Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's
Speaker 2: Chuck and Jerry's here too, and this is stuff you
Speaker 2: should know.
Speaker 1: That's right. I don't want to give away what this
Speaker 1: one contains, so let's just say it is the strange
Speaker 1: tale of a man named Larry Vader.
Speaker 2: Yes, he went to Great Links to escape Ohio.
Speaker 1: Right, well, you just gave it away. Not really, this guy,
Speaker 1: Lawrence Joseph Bater. He was an Akron native, So shout
Speaker 1: out to my people, my wife's folks, and Akron, Akron,
Speaker 1: Akron Akron, as she says, because of that bridge. If
Speaker 1: you've been through there, you know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 1: He was born in nineteen twenty six to a Catholic,
Speaker 1: pretty well to do Catholic family. His father was a dentist,
Speaker 1: and Lyvia dug up some dirt from a family friend
Speaker 1: who was like, you know, Larry and his brothers and
Speaker 1: sisters were spoil little rich kids. Larry was pretty careless
Speaker 1: with his money because he could just get more anytime
Speaker 1: he needed it. But he was pretty funny, guys, pretty
Speaker 1: fun dude. Had a lot of personality and he used
Speaker 1: to do weird things, like in one of his party tricks,
Speaker 1: would he would he would eat a whole chicken, like
Speaker 1: including the bones.
Speaker 2: Yeah that's special.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but put a pin in that. We're not just
Speaker 1: mentioning that strange factor for no reason.
Speaker 2: No, So he joined the Navy in nineteen forty four.
Speaker 2: I think he left high school to join the Navy
Speaker 2: because the United States was in the grip of World
Speaker 2: War Two and he served for I think a little
Speaker 2: under two years. And when he came back, he graduated
Speaker 2: from high school and he went to the University of Akron,
Speaker 2: but school was just not for him, and he dropped
Speaker 2: out after a semester. Apparently he was known for money
Speaker 2: making schemes more than he was known for acing tests.
Speaker 1: I gotta say, if you're known for money making schemes
Speaker 1: after a semester, you must have been doing a lot
Speaker 1: of money making, well, highly visible money making schemes. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Or you wear a suit that's got dollar dollar signs
Speaker 2: printed all over it. It's a green suit with dollar signs.
Speaker 2: That's another way to become known for money making schemes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's bait. All my suits look like that. You
Speaker 1: know nothing, You threw me off, all right, So he's
Speaker 1: not lasting in college. He didn't last long in the navy.
Speaker 1: But while he was in college, he did accomplish something
Speaker 1: because he got married. He met a woman named Mary
Speaker 1: loud Knapp with a K. They got married nineteen fifty
Speaker 1: two and within five years had three kids, with a
Speaker 1: fourth on the way. And he was doing pretty well
Speaker 1: for himself. He was making the equivalent of about one
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty thousand dollars a year these days as
Speaker 1: a cookwear salesman, and that was about twice the median
Speaker 1: income at the time. So he's doing pretty good. But
Speaker 1: he still had some debts. He had a pretty hefty mortgage,
Speaker 1: He had a new car, and was about two four
Speaker 1: hundred dollars in debt. Basically, you can multiply most stuff
Speaker 1: from this era by ten and arrive at our modern
Speaker 1: conversion rate, so you know, roughly twenty four thousand dollars
Speaker 1: in debt is pretty hefty.
Speaker 2: Yeah. He also like he didn't pay his taxes for
Speaker 2: like five years.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, not good.
Speaker 2: No, And it was bad enough. He was bad enough
Speaker 2: with the bills or behind enough that the milkman apparently said, like,
Speaker 2: I'm not bringing milk anymore until you pay your milk bill.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So the thing is, is this guy, like you said
Speaker 2: family friend from when he was a kid, was like
Speaker 2: he was a rich kid, but he was actually really charming,
Speaker 2: fun to be around, rich kid, And apparently as he
Speaker 2: grew up into an adult, he remained essentially the same.
Speaker 2: Like basically everyone who met him or had something to
Speaker 2: say about him later on basically unanimously said, this guy
Speaker 2: was a good guy. So if he's like cracking under
Speaker 2: the pressure of these bills and this debt, it's not
Speaker 2: showing outwardly to anybody who knew him. One of his
Speaker 2: friends said that he was a red blooded American thirty
Speaker 2: year old family man who liked hanging out and drinking
Speaker 2: beer with friends, and his friends liked hanging around him
Speaker 2: because he was just fun to be around, essentially without
Speaker 2: being like a reckless party animal. He was just fun
Speaker 2: to be around.
Speaker 1: Yeah, just sort of your average fun guy exactly. And
Speaker 1: he was also and put a pin in this, we
Speaker 1: just were not mentioning this for no reason. He was
Speaker 1: also very good at archery, had won some competitions, so
Speaker 1: he was an archery He was a fun guy and
Speaker 1: everything swimming along in his life, making a pretty good living,
Speaker 1: little bit in debt, and then on Wednesday May fifteenth,
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty seven, he had collected some bad payment checks
Speaker 1: from vendors from his business and said, you know what,
Speaker 1: I got to go to Cleveland to kind of clear
Speaker 1: up these bad checks with these vendors. He tells this
Speaker 1: to his wife, Mary Lou who is, keep in mind,
Speaker 1: four months pregnant, and he said, so, I'm going up
Speaker 1: to Cleveland. It's going to be the morning, and then
Speaker 1: I'm gonna probably do a little fishing in the afternoon
Speaker 1: in Lake Erie, and so I'll be home late. And
Speaker 1: she said what any partner should say in that situation,
Speaker 1: which is, maybe you could also come home and be
Speaker 1: a father and husband instead of going fishing after you
Speaker 1: do your work. And he supposedly replied with, yeah, maybe
Speaker 1: I will, maybe I won't. All right, So I'm not
Speaker 1: saying he's some really bad guy. It may have been
Speaker 1: a cheeky response, that may have been how things went
Speaker 1: in their marriage, but he just was a little vague,
Speaker 1: and that will come into play.
Speaker 2: So one of the things he did was he paid
Speaker 2: some bills before he left, and one of those bills
Speaker 2: was a life insurance premium. He had recently adjusted or
Speaker 2: changed the policy to include a nice payout for an
Speaker 2: accidental death. And he whistled as he drove off to
Speaker 2: Cleveland and eventually went to Rocky River, Ohio, which is
Speaker 2: a little town on the Rocky River which flows into
Speaker 2: Lake Erie, and he runted a boat at Eddie's Boat Dock,
Speaker 2: about a half a mile inland from the lake from
Speaker 2: a guy named Lawrence Cott cut leure, yeah, cut lower Yeah. Anyway,
Speaker 2: he paid fifteen bucks from a big roll of bills.
Speaker 2: It's also kind of important. And he said, hey, Lawrence,
Speaker 2: I want you to put some running lights on this
Speaker 2: boat because I'm probably going to be out after dark.
Speaker 2: And Lawrence said, okay, I'll do that, but it's going
Speaker 2: to cost you an extra fiver I'm presuming here at
Speaker 2: this time. And Larry Bader paid it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he paid it, and he was like, all right, whatever, buddy.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: He did notice, and this is stuff that you know.
Speaker 1: They interviewed Lawrence afterward for reasons that we still don't
Speaker 1: know because we're keeping this a secret. Well we know, yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: but he did notice that he had a suitcase with him.
Speaker 1: He thought that was a little bit weird. He said,
Speaker 1: you know, you got a storm coming, you might not
Speaker 1: want to be out there after doc.
Speaker 2: Let us people in Cleveland. Sure it is, and King
Speaker 2: novel about Cleveland.
Speaker 1: So people don't go in there. That's why the Browns play.
Speaker 1: So he warned you about the storm. Uh. He goes
Speaker 1: out on Lake Erie. The coastguard sees him and says, hey, there,
Speaker 1: you know there's a big storm coming in after sunset,
Speaker 1: and I've noticed you have some running lights, so you
Speaker 1: clearly plan on being out after dark. And he was like,
Speaker 1: it's fine, and so they said, all right, go about
Speaker 1: your way. Three hours later, that storm does come in
Speaker 1: and Larry Baier has disappeared. They find the boat the
Speaker 1: next day about five miles away. The life jackets were
Speaker 1: all on board. There was a some scratches like it
Speaker 1: had hit some rocks. There was a bent propeller, and
Speaker 1: some accounts say that it was either a gas line
Speaker 1: had been disconnected or the gas cans were empty, but
Speaker 1: either way, and I guess it's the kind where the
Speaker 1: gas line runs directly into like a gas can. That
Speaker 1: sitting on the boat must have been one of those
Speaker 1: kind of boats. But basically they were like, but nothing
Speaker 1: shows the kind of distress where a human would be
Speaker 1: completely missing, Like it wasn't capsized or sunk or anything
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 2: No, and the life jacket was in the boat.
Speaker 1: You said, right, that's right.
Speaker 2: So that's a really that's so that's a big point
Speaker 2: because the coastguard was like, that was one heck of
Speaker 2: a storm on Lake Erie. There's no way that anybody
Speaker 2: could have survived this. Even a strong swimmer like Larry
Speaker 2: Baiter was known to be without a life jacket.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one of the oars was missing, but you know,
Speaker 1: just do with that what you want, right.
Speaker 2: But the boat was generally in pretty good shape. The
Speaker 2: thing is is like, this is not an uncommon thing,
Speaker 2: Like people drown in Lake Erie pretty frequently. It's a
Speaker 2: great lake. It's a very big lake. And just as
Speaker 2: a little side anecdote, when I was a kid, we
Speaker 2: used to vacation on Kataba Island on Lake Erie, and
Speaker 2: every week we would go there for a week every summer,
Speaker 2: and every time we went, I would have to wait
Speaker 2: on the beach the first half of the week because
Speaker 2: somebody had drowned, and I was convinced that if I
Speaker 2: went in the water, they would their dead body would
Speaker 2: bump up against me, and I just couldn't even bear
Speaker 2: the thought of that. So finally I would watch the
Speaker 2: news every night, and finally when they announced they found
Speaker 2: the missing person. Wow, then I would start to go
Speaker 2: into the lake.
Speaker 1: And you thought, I won't run into that body. Now
Speaker 1: I might become one, but it's worth the.
Speaker 2: Risk, right, yeah, because no one had any business swimming
Speaker 2: in Lake Erie back when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: What do you what's Kataba Island? Like? What do you
Speaker 1: do there?
Speaker 2: Oh? You play mini golf and putt putt?
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: We stayed at this place. It was just like a
Speaker 2: block of like I guess, little condos or apartments or
Speaker 2: something like that. And everybody had beach towels like drying
Speaker 2: over like the railing and it was like on the beach,
Speaker 2: like the sand came up into your little front stoop
Speaker 2: and it was just great. It was one of it.
Speaker 2: I remember my oldest sister went on a date with
Speaker 2: the dude she met there, and they went and saw
Speaker 2: a top secret at the drive in.
Speaker 1: Oh, the vacation date. That's always great, man, that's nice.
Speaker 1: I love young Josh stories, all right, So they looked
Speaker 1: for Larry Bayder for a couple of months. The coast
Speaker 1: guard was like, no one's going to survive that storm
Speaker 1: if they don't have a life jacket, but they looked anyway,
Speaker 1: and they were also were like, well he was a
Speaker 1: strong swimmer though, so it's a little weird that, like
Speaker 1: the boat wasn't that damage and he's just nowhere to
Speaker 1: be found. Some people thought, you know, he had this
Speaker 1: big wad of cash. I don't think, we said, but
Speaker 1: he cashed a four hundred dollars check, so if you
Speaker 1: do the math, you know, that's probably like four thousand
Speaker 1: bucks a lot of dough. So he may have been
Speaker 1: you know, robbed and murdered or something. And also the
Speaker 1: suitcase was gone, so that could also explain that. But
Speaker 1: either way, they said, we just got to put this
Speaker 1: one to rest. And so in nineteen sixty he was
Speaker 1: declared dead and his wife got that forty thousand dollars
Speaker 1: insurance policy and Social Security started rolling in. That's right,
Speaker 1: and I believe that's where we should take a break
Speaker 1: and see what happened to Larry Bader.
Speaker 2: Okay, Chuck, where we last left off, Larry Baters missing,
Speaker 2: he's disappeared, but enough years have gone by, I think
Speaker 2: roughly three that he's officially declared dead. His insurance policy
Speaker 2: has come in, his wife has said, this is what
Speaker 2: you get for telling me. Maybe I will, maybe I
Speaker 2: won't when I tell you not to go fishing. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and if we rewind just a little bit to the
Speaker 2: day that Larry Batter went out on the lake and
Speaker 2: add usually people say about three days zoom on over
Speaker 2: from Lake Erie over to Omaha, Nebraska. When we sit
Speaker 2: down at a little bar called the Round Table Bar
Speaker 2: in Omaha, what we will see on May eighteenth, nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty seven, as a guy walk in and his name
Speaker 2: is John Johnson. Take it, Chuck.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 1: I was so busy trying to work up a Saturn
Speaker 1: joke about that eight hundred miles, but I couldn't do
Speaker 1: it in time.
Speaker 2: Well wait, if you can, I'll give you an hour.
Speaker 1: Eight hundred miles between Omaha and Acri and roughly one
Speaker 1: third the size of the distance between. And then I
Speaker 1: couldn't remember what it was on Saturday.
Speaker 2: The Cassini Division.
Speaker 1: That Cassini Division.
Speaker 2: So that's not a joke. That's making fun of my
Speaker 2: hard work.
Speaker 1: I know. So here's what happens. Three days after Larry
Speaker 1: Bader disappears, eight hundred miles away, a dude shows up
Speaker 1: in Omaha at the Round Table Bar. He said his
Speaker 1: name was John Johnson. He said, I got this driver's
Speaker 1: license here, it's got my name on it. I was
Speaker 1: a fourteen year veteran of the Navy. It's a Navy license,
Speaker 1: as you'll see. I got out because of a bad back.
Speaker 1: And I go by the name Fritz. And there was
Speaker 1: a bartender there named Betty who said he was a
Speaker 1: really well dressed guy. He clearly had money. He was
Speaker 1: really sort of fascinating and charming. He asked me out
Speaker 1: like thus second he met me, which is I assume
Speaker 1: what you do if you three days after you have
Speaker 1: left your wife and soon to be four kids. Oh well,
Speaker 1: probably ask out the first woman you see. Well we have.
Speaker 2: I haven't said it yet, but okay. John Johnson bore
Speaker 2: a really striking resemblance to Larry Bader.
Speaker 1: Also, yeah, I mean, didn't people see that coming.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean now they do.
Speaker 1: Okay, So this guy, John Johnson aka Fritz, gets a
Speaker 1: job not there, but at Ross's Steakhouse. And basically it
Speaker 1: was like, hey, I came from an orphanage in Boston.
Speaker 1: There were twenty two boys in this orphanage. They named
Speaker 1: us all john Johnson and gave us all nicknames so
Speaker 1: they could tell us apart instead of just naming us
Speaker 1: different things. It's very strange, but they called me Fritz
Speaker 1: because I reminded them of a character from a comic,
Speaker 1: The Kats and Jammer Comic, Cats and Jammer Kids Comic.
Speaker 1: Different times during that period, he also would say that
Speaker 1: his navy buddies thought his haircut made him look like
Speaker 1: a German soldier, so he went by Fritz. But either way,
Speaker 1: this is some new dude in town, and he was like,
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, the talk of Omaha.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Betty Johnson's impression was not isolated. Apparently, people who
Speaker 2: met Fritz Johnson felt essentially the same way that she did.
Speaker 2: Like he was a cool dude that you wanted to
Speaker 2: be around. Debonair, you could say. But he also was
Speaker 2: a bit of a character. And by a bit, let
Speaker 2: me just say that he bought a hearse and rearranged
Speaker 2: the back so that it was like a little lounge
Speaker 2: area for him when he picked up women on dates.
Speaker 2: And I saw one place but it was a legitimate source,
Speaker 2: like a contemporary newspaper article that said that it he
Speaker 2: had somehow gotten it licensed with the city as a
Speaker 2: hunting vehicle. Can you imagine anything more nineteen fifty seven
Speaker 2: than that nineteen fifty seven bachelor?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean he was an avid hunter.
Speaker 2: That is not what he was going for.
Speaker 1: You think it? Is it? I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 2: Yes, you don't put a lounge area in the back
Speaker 2: of your heart for dead deer.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, I know. But do you think he
Speaker 1: had it licensed as a hunting vehicle because like he
Speaker 1: was hunting ladies and he just want to be able
Speaker 1: to tell people that yes I do. Okay, I don't agree.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's fine, but either way with UPI buddy.
Speaker 1: He's an eccentric dude. He wears a leather beret. His
Speaker 1: apartment apparently was just a bunch of like beanbags and
Speaker 1: throw pillows. He had champagne parties, he had Sime's fighting fish.
Speaker 1: He was an archer. He said, you know, I hurt
Speaker 1: my back, and so archery really helped strengthen the back,
Speaker 1: and so I took up archery. And then five weeks
Speaker 1: later he's won a state championship in Nebraska and then
Speaker 1: one's thirteen I believe twelve more thirteen total archery titles
Speaker 1: in the state, and at parties would do the eat
Speaker 1: the whole Chicken, including the bone.
Speaker 2: Trick and the last three listeners.
