October 13, 2025 • 56 mins
Every town has its ghosts. For the quiet Colorado mining town of Silver Plume, those ghosts are real people who vanished without a trace.
In this two-part Halloween special of Armchair Historians, host Anne Marie Cannon talks with award-winning filmmaker Eric Walter, whose documentaries explore the unsettling corners of human experience. Walter’s film Dark Side of the Mountain investigates the mysterious disappearance of journalist Keith Reinhard, whose story eerily mirrors that of another missing man, Tom Young—both from the same street, a year apart.
Together, Anne Marie and Eric delve into obsession, synchronicity, and the strange overlap between fact and folklore.
Eric Walter’s previous work includes My Amityville Horror (IFC Films), one of the top festival genre films of 2012. His editing and producing credits span Netflix, Amazon Prime, FX, AMC, and Disney+.
This episode remains one of Armchair Historians’ most-listened stories—perfect for those who like their history with a chill down the spine. 🎧
Today we talk to Eric Walter about the mysterious disappearance of Keith Reinhard in Silver Plume, Colorado.
Eric Walter is an award-winning director, editor, and documentary filmmaker in Los Angeles, known for producing investigative nonfiction films that explore bizarre cold cases, unexplained phenomena, and the dark side of human psychology.
His directorial debut, My Amityville Horror, was named one of the top 10 festival genre films of 2012. The film was distributed theatrically by IFC Films and is currently available on streaming services.
As a lead editor for feature films, docuseries, and commercial advertising campaigns, Eric’s work has spanned across a variety of platforms including Netflix, Amazon Prime, FX, AMC, Disney+ and many others.
He also frequently serves as an expert on the Amityville Horror case, having recently been profiled by networks such as ABC, A&E, and Travel Channel.
Eric’s second documentary feature, Dark Side of the Mountain, is slated for release in 2021.
Follow us on Social Media:
Instagram: @armchairhistorians
Twitter: @ArmchairHistor1
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/armchairhistorians
Support Armchair Historians:
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/armchairhistorians
Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/belgiumrabbitproductions
Buzzsprout - Let's get your podcast launched!
Start for FREE
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Anne Marie Cannon (00:16):
Thank you for joining us today for armchair
historians. I'm your host, AnneMarie Cannon, armchair
historians is a Belgian rabbitproduction. Stay up to date with
us through Facebook, Twitter,and Instagram. Wherever you
listen to your podcast that iswhere you'll find us. You can
also find us at armchairhistorians.com armchair
(00:40):
historians as an independent,commercial free podcasts. If you
would like to support the show,you can buy us a cup of coffee
through cofee or you can becomea subscribing member through
Patreon You can find links toboth in the Episode Notes.
Anyone who knows me knows I am ahuge fan of Halloween. I love
(01:06):
dressing up in scary costumes,watching the classics, the
shining Rosemary's Baby, YoungFrankenstein, etc. So as a lead
up to Halloween, armchairhistorians is celebrating the
mysterious and the spooky withfour special episodes starting
today. Look for special releasemini episodes over the next two
(01:29):
weeks. Today I have a real treatfor you. We're going to be
talking to Eric Walter. Eric isan award winning director,
editor and documentary filmmakerin Los Angeles, known for
producing investigativenonfiction films that explore
bizarre cold cases, unexplainedphenomena and the dark side of
(01:50):
human psychology. hisdirectorial debut, my Amityville
Horror, was named one of the top10 festival genre films of 2012.
The film was distributed thePatrick Lee by IFC Films, and is
currently available on streamingservices. Look for a mini
episode later on this week onEric's experience directing the
(02:14):
documentary as a lead editor forfeature films docu series and
commercial advertisingcampaigns. Eric work has spanned
across a variety of platformsincluding Netflix, Amazon, prime
FX, AMC, Disney plus, and manyothers. He also frequently
serves as an expert on theAmityville Horror case, having
(02:36):
recently been profiled bynetworks such as ABC, a&e and
the Travel Channel. Eric'ssecond Documentary Feature dark
side of the mountain, which isslated for release in 2021.
Today, Eric talks about themysteries and subsequent
unanswered questions behind darkside of the mountain, which
(02:58):
investigates the disappearanceof not one, but two men in the
rocky mountain town of silverplume, Colorado, and the ominous
legacy surrounding their strangedisappearances, which has been
one of Colorado's greatestunsolved mysteries.Eric Walter,
(03:19):
welcome. And thank you for beinghere.
Eric Walter (03:22):
Hi, how you doing?
Anne Marie Cannon (03:24):
Doing good.
We're finally getting a littlerain in that fire Laden, Rocky
Mountains here. So that's nice.
So I start every interview withthe question, what is your
favorite history that we'regoing to be talking about today?
So Have at it tell us about yourfavorite history?
Eric Walter (03:41):
Oh my gosh, Well, I certainly have so many things
throughout history that I'minterested in and passionate
about. But this story of KeithReinhard and Tom young from
silver plume, Colorado, which ofcourse is in Clear Creek County,
nestled in the rocky mountainsof Colorado, and has fascinated
me since I've probably been myGod. It was the early 90s. So I
(04:03):
was a very, very young kid, whosaw an episode of Unsolved
Mysteries profiling the story,and I believe that was in 1990.
So through subsequent re airingsthroughout the years, this story
intrigued me because the storytalks about Keith Reinhart, a
journalist from Chicago, wholeft his job took a sabbatical
(04:26):
from his job at The DailyHerald, which is a Chicago based
suburban Chicago newspaper,where he had worked for 22
years. And he left his job andheaded down to silver plume,
which is a town of about 130people at the time. And he had
been going there for four years,he had a good very good friend
named Ted Parker, who operatedKp cafe there in silver plume on
(04:51):
its main street. He had beenfree. He and Ted were childhood
friends, they had grown upacross the street from each
other and Ted hadbeen operating this cafe and
Keith was just fascinated withthis lifestyle anyone who's
visited silver plume orGeorgetown or anywhere in Clear
Creek County, but especiallysilver plume because it doesn't
embrace its history, the sameway that Georgetown does being
(05:12):
Georgetown embraces a little bitmore of the tourist end of
things. And silver plume, by andlarge. And I know this from
having talked to many, manyresidents there don't want
visitors. They don't want peopleto come trooping through taking
photos and they don't want thetourist trade to be a big part
of that. But Keith wasdetermined to hopefully he you
(05:34):
know, he wanted to set up aresidence. He was corresponding
with his family writing letterstalking about how excited he was
he was there. That summer he wasabout to turn 50. And he was,
as many friends have said he waskind of having a midlife crisis.
Let's say he was a little bitdespondent with a job. He was
(05:58):
overwhelmed with the busytraffic of Chicago, and one of
the simpler lifestyle and aplace where he could start
working on what he said thegreat American novel. Can I just
interject there? I came to themountains here because I live
the next town over from silverplume. You mentioned Georgetown
when I turned 50 that is sowell. That is so interesting.
(06:22):
There's a reason we're talkinghere today. synchronicity. Yeah.
And so I mean, it's and Itotally understand I would love
to move there myself. Because Ithink that was part of what
attracted me to Keith's desirefor silver clue many people's
insight began started working onthis documentary for this
project, or covering this story.
have been, you know, asked mewhy Why are you so interested in
(06:42):
you know, what is it about Keithand his story and I guess I've
just as an artist, myself,understood what he was looking
for it that solitude of themountains and that silver plume
is eerily beautiful. I've alwaystold that's how I tell people
you know, it's a dozen embracethe Torres Strait, as I
mentioned, but it's it'sbuildings are just seemed to be
very everything that has beendesigned there since its heyday,
(07:05):
are, you know, actually twospecks of original silver plume
design. So getting back to thestory, Keith, you know, is very
interested in the town andwanting to write a novel while
he was staying there. He hadtaken a three month leave from
his job from Chicago newspaper,and being a journalist, and
being that he had travelled tothe town for many years.
(07:28):
Subsequent about 10 years. Ithink the first year he gone to
silver flame was in 79. Therewas a gentleman named Tom young
who owned a bookshop on silverplumes Main Street that was
operating at the time, in 1987.
In the Kp building, that was TedParker's building that was the
same building that KeithReinhard was now moving into the
(07:50):
same shop space because Tomyoung, had mysteriously
vanished. Police estimatebetween September 7 to September
9, of 1987. No one's totallysure which day that really is.
And what it makes it even moreeerie is that Tom's birthday
actually was the nineSeptember so which is strange
because Tom was not found for ayear, questions mounted flurry
(08:14):
of questions, people began tospeculate because of Tom young,
his background as a Green Beret,with the Army Special Forces,
his solitude, him living on whathas been called by Ted Parker.
In various articles, we lookedat the dark side of the
(08:34):
mountain, which meant the sideof Pendleton mountain, the
silver plume is kind of wedgedbetween two mammoth mountains
that's republican mountain andPendleton mountain. And
republican has vast miningsilver mining throughout, up and
down its side now, so doesPendleton. But I would say its
theory is very, it's not as muchas the Republican side. But the
(08:57):
town itself is kind of cloakedin shadow for about five months
of the here is what it's beensaid. And because of the way the
sun, you know, that the orbit ofthe Earth and basically it
becomes, you know, casts a longshadow on that side of the
mountain and Tom lived on thisside, and in a frame house, and
had lived there since the early70s. He was a former school
(09:21):
teacher, who taught at WestArvada high. He taught German
because he was stationed in WestGermany in the Army Special
Forces that's I mentioned.
What's curious about this, sowas Keith. But he was in the
Keith was in the Air Force, buthe was in the military. And he
was also in West Germany at thesame time as Tom now, we don't
(09:43):
know each other. Well, that'sthe big question. Look, there
are many, many curiousintersections in the story that
your imagination can connect andsay, Whoa, there might be
something. And that's what'sactually I think so interesting
about this story is becausethere are so many connected
issues but we have no directevidence that they knew each
other at time. But it iscurious. Right? So Tom had gone
(10:07):
missing. He and his dog he had agreat big black lab named Gus.
And Gus was essentially Tom'sbest friend. Gus was a beautiful
black lab. It just was alwayswith him. One of the residents
in town has told us ininterviews that had his name's
Harry Holman who's lived in thetown for many, many years and
(10:28):
silver plume and told us that,you know, Tom was always out
throwing a chewed up doll's headacross the street, and that
Gus would fetch the doll's headand it was just David's just
kind of a quirky, you know,quirky guy who is very friendly
with people, but also very kindof solemn and on his own. I do
(10:50):
want to say that when I firstcame to Colorado, and was going
to move here, I had an apartmentand silver plume, and I was
going to move to silver plume.
So, you know, I don't think youcan state enough how quirky
silver plume is, unfortunately,the guy who I was running the
apartment from took off with mymoney, and I ended up no doubt.
Yeah, it's just, it's the WildWest out there, even though it's
(11:13):
like our squatter town. It'salso part of the Georgetown
silver plume National HistoricLandmark District, which has
over 200 record buildingsbetween Georgetown and silver
plume that are protected fromthe 1800s. Except for when you
come into Georgetown, it lookslike an avant garde mining town.
But when you go into silverplume, it looks like the Wild
(11:36):
West, right?
It does. And you know, I have adeep being that I've worked on
this case for so many years, Ihave a deep love for the town
and its people and reallyunderstand and have grown to
respect their desire for stayinganonymous, which is curious when
you're a documentarian and youwant to go to the town to
(11:57):
research a story and talk topeople, there's kind of a fatal
attraction that some people didnot at all, you know, get a door
slammed in our face, but it was,and I'm getting my head in
myself a little bit because Idon't want to get off our story.
But, you know, I had, it was along process of getting people
to slowly open up and talk butwe'll get into that. But I
totally understand. Yes, silverplume is very rooted in its
(12:20):
history. That again, I've grownto respect that and respect, you
know, the people in the town whohave been so gracious with me.
