Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: There's Charles W Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry Roland over there,
Speaker 1: and this is Stuff you Should Know about the Manson
Speaker 1: Family Part two. And that's right. Uh if you if
Speaker 1: you're listening to this one first and you're doing it wrong,
Speaker 1: so um, no need to recap. Just go listen to
Speaker 1: part one. Yeah, and we'll pick up um with the
Speaker 1: Beatles White Album, which was a very big deal and
Speaker 1: how this figures in um, great great album Obviously as
Speaker 1: a Beatles fan, I know you're not super into them,
Speaker 1: but uh, I love the White Album. It's there, um
Speaker 1: arguably their weirdest album. Uh. And it spoke to Charles
Speaker 1: Manson for sure, because he really became pretty obsessed with
Speaker 1: it and diving into deconstructing the album. Uh. It's a
Speaker 1: very dense, long album anyway, and there's a lot to it.
Speaker 1: So it's no wonder that um, Charles Manson of the
Speaker 1: head Fallow Acid would think that the Beatles are speaking
Speaker 1: to him, right, and he definitely did. Um. So he
Speaker 1: apparently had a history already of deconstructing Beatles lyrics, but
Speaker 1: before he was deconstructing lyrics like Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts
Speaker 1: Club Band, which compared to the White Album, is decidedly
Speaker 1: upbeat and positive. Right, So, while use in prison, he
Speaker 1: was super into the Beatles. When he gets out the
Speaker 1: Beatles released the White Album, he's already obsessed with them,
Speaker 1: but now he's on tons and tons of acid. The
Speaker 1: White Album is kind of a downer compared to Sergeant
Speaker 1: Pepper's UM and the fact that it's speaking to Charles
Speaker 1: Manson like really made things turn dark, it seems like
Speaker 1: as far as him and the people in his orbit
Speaker 1: are concerned. Yeah, so they're hanging out their lighting bonfires,
Speaker 1: they're doing drugs. Their list thing to Charles Manson stomp
Speaker 1: around with his tiny feet uh in his redneck voice
Speaker 1: talking about Helter Skelter, which is a great great Beatles song,
Speaker 1: um and basically sort of sort of renamed his uh,
Speaker 1: his vision for the this race war and impending apocalypse
Speaker 1: Helter Skelter. He kind of stole that from the Beatles,
Speaker 1: as Bano would later go on to say, yeah, he
Speaker 1: stole it from the Beatles, but he also um, took
Speaker 1: it again as like a message that the Beatles were
Speaker 1: sending him, a sign that he needed to prepare his
Speaker 1: family for this because they were the chosen ones basically
Speaker 1: who should wait out the race, riot and in death valley.
Speaker 1: So there's this whole idea that the all of the
Speaker 1: Tate Lobianca murders took place. Um to further this idea
Speaker 1: of helter skelter, to strike strike the match that would
Speaker 1: set it off to get the is going right. And
Speaker 1: this idea apparently is the creation of the prosecutor in
Speaker 1: the case, a guy named Vincent Bugliosi, who wrote a
Speaker 1: book called Helter Skelter like a six d page book.
Speaker 1: Basically this the definitive true crime book on the Manson
Speaker 1: family and the Manson family murders. And so most of
Speaker 1: the most of what we said in part one and
Speaker 1: most of what everybody knows about the Manson family murders
Speaker 1: are come through this lens that was established by Vincent Bugliosi,
Speaker 1: who is the lead prosecutor in the case, was privated
Speaker 1: tons of information to to um, confessions, to interviews under questioning,
Speaker 1: to all this stuff. But he's the one who pieced
Speaker 1: together the idea that the Manson family committed these murders
Speaker 1: to to start helter skelter. That was his his whole jam. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean some of the Manson family coborate, coroborated, corroberated.
Speaker 1: It's in there somewhere corroborated. That's a dark time with
Speaker 1: that word corroborated, corroborated. I don't have to say it much, luckily,
Speaker 1: because I'm not in a life of crime. Uh No.
Speaker 1: But some of them back that up um and saying that,
Speaker 1: you know, at one point he wanted them to throw
Speaker 1: a wallet of a victim in a in a black
Speaker 1: neighborhood so so that people would think it was you know,
Speaker 1: black panthers that did this. Yeah, but it's some evidence
Speaker 1: that that was probably the case. If you talk though
Speaker 1: to Manson and you or if you listen to some
Speaker 1: of the stuff he says. Some of these explanations because
Speaker 1: over the years people have said, what about this part,
Speaker 1: what about this part, and have basically presented him with
Speaker 1: every aspect of the whole case against him. He you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of the stuff he has no explanation for
Speaker 1: nothing good. But that whilet is a sterling example of
Speaker 1: where it becomes obvious that wait, we're we're basically hearing
Speaker 1: one point of view about this, and we've never that's
Speaker 1: all we've ever heard, um, Which if you're doing any
Speaker 1: kind of reporting, which you and I are not, but
Speaker 1: if you were inclined to do any kind of reporting, UM,
Speaker 1: you never want to just stick to just one source.
Speaker 1: And with the Manson family case, it's basically one source,
Speaker 1: and it's Vinci Bugliosi, the prosecutor. But Manson explains it
Speaker 1: as he told, UM, I think it was Linda Kasabian
Speaker 1: to just get rid of that wallet that he was
Speaker 1: it wasn't in a predominantly black neighborhood, and then he
Speaker 1: told her to get rid of the wallet because it
Speaker 1: was hot, and she hid the wallet actually in the
Speaker 1: tank of a toilet in a women's bathroom in a
Speaker 1: gas station, which is hardly where you'd put it if
Speaker 1: you wanted a black person to find it, to use
Speaker 1: the credit cards inside, and to tip off the cops
Speaker 1: that a black person was behind the Tate La Bianca murders.
Speaker 1: So when you when you kind of dive into stuff
Speaker 1: like that, you see that there actually are two competing
Speaker 1: explanations in some aspects of this case. Yeah, but I
Speaker 1: think Cassabian herself said that too though, didn't you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The thing is is if you are, if you losableach
Speaker 1: Arles Manson, Right, I know that's that's the thing is.
Speaker 1: There's a terrible realization when you're like, actually a wait
Speaker 1: a minute, I understand what Charles Manson is saying here. Um,
Speaker 1: the with with stuff like that when you look at
Speaker 1: the testimony. These were people who were on trial for
Speaker 1: murder who had every incentive to go along with the
Speaker 1: lead prosecutors theory that it was all Charles Manson's fault.
Speaker 1: They could have maybe immunity, Um, they could have they
Speaker 1: could have charges dropped against them that by saying yes,
Speaker 1: this is the case, or having their testimony jibe with
Speaker 1: what Vincent Boogliosi's case was. Um, they had an incentive
Speaker 1: to do that. Whether Charles Manson is right or correct
Speaker 1: or lying from a from a an objective perspective, the
Speaker 1: people on trials for murder had a an incentive to
Speaker 1: agree with Vincent Boogliosi. All right, So, uh, the way
Speaker 1: they got caught was actually pretty interesting. Um. Unrelated to
Speaker 1: these murders. Police rated spawn Ranch because um, it was
Speaker 1: sort of became known that the people were living there
Speaker 1: that were out on these creepy crawls doing these crimes.
Speaker 1: And so that's why they were originally uh fingered as
Speaker 1: they say in the biz Um. And they went there
Speaker 1: and they rated Spawn Ranch and a lot of the
Speaker 1: family were arrested at that time for like kr theft
Speaker 1: and burglary and stuff. Um. They were released on the
Speaker 1: technicality and then went to Death Valley to that weird ranch. Um.
Speaker 1: If you ever been to Death Valley, it's not a
Speaker 1: place you want to hang out. No, it's not, especially
Speaker 1: in the summertime. Is that where Joshua Tree is? No,
Speaker 1: that's it Joshua Tree, But that's not in Death Valley. No,
Speaker 1: they're those are two different places. But is it close by?
Speaker 1: Is the same type of terrain kind of thing? Uh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I've been to both. Are they similar? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean Joshua Tree is is the desert for sure,
Speaker 1: but it's very lovely. Like I don't remember much about
Speaker 1: Death Valley that was. Um, I think it was not
Speaker 1: very hospitable for me. It's it's appropriately named, yeah, I
Speaker 1: think so okay. Um. And of course now people are
Speaker 1: gonna say Death Valley is the best. You know what
Speaker 1: you're talking about, heavy sweater um, So they go to
Speaker 1: Death Valley. Then there were a bunch of raids at
Speaker 1: the Death Valley camp between October tenth and twelfth of
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine, and eventually they ended up rounding up
Speaker 1: the people responsible for these murders without knowing that they
Speaker 1: were responsible for these murders. So they were they were
Speaker 1: in jail, uh kind of luckily already in jail when
Speaker 1: they sort of decided they could pin on that pin
Speaker 1: like legitimately, um pin these murders on these people. So
Speaker 1: this being the second time there's there's something that I've
Speaker 1: ran across the research, Chuck. It never gets talked about,
Speaker 1: but is I think really significant. At both of those raids,
Speaker 1: the Spawn Ranch rate and the Death Valley rate. The
Speaker 1: the state took children from this, Like there were kids, babies, toddlers, um,
Speaker 1: little kids running around growing up, uh like at the
Speaker 1: Spawn Ranch end at the Barker Ranch, which is extraordinarily troubling.
Speaker 1: And some of them have been are thought to have
Speaker 1: possibly been um Charles Manson's kids, like he may have
Speaker 1: had some some there's just so much free love going
Speaker 1: on and so many pregnancies that were the results of
Speaker 1: this free love. It was difficult to say whose kid
Speaker 1: was who's, but it's they think that it's possible at
Speaker 1: least one or two of those kids was Charles Manson's kids, UM,
Speaker 1: and they were taken by the state and later adopted
Speaker 1: by people. But it's like, you know, it's one thing
Speaker 1: to think of a bunch of hippies just out in
Speaker 1: the desert taking acid, just being idiots, you know, and
Speaker 1: then eventually turning dark and murderous. But the idea that
Speaker 1: there were kids around at any part of this is
Speaker 1: really I find it very troubling. Yeah, for sure. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean, all those cults had kids roaming around, UM,
Speaker 1: they just weren't murderous cults, you know, yea. Uh so.