Speaker 1: That's right, so's he's working at the bar, but he
Speaker 1: butties up with a guy that works at a radio
Speaker 1: station kbo IN, and he lets him come in there
Speaker 1: to kind of just monkey around because he was interested
Speaker 1: in broadcasting. And he's monkeying around enough to where he
Speaker 1: figures it out and deers himself like he seems to
Speaker 1: be doing to everybody gets a job as a DJ
Speaker 1: reading the news.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I want to just backtrack a little bit and
Speaker 2: specifically say there was nobody in any interview or any
Speaker 2: article that I read about this who seemed to think
Speaker 2: that Fritz Johnson was a creep or like a jerk,
Speaker 2: or like a sicko or anything like that. I know,
Speaker 2: he kind of painted him a little questionably, but there
Speaker 2: doesn't seem to be anybody who had any kind of
Speaker 2: weird vibes from him at all. He was just a
Speaker 2: fun guy to be around and just living up the
Speaker 2: bachelor life. Apparently he was saying like I spent you know,
Speaker 2: my youth and an orphanage having to listen to the
Speaker 2: people who ran the place tell me what to do.
Speaker 2: I spent fourteen years in the Navy listening to them
Speaker 2: tell me what to do. And now I'm finally free.
Speaker 2: I'm living it up. So that's essentially I think the best,
Speaker 2: the best way to paint his character is that he
Speaker 2: was living it up his newfound freedom.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure he and we can talk about some
Speaker 1: more of his plamboyants, just because it's simply really funny
Speaker 1: and interesting. When he wrote a personal check to someone,
Speaker 1: he would sign it Fritz only, and then he wouldn't
Speaker 1: put it in a date. I don't know why I
Speaker 1: love this so much. He wouldn't put a date. He
Speaker 1: would just put a season. So he would write a
Speaker 1: check to someone on the date of, you know, autumn,
Speaker 1: and then he would just sign it Fritz.
Speaker 2: Isn't that weird that they would catch I.
Speaker 1: Think it's well, it's a nineteen fifties. I guess stuff
Speaker 1: like that would happen. It was also the nineteen fifties,
Speaker 1: so you could collect your tip money as a bartender
Speaker 1: in a milk bottle and then just go hand that
Speaker 1: milk bottle to the uncounted to the person working at
Speaker 1: the bank and fill out the deposit slip one court
Speaker 1: of money. And I'm sure they thought, oh, he's such
Speaker 1: a character, but like, now I got to count on
Speaker 1: the stuff. Yeah, thank good, lot, dude.
Speaker 2: Yeah, every time he made that deposit, he think to himself,
Speaker 2: are you going to withhold the milk deliveries?
Speaker 1: H yeah exactly.
Speaker 2: So one of the other things that he was known
Speaker 2: for is being a little unkind to friends who were
Speaker 2: engaged or married or about to get married. He was like,
Speaker 2: marriage is just another way to trap a fella. Yeah,
Speaker 2: whoever gets married is a sap. Probably said something.
Speaker 1: Along those lines, that old thing.
Speaker 2: And then a few years after he appeared in Omaha
Speaker 2: in nineteen sixty one, he got married. Yeah, he got
Speaker 2: married to a model named Nancy Zimmer who was twenty
Speaker 2: one at the time, and she had a daughter from
Speaker 2: her first marriage. She said later that they were just
Speaker 2: too young, and not only did Fritz Johnson adopt her daughter,
Speaker 2: they also had their own son. So he had a
Speaker 2: family all of a sudden, within just a couple of years.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So he's working part time at the radio station,
Speaker 1: eventually works full time there and then transfers over to
Speaker 1: TV when he got a job at k E TV,
Speaker 1: the local affiliate there, eventually getting promoted up to sports
Speaker 1: director and also on the side, he was advising, like consulting,
Speaker 1: I guess for archery companies because he was just so
Speaker 1: good at it.
Speaker 2: And he's like, well, maybe consider making the arrows straight.
Speaker 1: And it's MARCHERI at the camp. We took a big
Speaker 1: family trip with a bunch of families, and I got
Speaker 1: the archery set out and it was quite fun and
Speaker 1: I'm a pretty good shot.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, any bulls eyes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was hitting some bulls eyes on the rag.
Speaker 1: And I've never even done much archery. It just seems intuitive,
Speaker 1: you know, just kind of hold it steady and aim
Speaker 1: at the thing and then let it go.
Speaker 2: You're like, I'm just as surprised as any of you.
Speaker 1: I really was.
Speaker 2: How far away though, are we talking like five feet?
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know what standard archery is. I
Speaker 1: was shooting I bet from about probably from about thirty
Speaker 1: five feet would be my guest.
Speaker 2: Oh that is good man.
Speaker 1: I don't know what standard is. But everyone's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I can come up here on the time and do this.
Speaker 1: I was like, I actually never do this. I'm just
Speaker 1: good at it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you just have to say that out loud with
Speaker 2: every shot.
Speaker 1: I know, like, don't compliment me because you think I've
Speaker 1: worked at.
Speaker 2: This, right, this is all blind luck.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: Speaking of blind luck, one of the other things that
Speaker 2: kind of made Fritz Johnson a noted character around town
Speaker 2: is that he ended up donning an eyepatch. And he
Speaker 2: was one of those eyepatch wears who really needed one
Speaker 2: because they found a tumor behind his eye, I think
Speaker 2: his left eye, and to remove the tumor, they had
Speaker 2: to permanently remove his left eye. So he wore an
Speaker 2: eye patch rather jauntily from what I can tell, and
Speaker 2: that just made his legend even more so, Like one
Speaker 2: of the local lod TV announcers now wears an eye
Speaker 2: patch with his little pencil thin mustache and everybody just
Speaker 2: loves the sky so much.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you something, Uh, are you saying that
Speaker 1: there are people who wear eye patches just for attention
Speaker 1: that don't need them?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I've never met one, but yes, I'm
Speaker 2: sure those people out there there that's I mean, they're
Speaker 2: they're the same people who wear glasses. That's how they start.
Speaker 2: It's the gateway. Drug is like wearing glasses that you
Speaker 2: don't actually work.
Speaker 1: You know that I did that? I know? Are you well?