Anne Marie Cannon (12:28):
I will say that it's quite a feat, that you
have been able to ingratiateyourself in silver plume with so
many people. I mean, they just Ithink like what you said they
just want their privacy and tokeep the town the way it is
respected. And well
Eric Walter (12:44):
in these days, you know, you can understand I mean,
there's so everything is one ofthe gentlemen when I my first
trip there told me I don't gonear the freeway. I wish I was
rolling camera when he saidthat, but it's very interesting.
you not go near so but anyway,getting back to the story. So
Tom young, he had been missingfrom September of 87, all the
(13:05):
way until July 31 of 1988. AndKeith had moved to the town and
moved in, he opened a littleantique shop in that vacated
bookstore. That was Tom Young'sbookstore in the KT building
empty space. So Keith wasworking in this shop. He was
writing stories about some ofthem based on himself, some of
(13:28):
them based on friends of his hewas kind of having fun with it
in kind of manipulating people'snames. There's a gentleman who
just recently passed away alegend in the town, George
downing that Keith changed thename and they just named George
uping and one of the stories andso Keith was kind of a you know,
a quirky, artistic, reallybrilliant person. I mean, I've
(13:54):
gotten to I feel like I know theman even though I've never
obviously met him but haven'tgotten to know him so well
through his writings and youknow, rifling through just boxes
and boxes. You wouldn't believethe poetry he's written and
handwritten letters and hisfamily has been so open and
giving with with the process ofme researching the story, but he
(14:14):
started writing about Tom youngand his disappearance and had
created this fictional characternamed guy gypsum, which there's
a little town you know, if youkeep going on the 70, past Clear
Creek County, there's a towngypsum, gypsum, Colorado, which
we theorize might have been thereason he decided to name him
(14:37):
guide gypsum but so guide gypsumwas kind of a composite
character of himself, you know,character traits of himself
Keith and of Tom. I mean, mostwriters write from experience,
right. And so I was reallyfascinated with that end of it
because this gentleman Keith waswriting about this person who
(14:58):
disappeared July 31 1987, to bowhunters were up in the mountains
on Sherman mountain, which ispast republican going towards
Empire. And they were on thesoutheast side of the mountain.
And it's pretty open up thereactually, if you've ever hiked
(15:20):
up there, but there was a smallpatch of trees, and they came
upon the remains of Tom youngand his dog Gus, they had bet
both been shot in the head.
There was a gun found in thescene.
There were remnants of a greentarp on the scene that were
shredded. It's theorized bypolice who determined that it
(15:43):
was a suicide, Tom had coveredhimself with a tarp. And the
animals had done the rest. Now,what's so curious about it,
though, is why was he covered ingreen tarp? Now, obviously, Tom,
wanted to disappear. He didn'twant to be found if he had gone
all the way up there to killhimself and cover him with a
essentially a green tarp thatwould blend in with the terrain.
(16:09):
Then, you know, I guess thatmakes sense. But it was curious.
There were question marks. Sothat week, like I mentioned,
that was 31st of July 1987.
Seven days later, Keith Reinhardleft his shop, there had been a
huge party in silver plume atthe Kp building where he was,
you know, he had a shop wherethere had been it said to be
(16:32):
100 150 people in the town, somepeople said, 300, but you know
how these stories get going. Wedon't really know how many but
we've talked many people whowere there and by and large, it
was a huge gathering. And whenthere are 150 people in silver
plum, even though it'spopulation, you inject more
people, you know, you're goingto know because it's a very
small town. So yeah, there was aparty there. Keith, by all
(16:55):
accounts, some people said hewas drunk. Some people said he
was just buzz, some people saidhe's just having fun. But Keith
was notorious for drinking, andhaving a good time and love to
party, and had been kind oftalking to everyone and about
it's alleged Tom young and hisinterest in talking to people
that were there at the at the Kpbuilding at the party. The next
(17:18):
day, he which was August seventhof 88. That was a Sunday. He
around five in the evening, fourto five in the evening,
announced to numerous people intown that he was going to hike
the face of Pendleton mountainthat he was going to do it quote
(17:39):
unquote, Chicago style, whichmeans straight up, bushwhacking.
No trip because there are notrails on Pendleton mountain.
I've hiked the mountain lookingfor Keith myself many times with
other crews that have worked onthis but so Keith would go
around, he went to some peoplehe knew some people were
acquaintances of his some peoplehe didn't know, like a gentleman
(17:59):
named stormy Culp, who owns agarage there right outside of
town. He was one of the lastpeople to see Keith. And Keith
just came by and said, I'm goingup there and was telling him on
purpose pointing saying I'mgoing up there. And, you know,
it's around five o'clock and whystorm is even told us, you know,
why was he telling me you know,I don't know the guy. It was
(18:22):
almost in people theorized thatit was very, you know, poignant
that Keith was making such apoint of telling all these
people that he was going up tothis destination. And the point
is, is that many people in thetown, were telling him not to go
that, hey, it's way too late.
Tonight,
Anne Marie Cannon (18:38):
he goes hiking starts a hike like that
at 430 in the afternoon. That'ssomething you do in the morning.
That's really bizarre.
Eric Walter (18:47):
That's right. And it's very strange that you know,
and what's even stranger is thathaving gotten to know his
family, you know, I'veinterviewed his former wife,
Austria, you know, the mother ofhis children and his kids that
even said he knew this, that hewould warn when they would go on
trips, hiking trips before Keithhad hiked various mountains. And
(19:08):
he was he was Rocky Mountainsobsessed. Right. At the same
time. There's been other peoplein town that said that Keith had
a heights phobia. And Keith evenwrote letters to his family
saying that he saw the mountainas a challenge that he had this
that he had been up there withTed Parker and Ted Parker, we've
(19:28):
interviewed as well also saidthat he had been up on the
mountain and that Keith did, youknow they were, they were into
an area where they couldn't evensee each other hear each other.
And at one point, Keith wasclinging to a tree with both
arms because he was soterrified. Now, this had
happened allegedly a week or twoprior to this infamous July or
(19:52):
I'm sorry, August 7, when hedecided to take this crazy hike.
So you know, five o'clock in theevening, and one of the Last
things that he said to TedParker before he left his cafe
that day, which was if I don'tcome back, send out the search
party. So they did send out thesearch party the next day when
Keith hadn't returned. Ted wentlooking for him and he you know,
(20:16):
had even with a son a driven upto Ted sun and emcell they had
driven to the base dependencemountain and shouting up into
the darkness for him. Nothing.
Next day, they left a note inthe key with staying in the
little church. That's right nextto the Kp building. It's a
beautiful Catholic Church, St.
Patrick's Catholic church. AndKeith was staying in the in the
(20:40):
loft, which was the back wherehe was doing all his writing.
Ted left a note for him, Keith,call me. I'm going to call the
sheriff if you're not home by,you know, certain time. Well, he
did call the sheriff and thesheriff deployed the Alpine
rescue team. And subsequentlyAlpine rescue team deployed
various other teams because thisterrain, and many people don't
(21:01):
understand many people fromChicago, especially did not they
said oh, they can find him. It'sno problem. This terrain is is
seriously it's bushwhackingisn't even the word for it. I
mean, it's it's extremely thickwith heavy vegetation, decades,
hundreds of years of foliage,you can easily if you were
(21:21):
injured fall somewhere withinthat terrain and never be found.
And I wish it was that easy, youknow, because we could all draw
it up to being just well keepwent up there and there was an
accident. And I will say thatmost of you know and i being a
documentary filmmaker, I reallyvalue objectivity. And not
(21:42):
giving my opinion too much. AndI will say that the film itself
is is not one that does have myopinion in it as everyone else's
opinions are what make itinteresting. And it's third act
because there are so manyopinions, but I will say that so
everyone knows that.
If I had to choose what happenedto Keith, I do think he's on the
mountain. I think he saw themountain as a challenge and he
(22:03):
went up there to conquerwhatever fear he had now why he
did it at five o'clock and whyhe told people finally come back
send out the rest, you know callthe rescue team is curious, a
lot of people and so bloom foundthat very, very strange
seriously. Most people in silverplume think that Keith stage
(22:25):
this disappearance that he wasunhappy with his life, he was
unhappy about the turn 50. Atthe time, Keith was married to
Carolyn Reinhard, his wifeCarolyn, now his widow is said
very little since he wentdisobey, you know, he
disappeared since then. But she,you know, she came out to silver
(22:48):
plume the following week, whilethey were searching for Keith,
this search was massive. I mean,hundreds of people. It grew and
grew throughout the days, therewere hundreds of people
searching for Keith on Pendletonmountain. And in fact, there
were other side republicanmountain they were sending
search and rescue members fromCalifornia from various other
(23:09):
states that were deployed. Andthey were there to try to find
any scrap of evidence possible.
What's so interesting aboutthis, though, is the police, of
course, went into keys computerwhich was in the church and
began looking into what Keithwas writing. And Keith had been
writing this as I mentioned,this guy gypsum story. I don't
want to give away everythingthat was in it because for the
(23:32):
first time, the the documentarythat I'm making about this film
is going to include the text ofthis, four pages that you know,
there were many stories in casecomputer but the one he was
reading about Tom, he apparentlyhad written it was dated he had
written in the week that Tom wasfound that you know, this seven
day period. He had written itduring that time, which is
(23:54):
curious because throughout itstext Keith the guy gypsum
references suicide as being theright thing as being the right
decision. The story takes placewith many similarities to Tom
Young's life, talking about himliving on the dark side of the
mountain talking about himliving in a frame house with his
(24:16):
dog, he would change like hechanged the name of the town to
white flume instead of silverplume and he would change all
these things but guy gypsum andthere are things in there that I
can't really totally get into.
But the final final paragraphstalk about guy gypsum
(24:36):
understanding Tom's motivationand deciding to put on his
hiking boots, put on a flannelshirt, and that he understood
Tom now and his motivation. Guyclosed the door and walked off
to the lush shadowless Coloradoforest above which is of course
(25:00):
What Keith did the day that hedisappeared Now many people have
read into this and and ofcourse, the the, you know, the
sheriff's office, clipper CountySheriff's Office, took this into
account and began looking, youknow, developing some sort of
psychological profile of key.
Was he despondent himself, washe suicidal? Why was why did he
go again at five o'clock and goaround and announced this hike,
(25:22):
it made no sense. Someone wouldhave to be they thought, crazy
or suicidal to want to dosomething like that. So during
this mission, this search andrescue mission, there was,
unfortunately, a terrible planecrash, Civil Air Patrol plane
pilot pilot named Terry legends,and the spotter, Don drove me
(25:45):
crashed into the side ofPendleton mountain. And Terry
Lenin's sadly was killed in theplane crash that was the pilot.
And this was on the fifth day ofthe search. And Don drove he
survived. Yes. And you know,that raises the stakes of this
entire story, because now wehave a death on our hands. And
(26:07):
again, I may have been gettingahead of myself a little bit,
but this previous eventmentioning silver plumes, the
town the residents belief thatKeith staged his disappearance,
because, hey, now there's adeath attributed to this search
for me. Some people havetheorized that Keith, having
read the paragraphs that hewrote this story that he wrote
about guide gypsum that he wentup there to try to find
(26:30):
inspiration for what Tom did, togo missing and to put themselves
in TOMS shoes or guide ships andshoes. And then after he had
staged his own disappearance,that he couldn't come back
because this had happened.
Obviously, you know, that
Anne Marie Cannon (26:46):
there's a lot of theories. I was reading some
of the different boards thismorning. One guy said that he
lives in Utah, and then he'sseen them. He's older buddy, you
know, looks the same. Oh, youwouldn't believe
Eric Walter (26:59):
I've had various since we've started this so many
people. And I love that andagain, and if anybody's
listening to this now, pleasesend any tips because look, even
though my theory is that Keithis dead somewhere up on that
mountain, because obviously,still to this day, he has never
been found. If there are any youknow, if anyone has any tips or
any any, you know, photos,anything you think, maybe Keith
(27:22):
Reinhard, if you know of hislocation alive or dead, please
send that into us. And you canreach us at dark side doc.com,
which I think is a good seguebecause obviously, I am a
documentary filmmaker. And I'vebeen fascinated with the story.
And this has been something thatI essentially was haunted by
(27:42):
just having seen a 12 minutesegment on Unsolved Mysteries as
a young kid, and there was very,very little explanation or, you
know, the theories were really Imean, looking at what we've done
was very watered down.
Anne Marie Cannon (27:54):
Well, I have a question, are we going to find
out things that we don't know?
Is there Oh, my gosh,information coming out in the
documentary?
Eric Walter (28:03):
Yes, the documentary is is entitled dark
side of the mountain based on aline from Keith's guide, gypsum
story. And and obviously, that'swhere Tom young lives on the
dark side of the mountain onPendleton mountain. Now, yes,
there are many things thatrevelations let's say of this
case, obviously, we and we havetried to find Keith ourselves
(28:26):
for many years. I mean, I I havebeen working on this. For six
years, we have been working onthis, as many documentaries take
a very long time. But we havebeen. We have been visiting
silver plume multiple times ayear. I'm here I'm based in Los
Angeles. And after I shot anddirected by first feature,
(28:48):
became just, I just had to go tosilver plume. I wanted to go
there. I wanted to know moreabout this story and visited the
town. And like I said, it beganthat slow, arduous process of
talking to people slowlyingratiating ourselves into
silver plumes community and itwas not an easy thing. And you
start a documentary like thiswith a set of intentions, right?
You're interested in the storyand gray it's captivating
(29:11):
missing persons case and whetherthe two are linked or related.
And obviously those things aretotally covered in the film in
complete depth more thananything is ever done. And all
theories are presented. Youknow, there's been a lot out
there talk about online and TVand stuff that only show a
fraction of the kind ofsensational end of the story. We
have covered every base. Infact, we have found people that
(29:34):
the police have never found. Sothere are things that are going
to come out in this that aregoing to change the entire
paradigm of the case. There arethere are so many aspects of
this and I might want to stopthere so you can get a question.
Anne Marie Cannon (29:47):
That was great. I heard about the story
from my friend Frank young, whocoincidentally is not related to
Tom young, but lives in the samehouse as Tom young. I think he
came here afterwards after Tomdisappeared if I'm not mistaken,
Tina's right. Okay?
Eric Walter (30:05):
Yes, I did. Yeah.
And I know Frank as well. Weworked with him on the
documentary and such a nicegentleman. He was so gracious
with allowing us to use hisproperty. I don't believe that.
And I, he can correct me if I'mwrong. But I don't recall if he
knew Tom young or not, I don'tthink we ever even got to talk
to him about it.
Anne Marie Cannon (30:23):
I don't think he did. And I think he maybe
bought the house after Tomdisappeared, is it? I'll ask him
because I'm interviewing himthis Friday, we're going to be
talking about the history ofhomesteading in the western
United States. So it should befascinating. Oh, that is
fascinating. Yeah. It's funnyhow this is kind of linked. So
Frank told me about it. And it'salways been that thing I've
(30:45):
always been curious about. And Ithink about it every now and
then. You know, I love silverplume. I have friends that live
in silver plume. It's a greatplace. The people, they're
really good. They like theirprivacy. There is a new energy
coming in now, because there area couple of new businesses there
the bread bar, I don't know ifyou went there or not.
Eric Walter (31:05):
Oh, absolutely.
Anne Marie Cannon (31:07):
So things are slowly kind of changing. But
we'll see. We'll see whathappens. Well,
Eric Walter (31:13):
we certainly we've certainly gotten the the old
guard, let's say in the film,who were there at the time at
the epicenter of the story. Infact, like I mentioned, George
downing, we interviewed Georgedowning before it's passing.
We've gotten numerous people whowere there and knew both Tom and
Keith. But also it should bementioned, too, that silver
plumes history is rich with oddincidents and dark history.
(31:39):
Yeah, afterwards, silver miningdays. There's the story of
Clifford Griffin, who was abrother of mine owner, heneage
Griffin, who you know, lived inGeorgetown, but own the 730
mine, the Griffins had come overfrom England, and Clifford
Griffin, the brother had beenvery also a very solemn and
(32:00):
depressed character, and hadcommitted suicide in a cabin up
on, you know, near the 730 mine.
But over time, the story'schanged. And as these things do,
folklore gets started, thestories of Clifford Griffin went
from suicide, to whispers ofmurder, and to conspiracy and to
ghost stories. And it justchanged over time and
(32:24):
snowballed. And what's sofascinating what part of my
documentary dark side of themountain illustrates very
heavily is, today, we're seeingthe same thing happening with
Tom young and Keith Reinhardt'scase, which has been
intertwined. I admit, I wasinterested in that link of Tom
and Keith. And, obviously,that's what drew me there. But
then when I got interested andtalked with the people in silver
(32:47):
plume, there's so much there aswell. So it's a little bit about
all of that. It's aboutfolklore, it's about loss. For
the family's perspective, it'sabout the unknown. And it's a
little bit about the humanpsychological aspect of needing
answers when there are noanswers. Sometimes you create
your own conclusions when noneexists. You know, it's it's a
(33:08):
very fascinating story. And it'sjust because we have just a huge
archive of opened up to us sograciously by the Reinhard
family who my crew and I havebecome so close with the process
of this many years of makingthis documentary. After my first
trip to silver plume, I foundout that Tiffany Brian Hart, as
(33:29):
Keith's daughter worked down thestreet from me at the time. So
I, you know, emailed her and wedidn't write, right, so we ended
up getting, you know, gettinglunch, and the rest is history.
So it's those types of thingsthat just the stars align,
Anne Marie Cannon (33:45):
how long have you been working on the
documentary?
Eric Walter (33:47):
Well, as I mentioned, it's been five to six
years of work, physical work onthe dock. Much of that was spent
in preliminary interviews,talking with people getting to
know the people in the town, asI mentioned, many poor people in
Chicago and with the DailyHerald, and those people were
immediately gracious,immediately open and wanting to
(34:09):
talk, but there was the aspectof, we found, for instance, Tom
Young's life, that even still tothis day is still clouded in
mystery. And but we
Anne Marie Cannon (34:19):
did Tom had family he
Eric Walter (34:20):
did at the time, his mother, his mother, and his
stepfather is still alive.
They've since passed. There aresome distant cousins that I've
been able to locate, but noclose family that's still
around. Sadly, he was a very, Iguess, as I said, solemn
character. And it is verycurious that he did disappear on
his birthday, or close to hisbirthday. And if he did kill
(34:43):
himself, you know, it'sincredibly sad and there's been
many theories. Often his deathgets overshadowed out shine by
Keith's bizarre disappearance,but just to look at Tom for a
minute. There are so manytheories about what happen with
him, you know, again, my opinionis that I think it was a
suicide. There are some strangecoincidences and weird things
(35:05):
about it as well. Well, he
Anne Marie Cannon (35:09):
was agreeing already. And that's pretty right
for all kinds of imagine, well,
Eric Walter (35:14):
people, this is where the snowball gets started,
people in the town startedtalking about the after he had
disappeared. And before he hadbeen found, they were saying
that maybe he was a spy and hadbeen killed for his knowledge.
Maybe he was get killed by drugdealers or something. And then
the top tier of this wholeconspiracy people email me all
the time about this. And it iscovered in the documentary. But
(35:37):
this is kind of one of thesetheories that has kind of
latched itself on to the storyis the whole issue of Rocky
flats, the former nuclear wastefacility in Rocky flats,
Colorado that in is sure, youknow, in 1989, was a raid that
went there, and it was shut downby the federal government for,
(35:59):
you know, illegal waste dumpingfor illegal practices, there
have been rumors and whispers ofillegal toxic waste, being
dumped into buying shafts andClear Creek county and other
places just to get rid of it bythe plant. There also had been
actual fact that rocky flats,employees, who had acted as more
(36:23):
as whistleblowers to what wasgoing out going on before it had
been exposed, they had come outand started talking about it to
the press were threatened,sometimes they were threatened
with death. And so people havetheorized over time, that Tom
Young was an environmentalist,and that he had witnessed some
(36:43):
of this illegal dumping that wasgoing on in the area being that
he lived in a in a remote areaof silver plume, that he was
killed for his knowledge of thisthis illegal dumping operation.
Now, I will say I, I speak onthis subjects with a bit of
skepticism, because it is alittle bit more of like the
(37:04):
Roswell theory of the Reinhardcase, Reinhard young case, if
you want to combine the two oreven just the young case, it
really is very, because somepeople have said that keeps
disappearance is because of therocky flats situation to they
keep was going to uncover thisdumping operation. And, you
know, it takes a bit ofstretching your mind to make
this fill the void. But what isfascinating about it is we
(37:29):
actually have found some thingsand I won't give away what they
are attributed to this theorythat make it something that you
can't completely write off.
There are some exclusive thingsthat are going to be in the
documentary that are veryinteresting with some things
that Keith actually wasresearching, and was saying and
telling people at a time that'srelated to this incident that
(37:50):
has never been revealed before.
It is, as I mentioned, one ofthese things that it's very
fascinating. It's certainly themost conspiratorial, and as I
alluded to, with the gypsumstory, shifting gears is many
people thought that Keithcommitted suicide as well that
he was mimicking Tom's method ofdisappearing.
Anne Marie Cannon (38:16):
Did he have a gun? I mean, did he have a gun
on this person, or myunderstanding is he had nothing.
And if somebody who is sayingI'm going up there, they would
have noticed if he was back in,
Eric Walter (38:28):
by all accounts keep was wearing worn out white
sneakers, a black and redflannel shirt, and jeans, and
carrying a can of pop. Andthat's it. They're why anyone
would leave at five o'clock withno supplies and a can of soda.
(38:50):
Just says to me that and likehis family believes again, I
don't want to speak for them.
But it certainly his his son,and his his ex wife and
everyone's talking to me as theybelieve that he was just playing
to take a walk that he wasn'tgoing to go all the way up
there. You know, there's no waymany of them don't think that he
went that somebody intervenedand prevented him from going up
there. They feel that it was amurder some of them
Anne Marie Cannon (39:16):
and must be really hard for the family to
know I can't even imagine thatto not know what happened and
all the different ideas andthings and wondering and there's
no resolution.
Eric Walter (39:29):
That's right. And you know, again, the the film is
so heavily focused on that and iand i should mention about Tom
Young's death. The scene, whichthere are photographs of the
scene in the dock in thedocumentary, most of the remains
were gone. his skull was layingright next to the body of Gus.
(39:50):
Both were just skeletal remainsthere was a gun right next to
the skull there were tattered,you know clothing and tattered
tarp as I mentioned, there wasan open Bullet box with the
shells all over the ground, likesomeone had just in a backpack
or red backpack had been takenup there. And a mat which at the
time according to news reportsand things people who knew Tom
(40:12):
found it curious as he knew heknew the mountain so well, why
why would he need the map butwho knows you need to have map
in his backpack, but he hadbought the gun, Tom young had
purchased the weapon. Somepeople have said that Tom
definitely committed suicide.
Some people find it interestingthat the night before he
disappeared, he went to thegrocery store and purchased
frivolous items like trash bags,and food and all the normal
(40:35):
things just the night before.
And then suddenly he askedhimself, I don't know, maybe
maybe that could be part ofthrowing the track
Anne Marie Cannon (40:46):
because even though they found his body,
there's still questions. And Iread somewhere that they
couldn't connect the bulletswith the gun. And I think it's
because the gun was it had beenout in the elements for so long.
And it
Eric Walter (40:59):
my you'll, you'll see in the film that we actually
have footage of it, we were ableto get the sheriff's office to
bring that out of the evidence,the actual spent bullet, which
is the only thing that's stillin evidence, unfortunately, this
is to great frustration of ourteam, I assume for storage
reasons and the you know,because it's the guard is turned
(41:20):
over there. There's very fewpeople at the sheriff's office
that were there at the time.
Rick Albert's who's the currentSheriff was he was on the scene
actually. And I know that onlybecause it's written in Dave
down hours report. That's thedetective date down Hauer, who
covered both young and reinartzcases that Eric Albert's was
there. Don Krueger, the formerSheriff was there. I don't know
how many years you've been inGeorgetown. But okay.
Anne Marie Cannon (41:45):
But I do know a lot about the history. The
people you've talked about i ithink you interviewed the
registers. They're like theroyalty of silver plume. Gary,
Eric Walter (41:56):
so I definitely Gary is a wonderful, wonderful
person. So he has been immenselyhelpful and loyal to us. And I
can't thank him enough for that.
