Unexplained Podcast

00:00 This is an iHeart Podcast. 00:02 Guaranteed human. 00:07 Hey, this is Hayes Davenport. And Sean Clements. 00:10 We host the podcast, Hollywood Handbook. Each week, we talk to someone in show business and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time, and no one gets mad at their publicist for letting them do our show. 00:21 We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, Adam Scott, Danny McBride, Ben Stiller, and a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are without us. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 00:35 Our hometown is not a test tube. 00:38 90 miles northeast of Nashville, a battle for the future of America plays out in one small town. 00:43 Developers with right-wing ties have purchased hundreds of acres of land. We need cities on a shining hill. 00:49 This is Our Town, a podcast about what happens when a small town becomes the site of a social experiment and fights back. 00:57 I guess you didn't move in on a bunch of dumb hillbillies now, did you? 01:00 Listen to Our Town on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 01:10 In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Petra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. 01:21 Dear honeys, this is goodbye. By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland. 01:30 Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? 01:34 Listen to Death of an Artist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 01:40 Hey, what's up? I'm Tony Gonzalez. 01:42 And I'm October Gonzalez. But you can call me Toby. We want you to join us on our new podcast, No Safe Words with October and Tony Gonzalez. We get real about marriage, parenthood, sex, divorce, and all the nitty gritty stuff we all think about. But just don't say out loud. You're probably just going to be some rich guy and he's going to whisk you away. 01:59 This is awkward. Listen to No Safe Words with October and Tony Gonzalez on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 02:09 Did you think you were the only one? Like no matter what you did, it was never good enough for your mother. I'm Jennifer Arnis, and this is the Black Mother Wound Podcast, where we unpack and heal from the very first relationship that shaped us. We rush to accommodate other people when we have been hurt and our hurt has not been healed. Listen to the Black Mother Wound Podcast from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts. 02:39 Hello and welcome to Unexplained with me, your host, Richard McLean-Smith, where each week we explore another true tale of high strangeness. 02:49 If you're new here and you're a fan of expertly told atmospheric stories about the strange and unexplained, then you've come to the right place. And please subscribe to the show if you haven't already done so. 03:01 This is Unexplained, Season 9, Episode 33. The Day You Came To Me The boy has been walking for two days under the baking desert sun. 03:22 His shoulder-length black hair, cut severely at the fringe, glistens in the light. 03:28 On his arm is an empty woven basket. 03:32 He couldn't give you a number for how long his people have made this walk. All he knows is that the trail was old, even when his beloved sewer was a child. 03:43 Just as Tawar reaches the highest point in the sky, he arrives at the rim of the Great Gorge and slowly begins his descent down toward the snaking Pieces Vayu. 03:55 It runs wide, dark and green through the vast canyon, the place they call Ungtupka, the place from which all his ancestors once came, climbing out from the other dimension below it. 04:09 Each had been guided through the dark by Kokiangwuti, the spider-woman, all the way up to a hole in the rock they called Siparpuni. 04:19 From there, they'd emerged into the light of this world, Mile after mile he walks as the quiet rumble of the Pisces Vayu echoes down the canyon walls, until finally he arrives at the confluence of another river, this one bright and turquoise, called the Pala Vayu. 04:40 Then he sees the dome rising out of the rock ahead of him, and that hole from which a spring now emerges, Sipapuni. 04:50 the boy stops dead in his tracks and a chill runs over him. 04:55 Because Sipapuni is not simply where his people came from, but where the dead still go back down when their time here is finished. 05:06 And there is something that is said to lurk nearby, who the boy has been told to watch out for at all times. 05:14 Masawu, caretaker of the underworld and keeper of the dead, Some call him the skeleton man. 05:23 Descriptions of him vary. Some say he is bejeweled beneath a fearsome mask. 05:29 Others that he is simply fearsome right through. 05:33 All agree that if you are ever unfortunate enough to see him, whatever you do, just don't look him directly in the eyes. The boy takes a deep breath and steps closer to the dome of rock, never taking his eyes from the springs. 05:50 He throws the basket down onto the wet yellow clay at the base of it, then sinks to his knees. 