Speaker 2: The ipatch were waiting to happen.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I hope someone writes in that knows somebody
Speaker 1: or maybe that even did that for a time. If
Speaker 1: you did this in middle school, you get a pass
Speaker 1: like it seems like something John Hodgman might have done
Speaker 1: in middle school.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, for sure. But yeah, also not as
Speaker 2: a pirate. You can't be dressed as a pirate of no, no, no,
Speaker 2: just be like normal street clothes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, amazing, that's the rules. Should we take our now?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I think there's no other place to take our
Speaker 2: second break on this?
Speaker 1: All right? We got another big reveal coming up right
Speaker 1: it for.
Speaker 3: This all right?
Speaker 1: So I promised a big reveal. Things are going great
Speaker 1: for old Fritzy. He's in a town, he's scoring with
Speaker 1: the ladies in the back of a hearse, he's eating
Speaker 1: chickens through the bone and people think it's the best
Speaker 1: thing you've ever seen. He's on TV, for goodness sakes,
Speaker 1: with an eye patch.
Speaker 2: Can I say one more thing about the chicken eating thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like, how do you eat bones? No?
Speaker 2: I mean I can get that if you cook a
Speaker 2: chicken enough, like it can.
Speaker 1: Be just dissolve it sort of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Okay, the thing is this that's not a party
Speaker 2: trick that you do quickly. People don't have to stand
Speaker 2: around you for possibly dozens of minutes while you do
Speaker 2: this trick.
Speaker 1: So everybody watch this right.
Speaker 2: Stop what you're doing and come over and quietly watch me,
Speaker 2: like it takes a real showman to hold people's interest
Speaker 2: while you're eating a whole chicken.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean the only party trick I ever did
Speaker 1: is that thing with the hat against the wall, and
Speaker 1: that takes like two seconds. M.
Speaker 2: I don't know what that is.
Speaker 1: You put a like a baseball cap on backwards and
Speaker 1: then you can kind of get up against a wall
Speaker 1: and then you act like you're blowing your cheeks out,
Speaker 1: and what you're doing is putting the brim against the
Speaker 1: wall such that the hat kind of levitates off your
Speaker 1: head like you're blowing it off your head.
Speaker 2: Oh that's I want to see that. Why have you
Speaker 2: never done that for me?
Speaker 1: Hey, buddy, next time I see you. The only I
Speaker 1: mean I haven't done it for years because I refuse
Speaker 1: to put a baseball cap on backwards because I'm a
Speaker 1: human adult. But I'll do it for you.
Speaker 2: Okay, thank you.
Speaker 1: Okay. The guys out there with their hat on backwards, right,
Speaker 1: they were like, what's wrong? Is that not cool? No,
Speaker 1: it's not.
Speaker 2: My only party trick was holding my breath until I fainted.
Speaker 1: Right, Did you ever do that?
Speaker 2: Yeah? We used to do that where you'd hold your
Speaker 2: breath like you bend over and hyperventilate yourself and take
Speaker 2: that last breath, cross your hands or your chest, and
Speaker 2: your friend just push as hard as they could on
Speaker 2: your chest and you just faint.
Speaker 1: I did it once, and this is something you should
Speaker 1: not do. It's dangerous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I shouldn't have that tone of voice right now.
Speaker 1: But like it was super fun. Yeah, actually pass out?
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah I did one time. And that was the
Speaker 1: only time I had ever passed out up into that point,
Speaker 1: and it was very, very strange.
Speaker 2: It was very strange. I remember feeling like I was
Speaker 2: dropping in on a halfpipe on a skateboard. As I went,
Speaker 2: oh cool, I was kind of like, this is all right.
Speaker 2: We didn't do it long.
Speaker 1: Yeah, do not try this. It is such a bad idea.
Speaker 1: I can't believe we were even talking about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we should probably edit this out. Yeah, I'm sure
Speaker 2: Jerry will with her responsibleness all right.
Speaker 1: So, like I said, he's living his best life. Then
Speaker 1: on February second, nineteen sixty five, a guy who knew
Speaker 1: John Bader disappeared. Man saw Fritzy at an archery demonstration
Speaker 1: at a Sporting Good show in Chicago and was like,
Speaker 1: that's Larry Bater, Like I would bet my life on it.
Speaker 1: And his niece lives nearby, and I know this, so
Speaker 1: I'm going to call her. She's twenty one years old,
Speaker 1: her name is her name is Susannah. She drives over
Speaker 1: and she's like uncle Larry basically pretty much.
Speaker 2: Yeah. He quote was pardon me, but aren't you my
Speaker 2: uncle Larry Bater, who disappeared seven years ago. Yeah, and
Speaker 2: he was like ho ho ho, no, I'm not go away.
Speaker 2: Actually supposedly he was super polite, yeah, but was quite
Speaker 2: insistent that they had the wrong person.
Speaker 1: He said, would you like to see my hearse? Right?
Speaker 1: But the.
Speaker 2: Resemblance was enough that then Susannah turned around and called
Speaker 2: hers Larry's brothers, and they I think got on the
Speaker 2: phone with this guy, and his voice enough convinced them
Speaker 2: that they should fly out to Chicago. They flowted Chicago.
Speaker 2: Suddenly this guy's like, man, I wish I didn't have
Speaker 2: to work this convention. People are surrounding me and telling
Speaker 2: me I'm another person, and so to kind of settle
Speaker 2: the whole thing, he's like, how about this, Well, let's
Speaker 2: go get my fingerprints taken. And they were like, that's
Speaker 2: a capital idea because our brother was in the Navy too,
Speaker 2: so his records, his fingerprints will be on record. So
Speaker 2: they went to the local police department, they took his fingerprints,
Speaker 2: They handed him over to the FBI. The FBI compared
Speaker 2: him to the Navy fingerprints on record of Larry Batter
Speaker 2: and the FBI looked up and said, this is a
Speaker 2: perfect match.
