American Hysteria

*Urban Legends Hotline* The inbred cannibal pig people who are said to inhabit Pig Hill in Meadville, PA attack teenagers who park on its lovers lane. But these are far from the only human-pig hybrids featured in American urban legends. For this episode, not only are we sharing different variations of the tale, but we are also digging deep into the weird history of pigs: Puritan bestiality trials, soldier-eating feral swine, hybrid animal experiments, the pigs who ruled the early cities, and what the history of the hog teaches us about suburbanization and the dehumanization of those the elite consider "unclean."If you have an urban legend you'd like us to explore, head to americanhysteria.com and leave us a message!Thank you to our listener Erin Hipple!Thanks to our author Nancy Williams!Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithSound design by Clear Commo StudiosResearch Assistant: Riley Swedelius-SmithVoice acting by Will RogersProducer: Miranda Zickler Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harmony Colangelo is one of the hosts of This Ends at Prom, a podcast that analyzes coming of age teen girl movies through a queer feminist lens, using her perspective as a trans woman and her wife’s experience as a cisgender woman. Today we are discussing the teen boy content of Jackass, how it affected our own journey with gender, how it changed the American culture of masculinity, what it says about Peter Pan Syndrome, and why we can’t get enough of these dirty and delightful boy-men.Listen to This Ends at Prom or wherever you get your podcastsBecome a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is produced and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithEdited by Miranda ZicklerSound design by Clear Commo Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In the year 2000, a group of rowdy skateboarders and loosely defined "performers" came to MTV with a pitch that would showcase their vulgar antics—outrageous stunts, shocking pranks, and gross-out humor. Tweens and teens from all over the nation became enthralled with Jackass, leading to some copycat incidents and a customary moral panic. For this episode, we will be exploring the roots of the show, the shockingly uncensored, purposefully offensive skateboard magazines and videos of the 80s and 90s that brought together the cast, and the death-defying 1970s daredevil who inspired a young Johnny Knoxville to risk it all for the footage. We'll look at what all this has to do with the psychology of Generation X, with our changing patterns of gender and sexuality, and see what meaning, if any, we can find in the meaninglessness of Jackass.Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithSound design by Clear Commo StudiosResearch Assistant: Riley Swedelius-SmithProducer and Editor: Miranda ZicklerVoice Acting by Will Rogers Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode will give context for our upcoming series on Jackass, an early reality show starring a group of skateboarders and unorthodox performers that filmed their stunts and pranks, becoming the outrageous superstars of the new millennium.Episodes used:InfluencersRotten.comHaunted AttractionsThe Streaking CrazeJoin our Patreon for ad-free early episodes and bonus content!This episode was produced by Riley SmithProduced and hosted by Chelsey Weber-Smith Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Blake Pfeil is the host of 'abandoned: The All-American Ruins Podcast,' a multimedia travelogue exploring abandoned spaces across the United States. Together, we discuss what our deep love of these American ruins means, how it relates to queerness, to addiction and recovery, capitalism and politics, and how these spaces can help us recultivate the empathy we need to find solidarity.Listen to abandoned: All-American Ruins wherever you get your podcasts or head to allamericanruins.comBecome a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is produced and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithEdited by Miranda ZicklerSound design by Clear Commo Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

*Urban Legends Hotline* Lauren's story: On a rural road outside Chicago, the ghosts of children killed in a school bus-train collision are said to push cars uphill, off the tracks, and out of harm's way, leaving their handprints in baby powder dusted on the bumper by local legend-tripping teenagers. So we investigated this urban legend, versions of which are told in small towns all over the country, by searching through old newspapers for related historical crashes, and then by unearthing reports of bizarre "mock accidents" that have occurred near Munger Road for decades. I even headed out all by myself to a rural road in Washington State said to be haunted by similar helpful ghosts, to see if there is any truth to this urban legend, or if it's all just an illusion.Listeners like you can now share urban legends from your childhood and if selected, we will investigate your story in depth, sometimes even testing it out ourselves.CW: Train accidents, deathIf you have an urban legend you'd like us to explore, head to americanhysteria.com and leave us a message!Thanks to Lauren and to Nick Smith, check out his film Munger Road on AmazonBecome a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithSound design by Clear Commo StudiosResearch Assistant: Riley Swedelius-SmithProducer: Miranda Zickler Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

For part two of my conversation with Sarah, I finish telling her about a satanic panic era "memoir" published by Chick Publications in the early 1990s which culminates in the author's transformation into a real-life vampire only able to survive by drinking human blood.Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentListen to You're Wrong About wherever you get your podcastsAmerican Hysteria is produced and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithEdited by Miranda ZicklerSound design by Clear Commo Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Over the next two episodes, I tell Sarah the story of another one of Jack Chick's occult experts using his "memoir" published by Chick Publications in the early 1990s which culminates in his transformation into a real-life vampire. We also discuss other memoirs of cultic abuse and participation written during the Satanic Panic and how they contributed to the hysteria.Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentListen to You're Wrong About wherever you get your podcastsAmerican Hysteria is produced and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithEdited by Miranda ZicklerSound design by Clear Commo Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Who was Jack Chick, really? For the final episode in our series we will explore his childhood, his time in WWII, the comic moral panic happening at the beginning of his career, and how it all shaped the nightmarish world he would come to create through his work. We'll explore the negative impacts of his egregious messaging while at the same time looking at how beloved his lurid and campy cartoons have become.Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithSound design by Clear Commo StudiosResearch Assistant: Riley Swedelius-SmithProducer and Editor: Miranda ZicklerVoice Acting by Will Rogers Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An ex-druid grand priest for the illuminati, an undercover Jesuit agent of destruction, a woman married to the devil, and a doctor who battled demons and satanists alongside her – these are the people who brought Jack Chick the life stories he would use to create his tracts, comics, and books. For this episode, we are going to hear their sensational tales, explore their relationships to Jack, and expose both their lies and their crimes.Become a Patron to support our show and get early ad-free episodes and bonus contentAmerican Hysteria is written, produced, and hosted by Chelsey Weber-SmithSound design by Clear Commo StudiosResearch Assistant: Riley Swedelius-SmithProducer and Editor: Miranda Zickler Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices