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Speaker 1: You're listening to American Shadows, a production of iHeartRadio and

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Speaker 1: Grimm and Mild from Air and Manky.

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Speaker 2: The letters continued to show up, just as they always had.

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Speaker 2: They arrived in all sizes and colors, perfumed and sealed

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Speaker 2: with kisses. The male had always managed to follow Ted

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Speaker 2: from place to place. The envelopes were a welcome window

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Speaker 2: into another world, a vehicle for escapism for the amount

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Speaker 2: of time it took his eyes to scan the pages.

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Speaker 2: They were made up of gentle missives and sweet nothings,

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Speaker 2: words of adoration and declarations of love, marriage proposals. They

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Speaker 2: were one of the most meaningful parts of his long days.

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Speaker 2: He felt good reading them powerful. Even those who saw

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Speaker 2: him every day shook their head at this guy, they

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Speaker 2: thought were they envious? Perhaps to them all of his adoration.

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Speaker 2: This reverence was a horrifying idea, indeed, but Ted loved

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Speaker 2: the attention. He had always been good at getting it.

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Speaker 2: People were drawn to him by all accounts. He was

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Speaker 2: a catch, a charismatic law school graduate, and a family

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Speaker 2: man to boot. And Ted's face greased the paper's front

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Speaker 2: pages and just about every magazine cover at the checkout line,

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Speaker 2: even from the page, His eyes were arresting, his face handsome,

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Speaker 2: But it was this same veneer of normalcy that chilled

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Speaker 2: the American public. He inspired obsession, yes, but also fear

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Speaker 2: he was a killer. Two hundred and fifty reporters showed

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Speaker 2: out to broadcast the first televised American murder trial, his

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Speaker 2: murder trial. But alongside these reporters were thrown of women

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Speaker 2: clamoring for his attention. And after Ted Bundy was sentenced

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Speaker 2: to die, his jailhouse confessions only made him more popular.

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Speaker 2: The stream of letters turned into a cascade. The terror

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Speaker 2: that Ted wrought across the nineteen seventies had been replaced

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Speaker 2: with a different emotion, desire. He was inarguably one of

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Speaker 2: the most popular inmates bound for the electric chair, but

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Speaker 2: he wasn't alone in stirring passions. This wasn't a new phenomenon,

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Speaker 2: but it was certainly noteworthy. For as long as people

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Speaker 2: have been incarcerated, they've had fans on the outside. But why.

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Speaker 2: Psychologists have long been fascinated by this question, and what

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Speaker 2: is it about these prisoners, men and women alike that

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Speaker 2: turned them from nightmare into fantasy? There are few hypotheses.

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Speaker 2: They have to do with brain chemistry and the stories

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Speaker 2: that we tell ourselves about love. Romantic love is made

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Speaker 2: up of chemicals. It's a potent cocktail of oxytocin and

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Speaker 2: dopamine that hijacks our nervous system and throws our reality

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Speaker 2: into tumil effectively, when we fall in love, we're under

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Speaker 2: the influence of drugs. Scientists have watched it light up

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Speaker 2: brain scans of the newly in love and broken hearted alike.

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Speaker 2: Some have even gone so far as to categorize love

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Speaker 2: as a kind of mental illness. Plato famously called out

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Speaker 2: all those years ago that love is madness. When we're

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Speaker 2: falling in love, we're overcome with potential, with the idea

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Speaker 2: of who someone is, or who we think they are,

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Speaker 2: and who we might be with them. In the case

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Speaker 2: of jail house romances, especially one that will end in

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Speaker 2: the electric chair, there's little opportunity to move the relationship

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Speaker 2: beyond the courtship phase. It can be drawn out, installed

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Speaker 2: in this space for a very long time, longer than

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Speaker 2: a general would be on the outside. The senses are heightened,

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Speaker 2: Every exchange is loaded with meaning. Because this connection isn't

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Speaker 2: rooted in a collection of shared experiences. The participants engage

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Speaker 2: in elaborate world building. The relationship, then, is really a

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Speaker 2: fiction of the participant's design. It's a complicated approach to

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Speaker 2: finding love, but there are countless people every year who

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Speaker 2: choose this avenue through any number of dating services catering

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Speaker 2: to exactly this. And as history tells us, pining for

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Speaker 2: forbidden love is the raw material from which some of

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Speaker 2: history's greatest works have been born. But romantic love is

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Speaker 2: fleeting in any lasting relationship. It's the shortest lived phase.

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Speaker 2: The heat eventually cools as the mechanics of life set in.

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Speaker 2: The shine tarnishes, the sparkle dulls. The prolonged exposure between

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Speaker 2: people breeds famili filiarity. This familiarity breeds comfort, but it

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Speaker 2: can also breed something else, contempt. There's a lot of

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Speaker 2: disappointment in our quests for love. When the story that

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Speaker 2: lays out in front of you is different than the

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Speaker 2: one you had imagined, the one you had wished for,

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Speaker 2: the results can be devastating or even deadly. I'm Lauren Vogelbaum.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to American Shadows. Nanny was nursing another headache. She

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Speaker 2: stood at her kitchen counter, rubbed her temples and folded

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Speaker 2: her cake batter together. They had come to her ever

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Speaker 2: since her childhood accident. They had been with her for

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Speaker 2: decades now, plaguing her during her days and well into

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Speaker 2: her nights. She didn't sleep well. Even still, she really

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Speaker 2: tried hard to be a good mother, a good wife.

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Speaker 2: But sometimes and it still perplexed her as to why

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Speaker 2: it just wasn't enough. Maybe she thought she wasn't enough.

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Speaker 2: Her ideas about romance had been engineered early on her blueprint.

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Speaker 2: The way she had come to understand what real love

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Speaker 2: was was through romance. Literature, novels, and magazine columns were

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Speaker 2: her drugs of choice. For years, she had been studying

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Speaker 2: these stories, searching for some real proximity to the love

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Speaker 2: she dreamed of, the love that she hoped would someday

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Speaker 2: be hers. It certainly wasn't modeled well by her parents,

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Speaker 2: and Nanny's father was a fearsome man, quick to anger

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Speaker 2: and didn't hesitate to show it. He was cruel to

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Speaker 2: his wife and children and kept the reins on his

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Speaker 2: family tight. It was surprising then that he allowed Nanny

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Speaker 2: to marry Charlie Bragg's, a local Alabama boy, when she

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Speaker 2: was fifteen. Her romance novels had set her expectations high

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Speaker 2: for what this love would be, what shape it would take,

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Speaker 2: what it would feel like, and who she would become,

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Speaker 2: But the practicalities of loving someone weren't something Nanny had

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Speaker 2: ever considered. The teenage couple started off happy, as most do,

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Speaker 2: and in time started a family, But as the sparks

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Speaker 2: began to fizzle out and the mundanities of everyday life

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Speaker 2: began to set in, Nanny became agitated. Charlie's wandering eye

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Speaker 2: had started to get the best of him, but Nanny

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Speaker 2: was certainly no angel herself. Even with four children. She

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Speaker 2: began to wander off for periods of time. She was

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Speaker 2: searching for that state of limerence, that new relationship electricity

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Speaker 2: that would make her feel special. The love that she

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Speaker 2: had always yearned for never seemed to be an impossibility,

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Speaker 2: if only she continued to make her own opportunities. Charley's mother,

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Speaker 2: Peggy Jane, who lived with them for some time, loathed

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Speaker 2: her daughter in law. Nanny had never met her high

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Speaker 2: standards of care for her son, and less so when

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Speaker 2: she began seeing other men. Peggy Jane saw how Nanny

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Speaker 2: and Charley fought, but was still reluctant to admit her

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Speaker 2: son's complicity in his wife's unhappiness. Things only got worse

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Speaker 2: when two of their children died. Charlie would later say

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Speaker 2: that they were sleeping only to suddenly be dead. No

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Speaker 2: one could wake them. He claimed that their little bodies

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Speaker 2: had both turned black by the time the undertaker came

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Speaker 2: to get them. This horrified the household and shocked the community.

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Speaker 2: What could have happened to two perfectly healthy children. Their

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Speaker 2: health insurance policies covered some, but not much, of the

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Speaker 2: expenses for the funerals and the upkeep of the rest

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Speaker 2: of the young family. Charley didn't believe in such policies himself,

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Speaker 2: but it seemed that Nanny did. At the funerals, Nanny

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Speaker 2: cut a stunning figure in her mourning attire, a vision

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Speaker 2: in black. She had always been beautiful, but in this

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Speaker 2: moment of grief, standing calm surrounded by family, she was

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Speaker 2: almost admirable. But Peggy Jane, who had long been privy

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Speaker 2: to Nanny in her moods, wasn't buying any of it.

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Speaker 2: She warned Charlie that something was amiss. This woman, who

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Speaker 2: had played an iron fisted role in Nanny and Charlie's

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Speaker 2: marriage began to shrink. Peggy Jane began to fear her

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Speaker 2: own daughter in law and warned her son to be careful.

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Speaker 2: Though Nanny was an excellent cook, maybe he should be

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Speaker 2: careful about eating what she fed him. Charlie wouldn't have

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Speaker 2: to be careful for long, though, as they soon divorced.

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Speaker 2: Nanny had started going off further and for longer, and

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Speaker 2: after eight years, they decided to permanently part ways. This

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Speaker 2: was a choice Charlie later said that probably saved his life.

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Speaker 2: Nanny reached for a baking dish and dusted it with

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Speaker 2: flour into it, she poured the batter for one of

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Speaker 2: her signature cakes, slices of which won her many hearts.

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Speaker 2: In recent times, she had gotten into the habit of

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Speaker 2: romancing with sweets. A way to a man's heart is

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Speaker 2: through his stomach, they say, and she liked to include

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Speaker 2: pretty paper wrapped baked goods in her correspondence. The mailman

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Speaker 2: had recently begun delivering fat stacks of letters again now

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Speaker 2: that she was back on the market. The Lonely Heart's

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Speaker 2: personal ads and the men who she found there were

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Speaker 2: never in short supply, and Nanny figured all she needed

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Speaker 2: to do was keep looking for her soulmate. He was

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Speaker 2: out there, and she would find him, no matter the cost.

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Speaker 2: In nineteen twenty nine, Nanny received a letter signed by

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Speaker 2: a man named Frank Harrelson. It said that he sent

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Speaker 2: her a poem and a photo of himself, and she

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Speaker 2: sent a photo back in kind. He replied by showing

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Speaker 2: up at her doorstep. And what he found, it's believed,

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Speaker 2: was better than he could have imagined. There was beautiful Nanny,

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Speaker 2: a cherubic face with dimples on her cheeks, and she

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Speaker 2: was sweet and gentle, a young, responsible mother looking for

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Speaker 2: her match. He began sending chocolate and flowers, sweet notes,

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Speaker 2: and big promises. Within two months, she and her girls

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Speaker 2: had moved with him to a plot of land in Alabama,

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Speaker 2: where Nanny intended to begin anew Nanny was utterly besotted.

