WEBVTT - Introducing: The Devil You Know with Sarah Marshall 0:00:03.800 --> 0:00:06.040 Hey, everybody, I want to share something special with you 0:00:06.080 --> 0:00:08.520 this week. It's an episode of a new podcast I'm 0:00:08.520 --> 0:00:12.320 pumped about, called The Devil You Know. In the nineteen 0:00:12.360 --> 0:00:15.360 eighties and nineties, Satan and his followers were accused of 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:20.000 brainwashing children, sacrificing babies, and infiltrating North American society on 0:00:20.040 --> 0:00:24.280 a massive scale. Yet these thousands of alleged Satanists were 0:00:24.280 --> 0:00:27.520 nowhere to be found. Even so, the narrative became embedded 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:31.240 in our cultural memory, wharping everything at touched, including the 0:00:31.280 --> 0:00:34.000 lives of innocent people, and it never quite died out. 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:37.960 You may know Sarah Marshall as the host of You'r Wrongabout. 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:41.120 In her new show, The Devil You Know, she explores 0:00:41.120 --> 0:00:43.880 the tangled web of the Satanic Panic, a journey that 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:47.080 will take you everywhere from Victoria, BC to rural Kentucky 0:00:47.080 --> 0:00:49.800 to San Antonio, Texas. This is a show about the 0:00:49.800 --> 0:00:53.800 people who experienced the Satanic Panic in real time, the believers, 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:57.840 the skeptics, the bystanders, the wrongfully convicted. What was it 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:00.480 like to be a psychologist told to look for Satanists? 0:01:00.560 --> 0:01:04.560 In every case? A mother slowly recovering memories of supposed 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:10.160 satanic abuse, a teenager accused of conspiracy to murder. The 0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:13.479 stories of these eyewitnesses point us toward the real underlying problems, 0:01:13.920 --> 0:01:16.600 and you can probably guess the problem wasn't the Satanists, 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.559 but us. Okay, here comes the episode. You can find 0:01:20.600 --> 0:01:22.800 the devil, you know wherever you get your podcasts. 0:01:29.240 --> 0:01:31.839 I didn't have any clue what that was all about, 0:01:31.880 --> 0:01:35.000 but now our teacher made it clear that I should 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:36.559 get the hell out right away. 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:43.440 This is Diane. She's a photographer. Diane is not her 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:46.440 actual name, but what I've given her for her privacy 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:49.320 and also in honor of one of my favorite women 0:01:49.360 --> 0:01:51.760 of the eighties, Diane on Cheers. 0:01:52.760 --> 0:01:58.320 I'm an artist, photographer, designer, art educator, digital designer, and more. 0:01:59.360 --> 0:02:02.320 Diane was telling me about a project she was working 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:04.080 on in the late nineteen eighties. 0:02:04.760 --> 0:02:07.200 I planned and I arrived in the full. 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:10.000 It had her traveling around Kentucky. 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:13.560 I wasn't staying permanently then, but I was there to 0:02:13.680 --> 0:02:16.960 kind of establish the program, find a place to live, 0:02:17.400 --> 0:02:18.960 and kind of get things going. 0:02:20.440 --> 0:02:24.240 She was photographing locals and also teaching them photography. 0:02:25.560 --> 0:02:28.080 The first time I went, we had this little after 0:02:28.160 --> 0:02:31.760 school club of girls who were really interested in photography 0:02:31.760 --> 0:02:35.640 and very enthusiastic. And they went home and told their families, 0:02:35.960 --> 0:02:39.680 and their families were really friendly, and they were inviting 0:02:39.720 --> 0:02:42.760 me over for dinners and stuff. So when I left 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:46.360 there the first time after a two week residency, I 0:02:46.440 --> 0:02:48.560 left with a really warm place in my heart for 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:50.079 the town and its people. 0:02:51.120 --> 0:02:55.960 She worked with people of all ages, including local high schoolers. 