You're listening to a Morbid Network podcast. Hey, weirdos.

I'm Ash. And I'm Elena.

And this is Morbid. It's Morbid.

In the morning, in case you couldn't tell from our voices.

It's morbid in the morning. It's like very early morning. We haven't done one like this in a while.

A while, and it's rainy out.

Yeah, it's real spooky. It is. It's cold, though. It's like very cold rain, which is disgusting.

The holidays are upon us.

Yeah, Thanksgiving is like in a minute. It's like in a minute. It's in a minute. We did this early in the morning because Chagirl is leaving on my honeymoon because I got married. Who? A whole ass Isaac these days. A whole ass Isaac. Absolutely wild.

It was such a good wedding.

It was so much fun.

It was so fun.

It was so fun. It was so fun. I had the two best men of honors in the entire world. Oh, my God, that was one of them. I just got so many of the pictures back and there were so many cute pictures of us. There's one of you giving your speech, and I'm just like, Actually, there's one of you giving your speech, and I'm looking on lovingly. Then there's one of you giving your speech, and I'm holding up a.

One finger. I know.

Exactly what it's like. Because it's the Captain Crunch's slurpy that she literally told everyone and the fish tacos. I told you we weren't speaking of the team.

Or not talking about the.

Fish taco. It's one time. The fish taco incident will remain unnamed. Thank you and good night. But no, it was so much fun and I had a blast. It was awesome.

It was gorgeous. You were gorgeous.

Oh, you were gorgeous. Drew was gorgeous. Drew was gorgeous. It was all that. He crowdsurfed three times.

It was amazing.

It was epic. All right, so I said, why don't we do a little curse city, curse town?

Yeah, this town is wild. It's just a weird-ass town. It's not even a town, is it?

It's literally not even a town. It's just like an area on top of a couple of fucking mountains.

It's like one of those unincorporated towns that are really fucking weird.

Yeah, it just got called a town because of the grouping of people that lived there. But they all went Cuckoo Nut's Bananas, allegedly. Then I did find a list in her tale of somebody that's visited. Hell, yeah. We're talking about Dudley town in Connecticut. Please be aware that I'm not encouraging you to go anywhere near there because that is illegal. But this person, I think, went before it was illegal or went on the low.

We're not going to.

Judge them. Yeah, we're not judging them in any way, but on the low. In the forward time of things. The forward times. I am encouraging not to go. I just want to.

State that. I like what you just called the future.

Yeah, the.

Forward times. In the forward times.

In the forward times. I am imploring you to not know because you'll get in trouble, and I don't want that for you.

I don't want that for you.

It's expensive to get in trouble.

Oh, no.

I'll let you know how much, but vanp for a sec because I need another sip of coffee.

All right, I'm vamping because Ash needs a sip of coffee before she goes on. Did it. I noticed this topic somewhere.

Yeah, because you- I'm trying to remember where. -were trying to remember where. This was yours originally, and then we did a little reverse.

A reverse, reverse. But I'm trying to remember where I found it because I feel.

Like I- Was it in one of those weird books?

It might have been in one of those weird books because it was one of those I was like, This is interesting.

We're not saying the book is weird. It's literally weird. -weird New Jersey. Like weird New England. Weird Connecticut. -yeah. I think maybe that's what it was. It probably was. Or like, No, you said a TikTok. Oh, yeah. You said you've seen a TikTok.

Yeah, it was. I've seen it.

All right, well, that's cool. Let's get into it. Deep in the woods near Cornwall, Connecticut, in a valley known as Dark Entry Forest-I'm already sold them. -are the remains of the small village of Dudleytown. Dudley town was a thriving mining community. It was settled upon in the mid 18th century by British colonists, much like pretty much everywhere else around here.

Yeah, you know.

Yeah. The town provided charcoal and other minerals for the growing steel industry in and around New England. But by the late 19th century, the mining industry had shifted west. I think we all know about that. I think we learned about that in sixth century. The Gold Rush. The Gold Rush. Because of that, slowly but surely, the population of Dudleytown shrank until by the early 20th century. There were only a handful of people living in this little, you can call it a village, it's like.

Barely a village. Like a little hamlet.

Yeah, actually. By 1924, the village of Dudleytown was completely abandoned at that point, and it fell into the ownership of a private trust who wanted to restore the forest ecosystem to its pre-colonial health. They set out on a little ecosystem- Makeover.

-correct. -extreme Makeover.

-f forest edition. I like that. Looking back, historians and other people familiar with this area, chalked up the abandonment of this little town, Hamlet, to a variety of social, economic, ecological reasons. But with that being said, there are people who think that those reasons, all those social, economic, ecological reasons are bullshit, and that the real reason the village was abandoned is much darker and far more supernatural in nature. I'm with them. I'm with them. There are rumors of widespread madness among the villagers, unexplained deaths and other tragedies, and, of course, a curse that dates back to the founding of the village in the 1740s or actually possibly even before that, regarding this one family. Woman to it. Now, today, the area is still said to be haunted. Despite being private property. -private property, it has become a popular destination for ghost hunters and legend trippers who are determined to find out whether Dudleytown is a truly cursed village or just a victim of those shifting social and economic trends.

Boo, boring. Haunted, cursed.

All right, so let's get into it. Located in the northwest corner of Connecticut, the town of Cornwall was incorporated in 1740, so long ago. It was after multiple shares of land were purchased at auction from Yale College, Cornwall. It was about a year or two earlier. Now, early colonists were initially drawn to this region for farming and the proximity to the Housatonic River. But they learned pretty quickly that the mountainous landscape made transportation difficult and that it also limited the crops that could be sold outside of the area for that very reason. Now, the river did aid in transportation of agricultural goods, but most people in the area shifted their focus to other forms of business like education and mining. They're just a little more fruitful.

Now.

Among those who immigrated to Cornwall were several members of the Dudley family. Dudley family, Dudley town. In the early 1740s, they settled in this heavily wooded part of Cornwall that sat right on top of a high hill that in time came to be known as Dudley town. Now, I was saying it earlier. The name would imply that they ended up with their own whole last town or formally recognized reason. Yeah, but it was just an informal name that they gave to the settlement.

I also love that they gave the name deadly town. Their last name was deadly, and they were.

Like, deadly town. This is our town, bitch.

It feels like, and I'm not equating them to him, but it feels like something Mayor Humdinger from PAW.

Patrol would do. That's a.

Mom moment.

I just- Humdinger town brought to you by PAW Patrol.

I could see.

That happening. You know what, though? That man. Right? That man. That man checks. No, like how an urban neighborhood, like a city neighborhood, might gain an informal nickname due to the particular characteristic. That's exactly.

Where it was.

Like a bean town for Boston.

Which.

I didn't know why Boston was called bean town. Really? I thought it was B-town for the longest time of my life. Wow. Only about maybe five or six years ago did I learn that it was- Wow, you were in your 20s. -in my 20s. In the 20s. Or maybe late teens. But yeah, I always thought it was B-town. But it's bean town because we have a lot of baked beans here.

That's hilarious that you did.

Not know that. I also didn't know that baked beans were a Boston thing.

Yeah, Boston baked beans.

Yeah, who knew? I did. You, but not me, not I. Who knew? But now I do. Now, anyways, early settlers in the area included Thomas Griffiths, Gideontimes. Gideon Dudley.

What did you say? I said, Shut up over there.

Barzolay Dudley, Abel Dudley, and Martin Dudley, who were eventually followed by other families that would also settle upon the town. Just wild-ass names, though. -wild-ass names. -barzolay is my.

Favorite name ever. -the Barzolay is.

Where it's at. Oh, my God. I meant to text you, you know that French guy on the pronunciation that we love? Yes, I love that guy. I looked it up and he goes, Barzolay. It is easy. Barzolay. He was like, You can do it. -it has a kick. -barsolay. -it is easy. -barsolay. I don't know if it is.

-i love him.

-he always encourages.

-he does. -i like him. -i like him.

What would you do if you thought you had met the love of your life? But as things began to slowly unravel, it went beyond your capacity to help, ending with his untimely death. What would you do? I'm Whitmisseldine, the creator of This is Actually Happening, a podcast that brings you extraordinary, true stories of life-changing events told by the people who lived them. I'm excited to share that we have hit 300 episodes. In honor of this, we've decided to revisit the first-ever episode of the show, entitled What if Your Boyfriend lit himself on fire? It's been about 12 years since I started the show with this interview, and both the storyteller and the show have evolved so much in that time. Our 300th episode is a deeper dive into the story and everything that has happened since then. To hear this story and so many more, follow this is actually happening on the Wondry app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to This is Actually Happening, ad-free on Wondry Plus.

In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again, leaving us to wonder decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott. From WNDY, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and many more. Every week, hosts Aaron and Justin sit down to discuss a new case covering every angle and theory, walking through the forensic evidence and interviewing those close to the case to try to discover what happened. With over 450 episodes, there's a case for every true crime listener. Follow the Generation Y podcast on the WNDY app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Generation Y ad-free right now by joining Wondry Plus.

Now, at first, the settlers in Dudley town tried to follow the path of other settlers in Cornwall by clearing large pots of forested land to establish farms of their own. However, after decades of tilling the soil and trying but failing to establish really any crops, the residents learned that for a number of reasons, the area was not well suited to farming, and it was definitely not as suited as the lower areas in the valley. Again, the natural limitations on transportation made selling the few crops that were successful very difficult. So unable to farm the land, the residents of Dudley Town turned to the only other potentially lucrative resource at their disposal, iron ore. We all know it.

We all know it.

We all love it. We all harvest it. We all live it. Yeah.

You know?

Ore. I don't even really know what.

Iron ore is, do you? I don't know. I know that Bobby Ore was a hockey player.

The more you know. In Boston. In Boston. Brought to you by- Sissy. -brought to you by, bean town. And Be Town. How about that? I mean, it both work. Get you a girl who could do both. Exactly. Like, Connecticut was being settled by European colonists in the early 18th century. It occurred to them that the Western part of the state could potentially be rich with valuable minerals. I don't know what it is about the West, but it's all about minerals.

I know everything in the West. Even the Western part of the Eastern states are more fruitful.

Exactly. I don't know why. What's happening there? I don't know why. What's up with the West?

I like the East personally.

Me as well personally. But the problem, however, was that extracting iron ore from the Earth was a very costly, time-consuming process that after you got through the entire thing could also prove profitable. Making a profit was real hard back in this day. It was. But fortunately, by the mid to end of the 18th century, the onset of the American Revolutionary War drove the need for locally-produced steel for arms, which dramatically increased the potential for local mining. There you go. It's sad that war made that happen.

I was going to say, yeah, okay.

For the residents of Cornwall living in Dudleytown, that demand for ore created a welcome opportunity to replace those failed attempts at farming, and soon the area became known for its active mining industry, and they were providing large amounts of charcoal to the growing mining industry. Now, while the end of the revolution saw a dramatic decrease in the need for war-related iron production, the industrialization of labor that occurred throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries ensured that New England's mining industry wasn't going anywhere. During this period, iron forges and industrial blast furnaces were scattered across the region, excuse me, including two in Cornwall alone. As one of the few areas in Western Connecticut with a quarry, Cornwall and the Dudley town area specifically became a really important source of charcoal to keep the regional furnaces operating. They were really needed in this period of time, which meant they were really profitable.

Like, we got a quarry.

We got a fucking quarry, kid. Very Boston also. Yeah, it is. Yeah. Everything's going great, right? It's going great. Well, for a little while. But by the end of the 19th century, the prosperity the residents of Dudley town were enjoying and just sliving on, began to decline before finally coming to a complete end in the second decade of the 20th century. Because toward the middle of the 19th century, the discovery of rich ore deposits in places like California and Nevada?

Nevada, I think. Yeah.

Those had driven the mining industry out west. Again, we all know it. And that took most of Cornwall's residents with it.

So.

They were fucked again. Soon after, life in the relatively isolated area of Dudleytown really became more of a hardship. If you stayed, you were ruffing it. If you didn't want to stay, you would relocate to be closer to the train system and the center of town. Those people just effectively abandoned their homes to eventually be reclaimed by the forest. Oh, damn. There's something about the forest just eating.

Up your house. Yeah, there's something about the forest reclaiming things that really just sets me alight.

It fucks me up because I just picture the forest like eating.

Your house. Yeah, the forest is just like, don't mind if I do. That's what I think. Just like that's mine.

My trees are going back there. It's like, damn. Yeah, the forest is... She's a sassy bitch.

Because she will. She'll just reclaim.

And good for her, she should. Now, by the early 20th century, there's like so many centuries. There were only a handful of people still trying to manage a living in Dudley town until the late 1920s when only one resident remained one in this once-thriving community. Unfortunately, the last holdout learned the same lesson of the early settlers and found the area impossible to farm. Eventually, he lost all of his income and had to abandon the farm and relocate closer to town.

-poor.

Person. -i know. They have a name for him. I'm not going to say it because it might be incorrect, but some books point to this one man, but then others are like, No, people just put him in there. I don't want to spread misinformation.

You don't want to do that.

Now, by the end of the 1920s, Dudleytown, like I said, had become completely abandoned. At that point, it was purchased by a land trust known as Dark Entry Forest Association. That's fucked up. Metal.

I love that.

That's a private organization started by New York philanthropists, and their mission was to preserve the region's forest ecosystem.

Dark.

Entry Forest. Oh, yeah. Their particular emphasis was on education. They were like, We're medalists. Fuck, but we just like to.

Teach you things. Well, that's a way to get people's attention.

That's the thing.

I'm listening.

Of course you are. Your middle name is Dark Entry Forest Association.

Hell, yeah. I'm like, Let's go.

Now, under the management of this land trust, the area once known as Dudleytown, became a popular destination for New Yorkers who needed an escape from city life. They found Cornwall a convenient place to vacation or a place where they could commute into the city for work. Since taking over the region in the late 1920s, the Dark Entry Forest Association, they have planted thousands of trees and restored most of the once deforested region basically to its pre-colonial ecosystem.

Hell, yeah, Dark Entry Forest Association.

Yeah, they created a sanctuary for- Probably too. -lots of bird species that had left previously in other wildlife.

Oh, I love that shit.

Or have they? Because people say that there's no wildlife and it's silent in those streets. They tried. Now, the decline and eventual abandonment of Dudley Town was a long process, resulting in a shift of economic opportunities and the increasingly infeasibility of the area, right? Exactly. Totally. In simple terms, people chalk it up to the decline in the demand for charcoal, the inability to farm the land, and all of that led to making relatively isolated Dudley town just an undesirable place to live.

But.

Ghost Towns do have a way of getting our imagination to go wild, and Dudley town is no different. And maybe it's not just our imagination.

I don't.

Think it is. It's not. Because rumors of supernatural forces and curses started even before this place was fully abandoned.

Hell, yeah.

Right? Definitely. She waited a minute.

In between that. She really waited a minute. I'm just texting John, too.

I'm just texting John. I'm just texting John. I'm just texting John. I'm just texting John. Okay. I found a couple of places where I didn't delete the doubt, so I'm just working with it.

Where.

Did you delete the doubt? I didn't delete the doubt. I didn't delete the doubt. I didn't delete all the doubt. According to the Cornwall Historical Society, the earliest mention of the curse of Dudleytown, excuse me, appeared in Edward C. Stars 1926 book, History of Cornwall. People say, quote, Stars account has formed the basis of every story published since then about Dudley town. But they are quick to point out that his account doesn't make any mention of the supernatural. It just weaves together a myriad of accounts about life in the 18th and 19th centuries, presenting what he refers to as the doom of Dudley town. Now, his version of events start off very factually with the establishment of Dudley town by the Dudleys, who actually were members of the British Royal family. Damn. Yeah. According to Star, the family actually fled England after the head of the family, Edmund Dudley, was hunted down and executed for his role in a plot to assassinate King George II.

Oh.

Shit. In some cases, people say that he was going to assassinate King George II. Other sources have it as King Henry VIII. I think the timeline's just got a.

Little obscured there. Yeah, and I think maybe some sources, King Henry VIII is such a polarizing and very like, whoa, figure that it's like, throw him in there and it's like.

Oh, shit. Exactly. Because he's also just even if you don't know anything about King Henry VIII, you know the name. But the family feared that they would soon meet the same fate of being executed because they were associated with him. Hell no. The remaining members of the deadly clan came to the colonies trading in, quote, title and fortune for a life of farming and brighter horizons in Connecticut.

They were literally like, We don't want to be associated with your plot to assassinate the king. We don't want to get killed. We're going to give everything up and just go live in Connecticut.

Just go live in Connecticut and hopefully farm. Then when we got there, they were.

Like, Fuck, camp farm. Camp farm.

We're royal, so what do we even do? Shit. Yeah, it's rough in it. They were like, Let's go camping, essentially.

Then they were like, Oh, no, we don't have skills.

It was like, Naked and afraid, except they had some clothes.

Clothes and afraid. Clothes and afraid. Clothes and afraid.

I would watch that. No, the legend was expanded a decade later in the 19th century.

Excuse me. Shut up.

Never. The legend was expanded a decade later in the 1938 publication, They Found a Way.

They Found a Way.

They Found a Way, written by Iva Hunt, Cherie and William Gehrigas, excuse me. According to Cherie and Gearigus, after Dudley's attempted assassination of the king, a coven of British Satanists placed a curse on Edmund Dudley's bloodline, dooming them to a tragic existence no matter where they fled.

I'm in. Here's my issue. I'm into.

This story. Here's my issue. We really think that the Satanists of the time, if there were any, were going to place a curse on the guy that tried to kill the king. You would feel like the Satanists would be against the king because he was all about the church.

At that point. Yeah. You'd think like some anarche stuff. Right? Yeah. I'm like, All right, let's go.

Someone placed a curse. I don't know if it was Satanist. I don't know if it was Satanist.

I know. I feel like they would have been like, Huh.

I feel like.

Real Satanists, they don't care enough to.

Do that shit. Yeah, I know.

They're not bothered enough.

I don't think they'd be rooting for the crown necessarily.

Yeah, that's the thing. I think that's the misconception about Satanists is that they are bothered.

Yeah.

They're not.

They're actually not even believe in Satan.

Very unbothered. Yeah, it's not even like a real deity or any entity. No.

There's no deities.

It's a symbol.

You're the deity, right?

Yeah, you worship yourself. That's hot. Right? I like it. Then Satan is the symbol of independence and.

Free thought. That's cool. And Baffy, right? Like Baffamad? Baffy, yeah.

He's a cool symbol.

He is a cool symbol. I like him a lot. We have a picture with him at the Satanic temple.

I love Baffy.

He's cool. According to American Hauntings Inc, one of Edmund's sons, the guy that got assassinated, he also tried to take control over the British throne because who wasn't trying to take control of the British throne.

I mean, me, I wasn't.

Well, you weren't alive. If you had been alive, Mee thinks you would have. Mee thinks you would have fucked over that crown hard. Instead of threatening to behead anybody, this guy just meddled, and that scared the absolute shit.

Out of me. Oh, my God. That brought us back to early days of recording when my charger would just be ripped out of the wall and fall down all the time. That was my charger, everybody. That was my charger falling out of the wall for no reason.

Does that plug even usually loose?

No, it's the curse. Yeah. It just flew out of the wall.

That's spooky. I don't like it. Well, instead of threatening to behead anybody, this guy, one of his sons, actually, just decided he would meddle into a marriage. He arranged the marriage of one of his sons to Lady Jane gray, who I feel like we've talked about before.

She's a very.

Historical figure. At this point in time, she was supposed to be next in line for the crown, so he was effectively setting his son up to become king.

Hell, yeah.

But unfortunately for them, after Edward, I believe it was the sixth, if it's V-I, if the I is after the V, you add, so yeah, the sixth. Unfortunately for them, after Edward the sixth passed away, Lady Jane did become queen, but her reign was short-lived, and she was actually beheaded along with John Dudley and his son, Gilford.

And Iup.

And Iup. Later, John Dudley's other son, Guilford's brother, was said to have brought home a plague from France. He had been fighting in France.

Oh, shit.

When he came back with that plague, he killed his officers, his troops, spreading the plague to them, and essentially went on to kill thousands throughout the country because of this illness. Holy shit. Big yikes.

Big.

Yikes. Big target on your.

Back right there.

Wow, Dudleys. Dudley is not killing it.

But also.

Killing it. Yeah. Other accounts that emerged in the years that followed actually suggested that the curse began centuries earlier when Edmund Dudley was beheaded for attempting to assassinate King Henry VIII, like I was saying. The family eventually was said to bring that curse with them to Cornwall when they fled England. In time, the curse of Dudley Town would supposedly earn the region the nickname Village of the Damned.

Oh, my goodness.

But other people think that nickname, Village of the Damned, started with a relatively simple murder.

Either way, or whatever. What a fucking nickname.

Village of the Damned. If that's not a band name already, what are the.

Musical people doing? Village of the Damned. Well, that's like a movie.

Yeah, is that a movie?

Yeah, actually. Yeah, Village of the Damned. Yeah, because it's like in Children of the Damned.

I don't think I've ever.

Seen those. Let me see. Hold on. Village of the-.

By the way, while I have you here and we're talking about movies, I want to watch that new Thanks Killing movie.

Me too.

I want to see that.

I really want to see that. That's been 16 years in the making. Are you serious? We're just going to talk about Eli Roth for a second. Eli Roth did a short of that movie in grindhouse. It was like 16 years ago, so people have been waiting for it forever.

It.

Looks-i'm trying to think of it. -the full length thing of it, and he finally was able to do it. It looks cool. I've heard amazing things about it. I've heard my girl, Sidney, on TikTok, horror chronicles.

By the way, quick little shout out to her. She has a podcast now. Oh, shit. It's called, I think it's called Hello, Sidney? The Hello, Sidney podcast. How could it not be? The Hello, Sidney podcast.

She.

Goes through horror movies. She's so knowledgeable. I've told you guys about her before. Oh, that's cool. Go listen to her podcast so it can blow up.

Because she's great.

But she said, and I trust her that it was a fucking phenomenal movie and that she thinks John Carver, the killer in that movie, is going to be one of those iconic killers. Then there will be more movies. I've been waiting for one of those.

We.

Haven't had one since- Give me another one.

I feel like the last iconic killer is probably.

Like Ghostface, right? Yeah, because you got to wait for the real good one to put him on the Mount Rush more of Killers.

That's true.

John and I had an argument about that the other day. Whether pinhead belongs on there.

I said John can't decide who goes on the Rushmore of iconic killers, but he can decide who goes on the Rushmore of 90s R&B. Exactly. You just have to stay in your own lane.

It's true. We stay in our own lanes here.

Exactly. But anyways, back to the Dudleys. It all started with a relatively simple murder. After decades of struggling and ultimately, again, failing to farm that land, considerable tensions had arisen between the families and Dudleytown because they're all trying to make something happen that's.

Not happening. Yeah, they're all aggravated.

They're all like Regina George and Gretchen Wieners over the fetch of.

It all. Yeah, it's not going to happen.

It's not. And neither is the farming. Now, those tensions were said to finally come to a head in 1792 when Gerchown Hollister was found murdered in a home owned by a man named William Tanner. Now, the weird thing is, Hollister's murderer is never named. No one knows who really murdered him. Oh, shit. It's unclear why he was even murdered in the first place, but it is said that immediately after the murder occurred, William Tanner started to lose his fucking marbles and would go around just speaking all kinds of wild things to his neighbors about wild animals and demons living in the woods and saying, Oh, shit. They were responsible. Until he finally went completely insane and straight up lost his mind. Wow. But before that, he claimed that some unrecognizable animal killed Hollister in the forest or attacked him. Then he brought him back into his home to try to help him, and that's where he died.

Oh.

Damn. Other people say that he died building a barn, but that's boring.

Yeah, that's boring.

I think animal, demon.

Animal.

Demon. Different animal. Yeah.

Oh, shit. This guy just went.

Mad after it.

Afterwards.

Damn. It's like, animal demon, William Tanner.

Yeah. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. But according to legend, Abel Dudley was the next to fall victim to the curse. Not long after Hollister's murder, Abel's neighbors noticed that he had become constantly distracted and also began decompensating until he, too, finally lost his mind altogether. Wow. He had to be taken away, actually, because he was talking about demon animals and just all kinds of nonsense. People took it as nonsense.

There's a consistent thread through this.

Madness as well. Of demon animals. Damn. Now, once he had been taken away by Abel, Nathaniel Carter and his family moved into Abel's house.

Oh, shit.

But they, too, became so disturbed by inexplicable tragedies that they just up and left and moved to Birmingham, New York, where they built a cabin. Holy shit.

Now, I have chills even just saying this. They got out of there because something just so disturbed them in that house that they moved out of the state and over to New York. Now, one day while Nathaniel was in the village, the home was raided and his wife and children were killed. When he returned later that day, he was also killed. According to the New England Historical Society, the unfortunate turn of events was likely linked to the Dudley town case and even followed them all the way to New York. Holy shit. Isn't that nuts? Like somehow the curse rubbed off on them from living in Abel's house.

Damn. Don't move into.

Abel's house. Don't do it. Don't do it. Now, the madness continued a short time later when General, Heman Swift, I believe his name is, a hero of the Revolutionary War, returned home after the war. He lived happily with his third wife, Sarah Fye, for a short time until she was struck and killed by a bolt of lightning. What the fuck? Struck and killed by a bolt of lightning, after which he, quote, went stark, raving mad.

Everyone's going mad.

Which I'm like, if my man's got killed by a lightning strike out of nowhere, I might too also go mad.

But it's like, Who gets struck by lightning?

That's the thing. This is strange. And of course, in Dudley Town. In Dudley town. She was just standing on her porch and got struck by lightning. Oh, my God. Now, then there was the newspaper editor and a one-time presidential candidate, Horace Greilly. I believe he was going up against Ulysses Grant. Oh, shit. Yeah. Now, in 1872, just one week before the presidential election, Greilly's wife, Mary Cheney, took a trip to her childhood at home in Dudley town. Oh, no. And hanged herself inexplicably. What the fuck? According to everybody, nothing had been going on. No lead up to this. There was the stress of the presidential election.

Coming up. But just went to Dudley town to hang herself.

Went to Dudley town to her childhood home. I have childs. It freaks me the fuck out. What the fuck?

That's.

Spooky. Yeah, it is.

That's really spooky. I also realized that when you said to Ulysses Esgrande that I was like, Oh, shit. He's like, my favorite President, or something like that. I don't know why I responded that way. I have no feelings about Ulysses Esgrande. I don't know a lot.

About him. I think he had a rock star mustache. All right, then.

I was shit. Did he?

Ulysses. I think he did.

I just realized my response seemed like I was a real fan girl for Ulysses.

It's a secret thing that we've never told you. The secret thing? Did he even know? The secret thing. Oh, no, his mustache wasn't even that great. No? No, he had a mustache, beard, combo.

Oh, okay. Oh, I think I can picture him in my head. Yeah. A Ulysssey sidequest.

Oh, I think he might have been good. I don't know. We don't have to get.

Into that. That's okay. I felt like I should clarify that. Yeah, you should. But I'm not here just.

Thirsting for Ulysssey. Not all of Ulysssey. I mean, he's a good looking man. If you were, I'd be like, okay. Listeners, we have a new show that we think you're going to freaking love. From Wondry and hosted by Laura Beale, the critically acclaimed Doctor Death is back with a new season. Doctor Death: Bad Magic. A story of miraculous cures, magic, and murder. When a charismatic hotshot doctor announced revolutionary treatments for cancer and HIV, it seemed like the world had been given a miracle cure. Medical experts rushed to praise Dr. Sirhat Gomruko, a genius who is the co-founder of a cutting edge biotech company. But when a team of private researchers dive into Sirhat's background, they begin to suspect the brilliant doctor is hiding a shocking secret. When a man is found dead in the snow with his wrist shackled and bullet casing spreading the snowbank, Sirhat would no longer be known for world-changing treatments. He'd be known as a fraud and a key suspect in a grizzly murder. Follow Dr. Death Bad Magic on the Wundry app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Dr. Death, Bad Magic early and ad-free right now by joining Wundry+.

But damn, this is all...

This is a lot. He loses his wife after she goes and hangs herself and her child at home in Dudleytown, and then he loses the presidential candidacy. It feels like a curse. Or he loses the election. Yeah, because of the curse. Fucking terrifying. Now, this person is said to be the final victim of the Dudley town madness, and she is the wife of Dr. William Clark, one of the original founding members of the Dark Entry Forest Association.

Oh, shit.

According to legend, Dr. Clark took a short business trip to New York in 1924. When he returned home to Dudley town, his wife had completely lost it, and he literally had to institutionalize her at this point.

Everyone's.

Going mad. She spent the rest of her life in a psychiatric institution. But she, too, referenced strange animals in the woods. Shut up. Before dissenting into complete.

Quote-unquote, madness. Guys, what the fuck is going on with that?

There's.

Animals in those words.

Demon fucking animals. Demon fucking animals.

Something's going on. Now, the madness that seemed to consume so many residents of Dudley town was just one of the many inexplicable tragedies to befall the community. Deaths seemed to have taken a liking to Dudley town from the very beginning. In 1774, not long after a Donna Ram Carter settled in the area with his family, every single one of them was killed by a mysterious illness. The entire family.

Wiped out. The entire family?

Now, according to Cherie Rivet, I believe, it was the mysterious deaths of the Carter family that so disturbed Nathaniel Carter to the point that he also relocated his entire family to excuse me, Binghamton. That was the guy that up and left to New York, but then was killed in New York.

Holy shit.

Now, in the late 19th century, the curse also found its way to the family of John Patrick Brophy, when his wife died of consumption. A short time later, the two Brophy children disappeared into the woods and were never seen again.

What?

Their mother died of consumption, which you can chalk up to.

A car. I was going to say everybody was dying of consumption.

But then the children disappeared into the woods and no one ever saw them again.

You said two children?

Two.

Children. Just disappeared into the fucking.

Dark forest. And no one.

Where the demon.

Animals are. We're not done with this poor family. Because if those tragic losses weren't enough, the home in which the Brofys lived then burned to the ground under mysterious circumstances.

I mean.

Come on. Some people think that John Brofys set the fire himself, which at that point I would probably light my home on fire too. Yeah, I wouldn't blame him. But whatever the case, after the death of his wife and the disappearances of his two children, he left Dudley town and was never heard from again.

I cannot get over the fact that these two children just.

Disappeared in the forest. My chills also will not go away telling the story.

They just walked into... The thought of people just walking into the forest and disappearing.

Forever is just- Never to be seen again. -holy shit. Were the demon animals beckoning them?

That's the thing. What was going on? Why did they just walk into the forest?

I don't.

Know, but I hate it. I know it's probably not on record, but I wonder how old they were and shit.

I didn't see anything about their ages, but they're probably children.

They were probably children. It's like they were younger, and it's.

Like they walked into the forest. If they're going to wander into the woods, you would think around 10 or younger.

I would think-Even that, it's like, Damn, you just walked into the damn forest and never to be seen again.

Never. Then he was never heard from again after he just dipped after lighting potentially, allegedly lighting his home a blaze.

By.

The mid 1970s, after all the people had flood and nature began to reclaim the land, all that remained of deadly town, and I believe still today all that remains is a few cellar holes, which is so fucking creepy. Then one or two of the original dirt roads, which are also probably dark, and the remnants of centuries-old farms just scattered throughout the forest. That was by the '70s. Right now, you probably can't even find the farms. Now, after 50 years of ownership, the Dark Entry Forest Association had finally started to see the fruits of their labor. The forest that was once Dudleytown, gained a reputation as a popular destination for hikers and campers from around New England and beyond. But they weren't alone. By the mid-1970s, a growing national enthusiasm for folklore and the abnormal, and led literally anyone with an interest in the supernatural out into their communities to find evidence in their own backyards of Dudleytown. In late May 1976, a reporter from the Meridian Journal, excuse me, joined a paracycology group from the University of Connecticut into the Dark Country Forest, where they spent a night in the remains of Dudley town. This just creeps me the fuck out.

It's like barely anything, but it just creeps me out. Reporter Chris Campos wrote, It is the most unusual, but virtually quiet forest. Not actually quiet, but practically silent. Except for the occasional gust of wind through the treetops, there are no sounds of life in the woods after dark. Not even one solitary cricket cracks on earthly silence after dark.

Something about that fucking terrifying.

That fucks me up.

Yeah, that fucks me because it reminds me of the Okigahara?

Yeah.

The forest in Japan at the base of Mount Fiji.

It's so dense that it's so silent.

Yeah, it's got that like just... That's why it's called like that like, Ocean of trees thing, because it's just like dead silence.

There's something... I can't even sleep in silence.

I can't. And especially like a forest. A forest should be when you walk in because you think of a forest around here that you walk in, and it's just bustling with birds chipping.

And the.

Buzz of insects and leaves rattling, rustling, and wind rustling through. There's always sounds and their comforting sounds of a forest. To go into a forest and.

Have it be- It must just be dead silent. -dead silent. As he said specifically, after dark, you don't even hear a fucking cricket.

See, and that night you hear nothing but sounds from the forest. Exactly. We bring the dogs out at the end of the night? Oh, yeah. The forest is fucking... They're partying.

Out there. It's a rager.

In the forest. I hear fucking owls hooting at each other. There's all crickets. There's- Coyotes. -coyotes. There's all kinds of shit.

You want to hear something.

You want to hear that shit. When you don't hear anything, I can't eat. That throws me.

For a loop. Yeah, and he said he was like, We didn't really experience anything supernatural or that people, I think, would take as supernatural. But he said, quote, We all sensed a very uncomfortable, very uneasy, and very frightening presence around us. I couldn't put their finger on it, but something was there and it was off.

See, and I feel like you know. Your body knows when something's off. It's like when you feel a heaviness and an unsettled thing.

I'm not kidding. My chills won't.

Go away. That's the thing. I feel like you know when something is a mess. You totally do. And something's a mess there.

It.

Is.

Now, Cambo's story actually got picked up by the Wire Service, and over the course of the week that followed, it appeared in newspapers across New England. Within a few years, the area, once known as Dudley became known as one of the nation's premier haunted locations. Damn. As one reporter put it, one of the state's most melancholy map points.

Everybody's got a way of just making this the creepiest thing ever.

The Village of the Damned. The Village of the Damned, melancholy map point. Now, within just a few years, the Legends had completely taken off. According to some, the curse, like we said, began after the residents had moved to the village and had been placed by, quote, a dabbler in black magic, causing those residents of Cornwall proper to fear the village and all those who lived in it. Similarly, the story about William Clark was moved forward by more than a decade to 1937. Upon his return from his New York business trip, his wife hadn't just lost her mind, but had, quote, seen something so terrible that her mind snapped. Which like, that's what.

I think. Hey. I mean, I wouldn't put it... It's not shocking when you look at everything else.

Exactly. By the the early 1980s, ghost hunters and legend chipper and scavengers, they had all set upon Cornwall, all looking to have first-hand experience with this haunted forest or to find some relic that they could take away and possibly sell because this place was getting all kinds of street cred. Yet for all the interest in the legend of Dudley town, few people outside of Connecticut seemed to grasp what it was that they were looking for. Dodie Wolf told a reporter from the New York Times, most people ask where Dudley town is after having walked right through it. Oh, damn. He was like, I don't know. Is it that crazy if you're walking right through it and you don't know? Yeah. But I think that's boring.

I think it's just, yeah, it's whatever. That's even weirder.

When it's in your backyard, of course, you're going to be like, Yeah, there's.

Nothing wrong with it. That's even weirder that you can walk through a whole last town and.

Not know it.

That's even spookier.

Yeah. Now, the granddaughter of William Clark, Wolf, so she's a descendant of this Dudley town area. Wolf and her husband had received special permission from the Dark Entry Forest Association to do selective logging in order to help spur new growth. She and her husband had a front row seat to watch this curious, out-of-staters influx wander around in search of the curse town.

Oh, shit.

Now, some Cornwall residents were happy to embrace the legends of the Cursed Forest, and they welcomed visitors and, of course, their tourist dollars. At the Cornwall Library, books like Ghost Towns of New England were prominently displayed in order to aid the curious. Librarian Hildrith Daniel. Of course, you're a librarian. Fuck. Hildrith Daniel. Hildrith, yes. I'm obsessed.

With you. Be a librarian forever. Not the rest of your life, for the rest of eternity. I want you to just always be- Hildrith.

Always be Hildrith. What a cool name. Like, wow. But Hildrith said they're all wide-eyed wanting to believe in ghosts.

Which like-.

Me too. Yeah, Hildrith, me as well.

I want to believe in ghosts very much.

I love it so much. But the stories of the curse, according to one elder resident, were made out of a whole cloth, mostly by those who'd recently moved to the area. According to this resident, they sit around and dream things up. This is just so that they can entertain their summer guests.

But I'm.

Like, I don't know about that because I think everybody's starting to get a little bit irritated that too many people are coming. Yeah, that's what it sounds like. Now you're like, no, it's not haunted.

Because it's like there's history to back it up that a lot of shit went down there at the very least. And it's like- Something happened.

-i.

Mean, there's some bad.

Energy there. There is. And by the mid 1980s, stories of the supernatural experiences that people had in Dudleytown at this point, began circulating widely. There were unexplained anomalies that showed up in photos taken in the forest, incoherent voices that seemed to start from afar and work their way closer, and strange shapes and subtle movements that people would catch out of the corner of their eye. And, of course, there was that eerie, unnatural silence that was emphasized by the lack of bugs and wildlife. Why wasn't there any wildlife.

Or bugs?

Now, as time went on, the reports of supernatural occurrences grew to include a wolf-like shadow, quote-unquote, that followed hikers but would always disappear if somebody tried to get a good look at it. It was like it was following you, and then the second you sensed it was and turned your head, it would be gone. It would be gone. You knew something was following you. Spuki. Yeah, very, very creepy. Now, after more than a decade of entertaining the ghost hunters and visiting, excuse me, and visitors seeking a brush with the supernatural, by the mid to late 1980s, the tone of Cornwall locals did become noticeably different. They were getting a little bit irritated with the influx of people.

Trying to shut it down.

I don't necessarily blame them. If you live in a quiet town and that's your desire? Of course. To have an influx of people, you're like.

Fuck my life. Totally get it. I think that's also why they're trying to shut down any thought that it.

Could be. That's what I think. And I get it. I get it too. I might do the same thing. I totally get it. But Cornwall historical society president, Michael Gannett, told reporters, There are some nuts who believe that stuff.

It's us. We're the nuts. Also rude. Very rude way of saying that. So rude. I'm mad at you, actually.

He said, When the warm weather starts, they'll all be around looking for ghosts. Sometimes there's so many of them that I can't even get out of my driveway. Maybe they think there's an old saloon with a swinging door instead of a bunch of holes in the ground. Or maybe there's a fucking demon in the woods in your area and you're trying to hide it, Mayer.

Yeah. It's like, You know what? Here's the thing. I get it. You just said sometimes you can't get out of your driveway. That's fucked up. I get that. I'd be pissed. But like, chill.

Then he went even further. Years later, he said in an interview with The New York Times, Go to Dudleytown, they tell you. It's this real ghostly place. But the truth is, Dudley town is a big fraud. Like, what did Dudley town.

Do to you? What did Dudley town do to... That sounded like it was personal.

Sounds like you had an experience that you want to chalk up to fake theory. That's right.

You don't want people blocking you into your driveway. You're like, Fuck this.

It's a fraud. Exactly. The increasingly frustrated and annoyed perspective of the Cornwall's locals aren't all that difficult to understand like we said. What began decades earlier as a campfire story told by hikers and campers had in the years that followed ballooned into this crazy Macabre legend that was starting to attract all these visitors that locals were like, Can you not? By the late 1980s, locals constantly complained about the yearly influx of visitors who they said have damaged reputations and often lure pollutors, litterers, and other undesirables. And that sucks. And that sucks.

Because that can happen. We've seen that happen in other places. Like in Salem, every Halloween. Oh, yeah. The residents of Salem have to deal with a lot of shit. Of course. And a lot of disrespect, which is really fucked up. If you.

Want to go somewhere and experience it by all means- Respect it. -but respect to the place that you are so desiring to go to. Yeah.

What are you doing? There's always a few bad apples that fuck it up for everybody else. Yeah.

According to Joan and John Leach, lifelong residents of Cornwall, they said the real curse of Dudley town are the Legends themselves, which have attracted everyone from witchcraft societies to motorcyclists who disrupt the flow of life in Cornwall and rarely pick up after themselves.

Yeah, that's the thing. I don't care who you are. Witchcraft, motorcyclists, whatever. Everything in between, pick up after yourself.

Just pick up after yourself and keep it quiet after a certain moment. But despite the complaints and frustration of locals, interest in Dudleytown and The Curse only intensified in the 90s. The Legends got a big boost in 96 when a guy named Greg Soltez, I believe is how you say the last name, a college student from Wallingford, Connecticut, took some pictures in Dudley town that he believed contained evidence of supernatural activity.

Oh, shite.

He ended up taking those photos to this local and husband-wife duo from Connecticut.

I don't know any husband and wife duos that are into the abnormal. You don't?

No. And the Lorraine Warren ring a bell?

Never heard.

Of them. No. Well, they immediately- These two, they're everywhere. They're everywhere. I love it.

Good for them. I do, too. I get.

It, guys. I go off if you guys are a hot couple. But they immediately recognized the potential of the photos and just the fucking wildness of them. Lorraine Warren told a reporter, Those pictures were the best I've seen of Dudley Town. For some reason, the spirits seemed to be attracted to that guy. According to the Warrens, Greg's photos captured electromagnetic energy that they referred to as ghost globules.

Ghost.

Globules?

Ghost globules.

That's awesome. I fucking love it. They said this was proof that the area once known as Dudley townwas indeed a hotbed of supernatural activity. Fuck you all who say it's not. Now, with Greg's permission, the Warrens started using his photos in their presentations about the haunted forest. According to him, his objective was to gather an abundance of evidence of the abnormal in hope that he might be able to convert all the skeptics. Because he's like, I know what I saw, dude, and I know what got printed out on my picture. He told the reporter, There's going to be people who don't believe it, but I don't really care. I was there. I won't even say it's a ghost. There are other things that co-exist that you can't see with your eye. It's understandable for people to be skeptical. I was. Hell, yeah. This is literally somebody who went into that forest, skeptical that they were going to experience anything, and came out completely confirmed. Yeah.

And the fact that he's just like, I don't give a shit if you believe me, I was there.

I was there. I know. I know. Now, for their part, Ed and Lorraine Warren agreed, but they encouraged him to proceed with an abundance of caution. He said, I go there, I observe, I take some pictures, and leave. I think there are really bad places to go. If I felt something like that, I would leave and never come back. The Warrens say, Don't conjure up things in cemetery. They say you have to have faith in God or in yourself, which I like that they give you the option there. There you go. You can have your faith in God or have it in yourself.

Have just whatever faith you feel is right.

Yeah. So whatever his intentions or the intentions were of anybody around him, by the 1990s, the residents of Cornwall had reached their limit when it came to the ghost hunters and the thrill-seekers and just the-The disrespect. -the curiosity of it all. In the disrespect, it sounds like-In the disrespect, that's what they had.

Enough with. I feel like if it was respectful and people were doing it in the right way, they wouldn't have been as big of an issue. They wouldn't have been upset.

But by then, the wooded area around Dudley town had not only attracted countless, abnormal enthusiasts, but also a large number of teens and those claiming to be occultists who held seances and gatherings in the area and were just causing... They were running amok, basically.

Yeah.

Ruckus. In addition to being a general nuisance, the attraction was also posing fire hazard, excuse me, and other dangers on this private property, which the Dark Entry Forest Association was like, we're trying to reclaim-save the forest. -and save the forest, can not burn it down? That led them to close the area to public access in 1999.

That I get. I get it completely. I get it, especially the fire thing. Your whole point is you're trying to save these ecosystems and this forest, and people are getting loosey-goosey.

With it. Only you can prevent.

Forest fires. Exactly. Dark entry forest association was like, we can.

Exactly, they were like, smokey gave us responsibility. Only us. The closure of the area prevented some seeking out the old ghost town, but not everybody was dissquited by the signs, noting that the area was private property.

It's like the caves that get sealed off and people break through them and go in anyway.

That's exactly what I thought of. That's the thing. There are literally signs all over this area that say you will be prosecuted, but people are like, I don't give a fuck. I don't give a fuck. And the success of films like The Blaire Witch Project only encouraged a new generation of abnormal enthusiasts and would-be horror filmmakers to go out into their own communities like Dudleytown and try to make found footage.

Horror movies. It sounds like it would be a cool place to make a.

Found footage horror movie. Why would you not go into the most fucking haunted forest in America to make a found-footage movie? Yeah, come on. Come on. The reason why you wouldn't now is because I'm not encouraging you to because.

It's bad. It's bad. It's private property. Private property. Don't do it.

Don't. So despite their best efforts to keep people out of deadly town, the local authorities, they had a new generation of ghost hunters who, thanks to the legend circulating widely now on the internet, were determined to get into that forest.

Fucking internet. I know. Connecticut state trooper, Scott Aitken told reporters in 2008. I would say we cite trespassers several times a month. Most of the trespassers we cite believe deadly town is haunted. A lot of them are looking for ghosts and stuff like that. Now, if caught, first-time offenders typically receive a ticket for about $100, which that's a lot. But then repeat offenders can receive even stronger penalties. In 2008, an 18-year-old was caught trespassing in Dudley town late one evening and due in part to having drug paraphernalia on him at the time, he was arrested and eventually charged $1,000. Oh, damn. That's why I'm saying don't do this. It's not worth it. Don't do it.

Yeah.

Because then, a few years later, in December 2011, police arrested eight people from Maine and Massachusetts who trespassed into Dudley town in order to film their own found footage horror movie titled Dudley town Curse, the 49th key. -obsessed. -when asked why they were even interested in making a movie about Dudley town, they were like, Because it's fucking cursed. Clearly? They were like, Dudley town. This is a quote, they said, Dudley town is a fascinating area. It's got this history that dates back to 16th century England. One member went on to say, There's a lot of traction on the internet already. The local lore about it. We're interested in creating a cool story around the Urban Legend. I get that. That's why people are interested. But again.

But don't do it.

Don't do it. Don't do it. But I did find a listener tale from one of our very own who did it, who happened to do it. I think it.

Was way before it was illegal. You know what? Even if it wasn't, it was. It was. Okay. That's what I'mI'm not trying. That's the story we are sticking to.

You're fine. You're fine. We've got listener tales, ghosts, ghost, crypted, what the fuck happened in Connecticut.

What the.

Fuck happened? Excuse me. What the fuk happened in Connecticut. What the fuk happened? Presented in huge ass, font, and double-spaced putifah. It says, Hey, ladies, I'm Mandy. Use my name. -use my name? -use my name. I'm so excited that you're reading this. I've been wanting to write in for a while now, but I had a case of the Lazies. Anyway, I love you both. I've listened to you for years, and I appreciate everything you do. Elena, really quick, just wanted to share that one time. This is so fucking funny. My boyfriend asked me for a spicy dance, so naturally, I shook my ass too, from the pinnacle to the pit.

I'm literally-I'm really obsessed with you.

I love you. And Mandy said that's why she pretty much booed her britches when you said that that was your baseball entrance song.

Oh, my.

God, I love you. She said, You rock. Oh, yeah. She goes, Anyhoo.

Mandy.

I love Mandy. Today, I'm going to tell you all about a creepy little spot in Connecticut, and it's scary as heck.

I live in Central Connecticut. What up, Northeast pals? Hell, yeah. I visited this spot in the Western part of the state on a number of occasions, and every time I go, I find something real weird happens. Side note, this area is restricted, so death don't visit there after you hear about it. Wink, winkk. But really cool. But really, the cops are there a lot, so be warned.

Really?

Don't. That's why I'm telling you, cops are.

Waiting for you there. Mandy is telling us there's cops there waiting for you. We know. It's like, don't do it.

Mandy says, It's summertime 2001. I'm driving my Camry and jamming out to Godsmack on the radio with my high school friends in the middle of the night. We decide to visit Dudleytown. Dudley town is this oldest fuck village from Pilgrim times or whatever. Now we know.

There's your summary of the episode.

Yeah, exactly. Legend has it that this is literally your summary for the thing. It's an oldest fuck village from Pilgrim times or whatever. Legend has it that all these peeps got possessed by demons or something weird and then all exorcists and killed each other until the village got abandoned. Like, what? It's super haunted.

Summary of those are the show notes.

From the episode. Mandy goes, link attached. Talk about it on an episode. It'll be fun.

I will.

Here we are. Now, she says, So we drove up to this village because it's out in the middle of the woods. Side note, the road is called Dark Entry Forest Road. Isn't that the most metal street name ever? Yes. Yes, it, Mandy. As we're driving, it gets really cool outside. Not exactly freezing, but enough to make you wish you had a light hoodie in the summer. Next, the radio crackles and goes in and out, which I, a skeptic, explain as, Oh, we're in the middle of buttfuck nowhere. So that explains it. Next comes the fog, like big fog, slowly rolling over and over the road in puffy clouds that obscure anything more than 5 feet in front of us. We all have the chills and start to nervously laugh to mask the feeling of impending dread. But here comes the really hideous part. We see something, an animal walking on the side of the road. As we get closer, we realized that we have no idea what animal this is. My friends and I are squinting through the fog to try to see what this is as we slow down alongside it. The creature was as tall as a deer and very, very thin like a grayhound.

It was sauntering like it was on a catwalk at fashion week. Oh, hell yeah. And its hip bones jetted out with every step, just swaying as it made its way along real slow. It had no ears. It had large feet, no fur or hair, just grayish white skin. The skin was so thin that it was almost clear. In some spots, it was scarred and scabby. As we got closer, we cannot for the life of us, figure out what this is, but we are uneasy at best. By now, the vibes had changed and we had all shut up because we were terrified of this freakish being. We were pretty much holding our breath as we approached and rolled up right next to it. We all had our eyes glued to this mystery creature. Just then, the creature turns its head very.

Very slowly. Oh, no.

Until it is looking right into the passenger, open passenger window of my car. We all pause and then it lunges at the window with a snarl, just narrowly missing the open window and hitting the frame of the car as we all shriek, even the dudes. I floor it and race out of there, almost in tears from what just happened as the thing runs behind the car in the middle of the road. I know I hate it. Oh, my God. I'm so stressed. Mandy says, What was that thing? Why did it attack us? Was it encrypted? I do not know my dudes. It was encrypted. My friends and I tell this story to anyone with ears, and no one can tell us what we saw. But we seen it. We seen it. And it scared me to death. Naturally, I went back a few more times. Naturally. And weird shit happened every time. So I can share some more stories at a later time. And later is right now. I was going.

To say.

When's later. Later is right now. And later is right now. -that made me laugh so hard because you know how some people will be like, And I'll send those later. We're like, Now. No. Mandy is like, Right now. Right now. The next time I went, a few years later, I was with a different group of friends. We were giggling in the car on the drive up there when the weird fog and the chill crept up again and the radio died just like the first time. It's dead quiet in the woods, like people say, and nothing is around. We pull over to the side of the road and we were trying to get up the nerve to get out of the car and walk around the village. Or is it ruins? I feel like ruins are ancient, not pilgrimony. Anyway. We're psyching ourselves up. We count on three, two, one, and run. We scream and run around and feel real proud of ourselves for being masters of fear. Good job. We make our way back to the car after a while and head for home. My friend picks up her phone that she'd left in the back seat of the car while we pranced in the forest.

A camera phone. So cool. But we pranced in the forest. And somehow she's got a new photo on her phone. It's a face. None of ours, not one of ours. What the fuck? This face has glasses and none of us were wearing glasses. She asked who fucked with her phone, but we were all in the woods dancing in the moonlight when the pic was taken. How does this pic exist? Who was in the photo?

Who is it?

The picture had this bluish tint and the face was very pale, almost ghostly. We freaked out and drove back to civilization, loaded up on 60 bucks worth of taco bell and pulled an all-nighter much too scared to sleep. We showed the picture to my sister, who's a big-time computer nerd for her to analyze. She offloaded it to her computer using surgery because who the fuck knew how to do that in the early 2000s? And when she did, the picture somehow deleted itself from both the phone and the computer. Poof, gone like it never existed. What? Sounds like lies, but the people I was with on these Dudley town adventures will all swear to the accuracy. This shit happened. I don't know how to explain it, but nothing this weird has ever happened to me, except for when I go to Dudley town. What the fuck? Wild times, kids. I've got no answers for you. Anyway, hope you liked my tales. Love you. Keep it weird.

Mandy. Mandy, I love you. I love everything about you and.

Holy shit. I love everything about Mandy, too. The fact that Mandy experienced this wild-ass creature that people seem to have gone mad after seeing. Yes. People were talking about demon animals in the woods.

That looks like that's a demon animal.

Mandy literally said, A cryptid? A diamond? What is this?

Yeah, like she described a demon animal. 100%. That's not. You can't figure out what it is. And that it lunged at them. It attacked them. It attacked them. All these people are going mad after this, probably because they were almost attacked by this demon animal.

Think of the one guy that died inexplicably. Yes. Definitely didn't die setting up a barn.

The kids disappeared in the forest? Yeah. What the fuck?

Fucking scary shit. Holy shit. I, for one, believe that Dudley town is haunted. I know there are skeptics out there, but I believe it. Especially for those people to have those things happen to them and be talking about this crazy ass animal in the woods in the 17th and then to have our girl, Mandy, go out there in the 20s, or in the 2010s, and see the same thing, there's a reason that people don't want people going out into those woods. Exactly. It's because they don't want people to get eaten by cryptists. Yeah, and I don't want you to get eaten by cryptids or get a.

$1,000 fine. It's true. You know what? I trust my girl, Mandy. I do, too. I always have, always will. Me as well. I trust her, and it's haunted.

It's haunted.

That was a demon animal. Holy shit. That's so unsettling.

The whole time I was telling that story, I just couldn't get rid of my chills.

Yeah, it's a very unsettling story.

Absolutely. Wow.

Terrible. Well done.

Thank you.

Well.

Done. Thank you. Well, we hope you keep it weird. No, we hope you keep listening. We hope you keep it weird. But I'm not sure whether you go to Dudley town because you really either get eaten by a crotchon or find a thousand dollars.

We're going to arrest it. The police are waiting for you.

There's too many bad things to happen. Love you. Bye.

Hey,

Prime members, you can listen to more of it early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen ad-free with Wondry Plus and Apple podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wundery. Com/survey.