The Legend of Sleepy Hollow AKA Brom Bones Apologists Anonymous | Halloween Strangedive | Ep #43 - Madame Strangeways: True Spooky Paranormal Stories

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
So to keep her company, Rupesal turns the turnips into her
friends and acquaintances. Oh, that's kind of nice
actually. As the turnips wilt after a
little while, as turnips are want to do, so do the persons
that were created by Rupesal's magic.
Oh, that's not good. Welcome stranger to a special

(00:31):
Halloween episode of Madam Strangeways with me.
Madam Strangeways. Now usually I share your true
strange stories and give my own strange commentary along the
way, but on this very special, very strange sawin spectral
spect. Oh, Spect.
Spooktacular. Strangtacular.

(00:52):
Join me for a deep dive into thefirst Great American ghost
story, The Legend of Sleepy Halloween.
Follow by Washington Irving. First, we'll discuss the strange
history and folklore surroundingthe story.
And of course, I will be dragging you down.
Some. Strange rabbit holes along the
way, obviously. And then at the end I'll narrate

(01:13):
an abridged version of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow just for
you. But before we get started, a
strange shout out to my Patreon patrons TJ Hotter of the Tapes
of Trepidation podcast, G Man Music.
Ted, Keith and Tori, thank you so much to my Feral Fiendish 5
for supporting the show. If you would like to hear your

(01:34):
name at the beginning of every episode and get a free sticker
while you're at it, join the Patreon today at
patreon.com/madam Strange Ways. And now on to this bizarro
Halloween strange dive on The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, here on
Madam Strange Ways. Happy strange tober everyone.

(02:13):
I hope everyone's having a fantastically strange, strange
tober. We are so close to Halloween or
strange a ween. You know, you could call it
strange a ween like that might be cool.
You think that's can we can we make that happen?
Can we make fetch happen? Let me know.
Anyway, I hope you're having a very strange, strange tober.
And of course, as you know, in the strange verse, which is

(02:35):
where you are right now, strangeis good.
So it's a good thing. I hope that you're having a
pleasantly strange strange tober.
We're just going to go ahead andjust jump face first.
Oh, head first, headless. Hmm.
Hmm. Something we're going to, you
see where I'm going. We're going to jump in head
first, or headlessness first into the Legend of Sleepy

(02:56):
Hollow. But really quickly, I want to
thank Keith, my patron. Keith, for the suggestion of
today's topic because I wouldn'thave even thought about doing
the story, an episode on the Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
So thank you, Keith. But also, if you're listening
and you have an idea for a story, if you have an idea for
just a future topic that I couldtalk about, let me know. e-mail

(03:18):
me madamstrangeways@gmail.com because it could be the next
episode. Who knows?
You'll never know until you try.OK, so here we go.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow published over 200 years ago, in
1819 and 1820. So if you do your own research,
you're going to find both years,but both are right.
But the earliest time of publication was 1819.

(03:39):
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow was considered the first Great
American ghost story and actually just kind of the first
good, like, passable American story period.
Because remember, this isn't that far removed from the
American Revolution. And I think in the UK they kind
of consider it the American rebellion.

(03:59):
And they were still kind of exalty about it at the time.
So they didn't really think thatany Americans were very good at
writing. And then Washington Irving came
around and they had to go. You know what?
This guy's on to something with this Headless Horseman
situation. So Washington Irving, who lived
from 1783 to 1859, published TheLegend of Sleepy Hollow in 1819

(04:22):
as a part of a collection of stories titled The Sketchbook of
Jeffrey Crayon. Jeffrey spelled, of course,
Geoffrey. And what does that even mean?
But don't I can't get ahead of don't put a pen in that.
We're going to come back. Who's Jeffrey Crayon, you may

(04:43):
ask, because I also wondered. We're going to get to it.
Keep keep your. Hmm.
What's a Halloween hat? What kind of hat do you keep it
on? Keep your Halloween hat on.
OK. The Sketchbook of Jeffrey Crayon
is what it was ublished in. Also included in that book was
the classic tale Rip Van Winkle.Yeah, he did that one too.
Isn't that interesting? They're both in the same book.

(05:04):
Both super iconic, Irving is often considered the first Great
American writer, so you're probably at least passingly
familiar with the story of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, either
from the Disney animated short or from the Johnny Depp and
Christina Ricci. Why did I say it that way?
Christina Ricci movie spoiler alert The gist of the story in

(05:27):
case you haven't. In case you don't know the story
of the Why do I keep saying the story of the Legend of Sleepy
Hollow? That's what this episode needs
to be called is the story of theLegend of Sleepy Hollow.
Anyway, the story spoiler alert is that a weirdo named Ichabod
Crane gets chased by this headless man on a horse.

(05:49):
That's, that's, that's the gist of it.
I don't know how else to to wrapit up for you, but we're going
to get into a little plot reviewin just a second, just to remind
everyone all the, all the, all the beats that happened in the
story. But first, like I said, you've
probably seen the Disney film ormaybe you've seen Sleepy Hollow,
which was the Tim Burton film, but there's also a bunch of

(06:10):
other adaptations. So here we go.
In 1922. The first adaptation was The
Headless Horseman, a silent filmwho starred Will Rogers as a
lanky Ichabod cream. It was kind of funny.
It was supposed to be humorous and probably slapstick.
I didn't. I didn't watch it.
I was going to say slapstick. Ian, is that a word?

(06:31):
We're going to go with that, I think.
I think I like it. Anyway, 1949 is when Disney made
the adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad.
We'll find out in just a moment.Why are why why why are those
connected? 1999 Sleepy Hollow with Johnny
Depp and Christina Ricci and then in the early aughts ish, I
don't remember. I didn't write this year down a

(06:52):
show where Ichabod Crane was like a real person and he was
frozen somehow for some reason and then thawed out in modern
times to help solve mysteries. Because I assume the Headless
Horseman is like back and presumably Ikapa is the only one
that can defeat him, even thoughthat's not how it worked in the

(07:13):
story. I don't know.
It's a strange premise. Strange premise for a show.
If you've seen it and you think I should watch it,
madamstrangeways@gmail.com, let me know.
Watch, watch. I watch it and then I get really
into the show and I'm like the number one fan.
Unlikely but possible. Stranger Things and all that,
but the Disney cartoon was one of Disney's four package films

(07:36):
quote UN quote so during World War 2, the studio Disney lost a
lot of manpower and resources, which left Disney with countless
unfinished ideas too long for shorts and too short for
features. So Disney being as good at
making money as it is, decided, oh, we'll just slap 2 together
that don't make any sense and there's no reason for them to be

(07:56):
connected otherwise, and we'll just put them together and then
we'll have a feature length film.
Great. So that's what they did with
three other films. So I think 4 total around that
time. I just thought that was so
interesting how World War 2 impacted even animation studios
at the time. Pretty interesting.
Anyway, what I remember specifically from the Disney
cartoon, which I have not watched since I was a child, but
I have this like vivid recollection of, of being in

(08:20):
like the school library, like around Halloween, obviously.
And then the librarian Wheeling out the big cart with the TV and
the VCR and the VHS and then sitting all of us down.
The lights go off. And I think it was probably even
like, you know, an overcast day or something very spooky and
then playing, you know, the movie for us.
And I genuinely don't think I'veseen it since then.

