The ODDentity Podcast

This week, with Halloween fast approaching, I dug through the archive of listener submitted stories and came up with some real doozies. Some contributors have asked I not use their real names and some names have been omitted from the stories you’re about to hear to conceal the identity of those involved as there was no way to get permission from them. I hope you enjoy the compiled spooky stories a...

Hello dear listeners, and welcome back to another episode of The ODDentity Podcast on the PodMoth Media Network, your weekly foray into the weird, wonky, and sometimes downright spooky. I know I usually only do one interview per season, but I took in the Milwaukee Paranormal Conference last weekend and was wowed by a member on their panel. Melinda Mitchell is an oddball like me who enjoys the weir...

Hello dear listeners, and welcome back to another episode of The ODDentity Podcast on the PodMoth Media Network, your weekly foray into the weird, wonky, and sometimes downright spooky. This week, I’ll introduce you to Daniel Dunglas Home, a Scottish physical medium with the ability to levitate, speak with the dead, and produce rapping and knocks in houses at will. His biographer Peter Lamont stat...

Hello dear listeners, and welcome back to another episode of The ODDentity Podcast on the PodMoth Media Network, your weekly foray into the weird, wonky, and sometimes downright spooky. After completing the research on Jack the Ripper last week, I came to the realization that this topic is so large that it actually needs a part 3. So, this week I’ll tackle the last 2 canonical Ripper victims and a...

Hello dear listeners and welcome back to another episode The ODDentity Podcast on the PodMoth Media Network. This week we tackle the second installment of the Jack the Ripper series, delving into the list of victims and the communications the Ripper sent to police. Upon finishing this week’s script, I realized that the two-part series will actually be a 3-part series. There’s just no way to fit ev...

Hello dear listeners, and welcome back to another episode of The ODDentity Podcast on the PodMoth Media Network, your weekly foray into the weird, wonky, and sometimes downright spooky. This week I’ve decided to tackle the tale of Jack the Ripper, the vicious killer who stalked the darkened alleyways of London in 1888. Jack began his killing spree in August of that year and spared no violence agai...

This week, we’ll take a look at the mysterious talking board that has horrified and titillated users since 1891. You’d be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t had an experience with this particular novelty and surprised to find that there are individuals who have large collections of the boards sitting in their basements. They come in every shape and size, some made from old tabletop and others...

This week, I’ll introduce you to Mary Toft, an English woman from Godalming, Surrey, who in 1726 became the subject of considerable controversy when she seemingly gave birth to rabbits.   Shout out to Ed from Ontario for suggesting this one. Apologies that it’s taken so long.   Next episode will drop on August 24.   The ODDentity Podcast is brought to you on a weekly basis by host Janine Mercer. T...

This week, I’ll introduce you to Elizabeth Cochrane, a young woman who went undercover and posed as someone with mental illness in order to expose abuses within the local asylum. She was an interesting and ambitious young woman who helped a lot of people who had otherwise been forgotten and the time she spent within the asylum changed the way in which it operated in a big way.   Shout out to Dave...

This week, I’ll be taking you to St. Nazianz, a haunted Wisconsin town founded by a heretic priest and a ragtag group of cult followers. It’s been a while since I covered a topic close to home and I figured it was about time to bring it back. This one is going to be fun. Shout out to Jeanette from North Carolina, Nickolas from Australia, Phil from Dublin, and Isiah from Wisconsin for suggesting th...

This week, I’ll be talking about the practice of palmistry, its origins, and one of the more famous palmists, Chiro. Palmistry has a long and interesting history and is still practiced today. I think you’d be hard-pressed to find an outdoor carnival or Halloween party that didn’t feature some type of fortune-telling or palmistry. The ODDentity Podcast is brought to you on a weekly basis by host Ja...

This week, I bring you an interview with Cindie Harper, an author and the Director of Historical Research and Paranormal Documentation of Sweet Springs Resort Park Foundation and Sweet Springs Sanitarium in Sweet Springs, West Virginia. Cindie is also the official paranormal documentarian for Sweet Springs Sanitarium. Cindie’s connection to the paranormal runs deep. In childhood, she experienced s...

This week, we tag along to the local cemetery with the resurrection men, men who dug up fresh corpses for the purposes of medical study. We’ll examine the history of body snatching, the purpose, and practice, and learn about Burke and Hare, two notorious murderers who were also body snatchers and grave robbers. This episode contains a body under a bed, some wooden shovels, a waving corpse, and som...

Hello ODD Pod Listeners, and welcome back to another episode. This week, I tell the tale of the Vanishing Hitchhiker and unravel the urban folklore that surrounds this fascinating legend. It’s an old story, some written accounts dating back to 1948, and it seems as if there are many incarnations of this particular urban legend. I’ll get into the history of this legend, dissect the historical telli...

Hello ODD Pod listeners and welcome back! This week, I bring you an in-depth look at Bodie California and the ghostly history that still lingers within some of the dilapidated buildings. I realized recently that I hadn’t taken you to a haunted location for a little while and I thought Bodie would be perfect. This episode contains a possible curse, a wild west ghost town, a lasagna sadly lacking in...

This week, I bring you the tale of a favorite cryptid of mine, The Jersey Devil, and the folklore that surrounds this fascinating creature. This show suggestion has been hanging around for a little while and I thought with all the unknowns we’re dealing with in our crazy world, a cryptid wouldn’t go astray. I’d also like to fill you all in as far as what’s happening in my world right now. Currentl...

Spiritualism and mediumship, two topics I keep coming back to as this podcast progresses. This week, I bring you the tale of the charlatan who swindled Mary Todd Lincoln and his connections to a presidential assassin and tales of other first ladies who entertained mediums at the White House. I’ll also discuss a medium that Jane Pierce swore was the real deal and even told the woman that, when she...

S5 Ep 6: Q & A This week I answer listener questions about me, the podcast, and my creepy collection. I welcome my dear friend Patti Wolf to ask away and peel back my crusty layers. :D This episode contains MANY excellent questions, a chat about anxiety and treatment, and various dead things from furry to wet. PLEASE NOTE: Patti had to call in for this episode and the audio is a little odd in some...

S5 Ep. 5: Through A Glass, Darkly Hello ODDPod listeners and welcome back to another episode. This week, I’d like to introduce you to Mary Worth, otherwise known as Bloody Mary (depending on who you ask) and the urban legends surrounding this common childhood experience. The ODDentity Podcast is brought to you on a weekly basis by host Janine Mercer. The podcast is written, produced, and edited by...

S5 Ep. 4: World’s Fair This week, I’ll be taking you to the Windy City of 1893, the World’s Fair, and introducing you to a, particularly diabolical fellow. A man who saw the fair as an opportunity to swindle and to murder. A man by the name of Herman Webster Mudgett, otherwise known by his alias Dr. Henry Howard Holmes. This episode contains a safe used for a nefarious purpose, the world’s first F...

S5 Ep. 3: Not in Vein Oddentitypod.podbean.com Boar bile enemas, urine as an antiseptic, and thick needles used to remove cataracts… Medical history is weird and some aspects of it are absolutely horrifying. I mean, I understand that we had to start somewhere. How were we to know that creating a poultice for an open wound using human excrement was a bad idea? We had to try it and see what would ha...

This week, I wanted to explore the nightmarish vision that is The Man in the Hat, a common figure seen during what many of us know as sleep paralysis. I’ve tackled my rendition of the creature that causes sleep paralysis in my part of the world on a past episode, The Hag and the folklore surrounding it, but I find it very interesting that The Man in the Hat is a commonality in many American cases...

S5 Ep. 1: Evaporated People Every year, over 100,000 people go missing in Japan and there’s a whole business surrounding orchestrated disappearances. Join me as I take you inside the Night Moving business in Japan and the folklore and spooky tales that permeate this part of the world. Is there a connection? This episode contains a magical body part, a dude who wants to be a rock, some Japanese fol...

This week, I wanted to draw attention to the reason for the season: ghost stories. An old tradition from the Victorian era was to tell ghost stories over the holidays in front of a roaring fire and I think it’s a tradition that should be rekindled. This episode contains a little communication history, cave drawings, a little Dickens (among others), and a special holiday treat. Get Social! Twitter...

This week, I present to you one of the most notorious mediums of all time. Even more cringe-worthy (by today’s standards) than The Long Island Medium. I’m speaking of course of Eva Carriere, a woman with the unique ability to produce “ectoplasm” (cheesecloth) from every orifice of her body. She was also super keen on cutting photos out of magazines. This episode contains SO much chewed paper, a 30...