And, and that goes to the sameamount of people. And like I
said, You know, I know that thisstory. Many people as I
mentioned in silver plume, whenthey even hear the name Keith
Reinhard, they roll their eyesbecause they think that it's
brought all this attention tothe town, we have not been a fly
(42:17):
by night operation. You know,there's so many TV shows and
things that come in and justcome in in a weekend or three
days and they're gone. And theytry to make something we've
spent so much time trying to geteverything. And as I mentioned,
there's some things I don't wantto give away. But there are some
subjects in this film that arecompletely have never been heard
from before. that are going tobe even a shock to even the
(42:39):
sheriff's office.
Anne Marie Cannon (42:41):
I do want to say that before I came on. I
watched half of my AmityvilleHorror. Haha,
Unknown (42:47):
yeah. Uh huh.
Anne Marie Cannon (42:48):
So you're you are I you know, I love the
cinematography. And that, by theway, it was beautiful.
Eric Walter (42:55):
So excited. Dark side is even better. So I've
gotten even better since I didthat.
Anne Marie Cannon (43:01):
Look, looking forward to that. But yeah, so I
did start I hadn't seen it yearsago, but I just started watching
it again, because I knew I wasgonna going to be talking to
you.
Eric Walter (43:11):
Right, are you gonna appreciate that?
Anne Marie Cannon (43:13):
Well, let's just kind of finish up with the
silver plume. The Reinhard storyin documentary, when is the
documentary coming out.
Eric Walter (43:23):
So we are currently obviously with the challenges we
had intended, ASAP this yearwith the challenges of COVID in
the industry right now. And sowe are working on it. Basically,
it's still ASAP but my previousfor so for my Amityville Horror,
we traveled internationally, wehad, you know, a real premiere
in our US premiere and Europeanpremiere, and all of that, you
(43:45):
know, the typical premiereprocess, and then we go and do
the rounds at festivals. And wehave full intention of doing
that with dark side of themountain. However, given the
challenges of the pandemic,right now, obviously, theater
capacities, and all of that havebeen shuttered. It's definitely
thrown us and obviously theentire industry for a loop. So
(44:05):
we are right now looking atother options. And that includes
possibly going straight tostreaming and then going to
Netflix to prime these types ofthings immediately prior to our
festival run. But we will seeobviously, your premiere matters
very much in these in thesewhole scenarios. So it's you
know, where you premiere and ifyou've already shown online,
(44:27):
sometimes you can't show at acertain festival premiere status
and all the rest of it. So itthere's a lot of talk right now
internally and with our team.
And well, I will say just sopeople know, the film has been
completed in editorial, and thatwe are talking about strategy
for the best strategy of get thefilm out there ASAP. And so
we're tremendously excited forpeople to see this. And you
know, we've kept the cap on thisthing for many, many years. And
(44:49):
I'm very excited to finallyuncapped this for the world to
see.
Anne Marie Cannon (44:57):
Wow, I'm really excited about this, and
I'm thrilled that you took timeout to talk to me about it. And
I would like to talk a littlebit more about who you are and
about your background. And
Eric Walter (45:07):
yeah, absolutely.
I'm a good question. You know,I'm originally from Maryland, as
many filmmakers do grew upmaking, you know, short films
and documentaries, as you know,as a child, with always with an
interest in unsolved mysteriesand unexplained phenomena. As I
got older and began working inbroadcast and television back
east until I moved to LosAngeles in 2008. began were, you
(45:29):
know, basically working up theranks and working mainly in
editorial. During that time, Iwas contacted by a gentleman
named Danny Lutz, who was theson of the Lutz family from the
infamous Amityville Horror case.
And that is a whole nother longstory that I won't be able to
(45:50):
completely tell here. But I hadalso been very, very interested
in that story in that case, andit started a website Amityville
files.com, which right now, it'sonly a shell of itself back in
the day was a little bit morethorough, and I haven't up kept
it as much as since I've beenworking on this Reinhard thing.
But it was popular back, youknow, and I was frequenting the
(46:10):
boards and things and you know,as a teenager, in my early 20s,
you know, was contacted by thisgentleman, Danny Lutz, who was
the oldest son of that familywho lived there for 28 days, and
then fled and left everythingthat they owned inside the
house. And, you know, prior totheir family living there, there
had been a series of, you know,mass murder in the house at the
(46:31):
failed family. The oldest sonRonald defeo, Jr, who was 23 at
the time had dispatched his momand dad, his sisters, his
brothers inside the house on twofloors of the house without any
neighbors hearing anything. Allthe bodies have been found
facedown in their beds, someshot in the head most in the
back and hit had beenunexplained how no one had heard
(46:54):
a 35 Marlin rifle going offballistics was able to determine
there was no silencer used onthe weapon. So the round three
in the morning this gun is goingoff killing all these people. No
one gets up no one runs verystrange the Lutz family moves in
after Ronnie's convicted youknow that would have been in
(47:14):
December of December 18 and 1975and they stayed for 28 days and
since then it's the story hasblown up into a massive as we
all know I sub genre inHollywood.
Anne Marie Cannon (47:27):
I think what I'm going to do is this part
that we're talking about myAmityville Horror, I might clip
and put more towards Halloween.
Oh, that's okay. And then I canlink out to your you know,
whatever. I'll be your Hey,
Eric Walter (47:42):
you're welcome.
You're welcome to I'm Welcome tojump back on with you if you
want to do an entire Amityvilleepisode I would be more than
happy to do that with youbecause we haven't even talked
about what they said happened.
Anne Marie Cannon (47:54):
We are going to table that discussion for
now. But stay tuned for therelease of a mini episode later
this week, in which Eric and Idiscuss his experiences making
my Amityville Horror.
Eric Walter (48:12):
Well, you know, it's uh, I remember telling
my producer friend who came withme to my first trip and silver
plume. And I hate to say thisabout the silver plume, because,
you know, it's such a beautifultown and but I said that the
whole notion of a stigmatizedproperty, right. And while there
were no murders in the Kpbuilding, which was Ted Parker,
(48:35):
you know, formally Ted Parker'swhen we first began shooting, he
still owned the building. He is,like you mentioned, there's been
kind of an influx of youngerpeople in the town. Now. At that
time, there was a little bit,the bread bar was opening, it's
still kind of, at the very tailend of it's the older phase. The
Kp building was always kind ofthis, you know, even seeing on
(48:56):
unsolved mysteries and seeingpictures of it. You know, this
is the building where Tom had astore and Keith that his store,
not to say it was sinister, butit looks spooky. You know, it's
this old. It's this old, youknow, beautiful, mind you but
very old storefront. It'sactually I believe two buildings
put together it's a false front.
And that was originally in adifferent location that was put
together in that location. Iknow Ted Parker, it
Anne Marie Cannon (49:20):
paler doesn't help be there that brown, you
know, have any color. If theyslide the paint paint on it. I
think it might look a littledifferent.
Eric Walter (49:29):
I know that the current the current owner, or
owners, certainly have embracedthe Reinhardt story. They seem
to be, you know, open to talkingabout it, which is great. I
mean, again, you know, I don'tknow what the consensus will be
after dark side of the mountainreleases and start streaming,
but it will be fascinating tosee you know, what kind of
(49:49):
effect it has on I I hope thatit doesn't have an effect on the
town. Ted Parker told us that,after Unsolved Mysteries aired
was subsequently in syndication.
Would air ever throughout the90s and it would go in reruns in
early 2000s. And things thatpeople would come back to the
town and say there's thebuilding that there is there is
talking about Ted. Ted certainlyhas been very reluctant to
(50:11):
speak. I mean, we were extremelylucky to speak to him. Very,
very limited. He did speak to usand Ted was very, very gracious
and certainly one of Keithreinartz. They were they were
best friends. And as Imentioned, they grew up across
the street from each other. isover Deerfield, Illinois, in
(50:31):
Deerfield, Illinois.
Anne Marie Cannon (50:35):
I was wondering about that, okay.
Yeah,
Eric Walter (50:37):
yeah. Ted had gotten divorced, had been
formally moved to Boulder, gotdivorced and then moved out to
silver plume where he hadpurchased the Kp building and
renovated itself from fromscratch and filled it with
antiques, you know, whenever helets up, which is fine. Is there
Anne Marie Cannon (50:57):
a coffee shop? There was a coffee shop in
there? Yeah. Wasn't there?
There's a
Eric Walter (51:00):
there's a coffee a plume coffee shop there now?
Yeah.
Anne Marie Cannon (51:04):
Yeah. I've been to that quite a few times.
I don't know if they're openright now because of COVID or
not.
Eric Walter (51:10):
I believe they are.
I think I've seen on theirsocial that they are still
operating. Yeah. So yeah, Ievery now and then. I haven't
been there this year because ofjust everything going on. But
well, because the film has beencompleted. I I haven't had a
need to go back right away. Iwill be back I'm sure very soon.
But yeah, I know. It's abeautiful building. There were
(51:30):
different groups, fraternitiesthat operated in that, you know,
the Knights of pythias. I hopethat silver plume is able to,
for the next century continue topreserve its history, because
it's it's really just what makesit stand out in so many
different ways. More than thebizarre story we're talking
about today. There's so muchmore history to the town. It's
(51:52):
just absolutely fascinating. Andcertainly, even beyond the
Clifford Griffin story, thereare other ghost stories and
other weird incidents that areworth looking up attributed to
silver plume. Yeah. And toGeorgetown, Idaho springs.
Right.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:10):
Well, uh, one more question. And then it will
jeweler goodbye. But um, well,two more? Is there anything that
we didn't talk about that youwanted to talk about?
Eric Walter (52:20):
There's plenty of other things I want to say. But
maybe we should do a anotherchat after the after you've
gotten to see the film. Okay.
And then we can we can maybetalk again, but because there's
gonna be a lot that comes out. Ithink after that about.
Hopefully Keith comes out, butwe'll see.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:40):
Oh, that would be nice. That would be
really nice. How old would he betoday? He'd be in his 80s.
Eric Walter (52:46):
Yeah, that's right.
That's right. At 8182, somethinglike that. I forgive me. I knew
that number. But all the yearsare running together.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:57):
I know. I think he was born in 39. My
mother was born in 32. Was shedied a couple years ago, she was
84. So he'd be in his 80s.
Eric Walter (53:06):
That's good. That's right. He was he would be in his
80s today.
Anne Marie Cannon (53:09):
So what is next for you? What is there
another project on the horizonthat you want to tell us about?
Eric Walter (53:16):
I am always working on several things, as I'm sure
you can relate. But withoutidentifying specifically what it
is I am working on another coldcase in Florida, that I've been
working on for several yearsthat's been going on kind of
under the radar, as many ofthese things have to happen that
way. But it's pretty, pretty bigdeal. And we'll see where it
goes. I'm very excited for thisfilm to come out. And to be able
(53:41):
to devote, you know, full timeto that project. I've already
begun shooting quite a bit forthat and working with some
investigators on that right now.
And hoping to get back downthere. Pretty soon. We're just
I'm hoping that the worldreopens safely and that we can
all go back and we can. I knowit will. So so we'll be able to
do that. And yeah, but I will Iwill be creating projects until
(54:05):
I disappear myself, I guess.
Anne Marie Cannon (54:12):
I'm a projects person myself.
Eric Walter (54:15):
I've just recently moved out of I'm still in LA
area, but I moved a little bitoutside the city to just escape
everything right now. This hasbeen a strange year. But Ty was
like I would love to move toGeorgetown. It's still I met I
meant that when I sent that toyou. Yeah, it's an absolute
dream. I mean, I I wouldn'texclude the possibility because
(54:38):
it is just so beautiful. And Ijust feel so incredibly
enlightened when I'm there.
That's just fodder for my mind.
You know?
Anne Marie Cannon (54:46):
Yeah, I like it. It is a different way of
life. It takes some getting usedto, but I haven't looked back.
So.
Unknown (54:54):
Yeah.
Anne Marie Cannon (54:56):
Yeah. So thank you so much.
Eric Walter (54:58):
All right. Well, we should we will We'd love to meet
you in person when I'm back intown some
Anne Marie Cannon (55:02):
definitely let me know. Do you know Kevin
Clark at the Hotel de Paris?
Eric Walter (55:06):
I know the Hotel de Paris.
Anne Marie Cannon (55:08):
Yeah, he's the executive director there.
But he told me about you aswell. I know did he guys yeah,
he follows your Facebook page orsomething.