(08:43):
But what I remembered from watching it back then, if I had
to tell you the plot, I guess I would say, OK.
I guess I would say Ichabod Crane is the protagonist.
He's a good guy, right. And then the Gaston looking guy
whose name is Brahm Bones, we'llget into him later.
The Gaston looking guy was kind of like not a great guy, but

(09:03):
like not a good guy. And then obviously the Headless
Horseman was the main bad guy, right?
That's pretty much all I remember.
And also how funny looking Ichabod Crane was made in the
cartoon. That's all I really recall.
But after all the reading that Ihave done for this episode,
Ichabod's kind of a Dick. Like it's kind of a bad dude.

(09:27):
I wrote bad dude in my script. And then I just, you know what?
I was like, that isn't strong enough.
He's a Dick. I don't know what else to say.
And it's on purpose. Like it's listen, you'll get,
we'll get there. Anyway, we'll get into more
detail about Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman and the
history and the setting and Washington Irving himself.

(09:47):
But first, let me just give you a little refresher on the story
of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow Man.
Also, if you can hear Thunder, that's not me.
That's not me. Putting that in afterwards,
that's natural. That's natural.
I summoned the storm for the perfect amount of atmosphere for

(10:09):
this episode, so you're welcome.OK, on to the plot.
So Ichabod Crane is a travellingschool teacher.
Yes, he looks almost exactly howthey animate him in the Disney
cartoon. It's Canon.
Like they took like no creative freedom with his character.
He looks exactly how he's described.
So Ichabod is trying to court Katrina Van Tassel, which is

(10:32):
this, of course, beautiful young18 year old girl in the town.
And he's trying to court her specifically because, and only
because he knows that she's going to inherit a bunch of land
and farms and orchards because her family are like rich farmers
and they've got a lot of land. And Ichabod is trying to be a
sugar baby. Ichabod is trying to find a

(10:54):
sugar Mama. And so he sees Katrina Van
Tassel and he's like, Yep, that's it.
So that's the only reason he's trying to court her, which is
rude. This is why I'm saying he's kind
of a Dick. So Ichabod gets an invitation to
one of the Van Tassel's party, the Van Tassels, of course,
being Katrina Van Tassel's family.
So he's like, oh, oh, geez, OK, this is my chance.

(11:14):
School's out, kids, fuck off. I got to go.
This is way more important than your education.
I actually don't care about you at all.
I got to go. So he closes school down early
and then he takes his weird. How do they describe it?
A broken down plow horse named Gunpowder rides that horse.
Poor Gunpowder rides Gunpowder out to the farm for the Van

(11:37):
Tassel party. So at this party, everyone is
telling ghost stories because everyone in Sleepy Hollow loves
ghost stories. And Brom Bones, you know, guest
on, tells a ghost story about the most famous ghost in Sleepy
Hollow, which is the Headless Horseman.
You may have heard of him. So at some point in the night,
off screen, Katrina Van Tassel ends up rejecting Ichabod.

(12:01):
And he doesn't take it very well.
And he sulks and he mopes his way home writing gunpowder.
And when I say home, I should also say that he just lives with
all the different farmers in thetown.
Like he just lives at different people's houses and moves around
week to week. So he's on his way to whatever
farm that he was staying at at the time.

(12:22):
Anyway, on his ride home, quote UN quote, he starts getting
perhaps understandably spooked because another rider on a horse
has started to trail him on the ride home.
And this is like not that long after he was hearing a very,
very scary story about the infamous Headless Horseman
chasing people at night on his horse.

(12:44):
Obviously, I feel like that's implied.
Anyway, apparently it does turn out to be the Headless Horseman,
who is now chasing Ichabod, and he stands up on his saddle as
his horse is running, which is kind of cool.
And then he throws his decapitated head at Ichabod and
knocks him off of gunpowder, andIchabod was never heard from

(13:04):
again. Dun Dun Dun.
But actually the book leaves it kind of vague.
So it's kind of letting you decide.
Was the Headless Horseman just Brom Bones pranking him, being
kind of an asshole, but like, also he kind of deserved it, you
know? Like I'm kind of on Brom's side
here, honestly. Here's the thing.
It's like they're they're pairing the, or they're pitting

(13:26):
the like the geek and the jock against each other.
I don't normally vote for the jock.
Normally I'm rooting for the geek, right?
But in this case, Ichabod's kindof a jerk.
So I'm kind of with Brom on thisone.
Anyway, the book lets you decidewas it Brom Bones pranking him,
or was it actually the Headless Horseman himself in the flesh,

(13:51):
In the spectral flesh, but actually in the book, the man
telling us the story. In the story, he heard that
Ichabod ended up becoming an attorney and a politician and a
Court Justice after fleeing Sleepy Hollow and leaving all of
his belongings behind because hewas so scared of what happened
to him that night. But others in the story say that

(14:12):
he was never seen or heard from again.
Of course, the Disney cartoon says that the Headless Horseman
was definitely a ghost. Like, no question.
So then why is Brahm even in this?
Anyway, we're going to move on. That's the basic gist of the
story. So now we're going to discuss
Ichabod. Ichabod Crane himself.
So actually he was named after areal person named Ichabod Crane

(14:35):
that Washington Irving did actually meet in real life.
So I saw in my research a few places that were saying, OK,
this story, like the character'sname is Ichabod Crane.
So like, what's the meaning behind Ichabod and Crane?
And I started going down that rabbit hole too, because
apparently Ichabod is a name from the Bible.

(14:55):
And so like, I'm looking at likethe the Bible references, I'm
looking it up and I'm seeing what was his character Ichabod
in the Bible. Is there some kind of connection
here to the story? And like, Crane is apparently an
antiquated way to refer to a tall, lanky man.
And Crane was tall and lanky. So I was like, OK, I'm trying to
put this together for the show, for my, for, for, for you.

