Crime Capsule

Join us for the 50th episode of Crime Capsule....coming soon!

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Cape Cod has a rich tradition of local lore, stretching back to a time before the Pilgrims arrived. Ancient Wampanoag legends like Granny Squannit and Princess Scargo are as familiar as tales of pirates and explorers, including "Black Sam" Bellamy and Donald Baxter Macmillan. Felines often blocked "Cat's Alley" in pursuit of food from fishermen's boats. The remnants of Billingsgate Island can be seen at low tide, and visits from Jenny Lind and Helen Keller contrast with the mysterious stories of the "Lady of the Dunes" and New England's Dark Day. Author Robin Smith-Johnson shares historic tales of shipwrecks, murders, hauntings and more from the Cape.

Robin Smith-Johnson works as the newsroom librarian at the Cape Cod Times and teaches in the English department at Cape Cod Community College. She holds English degrees from Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts, and Bowling Green State University in Ohio, and she is the author of a book of poetry titled Dream of the Antique Dealer's Daughter (Word Poetry, 2013).

PURCHASE HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On December 26, 1910, Oscar Chitwood lay lifeless on the courthouse lawn in Hot Springs, his wrists shackled together and his body torn by bullets. The deputies on the scene claimed that masked men had lynched their prisoner and that the lawmen were innocent bystanders to the carnage. Newspapers everywhere proclaimed this killing another example of vigilantism run rampant. Within days, however, the official story fell apart, and these deputies were charged with cold blooded murder. Authors Guy Lancaster and Christopher Thrasher tell the little-known story of accused outlaw Oscar Chitwood, the authorities he dared defy and the mysterious resort town of Hot Springs, a place where the Wild West met the epitome of civilization and where the boundaries between lawman and outlaw were never all that clear.

Christopher Thrasher earned his doctorate in American history from Texas Tech University. In 2015, Thrasher published his first book, Fight Sports and American Masculinity: Salvation in Violence from 1607 to the Present. He published his second book, Suffering in the Army of Tennessee: A Social History of the Confederate Army of the Heartland from the Battles for Atlanta to the Retreat from Nashville, in 2021. Guy Lancaster holds a PhD in heritage studies from Arkansas State University and currently serves as the editor of the online Encyclopedia of Arkansas, a project of the Central Arkansas Library System. He has authored, coauthored or edited several books on the history of violence in Arkansas, including American Atrocity: The Types of Violence in Lynching (2021).

Purchase the book HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On December 26, 1910, Oscar Chitwood lay lifeless on the courthouse lawn in Hot Springs, his wrists shackled together and his body torn by bullets. The deputies on the scene claimed that masked men had lynched their prisoner and that the lawmen were innocent bystanders to the carnage. Newspapers everywhere proclaimed this killing another example of vigilantism run rampant. Within days, however, the official story fell apart, and these deputies were charged with cold blooded murder. Authors Guy Lancaster and Christopher Thrasher tell the little-known story of accused outlaw Oscar Chitwood, the authorities he dared defy and the mysterious resort town of Hot Springs, a place where the Wild West met the epitome of civilization and where the boundaries between lawman and outlaw were never all that clear.

Christopher Thrasher earned his doctorate in American history from Texas Tech University. In 2015, Thrasher published his first book, Fight Sports and American Masculinity: Salvation in Violence from 1607 to the Present. He published his second book, Suffering in the Army of Tennessee: A Social History of the Confederate Army of the Heartland from the Battles for Atlanta to the Retreat from Nashville, in 2021. Guy Lancaster holds a PhD in heritage studies from Arkansas State University and currently serves as the editor of the online Encyclopedia of Arkansas, a project of the Central Arkansas Library System. He has authored, coauthored or edited several books on the history of violence in Arkansas, including American Atrocity: The Types of Violence in Lynching (2021).

Purchase the book HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Tell-Tale Heart,” one of Edgar Allan Poe’s most famous short stories, has inspired artists, filmmakers, and writers since its first publication in 1843. But it was two murders a decade apart that helped inspire Poe to write his macabre masterwork of psychological fiction. In Salem, Massachusetts, in April 1830, the ruthless murder of an old and wealthy sea captain rattled the city’s rich, sullied Salem’s reputation, and helped launch America’s obsession with true crime. A decade later, in December 1840, in New Brunswick, New Jersey, a wealthy banker mysteriously disappeared. The discovery of his mangled corpse and the demeanor of his alleged killer made for great headlines in New York’s new Penny Press and planted the seeds for Poe’s masterpiece. Poe’s life during the period of these murders went from idealistic poet to soldier to struggling writer, set adrift by family rifts and his stubborn nature. Exquisite Wickedness examines these two crimes, Poe’s life during this period, the circumstances of the writing of his famous story, and an unbelievable betrayal whose effects have lasted far beyond the grave.

"ANDREW K. AMELINCKX is an award-winning crime reporter, freelance journalist, and visual artist. His work has appeared in Business Insider, Men’s Journal, Smithsonian.com, Modern Farmer, and many other publications. Andrew is the former crime and courts reporter for The Berkshire Eagle newspaper. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and an MFA in painting from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY. Exquisite Wickedness is his third book. Andrew lives in New York’s Hudson Valley where he’s working on his next book. He is represented by Jeff Ourvan of the Jennifer Lyons Literary Agency."

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Tell-Tale Heart,” one of Edgar Allan Poe’s most famous short stories, has inspired artists, filmmakers, and writers since its first publication in 1843. But it was two murders a decade apart that helped inspire Poe to write his macabre masterwork of psychological fiction. In Salem, Massachusetts, in April 1830, the ruthless murder of an old and wealthy sea captain rattled the city’s rich, sullied Salem’s reputation, and helped launch America’s obsession with true crime. A decade later, in December 1840, in New Brunswick, New Jersey, a wealthy banker mysteriously disappeared. The discovery of his mangled corpse and the demeanor of his alleged killer made for great headlines in New York’s new Penny Press and planted the seeds for Poe’s masterpiece. Poe’s life during the period of these murders went from idealistic poet to soldier to struggling writer, set adrift by family rifts and his stubborn nature. Exquisite Wickedness examines these two crimes, Poe’s life during this period, the circumstances of the writing of his famous story, and an unbelievable betrayal whose effects have lasted far beyond the grave.

"ANDREW K. AMELINCKX is an award-winning crime reporter, freelance journalist, and visual artist. His work has appeared in Business Insider, Men’s Journal, Smithsonian.com, Modern Farmer, and many other publications. Andrew is the former crime and courts reporter for The Berkshire Eagle newspaper. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and an MFA in painting from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY. Exquisite Wickedness is his third book. Andrew lives in New York’s Hudson Valley where he’s working on his next book. He is represented by Jeff Ourvan of the Jennifer Lyons Literary Agency."

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy Thanksgiving! Join us in one week when we kick off our series on Holiday Horror, brought to you by Evergreen Podcast, Killer Podcasts and the History Press. Host Benjamin Morris kicks off the genre with an interview with Andrew Amelinckx about his book Exquisite Wickedness: Two Murders and the Making of Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart”.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The barrier between Joplin's boisterous past and its present is as flimsy as a swinging saloon door. Lisa Livingston-Martin kicks it wide open in this ghostly history. In her expert company, tour a hotel with a reputation made from equal parts opulence and tragedy. Visit that house of horrors, the Stefflebeck Bordello, where guests regularly got the axe and were disposed of in mine shafts. Navigate through angry lynch mobs and vengeful patrols of Civil War spirits. Catch a glimpse of Bonnie and Clyde. Keep your wits about you--it's haunted Joplin.

Lisa Livingston-Martin is a lifelong resident of Missouri, living in Webb City with her children. She has practiced law in Southwest Missouri for more than 20 years, and has long standing interests in history and the paranormal. She is the author of Civil War Ghosts of Southwest Missouri and Haunted Joplin, also published by The History Press.

Purchase HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The barrier between Joplin's boisterous past and its present is as flimsy as a swinging saloon door. Lisa Livingston-Martin kicks it wide open in this ghostly history. In her expert company, tour a hotel with a reputation made from equal parts opulence and tragedy. Visit that house of horrors, the Stefflebeck Bordello, where guests regularly got the axe and were disposed of in mine shafts. Navigate through angry lynch mobs and vengeful patrols of Civil War spirits. Catch a glimpse of Bonnie and Clyde. Keep your wits about you--it's haunted Joplin.

Lisa Livingston-Martin is a lifelong resident of Missouri, living in Webb City with her children. She has practiced law in Southwest Missouri for more than 20 years, and has long standing interests in history and the paranormal. She is the author of Civil War Ghosts of Southwest Missouri and Haunted Joplin, also published by The History Press.

Purchase HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sudden, violent storms and rocky shoals have claimed the lives of countless mortals foolish enough to brave the treacherous surf of Lake Michigan. But is there another, unnatural force at work? A force that spirited away a ship’s captain from a locked cabin without a trace? A force that caused a perfectly airworthy jet to fly into the waves, taking all its passengers to a watery death? Perhaps these tragedies are linked to numerous UFO sightings over the lake. Or perhaps a clue might be found in the prehistoric Stonehenge-like structures discovered deep beneath the crystalline-blue surface. Historian and storyteller Gayle Soucek explores the mysteries behind the area known as the Lake Michigan Triangle.

Gayle Soucek is an author, historian and freelance editor with more than a dozen books and numerous magazine articles to her credit, including Haunted Door County; Door County Tales: Shipwrecks, Cherries and Goats on the Roof; and Chicago Calamities: Disaster in the Windy City. Gayle and her photographer husband divide their time between their home in a Chicago suburb and a second home in Gills Rock, Wisconsin, directly overlooking the Death’s Door passage. It’s this proximity to the rich history and unexplained events that occur along the Lake Michigan shoreline that inspired this book on the Lake Michigan Triangle.

Purchase HERE

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices