Speaker 1: Proclaimed there's one of America's best sports shows by Sports Illustrated.
Speaker 1: This is the Pauline Ball Radio Network to be part
Speaker 1: of the show. One day um going through the show
Speaker 1: in January of two thousand and eleven, and we get
Speaker 1: a call from a guy who describes himself as Al
Speaker 1: from Dadeville, Alabama. Are doing well? Thanks? He lost his
Speaker 1: core with me, and he said, we'll tell you what
Speaker 1: I did last week, the weekend after the Iron Bowl,
Speaker 1: I went to Auburn, Alabama, and I poisoned the two
Speaker 1: tumors tree did die. They're not dead yet, but they
Speaker 1: definitely will die. You heard that right, This man calling
Speaker 1: himself Al from Dadeville calls into a radio show to
Speaker 1: say that he's poisoned two oak trees. Is that against
Speaker 1: the law to poison the tree? What do you think
Speaker 1: I care? Okay, I really don't roll down, roll damn
Speaker 1: tiede and he hung up. I didn't give it much thought.
Speaker 1: Two weeks later, a man named Harvey Updike was arrested.
Speaker 1: It became one of the biggest stories of the year
Speaker 1: and one of the ugliest college football related crimes that
Speaker 1: has ever been reported. To understand how a man with
Speaker 1: no criminal record, became one of the most hated individuals
Speaker 1: in the history of college sports. You have to know
Speaker 1: a thing or two about college football in Alabama and
Speaker 1: the rivalry that's long defined it, and to understand why
Speaker 1: a whole town would mourn over the death of two
Speaker 1: old oak trees like they were people. He needed to
Speaker 1: know about a small college town named Auburn with a
Speaker 1: big football tradition. This episode, I'll go to the scene
Speaker 1: of the crime and meet the man who did it.
Speaker 1: I wanted Auburn people gonna hate me as much as
Speaker 1: I hate them. I'm Morocca and this is mobituaries, This
Speaker 1: mobid death of a tree, roots of a rivalry. It's
Speaker 1: a night. We have a story about a long standing
Speaker 1: rivalry where things have now gotten out of hand and
Speaker 1: became Alabama have arrested this man who they say poisoned
Speaker 1: a pair of beloved oak trees. At already we took
Speaker 1: Harvey Updike Junior into custody for the poison. Trees were
Speaker 1: started find that somebody would do something like this to
Speaker 1: a few trees that had never done anything to anybody.
Speaker 1: How important a trees to to Auburn. Without trees, this
Speaker 1: campus is nothing to me without the trees. It's just
Speaker 1: buildings on a side. I'm with horticulturist Gary Kiver at
Speaker 1: Auburn University in eastern Alabama, about an hour outside state
Speaker 1: capital of Montgomery. Auburn has one of the most beautiful
Speaker 1: campuses in the South, in part because of all the trees.
Speaker 1: That's nice. What kind of trees are those? Is that birchrtle? Kind?
Speaker 1: So path with trees? There are over one D twenty
Speaker 1: species of trees on campus. Not so surprising at a
Speaker 1: school where you can major in forestry. That is a
Speaker 1: mini magnolia. That is a silver bill. And that thing
Speaker 1: over there that looks like a Christmas tree? Is that
Speaker 1: a sort of It's not a pine, it's a cryptomeria.
Speaker 1: No one knows what that is. If you're in horticulture,
Speaker 1: you know what it is. By now you can tell
Speaker 1: I didn't major in forest tree. I guess? Can I
Speaker 1: guess that that is? It's a is it alive oak?
Speaker 1: It is d D Ding Dan Dan. I'm so excited
Speaker 1: that I got something right. But at one spot on campus,
Speaker 1: the trees have deep symbolic value. We're standing here in
Speaker 1: the Tumors corner and this is the gateway to campus
Speaker 1: and imagined the term where town meets down. Tumors Corner,
Speaker 1: the intersection of College Street and Magnolia Avenue. Two massive
Speaker 1: old growth oak trees once stood sentry here, about eighty
Speaker 1: feet apart. They're glorious crowns of foliage joined overhead, indeed
Speaker 1: forming a kind of gateway the heart and soul of
Speaker 1: Auburn's campus. The Tumors Oaks that's t O O M
Speaker 1: E R S. We're over eighty years old and named
Speaker 1: after the founder of a drug store that's still there
Speaker 1: just across the street. Okay, this is kind of a
Speaker 1: big deal for me because I'm actually now seeing it.
Speaker 1: So where are the trees? I'm looking here and right here,
Speaker 1: the slender trees i'm seeing are replacements, perfectly nice, but
Speaker 1: you certainly wouldn't try climbing one these. One day they
Speaker 1: might touch overhead, but right now they seem disconnected from
Speaker 1: each other. Two trees among many on campus. And we
Speaker 1: look here and for each of these new Tumors Oaks,
Speaker 1: fairly immature. There's a little sign around them. And what
Speaker 1: does it say? Please do not roll rolling. It's a
Speaker 1: school tradition, really a ritual that goes back to the
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies. When Auburn's football team wins, students rushed Tumors
Speaker 1: corner and hurl rolls of toilet paper up into the trees.
Speaker 1: The original tumors oaks that stood here were majestic, but
Speaker 1: when rolled, they looked kind of magical. In photographs, the
Speaker 1: long streams of toilet paper resemble white flowing mains that
Speaker 1: at night seemed to glow, made from pounds and pounds
Speaker 1: make that many hounds of toilet paper. Usually rolling and
Speaker 1: it's still done is to celebrate Auburn's winds, but sometimes
Speaker 1: the students roll trees to celebrate another holy occasion when
Speaker 1: their arch nemesis, the University of Alabama, loses no matter
Speaker 1: who beats them. These two teams hate each other. But
Speaker 1: why where did this rivalry that divides the whole state
Speaker 1: and led one man to poison two oak trees originate?
Speaker 1: Turns out that's an old story, like Civil War old.
Speaker 1: During the Civil War, the federal government decides to fund
Speaker 1: what are called land grant universities. These are schools that
Speaker 1: teach programs on farming and mechanical trades, basically aggie schools.
Speaker 1: After the war ends when the former Confederate states joined
Speaker 1: the Union, the state of Alabama wants to get in
Speaker 1: on that money. Then all of a sudden there comes
Speaker 1: this fierce competition to see who will become the land
Speaker 1: grant university in each state. That's historian Wayne Flint. He
Speaker 1: wrote the book on Alabama. Like literally, he wrote the
Speaker 1: Encyclopedia of Alabama. So which Alabama school will win this
Speaker 1: distinction and the money that goes with it. University of
Speaker 1: Alabama wants to be the language school. And the last
Speaker 1: thing they want is for a college in East Alabama
Speaker 1: that would be Auburn to get this ultimate plum of
Speaker 1: the federal money. And in this their first head to
Speaker 1: head competition, Auburn, a formerly small Methodist college out in
Speaker 1: the Sticks, wins out over the older, than more affluent
Speaker 1: University of Alabama, thus sparking a rivalry that lives on
Speaker 1: even today. So how can two in state schools that
Speaker 1: compete for wealth, political power, and for stege settled the
Speaker 1: score football? So there is in sublimated form this rivalry
Speaker 1: that is about politics and wealth. It immediately manifest medal metastasizes,
Speaker 1: tastasizes onto the gridiron and into the stands. The football
Speaker 1: rivalry gets so intense, brawls between fans, fights over regulation rules,
Speaker 1: that it's suspended at one point for forty years. Seriously,
Speaker 1: it takes an act of state government, a House joint
Speaker 1: resolution to bring these teams back together. And in the
Speaker 1: Alabama Crimson Tide and the Auburn Tigers pick up where
Speaker 1: they left off. It's like they never stopped hating each other.
Speaker 1: At its heart, this rivalry is less about two schools
Speaker 1: and more about class. I'm thinking of that awful cheerio
Speaker 1: sometimes here at high school games. That's all right, that's okay,
Speaker 1: You're gonna work for us someday. Does that kind of
Speaker 1: sum up feeling that that Alabama has for abur heicks
Speaker 1: strawberries of second hand forward trucks. You said it, not
Speaker 1: I did, because that's the stereotonuk. Never mind that today
Speaker 1: Auburn is ranked higher than Alabama on the list of
Speaker 1: top state schools. It's sent six alumni into space and
Speaker 1: one into the top office at Apple, as in CEO
Speaker 1: Tim cook yep he went to Auburn. In fact, Auburn
Speaker 1: grads on average make more than Alabama grads, a fact
Speaker 1: which may have made this rivalry even more poisonous. I
Speaker 1: would say that college football is as close to a
Speaker 1: religion in that state as you could possibly find. The
Speaker 1: main difference is that people practice it every day. Where religion,
Speaker 1: they show up when they feel like it. This is
Speaker 1: beyond obsession. It's addictive. There's people that live for football s.
Speaker 1: I have heard people tell stories of going into labor
Speaker 1: in the middle of the game and being told that
Speaker 1: they need to wait alburn football. I have to believe
Speaker 1: that part of this is that Alabama doesn't have a
Speaker 1: professional football team. Does that matter? I've always thought that
Speaker 1: was a big part of it. Um there are there
Speaker 1: are just no professional teams of any which means in
Speaker 1: Alabama you've got two choices, arguably the most intense rivalry
Speaker 1: in all of college football. You pledge your allegiance from Burns,
Speaker 1: Auburn or Alabama, you must choose us brother versus brother,
Speaker 1: battle of wills, dividing families at Tensions between these teams
Speaker 1: are so high that matrimony between Auburn and Alabama fans
Speaker 1: is called a mixed marriage, and once a year, on
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving Day weekend, the two teams meet on the gridiron
Speaker 1: in the game known simply as the iron Ball. This
Speaker 1: game is basically a high holiday in the state. Virtually
Speaker 1: everyone will be either act this game or watching from home.
Speaker 1: The highways are empty, stores are shut down. The winner
Speaker 1: of the iron Ball secures bragging rights for the whole
Speaker 1: next year. And when football fans in Alabama want to
Speaker 1: boast about their team's big wins, they call into the
Speaker 1: Paul fine Bound Show. And it must be great being
Speaker 1: known as the Oprah Winfrey of college football. Oh that
Speaker 1: was a compliment to that treasure. Hello, Hello, show isn't
Speaker 1: isn't a radio show. It's a family kind of like
Speaker 1: the Manson's who are a family? Can turned? How dare
Speaker 1: you say that about Alabama? Reading the telebrampt then you
Speaker 1: are just keep your mouth about Alabama sometimes because you
Speaker 1: don't want to hear it's not done obvious really needs
Speaker 1: a professional I mean, I dare say that no one
Speaker 1: in the history of mankind has profited more from the
Speaker 1: Alabama Auburn rivalry than the person you're currently listening to.
Speaker 1: The sec is over this conflict has been good for you.
Speaker 1: I I will admit that under oath God, you're like
Speaker 1: a war profit here. But when Harvey Uptake called into
Speaker 1: the Paul find Bound show in early two thousand eleven.
Speaker 1: He wasn't ranting a raving. The weekend after the Iron Bowl,
Speaker 1: I went to Auburn, Alabama, poisoned the two tumors treats.
