Speaker 1: You're listening to the Puck What You Whisper on the
Paranormal UK Radio Network.
Speaker 2: Everyone, thanks for joining.
Speaker 3: I'm super excited about tonight's guest. He is a history
professor that is super knowledgeable about all kinds of visitors
to New England. So hang tight and I'll be right
back with Eddie Gumont. Hi, Eddie, thanks for joining me.
Speaker 4: Oh my pleasure. Happy to be here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a quick shout out to our mutual friend Horace
Smith for introducing us. You touched a few things in
our email exchanges that really piqued my interest, so I'm
very excited to pick your brain about some things today.
Speaker 4: Oh it's here to be picked, so happy to provide it.
Speaker 3: And you're joining us from Puckwagy Territory.
Speaker 4: I am. I'm in Fall River, Massachusetts, which I guess
is it's technically I think, directly below the lower tip
of the so called Bridgewater Triangle. Freetown, the town that's
right north of us, is that southern tip. It up
got the state forest where you know a lot of
the Puckwadgy sightings are. It is officially the Fall River
Freetown State Forest. So I feel like I'm able to
still say I'm in the Bridgewater Triangle, even if just
at that lower edge.
Speaker 3: I think it's more like the Bridgewater Blob personally. And
I don't think that like Puckwadgies would adhere to any
type of border or boundary. I don't think they'd be
into that definitely. Yeah, So the Freetown State Forest is
actually the one place I do not like. I am
not you know, like a parent, normal sensitive person at all,
but that place I just don't like it.
Speaker 2: It makes me angry.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's funny. I knew about its reputation before
I moved here a few years ago. And when I
did move here, you know, one of the first things
I did was, you know, I'll go walk around the
state Forest, you know, to have a good time there.
And it was still in winter, so there's a lot
of snow and I'm walking around just thinking, like, you know,
it's not too spooky, and they know, the sun was
started to go down that I realized, like, there's no
signs in I was getting a little lost walking around.
So when all of a sudden it's cold, it's getting dark,
you know, you're lost. So I could see the uh,
you know, kind of the uh ominous aspect of the
forest and maybe during the day it's not so evident.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then I've also stayed at the Lizzie Borden House.
If I'm there, nothing perfectly fine.
Speaker 4: I think my understanding and I know this just from
hearsay around town. Like I'll say, you know, the current
owners of the Lizzie Bordon House are they're not too
popular around here. There's been a big dispute with them
in a coffee shop that's nearby, and mister I mean,
and the coffee shop owners are very nice, and you know,
I think the Lizzie Bordon House owners did not do
themselves any and it's kind of been doubling down on
it too. It's been so they've kind of made a
bad name for themselves in town. But my understanding is
that a lot of the so called haunted reputation of
the Lizzie Bordon House kind of was pr for them
after they started promoting it as the big bed and Breakfast.
I don't believe there was a huge history of kind
of a you know, paranormal sightings there and you know,
and it's also worth it's not the house that she
died in either, as across town the Maplecroft House, which
is still a private residence. And it's funny that house
was up or sale a few years ago and I'd
go running past it in the morning and you know,
no sign, nothing else indicates that this is the Lizzie
Borden like residence at all, but a lot of signs
and you know, like private property, you know under surveillance,
do not approach. So I imagine they must have or at least
in the past, have had some issue, you know, people
you know, kind of trying to show up and peep
in the windows or something.
Speaker 3: Actually, not too long ago, I noticed that the Fall
River Historical Society's website they have a picture of her
holding it was either she was holding a dog, but
the caption said with her cat or vice versa.
Speaker 4: Interesting, it's a I've noticed a few issues with the
Fall River Historical Society website. I've only actually been to
the location once. They've actually maybe they're done that, but
for a while they were renovating, so it was I
wasn't able to go in person, but I asked them
about something on the website when I went there, and
no one knew any think about it, so I think
maybe there's a bit of a disconnect between the website
and the volunteers who actually work at the place, which
I guess is on. I've volunteered at historical societies before,
so I can understand that, but yeah, it is something
I've run into.
Speaker 1: Also.
Speaker 3: Yeah, have you noticed a lot of difference in different
towns historical societies and the way they operate, Because from
my perspective, I grew up in Lebanon, Connecticut, where everything's historical.
The historical society kind of runs the town and they
like to gloss over any kind of ugly aspects. But
I just went to Old Newgate Prison that's under the
state and they are very straightforward and giving you the
real history of the place. So have you found that,
you know, some towns do a better job than others
with that type of thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've noticed that. I used when I was in college,
I worked at the Glastonbury Historical Glastonbury, Connecticut. I should
say I also worked for the Connecticut Historical Society for
a brief amount of time, and the old State House
in Hartford. So those are kind of the three direct
bits of historical society experience I have. But no, just
going to local towns. It really varies. No, there's certain
towns where they have something notorious. You know, the Fall
River Historical Societies. You can imagine a lot of it's
dedicated to Lizzie Bordon. You know, if you go into
the uh the gift shop, a lot of Lizzy Bordon
history books there. And you know they have a big science.
You know, we were not endorsing any particular verdict or theory.
They're very clear about that. You know, you go to
some like no I say, like you know, middle of
nowhere town in Vermont or upstate New York, and it's like,
here's the history of you know this one farm, or
you know, here's the church. I mean, I think it varies. Me.
I will say I've noticed that you in Connecticut, at
least the State Historical Society in Hartford. Even in Glastonbury too,
they've done a big effort of you know, bringing I guess,
you know, marginalized people's not shying away from negative experiences.
I know, at least in real I think since I've
really worked there, which was some time ago, I think
they've really tried to do a lot more of Native
American stuff at the Glastonbury Historical Society, which was definitely
a large blank or not not. They did have a
small amount, but it wasn't as prominent as the last
time I was there a few years ago.
Speaker 3: Yeah, some time like we're growing up as kids, I
didn't even think that.
Speaker 2: There were slaves in the North.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and then you you know, you find out there
definitely was for sure. In the Ancient Burying Burial Grounds
in Hartford, they have been doing a great job of
talking about history of slavery as well as the Connecticut
witch Trials.
