WEBVTT - The Murder of John Lennon 0:00:00.800 --> 0:00:03.760 Hey, everybody, we're coming to the Pacific Northwest. So if 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:06.000 you live in that area or can get on a 0:00:06.040 --> 0:00:07.840 plane to go to that area, or a boat or 0:00:07.920 --> 0:00:11.320 snowshoe whatever, we'll see you at the end of January. 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:14.160 That's right, brand new show, brand new topic. We don't 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:16.200 even know what it is yet, but we'll be in Seattle, 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:20.640 Washington on January twenty fourth, Portland on January twenty fifth, 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:24.440 and then our annual trip to San Francisco's Sketch Fest 0:00:24.720 --> 0:00:26.840 on January twenty sixth in Seattle. 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:27.800 We're counting on you. 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:29.880 We're at the Paramount this year and that's a lot 0:00:29.960 --> 0:00:31.760 of seats, so we need a lot of your lovely 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:32.800 faces in the audience. 0:00:33.040 --> 0:00:35.880 Yes, so get thee too, stuff youshould know dot com 0:00:35.920 --> 0:00:38.240 and click on the tour button to get all your facts, 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:41.440 or you can go to link tree slash sysk and 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:43.839 get the same links and the same facts and we'll 0:00:43.840 --> 0:00:46.080 see you guys in January. We can't wait. 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:54.440 Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:58.240 --> 0:01:01.040 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. Josh, and there's Chuck 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:05.039 and Jerry's here too, And this is Stuff you should Know. 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:06.479 Solemn edition. 0:01:08.640 --> 0:01:10.000 Yeah, pretty solemn. 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:14.320 Yeah, it's a solemn occasion to this episode is coming 0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:19.240 out on the anniversary of John Lennon's death, and not coincidentally, 0:01:19.480 --> 0:01:22.039 because we're actually doing an episode on the death of 0:01:22.080 --> 0:01:24.120 John Lennon, so it's appropriate. 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:27.720 It's actually the day before his death. If we're being 0:01:27.840 --> 0:01:29.160 nippicking close enough. 0:01:29.440 --> 0:01:30.680 I was very close to Chuck. 0:01:31.520 --> 0:01:35.080 Yeah, and I'm not one to commemorate death dates, especially 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:40.000 murder dates. But I did want to do this episode, 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:42.319 and since I saw it alined, I thought, you know, 0:01:42.319 --> 0:01:46.240 if we can get this out quicker than maybe it's timely. 0:01:46.400 --> 0:01:46.800 I don't know. 0:01:47.280 --> 0:01:50.840 Yeah, had you decided you wanted to do this before 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:54.800 we did JD. Salinger or did it all just kind 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:55.640 of work out like that. 0:01:56.480 --> 0:01:58.160 I think it just worked out like that, Like the 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:02.640 two were completely unrelated in my mind, such that when 0:02:02.640 --> 0:02:04.960 you suggested we put them both out on the same week, 0:02:05.000 --> 0:02:09.120 I was like, why. 0:02:07.400 --> 0:02:10.240 Oh, they're related. The two are related for sure. 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:13.160 Yeah, absolutely, so let's. 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:15.600 Talk about this. I knew about the death of John 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:18.320 Lennon some, but certainly not to the degree I do now. 0:02:19.960 --> 0:02:22.560 I like, for example, I knew he was forty, I 0:02:22.639 --> 0:02:25.920 knew he was shot I knew he died in front 0:02:25.960 --> 0:02:29.639 of his apartment building the Dakota, which we've talked about before. 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:33.280 I knew a few other things, but certainly not the details. 0:02:33.320 --> 0:02:35.119 And I didn't know much about the guy who killed 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:36.000 them that either. 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:37.120 Yeah. 0:02:38.040 --> 0:02:40.160 Well, let's tell everybody what we've learned. Huh. 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:43.639 Yeah, I remember this happening, believe it or not. Wow, 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:48.840 because I was, But I guess. And I would have been. 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:53.000 Nine. When's my birthday? March? 0:02:53.360 --> 0:02:54.960 Yes, so yeah, you would have been nine. 