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Speaker 2: Here was the gentleman, a real prince charming. It seemed

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Speaker 2: that she had always deserved. She had finally found him.

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Speaker 2: If Charlie was a trial run, he had indeed prepared

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Speaker 2: her for Frank. Frank's old habits didn't take long to

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Speaker 2: catch up to him. It had had a lifelong affinity

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Speaker 2: for the bottle a habit that came back full force

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Speaker 2: after the two had become legally bound. His heavy drinking

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Speaker 2: soon began to tarnish the luster of Nanny's perfect vision

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Speaker 2: for herself. For her entire life, she had felt like

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Speaker 2: an afterthought, prone to the company of neglectful and often

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Speaker 2: abusive men. He would arrive home breath hot with whiskey

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Speaker 2: and make slurring demands of her. He was hansy. He

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Speaker 2: would prowl at all hours and not come home for days.

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Speaker 2: She was living with a jekyline hide right in her

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Speaker 2: own bed. So Nannie did what she knew. She threw

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Speaker 2: herself into parenting her remaining children under her in Frank's roof.

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Speaker 2: She was especially close to her daughter, Melvina, who was

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Speaker 2: her first born. Nanny had big dreams for the girl,

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Speaker 2: a life better than the one she had had, far

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Speaker 2: beyond the limits of their small Alabama town, But it

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Speaker 2: soon became clear that the apple didn't fall far from

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Speaker 2: the tree, and Melvina began repeating her own mother's same mistakes.

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Speaker 2: Melvina would eventually grow up to welcome not one, but

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Speaker 2: two children. Her marriage didn't work out, so they came

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Speaker 2: back to live with her mother. Nanny felt that she

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Speaker 2: was flighty and disobedient, and careless with her life, and

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Speaker 2: flagrantly dismissive of the love Nanny gave her. Nanny felt

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Speaker 2: once again powerless. It's here that Nanny could have been

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Speaker 2: the savior in her own story, had both of the

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Speaker 2: children not died. The baby girl was the first to go,

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Speaker 2: passing in the hospital shortly after her birth. The older child, Robert,

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Speaker 2: died some months later. In her post birth haze, Melvina

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Speaker 2: would later remember something so shocking she wouldn't dare say

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Speaker 2: it out loud. It had all felt like one strange,

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Speaker 2: bad dream, But in the fog of her memory, she

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Speaker 2: recalled seeing her mother take a hat pin and push

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Speaker 2: it through her newborn baby's skull. And after two year

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Speaker 2: old Robert died suddenly some months later, Melvina's father, Frank,

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Speaker 2: and his brother Ernest went to visit the child's grave.

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Speaker 2: Ernest would recall that Frank pointed to the grave and said,

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Speaker 2: I'll be next. He wasn't wrong. Two months later, Frank

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Speaker 2: was dead, his body cold and contorted in his backyard.

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Speaker 2: The police who came to investigate the scene quickly decided

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Speaker 2: that his demise was attributed to some bad moonshine, which

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Speaker 2: they could still smell on his body. At the funeral,

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Speaker 2: Nanny's children stood far away from her what they suspected

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Speaker 2: cast an even darker pall over the day, as Frank

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Speaker 2: was lowered into the dirt, their mother, their sweet mother,

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00:15:03,400 --> 00:15:06,400
Speaker 2: was beginning to look less like a cherub and more

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Speaker 2: like an angel of death. They decided that they would

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00:15:10,480 --> 00:15:13,800
Speaker 2: never again speak to her, out of sheer horror and

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00:15:14,000 --> 00:15:18,800
Speaker 2: fear that she would have no reason to spare their lives. Nanny,

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00:15:18,960 --> 00:15:22,560
Speaker 2: for her part, set about recovering from her grief rather quickly,

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00:15:23,400 --> 00:15:26,520
Speaker 2: a thanks to Frank's smart thinking early in their marriage.

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00:15:26,720 --> 00:15:30,000
Speaker 2: She now had a sizeable life insurance payout but allowed

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Speaker 2: her to move and buy a new little cottage. It

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00:15:33,520 --> 00:15:36,520
Speaker 2: would be all her own, and for the first time

224
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Speaker 2: in her life, she would be indentured to no one.

225
00:15:40,360 --> 00:15:45,080
Speaker 2: But still something in her recoiled. She so desperately craved

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00:15:45,160 --> 00:15:48,360
Speaker 2: enmeshment with another person, even when her own history told

227
00:15:48,400 --> 00:15:52,800
Speaker 2: her this was a very dangerous thing. So Nanny took

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00:15:52,840 --> 00:15:55,880
Speaker 2: to the rails, traveling all over to visit suitors who

229
00:15:55,920 --> 00:15:59,520
Speaker 2: she met in the Lonely Heart's ads, but in all

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Speaker 2: of this, Nanny couldn't escape her own darkness. She married

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Speaker 2: for a third time in nineteen forty seven to a

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Speaker 2: man named Arley, but failed to stay sated for long.