(15:16):
I wanted to be able to give you the most accurate information.
But no, no, Irving just heard that this real man that he met,
he heard the name Ichabod Crane,and he immediately wrote it down
for a future story. He said, now that's a name.
I mean, it's crazy. Irving had a very good, and by

(15:36):
good I mean weird. And by weird, I mean strange
taste in names. As you will come to talk about,
you probably have already pickedup on it.
Brom Bones, Ichabod Crane, Jeffrey Crayon, even his own
name, Washington Irving. What is that?
Anyway? We're going to do it more.
Ichabod Crane's superstitious belief, you know, because he's

(15:57):
easily spooked, right? Like on the on the ride back
from the farmhouse, he's really spooked.
And the reason that he's so easily spooked is that he always
had his nose in a scary book such as The History of New
England Witchcraft by Cotton Mather.
But actually, there is no real book by that name, although

(16:18):
Washington Irving could be alluding to Mather's memorable
Providence's relating to witchcraft's and possessions,
which is probably true because of course, back when this was
written in 1819, you couldn't just Google it.
You couldn't just Google it. So I feel like it's close
enough. So Mather, who wrote that book,
was a Puritan minister and a prolific author, though best

(16:40):
remembered for his role in the Salem witch trials, which were
between 1692 and 1693, not very long.
For as much as we talk about theSalem witch trials, they didn't
go on for that long, not nearly as long as the European witch
trials, which went gone from 1400 to 1775, in which 100,000

(17:01):
people were prosecuted for witchcraft in Europe and British
America. Meanwhile, the Salem witch
trials, 25 people, 25 people died.
Why do we talk about the Salem witch trials so much?
It's kind of weird. Anyway, Mather, who wrote that
book that Ichabod Crane is always reading, was a firm
believer in witchcraft and the supernatural, and was an

(17:21):
influential champion of such beliefs.
O it's weird that Ichabod was reading that because in 1790,
when the story is set, which I robably should have mentioned
earlier, by the way, the story is set in 1790.
We'll get to that in the settings section.
OK? It's further down.
Anyway, in 1790, people weren't thinking about witch trials

(17:42):
anymore, and they definitely weren't as superstitious as he,
the character Ichabod Crane is being.
And he's supposed to be a schoolteacher, so why was he so
superstitious? It's kind of weird and it feels
like it feels like Irving was definitely doing it on purpose.
I wish that I were a smarter person that would be able to
tell you kind of what he was going for there.

(18:05):
But he's clearly trying to go somewhere because otherwise, why
would you include that detail? I think it's fascinating detail
and I think it makes him, if nota likable character, a very
memorable 1. So I'm going to read you the
actual description that Irving wrote of Ichabod crayon so you
can see just what I mean when I say Disney took zero creative
liberty with his character. Decide OK, here we go.

(18:28):
The cognomen of Crane was not inapplicable to his person.
He was tall but exceedingly link, with narrow shoulders,
long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his
sleeves, feet that might have served for shuffles, and his
whole frame most loosely hung together.
His head was small and flat at top, with huge ears, large green

(18:52):
glassy eyes and a long snipe nose so that it looked like a
weather cock nice perched upon his spindle neck to tell which
way the wind blew. To see him striding along the
profile of a hill on a windy daywith his clothes bagging and
fluttering around him, one mighthave mistaken him for the genius
of famine descending upon the earth or some scarecrow eloped

(19:16):
from a cornfield. Like, that's so mean.
So just to be clear, the real Ichabod Crane that this that
that Irving met was, did not look like this.
He didn't look like this. He took the name.
The real Ichabod Crane is like ageneral or something and the the
Navy or the army, I don't remember.

(19:37):
He's a real guy, but Ichabod Crane's looks were not based on
him. So how rude was that
description, though? See, see what I mean?
You don't write a you're not writing a protagonist like that.
Honestly, you're just not. But I'm here for it.
All right? We're just going to stop very
briefly on the character of BromBones.
And I mean very briefly but I just had to highlight I love

(20:00):
this fact. Brom Bones played pranks on
Ichabod with his bro friends andtrained a local dog to howl
whenever Ichabod sang. Which apparently happened more
than one might imagine because Iguess Ichabod being the school
teacher he would also He would also do a lot of stuff with
church and he would like lead the psalms.

(20:23):
He would lead, you know, I don'tknow.
I don't know, I don't know how church works, but he did a lot
of stuff in his voice, saying a lot.
And I guess Brahm trained a local dog to hell.
Whenever Ichabod saying, I thinkthat is so funny, Brahm.
Hell yeah, Brahm. And when I say brief, that's
honestly that's all I wanted to say because I really want to get
into the Headless Horsemen because not only are we going to

(20:45):
talk about the character in the book, we are also going to talk
about all the other headless Horsemen that exists in other
cultures. And I'm very excited to talk
about it. So the Headless Horseman, I'll
go ahead and open with the description from Washington
Irving himself in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, which describes
the Headless Horseman. The dominant spirit, however,

(21:06):
that haunts this enchanted region, Sleepy Hollow, and seems
to be. Commander in chief of all the
powers of the air is the apparition of a figure on
horseback without a head. It is said by some to be the
ghost of a Hessian trooper whosehead had been carried away by a
cannonball in some nameless battle during the Revolutionary

(21:26):
War, and who is ever and Anon seen by the country folk
hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the wings of the
wind. His haunts are not confined to
the valley, but extend at times to the adjacent roads, and
especially to the vicinity of a church at no great distance.
Indeed, certain of the most authentic historians of those

(21:47):
parts who have been careful in collecting and collating the
floating facts concerning the specter, allege that the body of
the trooper having been buried in the churchyard, the ghost
rides forth to the scene of the battle in nightly quest of his
head. And that the rushing speed with
which he sometimes passes along the hollow like a midnight blast

(22:09):
is owing to his being belated and in a hurry to get back to
the churchyard before dark. What's a Hesse?
And you ask, Put a pen in that. How many pins have we got?
Are you keeping track? Let me know,
mattofstrangeways@gmail.com. So the Headless Horseman was a
fearsome spectre in the Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
And like I said, it's like the most famous ghost in Sleepy

(22:31):
Hollow because they tell a lot of ghost stories.
This is the most famous one. So the Headless Horseman wore
all black and he had a Cape and also his horse was black.
And by the way, Brom Bones horsewas also black and Brom Bones
horse was named Daredevil. Interesting.
We'll find out more. OK, maybe I could have talked
about Brom Bones more because I'm already thinking about more

(22:52):
details that I could add. It doesn't matter, we're moving
on. We're talking about the Headless
Horseman. So what you may famously
remember about the Headless Horseman is a pumpkin or a Jack
O Lantern, especially as his head right, which is very scary.
However, in Irving's time, a pumpkin was not yet a Halloween
Jack O Lantern. Pumpkins didn't begin getting

(23:13):
used for Jack O lanterns until the 1840s, after the Irish
Potato Famine forced many Irish to immigrate to America purely
so they wouldn't starve to death.
And then they found the native pumpkins to be much easier to
carve and use as lanterns than the traditional turnip used in
Ireland. Because imagine, have you tried
to, have you tried to carve a a turnip and do a Jack O Lantern?

(23:38):
It's difficult. It's difficult, although the
effect is much spookier. I'll say that anyway.
So listen, no, the pumpkin that the Headless Horseman used was
not in fact a Jack O Lantern. It was just a normal pumpkin,
but presumably in the dark and normal pumpkin with kind of
seamish along the size of like ahuman head.