Eric Walter (55:16):
The word is definitely out. So I'm happy to
do this podcast, let people knowthat it is coming. It's on its
way and people are not going tobe disappointed with the amount
of things that are gonna berevealed within the documentary,
dark side. doc.com
Anne Marie Cannon (55:30):
check it out.
And check out our episode notesbecause that'll it'll be in
there as well. Eric Walter,thank you for joining us.
Eric Walter (55:39):
Thank you so much.
It's been a pleasure. Take care.
I'll talk to you soon. Bye.
Anne Marie Cannon (55:46):
There you have it, Eric Walter and the
dark side of the mountain. Besure to check out our episode
notes to find out more aboutEric, dark side of the mountain
release date in about myAmityville Horror. Thanks for
joining us today. Have a greatweek.
Thank you for joining us today for armchair
historians. I'm your host, AnneMarie Cannon, armchair
historians is a Belgian rabbitproduction. Stay up to date with
us through Facebook, Twitter,and Instagram. Wherever you
listen to your podcast that iswhere you'll find us. You can
also find us at armchairhistorians.com armchair
(00:40):
historians as an independent,commercial free podcasts. If you
would like to support the show,you can buy us a cup of coffee
through cofee or you can becomea subscribing member through
Patreon You can find links toboth in the Episode Notes.
Anyone who knows me knows I am ahuge fan of Halloween. I love
(01:06):
dressing up in scary costumes,watching the classics, the
shining Rosemary's Baby, YoungFrankenstein, etc. So as a lead
up to Halloween, armchairhistorians is celebrating the
mysterious and the spooky withfour special episodes starting
today. Look for special releasemini episodes over the next two
(01:29):
weeks. Today I have a real treatfor you. We're going to be
talking to Eric Walter. Eric isan award winning director,
editor and documentary filmmakerin Los Angeles, known for
producing investigativenonfiction films that explore
bizarre cold cases, unexplainedphenomena and the dark side of
(01:50):
human psychology. hisdirectorial debut, my Amityville
Horror, was named one of the top10 festival genre films of 2012.
The film was distributed thePatrick Lee by IFC Films, and is
currently available on streamingservices. Look for a mini
episode later on this week onEric's experience directing the
(02:14):
documentary as a lead editor forfeature films docu series and
commercial advertisingcampaigns. Eric work has spanned
across a variety of platformsincluding Netflix, Amazon, prime
FX, AMC, Disney plus, and manyothers. He also frequently
serves as an expert on theAmityville Horror case, having
(02:36):
recently been profiled bynetworks such as ABC, a&e and
the Travel Channel. Eric'ssecond Documentary Feature dark
side of the mountain, which isslated for release in 2021.
Today, Eric talks about themysteries and subsequent
unanswered questions behind darkside of the mountain, which
(02:58):
investigates the disappearanceof not one, but two men in the
rocky mountain town of silverplume, Colorado, and the ominous
legacy surrounding their strangedisappearances, which has been
one of Colorado's greatestunsolved mysteries.Eric Walter,
(03:19):
welcome. And thank you for beinghere.
Eric Walter (03:22):
Hi, how you doing?
Anne Marie Cannon (03:24):
Doing good.
We're finally getting a littlerain in that fire Laden, Rocky
Mountains here. So that's nice.
So I start every interview withthe question, what is your
favorite history that we'regoing to be talking about today?
So Have at it tell us about yourfavorite history?
Eric Walter (03:41):
Oh my gosh, Well, I certainly have so many things
throughout history that I'minterested in and passionate
about. But this story of KeithReinhard and Tom young from
silver plume, Colorado, which ofcourse is in Clear Creek County,
nestled in the rocky mountainsof Colorado, and has fascinated
me since I've probably been myGod. It was the early 90s. So I
(04:03):
was a very, very young kid, whosaw an episode of Unsolved
Mysteries profiling the story,and I believe that was in 1990.
So through subsequent re airingsthroughout the years, this story
intrigued me because the storytalks about Keith Reinhart, a
journalist from Chicago, wholeft his job took a sabbatical
(04:26):
from his job at The DailyHerald, which is a Chicago based
suburban Chicago newspaper,where he had worked for 22
years. And he left his job andheaded down to silver plume,
which is a town of about 130people at the time. And he had
been going there for four years,he had a good very good friend
named Ted Parker, who operatedKp cafe there in silver plume on
(04:51):
its main street. He had beenfree. He and Ted were childhood
friends, they had grown upacross the street from each
other and Ted hadbeen operating this cafe and
Keith was just fascinated withthis lifestyle anyone who's
visited silver plume orGeorgetown or anywhere in Clear
Creek County, but especiallysilver plume because it doesn't
embrace its history, the sameway that Georgetown does being
(05:12):
Georgetown embraces a little bitmore of the tourist end of
things. And silver plume, by andlarge. And I know this from
having talked to many, manyresidents there don't want
visitors. They don't want peopleto come trooping through taking
photos and they don't want thetourist trade to be a big part
of that. But Keith wasdetermined to hopefully he you
(05:34):
know, he wanted to set up aresidence. He was corresponding
with his family writing letterstalking about how excited he was
he was there. That summer he wasabout to turn 50. And he was,
as many friends have said he waskind of having a midlife crisis.
Let's say he was a little bitdespondent with a job. He was
(05:58):
overwhelmed with the busytraffic of Chicago, and one of
the simpler lifestyle and aplace where he could start
working on what he said thegreat American novel. Can I just
interject there? I came to themountains here because I live
the next town over from silverplume. You mentioned Georgetown
when I turned 50 that is sowell. That is so interesting.
(06:22):
There's a reason we're talkinghere today. synchronicity. Yeah.
And so I mean, it's and Itotally understand I would love
to move there myself. Because Ithink that was part of what
attracted me to Keith's desirefor silver clue many people's
insight began started working onthis documentary for this
project, or covering this story.
have been, you know, asked mewhy Why are you so interested in
(06:42):
you know, what is it about Keithand his story and I guess I've
just as an artist, myself,understood what he was looking
for it that solitude of themountains and that silver plume
is eerily beautiful. I've alwaystold that's how I tell people
you know, it's a dozen embracethe Torres Strait, as I
mentioned, but it's it'sbuildings are just seemed to be
very everything that has beendesigned there since its heyday,
(07:05):
are, you know, actually twospecks of original silver plume
design. So getting back to thestory, Keith, you know, is very
interested in the town andwanting to write a novel while
he was staying there. He hadtaken a three month leave from
his job from Chicago newspaper,and being a journalist, and
being that he had travelled tothe town for many years.
(07:28):
Subsequent about 10 years. Ithink the first year he gone to
silver flame was in 79. Therewas a gentleman named Tom young
who owned a bookshop on silverplumes Main Street that was
operating at the time, in 1987.
In the Kp building, that was TedParker's building that was the
same building that KeithReinhard was now moving into the
(07:50):
same shop space because Tomyoung, had mysteriously
vanished. Police estimatebetween September 7 to September
9, of 1987. No one's totallysure which day that really is.
And what it makes it even moreeerie is that Tom's birthday
actually was the nineSeptember so which is strange
because Tom was not found for ayear, questions mounted flurry
(08:14):
of questions, people began tospeculate because of Tom young,
his background as a Green Beret,with the Army Special Forces,
his solitude, him living on whathas been called by Ted Parker.
In various articles, we lookedat the dark side of the
(08:34):
mountain, which meant the sideof Pendleton mountain, the
silver plume is kind of wedgedbetween two mammoth mountains
that's republican mountain andPendleton mountain. And
republican has vast miningsilver mining throughout, up and
down its side now, so doesPendleton. But I would say its
theory is very, it's not as muchas the Republican side. But the
(08:57):
town itself is kind of cloakedin shadow for about five months
of the here is what it's beensaid. And because of the way the
sun, you know, that the orbit ofthe Earth and basically it
becomes, you know, casts a longshadow on that side of the
mountain and Tom lived on thisside, and in a frame house, and
had lived there since the early70s. He was a former school
(09:21):
teacher, who taught at WestArvada high. He taught German
because he was stationed in WestGermany in the Army Special
Forces that's I mentioned.
What's curious about this, sowas Keith. But he was in the
Keith was in the Air Force, buthe was in the military. And he
was also in West Germany at thesame time as Tom now, we don't
(09:43):
know each other. Well, that'sthe big question. Look, there
are many, many curiousintersections in the story that
your imagination can connect andsay, Whoa, there might be
something. And that's what'sactually I think so interesting
about this story is becausethere are so many connected
issues but we have no directevidence that they knew each
other at time. But it iscurious. Right? So Tom had gone
(10:07):
missing. He and his dog he had agreat big black lab named Gus.
And Gus was essentially Tom'sbest friend. Gus was a beautiful
black lab. It just was alwayswith him. One of the residents
in town has told us ininterviews that had his name's
Harry Holman who's lived in thetown for many, many years and
(10:28):
silver plume and told us that,you know, Tom was always out
throwing a chewed up doll's headacross the street, and that
Gus would fetch the doll's headand it was just David's just
kind of a quirky, you know,quirky guy who is very friendly
with people, but also very kindof solemn and on his own. I do
(10:50):
want to say that when I firstcame to Colorado, and was going
to move here, I had an apartmentand silver plume, and I was
going to move to silver plume.
So, you know, I don't think youcan state enough how quirky
silver plume is, unfortunately,the guy who I was running the
apartment from took off with mymoney, and I ended up no doubt.
Yeah, it's just, it's the WildWest out there, even though it's
(11:13):
like our squatter town. It'salso part of the Georgetown
silver plume National HistoricLandmark District, which has
over 200 record buildingsbetween Georgetown and silver
plume that are protected fromthe 1800s. Except for when you
come into Georgetown, it lookslike an avant garde mining town.
But when you go into silverplume, it looks like the Wild
(11:36):
West, right?
It does. And you know, I have adeep being that I've worked on
this case for so many years, Ihave a deep love for the town
and its people and reallyunderstand and have grown to
respect their desire for stayinganonymous, which is curious when
you're a documentarian and youwant to go to the town to
(11:57):
research a story and talk topeople, there's kind of a fatal
attraction that some people didnot at all, you know, get a door
slammed in our face, but it was,and I'm getting my head in
myself a little bit because Idon't want to get off our story.
But, you know, I had, it was along process of getting people
to slowly open up and talk butwe'll get into that. But I
totally understand. Yes, silverplume is very rooted in its
(12:20):
history. That again, I've grownto respect that and respect, you
know, the people in the town whohave been so gracious with me.
Anne Marie Cannon (12:28):
I will say that it's quite a feat, that you
have been able to ingratiateyourself in silver plume with so
many people. I mean, they just Ithink like what you said they
just want their privacy and tokeep the town the way it is
respected. And well
Eric Walter (12:44):
in these days, you know, you can understand I mean,
there's so everything is one ofthe gentlemen when I my first
trip there told me I don't gonear the freeway. I wish I was
rolling camera when he saidthat, but it's very interesting.
you not go near so but anyway,getting back to the story. So
Tom young, he had been missingfrom September of 87, all the
(13:05):
way until July 31 of 1988. AndKeith had moved to the town and
moved in, he opened a littleantique shop in that vacated
bookstore. That was Tom Young'sbookstore in the KT building
empty space. So Keith wasworking in this shop. He was
writing stories about some ofthem based on himself, some of
(13:28):
them based on friends of his hewas kind of having fun with it
in kind of manipulating people'snames. There's a gentleman who
just recently passed away alegend in the town, George
downing that Keith changed thename and they just named George
uping and one of the stories andso Keith was kind of a you know,
a quirky, artistic, reallybrilliant person. I mean, I've
(13:54):
gotten to I feel like I know theman even though I've never
obviously met him but haven'tgotten to know him so well
through his writings and youknow, rifling through just boxes
and boxes. You wouldn't believethe poetry he's written and
handwritten letters and hisfamily has been so open and
giving with with the process ofme researching the story, but he
(14:14):
started writing about Tom youngand his disappearance and had
created this fictional characternamed guy gypsum, which there's
a little town you know, if youkeep going on the 70, past Clear
Creek County, there's a towngypsum, gypsum, Colorado, which
we theorize might have been thereason he decided to name him
(14:37):
guide gypsum but so guide gypsumwas kind of a composite
character of himself, you know,character traits of himself
Keith and of Tom. I mean, mostwriters write from experience,
right. And so I was reallyfascinated with that end of it
because this gentleman Keith waswriting about this person who
(14:58):
disappeared July 31 1987, to bowhunters were up in the mountains
on Sherman mountain, which ispast republican going towards
Empire. And they were on thesoutheast side of the mountain.