05:56 Hurriedly, he claws at the clay, piling as much as he can into the basket, until finally, he has what he has come for. 06:06 With one last look at the spring, he grabs the basket and turns swiftly on his heels. 06:12 Away from that hole, never looking back, Up above, a majestic condor sweeps below the sun, casting a brief shadow over the buoy. 06:25 Then the waters of the Pisas Vayu begin to speed up. 06:29 So too does Tawa, as it moves through the sky, over and over again, faster and faster. 06:38 The seasons change, growing darker. 06:41 The upper rim turns white with snow, then red and dusty once more, until an entire cycle has passed, then another, then ten, then a hundred, a thousand. 06:56 Each time the banks of the Pisas Vayu snake and shift, one way, then another. 07:03 eventually arriving at one day, in the year some call 1956, when that gorge has another name, the Grand Canyon. 07:13 The Pisas Vayu, too. 07:16 Today, some call it the Colorado River, and up in the sky, just where that condor had swept so many years before. 07:26 Something is falling, falling from out of a cloudy sky. 07:31 People are falling from the sky. 07:34 And below, Masawu waits eagerly, ready to welcome them home. 07:42 You're listening to Unexplained, and I'm Richard McLean Smith. 07:54 No one knows exactly when the United Airlines cockpit crew spotted the TWA Constellation dead ahead of them, or if they saw it at all. 08:04 But it was around 10.30am on the morning of June 30th, 1956, the United Airlines Flight 718 slammed into TWA Flight 2 from behind. The left wing tip of the United's DC-7 struck the centre fin on the Constellation's tail and sliced straight through the rear fuselage, while simultaneously ripping open the underside of the baggage compartment with its propeller. 08:31 With a sickening lurch, the tail section of the constellation ripped away, and the plane entered a near vertical dive, heading straight for the Grand Canyon from 21,000 feet, spewing passengers and debris into the sky as it went. 08:46 After a moment of freefall, it slammed upside down into a steeply sloping hillside, around 400 feet above the Colorado River. 08:56 All 70 people on board were killed. 09:00 The DC-7 wasn't far behind. Having lost six metres off its left wing, it entered a leftward spiral, descending at high velocity toward the yawning chasm below. 09:12 First Officer Robert Harms managed to broadcast one last desperate message to air traffic control operators in Salt Lake City, who have control over Arizona airspace. 09:24 Salt Lake Area, 718, we are going in, yelled Harms frantically, while Captain Shirley screamed in terror beside him, pull up, pull up. 09:36 Only back then, when planes passed over a region of Arizona, known as the Painted Desert Line, they weren't guided by air traffic control and were instructed to simply use their own eyes to fly. 09:50 So no one heard United Flight's last desperate transmission. 09:55 Moments later, the plane slammed into the cliffs below Chouar Butte, sending burning debris ricocheting off the face and down into a dark crevasse. 10:07 Only then did it dawn on air traffic control in Salt Lake City that something terrible must have happened. 10:15 Owners of a sightseeing tour company, Grand Canyon Airlines, the Hudkin Brothers, were out flying over the canyon mid-morning that day when they spotted two columns of smoke rising from a remote area near the confluence of the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers in the eastern part of the canyon. 10:36 a land known to be sacred to the Hopi Native Americans that others were largely advised to avoid. 10:44 Assuming it was smoke from a brush fire, some Hopi perhaps, conducting a ritual, they thought little of it. 10:53 Only after landing back at Grand Canyon Airport did they hear of the missing airliners. 10:59 As dusk fell over the desert, The Hudgens flew to the vicinity where they'd seen smoke rising. Rounding a rocky butte, they spotted the distinctive triple tail of the TWA constellation lying on a hillside above the Colorado River. 11:19 Hey, this is Hayes Davenport. And Sean Clements. We host the podcast Hollywood Handbook on the Big Money Players Network. 11:25 Our show is extremely accessible to first-time listeners. Each week, we talk to someone in show business, a.k.a. The Biz, and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time, and no one gets mad at their publicist for letting them do our show. 11:40 We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, not that great. 11:43 Actually, can you help me shape this? How about we flip it on his head? How about we flip the script? What if the surprise woman who actually you think is the straight man is actually the one who's acting weird? 11:58 Adam Scott. This entire time, you've been expecting Adam Sandler to come to visit the show. 12:07 I would never set expectations for something like that to happen. If the universe allows for something like that to happen, I'm open to it. 12:17 I'm always going to accept. 