Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and Chuck's
Speaker 2: here two. Jerry's here too, and I'm here too. That's
Speaker 2: me Josh, And this is Stuff you Should.
Speaker 1: Know, the We're All Three Feeling Weird edition.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and that's strange. So yeah, I said that
Speaker 2: I was just feeling kind of off today and you
Speaker 2: said me too, and Jerry said me three.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what does that mean?
Speaker 2: I don't know, but I mean that is very That's
Speaker 2: remarkable to me that all three of us, I mean,
Speaker 2: we all have three different personalities. Ye, we don't like
Speaker 2: you know, we don't live together, despite what most people think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, not anymore.
Speaker 2: No, So I don't know what it is. Maybe something's
Speaker 2: in retrograde and something's house or something like that.
Speaker 1: That whole thing. Yeah, stuff you should Know is in retrograde,
Speaker 1: whatever that means.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, we'll do our best with this. I'll do
Speaker 2: my best not to break out in tears.
Speaker 1: No, I think would be okay. And big thanks to
Speaker 1: Julia for helping us put together this episode on one
Speaker 1: of the quacks of all quacks. I feel like we
Speaker 1: have covered quite a few quacks over the years.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this one know isn't as bad as that one
Speaker 2: guy that we did though, But she's up there for sure.
Speaker 2: I mean I think she still has her supporters, Like
Speaker 2: you can still buy her books online. Yeah, but most
Speaker 2: people who are familiar with their case are like, she
Speaker 2: was a serial killer, right, she just had a strange,
Speaker 2: strange method of murder.
Speaker 1: Yeah, of bleeding people of their money.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, for sure and their life force.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: As Toby Hooper might put it, that's right. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: we're talking about a woman named Linda Burfield Perry Hazard.
Speaker 2: There's at least two hyphens in there. Yeah, And she
Speaker 2: was born in the nineteenth century, but was doing most
Speaker 2: of her work in the late nineteenth early twentieth century.
Speaker 2: And she was a person who was vehemently opposed, like
Speaker 2: from what I could tell, like very seriously, like this
Speaker 2: was her personal philosophy against what would be called modern
Speaker 2: medicine today, but at the time was you know, just
Speaker 2: starting out as we'll see.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, she was a self described fasting specialist.
Speaker 1: She had no medical degree. She did have wealthy patients
Speaker 1: and I was about to say patrons, but I guess
Speaker 1: they were patients and she said she was the only
Speaker 1: fasting specialist in the world. You know, this was sort
Speaker 1: of the time of the sanitarium sanatorium world, where you
Speaker 1: could go off and practice some very questionable methods of
Speaker 1: healing people.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like the Kellogg brothers in Battle Creek.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, because you know that we had not in
Speaker 1: the United States yet set up sort of rules around
Speaker 1: the medical world at this point.
Speaker 2: No, but it's coming. It's like right around that time,
Speaker 2: and in part because of so much quackery that was
Speaker 2: going on the same time. A lot of this stuff
Speaker 2: is what you would call alternative medicine today or just
Speaker 2: sensible stuff. Like the Kellogg brothers had a bunch of
Speaker 2: weird stuff, and their whole jam was fairly weird, But
Speaker 2: if you boiled everything down to what they were saying,
Speaker 2: a lot of it was like diet and exercise, which
Speaker 2: is just great advice today as far as health is concerned.
Speaker 2: The problem is is like some people took this to
Speaker 2: terrible extremes. Other people were peddling just like outright fake
Speaker 2: and dangerous medicines, Like yeah, there were the outliers were
Speaker 2: so bad that they were ruining it for everybody who
Speaker 2: actually had some legitimate stuff that they were doing, and
Speaker 2: Linda Hazard was an outlier. Although again I think she
Speaker 2: was a true believer in herself and her cure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. But you know, to be clear, she
Speaker 1: was not serving up bowls of granula. She was killing
Speaker 1: people like I think fifteen patients starved to death under
Speaker 1: her watch. Yes, and she would eventually go to trial
Speaker 1: for the murder of one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a sensation in nineteen.
Speaker 1: Twelve, a real sensation.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Linda Burfield Perry Hazard, who we're just
Speaker 2: going to call Linda Hazard from here on out. But
Speaker 2: she was born Linda Burfield in Minnesota in eighteen sixty seven,
Speaker 2: as most people in eighteen sixty seven were born what
Speaker 2: really rurally, and a lot of them in Minnesota. I
Speaker 2: think something like ninety eight percent of births in eighteen
Speaker 2: sixty seven took pres Minnesota.
Speaker 1: That's incredible.
Speaker 2: She actually had an experience, she said, she wrote again
Speaker 2: a bunch of books, eleven by my count. Oh well,
Speaker 2: and so she said, according to herself, that she had
Speaker 2: been she had run into modern medicine as a child,
Speaker 2: and this doctor had given her some pills blue mass
Speaker 2: pills that are essentially mercury pills, and they were like
Speaker 2: fairly regularly used at the time, but they did not
Speaker 2: sit very well with her.
Speaker 1: No, it made her really sick, like this again, this
Speaker 1: is the day when they would, you know, a doctor
Speaker 1: would say like, here, take this thing, because it'll cure
Speaker 1: basically anything you have. And that's always the red flag,
Speaker 1: even if it's not pure snake oil, the sort of
Speaker 1: cure all thing. And it made it really sick, very memorably,
Speaker 1: so like digestively for the most part. But after that
Speaker 1: she was like, I'm done with doctors and I'm going
Speaker 1: to eventually be my own doctor and be a doctor
Speaker 1: to other people. She married a guy named Edwin Perry
Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty six, had a couple of kids, got divorced,
Speaker 1: and apparently I don't know if that led to her
Speaker 1: divorce when she just sort of went center of left
Speaker 1: as far as her care goes. Do you think that
Speaker 1: was it.
Speaker 2: It's possible that was the impression. I have too, but
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. There's so much just random stuff that
Speaker 2: people say about her that may or may not be true.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of surmising.
Speaker 1: I think it said center of left too, by the way, Yeah.
Speaker 2: The thing is, Chuck, is everyone knew what you meant,
Speaker 2: so that counts as communication. You know, don't be such
Speaker 2: a prescriptionist.
Speaker 1: That's right left of center. But she married Perry, got divorced,
Speaker 1: and then fell into the care of doctor Edward Dewey,
Speaker 1: who was a a faster. He preached fasting. He basically
Speaker 1: said that, you know, every disease that we have comes
Speaker 1: from habitual eating and excess. Basically like you're out eating
Speaker 1: what your stomach and your gastric juices can handle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the sum total of Linda Hazard's whole thing.
Speaker 2: I mean, she had a three prong approach, which was
Speaker 2: intense fasting ama anema an I've read that that her
Speaker 2: enemas lasted for hours sometimes.
Speaker 1: I think that was also the title of your second LP, right, it.
Speaker 2: Was my cover songs of William Shatner's cover r that's right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's actually appropriate title for that. Or lobotomy lobotomy lobotomy. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And then the other one was powerful massage that I
Speaker 2: think calling a massage is fairly genous. Yes, she would
Speaker 2: pound on her patients and apparently shall eliminate, eliminate because
Speaker 2: again she's trying to get undigested food and poop that's
Speaker 2: left over out of the body. And by fasting, you're
Speaker 2: not introducing more food, You're letting the body rest while
Speaker 2: getting rid of the food that's been undigested. That's the
Speaker 2: source of all of your diseases.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like you drank the colon clints before your first
Speaker 1: colonoscopy kind of empty.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, Oh, she would have loved that stuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah, probably, so. She did take a few nursing classes.
Speaker 1: You know, we have to mention that I'm not trying
Speaker 1: to legitimize he or anything, but she did take a
Speaker 1: few osteopathic nursing classes. She opened a fasting therapy practice
Speaker 1: in Minneapolis. There this is when she went by doctor
Speaker 1: Linda Burfield Perry, even though she was divorced from Edwin Perry.
Speaker 1: And yeah, she said, like, come on in, I'll beat
Speaker 1: on you. I will. I will not let you eat anything,
Speaker 1: like really not at all. As we'll see, let's hold
Speaker 1: on to that little factoid like how little these people
Speaker 1: are eating. But she would find love again in nineteen
Speaker 1: oh three, or find something in the way of a
Speaker 1: swindler named Samuel Hazzard, who was a He would go
Speaker 1: to jail for bigamy because he was already married and
Speaker 1: I guess did not get divorced and also married Linda Burfield,
Speaker 1: and so he went to jail for a couple of years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then got out of jail and they're like, all right,
Speaker 1: we're good to go. Let's go to Seattle.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And that's where her practice really started. The two
Speaker 2: of them together like really kind of established this.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 2: They call it Wilderness Heights, and it was supposed to
Speaker 2: be like a sanitarium or retreat where you went and
Speaker 2: got this fasting cure. And it's just like you said,
Speaker 2: you have to be wary of cures that cure everything,
Speaker 2: and that was very much the case with her. She
Speaker 2: apparently was saying like, once you go through the fasting
Speaker 2: cure and you get all this crowd out, you're set
Speaker 2: like everything from you can go have a kid and
Speaker 2: have no pain during childbirth. You're not going to get
Speaker 2: toothaches anymore. If you're an alcoholic, you won't be an
Speaker 2: alcoholic anymore. If you're depressed, no more depression, Like it's
Speaker 2: a cure all from her stance, that's how she basically
Speaker 2: advertised it. I guess.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So she's the main player here, Samuel. Her husband
Speaker 1: is a little bit in the background, but he'll pop
Speaker 1: up here and there when it comes to the financials.
Speaker 1: And then our other couple of players are Claire and
Speaker 1: Dora Williamson. They were English. They were daughters of an
Speaker 1: English military person, Evelyn Dorothy. Her name was Dora. She
Speaker 1: went by Dora Williamson. She was born in India in
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy three, and then her sister Enid Lily and
Speaker 1: Claire Williamson was born in London in eighteen seventy seven.
Speaker 1: And they were basically from teenagers on. Had no parents.
Speaker 1: I think their father died after Claire was born and
Speaker 1: then their mom died about sixteen years later. So they were,
Speaker 1: you know, they were orphaned teens who were really really
Speaker 1: rich and really really tight, very close with one another,
Speaker 1: and seemed to be like adventurous, not in a hurry
Speaker 1: to get married, which is what you would think for
Speaker 1: the time period to get married right away. They kind
Speaker 1: of like to travel the world and go on adventures
Speaker 1: and not follow the prescribed method.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they were independent women of the nineties, eighteen nineties,
Speaker 2: that's right. So they also though they weren't entirely orphan,
Speaker 2: I mean as far as like biological parents, maybe you're concerned,
Speaker 2: But they had a governess who took care of them
Speaker 2: as well, and I think kind of was part of
Speaker 2: their life long before their mother died. But I have
Speaker 2: the impression that she was like an additional mom or
Speaker 2: an additional grandmother or something to them, Right, So.
Speaker 1: I think that's how the richies do it, Yeah for sure.
Speaker 2: So just keep that in mind that these women are
Speaker 2: slightly outside of the norm. They have no problem with
Speaker 2: being slightly outside of the norm. And they are very
Speaker 2: interesting and interested people, are very curious, and one of
Speaker 2: the things that they are focused on is natural health.
Speaker 2: Like they're just super into that kind of thing. And
Speaker 2: by the time they cross paths with Linda Hazzard, they've
Speaker 2: done like all sorts of stuff, like any kind of
Speaker 2: cure you can think of. They've traveled to some sanitarium
Speaker 2: or some notorium, they've traveled to some health clinic, and
Speaker 2: they've just done this whole thing. It's like basically what
Speaker 2: they were interested.
Speaker 1: In, Yeah, for sure. And you know, they did some
Speaker 1: kind of brave things at the time. For the time
Speaker 1: period they were like, I don't want to wear corsets anymore.
Speaker 1: They're super uncomfortable, and don't I think they're probably bad
Speaker 1: for us. Sure, so they didn't wear corsets anymore. They
Speaker 1: gave up meat. Eating meat was or being vegetarian, I
Speaker 1: guess at the very least was a pretty weird thing
Speaker 1: back then. So they were definitely following their own path.
Speaker 1: And then in nineteen ten they were in their thirties.
Speaker 1: At this point they were in the beautiful Empress Hotel
Speaker 1: in Victoria, British Columbia.
Speaker 2: You sounded like you're an announcer for the Price's right.
Speaker 1: It looks really nice. I mean it's still around from
Speaker 1: what I can tell, at least the pictures of modern.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a fairmunt now, Oh, of course it is.
Speaker 1: And I didn't mean that snarkily, like there are some
Speaker 1: very nice Fearmonts.
Speaker 2: Sure you said that because they're a huge sponsor stuff.
Speaker 2: Should know they're not, are they?
Speaker 1: I don't think it's like, why am I not getting
Speaker 1: any free juice there? So at the time it was
Speaker 1: like the nicest hotel in North America. And they saw
Speaker 1: an ad in the local paper from doctor Hazard and
Speaker 1: I guess we can call her a doctor but mentally
Speaker 1: easing scare quotes, and they wrote her a letter and said, Hey,
Speaker 1: we're two sisters. We'd like to visit Wilderness Heights and
Speaker 1: we're coming to Seattle.
Speaker 2: Nice. I think that's a great place to leave off
Speaker 2: for an.
Speaker 1: Ad break, coming to Seattle. What could be better?
Speaker 2: Not much? Man, all right, we'll be right back. So
Speaker 2: before we get back to Claire and Dora and Linda Hazard,
Speaker 2: we should probably make like a little side note here that, like,
Speaker 2: although Linda Hazard's stuff was bizarre like this, the extremes
Speaker 2: she took it to, like, alternative medicine was still very
Speaker 2: much a thing. We did that whole episode on the
Speaker 2: Flexner Report which basically said from now on in the
Speaker 2: United States and Europe, it's just like medical science. That's it.
Speaker 2: Anything outside of that is cuckoo quackery and should be
Speaker 2: persecuted and run out of town on a rail essentially.
Speaker 2: And that so this was the time when you could
Speaker 2: still be an alternative medicine practitioner. You could still be
Speaker 2: an out and out quack. Yeah, And there was no
Speaker 2: law against that yet. And this was definitely the like
Speaker 2: the gray area that Linda Hazard fell in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think her case, and especially the case
Speaker 1: with these two sisters in particular. Like, it wasn't the
Speaker 1: leading reason, but it was definitely evidence as they move
Speaker 1: forward with stuff like the Flexner report of like changes
Speaker 1: is needed. Their fasting had been around for a long
Speaker 1: long time. Obviously, people fasted in the Bible, people fasted
Speaker 1: in ancient Greece. I think Hippocrates and Pythagoras both were
Speaker 1: into fasting, So that was not a new thing. Fasting
Speaker 1: is still a thing, and detoxes and cleanses, and you know,
Speaker 1: we've done our fair share of podcasting on that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, So none of this is new or old.
Speaker 2: No, we did one on courses too. I just remembered,
Speaker 2: that's right. Yeah. One of the other things that is
Speaker 2: definitely old about this is that whole idea of undigested
Speaker 2: food being the source of all disease. That's ir vedic
Speaker 2: in nature too. Ancient Asian Indian medic goal practice basically
Speaker 2: says if you have underjust of food or build up
Speaker 2: a poop or whatever in your system, all disease emanates
Speaker 2: from that. So even doctor Edward Dewey was not exactly
Speaker 2: like groundbreaking with that idea.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and people are like it all comes from the
Speaker 1: poop and They're like, have you smelled the stuff? There's
Speaker 1: no way that's good.
Speaker 2: It's gee ross.
Speaker 1: What if poop not you know, I guess we're going there.
Speaker 1: I'm going there. Okay, what if poop didn't smell like
Speaker 1: that at all? And I'm not saying, oh, what if
Speaker 1: it smelled like, you know, something great? Like what if
Speaker 1: it just literally had no odor and that was it?
Speaker 1: Like would the world be really a better place? H
Speaker 1: I say, yes, Yeah.
Speaker 2: I guess sure. I guess I don't smell enough poop
Speaker 2: in any given day that it really ruins the world
Speaker 2: for me.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean you have your outhouse.
Speaker 2: Sure, but I see yourself. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was just curious at like on the like the
Speaker 1: divorce rate, like what all would change air airports? Airports happens?
Speaker 2: Okay, yes, airports. That's a really good point right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's the worst.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is really bad. Like that's a good
Speaker 2: reason not to fly before like ten am.
Speaker 1: Like it's one thing to be married to somebody, but
Speaker 1: you don't want to smell the poop of twelve strangers.
Speaker 2: No, no you don't. That's why no one should poop
Speaker 2: in public bathrooms. They shouldn't even have toilets in there,
Speaker 2: all urinals all the time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they should have urals, urinals and signs that say
Speaker 1: hold it.
Speaker 2: Right, just hold it, have a poop, go to jail.
Speaker 1: All right. So sorry to get to go off on
Speaker 1: a tangent there about poop. I was just kind of
Speaker 1: I've never done that particular thought experiment.
Speaker 2: Okay, Well I liked it all right.
Speaker 1: So she had her her big, big book. I mean,
Speaker 1: she had eleven of them, but I feel like the one,
Speaker 1: as far as this goes, this most relevant is the
Speaker 1: one from nineteen oh eight. It's called Fasting for the
Speaker 1: Cure of Disease, ease, and that's where she laid out,
Speaker 1: you know, the program which is just those three things really,
Speaker 1: you know, fast to get beaten on and get those
Speaker 1: as Josh says, m enema. And the first person to
Speaker 1: die from this treatment. She wrote the book after six
Speaker 1: years after this, which is pretty disturbing. But in nineteen
Speaker 1: oh two at her Minneapolis practice, there was a woman
Speaker 1: who was partially paralyzed, and very sadly, she died on
Speaker 1: day thirty seven of a forty day fast and Linda Hazzard,
Speaker 1: as the doctor said, cause of death paralysis.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that would be a recurring theme, as we'll see, right,
Speaker 2: because she also she was declaring the cause of death
Speaker 2: for her patients as a physician, even though she wasn't
Speaker 2: really a physician. And I guess still even at this time,
Speaker 2: under circumstances like this, the local coroner would still take
Speaker 2: a look at any dead body. Saw the body of
Speaker 2: this woman, Gertrude Jon and was like, I don't know
Speaker 2: that this was paralysis that did this, because she's pretty emaciated.
Speaker 2: Let's perform an autopsy and see what happens. Looked inside
Speaker 2: of poor Gertrude Young and said, yep, she died of starvation,
Speaker 2: just as I suspected.
Speaker 1: That's right. And as we'll see later, Linda Hazard didn't
Speaker 1: think that was a viable way of dying. She's basically like,
Speaker 1: you can't starve some of the death. It's not possible, right,
Speaker 1: So she's wrong about that. But she did not have
Speaker 1: a medical license, so she could not be like brought
Speaker 1: up on charges or anything. It's she was telling this
Speaker 1: woman to fast, and the woman was fasting. She didn't
Speaker 1: have her, you know, locked up and chained to a
Speaker 1: bed or anything like that. She was just following the
Speaker 1: advice of the wrong.
Speaker 2: Person exactly, and yeah, Linda Hazard could just like shrug
Speaker 2: and be like, you know, what are you gonna do? Yeah,
Speaker 2: this was like years after when she and her husband
Speaker 2: Samuel moved to Seattle and started their practice together. So
Speaker 2: that's not why she moved. This was just the first
Speaker 2: body in her long body count essentially.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean bodies. You know, people started dying at
Speaker 1: her practice in Washington as well. And there in Washington
Speaker 1: at the time, you could be grandfathered in as far
Speaker 1: as what kind of alternative medicine you were practicing, so
Speaker 1: she was kind of all good there. In nineteen oh
Speaker 1: seven is when she started treating patients in Washington, and
Speaker 1: you know, right away, again this wasn't like the weirdest
Speaker 1: stuff at the time, so she had some of the
Speaker 1: elite of Washington, like state legislators coming there. It was
Speaker 1: it wasn't like that weird lady in the woods that's
Speaker 1: killing people. It was you know, it was sort of
Speaker 1: of the fashion of the day in some ways.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Also, there was a real deference to her from
Speaker 2: the local population, which were typically Swedish immigrants who were
Speaker 2: not necessarily formally educated. They didn't have a lot of money.
Speaker 2: So this was like she made a lot of money,
Speaker 2: we should say, multiple times throughout her career, so she
Speaker 2: was wealthy. She had a lot of land. She was
Speaker 2: a doctor, so she said, she was much more highly
Speaker 2: educated than anyone else in the area that they knew.
Speaker 2: So she was popular and people just kind of respected
Speaker 2: her in this area too. So in addition to these
Speaker 2: wealthy and kind of elite you know, alternative medicine file
Speaker 2: patrons and customers, just the local people who had nothing
Speaker 2: to do with this still thought fairly highly of her too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, even though people were dying. I think
Speaker 1: by the time the Williamson's sisters arrived in nineteen eleven,
Speaker 1: seven patients had died under her care, six from starvation
Speaker 1: what looked to be starvation. And what was also learned was,
Speaker 1: like you said, she performed all the autopsies herself. And
Speaker 1: it was also revealed that the estates of these people
Speaker 1: were left to the sanatorium, So she was also taking
Speaker 1: their money, even though it was, you know, from the outside,
Speaker 1: under the guise of like they believed in her so
Speaker 1: much they wanted her practice to continue.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly, and this is where it really becomes murdery.
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, like the super nefarious.
Speaker 2: Something else that was gross that I found was so
Speaker 2: the Wilderness Heights was like a few like a handful
Speaker 2: of primitive cabins and then her cottage, and her cottage
Speaker 2: still stood until like twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you could go into her cottage and it
Speaker 2: was still there was still furnishings in it and including
Speaker 2: her bathtub, and the bathtub of her cottage is where
Speaker 2: she was performing her autopsies.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: So that to me kind of like really gets across
Speaker 2: like this is not like a super polished outfit, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2: And I think that's important to keep in mind too.
Speaker 2: She basically built some rough fused cabins in the woods
Speaker 2: in Washington and called this like her sanitarium.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And this is by the way in Alala Woods, Washington.
Speaker 2: Yes, so close to Walla Walla, so close.
Speaker 1: So Claire and Dora get there in February of nineteen
Speaker 1: eleven and she was like, hey, we're not going to
Speaker 1: stay here in Wilderness Heights. I'm not sure why she
Speaker 1: did this. I have a feeling that she knew that
Speaker 1: she had some big fish on the line. So she
Speaker 1: took them to Seattle instead, and she basically lied to
Speaker 1: them and said that the Alala Woods Retreat wasn't completed yet,
Speaker 1: even though I think it clearly was. And so they
Speaker 1: they put them up in some apartments in downtown Seattle,
Speaker 1: started their fasting treatment and the vigorous massage, and they
Speaker 1: were eating two cups of vegetable broth sounds like basically
Speaker 1: canned tomato juice a day.
Speaker 2: I also saw I think Dora later said that they
Speaker 2: were made from asparagus tips, spinach, and lettuce. A broth
Speaker 2: made from that, yeah, veggie broth. Yeah, so not anything
Speaker 2: that you could possibly even remotely get full off of yet,
Speaker 2: like you said, I think a cup twice a day, Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's just yeah, So you're going to lose weight very quickly.
Speaker 2: And this was like forty plus days of fasting. That
Speaker 2: hazard was prescribing to her patients, right, And so I
Speaker 2: think both of the Williamson sisters made it to fifty
Speaker 2: days before they were transferred to Wilderness Heights. They didn't walk,
Speaker 2: they were on stretchers. That's how they got to Wilderness
Speaker 2: Heights from their apartments in downtown Seattle.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I mean from what I can tell. They
Speaker 1: weren't screaming on the way like get me help. Like
Speaker 1: it feels like they were either all in still on
Speaker 1: this or just so out of it at this point
Speaker 1: they didn't know any better, you know.
Speaker 2: Yes, or they were asking for help, but they were
Speaker 2: asking for it, like Stevie from Malcolm in the Middle,
Speaker 2: where they were like, get help.
Speaker 1: It was pretty good, Stevie.
Speaker 2: Thanks.
Speaker 1: Did you watch the reboot of that?
Speaker 2: No reboot. I can't give me one reboot that was
Speaker 2: as good as the original or even close.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I can't bring any reboots to mine at all,
Speaker 1: so I don't know. But you're you're pretty much right,
Speaker 1: like even the great Kids in the Hall, Like it
Speaker 1: was just okay, right. I kind of want to watch
Speaker 1: the Malcolm in the Middle one though, Oh oh, you
Speaker 1: haven't seen it either, No, but I heard it was
Speaker 1: pretty good.
Speaker 2: Actually all right, But is Frankie Munis has his voice changed?
Speaker 1: No, it's exactly the same. And so it was what's
Speaker 1: his face?
Speaker 2: What was his name, Stevie, Stevie, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I couldn't remember. I just remember Cranston was so great.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and his daughter's great too. We've said it before.
Speaker 2: We'll say it again on the Pit. Doctor mel Is
Speaker 2: Brian Cranston's daughter, and she does it great to him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think we said that live on stage. I
Speaker 1: don't think the listening public knows that you are now
Speaker 1: on the pit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but apparently it just stopped, like they just stopped
Speaker 2: putting out episodes. But that last episode does not end
Speaker 2: in any way that anyone would ever end the season
Speaker 2: of TV. Oh you think, Yeah, Like, Noah Wiley didn't
Speaker 2: leave yet. I don't even think as Buddy fully agreed
Speaker 2: to getting the treatment he's supposed to get. What's going
Speaker 2: on with Ali? Sheemi? Like the last thing we saw
Speaker 2: is she just kind of had a meltdown in her car.
Speaker 2: There's just all the stuff's up in the air.
Speaker 1: But oh, I think that was the purpose. I think
Speaker 1: it just was cliffhanger after cliffhanger.
Speaker 2: Okay, yes, I can get cliffhangers. But it's almost like
Speaker 2: it just petered out rather than cut it, like they
Speaker 2: just cut all right, disagree? All right, Well, I was
Speaker 2: surprised that that was how they ended it.
Speaker 1: We just spoiled some stuff, by the way.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we should probably Well, we.
Speaker 1: Didn't say anything huge. No Wiley didn't leave, big deal. Okay,
Speaker 1: all right, does he ever leave?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's what I just need to go, like, he's never
Speaker 1: he never leaves, he comes over, he overstays, is welcome.
Speaker 1: Everyone's like, when's this guy gonna get on SMO and
Speaker 1: drive out of Here's true? All right, I feel like
Speaker 1: we're really off the rails now. We should take a
Speaker 1: break and come back. Yes, yeah, all right, we'll be
Speaker 1: right back all right where we left you. So, Noah
Speaker 1: Wiley had not left yet the pit. No, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: We left the sisters in pretty bad condition. It was
Speaker 1: about fifty days into their treatment. They were obviously in really,
Speaker 1: really bad shape, having traveled by stretcher to Alaala Woods
Speaker 1: and Claire died seventeen days after they got to the compound.
Speaker 1: There in the forest. She and this is like very
Speaker 1: triggering and super upsetting, so I'm issuing a warning here.
Speaker 1: But she weighed less than fifty pounds when she passed,
Speaker 1: and Hazard's own autopsy once again determined she died of
Speaker 1: a liver disease that came from a childhood medical treatment
Speaker 1: that caused her organs to shrink, and when her the
Speaker 1: governess showed up, Margaret Conway, you know, finally arrived. She
Speaker 1: told her that and she was like, I basically raised
Speaker 1: these kids and she didn't have any childhood medical treatment
Speaker 1: that caused her organs to shrink.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we should just say that Margaret Conway, her governess,
Speaker 2: who we talked about earlier, she got a cable from
Speaker 2: one of them. I can't remember if it was Dora
Speaker 2: or Claire.
Speaker 1: Probably Dora, I think it was Dora.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it just basically saying like, please come, here's the
Speaker 2: ship you want to take, here's where we are. Just
Speaker 2: get here. And Margaret Conway just dropped everything. And within
Speaker 2: a month she had traveled from Australia to Seattle. That's
Speaker 2: how long it took.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I mean she was welcomed. I mean Samuel
Speaker 1: met her in Seattle and said, all right, let's get
Speaker 1: on the train. We're going to show you this operation.
Speaker 1: Like it's pretty sad what's happening, but like we have
Speaker 1: a top notch practice here. And they brought her to
Speaker 1: the mortuary to see Claire and she was like, that's
Speaker 1: not Claire, whoever this body is. And I get the
Speaker 1: impression that it wasn't like she so emaciated. I didn't
Speaker 1: recognize her like I think they tried to pull the
Speaker 1: fast one on her.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was rumors, I guess that the local mortuary
Speaker 2: was in cahoots with the Hazards and that they would
Speaker 2: switch out bodies that weren't amazing heated who had nothing
Speaker 2: to do with Wilderness Heights. Yeah, the emaciated bodies of
Speaker 2: their victims so that family wouldn't be like, I think
Speaker 2: you starved my mom to death. Right, So Margaret Conway
Speaker 2: was not in any way, shape or form put off
Speaker 2: by Samuel Hazzard's charm or Linda Hazard's authority, like she
Speaker 2: realized like that they had killed Claire. One of the
Speaker 2: dead giveaways was that Linda Hazard was wearing one of
Speaker 2: Claire's robes and her favorite hat when she received Margaret
Speaker 2: Conway at the at the Wilderness Heights at their cottage,
Speaker 2: and that I think immediately rubbed Margaret Conway the wrong way.
Speaker 2: And she was like, I give me Dora. I'm taking
Speaker 2: Dora home and Linda and Samuel said not so fast.
Speaker 1: Yeah, while Dora was in the same shape, she weighed
Speaker 1: about fifty pounds, was barely alive at this point, and
Speaker 1: so yeah, she asked for and the hazards are like,
Speaker 1: actually where the executor of her estate. She is under
Speaker 1: our legal guardianship forever, and my husband Samuel has power
Speaker 1: of attorney over all of her in the family's financial matters.
Speaker 1: And not only that is you've got a medical bill
Speaker 1: you need to pay. You owe us two grand.
Speaker 2: It's about seventy k today.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Margaret Conway is like, well, I don't have seventy grand.
Speaker 2: I have no idea how to overturn a legal guardianship.
Speaker 2: But it just so happened that Claire and Dora's uncle,
Speaker 2: John Herbert, was just up in Portland, not very far away,
Speaker 2: even back in nineteen eleven, nineteen ten, down in Portland. Yeah,
Speaker 2: oh yeah, you're sorry. Go to be right, No, one
Speaker 2: hundred percent, it is I have which show we did backwards?
Speaker 2: Usually we do Seattle first and then Portland. Right, yeah, okay,
Speaker 2: So anyway, John Herbert was down in Portland, and Margaret
Speaker 2: Conway got in touch with him as I need your help,
Speaker 2: like these Claire's been killed and Dora was in big trouble,
Speaker 2: She's about to die, and these two hucksters have like
Speaker 2: all sorts of legal mumbo jumbo going on. And John
Speaker 2: Herbert got involved. He's like, I'm a man and this
Speaker 2: is the Edwardian era. So everybody listened to me, and
Speaker 2: that's when things started moving.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, Samuel Hazard did produce a document. It
Speaker 1: was a typewritten statement that he said, Claire, you know,
Speaker 1: dictated this to us on her deathbed, but she didn't
Speaker 1: sign it because she was too weak to sign it.
Speaker 1: Because of the whole you know, liver issue. I said
Speaker 1: to my relatives and friends, I'm writing the statement to
Speaker 1: say that Dora and I entered on this course of
Speaker 1: treatment only after thorough investigation, that we have continued it voluntarily,
Speaker 1: and that if death occurs, I believe that it is
Speaker 1: inevitable that it would have come in any circumstances, which
Speaker 1: is like, I mean, it sounds like a child wrote
Speaker 1: that to get out of being in trouble, you.
Speaker 2: Know, right exactly. So, I mean, just that last line
Speaker 2: about if she dies it was inevitable anyway, just so
Speaker 2: smacks of Linda Hazard's philosophy that you can't starve to death. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was just very clearly fake. So John Herbert gets involved.
Speaker 2: Thanks to Margaret Conway, they find get this. The vice
Speaker 2: counsel of the British embassy in Tacoma. Let all that
Speaker 2: sink in for a second. They get them involved, and
Speaker 2: they get the guardianship overturned. Herbert gets the two thousand
Speaker 2: dollars unpaid bill negotiated down to one thousand dollars and
Speaker 2: essentially pays a ransom for Door to be released. And
Speaker 2: in the meantime, once he has Dora back, he starts
Speaker 2: looking into some of these other patients and finds like
Speaker 2: Dora and Claire were far from the only victims who
Speaker 2: were essentially had been exploited financially while they were out
Speaker 2: of their minds from starvation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. So it's, you know, just like the
Speaker 1: movie scene is starting to sort of add up in
Speaker 1: his head, and he brings this evidence into the authorities
Speaker 1: there in the county and they investigate obviously, and Linda
Speaker 1: Hazard was arrested for murder for I think murder in
Speaker 1: the first degree of Claire Williamson and for obvious financial fraud.
Speaker 1: And it was a you know, you said earlier, it
Speaker 1: was sensational. It was a big deal, international press. You know,
Speaker 1: first they had to find out where the Olala Woods
Speaker 1: was and then they came there and started covering this case,
Speaker 1: and she was known as the Starvation Doctor. I think
Speaker 1: they started calling her place Starvation Heights instead.
Speaker 2: Of what was it, Wilderness Heights.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Wilderness Heights, Yes, it's pretty good one. And they
Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of speculation flying around, like
Speaker 1: you know that she had this hold over people, that
Speaker 1: was rumors that she may have been hypnotizing them to
Speaker 1: keep them under her hold. But like you mentioned earlier,
Speaker 1: there still are and certainly back then had people their
Speaker 1: former patients or wealthy benefactors or other naturopaths that were like, hey,
Speaker 1: you know, she's a woman practicing outside the box medicine
Speaker 1: and that's why she's being prosecuted.
Speaker 2: Yes, we should say that it actually took a lot
Speaker 2: of leaning on the Kitsap County prosecutor where Wilderness Heights
Speaker 2: was located, to actually prosecute this crime, because again, she
Speaker 2: had a lot of local support and there were a
Speaker 2: lot of people who are like, she's being persecuted by
Speaker 2: these Brits who are like total out of towners, and
Speaker 2: they're being supported by vocal people from the American Medical
Speaker 2: Association who want only doctors to practice their way and
Speaker 2: basically this woman's being persecuted that as a witch essentially,
Speaker 2: so she did have a lot of supporters, but she
Speaker 2: had a lot of detractors too. It seems like, on balance,
Speaker 2: at least as far as the press is concerned, she
Speaker 2: was generally viewed as a murderer and a grifter. I guess,
Speaker 2: a grifting murderer, terrible combination.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think the first thing she said was this,
Speaker 1: the first guy that came at me was an ambassador
Speaker 1: stationed in Tacoma, Tacoma. Everyone does that sound remotely believable?
Speaker 2: Right? It does sound kind of made up.
Speaker 1: So January fifteenth, nineteen twelve, the trial starts. They lay
Speaker 1: out their evidence basically, which was all pretty obvious, like
Speaker 1: she's trying to fleece these people of money when they
Speaker 1: have no control over their own senses. And I think
Speaker 1: I had about one hundred people testify for the prosecution.
Speaker 1: There were lots of doctors, you know, being paraded up
Speaker 1: there as expert witnesses. And Dora even took the stand
Speaker 1: and talked about this scene basically near the end where
Speaker 1: she was bedside and Claire is trying to whisper Stevie
Speaker 1: style something to Dora like her sister as she's passing essentially,
Speaker 1: and every time she tried to speak miss Hazard or
Speaker 1: missus Hazzard as as she called him, she kept talking
Speaker 1: and I couldn't hear. Like she would lean in and
Speaker 1: she'd say Dory, and she would interrupt and say how
Speaker 1: did you spell that name again, and like she would
Speaker 1: not let her. I mean, this is one of the
Speaker 1: most upsetting parts. Like she wouldn't even let her sister
Speaker 1: perhaps even say goodbye. Who knows what she was trying
Speaker 1: to say.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and apparently also, I guess doctor Hazard cut in
Speaker 2: and was like, I'm going to give Claire one of
Speaker 2: my famous massagists and pressed down so hard that Claire
Speaker 2: lost consciousness. And shortly after that, Dora was told that
Speaker 2: Claire had died. And so, yeah, those probably would have
Speaker 2: been her last words to her that Linda Hazzard basically
Speaker 2: interrupted on purpose.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think she actually died, Dora. I found out
Speaker 1: she died the next morning, so she didn't get that chance.
Speaker 1: Later either, the defensive course comes in and said that
Speaker 1: you know it wasn't the treatment. She didn't die of starvation.
Speaker 1: That's when Linda Hazard very famously says, you know, it's
Speaker 1: not possible to starve someone to death. And you know,
Speaker 1: Trot's out her book in the middle of court and
Speaker 1: says here, read this, and this is the quote from
Speaker 1: the book. Death in the fast never results from deprivation
Speaker 1: of food, but is the inevitable consequence of vitality sapped
Speaker 1: to the last degree by organic imperfection. Right. I mean,
Speaker 1: that's quackery, if like nineteenth century quackery, if I've ever
Speaker 1: heard it, you know for sure.
Speaker 2: But I mean it is technically true, like you die
Speaker 2: from your organs failing, but your organs get their vitality
Speaker 2: from the food that you're not getting. So it's kind
Speaker 2: of like potato potato essentially. Yes, it is. It's a
Speaker 2: pretty glib workaround, I guess. But she stood by that.
Speaker 2: She was like, now, you can't die from starvation. That's
Speaker 2: why she said. And Claire died from liver disease. That's
Speaker 2: why her first patient, Gertrude Young, a first patient to die,
Speaker 2: she died from paralysis. It's whatever was wrong with you
Speaker 2: ahead of time, that's what killed you, not starvation. I
Speaker 2: don't know if Linda Hazard truly believed that there's actually
Speaker 2: some evidence at the very end that we'll see, but
Speaker 2: that's just so dumb that and I have the impression
Speaker 2: that Linda Hazard was not a dumb person at all.
Speaker 2: I just can't believe that she believed that.
Speaker 1: I feel like, given the financial piece, I feel like
Speaker 1: she knew what she was doing. Okay, that's just my
Speaker 1: take on it.
Speaker 2: Right. So again, there were some supporters who are like, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, like she's being persecuted, and the jury said,
Speaker 2: you know what, we're going to split the middle here.
Speaker 2: We're going to find her guilty on a charge of
Speaker 2: manslaughter not murder, so everybody can be unhappy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, basically, she was sentenced to two to twenty hard
Speaker 1: labor at Walla Walla Penitentiaria.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And that wasn't it though, because she appealed the case
Speaker 1: and appealed it and appealed it all the way up
Speaker 1: to the United States or was it the state Supreme Court?
Speaker 2: No, the US Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: From what I am seen, the US Supreme Court took
Speaker 1: about eighteen months to get there, and you know, she
Speaker 1: had supporter sending in letters the whole time saying to
Speaker 1: release her. The state of Washington did revoke her license
Speaker 1: to practice medicine, but she did continue to practice two
Speaker 1: more deaths happened after Claire Williamson, and then she finally
Speaker 1: goes to prison, eventually at Wallawalla.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so while she's appealing and is out and about
Speaker 2: on bail, two more people die. She kills two more people.
Speaker 2: That's just crazy. She finally gets to Walla Walla, like
Speaker 2: you said, and that two to twenty years. It's what's
Speaker 2: known as an indeterminate sentence, like you have to serve
Speaker 2: at least a minimum, but you're not going to serve
Speaker 2: beyond twenty right. So she was in there for I
Speaker 2: think less than two years before she was paroled. She
Speaker 2: very famously knitted ponchos for the other inmates. And when
Speaker 2: she did get out, I think within six months she
Speaker 2: had been pardoned by the governor of Washington.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, it's kind of hard to get
Speaker 1: super accurate information for this old time stuff, but I
Speaker 1: did see in the Washington archives there was a stipulation
Speaker 1: that she had to leave the country if they were
Speaker 1: going to let her out. So, regardless of whether or
Speaker 1: not that's true, she did leave the country. We'll get
Speaker 1: to that in a second. Dora also left the country.
Speaker 1: She went back to England and settled down in Gloucester
Speaker 1: and you know, lived sounds like a pretty great full
Speaker 1: life after that. She got married in nineteen fourteen to
Speaker 1: Reverend Wyndham Allen Chaplin and lived to be seventy one
Speaker 1: years old. Died in nineteen forty five. So she fully
Speaker 1: recovered from her quote unquote treatment, right, and Linda Hazard
Speaker 1: went to New Zealand to Hawker Wares.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and was very well received there during the trial.
Speaker 2: One of her vocal supporters was the Sydney Morning Herald,
Speaker 2: I think, or at least some columnists in there. And
Speaker 2: she made a ton of money again when she showed
Speaker 2: up in New Zealand, Like people just flocked to her
Speaker 2: for her treatment. And I think she long said like, hey, yeah,
Speaker 2: fifteen people died in my care from the fasting, but
Speaker 2: you know I've had hundreds of other patients, So is
Speaker 2: that really that bad? And people are like, yeah, it
Speaker 2: is kind of bad. But also, you know, most doctors
Speaker 2: who lose patients don't also fleece them of their estate.
Speaker 2: Like that's really what took it. Like, murder is bad,
Speaker 2: murder for profit is really bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree, we're going to rank murder.
Speaker 2: Sure, let's just face it. Murder for profit is really bad.
Speaker 1: I agree. I think the piece that you were talking about,
Speaker 1: the one additional little piece of information that maybe she
Speaker 1: did believe fully believe this stuff, yeh, is that she
Speaker 1: herself died from her own treatment June twenty fourth, nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty eight, self administering of fasting cure. So you know,
Speaker 1: I don't think it was pure hocum in her mind.
Speaker 1: I think she probably did believe it to a certain degree,
Speaker 1: but I think she took it to extremes to fleece
Speaker 1: people for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's Linda Hazard.
Speaker 1: Yeah. There's a book that a lots came from from
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety seven. It's called Starvation Heights by a local
Speaker 1: named Greg Olsen. So shout out to Greg Olsen in
Speaker 1: that book.
Speaker 2: If you can't find it at a sec or a
Speaker 2: third g, I guess to the end of Greg Olsen's
Speaker 2: name and it should.
Speaker 1: Come up that was it, g R e Gg.
Speaker 2: Yeah, probably won't come up on a search that's just
Speaker 2: g R. E g in Starvation Heights nineteen ninety seven,
Speaker 2: but if you add that extra ge, it will definitely
Speaker 2: come up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And if you just google greg Olsen, you'll probably
Speaker 1: come up with the Atlanta Braves Catcher from the nineteen
Speaker 1: nineties or.
Speaker 2: Early about him. Yeah, he was a catcher. Huh yeah, Okay,
Speaker 2: you got anything else about Greg Olsen, whether you're talking
Speaker 2: about the author or the catcher.
Speaker 1: I know he was not a belly scratcher.
Speaker 2: You belly itcher.
Speaker 1: I think scratcher a picture, not a belly atcher. Catcher,
Speaker 1: not a belly scratcher.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, I've never heard that second part. He just
Speaker 2: blew my mind. Buddy. Well, since we started talking about
Speaker 2: braves pictures and childhood rhymes, I think it's time for
Speaker 2: listener mail.
Speaker 1: That's right. This is from Daniel. Hey, guys, love the
Speaker 1: episode of Maple Syrup and all your episodes. You want
Speaker 1: to let you know something similar In Australia, there's a
Speaker 1: tree called the side agum or the eucalytus gunny nice,
Speaker 1: and it produces a similar sweet sap. Guys. I couldn't
Speaker 1: find any evidence of it being eaten as is, but
Speaker 1: the local Paalawa people of Tasmania let it naturally ferment
Speaker 1: to turn it into a cider like drink called Why Elena.
Speaker 1: Of course, the tree is now incredibly rare, mostly confined
Speaker 1: to one valley in Tasmania due to all the usual
Speaker 1: good things I sent sarcasm there. As a white Australian,
Speaker 1: I would love for you to do an episode on
Speaker 1: bush Tucker. So much knowledge was lost due to colonization
Speaker 1: and genocide, but there's still so much amazing information out there.
Speaker 1: And that is from Daniel.
Speaker 2: Nice. Daniel, thank you have not heard of cidergum tree
Speaker 2: no or bushtucker no. So those are really great ideas
Speaker 2: and thanks a lot for that. I cannot wait till
Speaker 2: we get back to Australia so we can try that
Speaker 2: cider bush Tucker?
Speaker 1: Is it food apparently?
Speaker 2: Oh? I think bush tucker is like knowledge. That was
Speaker 2: the impression I have.
Speaker 1: Well I just look it up and it's called it's
Speaker 1: a food, So.
Speaker 2: You know, thanks for that. He just gave me the rope,
Speaker 2: didn't you.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean I tried to tell you those food.
Speaker 2: Well, I hadn't realized that you looked anything up. I
Speaker 2: thought we always discussed before we look things up.
Speaker 1: Oh sorry, click any click type type.
Speaker 2: Here you go now. I know. If you want to
Speaker 2: be like Daniel and send us a great email, we
Speaker 2: would love that. You can send it off to Stuff
Speaker 2: Podcasts at iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is
Speaker 2: a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.