And it's pretty open up thereactually, if you've ever hiked
(15:20):
up there, but there was a smallpatch of trees, and they came
upon the remains of Tom youngand his dog Gus, they had bet
both been shot in the head.
There was a gun found in thescene.
There were remnants of a greentarp on the scene that were
shredded. It's theorized bypolice who determined that it
(15:43):
was a suicide, Tom had coveredhimself with a tarp. And the
animals had done the rest. Now,what's so curious about it,
though, is why was he covered ingreen tarp? Now, obviously, Tom,
wanted to disappear. He didn'twant to be found if he had gone
all the way up there to killhimself and cover him with a
essentially a green tarp thatwould blend in with the terrain.
(16:09):
Then, you know, I guess thatmakes sense. But it was curious.
There were question marks. Sothat week, like I mentioned,
that was 31st of July 1987.
Seven days later, Keith Reinhardleft his shop, there had been a
huge party in silver plume atthe Kp building where he was,
you know, he had a shop wherethere had been it said to be
(16:32):
100 150 people in the town, somepeople said, 300, but you know
how these stories get going. Wedon't really know how many but
we've talked many people whowere there and by and large, it
was a huge gathering. And whenthere are 150 people in silver
plum, even though it'spopulation, you inject more
people, you know, you're goingto know because it's a very
small town. So yeah, there was aparty there. Keith, by all
(16:55):
accounts, some people said hewas drunk. Some people said he
was just buzz, some people saidhe's just having fun. But Keith
was notorious for drinking, andhaving a good time and love to
party, and had been kind oftalking to everyone and about
it's alleged Tom young and hisinterest in talking to people
that were there at the at the Kpbuilding at the party. The next
(17:18):
day, he which was August seventhof 88. That was a Sunday. He
around five in the evening, fourto five in the evening,
announced to numerous people intown that he was going to hike
the face of Pendleton mountainthat he was going to do it quote
(17:39):
unquote, Chicago style, whichmeans straight up, bushwhacking.
No trip because there are notrails on Pendleton mountain.
I've hiked the mountain lookingfor Keith myself many times with
other crews that have worked onthis but so Keith would go
around, he went to some peoplehe knew some people were
acquaintances of his some peoplehe didn't know, like a gentleman
(17:59):
named stormy Culp, who owns agarage there right outside of
town. He was one of the lastpeople to see Keith. And Keith
just came by and said, I'm goingup there and was telling him on
purpose pointing saying I'mgoing up there. And, you know,
it's around five o'clock and whystorm is even told us, you know,
why was he telling me you know,I don't know the guy. It was
(18:22):
almost in people theorized thatit was very, you know, poignant
that Keith was making such apoint of telling all these
people that he was going up tothis destination. And the point
is, is that many people in thetown, were telling him not to go
that, hey, it's way too late.
Tonight,
Anne Marie Cannon (18:38):
he goes hiking starts a hike like that
at 430 in the afternoon. That'ssomething you do in the morning.
That's really bizarre.
Eric Walter (18:47):
That's right. And it's very strange that you know,
and what's even stranger is thathaving gotten to know his
family, you know, I'veinterviewed his former wife,
Austria, you know, the mother ofhis children and his kids that
even said he knew this, that hewould warn when they would go on
trips, hiking trips before Keithhad hiked various mountains. And
(19:08):
he was he was Rocky Mountainsobsessed. Right. At the same
time. There's been other peoplein town that said that Keith had
a heights phobia. And Keith evenwrote letters to his family
saying that he saw the mountainas a challenge that he had this
that he had been up there withTed Parker and Ted Parker, we've
(19:28):
interviewed as well also saidthat he had been up on the
mountain and that Keith did, youknow they were, they were into
an area where they couldn't evensee each other hear each other.
And at one point, Keith wasclinging to a tree with both
arms because he was soterrified. Now, this had
happened allegedly a week or twoprior to this infamous July or
(19:52):
I'm sorry, August 7, when hedecided to take this crazy hike.
So you know, five o'clock in theevening, and one of the Last
things that he said to TedParker before he left his cafe
that day, which was if I don'tcome back, send out the search
party. So they did send out thesearch party the next day when
Keith hadn't returned. Ted wentlooking for him and he you know,
(20:16):
had even with a son a driven upto Ted sun and emcell they had
driven to the base dependencemountain and shouting up into
the darkness for him. Nothing.
Next day, they left a note inthe key with staying in the
little church. That's right nextto the Kp building. It's a
beautiful Catholic Church, St.
Patrick's Catholic church. AndKeith was staying in the in the
(20:40):
loft, which was the back wherehe was doing all his writing.
Ted left a note for him, Keith,call me. I'm going to call the
sheriff if you're not home by,you know, certain time. Well, he
did call the sheriff and thesheriff deployed the Alpine
rescue team. And subsequentlyAlpine rescue team deployed
various other teams because thisterrain, and many people don't
(21:01):
understand many people fromChicago, especially did not they
said oh, they can find him. It'sno problem. This terrain is is
seriously it's bushwhackingisn't even the word for it. I
mean, it's it's extremely thickwith heavy vegetation, decades,
hundreds of years of foliage,you can easily if you were
(21:21):
injured fall somewhere withinthat terrain and never be found.
And I wish it was that easy, youknow, because we could all draw
it up to being just well keepwent up there and there was an
accident. And I will say thatmost of you know and i being a
documentary filmmaker, I reallyvalue objectivity. And not
(21:42):
giving my opinion too much. AndI will say that the film itself
is is not one that does have myopinion in it as everyone else's
opinions are what make itinteresting. And it's third act
because there are so manyopinions, but I will say that so
everyone knows that.
If I had to choose what happenedto Keith, I do think he's on the
mountain. I think he saw themountain as a challenge and he
(22:03):
went up there to conquerwhatever fear he had now why he
did it at five o'clock and whyhe told people finally come back
send out the rest, you know callthe rescue team is curious, a
lot of people and so bloom foundthat very, very strange
seriously. Most people in silverplume think that Keith stage
(22:25):
this disappearance that he wasunhappy with his life, he was
unhappy about the turn 50. Atthe time, Keith was married to
Carolyn Reinhard, his wifeCarolyn, now his widow is said
very little since he wentdisobey, you know, he
disappeared since then. But she,you know, she came out to silver
(22:48):
plume the following week, whilethey were searching for Keith,
this search was massive. I mean,hundreds of people. It grew and
grew throughout the days, therewere hundreds of people
searching for Keith on Pendletonmountain. And in fact, there
were other side republicanmountain they were sending
search and rescue members fromCalifornia from various other
(23:09):
states that were deployed. Andthey were there to try to find
any scrap of evidence possible.
What's so interesting aboutthis, though, is the police, of
course, went into keys computerwhich was in the church and
began looking into what Keithwas writing. And Keith had been
writing this as I mentioned,this guy gypsum story. I don't
want to give away everythingthat was in it because for the
(23:32):
first time, the the documentarythat I'm making about this film
is going to include the text ofthis, four pages that you know,
there were many stories in casecomputer but the one he was
reading about Tom, he apparentlyhad written it was dated he had
written in the week that Tom wasfound that you know, this seven
day period. He had written itduring that time, which is
(23:54):
curious because throughout itstext Keith the guy gypsum
references suicide as being theright thing as being the right
decision. The story takes placewith many similarities to Tom
Young's life, talking about himliving on the dark side of the
mountain talking about himliving in a frame house with his
(24:16):
dog, he would change like hechanged the name of the town to
white flume instead of silverplume and he would change all
these things but guy gypsum andthere are things in there that I
can't really totally get into.
But the final final paragraphstalk about guy gypsum
(24:36):
understanding Tom's motivationand deciding to put on his
hiking boots, put on a flannelshirt, and that he understood
Tom now and his motivation. Guyclosed the door and walked off
to the lush shadowless Coloradoforest above which is of course
(25:00):
What Keith did the day that hedisappeared Now many people have
read into this and and ofcourse, the the, you know, the
sheriff's office, clipper CountySheriff's Office, took this into
account and began looking, youknow, developing some sort of
psychological profile of key.
Was he despondent himself, washe suicidal? Why was why did he
go again at five o'clock and goaround and announced this hike,
(25:22):
it made no sense. Someone wouldhave to be they thought, crazy
or suicidal to want to dosomething like that. So during
this mission, this search andrescue mission, there was,
unfortunately, a terrible planecrash, Civil Air Patrol plane
pilot pilot named Terry legends,and the spotter, Don drove me
(25:45):
crashed into the side ofPendleton mountain. And Terry
Lenin's sadly was killed in theplane crash that was the pilot.
And this was on the fifth day ofthe search. And Don drove he
survived. Yes. And you know,that raises the stakes of this
entire story, because now wehave a death on our hands. And
(26:07):
again, I may have been gettingahead of myself a little bit,
but this previous eventmentioning silver plumes, the
town the residents belief thatKeith staged his disappearance,
because, hey, now there's adeath attributed to this search
for me. Some people havetheorized that Keith, having
read the paragraphs that hewrote this story that he wrote
about guide gypsum that he wentup there to try to find
(26:30):
inspiration for what Tom did, togo missing and to put themselves
in TOMS shoes or guide ships andshoes. And then after he had
staged his own disappearance,that he couldn't come back
because this had happened.
Obviously, you know, that
Anne Marie Cannon (26:46):
there's a lot of theories. I was reading some
of the different boards thismorning. One guy said that he
lives in Utah, and then he'sseen them. He's older buddy, you
know, looks the same. Oh, youwouldn't believe
Eric Walter (26:59):
I've had various since we've started this so many
people. And I love that andagain, and if anybody's
listening to this now, pleasesend any tips because look, even
though my theory is that Keithis dead somewhere up on that
mountain, because obviously,still to this day, he has never
been found. If there are any youknow, if anyone has any tips or
any any, you know, photos,anything you think, maybe Keith
(27:22):
Reinhard, if you know of hislocation alive or dead, please
send that into us. And you canreach us at dark side doc.com,
which I think is a good seguebecause obviously, I am a
documentary filmmaker. And I'vebeen fascinated with the story.
And this has been something thatI essentially was haunted by
(27:42):
just having seen a 12 minutesegment on Unsolved Mysteries as
a young kid, and there was very,very little explanation or, you
know, the theories were really Imean, looking at what we've done
was very watered down.
Anne Marie Cannon (27:54):
Well, I have a question, are we going to find
out things that we don't know?
Is there Oh, my gosh,information coming out in the
documentary?
Eric Walter (28:03):
Yes, the documentary is is entitled dark
side of the mountain based on aline from Keith's guide, gypsum
story. And and obviously, that'swhere Tom young lives on the
dark side of the mountain onPendleton mountain. Now, yes,
there are many things thatrevelations let's say of this
case, obviously, we and we havetried to find Keith ourselves
(28:26):
for many years. I mean, I I havebeen working on this. For six
years, we have been working onthis, as many documentaries take
a very long time. But we havebeen. We have been visiting
silver plume multiple times ayear. I'm here I'm based in Los
Angeles. And after I shot anddirected by first feature,
(28:48):
became just, I just had to go tosilver plume. I wanted to go
there. I wanted to know moreabout this story and visited the
town. And like I said, it beganthat slow, arduous process of
talking to people slowlyingratiating ourselves into
silver plumes community and itwas not an easy thing. And you
start a documentary like thiswith a set of intentions, right?
You're interested in the storyand gray it's captivating
(29:11):
missing persons case and whetherthe two are linked or related.
And obviously those things aretotally covered in the film in
complete depth more thananything is ever done. And all
theories are presented. Youknow, there's been a lot out
there talk about online and TVand stuff that only show a
fraction of the kind ofsensational end of the story. We
have covered every base. Infact, we have found people that
(29:34):
the police have never found. Sothere are things that are going
to come out in this that aregoing to change the entire
paradigm of the case. There arethere are so many aspects of
this and I might want to stopthere so you can get a question.
