The Backstory: Reincarnation Stories From the Famous and Not So Famous

Reincarnation is one of those topics that you either believe is a real possibility or you think is nuts. But there are stories with no other easy explanation. They come from both everyday folks, especially little children, as well as some big-name “A” list celebrities.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Have you ever given any thought to reincarnation. I know
it seems kind of hard to grasp the idea that
who you are could actually be transplanted into another body
with a whole different life and a different set of circumstances. Right,
But think about this. What about the mom of a
three year old who told her that in another life
he was a woman who died in a fire. Plus,

(00:22):
there are big names like Henry Ford, General George Patten,
Beatle George Harrison, and author Charles Dickens who were all
believers in reincarnation, and some even told stories of their
past lives. I'm Mattie Steele. Life after Life. That's next
on the backstory. The backstory is back. Does the idea

(00:45):
of reincarnation fascinate you, creep you out? Or maybe a
little bit of both. Let me tell you something. When
I was a really small little girl, maybe four years old,
my brother, who was around six, used to tell stories
that always started with, well, well when I was an
old man in my other life dot dot dot, and
then he'd talk about something he saw or did. My

(01:07):
mom said he actually started telling those stories when he
was just able to talk at two years old. It
wasn't something she encouraged or discouraged. She'd just let him
share and eventually it stopped. But there have been so
many stories from other folks that I wanted to explore
this idea a little bit. Some are incredibly famous personalities
and others just regular folks, often little kids, because researchers

(01:31):
say they're more likely to still be able to access
those kinds of memories. Now this one's going to give
you goosebumps. A young mom, Erica Ruhlman, said her little boy,
five year old Luke, was constantly calling dolls and other
toys Pam. He would also talk about once having been
a girl with black hair and wearing earrings like his
mom wore. So finally Erica asked Luke who PAM was.

(01:56):
He said, I was, well, I used to be, but
I die and I went up to heaven. I saw
God and then eventually God pushed me back down, and
when I woke up, I was a baby, and you
named me Luke. She pressed him for more details, and
Luke told her that when he was PAM, he lived
in Chicago. He took the train a lot, and he

(02:17):
died in a fire in a big building. Then he
made a hand motion as though someone was jumping out
of a window. When Erica googled the facts, she found
a news story about a fire in the Paxton Hotel
in Chicago in March of nineteen ninety three. Nineteen people
were killed in the fire there, including a woman named
Pam Robinson, who died when she jumped out of a window.

(02:41):
Erica said, Luke couldn't have known about the fire in Chicago.
He'd never even been to Chicago, and they had certainly
never talked about it. And another little kid with memories
of another life was James Lininger. He was born in
Louisiana in nineteen ninety eight, and during his whole childhood,
James had recurring nightmares of dying in a plane crash.

(03:01):
By the age of two, he was actually drawing detailed
pictures of World War II fighter planes. Then he kept
repeating the name junior, James, What would you do? Most
parents figured they'd look into it, and they were shocked
when they came up with the name James Houston Junior.
He was a pilot in World War Two who died
in combat in nineteen forty five. James knew everything about

(03:25):
him and had even recreated the insignia on the plane's
wing before they ever came up with the pilot's name. Now,
some people say that in past lives they were iconic
individuals we've all heard of. But here's the thing. There
are also a ton of well known folks you wouldn't
expect to be believers who have stories to tell. Take
founding father Ben Franklin. He famously believed that after death,

(03:49):
the human soul returns in a new body. At the
age of twenty two, he said his life's work would
never be lost because he'd be back in a new
and more elegant addition to revise and correct it, and
at eighty eight he wrote, I look upon death to
be as necessary to the Constitution as sleep. We shall
rise refreshed in the morning, finding myself to exist in

(04:12):
the world. I believe I shall, in some shape or other,
always exist. And Henry Ford, admittedly quite the narcissist, explained
his accomplishment saying genius is experience. Some seem to think
it's a gift or a talent you're just born with,
but it's actually the fruit of long experience in many lives.

(04:32):
In a nineteen twenty eight interview, Ford said, I adopted
the theory of reincarnation when I was twenty six years old.
Neither religion nor work gave me complete satisfaction. Work is
futile if you cannot utilize the experience you collect in
one life in the next. When I discovered reincarnation, it
was as if I had found a universal plan that

(04:54):
gave me a chance to work out my ideas. Time
was no longer limited. Some are older souls than others,
and so they know more. The discovery of reincarnation put
my mind at ease, and I would like to communicate
to others the calmness that the long view of life
can give us. And this guy, General George Patten, maybe

(05:16):
the toughest and most feared general in World War Two,
spoke extensively about his multitude of past lives, almost all
military centric. He claimed to have been a prehistoric mammoth hunter,
a Greek foot soldier, a medieval warrior, and a marshal
for Napoleon, just to name a few. He believed that
after this life he would be reborn to lead armies again.

(05:40):
He wrote poetry and at least one focused on his
past lives. Through a Glass Darkly reads in part so
as through a glass and darkly the age long strife,
I see where I fought in many guises, many names,
but always me. And finally, there's the late Beatle George
Harrison's take on reincarnation. Through his belief in the Hari

(06:03):
Krishna movement and transcendental meditation, he maintained that we could
stop the cycle of reincarnation through spiritual growth. His song
Art of Dying explores that idea. But George did see
the value of rebirth when he said, friends are all
souls we've known in other lives were drawn to each other.

(06:24):
That's pretty beautiful. All these stories, whether spiritual truth or
some kind of neurological trick, remind us of our deep
desire to understand who we are and what essential part
of who we are will last beyond this lifetime. Hope
you're enjoying the Backstory with Patty Steele. Please leave a
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(06:47):
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me if you have a story you'd like me to cover.
On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on Instagram Real Patty Steele.
I'm Patty Steele. The Backstories a production of iHeartMedia, Premiere Networks,

(07:09):
the Elvis Durand Group, and Steel Trap Productions. Our producer
is Doug Fraser. Our writer Jake Kushner. We have new
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at Real Patty Steele and on Facebook at Patty Steele.
Thanks for listening to the Backstory with Patty Steele. The

(07:30):
pieces of history you didn't know you needed to know.