0:02:56.280 --> 0:02:59.520 That's what brought her to this particular small town. 0:03:00.200 --> 0:03:02.560 So it was a pretty old town. It was really 0:03:02.600 --> 0:03:05.520 scenic and beautiful, kind of nestled in the hills or 0:03:05.639 --> 0:03:07.079 maybe there were mountains. I don't know. 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:11.360 But before Diane could really settle in and get to work, 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:15.120 something happened that made her want to get the hell 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:17.119 out of Dodge. 0:03:17.320 --> 0:03:19.560 And the art teacher turned to me, looked at me 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:24.440 real seriously, and he said leave right away. So I did. 0:03:26.600 --> 0:03:30.000 I mean? I arrived in the town hopeful and optimistic, 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:34.720 ready to like work hard and do good work. Yeah, 0:03:34.760 --> 0:03:38.640 And when I left, I couldn't drive fast enough. It 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:42.000 was just pedal to the metal. I just couldn't put 0:03:42.160 --> 0:03:46.480 the miles between me and that place fast enough. I 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:48.600 didn't know if I'd end up in a jail or 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:51.400 if I would end up, you know, thrown in a cave. 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:57.760 Diane, a stranger in a small town, had unwittingly become 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:01.040 the target of a conspiracy. 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:04.440 You know. At the time, I remember hearing about, you know, 0:04:04.600 --> 0:04:07.680 pentagrams on the floor of barns and all kinds of 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:10.680 stuff like that. I mean, I thought maybe it could happen, 0:04:10.800 --> 0:04:14.840 but I really didn't believe it. Where could all these like, 0:04:15.520 --> 0:04:18.200 all of a sudden, all these devil worshipers pop up. 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:26.320 What happened to Diane was a microcosm of a larger 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:31.680 conspiracy sweeping the nation throughout the nineteen eighties. It was 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:36.679 a conspiracy about a conspiracy. It was a story where 0:04:37.120 --> 0:04:44.240 rumor became panic, and eventually that panic became legend. That 0:04:44.320 --> 0:04:47.960 legend has always fascinated me. But to see it only 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:50.479 from the distance of the present is to not see 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:54.400 it at all. The grand sweep of the narrative turns 0:04:54.440 --> 0:04:58.360 it into something that happened to a country or a culture. 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:03.640 But that also means it happened to individuals, and each 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:09.880 of them saw something a little different. I thought, could 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:12.520 this have happened? You know, I mean, it questioned it 0:05:12.560 --> 0:05:14.359 because it's like we had such a strange childhood. 0:05:14.360 --> 0:05:17.240 Anyways, the first version of it was that this was 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:19.960 somehow wrapped up in the mafia. And then the next 0:05:19.960 --> 0:05:22.359 iteration I heard was that there were some group of 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:25.599 people at the school called the Group, especially some goth people. 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:28.480 I remember two days later, maybe even a day later, 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:30.760 I received a call from Detective Majeca. 0:05:30.920 --> 0:05:32.800 You know, would you come in and come and talk 0:05:32.839 --> 0:05:33.240 to me or. 0:05:33.320 --> 0:05:35.760 I'm sure you know I have nothing to hide. 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:40.520 Unfortunately, that was the worst thing I could have ever done. 0:05:40.880 --> 0:05:44.120 So what did it look like to the individuals who 0:05:44.200 --> 0:05:47.080 got caught up in this panic, often in ways that 0:05:47.120 --> 0:05:51.280 they could never have imagined. Today, we're going to see 0:05:51.279 --> 0:05:54.800 it through Diane's eyes. Come with me as I traced 0:05:54.839 --> 0:06:01.000 the development of one small strange rumor, a rumor involving 0:06:01.520 --> 0:06:08.880 virgin sacrifice, grave robbing, and Patrick Swayzee. I'm Sarah Marshall, 0:06:09.440 --> 0:06:22.720 and this is the devil you know, Welcome to the eighties. 