S03 Episode 1: We Are The Witchcraft (Pt.1 of 3)

John Maynard Keynes described Isaac Newton as the last of the magicians; the last person of science for whom the gnostic mysteries still held some sway.

In 1914 another scientist and magician was born. Jack Parsons would go on to help establish NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab developing a rocket fuel that will put the human race on the moon.

In 1946, Parsons would also attempt a complicated magic ritual in the hope of manifesting the divine goddess Babalon. Some say he did it too.

In 1952 Parsons was killed in a catastrophic explosion at his house in what many believe to be mysterious circumstances that to this day remain unexplained...

Go to @unexplainedpod or www.unexplainedpodcast.com for more info.

Thank you for listening.

Halloween Special 2017

If on Halloween you come across a looped branch of briar-thorn sticking up from the ground, you might decide to creep through it three times in the devil’s name. Then afterwards cut a piece of it so that you might take it home and place it under your pillow. In so doing, it is said, that you will dream of the one you will marry.

Perhaps it was just such a game that a young girl by the name of Bridget Boland played one Halloween afternoon down in Ireland’s County Tipperary. And perhaps that night, as she lay her head to rest, a man did come to her in a dream; his handsome face, his dark hair and his striking blue eyes, appearing to her from out of the flames of a fire, and his name, Michael Cleary whispered like a warning, but long forgotten by the first light of day…  

Warning: Contains some graphic imagery that some may find upsetting

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

Wedding photo of Bridget and Michael Cleary

S02 Episode 5 Extra: Child Be Strange

In the last episode Roads to Knowhere, we found ourselves circling a small, concreted patch of England on the southern boundary of Yorkshire, known as the Stocksbridge Bypass.

This seemingly unassuming stretch of road is considered by some to be the most haunted in all of the UK.

In this final part of Season Two we examine the ways in which landscape can both shackle and stir the imagination, and how the notion of haunting can become more than a simple invocation of the dead...

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 5: Roads to Knowhere

The A616 is a road in England running from the town of Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire to Huddersfield in West Yorkshire.  

In 1987 building began on a small stretch of the road that would later become known as the Stocksbridge Bypass, a stretch of road now generally regarded as one of the most haunted in the whole of the UK...

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 4 Extra: The Sound of Fear

For the last episode, When the Snow Melts, we took an in-depth look into the unsettling mystery often referred to as the Dyatlov Pass Incident.  

The incident details the mysterious deaths of nine hikers as they attempted a challenging trek through the Ural Mountains.  

In this Extra episode we look at one final theory that might go some way to explaining just what exactly happened on that fateful night of February 1st 1959.

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 4: When the Snow Melts pt.3

With five of the students' bodies now recovered from Kholat Syakhl mountain, rumours begin to circulate about just what exactly might have caused their deaths.  

Meanwhile, with four of the students still unaccounted for, lead investigator Lev Ivanov is under increasing pressure to bring the the case to a swift and uncontroversial end...

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 4: When the Snow Melts pt.2

It is February 25th 1959, and Igor Dyatlov and his team, due back in their home town of Sverdlosk on February 13th have not been seen since January 28th.

When their last movements are traced to a mountain known as Kholat Syakhl, or Dead Mountain, a gruesome discovery is about to be made...

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 4: When the Snow Melts pt.1

On Friday January 23rd 1959, a story begins from out of the foothills of the Ural Mountains.  A story that is perhaps the most extraordinary of all the stories featured on this show so far.  A chilling and profound mystery that remains to this day Unexplained…

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

S02 Episode 3 Extra: 6EQUJ5

In last week’s episode, The Final Flight, we looked at the tragic story of Australian Training Corp pilot Fred Valentich and his mysterious disappearance one evening in October 1978. 

In a famous last communication between Fred and Air Traffic Control it appeared that Fred was being tracked by a large UFO just prior to his disappearance.  If, as some believe, Fred had in fact fabricated the event, it has been suggested that the Stephen Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind may have served as a possible source of inspiration.  

Yet, only 6 months previously something far more fantastical had occurred that would no doubt have been noted by Fred, a young man with a keen interest in UFOs and the hunt for Alien life...  

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

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Sources

1.    Tate, K (2015), SETI: All About the Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence, Space.com, http://www.space.com/30043-seti-search-for-extraterrestrial-intelligence-infographic.html

2.    Big Ear Memorial Website, http://www.bigear.org/

3.    Reneke, D (n/a),  Wow - The Big Ear, DavidReneke.com, http://www.davidreneke.com/wow-the-big-ear/

4.    Pre-History of Radio Astronomy, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, http://www.nrao.edu/whatisra/hist_prehist.shtml

5.    Redpath, M, (2012), Karl Jansky: The Father of Radio Astronomy, ArmaghPlanet.com, http://www.armaghplanet.com/blog/karl-jansky-the-father-of-radio-astronomy.html

S02 Episode 3: The Last Flight

It has been calculated that likelihood of the human race being the only sophisticated life form in the milky way is a one in sixty billion chance.  The milky way is one of 2 trillion galaxies in the observable universe.

The following story is considered by many UFOlogists to be among the most compelling pieces of evidences of an alien visitation to our planet.  Just what happened in the skies off the coast of Melbourne Australia in 1978 has never been fully accounted for.  It is a mystery that remains to this day Unexplained.

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

Fred Valentich c. 1977

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Sources

1.    Original Case Files for disappearance of Fred Valentich available at National Archives of Australia, type VH-DSJ in the search box at: http://www.naa.gov.au/

2.    Basterfield, K. (2013), The Valentich Radio Transmissions, UFOs Scientific Research, http://ufos-scientificresearch.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/the-valentich-radio-transmissions.html

3.    Dunning, B. (2013), The Disappearance of Fred Valentich, Skeptoid, https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4385

4.    Kemp, M (2012), Frederick Valentich – Truth Was Out There After All, Sott.net, https://www.sott.net/article/247700-Frederick-Valentich-Truth-Was-Out-There-After-All

5.    Rhonda Rushton interviewed by Victorian UFO Action, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIyMpblIg88&t=719s

6.    NASA Press Release announcing discovery of 7 Earth-Size planets, https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-telescope-reveals-largest-batch-of-earth-size-habitable-zone-planets-around

S02 Episode 2 Extra: My Name is John

In last week’s episode, Time Out of Joint, we looked at two incidences of a supposed time slip. 

In both stories we find ourselves questioning the validity of someone’s belief that they unwittingly stepped back into the past.

But what, instead, if we were on the other side and it was us witnessing them arriving miraculously from the future.  How could we possibly believe them?  

Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod

John Titor's alleged military insignia

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Sources

1.    Archive of all things John Titor: John Titor Times, http://www.johntitor.com/

2.    John Titor’s Story, http://www.johntitor.strategicbrains.com/

3.    Dodds, L (2015), Who was John Titor, the time traveller who came from 2036 to warn us of a nuclear war?, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/11945420/Who-was-John-Titor-the-time-traveller-who-came-from-2036-to-warn-us-of-a-nuclear-war.html

S02 Episode 2: Time Out of Joint

It has long been accepted that time as we know it, or at the very least in the sense that we experience it, is not what it seems.  

There are two accounts of alleged time-slips that took place in Britain in the 1950s. Writer and long time member of the society of psychical research Andrew MacKenzie, documented both the events, in his 1997 book Adventures in Time.  For MacKenzie the accounts were nothing less than two of the most convincing accounts he had ever come across.  

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

Kersey, Suffolk

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Sources

1.    Bem, D. J. (2011), Feeling the Future Experimental Evidence for Anomalous Retroactive Influences on Cognition and Affect, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100, p407-425

2.    Fisher, M. (2013), What is Hauntology, Film Quarterly, Vol 66, No.1 (Fall 2012) pp 16-24, University of California Press.

3.    Lehrer, J (2010), Feeling the Future: Is Precognition Possible, Wired, https://www.wired.com/2010/11/feeling-the-future-is-precognition-possible/

4.    Mackenzie, A (1982), Hauntings and Apparitions, Heinemann: London

5.    Koestler, A. (1982), The Ghost in the Machine, Last Century Media: UK

6.    Dash, M (2009), Adventures in Time, Forteana, http://blogs.forteana.org/node/87

7.    Dash, M (2011), When Three British Boys Travelled to Medieval England (Or Did They?), Smithsonian Magazine, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/when-three-british-boys-traveled-to-medieval-england-or-did-they-35698485/

8.    Dunning, B (2012), The Versailles Time Slip, Skeptoid, https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4296

9.    The Wire Salon, panel discussion: Revenant Forms: The Meaning of Hauntology, The Wire, https://www.thewire.co.uk/audio/in-conversation/the-wire-salon_revenant-forms_the-meaning-of-hauntology

S02 Episode 1 Extra: Operation Cone of Power

In last week’s episode, Whispers in the Trees, we looked at the unsettling mystery of the skeleton found inside the hollowed-out trunk of an old Wych Elm tree.  

