10 Strange True Cases Involving Scarecrows

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
We ain't gonna stand I don't Hey, this is Jared from even the podcast
as a parade. I'm sure youhave been wondering where are those new episodes.

(00:23):
Well, we're still on our endof summer break as we're taking like
a short time away from the showto focus on time with our families and
some needed vacation. However, wewill be back on Monday, September the
nineteenth with a brand new episode anda series on where Wolves. But during
this time we are releasing two atrandom of our Patreon episodes, which includes

(00:49):
this episode you were currently listening toof our after Show, which is after
the podcast as a prede which isnormally exclusive to patrons as part of our
Elbow Deep Club. And of coursethis is being released to everyone for free,
just two episodes at random, butpatrons of our Elbow Deep Club during

(01:11):
this time you will receive two brandnew episodes of the Aftershow at random,
so be looking out for those.We didn't forget about you either, And
although we are taking this time off, we are looking forward to returning to
record the show and dropping our newepisode on Werewolves on September the nineteenth.
But during this time we want youto enjoy these free episodes of the Aftershow,

(01:36):
and we also want you to rememberto stay elbow deep. Welcome to
after the Podcast as a parade.We just finished out our series on Ivan
Milat, the Backpacker serial Killer.I'm like having brain for us tonight.
I feel like something's like fucked merandomly in the brain and that's just scrabbled

(01:57):
me. It was mister Onions,Onions, he threw you off. I
wonder if he actually grows onions.You know, that would be very interesting.
If your name was mister Onions andyou worked growing onions and how you
are, I would trust it.I would trust him because because if your
last name is Onions, and Iwould expect that your onions that you grow

(02:17):
are good. Probably. Probably.But obviously we're not gonna be talking about
Ivan Milat. We're gonna be talkingabout onions. We're not gonna be talking
about onions either. But we aregoing to be going into a one off
episode here on ten strange true casesinvolving Scarecrows. So we're not going to

(02:38):
dive deep into these stories. We'rejust gonna give you the stories because there
are some weird cases involving the creepyass things that hang out in the onion
field scarecrows. So my grandfather becausehe was a big gardener, you know
Italian immigrants, so big gardener,and he liked to make things himself.

(03:00):
He was a very very handy manthat way. So he made himself a
scarecrow, which was literally am likea helmet, like a we call like
a construction site helmet nailed to astick. What interesting, Yep, it
worked, that's so funny. Thereis no doubt that scarecrows can be creepy.

(03:23):
After all, they are associated withthe end of the harvest and the
dying off of the land. Theyalso happened to be the focus of quite
a few horror stories and movies.While we seldom see scarecrows in their original
form and in their natural elements today, there was a time when scarecrows were
prevalent throughout Europe, Australia, andthe United States. During these times,

(03:43):
it was often hard to distinguish thesemock humans from the living, or more
often from the recently. To seethe scarecrows, I think of first of
all the scariest stories to tell them. The dark episode or nine episodes Herbert
Herbert or Herb or it was itis it Harold or Herbert? I can't
remember. Harold, Harold, It'sHarold. Yeah. And they kept and

(04:06):
they kept making fun of Harold,they did, and then he just ripping
a piece of shot off and justwore it. There you go. We
have a little we have a littlescarecrow that we put out in her We
have a little scarecrow that we putit in her front guard, and um,
you know, falled like just decorationobviously. I mean it's just like
a dollar store one. So it'snot you were not going to mistake it

(04:28):
for a person. But you knowwhat Lily mistaked for a person this morning.
Can no. We were walking,I was walking her so she could
poop, and they're doing construction onthe road behind my house and they had
the sign up, you know,like this orange construction sign that's like men
at work and just has like apicture of a guy shoveling. Oh no,

(04:49):
yeah, Lily started growling a Barkam, what are you barking at?
I'm like, I had no idea. I'm like, what do you see?
Because it's daytime, right I Sowe just keep walking and then she's
like staring at the sign. I'mlike it's a sign number ten. Swinging
in the breeze sounds like a countrysong. Well, it could be made