Speaker 1: Susan Atkins, for her part, she agreed to testify initially
Speaker 1: UM against Charles Manson UM to avoid the death sentence UM,
Speaker 1: which UM for a few years more, was still a
Speaker 1: thing in California. I think in v two they reversed that,
Speaker 1: but at the time the death sentence was was a
Speaker 1: threat at the time of the crimes, so she had
Speaker 1: a grand jury testimony UM. It basically led to Manson
Speaker 1: being arraigned for these murders in December sixty nine. Um,
Speaker 1: she recanted that testimony, UM, and the deal was revoked
Speaker 1: by the prosecutors. It was kind of too late at
Speaker 1: that point. UM. Linda Kasabian, who you might remember was
Speaker 1: I think the getaway driver and then the one who
Speaker 1: um would not knock on the right apartment door to
Speaker 1: kill the actor. So she she'd actually didn't commit any
Speaker 1: more orders at all, was not in any of the houses.
Speaker 1: She was granted immunity immunity for testifying, and I think
Speaker 1: she was the only one granted immunity, right, although I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: they just took the death penalty off, like you said,
Speaker 1: for Susan Atkins. And I don't know if you said
Speaker 1: this or not, but Susan Atkins is the reason the
Speaker 1: case broke open eventually when they rounded up all of
Speaker 1: the Manson family and had him in jail for um,
Speaker 1: the death Valley raids for for you know, um, burglary
Speaker 1: and theft and stuff like that. The way that they
Speaker 1: found out that the Manson family was responsible for the
Speaker 1: Tate Lobbianca murders was Susan Atkins bragging about it and
Speaker 1: a couple of her cell mates going and telling the cops.
Speaker 1: And that's originally how the case began against the Manson family.
Speaker 1: That's how the authorities originally found out big mouth. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess so. All right, so let's take a break
Speaker 1: and we'll come back and talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: one of the weirdest, most sensational trials in American history.
Speaker 1: Right after this, alright, chuck so Um. On December nine,
Speaker 1: Charles Manson, who the public had just been acquainted with, UM,
Speaker 1: I think just in the last few months, was finally
Speaker 1: arraigned for UM the murders of Tatelbianca murders, and I
Speaker 1: think that UM. Did they get him for his role
Speaker 1: in the Hinman murder at that point, M I'm not,
Speaker 1: I'm not actually sure about that. Definitely the Tatelbianca murders,
Speaker 1: which was plenty enough UM and he it's it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of an understatement to say that he did not
Speaker 1: UM offer any public contrition. He actually went the opposite way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for sure, he was. UM. Well, the whole trial was chaos,
Speaker 1: and he UM he incited chaos at every turn, UM
Speaker 1: to make it just a circus, and was quite successful
Speaker 1: at doing so. Um initially wanted to represent himself and
Speaker 1: did for a little while, but the judge Um denied that,
Speaker 1: Judge William Keene and said, you have to work with
Speaker 1: a lawyer because of the fact that you're just making
Speaker 1: this into a circus. Basically, we need this to stay
Speaker 1: on track. And Um he actually was successful, though Manson
Speaker 1: was getting Judge Keene m Austred as Judge Um and
Speaker 1: Judge Charles Older eventually would oversee the trial. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: I read a two thousand thirteen interview with Manson, and
Speaker 1: the thing that seemed to still get him the most
Speaker 1: was that he was denied Um the ability to represent
Speaker 1: himself in court, Like he felt like he never got
Speaker 1: to have his same court and that was that was
Speaker 1: the thing that god him more than anything else, not
Speaker 1: being locked up for his whole life or anything like that.
Speaker 1: It was that he didn't get to open his big
Speaker 1: mouth and court as much as he wanted to. So
Speaker 1: I guess we could go over some of these things
Speaker 1: that happened in court, Um that that led to this
Speaker 1: circus atmosphere. And by the way, if you want to
Speaker 1: see it yourself, there's a pretty good dramatic recreation in
Speaker 1: the movie helter skelter that was based on Bugliosi's book
Speaker 1: nothing better than dramatic recreations. Yeah, Um, lots of yelling
Speaker 1: and screaming, lots of shouting and cursing, lots of disrespect
Speaker 1: to the judge and the American flag. Uh. They threw
Speaker 1: a copy of the Constitution in the garbage. At one point. Um.
Speaker 1: Very famously, Charles Manson carved an X into his forehead,
Speaker 1: which later became a swastika, saying that he was exed
Speaker 1: out of the world. And then his family members would
Speaker 1: do the same, and they would shave their heads and
Speaker 1: generally just trying to disrupt things at every turn, right,
Speaker 1: And they did. I mean they were quite successful. But
Speaker 1: the trial kept going on and on, right, I think
Speaker 1: it was it went on for a couple of years,
Speaker 1: based on news articles I was reading about it. So
Speaker 1: it turns out, though that Richard Nixon supposedly had the
Speaker 1: most disruptive effect on the trial, um by saying while
Speaker 1: the trial was going on, quote, here's a man who
Speaker 1: was guilty directly or indirectly of eight murders without reason.