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:57.040 Yeah, I would have been nine years old. And I 0:02:57.080 --> 0:03:00.600 remember just like you know, I didn't. I grew up 0:03:00.639 --> 0:03:02.600 in a house that didn't have a lot of music 0:03:02.680 --> 0:03:05.400 in it except for my room and my brother's room, 0:03:05.880 --> 0:03:07.960 So it wasn't like the Beatles were a household name 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:10.120 or anything like most kids of my age who had 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.280 parents who may or may not have been into the Beatles. 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:16.440 My parents didn't tell me anything about the Beatles, right, 0:03:16.840 --> 0:03:18.680 But I knew they were a thing, and I knew 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:21.359 like John Lennon is the guy with the round glasses 0:03:22.600 --> 0:03:24.360 because I was just a kid, and I remember it 0:03:24.400 --> 0:03:25.960 being like a big news and I was like, oh, 0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:28.440 that that singer guy, that one of those round Glasses 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:29.160 was killed. 0:03:29.200 --> 0:03:30.120 That's sad. 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.639 Yeah, it was really big news, as we'll see. I mean, 0:03:33.680 --> 0:03:35.640 it's still big news today, but at the time it 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:37.800 was just earth shattering for sure. 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:41.400 Thanks to Olivia for the help with this one. And 0:03:41.440 --> 0:03:43.960 I guess we should start with talking a little bit 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:48.760 about John Lennon and his love affair with New York City. 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:52.040 Yeah, I'm not sure when he moved to New York City. 0:03:52.400 --> 0:03:54.840 I just know that they moved to the Dakota he 0:03:54.960 --> 0:03:58.120 and Yoko in nineteen seventy three. When did they move 0:03:58.200 --> 0:03:58.560 to New. 0:03:58.520 --> 0:04:02.600 York, you know, I don't know if the Bank Street 0:04:03.240 --> 0:04:06.640 apartment was the first one, but they moved to Bank 0:04:06.720 --> 0:04:09.360 Street in seventy one, so that may have been their 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:13.400 first New York place. I know they lived a sort 0:04:13.440 --> 0:04:15.600 of partially lived in one of the hotels there for 0:04:15.640 --> 0:04:19.599 a while, but they lived at this very nondescript house 0:04:19.640 --> 0:04:21.560 at one oh five Bank Street in the West Village 0:04:22.360 --> 0:04:24.200 and for a couple of years. But one of the 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:28.120 reasons they moved is because they were robbed in the 0:04:28.160 --> 0:04:32.479 apartment and people busted in former tenants apparently and stole 0:04:32.600 --> 0:04:36.600 some artwork and the TV and Lennon's wallet and his 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:39.919 address book and supposedly he put the word out on 0:04:39.960 --> 0:04:43.839 the street that Bobby Seal's people are going to exact 0:04:43.880 --> 0:04:46.440 revenge if I don't get that address book back. 0:04:46.920 --> 0:04:48.479 Oh yeah, like the Black Panthers. 0:04:48.960 --> 0:04:51.279 Yeah. I don't know if he had a legit connection. 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:52.920 I mean, he seems like the kind of guy that 0:04:52.960 --> 0:04:55.919 would have known the Black Panthers and Bobby Seal. But 0:04:56.160 --> 0:04:58.240 it was enough to where that address book was in 0:04:58.279 --> 0:05:01.720 fact returned, and I guess that was enough to where 0:05:01.760 --> 0:05:04.880 they were like, hey, Yoko, I'm one of the most 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:06.880 famous people in the world. Maybe we should move to 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:08.919 a building that's a little more secure. 0:05:09.480 --> 0:05:11.680 I mean, that's why they moved to the Dakota Is 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:16.080 that had a security guard, that had a doorman. There 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:18.880 was a driveway that was gated, so you could drive 0:05:18.960 --> 0:05:20.800 in through the gate and they'd close the gate behind you, 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:22.200 and then you got out of your car in the 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:24.080 courtyard so you didn't have to get out on the street. 0:05:24.400 --> 0:05:28.200 It was much much safer. But saying that, I've read 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:30.520 interviews with John Lennon where he talks about his life 0:05:31.080 --> 0:05:33.880 in Manhattan, and like he would walk around Central Park, 0:05:33.920 --> 0:05:36.000 he would go get breakfast, like down the street, he 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:40.120 was just like living like a normal New Yorker. And 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:42.159 he said that people would like say hi or whatever, 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:45.960 but rarely would anybody ever bug him. So he was 0:05:46.720 --> 0:05:49.920 living he was super super famous, but at the same 0:05:49.960 --> 0:05:52.040 time he was just living like a normal person by 0:05:52.080 --> 0:05:52.560 this time. 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:55.200 Yeah, I think that's one of the allures of New 0:05:55.279 --> 0:05:57.799 York is you can be one of the most famous 0:05:57.839 --> 0:06:01.280 people in the world and generally, like New Yorkers themselves 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:02.760 aren't the ones that are gonna bug you anyway. 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:04.920 It's any tourists probably. 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:05.920 You know. 0:06:06.279 --> 0:06:08.640 Yeah, But otherwise you can kind of live in New 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:11.000 York and walk around and just do your thing. And 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:13.840 that's what they did when they bought five apartments at 0:06:13.839 --> 0:06:16.880 the Dakota. They lived in a couple of them. They 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:21.480 had a studio one which was Yoko's work studio, and 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:24.640 they had a guest apartment, very nice thing to have, 0:06:25.240 --> 0:06:26.520 and then a storage apartment. 0:06:27.080 --> 0:06:32.159 Yeah, and they also had Sean Lennon in nineteen seventy five, 0:06:33.440 --> 0:06:37.039 and this whole era from about that time until his 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:41.000 death has a couple of different portrayals depending on who 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:43.760 you ask. Yeah, a lot of times is portrayed is 0:06:43.839 --> 0:06:49.599 John Lennon's house husband era. He reputedly would bake bread 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:52.120 and he would take Sean to go walk in Central 0:06:52.160 --> 0:06:55.040 Park and just being like a stay at home dad. 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:57.680 He turned his business affairs over to Yoko and just 0:06:57.720 --> 0:07:01.080 basically was like, I'm just here to live. Yeah, And 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:07.240 another set of reporting, including from people who were like 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:10.080 there part of his life, like at least one personal 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:13.640 assistant who was there. Toward the end, he said, that's 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:16.520 kind of a charade, that he was actually really depressed. 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:18.680 He would lock himself in his room and just watch 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:21.320 TV for days on end. He was into the occult 0:07:21.520 --> 0:07:24.520 may or may not have been doing drugs, but he 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:27.520 wasn't like baking bread and just been paying attention to Sean. 0:07:27.880 --> 0:07:32.400 He was he was depressed. But even if that holds true, 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:37.280 by the time his death rolled around, he had turned 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:39.760 some sort of corner because he was on a schooner 0:07:39.800 --> 0:07:42.680 somewhere on the way to Bermuda and ended up being 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:45.320 the only person on the ship that wasn't seasick and 0:07:45.480 --> 0:07:48.520 was asked to like steer the boat through a storm, 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:53.640 and apparently going through that gauntlet made him like just 0:07:53.760 --> 0:07:56.240 it just gave him some confidence or produce a spark 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:58.480 in him that had been missing. So even if the 0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:01.400 people who said that his last years were pretty depressing, 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:04.640 the last year of his life was different than that. 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:05.480 It was renewed. 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:08.600 Yeah, I mean it was probably a little bit of both. 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:13.960 John Lennon struggled his entire life with you know, with 0:08:14.160 --> 0:08:17.280 just issues. He had issues from the moment he was 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:22.920 raised until the day he died, generally speaking in and 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:25.760 out of drugs, stuff like that. So it was probably both, 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:28.600 would be my guess as far as the work goes. 