12:19 You know, Danny McBride, fine. Yeah. It's all this fragile masculinity exuding. I could smell it walking down the hallway, to be honest with you. I was like, is that weed? Nope. It's fragile masculinity. Yep. 12:33 Ben Stiller, no. Because a lot of times, out of context, people don't get it or even know what a circle is. You know what I mean? They're so stupid. 12:42 Everyone's so dumb except for you. And fake. 12:45 Right, fake and also not interested or just like, oh, I've got my life. I don't care about your life. 12:51 And a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are without us. 12:55 Oh, and by the way, Will Ferrell told us personally he loves the show and he wants to be a guest on every episode, but he's just so busy. 13:02 Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 13:08 Our town is small taters by most standards, right? But to the people who grew up here, it's everything. 13:14 What happens when a quiet Tennessee town becomes the front line in a battle over the future of America? 13:20 Developers with right-wing ties have purchased hundreds of acres of land in the area. The first thing you see when it pops up is pioneers in Appalachia. 13:29 But they weren't just planting houses. 13:31 We need cities on a shining hill that exemplify and embody the Christian way of life. Stop right there. Is that normal? 13:39 A podcast about what happens when a small town becomes the site of a social experiment. God need men to rule. Great. And decides to fight back. 13:48 Do not use my hard work to sell your bull. 13:52 They're not just opposing what's being planned for here. Our hometown is not a test tube. They feel like they're standing in opposition to an entire administration. 14:02 Guess you didn't move in on a bunch of dumb hillbillies now, did you? Listen to Our Town on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 14:13 I'm Jake Brennan, and on my podcast, Hollywoodland, I revisit some of the biggest stories from Hollywood history, separating the myths people want to believe from the reality underneath them. Like how the story of Marilyn Monroe isn't just the story of a Hollywood icon. 14:31 Marilyn Monroe has become so iconic that her death can only be explained through conspiracy theories. And for some fans who can't let go, these stories have metastasized from conjecture to accepted fact. So on August 4th, 1962, Marilyn Monroe died. Then the rumors started and she died again. And now we're going to set the record straight and learn about the way Marilyn Monroe actually died the third way. 15:01 Learn more about what happens when fame, media obsession, and conspiracy collide. Listen to Hollywoodland on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 15:13 That call was really pivotal for me. Hey, it's Emily Tisch-Sussman, and this season on She Pivots, the podcast where women share bold career moves and personal turning points that changed everything. I sit down with culture-shifting women who share their pivots, like Paralympian Allie Truitt. I was like, I'm a month out from a shark attack. There's no way in 11 months I'm making the Paralympics. Advocate Elizabeth Smart. I still feel that drive that I can still make a difference, so I'm going to keep going. Celebrity chef Carla Hall. Was that scary to walk away from such a stable career after just two years? 15:45 No, I was more afraid of being unhappy than I was broke in a dead end job that I didn't enjoy. And feminist legend Gloria Steinem. 15:55 All of us were trying to express women's real lives. We need a meeting place of our own. And if I can contribute to that, I'd like to maintain that and leave this house for that purpose. 16:07 Listen to She Pivots on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 16:13 Self-care September is here, which means it's time to rethink what self-care actually means. Yes, self-care can be a long walk. It can be an everything shower. It can be putting your phone on do not disturb. But sometimes it's actually about sitting with the uncomfortable stuff and understanding your patterns, your boundaries, finally figuring out why you keep doing things that you swore you would never do again. I'm Gemma Spegg, the host of the Psychology of Your 20s podcast, and each week we unpack the psychology behind the experiences that shape your 20s, from relationships and friendships to money, anxiety, confidence, attachment, just becoming more comfortable with who you are. 16:49 Unlike the quarter-life crisis, which is depicted as the collapse, the quarter-life reinvention is the expansion and growth of something. When we develop the ability to be happy by ourselves, nobody else can take that from you. So this Self-Care September, don't just take care of yourself, get to know yourself as well. Listen to The Psychology of Your 20s on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 17:17 When rescuers finally located the crash site, they encountered a scene of utter devastation. Most of the wreckage was lodged on a precipitous ledge above a 900 foot tall cliff with a field of loose broken rock at its base. 17:32 A significant amount of wreckage and human remains had become lodged in a vertical crack running up the cliff face below the impact site, in a crevice so inaccessible that crash debris is still there to this day. 17:48 No bodies were recovered intact. 