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:28.520 Here's what's in legwarmers, Madonna, phones that look like Star Wars, 0:06:28.720 --> 0:06:32.919 trili gy and government initiative. Michael J. Fox, the de Laureate. 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:40.960 I'm Gohay Fox, Si Cha Koozi vcrgumic, cyndy, lauper, aquanett, fishnets, 0:06:41.400 --> 0:06:44.440 and also apparently Satanism. 0:06:45.040 --> 0:06:47.320 Good morning everyone, I'm Richard chair and welcome to people 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:49.560 are talking on this Monday. We are live on Television 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:52.440 Hill and as you know by watching previous programs on 0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:55.599 people are talking that Satanism seems to be on the 0:06:55.720 --> 0:06:58.920 rise here in the United States. 0:06:57.960 --> 0:07:02.880 People, especially Americans. We're getting this information not from the fringes, 0:07:03.400 --> 0:07:07.360 but from mainstream sources like local morning news shows and 0:07:07.760 --> 0:07:11.840 unnationally syndicated daytime talk shows like the Uprah Winfrey Show. 0:07:12.280 --> 0:07:14.880 In every state in the nation, authorities are investigating some 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:19.200 form of what they call botanic activity, which is covinar. 0:07:19.280 --> 0:07:24.160 Reportedly, people also heard these stories on primetime news, like 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:27.640 in this investigation by ABC's twenty twenty. 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:33.000 Dardling sobering results of a twenty twenty investigation, Satanism, devil 0:07:33.040 --> 0:07:35.800 worship is being practiced all across the country. 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:40.320 We have all types of perversion going on as. 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:48.040 Affecting America, perverse hideous acts, DeFi belief, suicides, murders, and 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:51.280 the ritualistic slaughter of children and animals. 0:07:52.800 --> 0:07:55.880 Satan has been in North America for a long time, 0:07:56.720 --> 0:08:01.680 at least according to some, began to enjoy a new 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:06.600 level of notoriety. In the nineteen sixties and seventies, Anton 0:08:06.680 --> 0:08:09.720 Levy was freaking people out with his Church of Satan 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:13.640 in San Francisco, a church that, if you read the literature, 0:08:14.120 --> 0:08:18.480 was about worshiping not Satan, but yourself and your ability 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:22.960 to do whatever you wanted. The public reeled from news 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:25.960 of the Manson family murders in the wake of their 0:08:26.040 --> 0:08:30.000 nineteen sixty nine crime spree, a case in which teenage 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:33.040 girls ran away from home and ended up in the 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:36.959 thrall of a man who commanded them to kill. Surely, 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:42.240 just some guy couldn't be responsible for such horrific crimes. 0:08:42.760 --> 0:08:47.080 Surely it had to be Satan, and members of the 0:08:47.080 --> 0:08:51.120 growing evangelical Christian movement began arguing that the Age of 0:08:51.160 --> 0:08:56.120 Aquarius was really affront for Satan. One day you're reading 0:08:56.160 --> 0:09:00.840 a horoscope, the next day you're sacrificing a goat. But 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:04.160 it's hard to know if Satan would have become quite 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.800 the American obsession he was if he hadn't also been 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:10.600 such big business. 0:09:13.000 --> 0:09:17.000 Satan his father, that guy, he came up from Hell 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:19.199 and beget a son, a mortal woman. 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:24.360 Pale Haydans his father and his name is Adrian. 