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:32.640 That fall of nineteen eighty is when the album Double 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:37.440 Fantasy came out. Great record released on November seventeen, the 0:08:37.440 --> 0:08:42.560 first one since Sean was born, and it was you know, 0:08:42.920 --> 0:08:47.199 things were looking I think more positive. You know, he 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:50.559 regretted how he fathered Julian. I think he felt like 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:53.200 he had a second chance here with Sean. He was 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:57.480 madly in love with Yoko Ono, just like partners and everything, 0:08:57.559 --> 0:08:59.760 and things were looking pretty good. I think he had 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:03.440 largely sort of let the Beatles thing. That was a 0:09:03.480 --> 0:09:06.240 tough breakup, you know, so he had to get through. 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:09.080 That, Yeah, But it sounds like he kind of had 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:11.439 by the time Double Fantasy came out because it was 0:09:12.040 --> 0:09:16.360 a fairly upbeat album about like family life and stuff, right, Yeah, 0:09:16.360 --> 0:09:19.600 a lot of it was Yeah, so that's John Lennon. 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:25.120 Kareening toreed him on a separate but soon to intersect path. 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:28.520 Was another person who was not in any way famous, 0:09:29.040 --> 0:09:31.720 and depending on what interview you read of his, who 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:36.200 you talk to, what psychiatrist notes you read, was very 0:09:36.200 --> 0:09:39.320 disappointed that he was not famous or that he was 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:43.400 a nobody. His name was Mark David Chapman, and I 0:09:43.440 --> 0:09:45.240 should say, right out of the gate truck, there's a 0:09:45.240 --> 0:09:47.400 lot of people who are like, don't even mention that 0:09:47.480 --> 0:09:52.000 guy's name. Yeah, because he said multiple times that the 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:55.160 reason that he killed John Lennon spoiler alert, Mark David 0:09:55.240 --> 0:09:59.080 Chapman was the person who killed John Lennon to gain fame, 0:09:59.320 --> 0:10:03.040 to like basically basque in the reflective glow that he 0:10:03.120 --> 0:10:06.200 would gain from taking John Lennon's life. So people are like, 0:10:06.240 --> 0:10:09.080 don't give that guy any publicity. You can't talk about 0:10:09.080 --> 0:10:11.600 the death of John Lennon unless you talk about Mark 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:16.439 David Chapman. And from interviews that I've wrote with him, 0:10:16.440 --> 0:10:18.160 there's a lot more to the story than him just 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:20.800 killing John Lennon because he wanted to be famous. 0:10:21.000 --> 0:10:23.439 Yeah, although I mean, like you said, he has literally 0:10:24.400 --> 0:10:28.280 said I thought I could acquire his fame by killing him. 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:33.319 So he was born in nineteen fifty five in Fort Worth, Texas, 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:36.880 to an Air Force father and a nurse mother, and 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:42.400 he grew up four miles from my house. Wowee, Yeah, 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:45.160 I had looked it up before years ago, and I 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:47.480 did it again today because I couldn't remember. He had 0:10:47.520 --> 0:10:50.559 a Decatur address, but it wasn't like a Decatur Decatur 0:10:50.640 --> 0:10:54.040 like we think of it. He went to Columbia High School, 0:10:54.040 --> 0:10:56.800 which was a rival high school to my high school 0:10:56.800 --> 0:11:00.400 that I went to. Obviously older than me, but yeah, 0:11:00.440 --> 0:11:03.440 he grew up right down the road. And his dad 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:06.160 was a pretty tough guy. Apparently there were stories that 0:11:06.280 --> 0:11:10.680 he told about physical abuse against his mother in which 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:14.480 he would step in to defend her. The mother did 0:11:14.520 --> 0:11:17.280 say that there were there was some abuse, but she, 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:19.000 you know, I think, like a lot of women of 0:11:19.040 --> 0:11:22.360 the time, down played that. But he didn't seem like 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:24.160 a very good guy, as evidenced by the fact that 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:28.000 at one point, as we'll see, Chapman thought about killing 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.719 his father, like he wanted to kill somebody, right, And 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.640 we'll get into all that, But as a kid, there 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:37.040 were you know, he was sort of a go get 0:11:37.040 --> 0:11:40.040 her in some ways. He started a newspaper for the neighborhood, 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:42.400 he was a coin collector. He was kind of a 0:11:42.440 --> 0:11:46.160 normal kid in some ways. But then he also, you know, 0:11:46.800 --> 0:11:48.840 Olivia found this one thing, and I've seen this elsewhere 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:52.080 that he would create these fantasies about people who lived 0:11:52.080 --> 0:11:55.000 in the walls and that he was their king. And 0:11:55.240 --> 0:11:57.760 you know, initially, I'm like, that's that's kids stuff, Like 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:00.240 kids do all kinds of things like that. But the 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:02.120 more and more I read, it seemed like it was 0:12:02.720 --> 0:12:06.280 it bordered on like like a godlike complex rather than 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:08.280 just sort of you know, make belief friends. 