Speaker 4: And I was gonna say, maybe five years I guess
this would have been right before the pandemic. In twenty nineteen,
I went on one of the guided tours of the
ancient Burial ground, and I know a lot of detail
on the Connecticut witch Trials, and my understanding is that
a lot of the actual or suspected witch graves are
now kind of underneath the street in front of the
Traveler's Tower there, so I think certainly they're not marked
in any way. But they've done a good job, at
least in the tours of bringing that up, and I
think the Connecticut Trials in particular kind of gotten a
bit more of a residence. In the last few years,
there's been the efforts to pardon or to secure pardons
for the people executed during the trials, which also has
been my understanding, fairly difficult, just because it's a lot
of international lit If I'm remembering correct, this might be
either some of the choose Its ones or Connecticut ones.
They ended up having to basically lobby the British government
because as colonies at the time they essentially know had
to you know, get part. They're not certainly not under
US jurisdiction. So modern laws, even you know, the modern
states state constitutions aren't in effect. There aren't their colonies
not states. But yeah, so it's it is interesting exactly
who you have to approach to get a pardon h overall,
And there's there's been something similar too with H. You know,
I'm sure you're familiar with the New England vampire uh
you know panic and some of the vampire graves that
have been accidentally unearthed and the need to rein ter them.
And I think my understanding is this is not just
the vampire grave, so that's how he came across this,
but anytime you know, there's a colonial era grave that
you know, a construction site accidentally on earth, you have
to reinter them by the religious u uh uh, the
religious understandings of the time. But because of you know,
the separation of church and state, the state government can't
really intrude in this. There's a lot of no kind
of informal back and forth of you know, the state
hiring like no Congregationalist ministers as you know, advisors to
conduct the burial rights. And it is an interesting, interesting
morass when you get into some of these issues of
modern government's modern historical institutions trying to determine how best
to deal with historical injustices when they're very directly being
applied to modern law, modern government.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Now, the Glastonbury Historical Society had an exhibit about a
local cryptid.
Speaker 4: Correct they did. Yes, I believe it's no longer there,
but at least as of I think mid late twenty
twenty two it was. They told me it was being
taken down, but it might still be there if anyone's curious.
This is the Gloacus, which definitely a very interesting case
one of the well I guess, not one of the
not the only, but one of the few kind of
so homegrown Connecticut cryptid. Certainly, I'm curious, you know, so
as someone who's interested in this, what what was your
knowledge or what have you heard about the Gloacus?
Speaker 3: So no one ever talks about it. I only came
across it a few years ago, and I read a
few articles with a few accounts, and my initial I
kind of wrote it off as these people just didn't
know what a fisher cat was, just from the descript
like the physical description and the like the terrible screaming
noises they said it was making. I remember the first
time I saw a fisher cat, and.
Speaker 2: It sounds like a demon.
Speaker 3: They are kind of If I didn't have the Internet
to look up what I had seen, I would have
I don't know what I would have thought that was,
you know how I assessed it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I remember the first time I heard of red
fox screaming at night. I mean, if you didn't know
what it was, you would think someone was being murdered
in the woods, sir. But yeah, yeah, I mean so
for listeners who are to wear which imagine probably most
even most listeners from Connecticut. Yeah, it's in nineteen thirty
nine in Glastonbury, Connecticut, and people who might be aware
of Glastonbury today are very say, an upscale, you know,
a suburb of Hartford across the Connecticut River. But in
the nineteen thirties, this was a very poor, agricultural neighborhood town,
a very small population even compared to today, to the
extent that most of the bridges in town even today
are left over from the new deal they had to have,
you know, the federal government come in and build you know,
even just like basic roads at the time. So there's
a very poor farming community at the height of the depression.
This is coming right after, you know, the huge destructive
hurricane of nineteen thirty eight, which really damaged a lot
of towns along the Connecticut River. I believe, I understand
this is also a very harsh winter as well. But
in the middle of the night, farmers are listening, they're
hearing this, you know, screaming animals screaming something. They find these,
you paw prints in the snow. In the morning, pet dogs, cattle,
livestock have been killed by this creature. They see glimpses
of what seems to be some kind of giant black
cat or cat like creature, and this becomes known as
the Gloacus, or originally it eventually termed that kind of affectionately,
it's an abbreviation of the Glasston very Wackiuss. And so
you have something which initially, you know, for farmers, especially
in the Great Depression, something that's killing your live stock
is going to you know, that's a major threat to
your livelihood. Not to mention it's dangerous. That kills livestock,
it can kill you. This quickly became, you know, kind
of like a quickly got defined, so to speak, the
Hertford Current, the Hertford Times, which is no longer around
but was the other rival newspaper. Actually the Hartford Times
building is now the yukon Hertford campus downtown. But the
two newspapers first and then the New York Times, the
national newspaper, are publishing stories about the Gloacus. There are
people across Connecticut coming to Glastonbury to hunt this. People
are putting up bounties. But it quickly becomes kind of
a like a publicity thing. You know, local farmers in Glastonbury,
you know they're charging you know, parking for gloacis hunters.
You know they're selling food. You know, the people coming
in for the day, you know, selling AMMO in Hartford,
several insurance companies and again Hartford insurance capital of the world.
They're offering to sell Gloacis insurance. There are people you know,
like offering you know, like a bounce, you know, Butcher's
in Hartford are offering bounties for Gloacis meat clothing or
clothiers are offering, you know, bounties for the Gloacis pelts,
you know, to make you know, a Gloacis pelt shirt
or something. So this becomes you know, a major thing
for a few weeks, a few months. It does, you know,
eventually die out. But there are this, you know, a
few occasional waves over the next few decades. I think
the nineteen fifties there's a brief wave, and then the
nineteen sixties there's also like another brief wave of sightings,
notably not in Glastonbury but elsewhere in Connecticut. But my
understanding least is that after the nineteen sixties it kind
of like permanently dies down. And you know, the question
is what was this the view of the Glastonbury Historical Society,
I think, you know, it's pretty incontrovertible, is that some
of these are hoaxes, and actually at the Glastonbury Historical
they have like the wooden blocks that were used to
make some of the fake Glowacus prints. I think it's
the nephew of the guy who did the hoaxes and
offered it to the Historical Society. So some of these,
especially later on, were hoaxes that were meant to draw
in tourists of Blastonbury basically. But again, you know, initially
there are dead lives stuck, there is stuff that's screaming
in the middle of the night, there is some kind
of black panther like creature that's being sought. So it's
not it's never not one hundred percent clear exactly what
those initial sightings, where those initial creatures were. I think,
you know, probably not anything supernatural. You know, there's probably
some you know, flesh and blood explanations of some kind
of exotic or rare or just misidentified creature that wandered in.
