in closets sounds like fodder for horror films, this was realty for a house in Portage. The investigation which unfolded, uncovered a ring of identity thieves, causing havoc and ruining lives in many states throughout the country.

Scott and Mickey discuss this case, what enabled it, and its aftermath, including some of the misteps that were taken, repeatedly, by people in positions meant to help avoid these crimes ocurring in the first place.

In the opening banter we discuss a similar case in Outagamie County currently being adjudicated, tie up the Morgan Geyeser saga, and further evidence of why WI remains a UFO hotbed.

All here, on Episode 60 of Badger Bizarre, "Portage House of Horrors."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Baraboo News Republic - Archives

Milwuakee Magazine: "House of Horrors" 3/2008

US Sun - Oshkosh UFO

Portage Daily Register - Archives

Tampa Bay Times - Archives

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A collection of our conversations with others at the Great Lakes Paranormal Conference this past September.

Interviews include owners of the Humbird Hotel Bar & Grill, Ghosts & Us, and 'friends of the show', Katie Skuban and Pat Haberman.

The opening banter includes initial thoughts on the current happenings in the continuing saga of Morgan Geyser.

Sit back and enjoy the conversations, here, on Episode 59 of Badger Bizarre, "The 3rd Annual Halloween (Thanksgiving..?) ParaShare."

The Humbird Hotel Bar & Grill

Ghosts and Us

US Paranormal Research

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Pirates are not usually associated with the Great Lakes, as most folklore and real historical seafaring adventures took place on the southern high seas, such as The Bahamas or the Carribean.

That does not mean, however, that pirates did not exist in the Great Lakes region, because they most certatainly did.

The most famous of which was "Roaring" Dan Seavey, whose playground was Lake Michigan and the port cities around her. Although not having a peg leg, a hook for a hand, or likely burying any treasure, Dan Seavey's escapades on and around the lake repeatedly led to the misery of others, as he stole, pillaged, trafficked, defrauded and killed as all the other pirates of legend did, but until his dying day, seemingly was always able to beat the rap.

Scott and Mickey discuss the case of Dan Seavey, who's adventures have been told and retold for decades, as the mythlogy of his life gets more muddled between fact and fiction as the years go by.

In the opening banter, we discuss an update about Fox Hollow Farms, as well as ongoing consequences of the Ed Gein series on Netflix to the small town of Plainfield.

All here, on Episode 58 of Badger Bizarre, " 'Roaring' Dan Seavey."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Boyd, Richard - "The Pirate of Lake Michigan"

Escanaba Daily Press

Grand Haven Tribune - Archives

Green Bay Press Gazette - Archives

Mikel B. Classen: "Dan Seavey: Great Lakes Pirate"

Nailhed: "Piracy on the High Lakes"

National Museum of the Great Lakes: "Captain Daniel Seavey"

Schmitt, Gavin - "Great Lakes Pirate: The Adventures of Roaring Dan Seavey"

Sheboygan Press - Archives

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In July of 1971, an unkown, incoherent teenager was found outside of St George Catholic Church in the town of Wilson in Sheboygan County.

Presenting as conscious, but non-responsive when authorities were called, an investigation quickly began into his identity, and turned into one of the darkest days in Sheboygan's storied history.

5 lifeless bodies were found throughout the city, another previous death by alleged suicide was called into question, and Sheboygan was never again the same.

Scott and Mickey discuss this case, its legacy, and the attempts of some to get a convicted mass murderer released back into society.

In the opening banter, we discuss a peculiar piece of paranormal audio evidence we obtained while in Lincoln, NE, and an interesting update to a case from a previous episode...

All here, on Episode 57 of Badger Bizarre, "Douglas Dean."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

Sheboygan Press - Archives

State vs Dean - Justia US Law

Wisconsin Magazine - WIPBS, 1980

Wisconsin State Journal - Archives

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In July of 2021, Bart and Krista Halderson, of suburban Dane County, were said to have gone up north to their cabin in Langlade County to celebrate the July 4th Holiday with friends.

After days of no contact with their family back home in Windsor, WI, they were reported missing by their 23-year-old son, Chandler.

When they were finally found by police, the shock and awe of what happened to Bart and Krista still has not worn off the small, tight-knit community north of Madison, as the story horrified the state and left a nation in disbelief.

Scott and Mickey discuss the case of Chandler Halderson, who's name has been etched into the notorious annals of Wisconsin true crime amongst the most evil, and attempt to make sense of what happened.

In the opening banter, we discuss some exciting upcoming appearances, and a few projects we have in store.

All right here, on Episode 56 of Badger Bizarre: "Chandler Halderson."

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Opening Trailer:

Ed Gein Sound Byte : "Hard Copy" - Paramount Domestic/CBS Televsion

Frank Lloyd Wright and Jeffery Dahmer Sound Byte - WISN 12 News - Milwaukee, WI

Jeffery Dahmer Quotes: "Inside Edition" - King World/CBS Television/CBS Media

Attribution for Music:

Trailer: Composer: Adam Phillip Zwirchmayr https://www.pond5.com/

Intro: https://pixabay.com/

Outro: Composer: Viacheslav Sarancha https://www.pond5.com/

Attribution for logo design:

Red Claw Scratch Photo

Sources:

ABC-TV - Wisconsin parents murdered over college lies: How Snapchat helped uncover the truth

Court TV - WI vs. Halderson

Kenosha News - Archives

Wisconsin State Journal - Archives

WMTV - Madison

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