0:12:08.880 --> 0:12:12.280 Yeah, they considered him important, and they were the only 0:12:12.320 --> 0:12:16.320 ones who considered him important supposedly. Yeah, but I think 0:12:16.360 --> 0:12:19.880 like that's a good illustration that he was showing signs 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:23.160 that could be taken a mental illness, like as early 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.280 as childhood. Yeah, there's a lot of debate on the 0:12:26.320 --> 0:12:29.800 internet whether he's mentally ill at all. It seems like 0:12:30.200 --> 0:12:33.440 the growing consensus is, especially as we understand mental illness 0:12:33.480 --> 0:12:36.720 more and more, that yeah, he's probably very mentally ill, 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:39.440 which makes the fact that he's not being treated for 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:43.079 mental illness in prison like that much worse, you know. Yeah, 0:12:43.120 --> 0:12:46.240 of course, So he came of age in like the 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:49.720 sixties and really kind of bought into the whole hippie 0:12:49.720 --> 0:12:51.920 thing for a little while. When he was in high school, 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.280 started doing drugs. I think he started huffing in Halen's 0:12:55.280 --> 0:12:57.440 which is that's what you do when you start trying 0:12:57.520 --> 0:13:00.880 drugs in Georgia. And then he just moved on and 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:04.199 eventually came to acid. I think he tried heroin a 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:07.360 few times. Like he definitely tried all the drugs. And 0:13:07.480 --> 0:13:10.040 he also was into the Beatles. His favorite album was 0:13:10.080 --> 0:13:14.720 Sergeant Pepper's. He also kind of got into conspiracy theories 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:17.880 in UFOs. Who's just kind of like into all the 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:20.960 stuff you get into when you start doing lots of drugs, right, 0:13:21.480 --> 0:13:23.960 And then he had a turning point, Chuck, He like 0:13:24.080 --> 0:13:27.160 completely didn't about face during high school. 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.080 Yeah, it was only he only had did drugs for 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:34.760 a couple of years, and you know, from fourteen to 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:38.840 sixteen at Columbia High School he became a born again 0:13:39.280 --> 0:13:45.200 Presbyterian Christian quit drugging and during his drug years, like, 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:47.720 you know, I saw those just weed and LSDVE, but 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:50.320 I guess some other things were sprinkled in there. But 0:13:50.440 --> 0:13:53.800 he was actually ran away from home and was living 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:55.480 on the streets of Atlanta for a couple of weeks 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:56.560 as like a fifteen year old. 0:13:56.679 --> 0:13:56.959 Wow. 0:13:57.600 --> 0:13:59.960 But when he straightened himself out, he got a job 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:04.600 at the YMCA after he graduated and was a counselor. 0:14:04.640 --> 0:14:09.280 He worked with Vietnamese refugees in Arkansas, and by all accounts, 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:12.560 was really good at it. He was popular with the kids, 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:16.040 he was popular with the campers. This is sort of 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:18.560 I guess where we can start talking about the Catcher 0:14:18.559 --> 0:14:21.040 and the Rye. Yeah, because the one thing that he 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:26.040 sort of identified with was well Holden call Field as 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:29.960 a whole, but Holden call Field and his liking kids 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:33.080 more than he liked adults, and that was certainly seen 0:14:33.120 --> 0:14:34.000 to be true with Chapman. 