17:51 Some appeared to have disappeared completely, making it impossible to positively identify most of the victims. 128 people died that day. 18:04 And in time, the crash would be mostly remembered for being the crash that forced the US government to rethink commercial flight protocols, leading to the creation of the Federal Aviation Administration. 18:19 Students Neil Newby and Frank Maltzen would remember it for something a little different. On August 16, 1956, Neil Newby sat on the banks of the Colorado River, half a mile downstream from an area known as Lee's Ferry, watching the water glide by. 18:39 He was contemplating the adventure ahead and was already having doubts about the wisdom of what he was about to attempt. 18:46 Neil had recently spent six months working at a Christian mission on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona, where he'd read about John Wesley Powell and his expedition through the Grand Canyon along the Colorado River. 19:00 It inspired him to make the journey himself. Joined by his boyhood friend Frank, who'd just flown in from New Jersey, the pair had heard the news of the two airliners colliding over the Grand Canyon several weeks earlier, killing everyone on board, and scattering wreckage over remote areas, but they had other, more pressing matters on their minds. 19:23 Arriving by bus at Marble Canyon, a tiny outpost close to Lee's Ferry, Neil had gone looking for someone, willing to drive himself, Frank and their six large duffel bags of gear for six miles down to the river. 19:39 While waiting, Frank chatted with the locals. 19:43 and what they said seriously unnerved him. 19:47 One man told him that the canyon was crawling with scorpions and rattlesnakes, and warned him darkly not to sleep under any ledges. 19:56 The warning about the ledges was good practical advice. 20:00 Their shady recesses are often favoured hangouts for scorpions, spiders and rattlesnakes, while the overhangs are prone to sudden collapse. Local folklore maintains that such accidents were caused by vengeful ledge spirits who crush trespassers, who venture into the places where their restless spirits dwell. 20:22 But there were other stories too. 20:30 The Grand Canyon is a dangerous place at the best of times. 20:34 Between 12 and 7 people die there every year. 20:38 On average, two or three deaths are from accidental falls over the edge. 20:44 The rest are caused by suicide, being hit by lightning or rock falls, succumbing to extreme heat or drowning in the river. 20:53 And many people say they have felt the haunting presence of the spirits of the deceased, especially near that sacred spring that emerges at the confluence of the Colorado and Little Colorado River. 21:08 At one overlook, past midnight, some visitors have reported seeing two little boys playing under the stars before suddenly vanishing, at the site where a car accidentally plunged into the canyon with two young brothers inside. 21:23 In another vivid account from late May 1900, a history professor named Edwin Vespers was hiking down the Bright Angel Trail from the canyon's south rim, when after about two miles, he is said to have heard cries for help ahead of him. 21:41 Rounding a bend, he saw a woman whose upper body was trapped under a huge boulder, clearly in great pain. He tried but failed to release her, so holding her hand to reassure her, he said he would go and get help. 21:56 But as he spoke, her eyes closed and she appeared to have died. 22:02 Racing back up the trail, he burst into the lobby of a nearby hotel and breathlessly relayed his story to the desk clerk. 22:10 Strangely calm, the clerk took him to a back office. There, the manager was also eerily unperturbed. And before the professor could explain everything, the manager related all the details of the accident and where it had occurred. 22:26 The manager then told the startled professor that the accident had occurred exactly as he had witnessed it three years previously to the day, and that this was the third year the unfortunate young woman, named Olivia Jouston, had appeared again at the accident site. 22:44 The manager then told the professor that he'd sent someone down to check the trail for an injured hiker just in case, but assured him that no one would be found. 22:56 It was all enough to at least remind Neil and Frank that they should probably tell someone where they were going, lest they get into trouble and fail to make it back themselves. 23:07 And so, shortly before leaving Marble Canyon, Neil mailed a postcard to park administrators with brief details of their planned trip. That postcard would come back to haunt them in the most unexpected way. 23:27 Finally, alone on the riverbank, Neil and Frank unloaded and prepared their gear. 23:33 To any experienced river runner, it would have looked woefully inadequate. They had two inexpensive, tiny, WWII surplus inflatable life rafts, two double-bladed paddles, a frying pan, some small cooking pots, two sleeping bags, maps, and two good quality life preservers, especially important for Neil, who'd never actually learnt to swim. 24:00 estimating that they would make it to Bright Angel Creek in five or six days. They had enough dehydrated food to last for ten days just to be on the safe side. With barely any space for themselves to sit, they shoved off from the bank around midday. 24:16 The first few miles were pretty easy, and both young men soon got the hang of paddling the tiny rafts. 24:24 They drifted under the marble canyon bridge that sat around 600 feet above the river. 24:30 They saw people running over to look down at them. They seemed to be trying to get their attention, but they were too far away to be heard. 24:39 That first afternoon passed pleasantly enough, and the pair found a beach to camp on for the night, but Frank found it hard to sleep. He couldn't stop thinking of all those eerie stories he'd been told shortly before they set off. 24:53 and of one in particular that involved a rafting trip with a party of students. While the students pitched tents, their guides laid their sleeping bags over an overhanging ledge to get shelter from a rain shower. 25:07 Then at some point in the night, one of the guides began to hear what sounded like someone hitting a drum. 25:15 Convincing himself it was only the pounding of water in nearby rapids, he was about to settle back down to sleep when he was approached by what appeared to be an old Native American holding a stone knife. The man was silent, his face featureless in the darkness, but the guide got a strong sense of the presence of death and that he was being told that he shouldn't be there. 25:41 He lay for a while paralysed with fear. 25:45 Before rolling over and asking his fellow guide if he'd also seen anything, the second guide looked just as rattled as he did. 25:54 He had experienced the exact same vision, he said. 25:58 Both men scrambled to their feet and hastily moved away from the overhang. 26:04 Once they'd done so, the sound of the drums did not return. 26:09 In another story, a rafting party was camped out one evening on some rocky ledges near the Muav Gorge. 26:17 Over breakfast the next morning, one of the guests asked if anyone else had been woken by the wooden boat that pulled up next to them in the middle of the night. 26:27 She said that three men with long beards had got out, dressed in old-style long-sleeved shirts, boots and hats. 26:36 They asked her directions, to which she didn't know the answer, then simply got back into their boat and headed down the river. 26:44 When the woman described the boat in detail, the guide recognised it to be a cataract boat, used by the early Wild West rafters of the previous century. No one else in the party, including the guides, had seen or heard a thing. 27:06 On day two of their voyage, Neil and Frank got back into their tiny craft and continued downriver. 27:14 With the canyon walls deepening and steepening around them, they approached their first major rapid, Soap Creek. 27:22 When Neil caught his first glimpse of it, he got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. 27:28 It was a wild maelstrom of white water which crashed onto boulders and threw spray high into the air. 27:35 But there was no turning back now. 27:38 The next 15 days became a battle for survival. 27:42 But rather than malevolent spirits, it was the demon rapids that plagued the hapless pair. 27:49 Some, like Lava Falls, had standing waves 15 feet high. 27:55 Day after day they were tossed and pummeled by the white water. The river level was lower than normal, making existing rapids more dangerous and creating new ones where giant boulders weren't exposed at higher flows. 28:10 The pair were repeatedly thrown out at their boats, tumbled through the thrashing water and bashed against the rocks. 28:17 On one occasion, Neil even lost his boat and only recovered it after a two-mile trek downstream where, with immense relief, he found it trapped on a floating tree branch. 28:30 They also lost some of their gear, including half a paddle in one of the capsizes. 28:36 With no alternative, the young men soldiered on as best they could, wearing hats made out of tinfoil food containers and a paddle repaired by strapping their frying pan onto the broken half. 28:50 They took to camping in quiet stretches, as far from the rapids as possible, because the sound of the roaring water gave them sleepless nights. 29:00 Neil started to dream of escape. 