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00:16:11,880 --> 00:16:14,880
Speaker 2: During their marriage, her sister ended up dying after a

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00:16:14,920 --> 00:16:18,840
Speaker 2: short visit, as did Nannie's new mother in law. Then

235
00:16:19,080 --> 00:16:23,359
Speaker 2: Arley died in nineteen fifty two. His passing was attributed

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Speaker 2: to a coronary condition, but it looked suspiciously like the

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00:16:27,280 --> 00:16:30,200
Speaker 2: other deaths that Nanny had seen across the decades of

238
00:16:30,200 --> 00:16:34,840
Speaker 2: her life. Not to be deterred, Nanny bought more stamps,

239
00:16:35,120 --> 00:16:38,960
Speaker 2: signed more letters, licked more envelopes, and got back out

240
00:16:39,160 --> 00:16:49,560
Speaker 2: on the road. When Richard Elmorton wrote to the Diamond

241
00:16:49,680 --> 00:16:52,400
Speaker 2: Circle to remove his name from their list, he told

242
00:16:52,480 --> 00:16:55,520
Speaker 2: them that thanks to them, he had met a sweet

243
00:16:55,560 --> 00:17:00,720
Speaker 2: and wonderful woman. It was an exclusive club for romans seekers,

244
00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:03,760
Speaker 2: one which could be opted into by paying top dollar,

245
00:17:04,760 --> 00:17:07,199
Speaker 2: and Nanny thought that maybe this would result in her

246
00:17:07,280 --> 00:17:10,800
Speaker 2: finding a top caliber mate, a high value man who

247
00:17:10,840 --> 00:17:15,560
Speaker 2: would finally appreciate her. He was a tall, tan and

248
00:17:15,680 --> 00:17:20,119
Speaker 2: handsome fellow with enough swagger and reputation around Emporia, Kansas

249
00:17:20,119 --> 00:17:23,399
Speaker 2: to make tongues waggle, but when he found Nanny she

250
00:17:23,440 --> 00:17:26,159
Speaker 2: would be the only one for him, at least for

251
00:17:26,200 --> 00:17:29,320
Speaker 2: a little while. She moved there to be with him,

252
00:17:29,600 --> 00:17:33,840
Speaker 2: reveling in his adoration and avalanche of gifts. But when

253
00:17:33,920 --> 00:17:36,879
Speaker 2: Nanny discovered that she wasn't the only one receiving his

254
00:17:37,000 --> 00:17:40,760
Speaker 2: gifts and his affections, the scales fell from her eyes

255
00:17:40,880 --> 00:17:45,719
Speaker 2: once again. He became sick while working at a billiard's parlor,

256
00:17:46,080 --> 00:17:49,600
Speaker 2: was sent home and died the following day, and their

257
00:17:49,640 --> 00:17:54,160
Speaker 2: family dog got sick and their home burned. Morton's son

258
00:17:54,280 --> 00:17:58,119
Speaker 2: became suspicious of all of this, but police investigations slim

259
00:17:58,160 --> 00:18:03,080
Speaker 2: as they were turned up no evidence. Off to North Carolina,

260
00:18:03,200 --> 00:18:06,679
Speaker 2: Nanny went to care for her mother. During her stay,

261
00:18:06,800 --> 00:18:10,160
Speaker 2: she would correspond with Samuel L. Dass, who became her

262
00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:14,320
Speaker 2: fifth and final husband, and joined him in Tulsa, Oklahoma,

263
00:18:14,560 --> 00:18:17,639
Speaker 2: in the wake of her mother's death. He was a

264
00:18:17,680 --> 00:18:21,040
Speaker 2: widower and a preacher, Having lost his entire family to

265
00:18:21,080 --> 00:18:25,240
Speaker 2: a tornado, He now ministered to his Baptist flock and

266
00:18:25,320 --> 00:18:28,919
Speaker 2: lived out similar principles in his home. He came to

267
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:34,440
Speaker 2: loathe Nanny's love of romance novels and considered them wicked things.

268
00:18:34,480 --> 00:18:38,000
Speaker 2: Samuel proved himself to be a godly and domineering man.

269
00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:41,800
Speaker 2: Her father simply cut from a different set of genetics.

270
00:18:42,800 --> 00:18:46,480
Speaker 2: It seems that the blueprint of Nanny's childhood was inescapable.

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00:18:47,119 --> 00:18:50,840
Speaker 2: For across her years, she continued to inadvertently fall into

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00:18:50,840 --> 00:18:55,080
Speaker 2: the old cycles of her childhood. Trauma. History continued to

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00:18:55,119 --> 00:18:58,600
Speaker 2: repeat itself, and her home would prove to be unsafe

274
00:18:58,760 --> 00:19:02,919
Speaker 2: for everyone involved. So Nanny would do what she had

275
00:19:02,920 --> 00:19:06,840
Speaker 2: always done, dispose of this next person who stood in

276
00:19:06,880 --> 00:19:11,080
Speaker 2: her way of finding what she was owed. She knew

277
00:19:11,080 --> 00:19:14,240
Speaker 2: the recipe well at this point. A little rat poison

278
00:19:14,280 --> 00:19:17,360
Speaker 2: went a long way, especially when administered over a long

279
00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:20,040
Speaker 2: period of time. It had worked for all of her

280
00:19:20,080 --> 00:19:24,760
Speaker 2: other husbands and tangential people in her orbit. So into

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00:19:24,800 --> 00:19:28,439
Speaker 2: the pot of stewed prunes she stirred the chemical, knowing