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:37.000 Yeah, he definitely came to identify with Holden call Field 0:14:37.040 --> 0:14:43.680 for sure. I read a people Like People magazine interview 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:46.160 with him from nineteen eighty seven. It's really long piece 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:50.080 by a guy named James R. Gaines, and in it 0:14:50.160 --> 0:14:53.720 you get the impression that Mark David Chapman during this 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:58.880 time is struggling with trying to be sane, trying to 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:01.560 be good, try not to be bad, trying not to 0:15:01.760 --> 0:15:05.320 feel like he's going crazy. Yeah, and at one point 0:15:05.600 --> 0:15:08.080 he finally got to the point where he's like he 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:11.360 was apparently tired of struggling. He started he basically turns 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:13.200 his back on God and started praying to Satan and 0:15:13.360 --> 0:15:16.240 was just like, just turn me crazy. I'm basically I'm 0:15:16.280 --> 0:15:19.400 sick of trying not to be crazy. From that point 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:24.960 on his words, yeah, Yeah, from that point on, he 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:30.600 just kept really going downhill from there essentially. 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:34.400 Yeah, And I think that can be the case, as 0:15:34.520 --> 0:15:37.120 you you know, depending on what sort of mental illness 0:15:37.200 --> 0:15:39.880 you have, as you get up in your upper teenage years, 0:15:39.880 --> 0:15:41.320 things can really sort of settle in. 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:41.880 Yeah. 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:44.640 And I saw a lot of interviews. He talked a 0:15:44.680 --> 0:15:49.040 lot about the two sides of himself. As we'll see later, 0:15:49.120 --> 0:15:53.480 there were certain psychiatrists after, like during the trial, that 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:59.320 diagnosed him as having paranoid schizophrenia. He heard voices in 0:15:59.360 --> 0:16:01.800 his head like things like that were starting to happen 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:07.120 with more regularity. So in nineteen seventy seven he kind 0:16:07.120 --> 0:16:10.760 of dropped out and moved to Hawaii. I think thinking 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:13.640 it would be good for him. He did have a 0:16:13.680 --> 0:16:17.680 suicide attempt there, but he also got treatment for depression 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:19.640 and started traveling and stuff. 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:23.840 Like that he did. This is really strange. He at 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:28.440 this time managed to travel the world. I could not 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:30.840 find how he paid for it, but I know that 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:33.360 he paid for a later trip by selling an original 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.280 Norman Rockwell that he had acquired. So this guy who 0:16:37.360 --> 0:16:39.920 is like basically living on the beach in Waikiki with 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:43.080 no money, suddenly goes on a trip around the world 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:47.680 to Asia to the Middle East during this several month 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:52.400 period between oh, I think it's sometime in nineteen seventy eight. 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:55.120 It's a really bizarre little footnote that there's not a 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:57.920 lot of information on. But that's one thing he did. 0:16:58.400 --> 0:17:00.680 And the reason that we bring this up is because 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:04.879 his travel agent, a woman named Gloria Abbe, ended up 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:07.399 marrying him and they're still married. 0:17:07.440 --> 0:17:11.960 Actually, yeah, they were. I mean that may be one 0:17:11.960 --> 0:17:13.919 of the facts of the podcast. They were married for 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:18.239 eighteen months before he murdered John Lennon, and she has 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:22.320 subsequently stayed married to him. And the interviews that I read, 0:17:22.480 --> 0:17:26.560 she's like, you know, I took an oath of marriage 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:31.040 in front of God and everybody, and I'm gonna honor that. 0:17:32.359 --> 0:17:35.160 So that's basically the end of the story. I mean, 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:37.680 there's really not more to it than that she has 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:41.960 stayed by his side. You know, does regular conjugal visits 0:17:42.280 --> 0:17:45.160 with him in prison, and they're you know, they're still 0:17:45.160 --> 0:17:49.479 going strong, I guess. But in Hawaii is when although 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:53.800 he was getting depression treatment, he really went downhill with 0:17:53.840 --> 0:17:57.680 his mental health there and that's where he started obsessing 0:17:57.720 --> 0:18:01.560 about killing somebody famous in order to gain fame. And 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:05.640 Lennon was on a list as well as Johnny Carson 0:18:05.920 --> 0:18:11.040 and Elizabeth Taylor, Paul McCartney, George C. Scott, the governor 0:18:11.080 --> 0:18:14.000 of Hawaii, Ronald Reagan, apparently David Bowie was on the list. 0:18:14.040 --> 0:18:15.760 It was a big list. 