29:03 He vaguely remembered reading about routes to the top of the gorge up Nankoweep Creek, or was it Hans Trail? 29:11 On two occasions, the pair trekked several miles up an apparent trail, only to reach unscalable thousand-foot cliffs that forced them back to the river. 29:22 Then, on August 27th, they spotted something strange sticking out of the sandy ground, a piece of aeroplane. 29:32 Frank picked it up and put it in his bag. 29:39 Hey, this is Hayes Davenport and Sean Clements. We host the podcast Hollywood Handbook on the Big Money Players Network. 29:46 Our show is extremely accessible to first time listeners. Each week we talk to someone in show business, aka the biz, and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time and no one gets mad at their publicist for letting them do our show. 30:00 We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, not that great. 30:03 Actually, can you help me shape this? How about we flip it on his head? How about we flip the script? What if the surprise woman, who actually you think is the straight man, is actually the one who's acting weird? 30:18 Adam Scott. This entire time, you've been expecting Adam Sandler to come to visit the show. 30:28 I would never set expectations for something like that to happen. If the universe allows for something like that to happen, I'm open to it. 30:38 I'm always going to accept. 30:39 You know, Danny McBride, fine. Yeah. It's all this fragile masculinity exuding. I could smell it walking down the hallway, to be honest with you. I was like, is that weed? Nope. It's fragile masculinity. Yep. 30:53 Ben Stiller, no. Because a lot of times out of context, people don't get it or even know what a circle is. You know what I mean? They're so stupid. 31:03 Everyone's so dumb except for you. And fake. 31:05 Right, fake and also not interested or just like, oh, I've got my life. I don't care about your life. 31:12 And a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are without us. 31:15 Oh, and by the way, Will Ferrell told us personally he loves the show and he wants to be a guest on every episode, but he's just so busy. 31:22 Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 31:28 Our town is small taters by most standards, right? But to the people who grew up here, it's everything. 31:34 What happens when a quiet Tennessee town becomes the front line in a battle over the future of America? 31:40 Developers with right-wing ties have purchased hundreds of acres of land in the area. The first thing you see when it pops up is pioneers in Appalachia. 31:49 But they weren't just planting houses. 31:51 We need cities on a shining hill that exemplify and embody the Christian way of life. Stop right there. Is that normal? 31:59 A podcast about what happens when a small town becomes the site of a social experiment. God need men to rule. Great. And decides to fight back. 32:08 Do not use my hard work to sell your bull****. 32:12 They're not just opposing what's being planned for here. Our hometown is not a test tube. They feel like they're standing in opposition to an entire administration. 32:22 Guess you didn't move in on a bunch of dumb hillbillies now, did you? Listen to Our Town on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 32:34 I'm Jake Brennan, and on my podcast, Hollywoodland, I revisit some of the biggest stories from Hollywood history, separating the myths people want to believe from the reality underneath them. Like how the story of Marilyn Monroe isn't just the story of a Hollywood icon. 32:51 Marilyn Monroe has become so iconic that her death can only be explained through conspiracy theories. And for some fans who can't let go, these stories have metastasized from conjecture to accepted fact. So on August 4th, 1962, Marilyn Monroe died. Then the rumors started and she died again. And now we're going to set the record straight and learn about the way Marilyn Monroe actually died the third way. 33:21 Learn more about what happens when fame, media obsession, and conspiracy collide. Listen to Hollywoodland on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 33:33 That call was really pivotal for me. Hey, it's Emily Tisch-Sussman, and this season on She Pivots, the podcast where women share bold career moves and personal turning points that changed everything. I sit down with culture-shifting women who share their pivots, like Paralympian Allie Truitt. I was like, I'm a month out from a shark attack. There's no way in 11 months I'm making the Paralympics. Advocate Elizabeth Smart. I still feel that drive that I can still make a difference, so I'm going to keep going. Celebrity chef Carla Hall. Was that scary to walk away from such a stable career after just two years? 34:06 No, I was more afraid of being unhappy than I was broke in a dead end job that I didn't enjoy. And feminist legend Gloria Steinem. 34:16 All of us were trying to express women's real lives. We need a meeting place of our own. And if I can contribute to that, I'd like to maintain that and leave this house for that purpose. 