Speaker 1: He was the sitting US president commenting saying unequivocally that
Speaker 1: this guy was guilty of a trial that was going on,
Speaker 1: which is, you just don't do that. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: what the case is. Not not for any compassion for
Speaker 1: Charles Manson or anything like that, but just because even
Speaker 1: on the other side, you could have blown the case
Speaker 1: and and and he legitimately could have created a mistrial
Speaker 1: there just because the President said something and everyone reported
Speaker 1: on it. I can't imagine that happening today. I totally can't.
Speaker 1: It was a very Trumpean move. Um. So we we talked.
Speaker 1: I think we covered the Helter Skelter thing enough, don't you.
Speaker 1: We did. But I think there's a there's a big
Speaker 1: thing that all this hinges on is that, um they're
Speaker 1: the prosecution said, and you said earlier you even had
Speaker 1: a quote from text Watson that Charles Manson told him
Speaker 1: to go and just destroy the people in that house,
Speaker 1: gruesome as you can. And the prosecution said that that
Speaker 1: Charles Manson was trying to spark the Helter Skelter race
Speaker 1: war that he believed was going to happen. Manson's whole
Speaker 1: thing was this here, this is Charles Manson's explanation for
Speaker 1: what happened and why he's innocent. He said, yeah, I
Speaker 1: believed in Helter Skelter. Yes, I believe there's a race
Speaker 1: war coming. Um. I I talked about it at night
Speaker 1: around bonfires with everybody on acid. I also talked about
Speaker 1: death of the ego and all sorts of other stuff.
Speaker 1: Um And if you ask me, what happened was my
Speaker 1: friends just took things and went it took it to
Speaker 1: who literally and went too far. And that it all
Speaker 1: hinged on this Bobby Bosl thing, right, and even even
Speaker 1: before that, this lots of Papa thing. So text Watson
Speaker 1: rips off Bernard lots of Papa crow and he's got
Speaker 1: a problem with lots of Papa who wants to kill him? Now,
Speaker 1: and Manson goes over there to help, Um, text Watson
Speaker 1: solve this problem by shooting, shooting lots of Papa. So, now,
Speaker 1: as far as Manson and Texts are concerned, text os
Speaker 1: Watson a debt, any kind of debt? Well, Manson's or
Speaker 1: Tex owns Manson a debt. Now, Manson's friend Bobby Boos,
Speaker 1: who was one of his tightest family members, gets arrested
Speaker 1: for murder, the murder of Gary Hindman, and Manson says, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean you should do something to help
Speaker 1: my brother Bobby bos Al and um, you know, text says,
Speaker 1: well what should I do? And apparently Manson flew off
Speaker 1: the handle and said, don't ask me what you should do.
Speaker 1: You know what you should do. And that was that
Speaker 1: at And the next thing, Manson knows Watson and cran
Speaker 1: Winkle and Atkins are over at the Tate, the Tate residents,
Speaker 1: carving up Sharon Tate and the rest of the people
Speaker 1: in the house. He didn't say anything about going to
Speaker 1: kill anybody. He didn't direct him anywhere, he didn't say
Speaker 1: anything like that. He just said they took what all
Speaker 1: the other stuff that he'd said too far, and that
Speaker 1: really what they were doing was trying to cover up
Speaker 1: cover for um, Bobby Busy to get him out of prison.
Speaker 1: That's Manson's explanation for the whole thing. Well, yeah, and
Speaker 1: for and for the part uh, well, I guess we
Speaker 1: should go ahead and say that, um, that all of
Speaker 1: these people went to prison, um uh and Susan Atkins,
Speaker 1: Patricia Cranwinkle, Leslie Van Houghton, they all were, you know,
Speaker 1: still so under his spell that they were fully ready
Speaker 1: and did take the blame for these killings. UM. But
Speaker 1: when it comes to parole, it was in January one
Speaker 1: that they were all convicted on all accounts murder conspiracy
Speaker 1: to commit murder. UM. But years later, as parole hearings
Speaker 1: would come up for all these women and Texas Watson
Speaker 1: and Manson himself, the reason why they were continually denied. UM,
Speaker 1: even like tex Watson became a born again Christian and
Speaker 1: and you know supposed he turned his life around. But
Speaker 1: they none of them would would take responsibility. All these
Speaker 1: years later, they would all still say that it was
Speaker 1: Manson was Manson. And from what I understand a big
Speaker 1: part of getting your parole approved is to finally take
Speaker 1: full responsibility for what you had done. And none of
Speaker 1: them would do it, and they were all all denied
Speaker 1: over the years. UM. Susan Atkins eventually died of brain
Speaker 1: cancer in two thousand nine. UM. And then just a
Speaker 1: few days ago, UM. Well, Leslie van Houghton September of
Speaker 1: last year was actually recommended for parole in just a
Speaker 1: few days ago. As of this recording, the Governor of California,
Speaker 1: Jerry Brown, denied that UM and said, now she's still
Speaker 1: isn't taking responsibility. UM. And I think these cases are
Speaker 1: just so loaded still that it would be really tough
Speaker 1: even though parole was recommended for the governor to to
Speaker 1: approve that. You know. So we'll see they're gonna apparently
Speaker 1: they're gonna keep pursuing that, and I'm not sure what
Speaker 1: the next steps are, but they're gonna fight that ruling
Speaker 1: by Jerry Brown and we'll see where that goes. So um,
Speaker 1: so I think, and then Patricia Fenwinkel is still in prison.