(05:14):
into a country song. Albert's inglemade one heck of a realistic scarecrow back
in Wisconsin in nineteen sixteen, andall of his neighbors were so impressed with
his work that they showed up onhis doorstep to find out how he did
it. Oddly enough, his familyanswered the door and said that Albert had
not been home for the past fewdays. Disappointed, the neighbors left for
the day, but word got outabout the wonderful, almost lifelike scarecrow hanging

(05:40):
from the tree in the cornfield.The next morning, another neighbor was writing
by the cornfield when he decided tostop and check out the scarecrow everyone was
talking about. But as he camecloser to the hanging scarecrow, he realized
something was not quite right. Thedummy wore a wide brimmed hat, sealing
its true face from passerbys, butup close, the curious staber could plainly

(06:04):
see that the scarecrow was actually AlbertEngle himself. Police were called to the
scene and Albert's death was rolled asuicide. He never took off his hat
when he hung himself from the treebranch, and it was believed that the
scores of people had passed by hishanging body, believing it to be a
harmless scarecrow meant to shoot the birdsaway. She's okay, but who who

(06:28):
the fuck hangs a scarecrow like that? Though? So you don't know,
really they just put him in theground, right, Not necessarily. I
mean I could from a tree.Yeah, I mean I've never heard of
that, but I mean I don'tthink it's the weirdest I would think that
that was odd. Like if I'mdriving and I see like something hanging from

(06:49):
a tree, I'd be like,what the fun unless it's October. Yeah.
Other than that, if it's October, then it's normal, right,
know what you're saying. Yeah?Yeah, But here's the here's the real
kicker of that one. Right.His family was like, well, we
haven't seen him in a few days. You haven't seen the ship hanging from
the fucking tree out in the field. It's like, have you not walked

(07:12):
outside in your front yard? Ithink they hung him up there. I
think they did it. Oh,so now this has become a homie.
It's a homicide. Here we goframed by scarecrow hat number nine, throw
onto a bonfire. Clearing out fieldsis tiresome work and can get rather monotonous

(07:39):
after a few hours. In nineteenfifty three, a group of workmen were
clearing the fields and lang gland landgain whales. They were gathering up all
the old debris and tossing it intoa bonfire. At one point, the
men found an old scarecrow and someundergrowth. They wrenched its old corpse out
and tossed it into the fire withthe rest of the jump. But as

(08:01):
the scarecrow's old tathered clothes began toburn away, some of the men spotted
the bone underneath jolted out of theirhome drum work. The men returned to
the place where the scarecrow was foundand discovered a skull and a set of
false teeth. While it was toolate to rescue the dry burning bones,
police were able to identify the bodyfrom the dentures. They were made for

(08:24):
one ethel Winifred Collins, aged sixtysix, who had been sadly missing for
several months. Cheeze I mean atleast they threw her corpse on, not
her living body. Yeah, wellthat's what I was going to say.
At least they were already gone bythat time. She wanted to be cremated.

(08:46):
Well, well, I don't thinkshe wanted to be cremated by bonfire.
Yeah. Number eight brained and tornapart. Some people should live in
homes where there are no neighbors insight, while others are simply too crazy
to live next to. For instance, Mary Hayman of California hated the very

(09:07):
sight of her neighbor, Luigi Lugo. Her neighbor was Luigi Luigi. Whether
it was something he did, howhe acted, or threw no fault of
his own, we will never know. But his face so infuriated Mary that
when he put up a scarecrow innineteen eleven, they looked almost exactly like

(09:28):
himself. Mary simply went nuts.She trugged over to his home, grab
hold of the scarecrow and brained it, beheaded it, and tore it limb
from limb. The poor scarecrow wasbrained it. She ripped the pine straw
out of his head. I guess, oh, okay, the poor scarecrow
was totally dismembered, and Mary wasarrested for battery. When Mary was brought

(09:52):
face to face with a judge,it was decided that she should be set
free, After all, was abloodless murder. But we all are left
to ponder whether Mary and Luigi evercame to a truce or spent the rest
of their days torturing, torturing eachother in petty neighborhood wars Mary and Luigi
to imagine going to jail for literallywas alton battery of a scarecrow? Yeah?

(10:18):
How is that battery? I couldget? You know, vandalism?
I'm as well. They may nothave had vandalism as a law or a
crime back then, So battery iswhat she got charged with. But you
know what, some people it's sofun. Some people battery on a scarecrow.
Some people do have really punchable faces. I guess, So, I
guess Luigi Lugo just pissed her off. Maybe am I looking at Luigi?

(10:39):
Maybe she was racist? Maybe shewas Maybe she was racist. Maybe she
loved his brother Mario. More numberseven, nearly an entire regiment lured to
their death. It was nineteen fourteenand World War One was in its first
year. The French were on themove, but so was the nearby regiment.

(11:05):
On the move they meant about tosurrender. The French force knew that
they had to think fast if theywere to survive another day. Their way
flag and moved to Canada. Thefog was thick and the French realized it
could be used to their advantage.The men rushed into a nearby field and

(11:28):
gathering sticks and other field debris,made scarecrows that, from a distance in
the fog, looked like helpless soldiers. They placed their camps on the stick
scarecrows and the men hid themselves,ready to ambush the enemy. A few
of the French were sent ahead andlured the German troops to the field at
the side of the scarecrow figures.The Germans charged. As soon as the

(11:48):
Germans were well into the trap,shots rang out from three sides. Over
one hundred men of the Batten regimentwere killed, and as the war went
on, scarecrows and trench dummies becamemore and more common. Is a way
to trick the German enemy soldiers.That's amazing, That is actually genius funny.
You know, they actually used thatin World War Two. Also they

(12:11):
had the inflatable armies. The Britishwere notorious for using those against the Germans,
and the Germans would give up wherethey were because they would send out
bombers to bomb those areas. Andit was literally a blow up tank.
That's so crazy. Inflatable inflatable armysounds like just a poor selling pool toy.

(12:35):
It does. Maybe maybe on anepisode of the After Show, We'll
do like a small, little thirtyminute episode on the inflatable army from World
War Two. Because it legitimately existed, you can find pictures. That's incredible.
Oh I want to see it.I wonder you couldn't do that shit
now because of all the drones andstuff. Yeah right, but yeah no,
I mean, hey, at thetime, fantastic and you know,

(12:58):
it saves your own soldiers from havingto go up there. Number six and
offering to the waters. BC Rogersand his wife are heading home by horse
and buggy one Sunday afternoon in nineteenoh three, when from across the river
they saw a boy and a womanstanding along the bank. Then, to

(13:20):
their absolute horror, they saw theboy lift the woman into his arms and
toss her into the wild rapids.Oh my god. Barely able to believe
his eyes, mister Rogers stopped hishorses and ran to the water's edge.
He looked to find the woman,but he could not see a single trace
of her. When he looked up, he saw the boy run off and
vanish into the vermint scenery. Feelingas though he had to do something,

(13:43):
Rogers ran to the nearest village andreturned with two men to help him find
the body of the woman. Still, no trace of her could be found.
Rogers eventually returned to the buggy,took the reins, and rode to
the nearest farm across the river.There, he talked to the farmer and
soon discovered that the farmer's grandson hadtaken the old scarecrow to the river's bank

(14:03):
and tossed it in. Oh that'samazing. That sucks. But okay,
but like I can understand the kidman he was traumati say, oh my
god, they're they couldn't throw ina body. But do you think I
could understand what? Well? No, I was just saying, like I
could understand why he probably he waslike freaked out. The guy who was

(14:24):
like, oh my god, likethis kid just threw a woman inside the
river. Like what would you thinka child could throw a full grown woman
into anything? Right? Well,I mean if he if he was on
a horse and he was pretty faraway, maybe he couldn't tell that.
It was like a young you know, like a little boy. I don't
know. He thought it was theHulk. It was a young David Banner