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00:19:28,560 --> 00:19:32,080
Speaker 2: full well that the sticky, earthy fruits would cover any

283
00:19:32,119 --> 00:19:35,400
Speaker 2: traces of bitterness. It was one of his favorite foods

284
00:19:35,440 --> 00:19:39,879
Speaker 2: and he ate them often. In time, Samuel began to

285
00:19:39,920 --> 00:19:43,880
Speaker 2: suffer from nausea. He lost sixteen pounds and was sent

286
00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:47,280
Speaker 2: to the hospital. It took him weeks to recover, but

287
00:19:47,440 --> 00:19:51,480
Speaker 2: he was finally released and allowed to go home. Nanny

288
00:19:51,520 --> 00:19:56,680
Speaker 2: had misjudged her dosage, but she wouldn't this time, and

289
00:19:56,720 --> 00:19:59,480
Speaker 2: when Samuel arrived back home, she made a big show

290
00:19:59,520 --> 00:20:03,000
Speaker 2: of cooking his favorite dinner. She finished the meal with

291
00:20:03,040 --> 00:20:06,200
Speaker 2: strong cups of black coffee, another one of his favorites,

292
00:20:06,520 --> 00:20:12,000
Speaker 2: and smiled. He was dead in two days. She already

293
00:20:12,080 --> 00:20:15,280
Speaker 2: had another plan lined up. She had been corresponding with

294
00:20:15,320 --> 00:20:18,240
Speaker 2: a dairy farmer in North Carolina and had even sent

295
00:20:18,320 --> 00:20:22,640
Speaker 2: him one of her famous cakes. But Nanny Doss's time

296
00:20:22,840 --> 00:20:26,720
Speaker 2: was running out. She had gotten away with literal murder

297
00:20:26,880 --> 00:20:29,960
Speaker 2: for so long and across so many states that a

298
00:20:29,960 --> 00:20:35,560
Speaker 2: cloud of suspicion was coalescing around her. Her big misstep,

299
00:20:35,960 --> 00:20:39,240
Speaker 2: the fatal move if you will, happened when she was

300
00:20:39,320 --> 00:20:43,399
Speaker 2: cornered at Samuel's funeral by his attending doctor. There was

301
00:20:43,440 --> 00:20:46,399
Speaker 2: no way Samuel would have so suddenly died after leaving

302
00:20:46,400 --> 00:20:51,040
Speaker 2: the hospital in such good shape. In this very public setting,

303
00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:55,560
Speaker 2: with crying eyes all around, the good doctor pressured Nanny

304
00:20:55,680 --> 00:20:59,359
Speaker 2: to allow him to perform an autopsy. Whatever it was

305
00:20:59,440 --> 00:21:02,320
Speaker 2: he in sinnea, it might be deadly to the larger community.

306
00:21:03,760 --> 00:21:08,560
Speaker 2: Nanny was trapped. She shifted her weight uncomfortably and looked

307
00:21:08,560 --> 00:21:12,240
Speaker 2: at the faces around her. I want to find out

308
00:21:12,280 --> 00:21:15,600
Speaker 2: what killed my husband, she said, because it might kill

309
00:21:15,680 --> 00:21:30,960
Speaker 2: someone else. It didn't take long for Samuel's body to

310
00:21:31,040 --> 00:21:35,080
Speaker 2: incriminate Nanny. Upon inspection, he had enough arsenic in his

311
00:21:35,240 --> 00:21:40,240
Speaker 2: Organs quote to kill a horse. She was put under surveillance,

312
00:21:40,600 --> 00:21:43,440
Speaker 2: in which time she began working as a living housekeeper

313
00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:47,080
Speaker 2: with a family. In a strange twist, they knew of

314
00:21:47,119 --> 00:21:50,240
Speaker 2: her alleged crimes and kept police abreast of her movements

315
00:21:50,240 --> 00:21:54,359
Speaker 2: each day. The mother assured the papers that even though

316
00:21:54,359 --> 00:21:57,360
Speaker 2: she knew what Nanny was accused of, and that yes,

317
00:21:57,480 --> 00:22:00,480
Speaker 2: they were a bit nervous about eating her cooking, she

318
00:22:00,560 --> 00:22:03,520
Speaker 2: didn't think the grandmotherly woman would harm any of her

319
00:22:03,560 --> 00:22:07,440
Speaker 2: three children. She told the papers. All I can say

320
00:22:07,440 --> 00:22:11,320
Speaker 2: about Nanny was that she was a good woman. In

321
00:22:11,400 --> 00:22:15,040
Speaker 2: that time, more bodies were exhumed, and Nanny was finally

322
00:22:15,080 --> 00:22:20,720
Speaker 2: brought in for questioning. After countless cigarettes, she calmly confessed

323
00:22:20,800 --> 00:22:25,080
Speaker 2: to killing four husbands, but claimed no responsibility for any

324
00:22:25,119 --> 00:22:28,919
Speaker 2: of the other deaths around her. According to one paper quote,

325
00:22:29,359 --> 00:22:32,840
Speaker 2: she actually seemed to be enjoying her interrogation by police.