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:29.640 That was Rosemary's Baby from nineteen sixty eight. It established 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:32.920 a market for devil movies, and there was no devil 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:37.400 movie bigger than The Exorcist in nineteen seventy three, which 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:40.280 told the story of an adolescent girl possessed by a 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:44.280 demon and the two noble Catholic priests who saved her 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:44.960 from evil. 0:09:45.840 --> 0:09:47.880 An excellent day an excitator. 0:09:48.840 --> 0:09:53.560 But this pervasive fixation on Satan, both religious and secular, 0:09:54.040 --> 0:09:57.520 achieved a new level of urgency in the nineteen eighties. 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:02.360 Now stories of Satan tanic activity were no longer just 0:10:02.480 --> 0:10:06.920 in the movies. They were happening in your very own town, 0:10:07.920 --> 0:10:09.680 or at least that was what people were saying. 0:10:13.600 --> 0:10:16.640 And we have essentially in a moral panic, a somewhat 0:10:16.880 --> 0:10:23.520 regressive movement that it's trying to restore old moral lines 0:10:23.800 --> 0:10:27.320 or old cultural habits, you know, kind of like the 0:10:27.360 --> 0:10:32.360 good old days, that the social change was really threatening 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:33.160 to upend. 0:10:34.559 --> 0:10:38.440 That is Mary to Young, professor emeritus of sociology at 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:42.640 Grand Valley State University. And according to Mary, many of 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:47.040 these fears tend to center around children and teenagers. And 0:10:47.080 --> 0:10:51.200 the harms that might befall children, both physical and moral. 0:10:53.600 --> 0:10:56.200 I mean, there was a lot of anxiety about what 0:10:56.400 --> 0:10:59.240 was going on in the family during that period of time. 0:10:59.600 --> 0:11:02.160 That was it's one of the sources of social stress. 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:06.440 There was a higher rate of divorce, a higher rate 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:11.080 of what were referred to them as non traditional families. 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:15.240 We also were dealing with the consequences of a recession. 0:11:15.760 --> 0:11:19.040 We had more and more women going to work, and 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:24.160 you had a lot of social commentators who were talking 0:11:24.840 --> 0:11:28.360 with one degree of expertise or another about what the 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:35.080 consequences were of so called latch key children and unsupervised children, 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:40.280 and children, particularly boys who were not growing up with fathers. 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:43.559 And is there this idea that the nuclear family must 0:11:43.559 --> 0:11:47.560 stay together to word off Satanists and therefore, you know, 0:11:47.920 --> 0:11:48.880 don't get divorced? 0:11:49.600 --> 0:11:49.800 Right? 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:53.440 Well, you know, historically, the family has always been the 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:58.360 moral foundation of society. And when you begin changing that 0:11:58.480 --> 0:12:04.360 moral foundation, and consequentially, other things are going to happen 0:12:04.520 --> 0:12:08.240 that are either going to, depending on your belief system, 0:12:08.920 --> 0:12:14.400 invite evil influences however you define evil, or somehow make 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:17.439 it much more difficult to resist those. 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:23.280 This panic across the board was one whose proponents and 0:12:23.320 --> 0:12:27.520 alleged victims were largely white and middle class, in part 0:12:27.559 --> 0:12:30.640 because it affected white America the way so many moral 0:12:30.679 --> 0:12:34.880 panics do by giving a monstrous face to the changes 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:38.400 that the future might bring. Those accused of being in 0:12:38.480 --> 0:12:41.920 league with the devil were, as you might imagine, a 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:45.560 more diverse group than their accusers. The weight of false 0:12:45.640 --> 0:12:50.160 accusations fell most heavily, as always, on those without the 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:54.920 money or the power to crawl out from under them. 0:12:55.559 --> 0:12:58.640 It feels like so many structural problems can be ignored 0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:02.079 when we say, well, these things. Bad outcomes happen because 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:04.800 people wake up in the morning and sort of dis direction, 0:13:04.920 --> 0:13:08.000 do their affirmations and are like, I'm evil. I'm going 0:13:08.040 --> 0:13:09.680 to do something evil today. 