(23:59):
And also it would be something easy for Brom Bones to carry on
the horse with him and then throw.
I'm just saying maybe it is a ghost, maybe it's Brom Bones,
who knows. Anyway, hold on.
I got to go back to Jack O Lanterns here for a second
because side note, for American listeners who aren't really
taught much about the Great Famine that happened in Ireland,

(24:20):
just please humor me. And look, I'm taking you down to
this is a strange rabbit hole, and we're going down it really
quickly. I'm just going to give you a
strange nutshell in this strangerabbit hole.
I don't know. Do rabbits eat nuts?
Unclear. Doesn't matter.
Moving on. You ready?
We're going to talk about it. OK, Tie me.
Actually, you know what? Tie me.
Tie me on the strange rabbit hole.

(24:41):
OK, You ready? OK, go.
The Great Famine, also known as the Great Hunger or the Irish
Potato Famine, was a period of mass starvation and disease in
Ireland lasting from 1845 to 1852, caused in part by an
infection of potato crops by blight.
Oh, I didn't look up how to say this.
Phyto pho. No Phyto Thora infestins

(25:08):
throughout Europe during the 1840s.
So if you're wondering why a blight on potatoes only, why a
potato blight specifically, and no other kind of blight would
cause a famine, then Gold Star for you.
Excellent question. And the answer to that question
is that as a part of the United Kingdom at the time, the Brits
exported the rest of Ireland's food production for themselves.

(25:31):
Because A, that's kind of their whole thing, and B, they really
didn't think very highly of the Irish and they didn't especially
seem to care if they lived or died, which is very clear now in
hindsight. So it wasn't really the blight
on the potatoes themselves that caused the population of Ireland
to drop 1.5 million people. Just.

(25:52):
During the famine alone, in which 1,000,000 people of those
people died, but immigration caused further demographic
collapse until it had lost half of its entire population by the
1900s, so about the span of 45 years.
This nearly wiped out the Irish language itself, and if you're
wondering, neither the language nor the population of Ireland

(26:15):
have ever recovered to pre famine rates to this day.
Or you can just listen to the Sinead O'Connor song Famine
because that probably tells the story a lot better than I did.
OK, how long was that? Did you tie me?
Let me know. I'm out of
strangeways@gmail.com. OK.
Back to Sleepy Hollow, back to the Headless Horseman.
All right, we're back. We're we've come out of the
strange rabbit hole through the other side.

(26:38):
So the Headless Horseman rises from his grave every night
searching for his decapitated head.
And the old Dutch graveyard is where he said to roam, but he
can't cross the bridge into the church.
Something about Holy Land of thechurch?
Or do you like desecrated land? Desecrated.
Consecrated. That's the opposite.
Something about consecrated landof the church, or like crossing

(27:00):
over a stream of water because there's a bridge there, which is
something that spirits are said to not be able to cross.
You know, I don't know. It's something like that.
Anyway, FYI, we're coming back to that pen from earlier about
the Headless Horseman being referred to sometimes as the
Galloping Hessian. We're going to get into it.
What's a Hessian? What's a Hessian?

(27:21):
I didn't know going into this. Now I know a lot about it, and
now you're about to know too. Here's some.
Here's some condensed notes thatI've taken on what is a Hessian,
Why, what, what, who, what, when, where, why?
What is a Hessian? Why is a Hessian?
How is a Hessian? Etcetera.
So Hessians were involved in theAmerican Revolution.

(27:44):
Hessians were German auxiliary forces that were used during the
American Revolution or you know,the rebellion or whatever.
So the British actually ended upusing more than 30,000 German
troops during the Revolutionary War, and the Hessian soldiers
made-up about 1/4 of all the troops in the British Army,

(28:06):
which is a lot. So also mind you, Germany was
not Germany, it was not unified.So it wasn't the Germany that we
know now. I think it was 1875 that Germany
became Germany, which seems likenot that long ago, but that's
how it worked. So while the Americans often
painted the Hessians as bloodthirsty, no, we've got a

(28:27):
pause. Hold on.
OK Google. When did Germany become unified?
1871, according to. OK.
OK, I was close. Are you going to give me that
one? Is it?
Come on. Come on.
All right. So where were we?
Well, the Americans often painted the Hessians as
bloodthirsty mercenaries. In reality, many of the Hessians

(28:48):
were actually forced into the army against their will, so they
didn't even want to be there. But Britain had really strong
ties to some of the German states, in particular because
King George the Third's family was from Hanover.
Gosh, this is a whole another situation that I do not know
enough about. You know what I know?

(29:08):
I know that I don't know a lot about it.
So we're not going to go into that.
It's going to be a whole anotherepisode.
What matters here is that the American colonists saw the
Hessians as brutal, savage invaders.
And Americans in general were outraged at the idea of King
George the Third hiring foreign troops to subdue them.
And they specifically called outthis practice in the Declaration

(29:32):
of Independence. How mad they were about it.
So rumors quickly spread across the continent of the Hessians
ferocity and savagery. Some American riflemen were even
found on Long Island impaled to trees by Hessian bayonets.
And reportedly, the Hessians didnot care whether or not you
surrendered, they're still goingto impale you.
At least that's how the rumors went in the American camps for

(29:55):
the American colonials. So Americans were pissed about
the Hessians, right? Because from what I can
understand, they basically just considered it cheating.
They considered that Great Britain was just cheating in the
war by bringing in these German Hessian soldiers, which I kind
of guess I don't know enough about war to understand why they

(30:16):
were mad. Because the one thing that I do
know about war is that all's fair in it and also in love.
So I don't really get why they were mad, but I can understand.
Maybe they were mad just becausethey felt like they were losing
and that they were get, like I said, they're getting impaled,
so it's not good. That's another reason why,
that's another reason why they're mad.

(30:36):
I mean, I'm going to give it to them.
That makes that makes total sense.
Anyway, in the aftermath of the American Revolution, captured
Hessians were sent to prisoner of war camps in Pennsylvania,
Maryland, and Virginia. And actually the western parts
of those states had already large German immigrant
populations. And so many Hessians actually

(30:57):
found that they preferred life in the Americas, even though
they were there fighting for theBritish on the British side,
because away from the harsh discipline of the German
military life and surrounded by people who spoke their language
and also had a similar culture. You know many of those Hessians
who didn't even want to be in the army in the 1st place, they

(31:19):
deserted, they deserted the armyand they stayed in America
following the war. And actually by the end of the
war, by the end of the Revolutionary War, 10s of
thousands of Hessians ended up staying in America.
So even though you may have beenliving next door to an ex
Hessian soldier, and even thoughyou may have not even realized

(31:39):
that they were a soldier in the 1st place, you're still
understandably scared of the concept of especially a headless
Hessian soldier. I mean, like I said, Americans
are already freaked out enough that they specifically mentioned
the use of Hessians and the Declaration of Independence
because it was such a big deal. So there you go.
That's why the Headless Horsemanin the story of the Legend of

(32:03):
Sleepy Hollow, That's why he wasa Hessian soldier.
However, where did the inspiration for the actual
Headless Horseman come from, youmay ask?
Well, I'm happy to talk all about it.
So just as a quick reminder, theHeadless Horseman, obviously, as
a Hessian soldier, was said to have had his head decapitated by
a cannonball and then the head was buried separately from his

(32:26):
body. That's why he's always out
looking for his head. That's why he's always out
running around. But then why is he holding on to
it? Why is it on his?
I have questions now. I haven't put this together
until I'm just saying this out loud right now.
Why does he have it if he's looking for it or I guess it's a
pumpkin. Does he have a hmm, hmm.
There's there's more to unpack here, but we're just going to

(32:47):
move forward. We're moving forward for the
possible inspirations for the Headless Horseman myth.
So to start, we've got the German, Czech and Polish
Rubizal. Did not look that up beforehand,
so apologies, whatever the word sorry is in German.
Then we've also got the infamousGerman pirate Klaus Storta

(33:11):
Baker. That sounds right, feels right.
Let me know matter of strangeways@gmail.com.
But we've also got the Irish Dullahan.
Then yet another German myth, the Wild Huntsman.
And why do the Germans have so many folklore stories about
Headless Horseman, I ask you. Then there's the Scottish Yuan,
the headless, very creative. The Welsh.

(33:34):
Ah, no, I can't do this one with.
I got to look this one up. Hold on.
OK, this one's tricky because I couldn't find anyone actually
saying it out loud. So I'm going to try my best of
the Welsh Venive Hebbing Pen. How'd I do?
Let me know I'm out of strangeways@gmail.com.
OK, so then, then I was like, OK, but why am I not finding any

(33:57):
headless horsemen in like, I don't know, Eurasia at a
minimum? Because that's kind of where
horses came from. OK, Horses actually came from
the North Americas originally. And then they walked, they
walked across the land bridge back when it was a Pangaea
situation, and then they ended up over there.
But you know what I'm saying? Horses are kind of like a big

(34:19):
deal in Eurasia. So why wouldn't there be more
horsemen in general mythology inthat area like in Russia or in
the Middle East? Like what's going on?
So then I had to like manually search for these areas to find
anything. So at a minimum, I did find the
Indian myth, Thakur Baba, a warrior who was decapitated mid

(34:41):
battle but stayed on his horse and kept fighting.
He was a good guy though. He's not a bad guy.
That's like, it's a good thing that he stayed on his horse
because he was fighting for his side still, which I guess are
the goodies and not the baddies.Anyway, if you know of any
Headless Horseman myths in any other cultures other than
European, then please let me know madamstrangeways@gmail.com.

(35:03):
OK, so those are the ones that Ifound, but we're going to do a
little, we're going to do a little bit of a deep dive into
each one of them. They're super fascinating.
But the one that seems like the most likely inspiration for
Irving's Headless Horseman character is the German legend
of Rubizal. I should probably let's check
hold, please. OK, so the Z is kind of more of
a T situation TS. So rubitzal.

(35:26):
All right, there it is. That's all you're going to get.
That's the best one you're goingto get out of me.
So anyway, the Rubitzal is probably the most likely to be
the actual origin story for the Headless Horseman and the Legend
of Sleepy Hollow. But we're going to pause because
just as a reminder, Sleepy Hollow or Tarrytown, that whole
area has a ton of Dutch immigrants living there.

(35:49):
So it's like mostly Dutch, right?
And so then also keep in mind that Germany was not Germany
until 1871. It was not unified until 1871.
So it's not the Germany that we know now, which feels like it's,
I know I mentioned it earlier, right?
And I, I guessed it wrong. OK, but I was pretty close.
I was four years off. It's you know what, it's fine
anyway, as another reminder, especially for especially if

(36:12):
you, especially if you are like me and then a few years ago you
were like, I actually, where arethe Dutch from?
Like where are they from? I'm actually not sure.
And the answer is the Netherlands.
The Dutch are from the Netherlands and the Netherlands
share a border with Germany. And so you're, are you kind of

(36:32):
seeing how because it doesn't really matter if you were from
Germany or if you were from the Netherlands, you probably heard
the same stories if it's a German story, like folklore
didn't just reach the the borderof a country and go, oh, well,
can't go further than that. So as you can probably imagine,
that's kind of how it's possiblethat Washington Irving, who was

(36:55):
living amongst all of these Dutch immigrants that were now
living in America, you can understand how he might have
heard the Headless Horseman mythof the Rubitzalt from Germany.
So I did find two different sources that tried to claim that
specifically because Irving travelled in Germany in 1821,
that he'd become familiar with Dutch and German folklore, which

(37:18):
is why they say that is the smoking gun as to why it's most
likely that the Rubitsall is theinspiration for the Headless
Horseman. But for those of you playing
along at home, the story was written, the story was published
in 1819. So if he's travelling Germany in
1821, how is that a smoking gun?It's not.

(37:40):
It's just not. I don't know what to tell you.
So if you hear anyone try to tell you, right, what are the
chances that this happens in thevery unlikely scenario that
someone tries to tell you? Well, actually, Washington
Irving visited Germany in 1821. And that's probably when you'll
be like, you're going to put your index finger just directly

(38:01):
on their lips to stop them talking.
You're going to go, Nope, no more talkie for you.
Because how did you not realize that the story was written in
1819, which is before he visitedGermany?
So I need you to just just no more talkie.
No more talkie for you. So the Legends of Rubitsall by
folklorist Johann Karl August Moussaus.

(38:23):
Oh no, don't worry about it. Who lived from 1735 to 1787?
Rubitzal is a mountain spirit associated with the come on
Crocanos mountains. That's not how it's said, but
it's spelled. There's like not enough fowls.
KRKONOSE, those mountains of modern Czech Republic and

(38:45):
Poland. That's why there's not enough
fowls. I'm seeing now.
I'm seeing now, but you can see how far it's spread.
You know, Germany is a pretty big country, but if you're
hearing the same legends that travel all the way to the
Netherlands, all the way to Poland and Czech Republic,
that's crazy. Anyway, Rubit Saul was a popular
figure in German folklore, featured in multiple tales of

(39:07):
the supernatural. So in one interpretation from
the story How Rubit Saul Got HisName, it recounts how Rubit Saul
abducted a Princess who liked turnips.
How are we talking about turnipsagain?
Isn't that interesting? The Princess gets very lonely
there in the mountains. So to keep her company,
Rubitsall turns the turnips intoher friends and acquaintances.