In 1945, Dr. Margaret Murray suggested a possible occult link to the crime.

As fanciful as the suggestion might sound, it certainly wouldn’t have been the first time that an occult ritual had been conducted in England during the second world war...

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

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Sources

1.    Charters, D. (2004), Was Hitler Defeated by Witchcraft, Meta Religion, http://www.meta-religion.com/Esoterism/Magick/was_hitler_defeated.htm#ixzz4YYxX3pm6

2.    Website dedicated to the history of Gerald Gardner, http://www.geraldgardner.com/

3.    Metcalfe, T (2016), Operation Cone of Power: When British Witches Attacked Adolf Hitler, Mental Floss, http://mentalfloss.com/article/86145/operation-cone-power-when-british-witches-attacked-adolf-hitler

4.    Cone of Power, The Mystica, https://www.themystica.com/mystica/articles/c/cone_of_power.html

S02 Episode 1: Whispers in the Trees pt.2

Early graffiti relating to the Hagley Wood Murder

Part Two of Episode 1: Whispers in the Trees.  

Where we return to the midlands in the winter of 1943 as the Worcestershire police try to unravel the mystery of the skeleton found in an old wych elm tree.

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter at @unexplainedpod

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Sources

1.    Woman’s Body Found in 1943, The Manchester Guardian, Oct 4th 1949.

2.    Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm, Series 7 Episode 4 of Punt PI, written by Steve Punt, BBC (2015).

3.    Sparke, A. (2014), Bella In The Wych Elm: In Search of a War Time Mystery APA Publications: UK

4.    Murray, M. (2010), Margaret Murray, England: The Other Within, http://web.prm.ox.ac.uk/england/englishness-Margaret-Murray.html

5.    Haughton, B (2008), Bella in the Wych Elm, Brian Haughton, http://brian-haughton.com/ancient-mysteries-articles/bella_in_the_wych-elm/3/

6.    Josef Jakobs research website run by granddaughter of Jakobs, http://www.josefjakobs.info/

7.    Strangeremains (2015), Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm?, Strange Remains, https://strangeremains.com/2015/04/24/who-put-bella-down-the-wych-elm/

8.    Vale, A (2013), Is this the Bella in the wych elm? Unravelling the mystery of the skull found in a tree trunk, The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/is-this-the-bella-in-the-wych-elm-unravelling-the-mystery-of-the-skull-found-in-a-tree-trunk-8546497.html

S02 Episode 1: Whispers in the Trees pt.1

Traditionalists consider the real Black Country to only include the region just West of Birmingham where the 30ft coal seam comes to the surface - a product of once living trees, compressed and buried for millions of years, returning to the surface like an irrepressible secret.  

There are some who say the trees can talk, and if they could, what secrets might they hold?

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

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Sources

1.    Woman’s Body Found in 1943, The Manchester Guardian, Oct 4th 1949.

2.    Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm, Series 7 Episode 4 of Punt PI, written by Steve Punt, BBC (2015).

3.    Sparke, A. (2014), Bella In The Wych Elm: In Search of a War Time Mystery APA Publications: UK

4.    Murray, M. (2010), Margaret Murray, England: The Other Within, http://web.prm.ox.ac.uk/england/englishness-Margaret-Murray.html

5.    Haughton, B (2008), Bella in the Wych Elm, Brian Haughton, http://brian-haughton.com/ancient-mysteries-articles/bella_in_the_wych-elm/3/

6.    Josef Jakobs research website run by granddaughter of Jakobs, http://www.josefjakobs.info/

7.    Strangeremains (2015), Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm?, Strange Remains, https://strangeremains.com/2015/04/24/who-put-bella-down-the-wych-elm/

8.    Vale, A (2013), Is this the Bella in the wych elm? Unravelling the mystery of the skull found in a tree trunk, The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/is-this-the-bella-in-the-wych-elm-unravelling-the-mystery-of-the-skull-found-in-a-tree-trunk-8546497.html

Unexplained Halloween Special 2016

Ronald Hunkelar taken from his High School Year Book in 1953

The Exorcist, released on December 26th 1973, is for many the most iconic horror film of all time.  From William Freidkin’s masterful direction, to Blatty’s profound and personal script to the intensely evocative use of Mike Oldfied’s tubular bells, it is a cinematic masterpiece.  