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:16.880 Right right? I mean, throughout history, there's always been something, someone, 0:13:17.240 --> 0:13:22.040 some group of people, some ideology, whatever that's been labeled 0:13:22.200 --> 0:13:28.200 as evil and evil. The word itself is an extremely 0:13:28.400 --> 0:13:34.320 powerful word. Throwing it into a sentence really begins to 0:13:34.440 --> 0:13:38.880 change the whole narrative about the problem that you're taking 0:13:38.920 --> 0:13:39.520 a look at. 0:13:40.880 --> 0:13:44.119 De Young tells a story where the Satanic panic emerged 0:13:44.440 --> 0:13:48.200 not just from the fears of everyday people, but from 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:50.359 a whole class of professionals. 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:55.640 All of a sudden, we had experts popping up on Satanism, 0:13:55.960 --> 0:14:01.640 on cults, on Satanic cults, even on ritual abuse, which 0:14:01.760 --> 0:14:04.600 was a brand new term. 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:08.480 Self appointed experts who could tell you how to find 0:14:08.520 --> 0:14:12.280 evidence of Satanism in a patient or at a crime scene, 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:17.040 and who turned around and trained more experts, who trained 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:24.840 more experts. Across North America, social workers and therapists were 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:28.480 urged to look for the devil in their client's memories, 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:33.200 and teachers, parents and children were told that secret Satanic 0:14:33.320 --> 0:14:38.200 messages were hidden in heavy metal songs, comic books, and games. 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:44.200 Virtually every state that I've taken a look at has 0:14:44.360 --> 0:14:49.520 had its own version of the Satanic panic. For example, 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:53.760 in Kentucky, where rumors that were going around that a 0:14:53.880 --> 0:14:58.920 Satanic cult was going to kidnap blonde haired, blue eyed 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:04.040 girls and sacrifice them meant that on one day in 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:09.120 one community in Kentucky, four hundred and fifty kids were 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:13.440 kept out of school by their parents. That's a manifestation 0:15:13.920 --> 0:15:15.880 of a belief system. 0:15:16.680 --> 0:15:18.760 By the time we got to the late eighties, the 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:22.760 idea that Satan and his followers have infiltrated North America 0:15:23.160 --> 0:15:28.160 is thoroughly embedded in our culture. Satanists, you are told, 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:32.720 are a threat to your children, your town, your country. 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:36.120 And out of all this fear come people who are 0:15:36.160 --> 0:15:40.920 primed to look for Satanists whenever something a little bit 0:15:41.040 --> 0:15:42.840 out of the ordinary occurs. 0:15:43.880 --> 0:15:49.520 I found training sessions where hundreds of Kentucky police officers 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:55.720 were attending training sessions on Satanic ritual abuse in what 0:15:56.000 --> 0:16:00.480 was generically referred to as a cult crime. You begin 0:16:01.200 --> 0:16:05.080 to look at those kinds of relationships again, and you 0:16:05.120 --> 0:16:07.640 see that you can have a community that really is 0:16:07.840 --> 0:16:12.200 primed for an allegation, prime to believe it, prime to 0:16:12.600 --> 0:16:17.200 proceed on it as if it were a credible allegation. 0:16:29.400 --> 0:16:32.440 Rumors of devil worship have spread like wildfire across a 0:16:32.520 --> 0:16:35.960 large section of eastern Kentucky, stumping police officers who have 0:16:35.960 --> 0:16:38.600 fielded thousands of telephone calls from terrified line. 0:16:38.400 --> 0:16:41.480 Satan worshippers are looking for blonde, blue eyed children to 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:44.920 kill in a sacrifice to the devil. Some versions implicate 0:16:45.040 --> 0:16:46.600 vacuum cleaner salesman. 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:51.119 Vandals painted six sixty six Satan rules and occult symbols 0:16:51.160 --> 0:16:52.000 in the city park. 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:54.680 Similar incidents or of a portacle on the floor of 0:16:54.680 --> 0:16:57.160 a mobile home the defendants are alleged to have used 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:01.280 for Satanic ceremonies. The words Satan rules were inscribed outside 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:03.359 a circle around their time months. 0:17:03.040 --> 0:17:05.760 Noble met with parents who were considering keeping their children 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:07.800 home because of fears of devil worshippers. 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:11.320 Videotapes and books on the occult were confiscated, along with 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:12.800 some heavy metal rock tapes. 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:16.440 The rumors during migrated into Leslie, clay, Lee, and Ousley 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:19.680 Counties to the southwest, and Wolf, Powell and mcgoffin counties 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:20.120 did All. 0:17:20.080 --> 0:17:22.600 Of the law enforcement officials surveyed last week said they 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:26.440 believe the stories were false. Most agencies reported investigating the 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:29.000 rumors and finding no supporting evidence. 0:17:29.119 --> 0:17:33.200 The state journal Frank the Messenger Inquirer owned the Louisville Courier, 0:17:33.280 --> 0:17:37.920 Kentucky New Era Lexington Herald Reader September twelfth, nineteen eighty eight. 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:46.600 September nineteen eighty eight, that is the very same month 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:51.360 a certain photographer travels to rural Kentucky. Remember our friend 0:17:51.440 --> 0:17:53.920 Diane from earlier when. 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:55.480 We were at school. We had a lot of fun 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:59.800 just running inside and outside because in the pinhole cameras 0:18:00.119 --> 0:18:03.119 called you could only put one film in at a time, 0:18:03.240 --> 0:18:05.560 so you would load it up in the dark room, 0:18:05.720 --> 0:18:08.240 run outside, take a picture, and then run back into 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:10.439 the dark room and develop it. You know, it was 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:14.280 this frantic, great release of energy as opposed to sitting 0:18:14.359 --> 0:18:16.119 in one of those little school desks. 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:19.560 You know, for hours, she was working in small towns 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:24.160 across the state teaching photography to kids and teenagers. 0:18:26.160 --> 0:18:29.520 I was part of an artist grant program through the 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:34.720 Kentucky Arts Council, So as one of those artists, I 0:18:34.760 --> 0:18:37.960 packed up my car with all kinds of photo gear 0:18:38.520 --> 0:18:41.680 and I would travel around the state doing these residencies. 0:18:42.240 --> 0:18:44.719 I think most of them were about two weeks. The 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:47.399 town would like find a place for you to stay, 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:49.479 and you know, you were just kind of on your 0:18:49.560 --> 0:18:53.359 own with the students and the specific group of teachers 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:58.080 or one teacher. Maybe I would show up with dozens 0:18:58.080 --> 0:19:01.960 of cardboard boxes that the students would make into cameras 0:19:02.400 --> 0:19:07.040 and then photograph with them, and we made school newspapers 0:19:07.240 --> 0:19:11.160 where they would write and publish their photos. We made 0:19:11.160 --> 0:19:15.520 photo books and had exhibits, and we made videos where 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.879 they would write the story and star in it and 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:21.320 dance in it. And they'd write original music. 