Speaker 1: He sounded deliberate, he sounded proud. They die. They're not
Speaker 1: the idea, but they definitely will die. Is that against
Speaker 1: the tree? When I first read about what Harvey Uptake
Speaker 1: had done, I found it disturbing. Really more than disturbing,
Speaker 1: I found a sinister What kind of a person will
Speaker 1: kill two beautiful, innocent living things. I thought about how
Speaker 1: cruelty to animals is a predictor of violence against other people,
Speaker 1: sometimes horrific violence. I thought of a kid up the
Speaker 1: street from where I grew up named Kevin. He used
Speaker 1: to get a kick out of crushing little baby bird
Speaker 1: eggs he found in nests. I don't know what happened
Speaker 1: to him, but I still don't like the name Kevin.
Speaker 1: I even thought about the Taliban blowing up the monumental
Speaker 1: statues of Buddha at bam Yon in two thousand one. Look,
Speaker 1: you might think that comparing the killing of two trees
Speaker 1: to the torture of animals or human beings, or to
Speaker 1: the destruction of a religious shrine is over the top,
Speaker 1: and maybe it is, but sorry, what kind of a
Speaker 1: person would do this? The question for me boiled down
Speaker 1: to this, is he a person who did something terrible and,
Speaker 1: as it turns out, dangerous or is he a dangerous person?
Speaker 1: I headed down to Texas or Harvey Updyke was living
Speaker 1: last summer to find out. Now, before I introduce you
Speaker 1: to Harvey Updyke, the University of Alabama fan who killed
Speaker 1: Auburn's two beloved oak trees, there's another person I have
Speaker 1: to tell you about. Like those trees, He's no longer
Speaker 1: with us in body, but in spirit he's very much alive.
Speaker 1: University of Alabama coach Bear Bryant is an icon, and
Speaker 1: not just for leaving the Crimson Tide to unprecedented glory
Speaker 1: with six national championships over a twenty five year career
Speaker 1: beginning in the late nineteen fifties. He had an aura,
Speaker 1: A man of few words. He stood tall six ft three,
Speaker 1: sporting his trademark houndstooth Fedora, projecting the gravitas and the
Speaker 1: intensity of a John Wayne or Gary Cooper. But he
Speaker 1: wasn't playing a character in a movie. He got his
Speaker 1: nickname Bear when he was thirteen years old. Naturally, when
Speaker 1: he agreed to wrestle a captive bear at a carnival.
Speaker 1: He became so influential across Alabama. From that, of course,
Speaker 1: he had to have his own TV show Sundays at
Speaker 1: four pm. He would sit down, crack open a bottle
Speaker 1: of Coca Cola and a bag of golden flaked potato
Speaker 1: chips the show's two sponsors, and break down the Alabama
Speaker 1: game from the day before. That was what we wanted
Speaker 1: to do either. We didn't want to kick all of Everton.
Speaker 1: We could help it, but we were forces here. They
Speaker 1: His mother had always wanted him to be a minister,
Speaker 1: and he famously said coaching and preaching are a lot alike.
Speaker 1: And watching his show on late Sunday afternoons was like
Speaker 1: a second church for die hard fans for four years.
Speaker 1: From now we're walking out of here. Nice good chance.
Speaker 1: After he died on January, he was posthumously awarded the
Speaker 1: Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Reagan. A few years
Speaker 1: back when they had those commemorative state quarters. From surprised
Speaker 1: Alabama didn't put Bear Bryant on theirs on both sides. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm telling you all this for a reason. Harvey Updike
Speaker 1: grew up watching the Bear Bryant Show, and like for
Speaker 1: many young kids, Brian gave him someone to look up to.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you this, I expect nothing less. We're
Speaker 1: driving down the street in Texas and in about point
Speaker 1: two miles we are going to meet Harvey Updyke. He's canceled,
Speaker 1: he's confirmed, he's canceled. He's confirmed, he's hedged. I get it,
Speaker 1: I get it. He's not sure what he's getting into.
Speaker 1: The destination is on your right, and neither are Well.
Speaker 1: Hello there, Hey, I'm Morocca. How are you? John Buddy
Speaker 1: breaks to meet too. You must be Harvey, right, I'm
Speaker 1: Hardy And then I said I love your hat, thank you.
Speaker 1: What do you know? Harvey is wearing a hound's tooth
Speaker 1: Alabama cap to match his short sleeved polo with a
Speaker 1: Crimson a insignia that look like if she did on
Speaker 1: Bart very much. And what's her name, Princess? That doesn't
Speaker 1: sound like anything to do with the Crimson tide. Well,
Speaker 1: I didn't name her. I had Harvey sixty nine. And
Speaker 1: he looks at his hair is such a light blonde
Speaker 1: that it looks white. He has a biker mustache, the
Speaker 1: kind that Hull Cogan has with a goatee, or is
Speaker 1: that a soul patch. I meet Harvey's son, Bear Upnight.
Speaker 1: Nice to meet you. That's right, Harvey named his son Bear. Incidentally,
Speaker 1: he's got a daughter in another state named, wait for it,
Speaker 1: Crimson Tide update. Nice to me, alright, alright. I also
Speaker 1: meet his two granddaughters and they're Adorableley, Briley, how do
Speaker 1: you do a mode that? I'm good? And this is
Speaker 1: princess right? I learned quickly that travel softball is a
Speaker 1: huge thing for these girls and their grandfather. I cheer
Speaker 1: all my girls as hard as I can. I'll love
Speaker 1: him to death. What does he, Briley? What does he do?
Speaker 1: How does he cheer? He's like, let's go of dyke.
Speaker 1: I just go board and go out there. I have
Speaker 1: to wonder what going overboard means for Harvey up Dyke.
Speaker 1: But the girls seem to love their grandfather's fervor. I
Speaker 1: like it. I like how big of a fan he is.
Speaker 1: All my friends like it too. They laugh, they walk
Speaker 1: up to me and they're like, me and your Grandma's awesome.
Speaker 1: I wish I had a grandpa like that. And I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's amazing. But he's loud, loud and proud, and Briley
Speaker 1: and Madison imitate Harvey's signature catchphrase man. Then Harvey shows
Speaker 1: him how it's done. Is there a fault line in Texas?
Speaker 1: Because the walls just shut twenty minutes in. If I
Speaker 1: have to sum up Harvey in one word, it isn't
Speaker 1: scary or creepy, but grandpa. So far, at least he's
Speaker 1: kind of a regular grandpa. Then, without any prompting, I
Speaker 1: hear what sounds like Harvey's origin story, how he lost
Speaker 1: his dad when he was just four years old, and
Speaker 1: how a certain legendary coach filled the voice my mother
Speaker 1: when I was seven or eight years old. If I
Speaker 1: ever have a boy, I'm gonna name him Bear Bryant.
Speaker 1: And she asked me why. I said, will. He's everything
Speaker 1: at a father figure should be. He makes his players
Speaker 1: called their parents on weekends, and I just thought he
Speaker 1: was a great person. Harvey fondly describes sitting and watching
Speaker 1: The Bear Bryant Show on a black and white TV
Speaker 1: while his mother ironed he still members of the show's
Speaker 1: two sponsors. Yeah, yeah, he had opened the bag and
Speaker 1: you know, about three or four and drunk his coke
Speaker 1: and I think it lasted about an hour. We all
Speaker 1: head down the road now to a local surf and
Speaker 1: turf spot to grab some lunch. On the car ride over,
Speaker 1: Harvey tells me about his previous life as a police
Speaker 1: officer in Texas. There's the best job I ever had.
Speaker 1: I love being a trooper. I put a lot of
Speaker 1: people in jail for d W which is a huge
Speaker 1: point of pride for Harvey. He says his father was
Speaker 1: killed by a drunk driver. Newspaper accounts from the time, though,
Speaker 1: report that his father died when he lost control of
Speaker 1: his tractor trailer and flipped over, and that no other
Speaker 1: vehicle was involved. But I believe that Harvey believes his
Speaker 1: father was killed by a drunk driver. He says it's
Speaker 1: something that defined his career in law enforcement. The only
Speaker 1: thing I remember about my dad is uh, At the funeral,
Speaker 1: they picked me up to kiss him and I just
Speaker 1: his forehead and it scared me to death. You know
Speaker 1: it's it felt like marble or something. And you know,
Speaker 1: I was three years old. I didn't know what. It's
Speaker 1: pretty out here? It is pretty? What is his belt
Speaker 1: in lake? I'm genuinely moved by Harvey's story. But wait
Speaker 1: a second, am I being manipulated? Look? This is my
Speaker 1: first true crime episode, so maybe I'm being gullible. I
Speaker 1: need to be more circumspect. Anyway, do you want to
Speaker 1: go ahead and at the restaurant? I ordered the mixed
Speaker 1: field green salad and catfish fingers. Now, like any good
Speaker 1: lunch spot, it's a little noisy. If there's levels of
Speaker 1: fans like weekend fans, you know, avid fans, radical fans.
Speaker 1: Where are you? I would say probably radical? I know
Speaker 1: it's it's unhealthy. Do you what? What have you? Well?
Speaker 1: I mean, besides my kids and grandkids, I love that
Speaker 1: Alabama you know, right below him, not too far below him.
Speaker 1: Madison who goes by move seems to take this and
Speaker 1: stride move. Do you love anything as much as your
Speaker 1: grandpa loves Alabama football? Um? I mean, I love him
Speaker 1: as much as he loves Alabama, but he loves it
Speaker 1: a lot. And what do you think of that? Did
Speaker 1: you understand it? No? I don't understand why he had
Speaker 1: to kill the trees. I don't. I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 1: He's a little crazy. I didn't mean it. I did,
Speaker 1: and just like that, courtesy of his eleven year old granddaughter,
Speaker 1: we're talking about the crime itself. You just I didn't
Speaker 1: mean it. I did. What does that mean? I was
Speaker 1: saying I didn't mean it, but then I then I
Speaker 1: was gonna tell you truth. I didn't mean it. I
Speaker 1: wanted to alburn people to hate me as much as
Speaker 1: I hate him, because they bought Cam Newton. Scam. You
Speaker 1: know who he is. Scam Newton, a camp back. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do some translating for the non sports people
Speaker 1: you may have heard of NFL quarterback Cam Newton. Harvey
Speaker 1: calls him Scam Newton. Back in college, Newton was a
Speaker 1: star player at Auburn, which made him enemy number one
Speaker 1: at Alabama. Throughout two thousand ten, Newton was under investigation
Speaker 1: after allegations that he had been paid to play for Auburn.
Speaker 1: That's a big no no in college sports. Cam Newton
Speaker 1: was eventually officially cleared of these allegations. That season, Newton
Speaker 1: led Auburn to a historic comeback victory over Alabama in
Speaker 1: the Iron Ball, a stinging defeat coming on the heels
Speaker 1: of an even greater outrage for Harvey. They home the
Speaker 1: Scam Newton jersey on Bear bryan statue. That's when I
Speaker 1: went crazy. Yes, fans taped Cam Newton's jersey onto Bear
Speaker 1: Bryant's statue a week before the iron Ball This is true.
Speaker 1: You can it or that like like I like sacrileged. Yes. Yes.
Speaker 1: Harvey also says that when Bear Bryant died in Auburn,
Speaker 1: fans rolled Tumors corner in celebration. Now, there's no proof
Speaker 1: that something so ghoulish as that happened, but again, I
Speaker 1: believe that Harvey believes it. At this point in the meal,
Speaker 1: I'm kind of understanding why all of this was so
Speaker 1: upsetting for Harvey. Auburn fans taped Scam Newton's Forgive Me
Speaker 1: Cam Newton's jersey onto a statue of Bear Bryant, which
Speaker 1: I'm guessing in Harvey's mind was tantamount to mocking his father.
Speaker 1: But then Harvey goes into a clinical, step by step
Speaker 1: description of how he poisoned the trees in the middle
Speaker 1: of this family seafood restaurant in front of his granddaughter.
Speaker 1: Took me a month. Ever, now I stay up all
Speaker 1: not long, and I used to have cameras on the trees.
Speaker 1: I figured out when the slow most time, what day
Speaker 1: of the week, and what hour of the night was
Speaker 1: the slowest around old oak trees, so I could go
Speaker 1: in there at that time and not get caught at
Speaker 1: what time was it? And boy am on Sunday night.
Speaker 1: The chemical he used was an herbicide called spike a
Speaker 1: D D F. Mixed it with water and put it
Speaker 1: in a Milton jugs. I had to milk guts roots
Speaker 1: tree and I walked around the the outside of the tree,
Speaker 1: you know where the bulgage came out, so just pouring
Speaker 1: it around, almost like gasoline to set a fire. Like
Speaker 1: when he arrested me, they came to my house. They
Speaker 1: brought I'm not lying to you. They brought twenty five
Speaker 1: police cards out there are searching my house. We can't
Speaker 1: verify that. And they told me that, uh, I used way, way,
Speaker 1: way too much. We can verify that. Try five times
Speaker 1: the lethal I'm out there was even concerned from federal
Speaker 1: police officers that he might have poisoned the water table.
Speaker 1: In other words, Harvey Updyke put Auburn's drinking water at risk.
Speaker 1: You know, I wouldn't have chemist. I didn't know how
Speaker 1: much do you use? I just want to make sure
Speaker 1: they died. It felt like I was sitting across from
Speaker 1: someone who had been radicalized. I know, fanaticism in sports
Speaker 1: didn't start with Harvey. In nineteen seventeen, Texas A and
Speaker 1: M fans stole the University of Texas's mascot steer Bibo
Speaker 1: and branded him, And just the last year, West Point
Speaker 1: Cadets kidnapped the Air Force mascot falcon Aurora and seriously
Speaker 1: injured her. Grown ups did this. Maybe it's fitting that
Speaker 1: the voice of reason at this table belongs to eleven
Speaker 1: year old Madison. Yeah. I don't know why he wants
Speaker 1: people to hate him my name. They probably already do.
Speaker 1: But he's not really acting like his age. He's kind
Speaker 1: of acting young, like he's back in elementary school. I
Speaker 1: would never want someone to hate me as much. I
Speaker 1: would hate that. I'm sorry, baby, And just like that,
Speaker 1: I'm feeling a little better about Harvey. Do you like
Speaker 1: trees in general? Yeah? I like trees in general. You know,
Speaker 1: I just don't like alb There's several things in this
Speaker 1: world and I really intruded. I don't like and Alburn's
Speaker 1: one of them. What are the others? Liver? I ain't
Speaker 1: gonna eat no liver. It's got a lot of protein.
Speaker 1: I don't care what had happened. I don't eat liver.
Speaker 1: And what are the other things you don't like? I
Speaker 1: hate to say this because this is an upset a
Speaker 1: lot of people, but I hold my breath. I'm not
Speaker 1: crazy about cats. I didn't know what you were gonna say.
Speaker 1: Just now. Okay, So Harvey is so matter of fact
Speaker 1: describing his crime, but there was nothing matter of fact
Speaker 1: about it for the Auburn community. After the trees were poisoned.
Speaker 1: The first thing that happened after it was announced was
Speaker 1: the fans rolled the trees, almost like, Okay, we're gonna
Speaker 1: show our concern for you by rolling you. I'm back
Speaker 1: with Gary Kiev, the horticulturist and former Auburn professor, and
Speaker 1: he's telling me about the aftermath of the two thousand
Speaker 1: eleven poisoning. I empathized with the students because they were
Speaker 1: filling the trees pain And the next thing they did
Speaker 1: was to begin to insurround the trees. They began to
Speaker 1: bring up flowers, They began to bring up memorabilia to
Speaker 1: pay respects. Toilet paper rolls inscribed with get well messages
Speaker 1: were laid down a bouquet of flowers made out of
Speaker 1: toilet paper. I began to see the human quality that
Speaker 1: these trees brought out in people. This vigil. Absolutely, absolutely
Speaker 1: thank you to the Auburn family for the outpouring of
Speaker 1: love that you are showing now during this time of hurt.
Speaker 1: These trees will likely die, but the Auburn spirit we'll
Speaker 1: continue to live on. While the prognosis was Grandma, some
Speaker 1: held out hope, including Gary Kiver and are you in
Speaker 1: rescue mode right now? What is where is your head
Speaker 1: when all of this is happening. Well, at this point
Speaker 1: we didn't know where the herbside had been placed, we
Speaker 1: didn't know how much, so we were way behind the curve.
Speaker 1: The university consulted with the nation's best tree doctors. Various
Speaker 1: treatments were tried at great expense, Sugar injected into the roots,
Speaker 1: liquid activated carbon drenched over tree beds, but the tumors
Speaker 1: oaks only got sicker. In essence, the trees was starving
Speaker 1: it seft today. I mean when you see something like
Speaker 1: that happening, I mean, do you feel for the tree
Speaker 1: without a doubt, without a doubt, you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: We've got this majestic trees that do no harm to
Speaker 1: anyone if someone has chosen to harm them, and it
Speaker 1: makes no sense to me. If you want to know
Speaker 1: how this felt for Auburn, listen to the voice of
Speaker 1: Gary Keeper's colleague Stephen and Low, when he was asked
Speaker 1: by a reporter if the trees were definitely going to die.
Speaker 1: It's an emotional question. Oh, I always want to hold
Speaker 1: that home. Based upon the technical experts are consulted with
Speaker 1: around the country, the concentration of spike basically found within
Speaker 1: the soil would suggest there is a very low probability.
Speaker 1: On April thirteen, two and a half years after Harvey
Speaker 1: uptake had poisoned them, the tumors oaks were removed, it
Speaker 1: is so said. And then every time the chain stow
Speaker 1: cuts and just listen to the people get closed. So
Speaker 1: that's a sad day. It's uh tough to talk about.
Speaker 1: Just think this, it's like a funeral. I mean, just
Speaker 1: people have tears in their eyes, or they did when
Speaker 1: the street was barricaded off and there were hundreds of
Speaker 1: people out there. Uh, there were people crying without a doubt,
Speaker 1: and surprisingly some of those who had come to bear
Speaker 1: witness were from Alabama. In the effort to save the trees,
Speaker 1: Auburn's arch rival had raised it over fifty dollars on
Speaker 1: a Facebook page called Tied for Tumors. In many ways,
Speaker 1: of poisoning brought Auburn in Alabama closer together because many
Speaker 1: of the Alabama fans felt maybe, in some way a
Speaker 1: small part responsible for their poisoning. I'm driving with Harvey now.
Speaker 1: We've just left the restaurant where he described in detail
Speaker 1: his crime. Let me ask when we were sitting in
Speaker 1: the restaurant, so you said you you were honest, and
Speaker 1: you said you don't regret it. But do you think
Speaker 1: it was wrong what you did? Yes, I think it's wrong.
Speaker 1: You know, them trees wouldn't hurt me, but that's the
Speaker 1: only way I felt like I could get back at.
Speaker 1: You know, I wasn't gonna hurt anybody, and at the
Speaker 1: time we had just found out that my ex wife
Speaker 1: had cancer. On the one hand, unrelieved that Harvey actually
Speaker 1: recognizes that what he did was wrong, I guess I
Speaker 1: was depressed. On the other hand, he's making excuses again. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think everybody has done things that they regret, probably
Speaker 1: not a magnitude that I did. But if you could
Speaker 1: say anything to those trees, what would you say to them?
Speaker 1: I'd probably say sorry, but too late. Now we're back
Speaker 1: at Harvey's house now, actually it's his son Bears house.
Speaker 1: Harvey moved in here in two thousand seventeen. Oh you
Speaker 1: got a huge upstairs. Well, that's where I stay. It's
Speaker 1: not really a bedroom where he's staying when I visit,
Speaker 1: more like the second floor landing. Do you see all
Speaker 1: my hats? They're really nice. I mean, I got a
Speaker 1: bunch of them. That's a pretty good looking hat. I care.
Speaker 1: I like that. Bam. This is the one Bear Brynet
Speaker 1: used to wear. The kind of he wore. I didn't
Speaker 1: start liking on yesterday. Uh, you've been with them for
Speaker 1: four decades now, you know. I stayed with him when
Speaker 1: day was down, but they didn't stay with him when
Speaker 1: he was down. Too many Crimson Tide fans. Harvey became
Speaker 1: a pariah, denounced by no less a person than Alabama
Speaker 1: head coach Nick Saban. Part of what makes this so
Speaker 1: sad is that Harvey didn't even go to Alabama. He
Speaker 1: didn't even grow up in the state, but across the
Speaker 1: line in the Florida Panhandle. Harvey is a member of
Speaker 1: what's known unofficially as the pickup truck Alumni, working class
Speaker 1: people so inspired by the heroics of Bear Bryant that
Speaker 1: they became die hard fans who take the rivalry way
Speaker 1: more seriously than the actual alumni do. And now the
Speaker 1: Alabama community was looking down at him worse than they
Speaker 1: ever looked at those kids from Auburn. You got your
Speaker 1: pills there? What are the pills for? I take about
Speaker 1: thirty pills a day for what everything? I mean everything,
Speaker 1: I've got everything. It's a veneerial disease. Harvey spent six
Speaker 1: months in a small jail in Lee County, that's where
Speaker 1: Auburn is. He said he got jumped several times by
Speaker 1: Auburn fans serving time there, and that people would spit
Speaker 1: in his food. He said he lost over eighty pounds,
Speaker 1: and if you compare photos before and after his sentence,
Speaker 1: you can see that he's not lying. He came out
Speaker 1: looking gaunt and pale. Do you think it was extreme
Speaker 1: the punishment? Yes, I do. I mean what what I
Speaker 1: did I shouldn't have done. But I think I pretty
Speaker 1: well got what I deserved. You know, I think, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think I deserved to go to jail for doing it.
Speaker 1: I mean I do, I mean I shouldn't have done it. Yes,
Speaker 1: I know, Harvey just completely contradicted himself. Again. As for
Speaker 1: whether Harvey's punishment that is crime, no surprise, Alabama's legal
Speaker 1: community is divided. It was almost a personal attack. These
Speaker 1: weren't just a couple of trees. There are a lot
Speaker 1: of cheers have been shed over this. That's Lee County
Speaker 1: d A. Brandon Hughes. If you remove that emotional attachment
Speaker 1: to those two trees, his case is way out of
Speaker 1: proportion of what ordinarily would be charged. And that's University
Speaker 1: of Alabama law professor Jenny Carroll. Harvey was charged with
Speaker 1: a Class C felony, which for a non violent first offense,
Speaker 1: was not typical. There was also a misdemeanor charge for
Speaker 1: and I find this significant, desecrating a venerated object. There
Speaker 1: were plenty effects who felt like, if ever there was
Speaker 1: a time for capital punishment, it was this time. There
Speaker 1: was no trial, A plea deal was struck, which included
Speaker 1: the six month long jail sentence, a five year probationary
Speaker 1: period and over eight hundred thousand dollars in restitution at
Speaker 1: a payment rate of two hundred dollars a month. It
Speaker 1: will take Harvey more than three hundred years to make good.
Speaker 1: I think it was garbage. I think he got off easy.
Speaker 1: To call it a slap on the wrist is overstating.
Speaker 1: I think it was a kiss on the cheek. That's nothing,
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing for what he did. Harvey was banned for
Speaker 1: life from Auburn's campus as part of the probation, he
Speaker 1: had a seven pm curfew, and worst of all, for Harvey,
Speaker 1: was not allowed to go to any college sporting events,
Speaker 1: which meant no Alabama football for five years. They are
Speaker 1: punishing him at the very heart of the thing he
Speaker 1: loves the most. It's like a modern day shunning, right,
Speaker 1: Like you have to leave our community that we all
Speaker 1: consider so valuable. Still, a lot of people weren't satisfied.
Speaker 1: I think you'd be hard pressed to find anybody around
Speaker 1: here that says, yes, justice was served. After he was
Speaker 1: out of jail. That guy didn't look back. He was
Speaker 1: He was a hero to the Alabama people. I wondered
Speaker 1: what this was like for Harvey's family, while this was
Speaker 1: all happening, It doesn't. Marcia Updyke is Bear's wife and
Speaker 1: Harvey's daughter in law. She's just home from work and
Speaker 1: we sit in the kitchen to chat. Do you think
Speaker 1: if he'd been living with you all and been involved
Speaker 1: with the grandkids, then that he would have done it? Oh?
Speaker 1: Heck no, because he would have been like, hey, I
Speaker 1: got this idea, and I'm like, heck no, we're not
Speaker 1: going to go do that. But anything. I don't even
Speaker 1: let him take food upstairs. She wanted to run and
Speaker 1: take the food upstairs. So sometimes I'll naked, I put
Speaker 1: in my pockets take upstairs anymo. Yeah, So there would
Speaker 1: have been no poison. No, no poison. It would have
Speaker 1: been a different world when this was all happening. Marcia,
Speaker 1: What did you think? I don't know. We weren't directly involved.
Speaker 1: You know. On a serious note, there were fans that
Speaker 1: would like Bear had to shut down his Facebook page
Speaker 1: because he would receive death threat and that was ridiculous.
Speaker 1: So it's so funny because they would get so upset.
Speaker 1: These Auburn fans would get so upset because of what
Speaker 1: happened and then message his son and that they're his
Speaker 1: kids should die. And seriously, it was hypocritical of them
Speaker 1: to say they were outraged by this and then turn
Speaker 1: around and threaten your kids. Absolutely, yeah, absolutely, do you
Speaker 1: feel bad for the trees? So here's the thing, their trees.
Speaker 1: I mean, I get it, don't get me wrong. I
Speaker 1: mean that's going to be super insensitive to something oaks,
Speaker 1: and Um, what people need to know is I don't
Speaker 1: care about I mean it, I shouldn't say I don't care,
Speaker 1: but it's it's football, it's Auburn, it's Alabama. But when
Speaker 1: I found out like the value that they placed on
Speaker 1: those trees and things like that, I was a little
Speaker 1: surprised myself. I do have to say, so I understand
Speaker 1: they are special and um, it was devastating. But you know,
Speaker 1: if someone comes and breaks a statue or something along
Speaker 1: those lines, I'm not sure that the ramifications are as
Speaker 1: I don't know, intricate as they were for that, they
Speaker 1: would be punished as much. Yeah, they definitely breaks him
Speaker 1: over the coals a little bit. They definitely threw the
Speaker 1: book at him and said, hey, we're going to go
Speaker 1: to the highest of the high. Yeah, I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: Ald Barbara Walters on you if the trees could talk,
Speaker 1: what do you think they would say when they see
Speaker 1: those toilet paper rolls coming at them? Brace for contact.
Speaker 1: I guess I don't. I'm sure. I'm back with horticulturist
Speaker 1: Gary Kiever at Auburn. Now, if you're an Auburn partisan,
Speaker 1: you're probably fuming right now from Marcia's they're just trees.
Speaker 1: Take But before you go all lo rax speaking for
Speaker 1: the trees, listen to this. There there hazards associated with
Speaker 1: the rolling tradition. Historically, the paper was removed with high
Speaker 1: pressure fire hoses and that damaged the trees. That weakened
Speaker 1: the trees. Oftentimes, by the end of the football season
Speaker 1: there was no no foliage on the lower third of
Speaker 1: the tree. You know, they had declined over time. Plant
Speaker 1: pathologists had warned against rolling. One even dared to joke
Speaker 1: that it would help if Auburn just stopped winning. So
Speaker 1: it sounds like the trees weren't always treated right. They
Speaker 1: were not. They were They were special because of the
Speaker 1: tradition and their location. If they had been located elsewhere
Speaker 1: on campus, we might have replaced them, but we were
Speaker 1: going to keep them at all costs because of their role.
Speaker 1: In the tradition. So was the tradition that made these
Speaker 1: trees so beloved also the thing that was slowly killing them.
Speaker 1: They weren't on Magnolia. In my opinion, it was getting
Speaker 1: close to the end of his life. This wasn't privileged information.
Speaker 1: In the summer of two thousand seven, three years before
Speaker 1: Harvey doused the trees and Spike a d d F,
Speaker 1: a headline in Auburn's Alumni magazine asked the question too
Speaker 1: late for the tumors trees. Local outlets reported on the
Speaker 1: trees declining health. The student newspaper declared, even more bluntly,
Speaker 1: landmark tumors trees dying. Now. I don't know if you're
Speaker 1: aware of this, but as early as two thousand and
Speaker 1: seven the trees were in pretty poor health. Does that matter? No,
Speaker 1: I mean, you don't get a pass for killing a
Speaker 1: nine year old person because they were in bad health
Speaker 1: to begin with. That's Lee County d A. Brandon us Again.