(14:48):
or Bruce Banner. Excuse me,David Banners a rapper, the rapping hulk.
I'm sure that's a thing. Oh, I'm sure it is. It
was a young Bruce Banner, nota David Banner. Number five. The
Incredible Rescue. Two men, accordingto a Perth Newspaper newspaper article published in

(15:09):
nineteen forty, were taking a strollthrough a Sussex meadow one night when they
came upon a plank bridge that crosseda stream. The men began to walk
across the planks, when, totheir horror, a body floated beneath that.
The men had been in shock atthe sight, but it did not
stop them from being brave. Theyquickly got off the bridge, ran to

(15:30):
the water's banks, and took offtheir shoes and socks. Together, the
men waded into the water and grabbedhold of the body. When they got
the body to the water's edge,they lifted it and heaved it onto the
bank. There they discovered in thedarkness that the victim was no ordinary human.
They had rescued a scarecrow that hadsomehow made its way into the stream

(15:50):
as either a prank or as ameans of disposal. So it must have
been the common thing to throw yourold scarecrows in the water. I mean,
that sounds like a really bad idea, because then shit like that happened.
Why would't you just throw them inthe garbage there were Do you think
that they had garbage? But theyprobably had a burn pile. I mean,

(16:14):
it's just hey, you know,like it's you could just like break
it apart and to the animals orsomething to eat, or just set it
on fire and then go bees.Not the base not the base number four
mistaken identity. Maud helf Noggle andher friend were walking through a Pennsylvania cornfield

(16:41):
on their way to church one Sundaymorning in nineteen oh nine when Maud spotted
something lying on the ground. Look, she said, somebody has knocked over
a Papa scarecrow. Maud walked overto set the scarecrow back up, but
when she reached it, she screamedand fainted. Her friend ran to her
and discovered it. The scare Ericawas actually the mutilated body of Maud's father.

(17:03):
God jeez. Charles Heffnoggle was walkinghome through the corn filled when he
was attacked. The police were ableto determine that there was a fear struggle
between Charles and his attackers. Charlesfailed to overcome the other men and his
body was half pieces. All ofthe farmer's money and valuable papers were taken
from his pockets. It was clearlya brutal robbery, but the sheer shock

(17:27):
value of the story led to beled to it being printed in newspapers across
the country. Holy shit, jeez, that would suck. Talk about the
traumatizing experience with that child. Numberthree A stone's throw away. Take any
smooth body of water and add abunch of stones to the mix, and

(17:48):
you can bet there will be akid standing around throwing the stones into the
water, or an adult like me. I like trying to skip stones.
I can't, but I have seenit done. Come on, I don't
even live near water, and Ican do it whatever. Give them a
target and they will be busy forhours. That is sort of what happened

(18:11):
at the reservoir and Beautiford, Victoria, back in nineteen o eight. It
was about four pm and a bunchof boys were throwing stones into the reservoir.
They noticed a coat and a hatfloating in the deep and used it
as a target. For about twohours, The boys thought they were pelting
a discarded scarecrow until someone decided tocheck the scarecrow out. That was when

(18:32):
the body of John cuth Burston wasdiscovered. At the end quest, it
was believed that John may have drownedhimself. He was a retired engineer and
had previously made a statement that hewas done with his life. No follow
was given on the stone throwers,however, one can easily imagine that that
discovery had made didn't think twice aboutpelting anything with a human like shape.

(18:53):
Again, well the fuck you drownyourself come up for air? I mean,
but like I don't know, becauseyou know, like the body's natural
reaction would be like to you know, to want to go back up for
air, and some would be kindof hard. I mean, it would
be hard to be scarier sitting theredrowning yourself. But at the same time,

(19:15):
I guess if you're trying to succeedin your endeavor, I mean,
I think there are better ways todo it than drowning yourself. But I
know, I know, it's like, I mean, you know, he
could have just shot himself or something. He was like, no, I'm
just gonna drown myself. Now,this is this is a quick and easy
Well maybe he thought it was easy. It's definitely not quick either. No.