0:19:21.960 --> 0:19:24.920 What was it like to be working with teenagers artistically 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:28.800 and specifically working with young adults in that part of 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:30.160 the country in that time. 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.480 Once they were on board with it, they really got 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:38.320 inspired by it, which I really enjoyed because it's so 0:19:38.440 --> 0:19:43.960 hard to sometimes get people interested or teenagers interested. But 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:47.280 I think it was so different than regular school for 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:50.280 them that they kind of latched onto it. It was 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.000 a real for them. It was a real opportunity I 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:57.000 had for years after. Some of the teenagers writing me 0:19:57.119 --> 0:20:01.280 and sending me photos and you know, asking me questions 0:20:01.359 --> 0:20:05.600 because they just wanted to keep going with it. So 0:20:05.680 --> 0:20:09.399 that was pretty amazing. I think most people were happy 0:20:09.440 --> 0:20:12.560 to have a visitor that was going to like shed 0:20:12.680 --> 0:20:14.080 light on something brand new. 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:21.359 I'm curious about what this town was like, what it 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:23.480 was like to drive into it, and kind of what 0:20:23.600 --> 0:20:26.439 it you know, the experience of it. 0:20:26.440 --> 0:20:29.280 It was pretty small, but when you drive in, you know, 0:20:29.320 --> 0:20:32.960 you see hills and beautiful scenery. It's like one road 0:20:33.040 --> 0:20:37.439 through the town and some other little neighborhoods around. The 0:20:37.480 --> 0:20:40.480 woman who was the teacher that I stayed with initially, 0:20:41.000 --> 0:20:45.560 she was living in the old one room schoolhouse and 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:49.040 she used to find like arrowheads in the front yard. 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:52.399 Was there like, was it like a dairy queen town? 0:20:52.600 --> 0:20:53.280 Was there like a. 0:20:53.800 --> 0:20:56.760 Yes, there was this. There was this great dairy queen 0:20:59.200 --> 0:21:02.400 and I was always just amazed there was this. One 0:21:02.440 --> 0:21:04.320 of the kids had a baby and they would put 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:07.879 the baby through the order window, you know, place their orders. 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:09.600 They would like push the baby. 0:21:09.280 --> 0:21:11.760 Through and you have to hold the baby upside down 0:21:11.840 --> 0:21:14.919 like a blizzard to make sure that he's thick enough. Yeah. 0:21:15.840 --> 0:21:18.040 Yeah, maybe. 0:21:18.880 --> 0:21:19.120 Yeah. 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:22.080 It was like a one everything town, one doctor, one 0:21:22.160 --> 0:21:25.840 dairy queen, one movie theater. I was staying at a 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:30.320 local motel. The doctor across the street. He offered a 0:21:30.400 --> 0:21:33.120 room in his building. I could use it as a 0:21:33.160 --> 0:21:36.840 studio slash dark room, and I'd run around the town 0:21:37.119 --> 0:21:39.840 as I was doing all this, meeting people, and when 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:42.600 I did, i'd tell him about the project, and with 0:21:42.680 --> 0:21:45.880 their permission, I would photograph them, and I was using 0:21:45.960 --> 0:21:49.560 a Polaroid camera so I could give them the photo. 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:55.840 The outcome was always really friendly, and in doing my recognisance, 0:21:55.880 --> 0:21:58.480 I scheduled a meeting with the high school principal and 0:21:58.600 --> 0:22:02.159 the high school art teacher. Day came for our meeting 0:22:02.160 --> 0:22:09.000 and I met the principal. I thought it went fine, 0:22:10.240 --> 0:22:13.000 and then I went to meet with the our teacher, 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:17.520 and halfway through our meeting, the principal's voice booms out 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:21.040 of the loud speaker and he said, if anyone sees 0:22:21.119 --> 0:22:26.159 the photo woman, escort to my office immediately. And the 0:22:26.280 --> 0:22:28.800 art teacher turned to me, looked at me real seriously, 0:22:28.840 --> 0:22:32.480 and he said leave right away. 0:22:32.640 --> 0:22:33.360 So I did. 0:22:36.520 --> 0:22:39.600 But during her drive through town, Diane spots a friend 0:22:39.800 --> 0:22:41.240 traveling in the opposite direction. 0:22:42.160 --> 0:22:45.160 I was thinking of finding her anyway, but our paths 0:22:45.280 --> 0:22:48.040 crossed in our cars, and so we stopped. You know, 0:22:48.119 --> 0:22:50.680 people used to, like in a small town that'd stop 0:22:50.680 --> 0:22:53.760 in Mill Street and have a conversation. So we kind 0:22:53.760 --> 0:22:56.120 of stopped in the mill Street and you know, going 0:22:56.160 --> 0:22:59.439 in two different directions, and rolled down our windows and 0:22:59.520 --> 0:23:02.600 I told what had just happened, and she looked at 0:23:02.640 --> 0:23:08.000 me and she said, leave town right away. She said, 0:23:08.080 --> 0:23:14.679 people have disappeared or are disappeared, like abducted, and often 0:23:15.240 --> 0:23:17.800 end up in nearby caves or mines, never to be 0:23:17.880 --> 0:23:23.320 heard from again. So then I really freaked out. And 0:23:23.680 --> 0:23:25.800 she said it in such a way too, that I 0:23:26.040 --> 0:23:28.359 knew it was no joke, you know, And It wasn't 0:23:28.400 --> 0:23:32.760 like a horror film where you might just stay anyway, 0:23:33.040 --> 0:23:36.879 you know. So I was really shocked and upset. I 0:23:36.920 --> 0:23:40.080 went back to the motel and I just grabbed all 0:23:40.119 --> 0:23:42.480 my stuff and threw it in the car and left. 0:23:42.520 --> 0:23:47.119 And for some reason, I remember, like for some reason, 0:23:47.160 --> 0:23:51.360 I decided to change my shirt, and I wasn't hysterical, 0:23:51.440 --> 0:23:56.080 but I was definitely panicky, because I remember I had 0:23:56.119 --> 0:23:59.679 the hardest time trying to button the buttons. Later, I 0:23:59.680 --> 0:24:02.200 found doubt that the sheriff was waiting for me in 0:24:02.320 --> 0:24:06.199 the principal's office, and later I found out that he 0:24:06.320 --> 0:24:08.560 had just missed me at the motel. 0:24:09.080 --> 0:24:09.399 Wow. 0:24:09.440 --> 0:24:12.600 So I was just so glad that I had left. 0:24:12.640 --> 0:24:14.560 I didn't know if I'd end up in a jail 0:24:14.760 --> 0:24:17.239 or if I would end up, you know, thrown in 0:24:17.280 --> 0:24:17.680 a cave. 0:24:21.200 --> 0:24:24.320 When okay, and so you got out of town, and 0:24:24.359 --> 0:24:27.359 so where did you had? Two? From there? 0:24:28.200 --> 0:24:30.600 I just drove back to Cincinnati the next day, and 0:24:31.000 --> 0:24:35.720 you know, nobody here really really understood. And my phone 0:24:35.760 --> 0:24:39.800 started ringing off the hook, just constant phone calls from 0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:44.040 all kinds of different media, including like People magazine, and 0:24:44.080 --> 0:24:46.840 all these people just kept calling and calling and calling 0:24:47.880 --> 0:24:49.639 I really didn't even know what to say. I was 0:24:49.640 --> 0:24:54.400 still trying to process what happened and why. But yeah, 0:24:54.440 --> 0:24:57.760 that's when I found out what I was being accused of. 0:24:57.880 --> 0:24:58.720 Or you know. 0:25:01.480 --> 0:25:04.880 I've been fascinated by Diane's story ever since I stumbled 0:25:04.920 --> 0:25:07.520 across it. I first saw it in a book from 0:25:07.560 --> 0:25:12.160 the eighties about police officers who became experts in cult crimes. 0:25:12.760 --> 0:25:14.879 So when I finally got the chance to sit down 0:25:14.920 --> 0:25:19.600 and talk with her, I had to read her this passage. 0:25:19.680 --> 0:25:24.320 A Cincinnati photographer traveled through rural Kentucky taking photographs under 0:25:24.320 --> 0:25:28.119 a grant from the Kentucky Arts Council. By coincidence, quote, 0:25:28.200 --> 0:25:31.400 rumors that devil worshippers were searching for blonde, blue eyed 0:25:31.480 --> 0:25:36.040 victims for sacrifices reached the town from surrounding counties about 0:25:36.040 --> 0:25:40.560 the same time. The photographer, however, had taken photographs of children, 0:25:40.640 --> 0:25:43.560 prompting the rumor quote that a woman was taking pictures 0:25:43.560 --> 0:25:48.160