34:28 Listen to She Pivots on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 34:33 Self-care September is here, which means it's time to rethink what self-care actually means. Yes, self-care can be a long walk. It can be an everything shower. It can be putting your phone on do not disturb. But sometimes it's actually about sitting with the uncomfortable stuff and understanding your patterns, your boundaries, finally figuring out why you keep doing things that you swore you would never do again. I'm Gemma Spegg, the host of the Psychology of Your 20s podcast, and each week we unpack the psychology behind the experiences that shape your 20s, from relationships and friendships to money, anxiety, confidence, attachment, just becoming more comfortable with who you are. 35:09 Unlike the quarter-life crisis, which is depicted as the collapse, the quarter-life reinvention is the expansion and growth of something. 35:17 When we develop the ability to be happy by ourselves, nobody else can take that from you. So this Self-Care September, don't just take care of yourself, get to know yourself as well. Listen to The Psychology of Your 20s on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 35:37 By September 1st, the exhausted pair, who'd only planned to be gone for five or six days, were approaching the 16th day of their trip. 35:47 Finally, after drifting under Silver Bridge, which spans the Colorado at a place known as Phantom Ranch, they reached the base of the Bright Angel Trail, their intended destination. 36:01 And there waiting for them was a slightly disgruntled looking park ranger, Dan Davis, and a couple of mules. 36:09 Neil and Frank had lost between 15 to 20 pounds and their clothes were hanging off them. 36:15 So perhaps taking pity on them, Davis offered them coffee and food before telling them to gather up their gear and follow him to the top of the gorge. 36:26 As they started the steep 3,000 foot climb to the south rim, mighty grateful that the mules were carrying their gear for them, Ranger Davis informed them that Chief Ranger Lynn Coffin was waiting for them at the top. 36:41 As it happened, Neil and Frank should have applied for a permit to make their journey. 36:47 That postcard that Neil had sent from Marble Canyon had been enough for the authorities to finally track the pair down. 36:55 Ranger Coffin told Neil and Frank that they were lucky to be alive and that their ignorance of the permit law didn't give them immunity from potential prosecution in federal court. 37:07 But strangely, he didn't press the point further, and instead moved swiftly on to ask why exactly their trip had taken so long, and had they seen any plane wreckage along the way. 37:22 Baltingly, Neil said no, and Frank, glancing toward one of his bags, remained silent. 37:31 but it was clear that Coffin had unvoiced suspicions. 37:35 He told the pair that on returning home, they should expect a visit from the FBI. 37:42 Neil Newby had only been back home in Bloomington, Indiana a few days, where he was a graduate student at the university, when he received a call from a federal official in Chicago who said they were coming to interview him the following evening. 37:58 Immediately, Neil called Frank in New Jersey to make sure they had their stories straight, which was just as well as someone was coming from New York to interview Frank that very afternoon. 38:11 Neil met his interrogator on campus in a private office in the physics building. 38:17 It all started pleasantly enough. 38:19 Neil presented his ID and confirmed that he was a graduate student in nuclear physics. 38:25 Then the questioning began. 38:28 How did the trip come about, and when did the pair start planning it? 38:33 Neil explained that they'd first discussed it during the previous Christmas vacation. 38:39 Then why, asked the man, were they so ill-equipped and unprepared for such a dangerous trip, if they'd been planning it for almost ten months? 38:48 Neil shrugged his shoulders. 38:51 Then the agent asked Neil when he purchased the boats. 38:55 I don't remember. 38:56 Sometime last winter maybe, he said, now deeply confused. 39:01 Then the man's cordial manner instantly vanished. 39:05 I wonder if you do remember, in July, the headlines were filled with stories of those two planes colliding. 39:13 Then just weeks later, you're in the canyon trying to get to the wreckage. 39:19 Then the penny finally dropped. 39:21 The FBI thought he and Frank had gone down the Colorado River specifically to loot the plane crash wreckage. 39:29 But why? Why? 39:37 Suddenly feeling a little hot under his collar, Neil went into a full explanation of why he and Frank made the trip and how difficult he'd found it all, including how he became so banged up in rapids that halfway through he was having trouble walking. 39:54 It was just supposed to have been a few days of fun, he insisted. 