Speaker 1: And I think now that Susan Atkins died, she is
Speaker 1: the longest serving female in may in California prison system. Yeah. Oh,
Speaker 1: and we should say too that um Squeaky From tried
Speaker 1: to kill Nixon. That's where she gained later fame. Oh
Speaker 1: what I say Nixon? Yeah, Gerald Ford and um, she's
Speaker 1: she's out of prison. She uh, she lives in upstate
Speaker 1: New York. And I think the last I've seen of
Speaker 1: her was someone took her picture in a Walmart parking
Speaker 1: line and she like smack the camera down. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: she she's an interesting case. Squeaky From was out. She
Speaker 1: wasn't um indicted for any of the murders or any
Speaker 1: role in the murders, but she was a number she
Speaker 1: was the number two UH person to join the Manson family. Remember,
Speaker 1: and she Um still to this day refuses to denounce Manson.
Speaker 1: It's still very much all about Charles Manson and UM
Speaker 1: just as much as she was before UM and she
Speaker 1: went to I I guess I'm not sure what she
Speaker 1: was doing with a gun and gerald Ford, but she
Speaker 1: aimed a gun at gerald Ford. It was the gun
Speaker 1: wasn't loaded, but it still had the effect of sending
Speaker 1: or to prison for decades for an assassination attempt on
Speaker 1: the president. Right, I'm surprised she ever got out. I
Speaker 1: am too, but she was parole eventually lee, but she
Speaker 1: still she's still never denounced Charles Manson. All of the
Speaker 1: other ones denounced Manson. She's the only one who has it.
Speaker 1: And supposedly one time she escaped in the eighties because
Speaker 1: she heard that m. Charles Manson was sick, so she
Speaker 1: broke her way out of prison to try to get
Speaker 1: to him. I guess was a Manson family member who
Speaker 1: tried to kill the president and escape from prison, and
Speaker 1: they she earned parole. Yeah, hard to believe, but I
Speaker 1: think it's like you said, I think those are the
Speaker 1: case that Tate La Bianca murders were so politically charged
Speaker 1: and so loaded, um that that that like it just
Speaker 1: didn't They just weren't going to get out the people
Speaker 1: who actually committed the murders. Yeah, Manson had an interesting
Speaker 1: time in prison too. He had a you got try
Speaker 1: and kill him by lighting him on fire at one point. Uh,
Speaker 1: and like I think of, his body was badly burned.
Speaker 1: And he had a string of of relationships with people
Speaker 1: from pin pals, which will kind of cover at the
Speaker 1: end to a to a woman that he did he
Speaker 1: actually marry that woman? I don't. I don't know she
Speaker 1: was in that two article that I was reading, um,
Speaker 1: and I don't know if they got married. Man, we
Speaker 1: should do I don't know what we would call it,
Speaker 1: but an episode on generally women who who marry serial killers.
Speaker 1: We totally should in prison. Let's do that, but first
Speaker 1: let's take a break. How about that? Yeah, let's do it. Okay, okay, Chuck,
Speaker 1: we're backward talking about. So Manson's in prison for a
Speaker 1: while there. This is just mind blowing to me. For
Speaker 1: a good decade he enjoyed, uh, actually more than that,
Speaker 1: he enjoyed the limelight he he could get. Um, interviewed
Speaker 1: by huge names like you said, Diane Sawyer, Charlie Rose,
Speaker 1: Haraldo Rivera very famously did an interview with um Charles Manson,
Speaker 1: where apparently Manson you were saying how much poise Diane
Speaker 1: Sawyer showed during her interview. Supposedly Manson just owned Haraldo
Speaker 1: during that interview, just totally took control of the whole thing.
Speaker 1: But um, these were things that were televised like on
Speaker 1: on national National News, and and these these people were giving,
Speaker 1: these networks were giving Charles Manson a platform too, talked
Speaker 1: about himself, to talk about his philosophy, to show the
Speaker 1: world how crazy he was. Oh yes, to keep him
Speaker 1: in the public, in the public eye, in the public mind.
Speaker 1: Until finally after the Diane Sawyer interview, they they not
Speaker 1: only pulled the plug on his interviews, they said for
Speaker 1: there you couldn't televise interviews with any inmates from in
Speaker 1: California because of Charles Manson. Basically, So, Um, it's just
Speaker 1: really strange to me, especially these days looking back, that
Speaker 1: he had a platform for so long to stay that boogeyman.
Speaker 1: You know that that just scared the Bejesus out of America. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think those last like whatever, like twenty five years
Speaker 1: in prison with no limelight. Was that had to have
Speaker 1: been like the darkest time of his life because you know,
Speaker 1: he wanted he clearly wanted to be a singing star.