Speaker 1: Please don't think I'm comparing a tree to a person.
Speaker 1: But the point being is, you know, Dr Calvorkian didn't
Speaker 1: get away with murder because the person was going to
Speaker 1: die anyway. But Jenny Carroll says that if they could
Speaker 1: do it all again, Harvey might have a case. If
Speaker 1: Auburn fans were already killing those trees, then I think
Speaker 1: he could make a claim that he did not actually
Speaker 1: kill them. If he was looking for a defense lawyer
Speaker 1: who would actually take his case, I would be perfectly
Speaker 1: willing to defend that man. I think we could have
Speaker 1: done better maybe than he did on that plea deal.
Speaker 1: On November tenth, two thousand eighteen, Harvey Updike was feeling
Speaker 1: good driving in his deep red pickup truck towards Bryant
Speaker 1: Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa, home of the University of Alabama,
Speaker 1: to watch his beloved Crimson Tide take on Mississippi State,
Speaker 1: his first Alabama home game since his probation ended Denny Stadium.
Speaker 1: And it is beautiful, thousands of Alabama fans and in
Speaker 1: Harvey's not lying load today, bring Cowboy. He hoots and
Speaker 1: hollers through the whole game, turns Da Baba. One of
Speaker 1: the Bama fans sitting behind him, realizes who he is
Speaker 1: and high five. No Burday night. I didn't think I'd
Speaker 1: ever get to come back here before I died. Something
Speaker 1: tells me Harvey will be with us for a while.
Speaker 1: Just listen to him at one of his granddaughter's recent
Speaker 1: softball games. Yes, yes, yes, I'll admit it. I've developed
Speaker 1: a little bit of a soft spot for Harvey. Look,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying he's innocent of a crime he clearly committed.
Speaker 1: This isn't making of a tree murderer. But I don't
Speaker 1: see the seeds of a homicidal maniac in him. I
Speaker 1: see someone who latched onto a community, to an identity
Speaker 1: that made him feel like he belonged, who got carried
Speaker 1: away by the tide of what really is an obsession,
Speaker 1: Alabama football. He did something terrible. He's a fanatic, for sure,
Speaker 1: but I guess I don't think he's a dangerous fanatic,
Speaker 1: at least not any longer. There's not a day it
Speaker 1: doesn't go by that I don't get up and read
Speaker 1: tighter and tighter, and then I go look at de bituaries,
Speaker 1: and if my name is not in there, then I'll
Speaker 1: probably go back and lay down sleep a little bit longer.
Speaker 1: He knows what he did was wrong, and deep down
Speaker 1: I think he does regret it. I want to be
Speaker 1: cremated and and I want half my ashes put on
Speaker 1: REALM Bryant Denny Stadium in a best them around too
Speaker 1: mus corner, so they don't know I've been there, or
Speaker 1: maybe he doesn't. When I leave this world, I want
Speaker 1: people to say he was a good father, he was
Speaker 1: a good step father, and he was a very very
Speaker 1: good Alabama fan. I admit I I like them too much.
Speaker 1: We should note that on Sunday, March three, tornadoes ravaged
Speaker 1: parts of the southeast. At least twenty three people were
Speaker 1: killed in Lee County, Alabama, home of Auburn University. Our
Speaker 1: sympathies are with the victims and their family and friends.
Speaker 1: I certainly hope you enjoyed this first season of Mobituaries.
Speaker 1: If you haven't heard the previous seven episodes, please go
Speaker 1: back and listen while you're there. It would be awfully
Speaker 1: nice if you'd rate and review the podcast. You can
Speaker 1: also follow Mobituaries on Facebook and Instagram, and you can
Speaker 1: follow me on Twitter at Morocca. You can subscribe to
Speaker 1: Mobituaries wherever you get your podcasts. For more great content
Speaker 1: and to see Harvey's reaction to Alabama's lost to Clemson
Speaker 1: in the two thousand eighteen Championship game, please go to
Speaker 1: Mobituaries dot Com at your own risk. This episode of
Speaker 1: Mobituaries was produced by Kate mccauliffe. Our team of producers
Speaker 1: also includes Gideon Evans, Megan Marcus, Megan Dietrie, and me Morocca.
Speaker 1: It was engineered by Bart Warshaw, indispensable support from Genius Staneski,
Speaker 1: Show she Cement, Zach Gilcrest and Richard Roarer. Special thanks
Speaker 1: to Coach Pat Die, Greg Schmidt and Auburn's Special Collections,
Speaker 1: Sean McManus, Benjamin Dietrich, Steve Kerasak Preston Sparks, Mike Clardy
Speaker 1: and everyone at CBS News Radio OWUR. Theme music is
Speaker 1: written by Daniel Hart and as always, undying thanks to
Speaker 1: Rand Morrison and John carp without whom Mobituaries couldn't live. Hi,
Speaker 1: It's mo. If you're enjoying Mobituaries the podcast, may I
Speaker 1: invite you to check out Mobituaries the book. It's chock
Speaker 1: full of stories not in the podcast. Celebrities who put
Speaker 1: their butts on the line, Sports teams that threw in
Speaker 1: the towel for good, forgotten fashions, Defunct diagnoses presidential candidacies
Speaker 1: that cratered whole countries that went to put and dragons, yes, dragons,
Speaker 1: you see. People used to believe the wagons will reel
Speaker 1: until just get the book. You can order Mobituaries the
Speaker 1: book from any online bookseller, or stop by your local
Speaker 1: bookstore and look for me when I come to your city.
Speaker 1: Tour information and lots more at mobituaries dot com