Speaker 1: That's right. So Fritzi said, it came as a literal
Speaker 1: physical shock. He said, I don't know anything about that
Speaker 1: other fellow, and he said, why would I have to
Speaker 1: give my fingerprint? I felt like I was trying to
Speaker 1: get some scam, new double life and new identity, Like
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have gotten fingerprinted. It seemed genuinely like he
Speaker 1: didn't know and didn't realize this. He's like, I've got
Speaker 1: all these memories, I remember the orphanage, I remember growing
Speaker 1: up as Printz Johnson that you're saying these memories are
Speaker 1: all fake and this is really starting to bum me out,
Speaker 1: to be quite honest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like, if he knew he was hiding from his
Speaker 2: family and he was found at this sporting goods convention,
Speaker 2: he would have shot like a smoke bomb tipped arrow
Speaker 2: at the floor and then it vanished as the smoke
Speaker 2: just choked everyone out.
Speaker 1: Oh I could literally smell that. I was so in
Speaker 1: that scene.
Speaker 2: But he didn't do that, and it is a really
Speaker 2: significant thing, Like he so not only remember if he
Speaker 2: was Larry Bader who had assumed a new identity to
Speaker 2: agree to fingerprints is a dumb move to begin with,
Speaker 2: but he could have been calling a bluff or something
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: Who knows maybe. But he also didn't have It wasn't
Speaker 1: like he had some awful family life like everyone. By
Speaker 1: all accounts, he liked. He liked his wife and kids
Speaker 1: and enjoyed being around them as much as any dad
Speaker 1: did in the nineteen fifties. I'm not saying he was doting,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't like, oh, God, I hate these kids,
Speaker 1: and my wife's a real drag.
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah, it didn't make sense.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's a little bit in debt, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: like his world was crumbling down around him such that
Speaker 1: he had to escape. It was all debt that he
Speaker 1: could get out of with a little bit of work.
Speaker 1: So none of this was making any sense.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 2: Plus, also one other thing, Chuck, if you're on the
Speaker 2: run and a new with a new identity, usually the
Speaker 2: last thing you do is become a local TV personality
Speaker 2: and a largish city in the United States.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let me see if the largest city.
Speaker 2: I said, a largish Oh.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh man, that's not what I know.
Speaker 2: The largest city in Nebraska.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so none of this is adding up. He Yeah,
Speaker 1: you would want to keep a low profile, so it
Speaker 1: didn't make sense.
Speaker 2: Well, put, I think that was much more succinct than
Speaker 2: my whole jam Uh.
Speaker 1: No, I liked it. The whole Omaha thing was great.
Speaker 1: So he hires an attorney, a guy named Harry Farnham.
Speaker 1: This attorney gets a team of psychologists on board. They
Speaker 1: examine Larry and test him along with the neurologists. Over
Speaker 1: about a week and a half. The you hypnosis on him.
Speaker 1: They're like, we can't see anything medically wrong with this guy.
Speaker 1: It doesn't seem like a scam back home, Mary is,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Mary lou Is. She gets this news and
Speaker 1: she was like, Oh, I mean, I'd kind of moved
Speaker 1: on with my life. I'm I'm engaged to somebody new
Speaker 1: who I've been dating for a few years. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: I can't like I'm a good catch, Like I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna like divorce Larry, Who's seems to be back in
Speaker 1: my life now.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Initially she said that she wished she'd never been
Speaker 2: he'd never turned up again, that they had gotten used
Speaker 2: to life without him, they'd accepted that he died, And yes,
Speaker 2: she moved on and now all of a sudden her life.
Speaker 2: To say it was complicated is a real understatement, Like
Speaker 2: a handful of people's lives were ruined when that guy,
Speaker 2: the acquaintance of Bader saw Fritz Johnson at that sporting
Speaker 2: goods convention, like ruined. Not only do you have like
Speaker 2: Mary lou Fritz slash Larry, Larry's wife, Nancy, their kids,
Speaker 2: you also have like the nameless fiance that was engaged
Speaker 2: to marry Lou like people's lives were completely upended by
Speaker 2: the news of this, and apparently the whole time, Fritz
Speaker 2: Johnson is like, this makes zero sense to me, But
Speaker 2: the FBI said that my fingerprints matched this other guy,
Speaker 2: and everybody else from Akron is telling me that I'm
Speaker 2: this other guy. I think I'm Fritz Johnson. But he
Speaker 2: was resigned, resigned himself to be like, maybe maybe this
Speaker 2: is right, maybe they're right. He wasn't just he didn't
Speaker 2: deny it the whole time, and he did not seem
Speaker 2: fishy at any point. He was also more than willing
Speaker 2: to talk to the press as this was going on,
Speaker 2: but he was not an attention hound.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, not at all. So Mary, all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: her life is up ended with you know, every regional
Speaker 1: news outlet is banging on her door. The insurance company
Speaker 1: was like that forty grand which will be four hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars in twenty twenty four, basically life changing money,
Speaker 1: we're gonna need that back, although social Security payments, we're
Speaker 1: gonna need that back. Even Eddie and his boat rental company,
Speaker 1: it's like, you owe us for boat damages. Johnson Fritzi.
Speaker 1: You know he loses that job, the TV station fires him,
Speaker 1: he gets that marriage annulled, He moves into a YMCA
Speaker 1: it starts working at the bar again, making one hundred
Speaker 1: bucks a week, and he's sending money to Mary Lou
Speaker 1: and Nancy, and I'm think keeping about what like seventy
Speaker 1: or thirty bucks for himself to live on, And it's
Speaker 1: just it's upheable everywhere you look.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So a few months later, it's funny
Speaker 2: she waited a few months. Mary Lou took her for
Speaker 2: kids and they went to meet him in Chicago, I guess,
Speaker 2: like a neutral city, and they spent the weekend together
Speaker 2: and she told the press later that she was like,
Speaker 2: he's a great guy, good with the kids, but we're
Speaker 2: strangers to him, so it was a bit of an
Speaker 2: awkward weekend. Essentially, the thing is is she didn't really
Speaker 2: have a choice now, Like she was a Catholic, like
Speaker 2: you said, she didn't believe in divorce, and now her
Speaker 2: husband was all of a sudden back, so she has
Speaker 2: to figure out how to work him back into her
Speaker 2: life and their kids' lives as minimally disruptive as possible,
Speaker 2: and she's just completely just lost. By this time, Nancy
Speaker 2: Also she was saying, you know, I'm going to stand
Speaker 2: by my husband Fritz. At some point she even said,
Speaker 2: I'm willing to go back to work to help pay
Speaker 2: Mary lou child support if he's going to stay with me.