(39:28):
Oh, that's kind of nice actually.
As the turnips wilt after a little while, as turnips are
want to do, so do the persons that were created by Rubitsall's
magic. Oh, that's not good.
The Princess asks him to count the turnips in the field.
While he counted, she escaped. Following this explanation, some
early English writers translatedhis name as number nip, as in

(39:51):
turnip, short for turnip. That is turnip numberer.
So not nearly as scary as Headless Horseman is the turnip
numberer. So this is from Wikipedia.
Rubensall, you should know, has the nature of a powerful genius,
capricious, impetuous, peculiar,rascally, crude, immodest,

(40:14):
haughty, vain, fickle today, your warmest friend tomorrow,
alien and cold, roguish and respectable, stubborn and
flexible again. I I think I'm going to need the
supernatural romance with this guy as the main character.
I'm interested. This sounds like a morally grey

(40:34):
character. I'm here for it and listening.
But that is a direct descriptionof Rubensall from the legend, oh
legend in von Rubensall. So in legends, Rubensall appears
as a capricious giant or a gnomeor a mountain spirit.
OK, with good people, he's friendly, teaching them medicine

(40:57):
and giving them presents. But if someone derides him,
however, he exacts a severe revenge.
He sometimes plays the role of trickster in folk tales.
So the stories originate from Pagan times and Rubensall is the
fantastic Lord of weather of themountains and is similar to the
Wild Hunt which we are going to get into just a few minutes.

(41:18):
And it's actually weird because I found the Wild Hunt through a
completely different way and didn't actually, we know it was
related to Ruben Saul when I first started writing about
this. So isn't that interesting how
this is all connected anyway? You know, honestly, the more
that I look into the actual legends around Ruben Saul, the
more I'm like, I don't understand how everyone is

(41:39):
saying that this is the most likely explanation for the
Headless Horseman. You know what, I could go back
and edit it and take it out or I'm saying that, but that's
true. All of my research is telling me
that this is the most likely explanation for the Headless
Horseman, but I can't find anything, anything in these
stories about him being headlessor a horseman.

(42:01):
They're saying he looks like Gandalf the Grey or the White,
but it specifically says a grey frock that he wears.
He has his head in all of these depictions of paintings that I'm
finding, and one of them he's actually a demon, and he has a
little weird demon tail and he has weird demon antlers, but in
none of them is he a Headless Horseman.
Isn't that, isn't that interesting?

(42:23):
Isn't that interesting? He controls the weather,
basically. And get this and check fairy
tales. Rubensall gave sourdough to
people. He gave them sourdough and he
invented the traditional regional soup, Kaisalo.
OK, so how? How's that a bad guy?
How's that a bad guy? What are we doing?
Why? Why are we blaming the Headless

(42:46):
Horseman on a man who gave people bread and soup?
Who doesn't love sourdough and soup?
Come on, Why are we bad mouthingthis guy?
OK, I, you know what? I'm changing.
I'm changing my assumption. I no longer think based on the
information available to me. I no longer think that this is

(43:06):
the this is the most likely explanation.
OK, you heard it here first, folks.
This is how we do things in thisstrange.
First, we change our minds. We admit when we're wrong and
and we're we're vocal about it. We let everybody know.
Hey, I might have messed up. If you are more familiar with
Rubensall and you think you you have a reason to believe that he

(43:27):
might have been the Headless Horseman, please let me know
amount of strangewas@gmail.com. But this is just another reason
why we need to talk about every single one of the inspirations
that I think may have potentially been around for the
Headless Horseman. So we're going to talk about all
of them. We're not going to just talk
about this one. We're going to talk about all
the ones that I discussed earlier.
So next on the list, we have a German pirate, which I don't

(43:50):
know why I didn't think that there were German pirates.
Germany has a coast. Obviously there were pirates
that were German. It's just it's not something
that I think about. So anyway, the German pirate,
the infamous pirate Klaus StortaBaker, a legendary figure
similar to Robin Hood. So again, good guy who thinks

(44:10):
Robin Hood's a bad guy. OK, if you think Robin Hood's a
bad guy, I'm going to need you to.
I'm going to need you to reread Robin Hood.
I'm going to teach you. You are.
You are the baddies. Are we the baddies?
You may ask yourself. Yes, you are if you think Robin
Hood's a bad guy. So obviously I'm also a fan of
Klaus here, the pirate Klaus. So he would steal from the rich

(44:33):
to help the poor and he would amass and hide great treasure
and was said to, after his execution by decapitation, have
patrolled in front of his shakencrew, still carrying his head in
his hands. What a bad ass.
I want to learn more about this guy, but we've got a lot of them
to cover. So we're going to move on to the

(44:54):
next one. The Scottish headless ghost.
Ewan the headless. Of course his name is Ewan.
Prior to losing his head, he wasknown as Ewan.
I forgot about this. I wrote these notes a few days
ago. Hold on.
Prior to losing his head, Ewan the headless was known as Ewan
with the small head. Not headless, just head.

(45:19):
Small head tiny like Becky with the good hair, but Ewan with the
small head. It's weird that both of his
nicknames both involved heads even before he was decapitated.
Isn't that weird? OK anyway he was a big man baby
from what I can. From what I can tell in my

(45:40):
reading he was a big man baby who talked shit to a creepy
fairy and then died in battle because of said shit talking to
said creepy fairy. And now whenever his descendants
die on his land, his family's land, he reappears to guide
their souls to the the afterlifeor somewhere, it's not really

(46:03):
clear where he guides them, but he guides them.
And that's when he shows back upis when someone dies.
So I guess there are worse circumstances that he could show
up for. Anyway, next, next on the list
is the Welsh venue Hebb in Pen, which translates to the headless
woman. So we have a headless woman.
I'm so excited. Anyway, she rides the Kefel HEB

(46:28):
in pen, which if HEB in pen sounds familiar, it's because I
just said it. And that's because Heb in pen
means without a head. So that's right, the headless
woman, the headless Welsh woman rides a headless horse.
What are the odds? What are the odds?
I love it. This is already my favorite one,

(46:50):
and it's not just because I havea weird fascination with Welsh.
That's not why. Come on.
It's first of all, she's the first headless woman in the
story that we've been talking about.
And then also she rides a horse without a head.
All right, so Brynn Hall in Hlada Maudwe.
Hlada Maudwe, if you're Welsh, e-mail me

(47:12):
madamstrangewaysaidgmail.com, sothat I can apologize to you
personally. Brynn Hall in Hlada Maudwe is
said to have been haunted by a Headless Horseman, I think
woman. We now know, which only came to
an end when one of the Hall's servants discerned a message
from the horse woman identifyingthe location of a buried body.

(47:34):
The body was said to be that of an illegitimate child fathered
by the Lord of Bryn Hall. Isn't that interesting?
Also, as Whales shares cultural similarities with Cornwall, it
is possible that a version of the Welsh horse woman or a
Cornish equivalent may have beenwhat was known to the parents of
Washington Irving who came from Cornwall.