326
00:22:33,200 --> 00:22:37,399
Speaker 2: Her eyes sparkled merrily. She blamed the impulse on a

327
00:22:37,440 --> 00:22:40,919
Speaker 2: head injury she had received in childhood, and also blamed

328
00:22:40,920 --> 00:22:46,439
Speaker 2: her victims. For Frank husband number two, she claimed to

329
00:22:46,480 --> 00:22:50,000
Speaker 2: have poured rat poison into his whisky. He drank all

330
00:22:50,040 --> 00:22:53,560
Speaker 2: the time and wasn't much of a loss, she said.

331
00:22:54,000 --> 00:22:57,359
Speaker 2: As for Arlie, husband number three, she claimed she was

332
00:22:57,480 --> 00:23:00,359
Speaker 2: jealous of how popular he was with other women and

333
00:23:00,560 --> 00:23:03,040
Speaker 2: angry that he threw a wild party at their home

334
00:23:03,119 --> 00:23:06,520
Speaker 2: while she was away. She was a bit remorseful that

335
00:23:06,600 --> 00:23:09,960
Speaker 2: she had poisoned him because, according to her, he otherwise

336
00:23:10,160 --> 00:23:14,720
Speaker 2: was quote a pretty good husband. When she was accused

337
00:23:14,720 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 2: of killing Richard, husband number four, she initially denied having

338
00:23:19,119 --> 00:23:22,879
Speaker 2: even known him, but when police showed her evidence of

339
00:23:22,920 --> 00:23:26,120
Speaker 2: the small life insurance policies she had collected after his death,

340
00:23:26,280 --> 00:23:29,880
Speaker 2: she came clean. I didn't want any one to know

341
00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:32,879
Speaker 2: I had been married to a man that old, she explained,

342
00:23:33,720 --> 00:23:36,440
Speaker 2: And Nanny told police that she hadn't liked him running

343
00:23:36,440 --> 00:23:39,120
Speaker 2: around with other women and that he had even purchased

344
00:23:39,160 --> 00:23:42,800
Speaker 2: an engagement ring for some one else. As for Samuel,

345
00:23:43,000 --> 00:23:46,399
Speaker 2: she said, he was just mean to me. He denied

346
00:23:46,440 --> 00:23:49,560
Speaker 2: her the simplest pleasures of life, and for this he

347
00:23:49,600 --> 00:23:54,000
Speaker 2: had had to go Nanny denied killing any of her

348
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:58,520
Speaker 2: blood kin. She said, I dealt strictly with men, and

349
00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:03,199
Speaker 2: when the time comes, I can justify every act. But

350
00:24:03,440 --> 00:24:07,240
Speaker 2: this wasn't the case. When the bodies of her mother, sister,

351
00:24:07,320 --> 00:24:10,600
Speaker 2: and grandson were exhumed, they were also found to be

352
00:24:10,640 --> 00:24:15,360
Speaker 2: pumped full of arsenic. Nanny was spared the electric chair

353
00:24:15,560 --> 00:24:19,800
Speaker 2: because the judge deemed her a quote mental defective. Her

354
00:24:19,800 --> 00:24:24,600
Speaker 2: eyes sparkled, but looking closely enough, they seemed hollow. Her

355
00:24:24,640 --> 00:24:29,359
Speaker 2: spontaneous giggling would ring a trifle too long, as she

356
00:24:29,440 --> 00:24:33,159
Speaker 2: explained that she wished everyone could be nice and happy

357
00:24:33,400 --> 00:24:36,800
Speaker 2: and kind. She told the newspapers that all of her

358
00:24:36,880 --> 00:24:39,440
Speaker 2: husbands had failed her in some way, and that those

359
00:24:39,480 --> 00:24:43,520
Speaker 2: failings were often denied by her family and her husband's families.

360
00:24:44,680 --> 00:24:50,399
Speaker 2: In her search for connection, Nanny never felt anything but alone.

361
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:54,119
Speaker 2: In nineteen fifty four, she was interviewed on television. The

362
00:24:54,160 --> 00:24:58,320
Speaker 2: newscasters suggested she'd take off her glasses and smile. He

363
00:24:58,440 --> 00:25:01,679
Speaker 2: told her teasingly that you might get another husband if

364
00:25:01,720 --> 00:25:06,520
Speaker 2: you look nice. Nanny giggled and replied, ain't that the

365
00:25:06,640 --> 00:25:16,760
Speaker 2: dying truth? There's more to the story. Stick around After

366
00:25:16,800 --> 00:25:33,800
Speaker 2: this brief sponsor break to hear all about it. By

367
00:25:33,800 --> 00:25:37,879
Speaker 2: the light of the moon, Carl and Elena danced. A

368
00:25:37,920 --> 00:25:41,400
Speaker 2: breeze came through the window and carried their two entwined

369
00:25:41,440 --> 00:25:45,760
Speaker 2: bodies across the floor. Together they stepped and spun, with

370
00:25:46,000 --> 00:25:49,480
Speaker 2: Carl leading. Of course, he was a gentleman, and he

371
00:25:49,560 --> 00:25:53,560
Speaker 2: loved a good waltz. It was a peaceful night, a

372
00:25:53,680 --> 00:25:57,800
Speaker 2: carefree one, even with the Florida heat hanging heavy and right.

373
00:25:59,240 --> 00:26:03,320
Speaker 2: So Kata saying, and thunder rumbled across the coastline. The

374
00:26:03,400 --> 00:26:06,840
Speaker 2: beads of sweat appeared on Carl's brow. He felt alive.