Anne Marie Cannon (29:47):
That was great. I heard about the story
from my friend Frank young, whocoincidentally is not related to
Tom young, but lives in the samehouse as Tom young. I think he
came here afterwards after Tomdisappeared if I'm not mistaken,
Tina's right. Okay?
Eric Walter (30:05):
Yes, I did. Yeah.
And I know Frank as well. Weworked with him on the
documentary and such a nicegentleman. He was so gracious
with allowing us to use hisproperty. I don't believe that.
And I, he can correct me if I'mwrong. But I don't recall if he
knew Tom young or not, I don'tthink we ever even got to talk
to him about it.
Anne Marie Cannon (30:23):
I don't think he did. And I think he maybe
bought the house after Tomdisappeared, is it? I'll ask him
because I'm interviewing himthis Friday, we're going to be
talking about the history ofhomesteading in the western
United States. So it should befascinating. Oh, that is
fascinating. Yeah. It's funnyhow this is kind of linked. So
Frank told me about it. And it'salways been that thing I've
(30:45):
always been curious about. And Ithink about it every now and
then. You know, I love silverplume. I have friends that live
in silver plume. It's a greatplace. The people, they're
really good. They like theirprivacy. There is a new energy
coming in now, because there area couple of new businesses there
the bread bar, I don't know ifyou went there or not.
Eric Walter (31:05):
Oh, absolutely.
Anne Marie Cannon (31:07):
So things are slowly kind of changing. But
we'll see. We'll see whathappens. Well,
Eric Walter (31:13):
we certainly we've certainly gotten the the old
guard, let's say in the film,who were there at the time at
the epicenter of the story. Infact, like I mentioned, George
downing, we interviewed Georgedowning before it's passing.
We've gotten numerous people whowere there and knew both Tom and
Keith. But also it should bementioned, too, that silver
plumes history is rich with oddincidents and dark history.
(31:39):
Yeah, afterwards, silver miningdays. There's the story of
Clifford Griffin, who was abrother of mine owner, heneage
Griffin, who you know, lived inGeorgetown, but own the 730
mine, the Griffins had come overfrom England, and Clifford
Griffin, the brother had beenvery also a very solemn and
(32:00):
depressed character, and hadcommitted suicide in a cabin up
on, you know, near the 730 mine.
But over time, the story'schanged. And as these things do,
folklore gets started, thestories of Clifford Griffin went
from suicide, to whispers ofmurder, and to conspiracy and to
ghost stories. And it justchanged over time and
(32:24):
snowballed. And what's sofascinating what part of my
documentary dark side of themountain illustrates very
heavily is, today, we're seeingthe same thing happening with
Tom young and Keith Reinhardt'scase, which has been
intertwined. I admit, I wasinterested in that link of Tom
and Keith. And, obviously,that's what drew me there. But
then when I got interested andtalked with the people in silver
(32:47):
plume, there's so much there aswell. So it's a little bit about
all of that. It's aboutfolklore, it's about loss. For
the family's perspective, it'sabout the unknown. And it's a
little bit about the humanpsychological aspect of needing
answers when there are noanswers. Sometimes you create
your own conclusions when noneexists. You know, it's it's a
(33:08):
very fascinating story. And it'sjust because we have just a huge
archive of opened up to us sograciously by the Reinhard
family who my crew and I havebecome so close with the process
of this many years of makingthis documentary. After my first
trip to silver plume, I foundout that Tiffany Brian Hart, as
(33:29):
Keith's daughter worked down thestreet from me at the time. So
I, you know, emailed her and wedidn't write, right, so we ended
up getting, you know, gettinglunch, and the rest is history.
So it's those types of thingsthat just the stars align,
Anne Marie Cannon (33:45):
how long have you been working on the
documentary?
Eric Walter (33:47):
Well, as I mentioned, it's been five to six
years of work, physical work onthe dock. Much of that was spent
in preliminary interviews,talking with people getting to
know the people in the town, asI mentioned, many poor people in
Chicago and with the DailyHerald, and those people were
immediately gracious,immediately open and wanting to
(34:09):
talk, but there was the aspectof, we found, for instance, Tom
Young's life, that even still tothis day is still clouded in
mystery. And but we
Anne Marie Cannon (34:19):
did Tom had family he
Eric Walter (34:20):
did at the time, his mother, his mother, and his
stepfather is still alive.
They've since passed. There aresome distant cousins that I've
been able to locate, but noclose family that's still
around. Sadly, he was a very, Iguess, as I said, solemn
character. And it is verycurious that he did disappear on
his birthday, or close to hisbirthday. And if he did kill
(34:43):
himself, you know, it'sincredibly sad and there's been
many theories. Often his deathgets overshadowed out shine by
Keith's bizarre disappearance,but just to look at Tom for a
minute. There are so manytheories about what happen with
him, you know, again, my opinionis that I think it was a
suicide. There are some strangecoincidences and weird things
(35:05):
about it as well. Well, he
Anne Marie Cannon (35:09):
was agreeing already. And that's pretty right
for all kinds of imagine, well,
Eric Walter (35:14):
people, this is where the snowball gets started,
people in the town startedtalking about the after he had
disappeared. And before he hadbeen found, they were saying
that maybe he was a spy and hadbeen killed for his knowledge.
Maybe he was get killed by drugdealers or something. And then
the top tier of this wholeconspiracy people email me all
the time about this. And it iscovered in the documentary. But
(35:37):
this is kind of one of thesetheories that has kind of
latched itself on to the storyis the whole issue of Rocky
flats, the former nuclear wastefacility in Rocky flats,
Colorado that in is sure, youknow, in 1989, was a raid that
went there, and it was shut downby the federal government for,
(35:59):
you know, illegal waste dumpingfor illegal practices, there
have been rumors and whispers ofillegal toxic waste, being
dumped into buying shafts andClear Creek county and other
places just to get rid of it bythe plant. There also had been
actual fact that rocky flats,employees, who had acted as more
(36:23):
as whistleblowers to what wasgoing out going on before it had
been exposed, they had come outand started talking about it to
the press were threatened,sometimes they were threatened
with death. And so people havetheorized over time, that Tom
Young was an environmentalist,and that he had witnessed some
(36:43):
of this illegal dumping that wasgoing on in the area being that
he lived in a in a remote areaof silver plume, that he was
killed for his knowledge of thisthis illegal dumping operation.
Now, I will say I, I speak onthis subjects with a bit of
skepticism, because it is alittle bit more of like the
(37:04):
Roswell theory of the Reinhardcase, Reinhard young case, if
you want to combine the two oreven just the young case, it
really is very, because somepeople have said that keeps
disappearance is because of therocky flats situation to they
keep was going to uncover thisdumping operation. And, you
know, it takes a bit ofstretching your mind to make
this fill the void. But what isfascinating about it is we
(37:29):
actually have found some thingsand I won't give away what they
are attributed to this theorythat make it something that you
can't completely write off.
There are some exclusive thingsthat are going to be in the
documentary that are veryinteresting with some things
that Keith actually wasresearching, and was saying and
telling people at a time that'srelated to this incident that
(37:50):
has never been revealed before.
It is, as I mentioned, one ofthese things that it's very
fascinating. It's certainly themost conspiratorial, and as I
alluded to, with the gypsumstory, shifting gears is many
people thought that Keithcommitted suicide as well that
he was mimicking Tom's method ofdisappearing.
Anne Marie Cannon (38:16):
Did he have a gun? I mean, did he have a gun
on this person, or myunderstanding is he had nothing.
And if somebody who is sayingI'm going up there, they would
have noticed if he was back in,
Eric Walter (38:28):
by all accounts keep was wearing worn out white
sneakers, a black and redflannel shirt, and jeans, and
carrying a can of pop. Andthat's it. They're why anyone
would leave at five o'clock withno supplies and a can of soda.
(38:50):
Just says to me that and likehis family believes again, I
don't want to speak for them.
But it certainly his his son,and his his ex wife and
everyone's talking to me as theybelieve that he was just playing
to take a walk that he wasn'tgoing to go all the way up
there. You know, there's no waymany of them don't think that he
went that somebody intervenedand prevented him from going up
there. They feel that it was amurder some of them
Anne Marie Cannon (39:16):
and must be really hard for the family to
know I can't even imagine thatto not know what happened and
all the different ideas andthings and wondering and there's
no resolution.
Eric Walter (39:29):
That's right. And you know, again, the the film is
so heavily focused on that and iand i should mention about Tom
Young's death. The scene, whichthere are photographs of the
scene in the dock in thedocumentary, most of the remains
were gone. his skull was layingright next to the body of Gus.
(39:50):
Both were just skeletal remainsthere was a gun right next to
the skull there were tattered,you know clothing and tattered
tarp as I mentioned, there wasan open Bullet box with the
shells all over the ground, likesomeone had just in a backpack
or red backpack had been takenup there. And a mat which at the
time according to news reportsand things people who knew Tom
(40:12):
found it curious as he knew heknew the mountain so well, why
why would he need the map butwho knows you need to have map
in his backpack, but he hadbought the gun, Tom young had
purchased the weapon. Somepeople have said that Tom
definitely committed suicide.
Some people find it interestingthat the night before he
disappeared, he went to thegrocery store and purchased
frivolous items like trash bags,and food and all the normal
(40:35):
things just the night before.
And then suddenly he askedhimself, I don't know, maybe
maybe that could be part ofthrowing the track
Anne Marie Cannon (40:46):
because even though they found his body,
there's still questions. And Iread somewhere that they
couldn't connect the bulletswith the gun. And I think it's
because the gun was it had beenout in the elements for so long.
And it
Eric Walter (40:59):
my you'll, you'll see in the film that we actually
have footage of it, we were ableto get the sheriff's office to
bring that out of the evidence,the actual spent bullet, which
is the only thing that's stillin evidence, unfortunately, this
is to great frustration of ourteam, I assume for storage
reasons and the you know,because it's the guard is turned
(41:20):
over there. There's very fewpeople at the sheriff's office
that were there at the time.
Rick Albert's who's the currentSheriff was he was on the scene
actually. And I know that onlybecause it's written in Dave
down hours report. That's thedetective date down Hauer, who
covered both young and reinartzcases that Eric Albert's was
there. Don Krueger, the formerSheriff was there. I don't know
how many years you've been inGeorgetown. But okay.
Anne Marie Cannon (41:45):
But I do know a lot about the history. The
people you've talked about i ithink you interviewed the
registers. They're like theroyalty of silver plume. Gary,
Eric Walter (41:56):
so I definitely Gary is a wonderful, wonderful
person. So he has been immenselyhelpful and loyal to us. And I
can't thank him enough for that.
And, and that goes to the sameamount of people. And like I
said, You know, I know that thisstory. Many people as I
mentioned in silver plume, whenthey even hear the name Keith
Reinhard, they roll their eyesbecause they think that it's
brought all this attention tothe town, we have not been a fly
(42:17):
by night operation. You know,there's so many TV shows and
things that come in and justcome in in a weekend or three
days and they're gone. And theytry to make something we've
spent so much time trying to geteverything. And as I mentioned,
there's some things I don't wantto give away. But there are some
subjects in this film that arecompletely have never been heard
from before. that are going tobe even a shock to even the
(42:39):
sheriff's office.
Anne Marie Cannon (42:41):
I do want to say that before I came on. I
watched half of my AmityvilleHorror. Haha,
Unknown (42:47):
yeah. Uh huh.
Anne Marie Cannon (42:48):
So you're you are I you know, I love the
cinematography. And that, by theway, it was beautiful.
Eric Walter (42:55):
So excited. Dark side is even better. So I've
gotten even better since I didthat.
Anne Marie Cannon (43:01):
Look, looking forward to that. But yeah, so I
did start I hadn't seen it yearsago, but I just started watching
it again, because I knew I wasgonna going to be talking to
you.
Eric Walter (43:11):
Right, are you gonna appreciate that?
Anne Marie Cannon (43:13):
Well, let's just kind of finish up with the
silver plume. The Reinhard storyin documentary, when is the
documentary coming out.
Eric Walter (43:23):
So we are currently obviously with the challenges we
had intended, ASAP this yearwith the challenges of COVID in
the industry right now. And sowe are working on it. Basically,
it's still ASAP but my previousfor so for my Amityville Horror,
we traveled internationally, wehad, you know, a real premiere
in our US premiere and Europeanpremiere, and all of that, you
(43:45):
know, the typical premiereprocess, and then we go and do
the rounds at festivals. And wehave full intention of doing
that with dark side of themountain. However, given the
challenges of the pandemic,right now, obviously, theater
capacities, and all of that havebeen shuttered. It's definitely
thrown us and obviously theentire industry for a loop. So
(44:05):
we are right now looking atother options. And that includes
possibly going straight tostreaming and then going to
Netflix to prime these types ofthings immediately prior to our
festival run. But we will seeobviously, your premiere matters
very much in these in thesewhole scenarios. So it's you
know, where you premiere and ifyou've already shown online,
(44:27):
sometimes you can't show at acertain festival premiere status
and all the rest of it. So itthere's a lot of talk right now
internally and with our team.
And well, I will say just sopeople know, the film has been
completed in editorial, and thatwe are talking about strategy
for the best strategy of get thefilm out there ASAP. And so
we're tremendously excited forpeople to see this. And you
know, we've kept the cap on thisthing for many, many years. And
(44:49):
I'm very excited to finallyuncapped this for the world to
see.
Anne Marie Cannon (44:57):
Wow, I'm really excited about this, and
I'm thrilled that you took timeout to talk to me about it. And
I would like to talk a littlebit more about who you are and
about your background. And
Eric Walter (45:07):
yeah, absolutely.
I'm a good question. You know,I'm originally from Maryland, as
many filmmakers do grew upmaking, you know, short films
and documentaries, as you know,as a child, with always with an
interest in unsolved mysteriesand unexplained phenomena. As I
got older and began working inbroadcast and television back
east until I moved to LosAngeles in 2008. began were, you
(45:29):
know, basically working up theranks and working mainly in
editorial. During that time, Iwas contacted by a gentleman
named Danny Lutz, who was theson of the Lutz family from the
infamous Amityville Horror case.
And that is a whole nother longstory that I won't be able to
(45:50):
completely tell here. But I hadalso been very, very interested
in that story in that case, andit started a website Amityville
files.com, which right now, it'sonly a shell of itself back in
the day was a little bit morethorough, and I haven't up kept
it as much as since I've beenworking on this Reinhard thing.
But it was popular back, youknow, and I was frequenting the
(46:10):
boards and things and you know,as a teenager, in my early 20s,
you know, was contacted by thisgentleman, Danny Lutz, who was
the oldest son of that familywho lived there for 28 days, and
then fled and left everythingthat they owned inside the
house. And, you know, prior totheir family living there, there
had been a series of, you know,mass murder in the house at the
(46:31):
failed family. The oldest sonRonald defeo, Jr, who was 23 at
the time had dispatched his momand dad, his sisters, his
brothers inside the house on twofloors of the house without any
neighbors hearing anything. Allthe bodies have been found
facedown in their beds, someshot in the head most in the
back and hit had beenunexplained how no one had heard
(46:54):
a 35 Marlin rifle going offballistics was able to determine
there was no silencer used onthe weapon. So the round three
in the morning this gun is goingoff killing all these people. No
one gets up no one runs verystrange the Lutz family moves in
after Ronnie's convicted youknow that would have been in
(47:14):
December of December 18 and 1975and they stayed for 28 days and
since then it's the story hasblown up into a massive as we
all know I sub genre inHollywood.
Anne Marie Cannon (47:27):
I think what I'm going to do is this part
that we're talking about myAmityville Horror, I might clip
and put more towards Halloween.
Oh, that's okay. And then I canlink out to your you know,
whatever. I'll be your Hey,
Eric Walter (47:42):
you're welcome.
You're welcome to I'm Welcome tojump back on with you if you
want to do an entire Amityvilleepisode I would be more than
happy to do that with youbecause we haven't even talked
about what they said happened.
Anne Marie Cannon (47:54):
We are going to table that discussion for
now. But stay tuned for therelease of a mini episode later
this week, in which Eric and Idiscuss his experiences making
my Amityville Horror.
Eric Walter (48:12):
Well, you know, it's uh, I remember telling
my producer friend who came withme to my first trip and silver
plume. And I hate to say thisabout the silver plume, because,
you know, it's such a beautifultown and but I said that the
whole notion of a stigmatizedproperty, right. And while there
were no murders in the Kpbuilding, which was Ted Parker,
(48:35):
you know, formally Ted Parker'swhen we first began shooting, he
still owned the building. He is,like you mentioned, there's been
kind of an influx of youngerpeople in the town. Now. At that
time, there was a little bit,the bread bar was opening, it's
still kind of, at the very tailend of it's the older phase. The
Kp building was always kind ofthis, you know, even seeing on
(48:56):
unsolved mysteries and seeingpictures of it. You know, this
is the building where Tom had astore and Keith that his store,
not to say it was sinister, butit looks spooky. You know, it's
this old. It's this old, youknow, beautiful, mind you but
very old storefront. It'sactually I believe two buildings
put together it's a false front.
And that was originally in adifferent location that was put
together in that location. Iknow Ted Parker, it
Anne Marie Cannon (49:20):
paler doesn't help be there that brown, you
know, have any color. If theyslide the paint paint on it. I
think it might look a littledifferent.
Eric Walter (49:29):
I know that the current the current owner, or
owners, certainly have embracedthe Reinhardt story. They seem
to be, you know, open to talkingabout it, which is great. I
mean, again, you know, I don'tknow what the consensus will be
after dark side of the mountainreleases and start streaming,
but it will be fascinating tosee you know, what kind of
(49:49):
effect it has on I I hope thatit doesn't have an effect on the
town. Ted Parker told us that,after Unsolved Mysteries aired
was subsequently in syndication.
Would air ever throughout the90s and it would go in reruns in
early 2000s. And things thatpeople would come back to the
town and say there's thebuilding that there is there is
talking about Ted. Ted certainlyhas been very reluctant to
(50:11):
speak. I mean, we were extremelylucky to speak to him. Very,
very limited. He did speak to usand Ted was very, very gracious
and certainly one of Keithreinartz. They were they were
best friends. And as Imentioned, they grew up across
the street from each other. isover Deerfield, Illinois, in
(50:31):
Deerfield, Illinois.
Anne Marie Cannon (50:35):
I was wondering about that, okay.
Yeah,
Eric Walter (50:37):
yeah. Ted had gotten divorced, had been
formally moved to Boulder, gotdivorced and then moved out to
silver plume where he hadpurchased the Kp building and
renovated itself from fromscratch and filled it with
antiques, you know, whenever helets up, which is fine. Is there
Anne Marie Cannon (50:57):
a coffee shop? There was a coffee shop in
there? Yeah. Wasn't there?
There's a
Eric Walter (51:00):
there's a coffee a plume coffee shop there now?
Yeah.
Anne Marie Cannon (51:04):
Yeah. I've been to that quite a few times.
I don't know if they're openright now because of COVID or
not.
Eric Walter (51:10):
I believe they are.
I think I've seen on theirsocial that they are still
operating. Yeah. So yeah, Ievery now and then. I haven't
been there this year because ofjust everything going on. But
well, because the film has beencompleted. I I haven't had a
need to go back right away. Iwill be back I'm sure very soon.
But yeah, I know. It's abeautiful building. There were
(51:30):
different groups, fraternitiesthat operated in that, you know,
the Knights of pythias. I hopethat silver plume is able to,
for the next century continue topreserve its history, because
it's it's really just what makesit stand out in so many
different ways. More than thebizarre story we're talking
about today. There's so muchmore history to the town. It's
(51:52):
just absolutely fascinating. Andcertainly, even beyond the
Clifford Griffin story, thereare other ghost stories and
other weird incidents that areworth looking up attributed to
silver plume. Yeah. And toGeorgetown, Idaho springs.
Right.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:10):
Well, uh, one more question. And then it will
jeweler goodbye. But um, well,two more? Is there anything that
we didn't talk about that youwanted to talk about?
Eric Walter (52:20):
There's plenty of other things I want to say. But
maybe we should do a anotherchat after the after you've
gotten to see the film. Okay.
And then we can we can maybetalk again, but because there's
gonna be a lot that comes out. Ithink after that about.
Hopefully Keith comes out, butwe'll see.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:40):
Oh, that would be nice. That would be
really nice. How old would he betoday? He'd be in his 80s.
Eric Walter (52:46):
Yeah, that's right.
That's right. At 8182, somethinglike that. I forgive me. I knew
that number. But all the yearsare running together.
Anne Marie Cannon (52:57):
I know. I think he was born in 39. My
mother was born in 32. Was shedied a couple years ago, she was
84. So he'd be in his 80s.
Eric Walter (53:06):
That's good. That's right. He was he would be in his
80s today.
Anne Marie Cannon (53:09):
So what is next for you? What is there
another project on the horizonthat you want to tell us about?
Eric Walter (53:16):
I am always working on several things, as I'm sure
you can relate. But withoutidentifying specifically what it
is I am working on another coldcase in Florida, that I've been
working on for several yearsthat's been going on kind of
under the radar, as many ofthese things have to happen that
way. But it's pretty, pretty bigdeal. And we'll see where it
goes. I'm very excited for thisfilm to come out. And to be able
(53:41):
to devote, you know, full timeto that project. I've already
begun shooting quite a bit forthat and working with some
investigators on that right now.
And hoping to get back downthere. Pretty soon. We're just
I'm hoping that the worldreopens safely and that we can
all go back and we can. I knowit will. So so we'll be able to
do that. And yeah, but I will Iwill be creating projects until
(54:05):
I disappear myself, I guess.
Anne Marie Cannon (54:12):
I'm a projects person myself.
Eric Walter (54:15):
I've just recently moved out of I'm still in LA
area, but I moved a little bitoutside the city to just escape
everything right now. This hasbeen a strange year. But Ty was
like I would love to move toGeorgetown. It's still I met I
meant that when I sent that toyou. Yeah, it's an absolute
dream. I mean, I I wouldn'texclude the possibility because
(54:38):
it is just so beautiful. And Ijust feel so incredibly
enlightened when I'm there.
That's just fodder for my mind.
You know?
Anne Marie Cannon (54:46):
Yeah, I like it. It is a different way of
life. It takes some getting usedto, but I haven't looked back.
So.
Unknown (54:54):
Yeah.
Anne Marie Cannon (54:56):
Yeah. So thank you so much.
Eric Walter (54:58):
All right. Well, we should we will We'd love to meet
you in person when I'm back intown some
Anne Marie Cannon (55:02):
definitely let me know. Do you know Kevin
Clark at the Hotel de Paris?
Eric Walter (55:06):
I know the Hotel de Paris.
Anne Marie Cannon (55:08):
Yeah, he's the executive director there.
But he told me about you aswell. I know did he guys yeah,
he follows your Facebook page orsomething.
Eric Walter (55:16):
The word is definitely out. So I'm happy to
do this podcast, let people knowthat it is coming. It's on its
way and people are not going tobe disappointed with the amount
of things that are gonna berevealed within the documentary,
dark side. doc.com
Anne Marie Cannon (55:30):
check it out.
And check out our episode notesbecause that'll it'll be in
there as well. Eric Walter,thank you for joining us.
Eric Walter (55:39):
Thank you so much.
It's been a pleasure. Take care.
I'll talk to you soon. Bye.
Anne Marie Cannon (55:46):
There you have it, Eric Walter and the
dark side of the mountain. Besure to check out our episode
notes to find out more aboutEric, dark side of the mountain
release date in about myAmityville Horror. Thanks for
joining us today. Have a greatweek.
Popular Podcasts
CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist
It’s 1996 in rural North Carolina, and an oddball crew makes history when they pull off America’s third largest cash heist. But it’s all downhill from there. Join host Johnny Knoxville as he unspools a wild and woolly tale about a group of regular ‘ol folks who risked it all for a chance at a better life. CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist answers the question: what would you do with 17.3 million dollars? The answer includes diamond rings, mansions, velvet Elvis paintings, plus a run for the border, murder-for-hire-plots, and FBI busts.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.