(47:59):
There's another way that Washington Irving might have
heard this story. This is actually turning out,
you know what you know what? This is actually turning out to
be my pet theory. I reject the German group, it's
all, but I do still want him as a protagonist in a supernatural
romance. However, I'm leaning this way.
I'm leaning in the direction of of the Welsh headless horse

(48:21):
woman. Just a thought anyway.
So Wikipedia has a section aboutan English Headless Horseman
myth and it says English like England whatever above it.
But then I go on to read it, andthen it discusses the Green
Knight, an Arthurian legend, andKing Arthur is Welsh and the

(48:41):
King Arthur legends are Welsh. So what is this Welsh erasure in
2025? What is this?
Is this Victorian Times? What is this like?
So listen, if you like to submitedits on Wikipedia, I'm going to
go ahead and I'm going to ask you to suggest that they change
that Headless Horseman article title from English Headless

(49:04):
Horseman to specifically the Welsh section.
And you know what? If Wikipedia accepts that edit,
I will send you a Madam Strangeway sticker in the mail.
e-mail me, e-mail me a screenshot of your successful
Wikipedia edit to madamstrangeway@gmail.com.
I will send you a sticker because that is how confident I
am that that is wrong. And I specifically, before you

(49:25):
ask, I did Google. I double checked that the Green
Knight story is not some of the English fan fiction that's
written about King Arthur. No no no, it is some of the
original Welsh stories. So anyway, here's the Green
Knight in Arthurian legend from Wikipedia.
In Camelot on New Year's Eve, King Arthur's court is
exchanging gifts and waiting forthe feastings just to start,

(49:48):
when all of a sudden a giant figure, entirely green in
appearance and riding a green horse again.
It's like the headless woman riding a headless horse.
Now it's a Green Man riding a green horse.
Interesting. Rides unexpectedly into the
hall. He wears no armor, but wears an
axe in one hand and bears an axein one hand and a holly bow in

(50:09):
the other, So refusing to fight anyone there on the grounds that
they are all too weak. He insists that he has come for
a friendly Christmas game, whichis when you find out what he
says. It's not very friendly, and it
doesn't sound like a game. Someone is to strike him once
with his axe on the condition that the Green Knight may return
the blow in a year and a day. The axe will then belong to

(50:30):
whoever accepts the deal. So King Arthur is like, I don't
see anyone else volunteering. I guess it's got to be me then,
'cause I can't let no one take this challenge.
I'll have to take it. But then Sir Gawain, the
youngest of Arthur's Knights andArthur's nephew, asks for the
honor instead. Of course, like the young
upstart. Besides, he wants to prove
himself right? Like child, please sit down.

(50:53):
So the giant, the green knight, the Green Giant, is he jolly?
Oh my God, is this where the Jelly Green Giant comes from?
OK, moving on. The giant bends and bares his
neck before him, and Gawain neatly beheads him in one
stroke. Which is interesting because
what do you mean? Why would you behead him?
Why not just give him a little nick?

(51:14):
You know, just a little. Slice.
That's like, not a big deal, youjust put a, put a Band-Aid on
it. If you're going to get the same
blow in a year and a day anyway,it doesn't matter, we're moving
on. So he beheads the Green Knight.
And then, however, the Green Knight neither falls nor
falters, but instead reaches out, picks up his severed head
and mounts his green horse. So the Green Knight shows his

(51:38):
bleeding head to Queen Guineverewhile it reminds Gawain that the
two must meet again at the GreenChapel in a year and a day,
before the Knight rides away. And Wayne and Arthur admire the
axe, hang it up as a trophy, andencourage Guinevere to treat the
whole matter lightly. Like, don't worry honey, it's
fine, Poor Guinevere, Why did heshow Guinevere?
You'll find out, because I've already read this.

(51:59):
So as the date approaches, Sir Gawain leaves to find the Green
Chapel and keep his part of the bargain.
So he goes on some adventures and some battles which kind of
just vaguely, like, lost over. Anyway, he shows up at this
castle and there's the Lord of the castle and the Lord's
beautiful wife, who are very happy to have such a renowned
guest as one of Arthur's Knights.
So also present is this old and ugly lady that not my words

(52:24):
unnamed, but treated with great honor by all.
So Gwen tells them of his New Year's Eve appointment at the
Green Chapel with the Green Giant, and that he's going to
get his head chopped off. The Lord laughs and explains
that like, Oh yeah, there's a path over here, it'll take you
to the Chapel in less than two miles, and why don't you just
rest here and hang out until yougo to meet your doom?
Cool. So Gawain hangs out at the

(52:44):
castle, and then the Lord of thecastle decides to propose a
bargain to him. So the Lord is like, I'm going
to go hunting every day, and I will give you whatever I capture
on my hunt on the condition thatyou, Sir Gawain, give me
whatever you gain during your day here in my castle.
Interesting. Gawain accepts, of course.

(53:06):
So after, however, the Lord leaves his wife, the beautiful
wife visits Gawain's bedroom andbehaves seductively and
temptingly, but despite her bestefforts, Gawain allows her
nothing but a single kiss. So when the Lord returns from
his hunting and gives Gawain thedeer that he has killed on his

(53:26):
hunting trip, Gawain has to thengive him what he got at the
castle while he was out hunting,which is a kiss.
So Gowen gives him a kiss without divulging its source.
I think I also need to read thisbook.
This is also a book I need to read.
I understand this is classic literature.
That's mythology. OK, it's a joke.

(53:48):
I'm making jokes. All right?
Anyway, the next day, the beautiful wife of the Lord
returns to Gawain, who again courteously foils her advances.
And later that day there was a similar exchange of a haunted
boar from the Lord, because that's what he caught on his
hunting that day. And so then Gawain then had to
give the Lord 2 kisses. The Lord is not questioning.

(54:08):
The Lord is not asking any questions in this story, which I
find interesting. So then again, of course,
because it's always in threes. So the the lovely lady comes
once more on the third evening, but once again her advances are
denied. And so she offers Gawain a gold
ring as a keeps cake, keep well,keeps cake, keeps cake.
He gently but steadfastly refuses, but she pleads that he

(54:29):
at least take her sash, which isa girdle of green and gold silk.
So the sash, the lady assures him, is charmed and will keep
him safe from all physical harm.Tempted because he's thinking
he's going to have to get his head chopped off the next day,
Gawain takes it and they exchange 3 kisses instead of the
usual one or two. Again.
It's always threes, right? So the lady has Gawain swear

(54:51):
that he will keep the gift of the sash secret from her
husband. So that evening her husband
shows back up with a fox from his hunt.
He gives it to Gawain. Gawain then gives him three
kisses. He's now given this man 5 kisses
no questions, but notably Gawaindoes not give him the sash.
It doesn't mention the gold ringthough, so I don't know where

(55:12):
the gold ring went. Anyway, the next day Sir Gawain
binds sash around his waist. So outside of the Green Chapel,
he finds the Green Knight sharpening and axe waiting for
him so that he can visit the same blow that Gawain gave to
him, which is of course beheading him.
So as promised, Gawain bends hisbared neck to receive his blow.
At the first swing, Gawain flinches slightly and the Green

(55:35):
Knight belittles him for it. Like Oh my God, I just picture
you like ha ha ha, that's so mean.
Ashamed of himself. Gawain does not flinched, does
not flinch from the second swing.
But again, the Green Knight withholds the full force of his
blow. So the knight explains.
The Green Knight explains that he was testing Gawain's nerve.
Angrily, Gawain tells him to deliver his blow.