(19:37):
Oh, that's like one of theI heard. It's one of the
worst ways. Number two. Theremains of the Lost Australia must have been
littered with scarecrows hanging from the treesin the early half of the nineteen hundreds,
because barely anyone took notice of themuntil they turn out to actually be
the bodies of the four Lost Souls. Why twenty four a boy was searching

(20:02):
for his cattle around smith Filled,New South Wales when he came across what
he thought was a scarecrow hanging froma fig tree. He told his father
about it, and the father,being wiser, contacted the police and returned
with them to the spot. Therethey found the hanging body of Charles Valentine
lamb Age to fifty four. Butlater in nineteen thirty five, boys reported

(20:26):
seeing a scarecrow hanging from a figtree in Clontarf, Queensland. A few
days later a man also spotted thescarecrow and went to investigate it. He
found it to be the body ofa suicide victim. The police were notified
and the body was taken to theMorgue Cheese. Okay, I don't know
how Okay, well I get itbecause you know, it was back in

(20:47):
like the nineteen thirties and shit,so obviously like scarecrows were like a big,
big thing or whatever. But ifI see something hanging from a tree
and it looks like a person,I'm not going to automatically. But it
may have been a come and practice. I don't think you could think about
it. People now they don't youknow, you don't really put up scarecrows.
You can hang like one of thosebig plastic owls from a tree and

(21:08):
that it came the birds away,yeah, because they're not going to come
towards it. But I see itnow, like literally this weekend, I
was in Titus, Alabama, andI saw that this porch had two big,
huge, hanging plastic owls and theywasn't perched up on anything. They're
just hanging from the like the topof the porch area to keep the birds

(21:30):
out from making nests in there.And they work. So I mean you
don't technically have to prop them upat per se. True, yeah right,
yeah, Number one, the wifewill do. Women scarecrows were seldom
made in the recent past, butin the early nineteen hundreds there were some
gruesome reports of very real female scarecrows. For example, in nineteen oh six,

(21:56):
a newspaper article made its rounds throughoutthe United States telling of a Hungarian
farmer, Eugene Palsy, who wassuch a penny pincher that when his wife
passed away, he took her bodyand set it up in his orchard.
It was discovered that he was usingher body to scare the birds away from
his fruit trees. Oh my god, but like, wouldn't animals come to

(22:19):
the rotting corpse. Probably it's atwo in one, you know. He
was like a bird spearer and abird terror scary feeder. Did the natural
bird feeder again, this time inAmsterdam In nineteen ten, it was reported

(22:40):
that a farmer's wife passed away.While the marriage appeared to have been a
happy one, the farmer reportedly lovedhis crops more than her. After she
died, he dressed his He dressedher corpse in one of his old suits
and set her up in the orchardbehind his house to scare off the birds.
Say he wasn't the only one thatdid it. Why was that a
thing? Like what it says here? It says the neighbor spotted this scarecrow

(23:06):
wife two days later and reported thehusband to the authorities. The farmer called
win of the neighbor's discovery, Sothe wife was, of course nowhere to
be found. Jesus, Wow.Yeah, that's so weird. It's like,
why would that be the first thingyou think of? It is like,
oh, my wife died, soI'm just gonna use it. But
who knew there were weird stories aboutscarecrows? I assumed in real life,

(23:29):
Yes, that somebody had used adead body as a scarecrow, right.
Also, can we talk about someof the stock photos that they use for
stories. I was trying not tolaugh at the second one. The guy
that's like hagging with like a beltthing, like, I don't know,
it just does not look real.It looks absolutely fake and not terrifying.
But you can kind of see thepartial makeup on his face they used too.