But it is this kind of lingering mystery, I'll say.
Also growing up in Glastonbury, not really you know, it's
not something you would see a lot of. I think
they had a display in the library and the public
library in glaston area for a brief time as you know,
like one summer there's like, you know, the Gloacus display,
probably in nineteen ninety nine for the anniversary. I think
the Historical Society might have had like a Gloacis shirt
on sale. In recent years, I've noticed kind of an
uptick of discussion about this. So there's a historian at
UMS Amherst, Stephen Jenkrella. He just published a few years
ago a book of like like Spooky Trails and Tales
of Connecticut, and he has one chapter on the Gloacus
and you know, he went through did some scholarly work
on kind of like you know, Gloacis reports in newspapers
of the time. I believe that's the only kind of
like scholarly attention that's really been given to it. There's
a few podcasts on you know, cryptids or mythology that
have covered it. So it does seem like there's a
slow uptick in you know, kind of like the media attention.
I think because cryptozoology cryptids in general is becoming a
much more popular mainstream thing. I think any cryptid is
going to get some attention at least. But one thing
that is kind of also interesting to me is that
the Wikipedia page for the glax is very short, it's
very inaccurate. They described this as originating I think in
nineteenth century lumberjack folklore, which is absolutely wrong in every detail.
I'm curious what the source for that was. At some point,
I'm sure I'll look into that and try and figure
it out. But based on that, a lot of the
more recent media appearances of the Gloacus are basically just
saying it's a lumberjack thing. It's from the nineteenth century,
so you can tell they're just reading the Wikipedia article
and kind of building off that, which I think also
may have some maybe a cautionary tale in how a
lot of paranormal cryptozoological certainly beyond cryptozoological notions are mainstreamed,
and the lack of fact checking. We can say that
goes into some of this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I see that with puckulags too a lot, especially recently.
There was some interests around the turn of the early
nineteen hundreds. You see a lot of references in literature,
and then you know there's nothing about it. You see
some accounts start popping up in the nineties, but then
in the last few years now you have like people
going on podcasts saying are puckwadgis nephilim and things like that,
and it's gotten a little bit out of control the
past couple of years, especially.
Speaker 4: The nephilim aroma. They're responsible for everything. There are the
ancient aliens, you know, they're demons, they're puckwags. Now it's
I guess they're they're they're busy, busy entities. I guess.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 3: One of the other local cryptids that we have in
Connecticut I think you've done some research on is the
melon heads.
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, that's another interesting uh kind of like I
would say probably the big homegrown I guess you can
call them cryptid or urban legend mythological entity. But these
are focused in uh, southwestern Connecticut, and there's a few
different kind of origin stories for them. You know, these
are again kind of like diminutive you know beings with
you know, boldest heads that somewhat like the gray aliens.
But you know, none of the stories are that these
are aliens. But essentially these you know, diminutive, kind of hairless, pallid,
large headed creatures that you can find, uh if you
know you're in you know, walking through the woods, or
certain uh roads. I think in Hamden there's a Dracula
Drive is the name. I did go down there with
a friend once and I did not see any mail
and heads there. But again, you know, kind of like
these creatures, and there's a few like stories of their origins.
I think one story is that these are you know,
the descendants of like accused witches in the colonial era
that are you know, kind of being driven off and
then you know kind of like you know, interbreed or
like inbreeding and you know in the modern day they're
the descendants. There are other stories, you know, some like
you know, evil doctor was experimenting on children and you know,
gave them a hydrocephalitis you know, in large heads and
they killed the doctor. Living in the woods and you
know base. I think those are kind of like the
two extremes. And I think certain towns the melon head
legends that you know, they just want to be left alone.
They'll tell you to leave. Others, you know, they're kind
of more malicious and are attacking you. And so again
it seems like a very regional but with town differences
amongst them, and I know occasionally there's some other towns
I think is it Fairfield. I think that has like
a some kind of like you know, like haunted house
that's in like a local town legend, and that's supposed
to be, you know, where the melon heads hang out
and occasionally they'll you know blink up, you know, crossover
some other like town boogeyman. But it is this interesting
phenomenon of specifically south western Connecticut, although there's also the
fact that these are apparently prevalent in Ohio, which you know,
for those aren't where Ohio before was the state of
Ohio is the western reserve of Connecticut. I have been
like very interested in kind of recording like where in
Ohio these melon head legends are and seeing, you know,
because you know, certain towns in Ohio are established by
settlers that come from certain towns in Connecticut. Very curious
to see if there's any you know, kind of like
links to the towns in Connecticut with melon heads, because
that would seem to be one indication that this is
some kind of much longer folklore. U I used to
be more used to be a bigger proponent of this,
that this is you know, a mythology that goes back
much further, which might elements of it might be, but
I think a lot of you know, more in depth
researched by me, and there's certainly not uh, you know,
entirely definitive. Seems to indicate that these legends don't really
come up until after World War Two. Seem to be
you know, some kind of you know, byproduct of suburbanization.
I've seen arguments that this might the melon head. The
term might come from the lungeon, which is an Appalachian
term essentially for like a mixed race person who was
kind of shunned by white society. I'm not really sure
how that term would then come to Connecticut or why,
you know, you don't have melon heads in Appalachia, although
I guess they probably have equivalents to some degree. But
it is interesting that there seems to be possibly some linkage,
you know, to some kind of outcasts of some sort,
or as I think is the case with a lot
of cryptid especially like arboreal cryptids. We can say that
it's some reaction to suburbanization expansion into wilderness after World
War two, and it was kind of nostalgia for a
more pastoral lifetime before the war, especially you know, the
nineteenth century. But yeah, that's my interesting ideas about the
melon heads.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I might actually be able to help you out
with the Ohio melon heads. I have a couple of
friends that made a documentary about them. They actually had
it narrowed. They went to one specific location where there's
common sighting. So if you're interested in like specific locations,
they could definitely.