375
00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:10,920
Speaker 2: He was in a good mood, as he almost always

376
00:26:11,080 --> 00:26:14,400
Speaker 2: was when he was near his beloved. He adored Elena

377
00:26:14,480 --> 00:26:17,639
Speaker 2: more than anyone he had ever met. After all of

378
00:26:17,680 --> 00:26:21,800
Speaker 2: these years, the singsong cadence of her full name, Maria

379
00:26:21,880 --> 00:26:26,840
Speaker 2: Elena Malagro the Oios still made his stomach flip. He

380
00:26:26,880 --> 00:26:30,919
Speaker 2: had been married once before, but this was different. This

381
00:26:31,119 --> 00:26:34,560
Speaker 2: was a love far bigger than him. He almost couldn't

382
00:26:34,560 --> 00:26:38,560
Speaker 2: stand the magnitude of it, and it was all theirs.

383
00:26:39,720 --> 00:26:44,119
Speaker 2: Carl Panzer had loved Elena for years, so many years.

384
00:26:44,119 --> 00:26:46,520
Speaker 2: She was young when they first met in nineteen thirty,

385
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:49,879
Speaker 2: much younger than him, but he felt the electricity in

386
00:26:49,920 --> 00:26:54,679
Speaker 2: the space between them. She reanimated his world, infusing it

387
00:26:54,760 --> 00:26:57,960
Speaker 2: with technicolor and a verve in his spirit that had

388
00:26:58,000 --> 00:27:03,679
Speaker 2: long been dormant. And she was beautiful. But she had

389
00:27:03,720 --> 00:27:07,920
Speaker 2: gotten sick. It was tuberculosis, a bad case of it too.

390
00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:12,880
Speaker 2: She tried everything. He tried everything, a blood testing, radiation,

391
00:27:13,240 --> 00:27:18,359
Speaker 2: electroshock therapy. It all took a toll on her. Carl

392
00:27:18,440 --> 00:27:23,000
Speaker 2: remembered those hard days and held her tighter. He could

393
00:27:23,000 --> 00:27:25,680
Speaker 2: barely bring himself to think of them. Those times were

394
00:27:25,720 --> 00:27:30,920
Speaker 2: so dark, so hopeless, so filled with fear. But life

395
00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:34,080
Speaker 2: was different now, and he was grateful for that, and

396
00:27:34,119 --> 00:27:36,240
Speaker 2: there was a levity in the air, and their home

397
00:27:36,359 --> 00:27:39,560
Speaker 2: felt brighter. He kissed the top of her head and

398
00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:45,480
Speaker 2: ran his fingers down her neck. It was rough and cold.

399
00:27:46,359 --> 00:27:50,640
Speaker 2: You see. Elena's skin had started decomposing and falling off

400
00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:54,919
Speaker 2: years ago, so Karl had replaced it with plaster. He

401
00:27:54,960 --> 00:27:58,360
Speaker 2: had also harnessed her joints with piano wires and replaced

402
00:27:58,359 --> 00:28:01,400
Speaker 2: her eyes with glass after her had rotted in their sockets.

403
00:28:02,320 --> 00:28:05,240
Speaker 2: He made her a wig and stuffed her disemboweled body

404
00:28:05,280 --> 00:28:10,320
Speaker 2: with rags Elena was dead and had been for years,

405
00:28:11,200 --> 00:28:13,639
Speaker 2: but Carl had found a way for them to be together.

406
00:28:15,359 --> 00:28:17,399
Speaker 2: Elena and her mother had first met him at a

407
00:28:17,480 --> 00:28:20,000
Speaker 2: Key West hospital where she had gone to seek treatment.

408
00:28:20,800 --> 00:28:24,160
Speaker 2: He wasn't a doctor, just a radiologist, but he insisted

409
00:28:24,200 --> 00:28:27,640
Speaker 2: that he could help cure her. All the same, Elena

410
00:28:27,680 --> 00:28:31,000
Speaker 2: and her family were struck by an overwhelming sense of unease.

411
00:28:31,600 --> 00:28:35,400
Speaker 2: The sky was weird, but they were desperate, and Elena

412
00:28:35,440 --> 00:28:39,440
Speaker 2: didn't want to die. The other thing Elena didn't want

413
00:28:39,680 --> 00:28:43,480
Speaker 2: were Carl's romantic advances. She didn't want to date him,

414
00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:46,200
Speaker 2: let alone marry him. She wanted nothing to do with

415
00:28:46,280 --> 00:28:49,520
Speaker 2: him socially. At twenty years old, she was young enough

416
00:28:49,560 --> 00:28:52,560
Speaker 2: to be his granddaughter, but he kept showering her with

417
00:28:52,600 --> 00:28:57,160
Speaker 2: gifts and proposals, none of which Elena accepted. But when

418
00:28:57,200 --> 00:29:01,720
Speaker 2: she grew weak, Carl saw an opportunity. He was adamant

419
00:29:01,760 --> 00:29:04,160
Speaker 2: about being allowed to move into Elena's home to care

420
00:29:04,240 --> 00:29:07,880
Speaker 2: for her. She resisted, but her family put their foot down.

421
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:11,040
Speaker 2: It was all just too much, and she was tired.