But what many people don’t know is that William Peter Blatty’s nightmarish book, from which the film was adapted, was in fact based on a real life Exorcism.

This is that story.

@unexplainedpod

Unexplained Live at The London Podcast Festival

By 1952, the shadow of the Second World War continued to permeate deep into the fabric of British society.  It had left many people changed and caused significant upheaval to a great many families.  Families like the Glynn and Jones’ of number 1 Byron Street.  

Like most typical working class families of the region, they had little choice but to keep calm and carry on regardless.  But there was nothing that could prepare them for the extraordinary events that were soon to engulf their lives.

What exactly happened at number one Byron Street has never truly been accounted for.  It is an event that has been described as being in one part the most sinister story of poltergeist phenomena in England. 

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

S01 Episode 10 Extra: Who Aiwass

In last week’s episode, The Spaces that Linger, we journeyed to the grounds of Boleskine House on the banks of Loch Ness in the highlands of Scotland. Although the house has long been the subject of dark intrigue, it is best known for its association with author and occultist Aleister Crowley who made a failed attempt to conjure his Guardian Angel at the property.    

Four years later, in Cairo, Crowley claimed to have finally make contact with his Guardian Angel, it was an event that would change his life forever and one that has established Crowley in legend far beyond many of his peers.

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

Research, writing, music and production by Richard MacLean Smith.

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Some interesting links:

(See transcript for full list of sources)

1.    The Wickedest Man In The World, (dir. Rawles, N.), Diverse Productions broadcast on Channel 4 (2002),  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt9WJy6_XZU

2.    Crowley, A. (1969), The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, http://www.thelema.ca, http://www.thelema.ca/156/Confessions/confess.html

3.    MacGregor Mathers, S., L., (comiled by), The Lesser Key of Solomon http://www.hermetics.org, http://www.hermetics.org/pdf/grimoire/goetia.pdf

4.    Crowley, A. (1904), Liber AL Vel Legis – The Book of the Law, http://hermetic.com/legis/ccxx/

5. The Book of Abramelin Wikipedia entry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Abramelin

6. Aleister Crowley Wikipedia entry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley

7. Wallace, D., F., (2005), This is Water - Kenyon College Commencment Speech,

8. Hoff, K. & Pandey, P., (2004), Belief Systems and Durable Inequalities, An Experimental Investigation of Indian Caste, princeton.edu, http://www.princeton.edu/rpds/seminars/pdfs/hoff_indiancaste.pdf

S01 Episode 10: The Spaces That Linger

The world of horror is littered with unnerving locations, places that both draw from and have in turn seeped into the public imagination.

For many there is one place in particular that continues to fascinate like no other in the UK. For its combination of mystery, intrigue and atmospheric location you couldn’t concoct a better setting, the place: Boleskine House.

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod

Research, writing, music and production by Richard MacLean Smith.

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Some interesting links:

(See transcript for full list of sources)

1.    The Wickedest Man In The World, (dir. Rawles, N.), Diverse Productions broadcast on Channel 4 (2002),  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt9WJy6_XZU

2.    Crowley, A. (1969), The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, http://www.thelema.ca, http://www.thelema.ca/156/Confessions/confess.html

3.    MacGregor Mathers, S., L., (comiled by), The Lesser Key of Solomon http://www.hermetics.org, http://www.hermetics.org/pdf/grimoire/goetia.pdf

4.    Crowley, A. (1904), Liber AL Vel Legis – The Book of the Law, http://hermetic.com/legis/ccxx/

5. The Book of Abramelin Wikipedia entry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_Abramelin

6. Aleister Crowley Wikipedia entry, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley

Unexplained Bonus Episode: William, An Origin Story

With Unexplained on a short break until June 16th, here is something to fill the time...

A short story about a strange boy called William.

(Parental Guidance: some scenes of graphic horror)

More info at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and on twitter @unexplainedpod