WITCHES & MEDIUMS & GHOSTS, OH MY! 2018 Halloween Special

Our 2018 Halloween Special brings back four of our most popular guests with four new stories of hauntings, mysterious deaths, witch hunts, and seances to bring you many spooky returns of the season!

In 1612, ten people were hanged as witches in Lancashire, England, sentenced to death because of the testimony of a 9 year old girl. The eight women and two men Jennet Device accused included her mother, grandmother, sister and brother, and the trial of Old Demdike and her “coven” would become infamous around the world. Guest Mary Sharratt retold the story of the Pendle Witches in her novel Daughters of the Witching Hill. Thomas Potts voiced by Thaddeus Weiland.

Pearl DeVere was one of the most famous and successful madams in the history of the American West. Her incredible business acumen, as well as her famed beauty and charm, ensured that her legend endures to this day in the historic gold rush town of Cripple Creek, Colorado, but according to museum curator Charlotte Bumgarner, her legend isn’t the only thing that lives on in her house. Recorded on location at the Old Homestead House Museum in Cripple Creek, Colorado.

After her husband Harry Houdini’s death in 1926, Bess Houdini held regular seances to attempt to communicate with his spirit as part of a bargain the two had made while he was alive–he would contact her through a medium and give a secret code word that only the two of them knew to assure that it was really he. After ten years of attempts, she finally “turned out the light” on the Houdini seances, but her tireless efforts to keep his legacy alive assured that he is now the most famous magician in the world–more well-known than he was even in life. Guest Paul Draper shares Bess Houdini’s fascinating and compelling life. Bess Houdini voiced by Dena Brady.

Lily Cove was just 20 years old when she fell to her death during a parachute jump from her hot air balloon on June 11th, 1906. Her short career as a wildly popular aeronaut came to a tragic and mysterious end when she somehow became separated from her parachute and crashed into the field behind Ponden Hall in Haworth, England. Sharon Wright‘s book Balloonomania Belles brings her to life again.

Music featured in this episode included: “Ave Verum Corpus” and “Si le ne Vous” by the Weber State Univ. Chamber Choir, Puccini’s "Manon Lescaut, Intermezzo" by the MIT Symphony Orchestra and Concert Choir, Byrd's "Agnus Dei" by Solis, Choir of the Sun, "I Can't See You"by Jeff Cuno, “A Hot Time in the Old Town” by Daniel Henderson and Amanda Setlik Wilson, "A Hot Time in the Old Town” by Garrick and Anna Dunford Meacham, Elgar's “Salut d’Amor” by Peak Duo, “Aunt Hagar’s Blues” by The New Hot 5, “Goodbye, Liza Jane” by Marc Nelson, "Cripple Creek" by Half Pelican, and “Aquarium” from Saint-Saens’ Carvinal of the Animals performed by Jeremy Dittus.

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