Speaker 4: Oh, absolutely, yeah, I would love that. I would definitely
be interested in that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's interesting too. You mentioned that sometimes folklore travels
with settlers during that time pe and I've always wondered
about that with Puckwadji specifically, because you had the Pilgrims
coming here. They technically would not have on the books
believed in fay in that type of thing. But there is,
you know, the on the books beliefs, and then there's
what you actually believe. So I don't think it's impossible
that they brought some of those legends over.
Speaker 2: But New England.
Speaker 3: Actually had lots of different groups visiting throughout history and
that left some evidence here and some things we don't
even know who left it here, like Mystery Hill up
in New Hampshire and then Dighton Rock.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah your area also.
Speaker 4: Yeah, said Dighton Rocket. It's definitely an interesting case study
of I guess the way we maybe I don't want
not pseudo. I don't want to say pseudo Hitchman. Interpretations
of history can change depending on demograph if you go
back to the colonial I'll say, for those who aren't aware,
Dighton Rock it's a large boulder in the Taunton River.
It's actually in currently now it's in the town of Berkeley,
which broke off from Dyton, but still called Dighton Rock.
But it's now a state park, state museum. There's a
little museum around it, which is sometimes open, sometimes there's not.
There's not really any fixed schedule. It's kind of frustrating
if you call ahead of time. Supposedly they will keep
it unlocked for you. I've had mixed luck on that,
but at least you know I have been inside, so
it is occasionally open. But I know it's this large
boulder with pictographs on it, and you know, from the
sixteen hundreds has been a lot of settler interest in
who left the images, you know, on this rock, on
this pictograph, especially because you know, if you look at there,
there's some symbols that seem like maybe it's a boat
with sails, I think my favorite one is there is
a smiley face on it. So again smiley face a
universal symbol apparently. But the earliest so in the Pilgrim
era in the sixteen hundreds, they were very interested in
the idea that this was a boulder that had been
left by Phoenicians or the lost tribes of Israel. Because
again these are radical Puritans, their Calvinists. You know, worldview
is that you know, the lost tribes were scattered across
the world with the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem,
and that you know, finding evidence of the lost tribes
would help, you know, bring about this millinery and prophecy,
help bring about the Second Coming. Is not just in
New England, in Central Africa, in East Asia. You have
a lot of these sets explorers in the fifteen, sixteen,
seventeen hundreds really basically coming across any sign of quote
civilization and saying this must have been the Lost tribes
of Israel. And so there's that initial interests in that period.
By the eighteen hundreds it really becomes that da that
vikings leftist, because that started to be the main interest.
In eighteen thirty seven, there's a Danish antiquarian I think
he writes a book it translates into English as Antiquities
American I I think. But among other things, this is
the idea that, for example, Newport Tower was a Viking
tower that comes from that. Here in Fall River, there's
the skeleton in armor that's discovered by Lizzie Borden's or
Lizzy Borden's future aunt is the one who discovers it,
which also interesting local connection there. But New Englanders in
particular had started to look at the Viking Vinland sagas
from the Middle Ages, which Blood dismisses. Just you know,
there's a lot of stories, you know, people sailing into
the ocean finding strange islands in the early eighteen hundreds,
they start to say maybe this was New England was
what they discovered, And there's some cultural reasons for that too.
This is the start of the era of an early
Catholic emigration to the United States, which has a lot
of opposition, especially in New England, a heavily Protestant region.
The Vikings not Christian, but from Northern England. And you know,
even though it's before there even is a Protestant religion,
if you're from Northern England, you can kind of be
encoded as Protestant. So by saying the Vikings were here first,
that's kind of a way to reaffirm that Protestants had
been here first. And it also means if the Vikings
had first, you know, quote discovered America, you know, to
say Columbus, this southern European Catholic was and so again
kind of the way of you know, moving past that.
So the Viking interpretation of Dyton becomes very prominent at
the time. Flash forward, you know, to the end of
the nineteenth century, quite a lot of Portuguese settlers start
emigrating to this region. A fall River, I think, by percentage,
is the most Portuguese city in the United States. I
think forty nine percent speak Portuguese as their first language.
You know, if you come to visit, see Portuguese flags,
cape Verdean flags everywhere. A lot of good food too.
But there's a self educated port or a self he's
a dentist, so he's not self but he's a self
educated historian who after World War two comes to Fall River.
He becomes absolutely convinced that diton rock had been sent
or had been carved by these lost Portuguese explorers in
the early fifteen hundreds. And that's indeed, the modern State
Museum really emphasizes that because again lot of Portuguese in
the region, they lobby the state government to endorse the Portuguese.
It's quarto real is the name of the sailor that
this is left by his crew. And so therefore, you know,
if there's a large Portuguese voting block here, no one
really wants to challenge that in the state government. And
so you know, you go from Phoenicians or the Lost
tribes of Israel reflecting you know, the settler views of
the sixteen hundreds. You have you know, the Viking interpretation
reflecting a lot of these emerging you know, racial and
religious politics of the eighteen hundreds, the Portuguese interpretation of
the twentieth century reflecting the Portuguese population, and I would
I know several archaeologists. Kenneth Fader at Central Connecticut State
University is kind of he's a leading I think he's
an archaeologist of Native Americans, and he makes a specialty
of exploring kind of cases like this hill are you
know this is it's very similar to a lot of
womp and og pictograms you'll find around your act, you know,
even to a friend of mine. You know, we went
hiking along the Taunton River. No. Last winter, we found
a couple womp and og pictographs. No, just on boulders
along the river. You can find them here. They're not
they are rare, but they're not absent. And uh, this
is the only place where you can find pictograms. The logical,
the most logical interpretation will say is that it probably is, uh,
the wamp and OG's the local Native Americans who left this. Now,
the problem is the pictograms we have on the boulder
today have been touched up over time by by well
meaning I'm not gonna say this is van but well
meaning people across time have touched them up because, again
at different interpretations, some of them thought, this looks like,
you know, like Scandinavian ruins. Let's just highlight this, you know,
let's make it so it's easier to reach these ruins.