39:59 Finally, sensing Neil's honesty, the agent relented. As he explained to Neil, it seemed that at least one gang, possibly more, had been trying to get to the wreckage site to loot it. Then after a thoughtful pause, he let slip a secret. 40:17 The FBI was following this case very closely because one of the planes was carrying $5 million in negotiable securities, over $60 million in today's money. 40:29 A negotiable security is a financial asset that can be easily bought, sold or transferred to another party on the open market without needing the original issuer's consent. 40:41 Highly liquid, such securities can be quickly converted into cash by whoever acquires them. 40:48 But no, Neil and Frank had not been looking for it. 40:53 He didn't even know what a negotiable security was. 40:57 Years later, the pair would joke between themselves that those $5 million sure would have come in handy. 41:04 However, no such securities were ever listed on the official manifests of the TWA or United Airlines flights involved in the crash, and the authorities have never confirmed that they were even on board. 41:20 And so, the mystery as to whether anyone ever found and cashed in those negotiable securities continues to remain to this day unexplained. 41:33 As for that strange place, located at the confluence of the Pisas Vayu and the Pala Vayu, Or the Colorado and Little Colorado, as some have it. 41:44 See Parpoony? 41:46 That's still there. 41:48 And if One Ranger's story is to be believed, if you ever find yourself nearby, you might just catch the sight of some ghostly figures, still wearing the suits and dresses they died in. 42:01 walking along an ancient trail, perhaps toward that sacred hole in the ground, through which they will return into the world below. 42:16 This episode was written by Diane Hope and Richard McLean Smith. 42:22 Please remember to like and subscribe if you've enjoyed the show. Unexplained is an AV Club Productions podcast created by me, Richard McLean Smith. All other elements of the podcast, including the music, are also produced by me. Unexplained, the book and audiobook, is now available to buy worldwide. You can purchase from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones and other bookstores. Be sure to follow us on Instagram, TikTok and Facebook at Unexplained Podcast and on X and Blue Sky at Unexplained Podcast. 42:53 Until next time, stay strange and dissonant. 43:23 . . . . . 43:54 . . . . 44:19 . . . . 44:52 . . . 45:17 Thank you. 46:05 Hey, this is Hayes Davenport and Sean Clements. 46:08 We host the podcast Hollywood Handbook. Each week we talk to someone in show business and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time and no one gets mad at their publicist for letting them do our show. 46:19 We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, Adam Scott, Danny McBride, Ben Stiller, and a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are without us. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 46:33 Our hometown is not a test tube. 46:36 90 miles northeast of Nashville, a battle for the future of America plays out in one small town. 46:41 Developers with right-wing ties have purchased hundreds of acres of land. We need cities on a shining hill. 46:47 This is Our Town, a podcast about what happens when a small town becomes the site of a social experiment and fights back. 46:56 Guess you didn't move in on a bunch of dumb hillbillies now, did you? 46:58 Listen to Our Town on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 47:08 In February of 2024, celebrated illustrator and children's book author Petra Mathers and her husband Michael mailed letters to dozens of friends and family members to let them know they had died by suicide. 47:19 Dear honeys, this is goodbye. By the time you get this letter, both Petra and I will be dead. Next stop, Wonderland. 47:28 Why did they do it? And what did it do to the people they left behind? 47:32 Listen to Death of an Artist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 47:38 Hey, what's up? I'm Tony Gonzalez. 47:40 And I'm October Gonzalez. But you can call me Toby. We want you to join us on our new podcast, No Safe Words with October and Tony Gonzalez. We get real about marriage, parenthood, sex, divorce, and all the nitty gritty stuff we all think about. But just don't say out loud. You're probably just going to be some rich guy and he's going to whisk you away. 47:57 This is awkward. Listen to No Safe Words with October and Tony Gonzalez on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 48:08 Did you think you were the only one? Like no matter what you did, it was never good enough for your mother. I'm Jennifer Arnis, and this is the Black Mother Wound Podcast, where we unpack and heal from the very first relationship that shaped us. We rush to accommodate other people when we have been hurt and our hurt has not been healed. Listen to the Black Mother Wound Podcast from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast. 48:40 Guaranteed human.