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:19.480 Of people that, you know, the police found this upon 0:18:19.480 --> 0:18:22.399 their investigations of people that he wanted to murder. 0:18:22.720 --> 0:18:28.040 Yes, alarmingly, he was hired as a security guard and 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:32.280 outfitted with a gun during this period, and in nineteen 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:36.440 eighty he quit his job and he bought his own gun. 0:18:36.760 --> 0:18:39.280 He flew from Hawaii to New York with a gun 0:18:40.000 --> 0:18:43.679 in November of nineteen eighty and by this time, like 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:45.800 you said he'd come up with a list of famous 0:18:45.840 --> 0:18:48.679 people who he might kill. And during this trip, he 0:18:48.760 --> 0:18:52.480 later said that he visited both Reagan's and Carter's election 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:57.800 night parties, probably with a gun, kind of like a 0:18:57.880 --> 0:19:01.960 Travis Beck yeah, bikel kind of thing. 0:19:02.480 --> 0:19:03.520 Yeah, but he. 0:19:03.480 --> 0:19:06.320 Didn't do anything, obviously, And he actually went back to 0:19:08.240 --> 0:19:09.840 Hawaii afterward. 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:13.480 Yeah, And before he did that, he went to Georgia 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:18.159 to get bullets because at the time, you know, the 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:20.359 good old days, you could not even buy bullets in 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:22.960 New York City. So he went back to Georgia to 0:19:23.000 --> 0:19:25.920 get bullets. And I don't know if he couldn't buy 0:19:25.960 --> 0:19:28.320 them there or what, but his plan was to get 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:32.040 them from a cop friend of his and said that 0:19:32.080 --> 0:19:35.280 he was thinking about killing his dad. And then, you know, 0:19:35.760 --> 0:19:38.360 went back to Hawaii at that point, then went back 0:19:38.400 --> 0:19:41.200 to New York on December sixth, which was a Saturday. 0:19:42.640 --> 0:19:45.160 And maybe that's a good time to take a break, 0:19:45.160 --> 0:19:47.920 what do you think? Yeah, all right, we'll be right. 0:19:47.840 --> 0:20:22.000 Back, all right. 0:20:22.119 --> 0:20:26.600 So Mark David Chapman is in New York on December eighth. 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:29.840 John Lennon and Yoko Ono are promoting the album they 0:20:29.920 --> 0:20:33.440 had just released, Double Fantasy, they went to breakfast. John 0:20:33.480 --> 0:20:36.760 Lennon went got a haircut. He had that awesome hair 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:38.520 at the time. It's when he was sort of in his. 0:20:40.000 --> 0:20:43.200 Kind of like grease or stray cats look. 0:20:44.320 --> 0:20:45.240 Yeah, yeah, you're right. 0:20:45.840 --> 0:20:46.919 That was kind of kind of a cool. 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:48.680 Look because he always had this long hair usually, and 0:20:48.880 --> 0:20:50.600 all of a sudden he had sort of this greaser look, 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:53.480 which is which is super cool. Yeah, And he had 0:20:53.520 --> 0:20:57.440 a very very famous photo shoot done at his apartment 0:20:57.520 --> 0:21:00.560 that day with Annie Leibovitz for Rolling Stone. What a Day, 0:21:01.359 --> 0:21:05.320 the iconic cover that was released much later in January 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:08.960 of nineteen eighty one, where John Lennon is curled up 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:12.000 naked beside Yoko Ono and the picture's kind of taken 0:21:12.040 --> 0:21:14.920 from above, very very famous photograph. 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:17.240 And that photograph was, you said, taken on the day 0:21:17.280 --> 0:21:17.760 he died. 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:18.880 That's right. 0:21:18.920 --> 0:21:20.119 Isn't that nuts? 0:21:20.760 --> 0:21:23.600 Yeah, not as nuts as one of the other photographs taken. 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:27.560 That No, that is it's great foreshadowing. So after the 0:21:27.760 --> 0:21:32.240 Annie Leebowitz photo shoot, they went downstairs to Yoko's studio 0:21:32.320 --> 0:21:35.920 and they were interviewed by RKO Radio and then after 0:21:35.920 --> 0:21:37.520 that was time to go to work. It's like five 0:21:37.600 --> 0:21:42.680 PM and Yoko and John leave the Dakota to go 0:21:42.880 --> 0:21:47.199 to the Record Plant, a recording studio, to work on 0:21:47.240 --> 0:21:50.680 a new single called Walking on Thin Ice. This is 0:21:50.720 --> 0:21:53.760