Speaker 1: And in a weird way, he ended up kind of
Speaker 1: getting what he wanted because some of his music ended
Speaker 1: up being recorded by you know, the Guns and Roses
Speaker 1: and the lemon Heads and Um. He became this kind
Speaker 1: of weird u cult figure and not as in uh,
Speaker 1: Jim James cult like like movie type jacket, yeah Jones,
Speaker 1: but like, yeah, like a cult figure in uh, revered
Speaker 1: by some people weirdly. It just it's so strange that
Speaker 1: people would look at him that way, you know. So
Speaker 1: one person who revered him later on in life was
Speaker 1: a woman I believe he named Star Um. And she
Speaker 1: moved from her parents house in Mississippi out to California
Speaker 1: to be just down the street from where Manson was held.
Speaker 1: And this is she was the woman who was um
Speaker 1: supposed to marry him Um, and she was a follower
Speaker 1: of his. She said she didn't care anything about nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty nine. He so Manson later in life became really
Speaker 1: interested in Um preserving the environment. He came up with
Speaker 1: a thing called at Wa air trees water. I can't
Speaker 1: remember the last a yeah, argon, that would be a right.
Speaker 1: So um, she became very interested in him for his
Speaker 1: ecological stance. Right, and she moved out to be close
Speaker 1: to him and would visit him on weekends. And they
Speaker 1: became very close, and I, I I guess to kind of
Speaker 1: demonstrate to the world that he he still had it,
Speaker 1: I still got it world, he um asked her to
Speaker 1: carve an X in her forehead and she did so. Um.
Speaker 1: She was also big time into collecting and selling Manson memorabilia,
Speaker 1: and Ed points out in this article. I think he's
Speaker 1: referring to her that the whole marriage thing may have
Speaker 1: been a ploy to get at Manson memorabilia. But I
Speaker 1: don't believe that's the case at all. So she actually
Speaker 1: ran a website and still does called Manson Direct dot
Speaker 1: com and it's it's like up to date. So I
Speaker 1: think she had not abandoned him after some big, big
Speaker 1: score with memorabilia. Like she seems to have been the
Speaker 1: real deal follower, like a early Manson family girl reincarnated weird.
Speaker 1: So there were a bunch of other uh I saw
Speaker 1: an article whether at least ten other weird deaths related
Speaker 1: to the Manson family that um some people say could
Speaker 1: have been them or maybe not. I looked into a
Speaker 1: few of them. That was his original or at least
Speaker 1: this guy was originally going to represent Manson, as he
Speaker 1: is an attorney named Ron Hughes. He ended up representing
Speaker 1: I think Leslie van Houghton, but she uh. He disappeared
Speaker 1: while on a There was a ten day recess in
Speaker 1: the trial. So he goes camping with another couple and
Speaker 1: the couple left and he's like, I'm gonna stay on
Speaker 1: here in the woods. He was never seen again, so
Speaker 1: that was a little weird. They never found a body
Speaker 1: or anything. I don't think it wasn't they even though
Speaker 1: he was one of their defense attorneys, they had a
Speaker 1: huge grudge against him because, like you said earlier, Van Houghton, Um,
Speaker 1: cren Winkle, and Atkins were all um or not Atkins,
Speaker 1: I can't remember who the third one was. We're all
Speaker 1: going to to incriminate themselves. So as Leslie van Houten's defense,
Speaker 1: her and he he said, I'm not he rested after
Speaker 1: the prosecution rested. He never presented a defense because he
Speaker 1: knew that they were gonna incriminate themselves and he refused
Speaker 1: to take part in it, so they had a grudge
Speaker 1: against him. So it's possible. Possibly, Uh, there was a
Speaker 1: spawn ranch worker that that disappeared and he would They
Speaker 1: were actually convicted. Some other family members of his murdered.
Speaker 1: His name was Shorty Shade Donald Shorty Shay. That was
Speaker 1: this one dude, Joel Pugh who was married to Sandra
Speaker 1: Good who was a member and he uh, he was
Speaker 1: found dead in his London hotel. He had um It
Speaker 1: was ruled a suicide, but his wrist had been slashed
Speaker 1: and his throat was slashed twice and there was something
Speaker 1: written in blood on the mirror that was erased. You know,
Speaker 1: it's one of these shoddy jobs I think by the
Speaker 1: London cops. But some say it said Jack and Jill.
Speaker 1: Other people say they don't remember what it said. But
Speaker 1: that was definitely a one of those that was like,
Speaker 1: could he have been killed Manson family member? Yeah, well
Speaker 1: this goes on one of those um Manson family members
Speaker 1: who was convicted of killing Shorty Shay had made a
Speaker 1: couple of trips to the UK while Joel Pugh was there,
Speaker 1: so there's even there's even more there's there's definitely weird
Speaker 1: that he died like that. Yeah, you know, having your
Speaker 1: throat slashed in a London hotel, it's weird no matter what. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so like we said, you know, you said at
Speaker 1: the beginning, it was definitely the end of the peace
Speaker 1: love movement, and UM sort of put a pin on
Speaker 1: what the um, what people thought about what a lot
Speaker 1: of people thought about the counter culture, and like, hey,
Speaker 1: this is these are the hippies. They're not peace and love.