422
00:29:11,760 --> 00:29:15,960
Speaker 2: Her body couldn't take it any more. After she died,

423
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:20,360
Speaker 2: Karl was pitched into mourning. He paid for her burial plot,

424
00:29:20,480 --> 00:29:24,240
Speaker 2: and her headstone, he conveniently left off her last name,

425
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:28,960
Speaker 2: her husband's name, and put his own. Karl made sure

426
00:29:28,960 --> 00:29:32,240
Speaker 2: to visit her grave each night, and it was there

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00:29:32,320 --> 00:29:35,200
Speaker 2: he'd say that he heard her singing to him and

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00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 2: begging him to take her home. So two years after

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00:29:39,960 --> 00:29:43,040
Speaker 2: she was buried, on a night just like that, warm

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00:29:43,040 --> 00:29:46,120
Speaker 2: and bright one, he disintered her body, put her in

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00:29:46,120 --> 00:29:51,040
Speaker 2: a little wagon, and wheeled her away. And then he

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00:29:51,080 --> 00:29:54,280
Speaker 2: lived with her body for seven years, and turning her

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00:29:54,280 --> 00:29:59,480
Speaker 2: into a taxidermid doll, keeping her fresh with disinfectants and deodorizers.

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00:30:00,520 --> 00:30:03,000
Speaker 2: He brought her to the breakfast table, and he brought

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00:30:03,000 --> 00:30:07,080
Speaker 2: her to bed with him. But seven years after her death,

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00:30:07,440 --> 00:30:11,320
Speaker 2: Elena's sister Florinda, just couldn't take the rumors any longer.

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00:30:12,200 --> 00:30:16,840
Speaker 2: There were whispers around town about Karl, dreadful, ghoulish whispers,

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00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:22,240
Speaker 2: and about her sister. People insinuated things that chilled even

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00:30:22,280 --> 00:30:26,360
Speaker 2: in the light of the tropical sun. When Florinda confronted

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00:30:26,400 --> 00:30:29,840
Speaker 2: Karl at his home, she discovered that these tales weren't fiction,

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00:30:30,880 --> 00:30:35,920
Speaker 2: they were facts. And there she found her sister costumed

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00:30:35,920 --> 00:30:38,760
Speaker 2: in a wedding dress. She had been made to play

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00:30:38,800 --> 00:30:41,400
Speaker 2: the part of a bride, though she had been veheminently

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00:30:41,480 --> 00:30:45,600
Speaker 2: non consenting to this wall alive, but in her silence

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00:30:46,040 --> 00:30:51,520
Speaker 2: Karl had stopped taking no for an answer. He was

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00:30:51,560 --> 00:30:57,560
Speaker 2: promptly arrested. His denial of her death and Frankensteinian methods

447
00:30:57,600 --> 00:31:00,480
Speaker 2: of trying to work around it, and all soon became clear.

448
00:31:01,840 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 2: He told a newspaper, life is dormant in a person

449
00:31:05,120 --> 00:31:07,640
Speaker 2: who has died. The ears can hear, but the eyes

450
00:31:07,680 --> 00:31:11,800
Speaker 2: cannot see because they are in darkness. He tried to

451
00:31:11,840 --> 00:31:16,160
Speaker 2: engineer a homespun resurrection, bathing Elena's body in tubs of

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00:31:16,240 --> 00:31:19,440
Speaker 2: chemical solutions in the hope that her cells would saturate

453
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:24,360
Speaker 2: and awaken from their suspended animation. But Karl was lucky.

454
00:31:25,320 --> 00:31:27,760
Speaker 2: By the time his case went to court, the statue

455
00:31:27,800 --> 00:31:31,280
Speaker 2: of limitations for his charges of desecrating a grave was up.

456
00:31:33,040 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 2: Elena was given a second funeral. She would finally be

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00:31:37,000 --> 00:31:41,240
Speaker 2: allowed to rest. Karl lived out the rest of his

458
00:31:41,360 --> 00:31:44,280
Speaker 2: days with an effigy of Elena, a doll with her

459
00:31:44,280 --> 00:31:49,120
Speaker 2: death mask glued to its face. His obituary reported that

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00:31:49,160 --> 00:31:52,280
Speaker 2: he died alone, with some rumors saying that he died

461
00:31:52,320 --> 00:31:55,920
Speaker 2: in the arms of his fake Elena. It was reported

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00:31:55,960 --> 00:31:58,560
Speaker 2: that he collapsed near the organ that he loved to

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00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:02,280
Speaker 2: play for her. He had once told a newspaper that

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00:32:02,320 --> 00:32:06,000
Speaker 2: he knew she was there with her latent spirit lying dormant,

465
00:32:06,400 --> 00:32:09,320
Speaker 2: and hoped that she could hear him at a faint distance.

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00:32:10,400 --> 00:32:13,800
Speaker 2: He believed this act of tenderness of his love would

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00:32:13,880 --> 00:32:17,400
Speaker 2: be beneficial to her in the hopes that it would

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00:32:17,440 --> 00:32:19,840
Speaker 2: keep her mind and spirit at peace.

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00:32:29,600 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 3: American Shadows as hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum. This episode was

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00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:37,760
Speaker 3: written by Robin Minatter, researched by Robin Minitter and Cassandra

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00:32:37,800 --> 00:32:41,400
Speaker 3: di Alba, and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young,

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00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:45,560
Speaker 3: with executive producers Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick.

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00:32:46,320 --> 00:32:49,400
Speaker 3: To learn more about the show, visit Grimminmile dot com.

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00:32:49,880 --> 00:32:54,840
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

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00:32:55,040 --> 00:33:01,600
Speaker 3: or wherever you get your podcasts. Six