Speaker 2: But it just did not. It didn't work out as well.
Speaker 2: So Nancy took her kids and kind of went back
Speaker 2: into the background to leave Fritz to deal with this
Speaker 2: whole Akron thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the whole Akron thing. Yeah, I mean, and as kids,
Speaker 1: I don't think we mentioned their ages. They were two,
Speaker 1: four to six and unborn when he disappeared, So maybe
Speaker 1: that six year old has a memory. The others probably
Speaker 1: had not even any memory of former dad.
Speaker 2: Right. So again, he's not denying this. He's saying, I
Speaker 2: don't get this. This doesn't make sense to me. But
Speaker 2: he's not like he stopped denying it after the fingerprint thing,
Speaker 2: but not like a oh you caught me kind of thing.
Speaker 2: He seemed genuinely baffled by this. There's a really good
Speaker 2: kind of Like one of the authoritative articles on this
Speaker 2: whole thing that was written by the Akron Bacrin Journal
Speaker 2: in September nineteenth sixty five.
Speaker 1: Beacon, Beacon, what did I say Akron Beacrin, the Akron.
Speaker 2: Beacon journal I say it like a local.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: And it's funny because the journalist who wrote this clearly
Speaker 2: had just read Hell's Angels by Hunter Thompson was trying
Speaker 2: his hand at it. So like the whole the whole
Speaker 2: thing starts in this jet flight that he's on on Omaha,
Speaker 2: it ends on the jet flight too, and like he's
Speaker 2: talking about them walking through the town to the YMC.
Speaker 2: It's just like he wrote himself into this this article.
Speaker 2: And it was just kind of funny to see.
Speaker 1: The drugs started to gig in around barstow Right, But
Speaker 1: what are you doing in barstow Right?
Speaker 2: But there was a quote in there that stood out
Speaker 2: to me that Fritz Johnson told this guy. He said,
Speaker 2: I've begun to think that God might solve the problem.
Speaker 2: And it turns out who was right because later he
Speaker 2: died from cancer.
Speaker 1: Wow, I did not see that quote. Here's just the tip,
Speaker 1: don't I'm not a big superstitious guy, but if you
Speaker 1: believe stuff like that, don't say it out loud.
Speaker 2: Right. You don't want to tempt God to kill you.
Speaker 1: No, because he'll do it just for.
Speaker 2: Laughs, just to show you whose ball.
Speaker 1: September sixteenth, nineteen sixty six is when he died. Did
Speaker 1: you say it was the tumor?
Speaker 2: No, I said cancer, he moved to his liver.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, that tumor came back, passed away. First
Speaker 1: Methodist Omaha had a memorial for him. Then he was
Speaker 1: transported back to Akron buried in his family plot. And now,
Speaker 1: how many of these explanations do you want to go over?
Speaker 1: Because I almost feel like we should just skip to
Speaker 1: the one that you dug up that sounds the most
Speaker 1: plausible to me.
Speaker 2: I agree wholeheartedly. There was just one other thing I
Speaker 2: want to say about his two funerals in Omaha. The
Speaker 2: funeral was given for Fritz Johnson and Akron the funeral
Speaker 2: was given for Larry Bader, but it was the same body.
Speaker 2: They moved from one city to the other.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 1: That is super cool and a nice little footnote. But
Speaker 1: like we said, there were some theories that don't seem
Speaker 1: to hold water about different kinds of amnesia. But then
Speaker 1: you did some digging, and then I went back and
Speaker 1: did some further digging once you gave me what you
Speaker 1: dug And it seems like a lot of people on
Speaker 1: the Internet, and of course these are Internet people, so
Speaker 1: it's not like science isn't studying this. It's just sort
Speaker 1: of one of those things that's left to smart people
Speaker 1: on Reddit. But what the general consensus seems to be
Speaker 1: on the Internet is that he suffered from what is
Speaker 1: known as a disassociative fugue, which is a very strange
Speaker 1: syndrome in which you can have very very sudden, really
Speaker 1: significant retrograde memory loss that can't be attributed to like
Speaker 1: being hit on the head really hard or something like.
Speaker 1: Other kinds of amnesia can be explained away in other ways,
Speaker 1: and this one can't.
Speaker 2: Right, yes, fugue state, I mean, it's basically like they
Speaker 2: are describing what happened to them. But the essentially what
Speaker 2: happens is get you have this amnesia, but it wipes
Speaker 2: out your episodic memory, your biographical memory, and to the
Speaker 2: point where you accidentally inadvertently move away from home. Depending
Speaker 2: on how long it lasts, you're going to travel fairly
Speaker 2: far away from home. When you get to where you're going,
Speaker 2: you're going to set up a new life, the new identity,
Speaker 2: make new relationships, and you're not going to have any
Speaker 2: memory whatsoever of the life that came before this. That's
Speaker 2: a fugue state. And apparently it is actually real. I
Speaker 2: looked all over for like, like fake, this is made up.
Speaker 2: It's not correct, Like this is a crackpot theory that
Speaker 2: some psychologists came up with.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 2: Dissociative fugue is a widely accepted, very very rare medical
Speaker 2: condition that they do not know how to explain. There's
Speaker 2: a struggle between neurology and psychology. Your psychiatry. Is it
Speaker 2: brain based or is it like a break from some
Speaker 2: traumatic experience? And apparently it usually is prompted by some
Speaker 2: negative experience, but it's not something like seeing your family killed.
