WEBVTT - The Mystery of the Death Valley Germans 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:07.720 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:11.119 --> 0:00:13.319 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's 0:00:13.400 --> 0:00:15.520 Chuck and Jerry's here too, and this is stuff you 0:00:15.520 --> 0:00:18.919 should know. I don't really think you could call it 0:00:18.960 --> 0:00:23.160 part of our ongoing true crime suite, but certainly unsolved 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:23.840 mystery suite. 0:00:23.960 --> 0:00:27.040 I think, yeah, semi solved mystery, I guess at this 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:30.120 point because we're talking about what's known as the Death 0:00:30.200 --> 0:00:34.840 Valley Germans. Pretty good band name, but it's in fact 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:38.600 a very sad story from July nineteen ninety six when 0:00:38.800 --> 0:00:42.480 a blended family of German tourists came to the United 0:00:42.520 --> 0:00:46.120 States for a three week tour of California and Nevada 0:00:46.640 --> 0:00:48.920 and we're never seen again alive. 0:00:49.360 --> 0:00:53.920 Yeah, they just vanished into thin air, essentially in Death 0:00:54.000 --> 0:00:59.960 Valley National Park and they've I mean, it's weird like essentially, 0:01:00.080 --> 0:01:03.200 there was one guy who will meet later who got 0:01:03.240 --> 0:01:06.720 it as close to solved as possible just from sheer determination. 0:01:07.640 --> 0:01:10.440 But the family that you were talking about, they were 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:13.240 made up of Egbert Rimkus, who was thirty four. He 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:17.320 was an architect. He was the dad. George. I'm not 0:01:17.360 --> 0:01:20.319 sure how to say George without an e. You took German? 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:22.440 Are you familiar? No? 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:24.840 I guess it's George Okay. 0:01:25.120 --> 0:01:29.399 He was eleven. He was Egbert's biological son. Connie Meyer, 0:01:29.520 --> 0:01:33.200 Cornelia Connie Meyer, she was twenty seven. She was Egbert's girlfriend, 0:01:33.800 --> 0:01:38.160 and Max was Connie's biological son from a previous relationship. 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:41.759 He was four and Egbert had gone through a fairly 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:45.399 difficult divorce recently. And so this trip was essentially meant 0:01:45.440 --> 0:01:48.840 to be like a fun bonding experience for the four 0:01:48.880 --> 0:01:52.000 of them, Yeah, to kind of form a family unit 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:56.200 in this new new reality, these new circumstances they were in. 0:01:56.640 --> 0:01:56.960 Yeah. 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:01.440 So they got to LA on July eight eighth. They 0:02:01.440 --> 0:02:04.520 had a return flight to Dresden, which is where they 0:02:04.560 --> 0:02:08.840 were from, for July twenty seventh, and the on the 0:02:08.880 --> 0:02:11.640 docket was about a week or so in the LA area, 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:14.440 head on over to Las Vegas for a few days, 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:19.520 go to Death Valley National Park, check that out, head 0:02:19.520 --> 0:02:22.160 over to Yosemite from there, and then go back to 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:24.840 LA and fly home. It's a it's a pretty standard 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:29.560 little itinerary for that that kind of you know, three 0:02:29.600 --> 0:02:30.200 week adventure. 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:34.440 I would say yes. And for the adventure, they rented 0:02:34.440 --> 0:02:39.560 a car, a ninety six Plymouth Voyager minivan, and they 0:02:39.600 --> 0:02:42.680 rented it from Dollar rent a Car. Being German, they 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:45.119 would have rented it from Dollar because that's the American 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:47.200 subsidiary of deutsch Mark rent a Car. 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:48.440 Yeah huh. 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:50.560 And it was due back on the twenty sixth of July, 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:54.239 which is a day before their flight back to Germany. Right, 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:57.720 that's right. The problem is is Dollar rent a Car 0:02:57.800 --> 0:03:00.760 never got their minivan back and the family didn't make 0:03:00.760 --> 0:03:04.960 their flight to Germany. And not everybody noticed this. I mean, 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:08.120 certainly no one in America paid much attention. But remember 0:03:08.160 --> 0:03:11.440 Egbert had an ex wife who was the mom of George, 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:17.080 and George's mom Heike, she was. She wanted to know 0:03:17.120 --> 0:03:19.960 where her son was, so she alerted the authorities, and 0:03:20.120 --> 0:03:23.840 very quickly Interpol put out an international alert for four 0:03:23.880 --> 0:03:28.600 missing German tourists last seen in southern California. And here's 0:03:28.639 --> 0:03:34.079 their itinerary. And it went absolutely nowhere. This is the 0:03:34.200 --> 0:03:36.800 end of July, beginning of August nineteen ninety six, and 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:38.480 nothing happened for months. 0:03:38.760 --> 0:03:42.920 Yeah, I think about I guess until October twenty first, 0:03:42.960 --> 0:03:46.880 when a ranger was flying around in a helicopter looking 0:03:46.880 --> 0:03:50.480 for mess labs, and he said, hey, this is a 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:54.200 very remote part of Death Valley, even for Death Valley, 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:57.880 and there's a Plymouth Voyager minivan with three flat tires 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:01.640 that had clearly been you know, mired in the sand. 0:04:02.920 --> 0:04:07.000 So immediately like, what is this thing? Once they figured 0:04:07.040 --> 0:04:09.520 out who the family was and this was who was missing, 0:04:10.160 --> 0:04:11.800 they were nowhere to be found. There were no signs 0:04:11.800 --> 0:04:14.120 of life, there were no signs of death. There was 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:17.240 nothing at all. And so the mystery of the Death 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:21.440 Valley Germans was born right there in one of the 0:04:21.440 --> 0:04:23.159 most inhospitable places on Earth. 0:04:23.600 --> 0:04:27.919 Yeah, and the whole thing wouldn't be close solved or 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:31.320 close to being solved for another fifteen years. And for 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:34.279 those of us who aren't familiar with Death Valley, it's 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:39.120 a national park, like I said, that straddles California and Nevada, 0:04:39.560 --> 0:04:43.760 and it is. It lives up to its name. It 0:04:44.520 --> 0:04:47.719 doesn't have the highest temperature ever recorded on Earth, but 0:04:47.800 --> 0:04:50.240 it has the second highest, and it's very close. The 0:04:50.279 --> 0:04:53.400 highest temperature ever recorded in Death Valley in the summer 0:04:53.440 --> 0:04:56.839 of nineteen thirteen was one hundred and thirty four degrees 0:04:57.000 --> 0:05:01.919 farent height. Yeah, fifty six point seven degrees celsius hot. 0:05:02.120 --> 0:05:05.080 I think the record was in Elaziza, Libya, in nineteen 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:07.320 twenty two. It was only two and a half degrees 0:05:07.360 --> 0:05:10.800 hotter than that. So clearly Death Valley is very hot. 0:05:11.120 --> 0:05:15.160 And even in a regular summer it's still crazy hot. 0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:17.760 And in nineteen ninety six in the summer, remember they're 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:21.000 in there hanging out in late July, which is the 0:05:21.160 --> 0:05:25.400 height of the summer of Death Valley. The daily high 0:05:25.480 --> 0:05:28.760 temperature the average was one hundred and twenty four degrees 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:31.400 height and ninety one was the low. 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:35.600 Yeah, so it's scorching hot, which is just you know, 0:05:35.600 --> 0:05:40.360 it's very dangerous conditions, especially if you're not used in 0:05:40.520 --> 0:05:44.320 that kind of thing, not prepared for that kind of thing. Apparently, 0:05:44.720 --> 0:05:48.039 Death Valley is something that was I guess two days 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:50.320 ago years old when I found out is a very 0:05:50.320 --> 0:05:55.120 popular tour site for Germans. There was a writer in 0:05:55.160 --> 0:05:58.680 the nineteenth century name Karl My spelled m a y 0:06:00.160 --> 0:06:02.279 writer had never been to Death Valley, but wrote a 0:06:02.320 --> 0:06:06.800 bunch of hugely popular travel adventure books set in the 0:06:06.800 --> 0:06:11.600 American Southwest, including Death Valley. Some were made into spaghetti westerns, 0:06:11.800 --> 0:06:14.839 including one called The Valley of Death in nineteen sixty eight. 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:16.919 But this dude, whom I've. 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:20.320 Never heard of, sold two hundred million books, so, like 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:22.599 you know, one of the top selling authors of all time. 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:26.239 And so Germans as a result, became fascinated with making 0:06:26.240 --> 0:06:28.000 that trek out to Death Valley. And that's what this 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:28.600 family did. 0:06:28.720 --> 0:06:29.640 Yeah, you didn't know that. 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:32.920 I had never heard of this guy, had you No? 0:06:32.960 --> 0:06:37.320 Okay, So this is popular with German tourists, but that's 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:39.000 not to say that all German tourists who go to 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:41.720 Death Valley die or get lost or even don't have 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:44.200 a good time. Like of course, yeah, it's a very 0:06:44.200 --> 0:06:48.359 popular place. But people do die in Death Valley National 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:52.240 Park every year, every summer in particular, and between twenty 0:06:52.320 --> 0:06:55.440 seven and twenty twenty four, sixty eight people died in 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:59.359 Death Valley. There's a lot of people who died simply 0:06:59.400 --> 0:07:02.479 from being a exposed to the local weather. They died 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:05.039 of hyper thermia, most of them, I think twenty or 0:07:05.080 --> 0:07:08.880 not most, but twenty percent died of hyperthermia, which if 0:07:08.920 --> 0:07:11.200 you've ever been in a hot sauna that got too 0:07:11.280 --> 0:07:15.080 hot for your comfort, that you imagine dying from that, 0:07:15.080 --> 0:07:19.480 that's dying from hyperthermia. I think the rest who died 0:07:19.480 --> 0:07:22.920 from exposure died from dehydration, because that can come on 0:07:23.000 --> 0:07:23.720 really quick too. 0:07:24.200 --> 0:07:24.880 Yeah for sure. 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:28.240 So a day after this mini ban is discovered by 0:07:28.240 --> 0:07:31.200 a helicopter and death Valley, the ranger came back with 0:07:31.200 --> 0:07:34.280 the local sheriff on the ground to check it out. 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:36.800 Or maybe they flew out there, who knows, but at 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:38.600 any rate, at some point their feet were on the ground. 0:07:39.320 --> 0:07:41.680 They opened the van up. They, like I said, there 0:07:41.680 --> 0:07:42.760 were three flat tires. 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:45.960 It was stuck up to its axles in the sand, 0:07:46.760 --> 0:07:50.040 and they determined that it had driven for at least 0:07:50.080 --> 0:07:52.000 a couple of hundred feet on the flat tires. 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:54.240 The whole thing was covered in dust. 0:07:54.400 --> 0:07:58.200 You know, clearly hadn't been seen by anyone else or disturbed. 0:07:58.680 --> 0:08:00.720 That was the things you would expect to fine from 0:08:00.880 --> 0:08:04.840 disappeared people on an adventurisfication like this, like their luggage 0:08:04.840 --> 0:08:07.440 and their clothes like nothing really weird. Empty water bottles, 0:08:08.000 --> 0:08:11.600 empty juice containers, a couple of unopened bottles of bud 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:14.280 Ice beer, which you remember that yeah, dates the thing 0:08:14.440 --> 0:08:17.480 in the mid nineties. I was never into the ice beers. 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:19.800 No, I think, if I remember correctly, it just it 0:08:19.800 --> 0:08:21.640 got you more crunk than the average beer. 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:25.720 I feel like that was how they sold it. Who knows. 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:28.920 I mean that was before things like high gravity beers 0:08:29.080 --> 0:08:31.400 really came to the forefront. So maybe it was like, 0:08:31.520 --> 0:08:34.600 you know, these things have an extra percentage of abb. 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:37.800 Yeah. I think the slogan was bud ice, get you plastered. 0:08:39.040 --> 0:08:40.280 I remember the dry beers too. 0:08:40.320 --> 0:08:41.959 I thought it was fancy in college at one point 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:43.320 because I was drinking michelob dry. 0:08:43.640 --> 0:08:46.640 Oh. At this point, speaking of fancy, I was drinking Zema. 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:49.640 Oh. I never went down the Zemer road. 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:51.640 Oh they were They went down easy. 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:55.280 What was the flavor? What was it like a sprite? 0:08:55.920 --> 0:08:58.559 Yes, it was. It was close to that, Like it 0:08:58.600 --> 0:09:00.640 wouldn't take a sip of zem and be like, that's right. 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:03.960 But that's probably the closest thing you could just mention 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:06.240 off the top of your head. Some people put jolly 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:09.400 ranchers in it too, to flavor it even further. It 0:09:09.840 --> 0:09:14.000 also had a bit of like a dry like in 0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:16.920 the sense that champagne can be dry. It had a 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:19.520 little bit of that nothing that you'd be like, wow, 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:22.679 it's a really dry drink. But yeah, and I think 0:09:22.920 --> 0:09:25.880 ultimately it was malt liquor, which really could get you 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:26.720 plastered too. 0:09:27.280 --> 0:09:27.640 Yeah. 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:29.959 I used to drink the Mickey's Big Mouths in college 0:09:30.040 --> 0:09:34.000 and the occasional little giant Schlitz tall Boy can. 0:09:34.160 --> 0:09:38.920 Yeah, those were the days. I keep it pretty simple 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:39.400 these days. 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.480 But yeah, but you're right there. But Ice definitely dates 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:44.640 it to the mid nineties for sure, and they're like, 0:09:44.679 --> 0:09:46.719 you said, this is kind of important. That's why I'm 0:09:46.720 --> 0:09:49.040 going back to it. There were a couple of bottles 0:09:49.040 --> 0:09:52.640 of unopened but ice beer still in the minivan. 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:55.400 Yeah, And then one of the just sort of small 0:09:55.400 --> 0:09:57.240 clue as far as to show where they'd been, there 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:01.000 was a business card from the Seahorse Resort in San Clemente, 0:10:01.480 --> 0:10:04.520 which is where they stayed while I guess seeing the 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:08.000 LA area, which is not super close to LA, so 0:10:08.040 --> 0:10:10.320 I guess maybe they wanted to be between LA and 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:11.240 San Diego or something. 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:11.640 I don't know. 0:10:11.760 --> 0:10:13.840 I think they just saw pictures of the view and 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:17.440 were like there, maybe because the view is very nice. 0:10:18.160 --> 0:10:21.400 So there was a guide book there too, in German, 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:24.920 a guidebook that they purchased or that was purchased at 0:10:24.920 --> 0:10:28.800 the Furnace Creek Visitor Center in Death Valley and like 0:10:28.840 --> 0:10:30.920 I said, it was in German. And so they went 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:34.080 to the visitors center. Investigators did later, and they found 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:36.720 that on July twenty second, there were two German language 0:10:36.720 --> 0:10:40.840 guide books sold at the visitor center at Furnace Creek 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:45.040 and none on July twenty third. So with that they 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.760 started to be able to begin to retrace their steps. 0:10:49.040 --> 0:10:51.559 That was the first clue that they were able to 0:10:51.640 --> 0:10:53.080 kind of extrapolate from. 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:57.880 Yeah, so their second clue came when they found undevelop 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:01.760 roles of film and cameras, So sort of like the 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:03.760 end of the hangover, they were able to get those 0:11:04.000 --> 0:11:07.960 developed and pieced together, you know, at least roughly by 0:11:08.040 --> 0:11:10.719 way of the pictures they took, at least what they 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:13.680 had done on their trip, maybe even as we'll see 0:11:13.720 --> 0:11:17.120 clues to where they like the last picture taken obviously 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:21.640 would be the most instructive. So from these pictures they 0:11:21.720 --> 0:11:24.000 realized they stayed in San Clementy for a little while 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:27.760 seeing the La area, they drove up the California coast 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:32.079 and then over to Las Vegas, Nevada, and there they 0:11:32.080 --> 0:11:34.840 stayed at the Treasure Island Hotel, which also dates this 0:11:34.920 --> 0:11:41.800 in the mid nineties and there, they found that the father, Egbert, 0:11:41.840 --> 0:11:44.880 had called his bank in Germany on July twelfth try 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:47.560 to have another fifteen hundred bucks wired to Bank of 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:49.839 American San Clemente, but they sent it to the wrong 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.600 bank and at Treasure Island. He you know, he was 0:11:53.840 --> 0:11:56.080 clearly in need of some dough as he even faxed 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:58.640 his ex wife and said, hey, which also dates this, 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:00.320 can you send more money? 0:12:00.360 --> 0:12:01.439 And she never responded. 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:04.079 Yeah. What I didn't get and I didn't see anyone 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:06.400 explain it is why he was just like, oh, well 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:08.480 they send it to the La branch of Bank of 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:10.920 America rather than San Clemente. I guess there's nothing I 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:13.600 can do to go get it. He just never went 0:12:13.640 --> 0:12:15.439 and picked up the fifteen hundred dollars. 0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:18.440 Well maybe he didn't know. I don't know. 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:21.240 Yeah, I mean I would still spend some time trying 0:12:21.240 --> 0:12:23.440 to figure out where my fifteen hundred dollars. That's about 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:26.880 three thousand dollars in today's money, So it seems like 0:12:26.920 --> 0:12:29.640 he just shrugged it off. From what from his actions, 0:12:29.679 --> 0:12:31.080 I just think that's really strange. 0:12:31.640 --> 0:12:33.520 Yeah, I mean, also could have been one of those 0:12:33.520 --> 0:12:35.240 things where where they're like, well, sir, we don't know 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:39.720 which banket's in, stop bothering us, and like we can find. 0:12:39.520 --> 0:12:42.240 Out in a week. Yeah, it could be, and you know, 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:43.680 they had a schedule, so who knows. 0:12:43.880 --> 0:12:45.960 Yeah. So the long and short of it, though, is 0:12:46.000 --> 0:12:49.079 they were low on funds now right. And Luckily, if 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.719 you're going to national parks like Death Valley and Yosemite 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:55.720 and the only thing you're doing after that is making 0:12:55.760 --> 0:12:57.760 it back to the airport to turn in your car 0:12:57.800 --> 0:13:00.280 and take your flight home, you can get by on 0:13:00.320 --> 0:13:02.400 some pretty low funds. You can still buy some but 0:13:02.600 --> 0:13:07.880 ice it wasn't particularly expensive, so they seem to kind 0:13:07.920 --> 0:13:12.080 of be making their way low on funds, and that 0:13:12.240 --> 0:13:15.680 actually helped track them a little bit further later on. 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:19.520 But there was one other clue too, and it was 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:24.040 an American flag and it had Butte Valley Stone Cabin 0:13:24.720 --> 0:13:28.160 on its label. That's where it belonged to in Death Valley. 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:32.040 It's locally called the Geologist Cabin, and I think it 0:13:32.640 --> 0:13:34.960 does what it says on the label, which is it 0:13:35.000 --> 0:13:38.520 houses geologists who are conducting experiments out there. So there's 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:41.480 food there, there's water there, but they keep it locked. 0:13:41.559 --> 0:13:43.360 If you're a geologist, it's kind of like a gas 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:45.320 station bathroom. You have to go get the key first 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:49.559 before you start using the geologist's cabin. So they seem 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:52.319 to have just taken the flag as maybe a souvenir 0:13:52.440 --> 0:13:55.000 or something like that. Like I know, if I were 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:58.280 in the Black Forest and I came across the German flag, 0:13:58.320 --> 0:14:00.880 I would take it and then take it back to 0:14:00.960 --> 0:14:02.360 America as a souvenir. 0:14:03.240 --> 0:14:05.320 Yeah, I guess that's what this was being used for 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:07.560 back then, because I think now you can actually stay there. 0:14:08.040 --> 0:14:09.920 Oh really, Yeah, it's like. 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:13.360 A you know, along the Appleachian Trail and just sort 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:15.679 of all over in national parks. They'll be like a 0:14:15.720 --> 0:14:18.640 remote cabin that you know, you come, you can stay there. 0:14:18.679 --> 0:14:20.680 There might be some food and water rations if you 0:14:20.720 --> 0:14:22.440 need it, and you're the idea is that you're supposed 0:14:22.440 --> 0:14:24.720 to leave something, yeah, and leave it better than you 0:14:24.800 --> 0:14:27.880 found it, because I've seen pictures of people that you know, 0:14:28.000 --> 0:14:31.480 in the twenty tens that have stayed there, and like 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:33.640 it's it's a destination for people who are into Death 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:35.120 Valley because it's super cool looking. 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:36.800 It's out in the middle of nowhere. 0:14:36.840 --> 0:14:39.240 It's like a stone cabin and it's on a lot 0:14:39.280 --> 0:14:40.720 of people's list of like I want to go stay 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:42.840 at the geologists cabin. So I guess that just wasn't 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:45.480 the deal back then, right, because it was locked up 0:14:45.760 --> 0:14:48.960 what I don't get, Well, we'll get. 0:14:48.800 --> 0:14:52.040 To what I don't get later. Okay, should we take. 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:54.880 A break, Yeah, I think that's a good spot. 0:14:55.280 --> 0:14:57.280 All right, we'll take a break and we'll come back 0:14:57.440 --> 0:14:59.400 with more on the Death Valley Germans right after this. 0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:30.720 Okay, Chuck, So where we left off, they had Pilford 0:15:30.760 --> 0:15:34.280 the American flag from the geologist's cabin, and right, like, 0:15:34.360 --> 0:15:36.000 all of this stuff, this is just the stuff they 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:37.800 found in the van. This is as far as the 0:15:37.840 --> 0:15:41.320 search has gone. Yeah, And so the rangers of the 0:15:41.360 --> 0:15:44.040 park start conducting their own investigation, and they go to 0:15:44.120 --> 0:15:48.400 like Furnace Creek Ranch, which is a resort kind of upscale. 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:51.400 There's a campground, but you have to pay for all 0:15:51.440 --> 0:15:54.240 those and there was no record of the family staying 0:15:54.240 --> 0:15:56.680 at either of those places on July twenty second or 0:15:56.680 --> 0:15:59.960 twenty third, or anytime. Really. One of the other things 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:02.240 they did was check logbooks. Apparently they pick up log 0:16:02.280 --> 0:16:07.520 books even at sites that don't have anyone working there. 0:16:07.720 --> 0:16:10.560 They'll still have a log book, and they struck gold 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.240 at one of them, the Warm Springs Mine log Book, 0:16:13.280 --> 0:16:17.320 which is an abandoned mine above Death Valley in the mountains. 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:20.600 I guess on a ridge and you can get to it. 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:23.160 It's a road. There's a road that goes to it. 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:25.800 It's nothing that you would normally call a road, but 0:16:25.920 --> 0:16:28.520 in Death Valley National Park it might as well be 0:16:28.560 --> 0:16:33.040 a luxurious eight eight lane highway. It's gravel, it's rough, 0:16:33.080 --> 0:16:38.840 but a Plymouth voyager can get on this road to 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:41.960 Warm Springs Mine. And in the logbook they got a 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:44.280 huge clue that would help track them down later. 0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:46.360 Yeah, they signed it. 0:16:46.360 --> 0:16:50.880 It was in German, apparently it was barely legible, and 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:55.760 it said we are going over the pass. Signed Connie, Egbert, 0:16:55.920 --> 0:17:00.480 George and Max So On October twenty third, this is 0:17:00.520 --> 0:17:03.840 two days after the minivan is found. They finally conduct 0:17:03.880 --> 0:17:07.359 a big four day search looking for this family. About 0:17:07.560 --> 0:17:10.480 two hundred and fifty plus people, a couple of helicopters, 0:17:10.920 --> 0:17:14.920 eight horses. A lot of these were volunteers, but dozens 0:17:14.960 --> 0:17:18.399 of them were trained search and rescue people. Right, no slouches, 0:17:18.880 --> 0:17:21.440 No slouches. Well, there was one slouch, but he didn't 0:17:21.480 --> 0:17:22.600 last long because it was Death. 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:27.560 Valleyene exactly, and the only evidence from this four day 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:31.800 search was an empty bottle of butt ice and a 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:34.360 butt print basically in the sand next to it, where 0:17:34.400 --> 0:17:36.880 someone had clearly sat down and enjoyed that butt ice. 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:40.440 It was about one point seven miles away from the van. 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:44.359 And yeah, clearly somebody took a little break in the 0:17:44.400 --> 0:17:49.720 shade and had that sweet, sweet extra potent ice, beear. 0:17:49.680 --> 0:17:55.960 Right, and they could even figure when they probably figured 0:17:56.000 --> 0:17:58.000 it was Egbert because the size of the butt print 0:17:58.080 --> 0:18:02.160 was fairly large. Well that's how I saw it described. 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:04.679 I think that is. I think they're just saying larger 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:06.840 than say a woman's or a child's, which is the 0:18:06.880 --> 0:18:09.760 only other people with them in this party. Right. But 0:18:09.800 --> 0:18:11.600 it was on the east side of the bush, so 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:14.320 that if he was taking refuge from it in the shade, 0:18:14.480 --> 0:18:17.480 that means that the sun would have been in the 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:19.919 western part of the sky, so he would have been 0:18:19.960 --> 0:18:23.240 sitting there in late afternoon, which seems ludicrous to even 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:25.560 point out, but it would come into play later on. 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:27.240 Yeah, that's right. 0:18:27.359 --> 0:18:31.040 So again in that visitor's log it says we're going 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:34.080 over the pass. The only pass near there is called 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:36.960 Mingle Pass M E and G E L. And if 0:18:36.960 --> 0:18:38.920 you look on a map back in nineteen ninety six, 0:18:38.920 --> 0:18:40.879 before you had you know, smartphones and things like that, 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:43.560 or people on the internet saying, hey, don't go this way, right, 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:48.399 it looks like it's pretty possible to drive from Warm Springs, 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:52.880 go through that Mingle Pass into an adjacent valley, and 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:55.600 then hit a dirt road toward Yosemite, which was their 0:18:56.000 --> 0:18:59.840 next destination. They didn't know that, you know, they didn't 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:03.200 have knowledge that it wouldn't it wasn't going to be 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:06.240 just like a little sort of rocky path, but something 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:09.120 you really really need a four by four vehicle four 0:19:09.240 --> 0:19:11.880 like full stop. It's not like, well maybe we can 0:19:11.920 --> 0:19:15.160 make it in the Plymouth Voyager, Like you can't make 0:19:15.200 --> 0:19:17.080 it down this road with anything other than a four 0:19:17.119 --> 0:19:17.440 by four. 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:18.399 And even that's dicey. 0:19:18.600 --> 0:19:20.399 Yeah, I saw that. Not only do you need a 0:19:20.400 --> 0:19:23.400 four by four, you need an experienced driver who has 0:19:23.480 --> 0:19:26.440 who can get through this stuff too. Like you can't 0:19:26.480 --> 0:19:28.199 just put some yahoo in a four by four and 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:30.879 expect them to make it. It's that dicey. Maybe a 0:19:30.920 --> 0:19:35.120 winch yeah, probably, yeah, Yeah, you just like go from 0:19:35.119 --> 0:19:38.919 Bowler to bowler winching yourself over the pass, right, Yeah, 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:41.080 So to get to the pass, you go by the 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:43.879 geologist station. And remember they had the flag from the 0:19:44.400 --> 0:19:48.160 geologist station. So now they're really starting to retrace their footsteps. 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:52.480 The problem is is the van wasn't anywhere near the 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:55.000 road to Mingle Pass. As a matter of fact, it 0:19:55.040 --> 0:19:58.159 wasn't really near anything that was a road, an actual 0:19:58.240 --> 0:20:00.280 road in Death Valley. It was essentially like they just 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.680 drove through the middle of the desert, which is how 0:20:02.720 --> 0:20:06.440 they found the van. So after this four day, very 0:20:06.520 --> 0:20:09.800 extensive search by at least two hundred and fifty people, 0:20:10.720 --> 0:20:13.919 all they found was the beer bottle at the bush 0:20:14.480 --> 0:20:17.399 and the butt print that was it. Those were the 0:20:17.400 --> 0:20:21.000 only physical clues that they found. And you know, there's 0:20:21.040 --> 0:20:22.720 a lot of stuff going on in Death Valley at 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:25.480 any given time, in the whole area of southern California. 0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:28.439 So these rescue groups got called off to other stuff, 0:20:28.480 --> 0:20:31.360 and the park rangers went back about their business, and 0:20:31.800 --> 0:20:34.520 the case just went totally cold for years and years 0:20:34.520 --> 0:20:37.800 and years, And it probably would have stayed that way 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:40.560 if not for a guy named Tom Hood, who will 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:45.080 meet in a second. But in the interim that vacuum 0:20:45.119 --> 0:20:48.400 between the end of the initial search and tom Ahood 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:51.800 picking this whole thing up. People just kind of came 0:20:51.880 --> 0:20:54.119 up with their own theories to explain it because it 0:20:54.160 --> 0:20:58.080 was just so they just vanished off of the face 0:20:58.119 --> 0:20:58.520 of the earth. 0:20:58.560 --> 0:21:01.679 It seemed like, yeah, so you know, one of the 0:21:02.440 --> 0:21:04.439 I guess it was probably the most popular theory, and 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:07.399 it makes sense in some ways, is that this was 0:21:07.480 --> 0:21:10.720 an intentional disappearing, Like, hey, let's this family set it 0:21:10.800 --> 0:21:13.439