Episode 8: The Bell Witch

The Wampus Cat, Big Foot, Alabama White Thang ... Mark and Lisa discuss whether or not they truly exist ... and why the world is cryptid crazy. 

Georgia's Lake Lanier is one of the deadliest in the U.S., and while some claim the high death rate is due to the large number of visitors each year, Mark and Lisa ponder if Lanier's shady history could be the cause of so many deaths.

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Sources:
Underwater Ghost Towns of North Georgia by Lisa M Russell  https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07G1D1TG4/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_hsch_vapi_tkin_p1_i0
Welcome to Lake Lanier, Georgia! https://lakelanier.com/welcome/

CNN: Lake Lanier: A Lake's Dark and Deadly History Has Some People Seeing Ghosts  https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/31/us/lake-lanier-urban-legends-trnd/index.html

Southern Gothic: The Curse of Lake Lanier https://www.southerngothicmedia.com/lake-lanier

Travel Noir: Is Lake Lanier Haunted? The Eerie History of The Georgia Lake Built Over an Entire Town  https://travelnoire.com/georgia-lake-lanier-haunted-twitter-chimes-in

Oxford American: The Haunting of Lake Lanier by Anjai Enjeti  https://oxfordamerican.org/magazine/issue-113-summer-2021/the-haunting-of-lake-lanier#:~:text=Legend%20has%20it%20Lake%20Lanier,bodies%20were%20never%20successfully%20recovered.

Georgia Exhibits: Race and Reckoning in Forsyth County https://georgia-exhibits.galileo.usg.edu/spotlight/forsyth-race-relations/feature/the-lynchings

11 Alive: Whitewashed: The Racial Cleansing of Forsyth County
https://www.11alive.com/article/news/investigations/the-reveal/forsyth-county-lynching-memorial-to-go-up/85-e9e16326-36d5-4c3b-abfd-e76f9b0a793a

The Bell Witch is arguably one of the most famous ghost story in the south, Mark and Lisa discuss the two-hundred-year-old legend, and speculate on whether the stories are folklore or fakelore.
Sources:
The Authenticated History of the Famous Bell Witch by Martin Ingram
https://www.amazon.com/Authenticated-History-Famous-Bell-Witch-ebook/dp/B00BNWH61A/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=the+authentic+famous+bell+witch&qid=1653960218&sr=8-1
Bell Witch: The Truth Exposed by Camille Moffitt
https://www.amazon.com/Bell-Witch-Exposed-Camille-Moffitt-ebook/dp/B0121MFGIA/ref=sr_1_4?crid=2JRUOBT6G06K5&keywords=the+bell+witch&qid=1653960357&sprefix=t%2Caps%2C1203&sr=8-4
The Mark of The Bell Witch
https://www.amazon.com/Mark-Witch-Lauren-Ashley-Carter/dp/B08N87YR76/ref=sr_1_8?keywords=the+bell+witch&qid=1653960459&sr=8-8
The "Bell Witch" Poltergeist by Joe Nickell Skeptical Inquirer From: Volume 38 Issue 1
https://skepticalinquirer.org/2014/01/the-bell-witch-poltergeist/

Astonishing Legends Podcast with Scott Philbrook & Forrest Burgess (Seriously, they're great!)
The Tennessean

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Mark and Lisa discuss the wild past of Phenix City, AL. Dubbed the Wickedest City in America, Phenix City was once home to gamblers, gangsters, and crooked politicians.

In 1954, the shooting death of Albert Patterson, the Attorney General nominee, would rock the state and force the Governor to issue Martial Rule on the violent city.

Sources:

The Tragedy and The Triumph of Phenix City Alabama by Margaret Anne Barnes
Phenix City by Edwin Strickland and Gene Wortsman
Up From the Ashes: The Rebirth of Phenix City   https://youtu.be/8paw63WpyRw

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Mark and Lisa discuss the life of Huntsville, AL native - the irreverent Tallulah Bankhead.

Star of stage and screen, Tallulah Bankhead was a gifted actress that was just as infamous for her antics offstage as she was for her performances onstage.

Sources for this episode:

Tallulah!: The Life and Times of a Leading Lady by Joel Lobenthal

Tallulah Bankhead A Life From Beginning to End by Hourly History

DAH-LING The Strange Case of Tallulah Bankhead by Robert Gottlieb from The New Yorker

Cruella de Vil is Wicked - But Tallulah Bankhead Was Even Wickeder by Rosemary Counter from Vanity Fair

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Nannie Doss spent most of her life looking for love, criss-crossing the states in search of romantic connections. Wedding bells rang five times, but when the marriages fizzled most of her husbands wound up dead.

Nannie is suspected of killing as many as twelve, including four husbands and several family members. Join Mark and Lisa as they discuss this unlikely serial killer and how she was able to go undetected for almost three decades.

In Part 2  we discuss Nannie's last three husbands, more family members who die, and how The Giggling Granny was finally caught.

Sources: Black Widow: The True Story of Giggling Granny Nannie Doss by Ryan Green.

Contact us at: ghostsandcornbread@gmail.com

Trigger Warning: This episode discusses child death and sexual molestation. 

Nannie Doss spent most of her life looking for love. She criss-crossed the states in search of romantic connections, and several times wedding bells rang, but when the marriages fizzled most of her husbands wound up dead.

Nannie is suspected of killing as many as twelve, including four husbands and several family members. Join Mark and Lisa as they discuss this unlikely serial killer and how she was able to go undetected for almost three decades.

In Part 1,  we discuss Nannie's early life in Blue Mountain, Alabama and her first two marriages.

Sources: Black Widow: The True Story of Giggling Granny Nannie Doss by Ryan Green.

Contact us at: ghostsandcornbread@gmail.com

Trigger Warning: This episode discusses child death and sexual molestation. 

Mark and Lisa discuss southern ghost stories.

First, Mark presents the story of Sally Carter, a young woman who died in Huntsville, AL in 1837.  Decades after her death, locals are still reporting sightings.

Then, Lisa discusses Lavinia Fisher, from Charleston, SC, who was hung in 1820. Was she really the first American female serial killer, as local ghost tours would have you believe?

Join Mark and Lisa as they get to the bottom of these ghastly tales.

Sources:

For Sally Carter - hauntedworld.com

For Lavinia Fisher - Six Miles to Charleston: The True Story of John and Lavinia Fisher by Bruce Orr. Available on Amazon- https://www.amazon.com/Six-Miles-Charleston-Lavinia-Fisher/dp/1609491173

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On May 28, 2006, Yalena Zakin goes missing from her Madison, AL home. Suspicion quickly falls on her husband, Dr. Andrew Pakhomov, UAH Physics Professor. Pakhomov is the President of the American Institute of Beamed Propulsion and the interim Physics Department Chair at UAH, could he really be involved? Join Mark and Lisa as they discuss the case.



Sources: Huntsville Times, WAFF News, Wired Magazine, ID's Betrayed, Ancestory.com


Contact us at: ghostsandcornbread@gmail.com

In 1976 Judith Alter was brutally attacked in her own home on Rustic Circle in Huntsville, AL. Although the killer was never caught, the evidence points to one person. Join longtime friends, Mark and Lisa, as they discuss the historic Huntsville murder and the person most likely responsible.



Sources: Wicked North Alabama by Jacquelyn Procter Reeves, Huntsville Times, The Tennesseean, Chatanooga Dailey Times, The Baldwin Times, Fairhope Courier.


Contact us at: ghostsandcornbread@gmail.com