Speaker 2: It can be something like being twenty four hundred dollars
Speaker 2: in nineteen fifty seven dollars in debt and stressed out
Speaker 2: from that.
Speaker 1: Or I mean, here's what I think. I think it
Speaker 1: could that whole boat trip and fishing expedition was just
Speaker 1: on the level and that's really just what he was doing.
Speaker 1: He had all that cash and the briefcase, the suitcase
Speaker 1: because maybe he just didn't want to keep that stuff
Speaker 1: in the car, and he went out in a really
Speaker 1: bad storm and had a traumatic event happen out there,
Speaker 1: like maybe being tossed overboard. I think that could have
Speaker 1: been the stressful event. So that's one thing. Another thing, too,
Speaker 1: is when this disassociative fugue ends, you will probably remember
Speaker 1: your real life, but you're not going to remember what
Speaker 1: happened in the fugue state. My explanation there is that
Speaker 1: he died of a tumor, so that might have happened
Speaker 1: to him given enough time, and he just died before
Speaker 1: that memory of the real life came back to him.
Speaker 2: So I guess kind of what you're saying is he
Speaker 2: died in a fugue state, like he never emerged from
Speaker 2: the fugue state.
Speaker 1: Huh, Yeah, that's my theory.
Speaker 2: Okay, I think that's a pretty good theory. Actually, I mean,
Speaker 2: it does seem like he was not malingering, he was
Speaker 2: not faking. This was not a con. It's a just
Speaker 2: genuine mystery because also, like he just checks so many
Speaker 2: boxes for a fugue state, but it's just it usually
Speaker 2: goes on for what weeks or months, right, not years?
Speaker 1: I don't know, that's what I don't know.
Speaker 2: That's what I saw that really, yeah, but that in
Speaker 2: that time, you're so convinced of your new identity that
Speaker 2: you can form relationships that now all of a sudden
Speaker 2: are jeopardized around the rocks because you don't remember these
Speaker 2: people anymore, and you're like, what am I doing in Omaha?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Well when did he die in nineteen sixty six?
Speaker 1: And when in.
Speaker 2: Nineteen sixty five?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it was only like a year, right, I
Speaker 1: mean that seems plausible for what little I know about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, hopefully we figure out more about fugue states, because
Speaker 2: then we'll understand a little more about Larry Batter And
Speaker 2: if we don't, then we're never going to know what happened,
Speaker 2: Like it's just a mystery.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this could I was wondering if this could be
Speaker 1: a movie, if there's enough there, and then I decided
Speaker 1: it probably couldn't be a movie, but it could be
Speaker 1: like probably like a ten part Netflix show.
Speaker 2: A ten hour long movie, yeah, with tons and tons
Speaker 2: of archery montages.
Speaker 1: Oh man, so many?
Speaker 2: So you got anything else about Larry Bater?
Speaker 1: I got nothing else? Thanks to Olivia. This is an interesting one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks a lot. Well how'd you hear about this?
Speaker 2: I meant to ask you.
Speaker 1: That I am convinced I know that this came from
Speaker 1: a listener, but I could not find it anywhere an email,
Speaker 1: so I don't think it did. Actually, I think I
Speaker 1: might have just been searching for, like, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of crazy story.
Speaker 2: Or something, or it came to you in a fugue state.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe I'm not even Chuck Bryant.
Speaker 2: Well, Chuck seems like he's having an autobiographical crisis right now,
Speaker 2: and that of course unlocks listener mail.
Speaker 1: I'm going to call this rare shout out. We don't
Speaker 1: really give shout outs on listener mail because we get
Speaker 1: inundated with people saying like, Hi, can you say my
Speaker 1: sister's name? But we're going to grant this one because
Speaker 1: it is for a nana and we'd like to honor
Speaker 1: the nanas.
Speaker 2: Of the one.
Speaker 1: Hey, guys, hope this message find you well reaching out
Speaker 1: to request a shout out for Nana. My nana. She's
Speaker 1: such a huge fan of you both. Every time I call,
Speaker 1: she always mentioned your show, and you would think you
Speaker 1: guys are family members. If you get into her car,
Speaker 1: the bluetooth speaker automatically starts playing an episode. Your show
Speaker 1: has brought her so much joy over the years and
Speaker 1: kept her sharp. At the age of eighty one and
Speaker 1: has given us something to connect over. Because Nana's high
Speaker 1: praise has got me hooked as well.
Speaker 2: It's awesome.
Speaker 1: For the last few years, she's always dreamed of going
Speaker 1: to one of your live shows, but it's never worked out.
Speaker 1: Now with her age, it would be difficult for her
Speaker 1: to travel to any future potential shows. Mi, Nana is
Speaker 1: the most important person in my life, and I know
Speaker 1: it would mean the world to hear a message from you. Guys.
Speaker 1: It might be a shot in the dark, but I
Speaker 1: thought it would try. Thanks for your time and for
Speaker 1: considering the request. And that is from Nori Shl's or Shalis.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how you pronounce it, but Nana, we
Speaker 1: just want to say thank you and you're great and
Speaker 1: we appreciate you. And I'm not sure where you live.
Speaker 1: Maybe either you or Nori can write in and we
Speaker 1: can find out kind of how close you are and
Speaker 1: get you to a show somehow. Maybe we'll go do
Speaker 1: one at your house or something.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was going to say the same thing. A
Speaker 2: show in Nana's living room. That'd be fun, especially if
Speaker 2: it's an Omaha. I've always wanted to see beautiful Omaha.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't that be something well.
Speaker 2: Thanks a lot, Nana, thank you very much for not
Speaker 2: only listening to us all this time, but also for
Speaker 2: turning Nori on to us. That's pretty great stuff. And
Speaker 2: if you want to be like Nori and tell us
Speaker 2: about your awesome grandparent, we want to hear about them.
Speaker 2: You can wrap it up, spank it on the bottom,
Speaker 2: and send it off via email to Stuff Podcasts at
Speaker 2: iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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