Speaker 1: They murder people on drugs and this is what acid
Speaker 1: can do to you. So that was mainstream media. You
Speaker 1: had other um, alternative media or places like Rolling Stone
Speaker 1: that was still a pretty young magazine that would uh
Speaker 1: would not say things like that, would not kind of
Speaker 1: buy into the mainstream media portrayal. But UM it captured
Speaker 1: and still captures a lot of people's um imagination. You know,
Speaker 1: it was a part of the zeitgeist. But it just
Speaker 1: endured for decades after, you know for sure. And Rolling
Speaker 1: Stone actually did a tremendous amount of reporting on UM.
Speaker 1: Charles Manson that was really good at the time. That
Speaker 1: two thou article I read was really good. That was
Speaker 1: from Rolling Stone. You can get into a Manson rabbit
Speaker 1: hole just going onto Rolling Stone's website, and that that
Speaker 1: two thousand UM article I read Chuck the the author.
Speaker 1: Um he I think he kind of summed up Charles
Speaker 1: Manson better than I've seen it anywhere else. But he
Speaker 1: said this, he said, sometimes he can be so transparent,
Speaker 1: which makes him look like nothing more than a goofy,
Speaker 1: klutzy small timer who made some bad decisions that led
Speaker 1: to more bad decisions that led to murder, and who
Speaker 1: then got caught up in an ambitious DA's dream about
Speaker 1: a mastermind saying Gali with demonic visions of world domination.
Speaker 1: Some crook, some outlaw, some gangster, some desperado, probably the
Speaker 1: worst ever, but in the end, a tiny redneck. I
Speaker 1: mean that definitely falls in there too. Yeah. So as
Speaker 1: far as these kids go, Um, it's kind of hard
Speaker 1: to get good information because I read a bunch of
Speaker 1: different things. But from what I can tell, he had
Speaker 1: three sons, for sure. Yeah, one with Candy Stevens named
Speaker 1: Charles Luther Manson. Uh, one with Mary Brunner named Valentine
Speaker 1: or Valentine Michael Manson. Those two guys are impossible to
Speaker 1: find anything on. I'm sure they have probably changed their names. Uh.
Speaker 1: There was a Charles Manson Jr. Who killed himself in
Speaker 1: the I think early nineties. Yeah, and then there's this stude.
Speaker 1: Did you see this Matthew Roberts guy. I ran across
Speaker 1: his name, but I don't know anything about him. Well,
Speaker 1: he claims to UH that his mother said, you know what, Um,
Speaker 1: Charles Manson's your dad. We um had sex in an
Speaker 1: orgy in San Francisco in the late sixties, and I
Speaker 1: believe that he is probably your father. Although given that
Speaker 1: it's an orgy, you know, those things go. So that's
Speaker 1: the last That's the last thing you ever want to
Speaker 1: hear your mom tell you that whole story, the whole story,
Speaker 1: from beginning to end. It's just bad news for you,
Speaker 1: the kid. Yeah. So just look this guy up. And
Speaker 1: if he doesn't look like Charles Manson Incarnate, then I
Speaker 1: don't know what to say. But the dude looks exactly
Speaker 1: like him. Um. Here's the deal, though, is he ended
Speaker 1: up He tried to get DNA from the prison, tried
Speaker 1: to smuggle it out, but it got contaminated. The test
Speaker 1: didn't work. He ended up taking a DNA test to
Speaker 1: match with who we know was Charles Manson Jr. Son
Speaker 1: a dude named Jason Freeman, who was you know, the
Speaker 1: grandson of Charles Manson, and there was no match there. Um.
Speaker 1: But Matthew Roberts says, well, that doesn't prove anything because
Speaker 1: we've never seen the DNA match from Freeman and Manson,
Speaker 1: so he's still claiming to be his son. And um,
Speaker 1: I mean, the guy looks so much like him. It's
Speaker 1: a little creepy. So it's hard to not say, you know,
Speaker 1: why would his mom make up the story? The guy
Speaker 1: happens to look just like him. Um, but who knows? Um.
Speaker 1: And in the end, his will and supposedly his estate
Speaker 1: is worth money. Um, and I know how much, but
Speaker 1: they say, you know, there could be a lot of
Speaker 1: dough there. And right now there's a legal battle going
Speaker 1: on between Jason Freeman, who was the grandson, and then
Speaker 1: this pen pal that Manson had for like decades named
Speaker 1: Michael Channels, who he scribbled out a will to this guy.
Speaker 1: And he's saying, hey, look, he wrote this will. He
Speaker 1: wants me to have this money. Jason Freeman saying it's mine. Um.
Speaker 1: For their part, they're both saying what they want to do.