(23:55):
I know, it's it's it's notgood. There's some random scarecrow stock
picture as well. And I don'tknow what they were trying to go for
with that number one with the female. Yeah, the brain and torn apart
one yes, yeah, fuck,Like why does she like? What the
fuck? It's so weird. She'slike literally just standing there with like pigtails

(24:18):
and she has an axe and she'sjust holding it just like a Lizzie Borden
stock photo. Yeah, so weird. But yeah, I found this the
other day. I know. Wesaid on the episodes like we don't have
anything, and then we got donerecording and I was like, oh,
I actually do have something. Isent this to myself the other day.
There you go, randomly found it. Who who would have known that there

(24:42):
were so many stories out Oh,I'm sure there's more than those. Yeah,
I'm sure there's more. Because yougot to think back then, people
were poor, especially in the thirties, and you're going through the depression,
you know, and people didn't wantto use their their stock. They're their
hey that they got or whatever theygot to feed the animals on on the

(25:02):
farm. And I guess some ofthese guys just thought, you know what,
my wife died, I'll use her. Yeah, strange. Well,
like, well, the thing isis, like I think they thought it
was gonna be you know, likea two for one thing, you know,
like, oh her, they'll eather decomposing body, but you'll also
scare away the predators. It's stillweird, still very strange, weird,

(25:26):
very weird, very strange. Butyeah, there you go, patrons.
Ten weird stories involving scarer crows arenot really scarecrows, actual corpses. They
were actually people, actually people.A lot of suicide in there. Yeah,
it's not anticipating that much suicide tobe in this, Like what the

(25:48):
fuck? Yeah, well, well, patrons, we will be back next
week. You know, we gotSide Crime coming up on Monday, and
obviously you will get that free onFriday, Add free early. There you
go, add free and early,and then I will go ahead and let

(26:10):
you guys know where we're going onour next series. We're gonna be going
into the crystal skulls crystal skull notwell, it may be mentioned. I'm
sure it will be mentioned by Nick. We'll go into that because the original
the crystal skulls that were found thatthey believe to be alien in origin.

(26:32):
So we'll see, we'll get ourthought process on it and see if the
conspiracy could be real or if it'sa gigantic hoax. So there you go.
That's coming up. Got that comingup, and then after that series
we will jump into another paranormal crimeseries after that with some more side crime
as well mixed in there. Doy'all have any closing thoughts on scarecrows?

(26:57):
Um? It's still does not changehow I feel about scarecrows. I think
they're pretty weird and creepy. Theywere, Yeah, they do. I
mean I haven't had any birds,you know, eat my lily plants when
we put it up in October.Well that's good, I guess. I
don't know, not that we everhave a problem with birds. I actually

(27:19):
no, you always have a problemwith birds. Every year they come back
to the same nest and they shitall over my poor So Liza Susa.
We have a wreath in front ofour door. Forevery like season or whatever,
right, and she had to removethe most recent one because the birds
will try building a nest in therebecause it's like all twigs and stuff,
right, So we usually will removeit for a couple of days and like

(27:41):
we'll destroy whatever nest they built inthere, and then we'll you know,
take away the wreath for a coupleof days and then put it back up
so they don't come back because it'sright on our front door. And I
don't feel like being dive bombed bybirds every time I open my door.
Yeah, yeah, getting ship onwould be fun. Yeah, all right,

(28:04):
patrons, Well, we appreciate everythingyou do for us. I know
this is a little bit of ashorter episode than our normal ones, But
next week we will come back.I don't know what we're going to do
on the after show. I'll maybewe'll we'll try to find something. We'll
do a little bit more of aI think we'll do a series again,

(28:26):
or maybe we'll just do a relaxeddiscussion next week. We'll see, because
we haven't done we did the onerelaxed discussion number one, but maybe we'll
just do another relaxed discussion on thingsgoing on in our lives and what's coming
up? Anything we got moving becauseI'm I'm I say movie. I'm actually
moving to a new house next week, so we've got that coming up.

(28:48):
So maybe maybe that will be thediscussion moving house, movie, moving,
and you know, any weird thingsthat may have happened or that we've seen
throughout the Here we go. Butanyways, thank you all for listening.
We appreciate it. With lobya andalways remember to stay elbow d. Thank

(29:11):
you Weird nine. This podcast hasbeen made possible by listeners like you.
This show is part of the DustPodcast Network.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}10 Strange True Cases Involving Scarecrows