You know, in the twentieth century, a lot of the
Portugese this looks like a Portuguese galley, and let's kind
of highlight that, just to make sure we don't miss that.
And you know, if you see photographs or not even photographs,
but inscriptions of dieton rock, some of which are like
several hundred years old. It looks very different from the
pictographs that are there today. So it has changed over
the years, which is why, you know, a definitive interpretation
is you know, probably impossible. It's most likely womp. Now
that being said, probably not Phoenicians and lost tribes of Israel.
But it's not impossible that Vikings came to southern New England.
It's not impossible that you know, Portuguese explorers did I
mean certainly by you know, the mid fifteen hundreds there
were Portuguese sailing around here of Arizona. But again saying
that this is left by those specific people, that requires
a standard of evidence that I think is not there currently.
Speaker 3: We'll say, yeah, the same thing happened with the Bellow
Falls Petrick glyphs in Vermont. Then the Smiley faces again,
someone probably well intentioned, went back over them. That's a
little bit frustrating, and I understand the desire to do that,
but still frustrating at the same time. But what do
you make of Newport Tower That's a little bit different
than a Petrick glyph?
Speaker 4: Yes, I mean, and again that's probably the kind of
the most famous quote Viking relic, which I say quote it,
I would say it's probably not left by Vikings. The
most accurate or the most likely in my opinion interpretations,
that is a colonial era wind million. If you look
at images of windmills from from specifically the parts of
the England where the settlers from early Rhode Island came,
it looks very similar to Newport Tower. There's mentions of
it in the colonial governor Benedict Arnold, who's not not
the the Revolutionary War trader, although he is related to him,
but the colonial governor of Rhode Island back when Newport
was the colonial governor or colonial capital. He mentions his
stone built windmill in his lease. And so again it
seems probably clear that this was the stone built windmill
since this was his property. Also, so that seems to
be the balance of it. But again there's there's alternate interpretations.
There is a Newport Tower museum that's right across the
road from the Newport Tower. The gentleman who runs that
I'm forgetting his actually have his book here, just James
Allen Egan. Uh He His interpretation is that Newport Tower
was built by John D. The I know, the court astrologer,
court magician of Elizabeth the First. Now who is himself.
He was the first person to come up with the
term British Empire, so he does have some connections there.
Mister Egan and his museum, you know, has this very
elaborate theory that the Newport Tower was a camera obscura
and that was you know, design, you know, as kind
of like you know, early observation. I mean it's uh,
it's it's not the typical uh of theory, but it's
you know, it's a it's interesting an interpretation, I will say, uh.
I was not convinced by his argument was built by
or by John D. He did convince me that John
D knew of the location of Newport and probably didn't
tend to establish a settlement here. He pointed out, you know,
historical sources where John D is talking about the region
that is modern day Newport in Rhode Island, and so
it does seem that John D didn't tend to establish
an English settlement here. That's, on the one hand, I
think that is interesting. I think he deserved some credit
for that, but it's that's also very different from saying
that John d basically you know, from Afar, designed this tower,
sent the designs over with English sailors who established this
and built this because of that, you know, building those
kind of instructions from across the Atlantic Ocean five hundred
years ago. That is quite the feat. But I do
think that the colonial windmill is probably the most accurate one.
But certainly the Viking interpretation is still pretty dominant. I mean,
there's the Viking hotel that is right next to the
Newport Tower. I think the local sports team are called
the Vikings. I just had a curiosity. I asked someone
at the Newport Art Museum just like you know, which
you can see the Newport Tower from there, as being like,
you know, what do you make of the Newport Tower,
And she was like, oh, I don't really think about
it wasn't supposed to be like a Viking church or
something like that. So it does seem that it's you know,
kind of a general sense of you know, the Viking ancestry.
But again it's coming from this cultural context of the
eighteen thirties, when there is this need to reaffirm, you know,
the Northern European Protestant nature of America at the first time,
that's being significantly challenged by not just you know, like
a mainly Irish and German at the time, which again
today we would consider white, but at the time we're
not considered white or European, uh, and French Canadians a
few years after that, which again is a major site
for French Canadians, and then Polish Portuguese and so again,
you know, the the New Englanders like to imagine themselves
as modern day Vikings, which also seems kind of strange
to us. But again, you know, the idea, you know,
medieval Greenland, Norway Ice in this very hard scrabble, very
austere lifestyle to kind of fit in with, you know,
the congregationalist view of themselves. And you know, it's worth
noting that Iceland, at least this is one of the
very first modern republics. The alt Ting was a democratic
Ish legislature, and so again there was an effort to
combine the town hall spirit of New England with you know,
the Norse legislature of Iceland and kind of draw that
symbolic link to republicanism.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think something similar happened with Gungey wop Down
and into people very much want that to have some
kind of Celtic origin, and I do think it's because
most of the people here are of Celtic origin. I
have never understood why, you know, the same thing with
Dyton Rock and mister Yale. I've never understood why there's
the refusal to admit it's probably just indigenous. I'd even
heard someone say, you know, there's evidence that there was
a sheep for here, why are we even talking about this, Well,
it was a continuously inhabited site. There's going to be
evidence of other things there also.
Speaker 4: I mean this reflects the sense I think that you know,
like a Native American, indigenous you know American, just like
you know if you go to Africa, but technically, you know,
I did my dissertation on African history. Seems a very far,
very long way away. But it's the same with African
cultures when Europeans arrive. You know, if you're not building cities,
if you don't have a literate you know, written based
transmission of knowledge, you're not really considered no real civilization.
And I mean it's even I think in recent years
you've seen things like the city of Kahokia. You've seen
a lot of the Native mounds in the Midwest kind
of get a bit more recognition, a bit more interest.