Speaker 1: His body's on ice still as they want to uh,
Speaker 1: they both want to scatter his ashes just where no
Speaker 1: one knows. So there it doesn't become like some weird shrine. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but the the ongoing legal battle first will, well, we'll
Speaker 1: see what happens there. So in that star Lady Wade
Speaker 1: in saying if anybody who says he has a will
Speaker 1: is lying that he purposefully said that he was not
Speaker 1: going to leave a will, right, but it would just
Speaker 1: it would be just like Charles Manson to scribble off
Speaker 1: a will, deny that he ever did it, and just
Speaker 1: leave a big mess behind afterwards, you know, yeah, just
Speaker 1: just one more mess for everybody to sort out. So strange,
Speaker 1: so strange, and said absolutely in the sixties there was
Speaker 1: some I know, he talked about the who was that
Speaker 1: one cult that saw the documentary with Father Zod or whatever.
Speaker 1: I mean, that was a crazy documentary that I mean,
Speaker 1: just that whole time was so so strange. It really
Speaker 1: was just people looking for something to belong to, something
Speaker 1: some meaning that wasn't their parents, meaning you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: well all right, Chuck, they found it. By the way
Speaker 1: they found it, they all became stockbrokers in the eighties.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about the Manson family, well,
Speaker 1: like I said, there's rabbit holes all over the internet. Um.
Speaker 1: And in the meantime, you can also read this great
Speaker 1: article by egg Grabanowski by typing the words Manson family
Speaker 1: and the search bar how stuff works. And like I said,
Speaker 1: he'll bring up this great grabs or article. Uh and wow,
Speaker 1: I said that it's time for listener. Now I'm gonna
Speaker 1: call this, uh Confederate monuments, well not Confederate monuments, but
Speaker 1: removal of monuments up. So we got a lot of
Speaker 1: great email about that podcast. Um. I don't know how
Speaker 1: many of those you read, but you know, people roundly
Speaker 1: said we did a good fare take on this tricky subject. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I saw that too, which always makes me feel good.
Speaker 1: Uh and a shout out. This is not from her,
Speaker 1: but one of the people who wrote in was an
Speaker 1: artist named ka Uh Kara Walker who just look up
Speaker 1: her work. She is amazing. She she's I think the
Speaker 1: second youngest person to ever received a MacArthur Genius Grant
Speaker 1: and she does He's great. She does a lot of
Speaker 1: stuff and a lot of mediums. But what she's known
Speaker 1: for I think of these room sized um silhouette like
Speaker 1: black cutout silhouettes depicting like statements on race and gender
Speaker 1: and civil rights. And she's just like a rock star
Speaker 1: in the New York art scene. And she went to
Speaker 1: my high school. Yeah, I saw that. I did not
Speaker 1: know that. She introduced herself. She graduated two years ahead
Speaker 1: of me at Redan, So uh. I wrote back to
Speaker 1: her and just told her proud I was to be
Speaker 1: an alum. So anyway, go check out Carl Carl Walker's work.
Speaker 1: That's a mouthful, but this is from someone else. Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for the podcast. I'm a big fan,
Speaker 1: especially enjoyed the Public Monument episode. I'm writing to clarify
Speaker 1: small point about the Georgia state flag that Chuck discussed
Speaker 1: in that episode. I got this thing wrong, by the way.
Speaker 1: You pointed out that Georgia, like some other former Confederate states,
Speaker 1: included the familiar Confederate battle flag with the ex pattern
Speaker 1: and it's state flag from fifty two thousand one. However,
Speaker 1: that flag is not the Stars and Bars. The Stars
Speaker 1: and Bars was the official national flag of the Confederacy
Speaker 1: and is the flag after which the current Georgia flag
Speaker 1: is patterned. It turns out that the flag Georgia used,
Speaker 1: uh TIL was modeled after the national Confederate flag, and
Speaker 1: the state switched to the Confederate battle flag in fifty six.
Speaker 1: And other words, while the most familiar Confederate flag was
Speaker 1: removed in two thousand one, it was replaced with another one.
Speaker 1: That's so Georgia. I thought we did the right thing. No,
Speaker 1: so I thought you guys to be interested. By the way,
Speaker 1: in Mississippi is the only state that still uses the
Speaker 1: Confederate Battle flag and its official state flag. Keep up
Speaker 1: the great work. And I don't have a name on
Speaker 1: this one. Well, thanks a lot, I don't have a
Speaker 1: name on this one. That was some good info. We
Speaker 1: appreciate that. And Chuck, that was big of you to
Speaker 1: to say, hey, I got it wrong. I got it wrong.
Speaker 1: That's all right, man, that's all right. Uh if you
Speaker 1: want to write end to tell us we got something wrong,
Speaker 1: lay it on us. That's fine. You can tweet to us.
Speaker 1: I'm at josh um Clark. I also have a website
Speaker 1: called are You Serious clark dot com. There's also an
Speaker 1: official Twitter for Stuff you Should Know called s y
Speaker 1: SK podcast. Chuck's on Facebook dot com slash It's Charles W.
Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant, and there's also an official Facebook dot com
Speaker 1: slash Stuff you Should Know You can send us all
Speaker 1: including Jerry an email to stuff podcasts at how stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com and has always joined us at our
Speaker 1: home on the web, Stuff you Should Know dot com.
Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, is
Speaker 1: that how stuff Works dot com m