But again it is a shame that so much you know,
indigenous history is not not remembered, not seen as exciting
as Europeans for some reason. You know, like if you
have you know, like Viking sailing across the ocean, you know,
encountering you know, the Americas, that's exciting. You know Native Americans,
you know, traveling across you know, visiting here from different
parts of the country. There's evidence that trade networks linked
New England to you know, the southwest, Central America. I
mean not directly, but that's very interesting. I mean in
my view that you can have you know, like uh,
what's jade or from Central America or you know, aquamarine
from the Southwest wind up here in Jewelry. That's a
very I think that's just as interesting to me as
you know, Viking sailing across the Atlantic. And again there's
also the fact that there is some evidence that Native
Americans sailed across to Europe, and you don't really hear that.
You hear about that much less than you hear about
you know, the opposite, even when most of the opposite
is of question historicity to some extent. But you know,
the idea that some Native Americans may have sailed to Ireland,
may have sailed to h Norway, there's fairly strong evidence
for that as well as far back as Roman times.
Even again, you know, that's not really as well known.
Not the same with, for example, I think, on the
other side of the continent, Polynesian navigation, which I think
is starting to get maybe a bit more recognition that
you know, there's been multiple contacts between kind of an
ancient Asian and Polynesian cultures and the West coast of
the Americas. The fact that the Polynesians navigating across the
Pacific Ocean, you know, using just you know, memorization of
star maps, that it seems like possibly no Polynesians were
the first to sail to Antarctica over a thousand years
before Europeans new Antarctica existed. I think that's all very interesting,
but again, unfortunately it's not really not as sexy as
Vikings or Phoenicians or you know, people from the quote
Old World, you know coming to North America.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know, a while back, so you know, growing
up you're told that people came to North America over
the land bridge. And then you know, recently there's been
more conversation about, well, maybe that doesn't all add up.
There's some evidence of humans being here before there was
a land bridge. I made the mistake of trying to
google that recently and what mess.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's I mean that it's again, and I want
to be careful this is this is far afield from
my specialty, but I know I have dabbled in this
because it's such a prominent topic. But yeah, the idea
that used to be used to decades ago is the
idea of the Clovis first hypothesis, which I argued that
you know, people came over the bearing land bridge first,
that you know, that was the only way that people
came in waves, that this certain culture was the first
culture over you know, in the decades since, that's increasingly
been challenged that there are now kind of like pre
Clovis artifacts that you know, the settlement of the coast
may have happened or almost certainly did happen much faster
than inland Today. You know, you'll have a we'll say,
people with certain agendas saying like, oh, you know, Clovis
first is impossible therefore, you know, the entire basis for
you know, the idea that you know, Native Americans you know,
came here, so that that's a completely thrown out. They challenged,
you know, the idea of that. They challenged the history
of Native settlement of the Americas based on how it
was you know, in the nineteen sixties, probably when a
lot of them were in school. They don't recognize that,
you know, scholarship has changed, and so any you know,
supposed out of place artifact. They then used to challenge
all of archaeology, and I think some, not all, I
want to know be clear, not all, but I think
there are some who are are doing this for particularly
nefarious reasons. I don't know if you've come across this.
There's the the Solutrean hypothesis as it's called, which are
you know, just as there is the bearing land bridge
during the Ice Age connecting Siberia and Alaska, this is
the idea that there's kind of like no a frozen
land bridge across the North Atlantic, and they know ancient Europeans,
you know, migrated across the Solutrean ice bridge, as it's termed.
And you know, this is an idea that's popular among
eight quote no certain online crowd because it means that
Europeans were the quote real Native Americans, that the people
we associate with Paleo Indians migrating out of Siberia massacred,
you know, killed off the original quote white settlers of
the America, and that therefore, as a result, you know,
the conquest of the Americas by Europeans, you know, the
genocide of the Native Americans. This is justified because you know,
they did it to quote us, as you know, ancient
Europeans tens of thousands of years ago. Just to be clear,
there is absolutely no evidence for that at all. But
you'll you'll find this very commonly repeated, even in a
you know, we'll say, like a more main more politically
active right wing websites that otherwise you have no interest
in ancient history and you know, Paleo Indian settlement theories,
but are very committed to the idea of this solutrean
land Bridge. No, it's it's kind of I always sent
much like you know, like the New Englanders of the
eighteen hundreds were very interested in the Viking theory. It's
essentially a similar reason why modern you know, right wing
people are very interested in the Solutrean idea.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I recently started looking into the legend of the
moon eyed people.
Speaker 2: It's a legend familiar with.
Speaker 3: That, yes, Yeah, And people will try to turn that
into a narrative of white people being here, you know,
And it's it's almost it's disheartening. It's a little bit
disgusting at times, the way some people try to take
history and rewrite it and make it fit there narrative.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's it's it's a sign that you know,
you hear the attack today that you know history is
too political or you know, people with the agendas are right,
as if that's never been the case. You know. Again,
it's as I tell students, and I you know, historians
are people, you know. I mean, no reputable historian will say, yeah,
you can be objective, because no one, no human is objective.
No AI is objective either, you know, as a lot
of the recent AI debates have shown, AIS are programmed
by humans that have just the same bio sees as
their creators. So you know, less unless an angel descends
from heaven, those without sin or something like that. You know,
no history that's written by any thinking being is going
to be free of bias. You know, some are hopefully
more objective than others, but the idea they know, it's
only like no crazy Marxist you know, university professors who
have you know, started to pervert history. You know, just
read any of the views of history, you know, for example,
in the eighteen hundreds or the nineteen hundreds, and you'll
see definitely interesting interpretations with clearly you know, political agendas
back then.
Speaker 3: Yeah, my family history also, so my mother is a
Hinckley governor. Thomas Hinckley is my ninth grade uncle, and
you know, growing up, I was told, you know, he
was a great guy.
Speaker 2: He was governor of Plymouth Colony and all this.
Speaker 3: When I started researching Puck Wedgies, I had to look
into King Phillips war his name started coming up and
it was not flattering. And so I had this ancestor
who I was told growing up was a great guy.
And then I found out his thought process was that
the great dying was because God killed everyone here because
they were meant to live here.
Speaker 2: And then he.
Speaker 3: Basically he was not the only one, but he was
a driver of a genocide. Really, So, I mean, it's
funny how you grow up with one narrative and then
you start digging and you find out it's not anything
like what you thought. My family does not like when
I talk about that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean it's the idea that I know, God
knows a no prepared this land for us. I mean,
I think that's a deeply ingrained not just in the US,
I mean it's a Canada, Australia. I think anywhere there's
a settler or colony, you're going to find ideas like this.
I mean, you know, I think I think it makes
sense in a certain point of you know, like, if
if God has prepared it for you, you can't really
challenge God, and it's therefore very and very easy. Again,
so not just bashing religion. Science also is ideas of
scientific evolution. The idea that you could take Darwin's theory
of evolution and apply it to the different human races
or human cultures, something that Darwin himself was definitely did
not believe in that, but others use that, including some
of his own friends. But you know, the idea that okay,
Native Americans are this you know, supposed you know, dying race,
because again it's just the law of natural selection. So
you know, it's not that you know, God has you know,
cleared them all off and take them up to heaven.
It's just you know, the scientific laws of you know, uh,
survival of the fittest just means it's it's the way
things work. And you know, even though if you read
a lot of like you know, a Bureau of Indian
Affairs documents from the late nineteenth century, you know, there
was this large sentiment it was just an assumption that
Native Americans will go extinct. That's not out of question.
You know, maybe a few of them can kind of
you know, be elevated to basically you know, become white
in culture, if not in well, you know, not in blood.
I guess I didn't have genes or knowledge of it then,
but it was essentially like, okay, you know, our job
is based you know, to be like, you know, hospice
workers for the Native Americans that set them on reservations
where they can know peacefully die off and then we
don't have to think about them anymore. And I think
it's I mean, it's uh, something I think is still
in a lot of the background you know, of a
lot of people today, even you know, not inventally maybe,
but I think it is difficult, you know, to think like,
you know, oh, it's the reason you know we're here
in North America is you know, you have to kind
of think about like, oh, it's the wide just how
widespread you know the population was before uh uh you
know settlers arrived and why you know we're able to
migrate west And I mean, uh, even then, you know,
I think the idea of you know, the pastoral native
and like the Native who lived in harmony with nature.
I think even that it's kind of a sense. Okay,
the Native American is you know or quote know, the
Native American is not a culture and it doesn't have
its own history. It's part of nature. I mean, I
think even until fairly recently in the Smithsonian, I think
a lot of Native American artifacts and like a Polynesian
artifacts do are in the natural history. Part is if
you know they're part of nature, they're not part of
you know, human history or human culture. And uh and
you know, the reality is Native Americans impacted there environment.
I mean, part of the reason why you can see
in records of ice cores that the Native American genocide
led to a global cooling because Native Americans were cutting
down trees, they had fires, you know, they were impacting
the environment. When they're all when many of them are
being killed off, they're stopping impacting the environment. So I
think even the idea, the probably well meaning idea of
you know, the noble savage who lived in concert with nature,
and it was kind of like an ideal for the
environmentalists movement in the nineteen seventies, that's also fairly a
historical that's a way of, you know, dealing with the
fact that you don't have to think of the Native
American as a human just it's part of nature. It's
not a branch of human history and human culture.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so there was one colonial New Englander that has
not been ruined for me yet. You might tell me otherwise,
but he seems to have had a positive attitude towards
Native Americans even and he hated my ancestors.
Speaker 2: So I immediately like him.
Speaker 4: But Roger Williams, Yeah, I mean it's the founder of
Rhode Island, founder of Providence. I think there's a few
examples of these in the seventeen hundreds. I think William
Penn comes across relative I say relatively. I don't think entirely,
but relatively well compared with other treatment of Native Americans,
and also with religious differences as well amongst the settlers.
And I know it tell us my students too. It's
worth pointing out there are people. You know, the idea
that you know, slavery was universally accepted is not true.
You know, the idea that settlement of the Americas was
seen as a good thing that was not You know,
there are critics in the past. I know, famously kind
of the Spanish colonial context. It's a Bartolo may dela
Cossas who wrote on the Destruction of the Indies, and
again he did think that the goal was to convert
Native Americans to Christianity, but you know, to kind of
do it through kindness, through respecting their culture, instead of
you know, just killing them off. Juan tom Lee. So
there are people in the past, maybe not as much
as today, but they are. There are people in the
past who were critics, did see Native Americans and Africans
as humans, as fully humans, did condemn you know, colonialism,
did condemn slavery. And you know, we can see that
there's a bit more recognition of that. But I think
that also kind of know fuels. I think kind of
on both sides of the political I you can see,
you know, conservatives who would like to say, you know,
like everyone in the past, who it's just terrible, so
who cares who killed who? And also now that we have,
you know, any kind of recognition of this, now that's
an inherent sign that we've done so much we don't
have to do anything else. And I think there's also
some you know, a section of liberals who I think
a either want you know, to view themselves, you know,
as a kind of like, you know, the endpoint of progress,
and so if you have any like any positives in
the past, that impacts their view of their own development.
But also I think you know a lot of scourging
of themselves also and don't want to recognize anything or
anyone good in the past. So I think on both
sides of the political divide, at least kind of in
the modern culture wars, there was a reluctance to address this.
And again, you know, it's not like these people were
dominant in the past, but they were there occasionally. I
think it's worth keeping that in mind as well, that
you know, even people in the past did recognize that
some of this stuff was pretty messed up, so to speak. Yeah,
and there's also I think maybe coming back a bit
to the more not necessarily cryptozoological, but mythological, there's an
increasing I think understanding that you know, people you know
long talk about trade with Native Americans, with you know,
Meso Americans, with the Caribbean peoples. But I think there's
been a bit more study recent of ideas that have
come from Native Americans, especially you know, for example, from
the Iroquois ideas of a democracy, representative government, constitutionalism that
impacted a lot of the colonial settlers, especially in the
decades leading up to the American Revolution. Very recently, you know,
there's been some historical work arguing that some of the
ideas of you know, the Declaration of Independence the Constitution
were coming from people like Benjamin Franklin who are very
interested in Iroquois political notions in the decades before the
American Revolution. Simultaneously, there's a historian of science, Adrian Mayer,
and others have as well, she's kind of the main
name behind this, but who have looked at how you know,
not just a Native Americans, but enslaved Africans in the
early colonies have applied their knowledge of fossils of life
to early paleontology and you know, identifying early fossils, like
the very first mastodon remains in the United States were
discovered by enslaved Africans from the Congo who not only
you know, physically uncovered the remains of the mastadon, but
identified them because they knew what elephant remains looked like.
And so you can argue paleontology as a science in
the Americas comes from Native Americans and Africans much more
than Europeans. And in the Midwest I'll be quiet after this,
but in the Midwest also there's a creature amongst kind
of like the plains, and it's a mythological beast, the
untech Ye, the water monster. The original like depiction of
the water monster from when these tribes lived around the
Great Lakes was very clearly based on quatic mammal uh.
When these tribes are then forcibly relocated to the bad
lands of you know, South Dakota, an area with a
lot of fossilized prehistoric animals, the description of the untech
Ye changes to reflect the fossils the moses ur so
you get something that's originally like a water buffalo and
starts to get described as a uh, you know, like
a dinosaur basically. And again this is because they're seeing
the fossil remains. They're decided think, you know, you can
see fossilized flippers from the Mosesaur. They said, this is
an this is an actual like ancient water monster. They
then change their mythological creature. They have the mythology of
this water monster. They see the actual remains. Oh, this
must actually be what the untechie looks like. By analyzing
remains of the past, they're applying it to their own histories.
And so you get this change of this mythological creature
through early scientific method we and.
Speaker 3: Say, yeah, I point out I have my Stegaton bone
necklace on right now.
Speaker 4: Very good.
Speaker 3: So what advice would you give someone that wants to
look into either folklore local history. You know, I we
talked briefly about my frustration just looking into the history
of these stone sites in the area. So what advice
would you give someone that wants to find out the
real facts between behind these these things in history?
Speaker 4: I would say, if you're interested in local story, again,
I'll promote the local historical Society. I think that's a
good place, you know, just to start to see what
people in the past have thought of some of these stories,
some of these mythologies, I would say, you know, particularly
with stone sites, with things like you know, fossils or cryptozoology. Again,
I'll bring up Kenneth Fader's books. He in particular has
one called I'm hoping I'm going to remember the title right, Frauds,
Myths and Mysteries, which is basically, you know, a good
primary it's kind of like a good source for the
aspiring paleon not just paleon archaeologists, paleontologist, cryptozoologists of how
to think about some of these myths, think about like
how to analyze and interrogate stories. Has a lot of
case studies. I think he's done kind of a really
good job creating, you know, literally the textbook for understanding
a lot of these. Some other names that I'll just
kind of throw out Andrew Kinkella's podcast pseudo Archaeology. Jeb
Card has a number of podcasts and books that explore this.
One of his books is called Spooky Archaeology. Definitely recommend that.
Sharon Hill has a book called scientifical Americans, which again
is about you know, how to understand, you know, the
scientific method and how it's used and misused by kind
of paranormal researchers. And I think these are all fairly
easy to read books. I think they're good kind of
introductory levels for people interested in historical analyzes of some
of these myths and legends of the past.
Speaker 3: Excellent, speaking of books, you have some company is interested
in them? What are their names, what are they about?
Where can they find them?
Speaker 4: So my first book that's out with Horace Smith your
Past Guests, called When the Stars Are Right HP Lovecraft
and Astronomy, available from Hippocampus Press. It looks at you
the Providence, Rhode Island author HP Lovecraft, you know, the
creator of Cthulhu, among many other things. It specifically looks
at a lot of his interests in astronomy and how
it impacts his life and his fiction. But I think
that's all so useful because we use it to look
at kind of like a case study of several evolving
notions of astronomical science. So yeah, we talk about evolving
notions of life on Mars and the Moon, you know,
during Lovecraft's lifetime we talked about a lot of the
early UFO sightings from the nineteenth century about changing ideas
of cosmology, like you know, the ether. I think we
talk about the hollow Earth a little bit. So even
if you know you only have kind of a vague
knowledge of Lovecraft, this is a good book for looking
at how ideas about astronomy and humanity's relationship to it changes,
you know, from the late nineteenth into the early twentieth centuries.
My second book, which I'm hoping should be done and
submitted to the publisher by the end of this year,
it's called The Power of the Flat Earth Idea. It's
going to be published by Paul Grave McMillan. This is
kind of like a political history of flat earthers, and
again relevant to our discussion. One of the main focus
is kind of one of the main quote characters in
my book is a former slave in Virginia after the
end of the Civil War named John Jasper, who is
a Baptist preacher but also a very prominent flat earther.
I talk to some degree about how, you know, his
ideas of the flat Earth come from basically a liberation
theology interpretation of the Old Testament, so kind of the
same religious sources he's looking at to justify and support
black emancipation during the reconstruction and post reconstruction eras, these
are interpretations that are leading him to think the Earth
is flat. So again kind of like a liberation interpretation
of flat earth theology, which, again, to pat myself on
the back, I haven't really seen this done before, so
I think it will make an interesting reveal in the field.
And I do talk a bit about, you know, where
flat earth ideas overlap with other notions a lot of
like UFO and modern conspiracy stuff near the end. So again,
if you're interested in kind of wider conspiracy or pseudoscience,
that could be a book of interest. And outside of that,
I have a number of articles, some of which are
online you can find google Edward Giemont some of these
will come up. Have some works on cryptozoology that are
free to read online. Some of my works on UFOs
and specifically UFOs and New England folklore, which maybe if
I come on again, I can talk about ideas you know,
UFOs and puck wedgies and melon heads. I feel like
there may be some kind of a unifying theory between these,
so maybe that's a little hook for me to come
back next time. But again, google my name and you'll
definitely find some interesting stuff to read.
Speaker 3: I'm definitely hooked because I have seen some commonalities there
and connections as well, so interested to see if they're
the same as what you found.
Speaker 4: Well, can't wait to talk about it someday.
Speaker 3: So well, thank you very much. This has been a blast.
I don't think I got through half of the list
of things. Definitely have to have you back on anytime.
Speaker 4: I'm happy to talk all.
Speaker 3: Right, great and thanks everyone for good night.
Speaker 4: Goodbye.