(55:58):
And so the knight does, causing only a slight wound on Gawain's
neck. Which is what I am saying Gawain
should have done in the 1st place.
Isn't that interesting? And so the the game is done
because it only causes a slight wound on his neck.
I don't know why Gawain seizes his sword, helmet and shield,
but the Green Knight laughing reveals himself to be none other

(56:18):
than the Lord of the castle, whowas transformed by magic.
He explains that the entire adventure was just a trick of
the unnamed ugly elderly lady that Gawain saw at the castle,
who was actually the sorceress Morgan la Faye, Arthur's step
sister, who intended to test Arthur's Knights and frighten

(56:39):
Gwyneth to death. Which, you see now, is why the
Green Knight decided to show thebloody head to Guinevere.
The nick Gawain suffered at the third stroke was because of his
attempt to conceal the gift of the sash.
Gawain is ashamed to have behaved deceitfully, but the
Green Knight laughs and pronounces him the most
blameless knight in all the land.
Isn't that lovely? I'm going to be honest, I

(57:00):
probably didn't need to read youthat entire story of the Green
Knight, but I thought it was toointeresting not to tell you,
especially when Gawain is just kissing this Lord every night.
Like what? I'm what?
Am I supposed to not tell you that story after I read it?
Sorry, sorry, not sorry. All right, moving on.
Others have pointed to other older, vaguely European

(57:21):
traditions for the story of the Headless Horseman, arguing that
Washington Irving was inspired by legends of the Wild Huntsman,
who is purportedly A ghostly writer who terrified nighttime
travellers with his pack of hounds in medieval Germany.
Again, we're in Germany. Why are we always in Germany?
However, I was trying to find anything about the Wild Huntsman

(57:41):
and I couldn't really find anything, but it kept bringing
me to the Wild Hunt, which we mentioned earlier.
Remember that pin that we put inthat earlier?
Well, now you can take that pin out because we're going to talk
about it. So the Wild Hunt happened in
Northeast Europe, which doesn't seem to actually be involving
any Headless Horseman in particular, but it did involve
Ruben Saul, who as we said, I couldn't actually figure out why

(58:03):
he has anything to do with the Headless Horseman myth.
But you know what? Here's The thing is the story is
just really cool. So we're going to talk about it.
So the Wild Hunt flies through the sky and is made-up of black
hounds and wolves. Sometimes even werewolves were
depicted as stealing beer and sometimes food from houses.
Horses were portrayed AS236 and eight legged, often with fiery

(58:27):
eyes with flocks of crows and Ravens overhead.
Sometimes led by the devil himself.
How badass is that? How badass is that?
So cool. It actually used to be led by
Odin, or at least people associated with Odin, and
instead of demons and werewolvesit originally involved a chase

(58:48):
led by a mythological figure escorted by a ghostly or
supernatural group of non demonic deities engaged in some
sort of spectral hunt. But as you know.
This is This is. How this is how Christianity and
Catholicism handled anything remotely Pagan is they made it
scary and they made it demonic. So it wasn't always demonic or

(59:12):
scary. It used to just be Norse
mythology. It used to just be Norse Pagan
beliefs. Jacob Grimm of the brothers fame
and also a folklorist, believed that under the influence of
Christianization, which is a word that I did not just make
up. It sounds like I did.
I'm not being sarcastic, it really is a word.

(59:32):
The Wild Hunt story was converted from being that of a
solemn March of gods to being a pack of horrid specters dashed
with dark and devilish ingredient.
And some suggest that the Wild Hunt actually influenced our
modern day Santa Claus. Listen, I prefer the Wild Hunt
to Santa Claus. I'm going to be honest.
OK, we're going to pop on over to Ireland and according to

(59:55):
legend, the Dullahan is an Irishlegend of an evil fairy Headless
Horseman. Now remember, fairies are
generally not good characters. In a lot of Celtic, especially
folklore, fairies are kind of bad guys and they're sneaky and
especially this one is evil, so just keep that in mind.
So the Dullahan is an Irish legend of an evil fairy Headless

(01:00:18):
Horseman who seems to be the harbinger of.
Death. His name means dark man in
Gaelic. The Dullahan originated around
the 6th century in Ireland. He uses this is so cool.
He uses a human spine as a horsewhip, and the head he carries
under his arm has the consistency of molded cheese,

(01:00:38):
which is so cool. The Brothers Grimm actually
wrote 2 similar Headless Horseman tales based
specifically on this Irish Headless Horseman, including a
tale of an unlucky woman who sees the monster and the tale of
a Headless Horseman whose hunting horn warns hunters of
impending doom. So this next bit is from Rutgers

(01:01:00):
University Camden. Again, this is something that
like, did I need to include it? Probably not, but it's really
interesting so I'm going to readit.
So in ancient medieval Ireland, the High King Tigernmus, we're
going to go with that. The High King Tigernmus, who
lived from 1621 until 1544 BC, would conduct various

(01:01:21):
sacrificial rituals to the evil deity named Crom Kua.
Which does that not sound kind of like Brom Crom Brom Bones.
It's a it's an alliteration. Same with Crom Kua.
OK. The most common form of Pagan
sacrifice was human decapitation.
And this practice would go on for centuries until the 5th

(01:01:43):
century AD, when Saint Patrick ended the practice and brought
Christianity into Irish culture,which is a whole nother.
I'm not getting into this right now.
I'm not getting into this. OK, I'm going to get into it a
little bit. Saint Patrick was not Irish, he
was English. And when he drove the snakes out
of Ireland, the snakes were the Irish, The the the snakes were

(01:02:06):
the Irish. So Saint Patrick not really a
good guy anyway. Saint Patrick ended the practice
of decapitations, according to Rutgers University.
This is not me, this is Rutgers.St.
Patrick ended the practice of decapitation for sacrificial
purposes and brought Christianity into Irish culture.
As legend goes, Krom Kroch took on a human form and became the

(01:02:29):
Dullahan to search for souls he could now take now that they
were no longer being given to him through sacrificial means.
The Dullahan's appearance is said to be of a decapitated
horseman holding a moldy lookinghead under his arm.
Like the cheese, right? Moldy looking cheese.
Weird with his eyes darting in many directions, which honestly

(01:02:52):
I feel like that's the scariest part so far that we've talked
about is the eyes darting in different directions.
In the decapitated head, the Dulahan is possessed with
supernatural sight, allowing himto see all of the Irish
countryside to stalk his next victim.
Whenever the Dulahan stops writing, he speaks the name of
his next victim and claims his or her soul.
Each ride, the Dulahan's head has only enough energy to speak

(01:03:15):
that of its next victim's name to preserve its energy for its
hunt. It is also said that whoever
looks upon his face while he is riding for his victim either
becomes blind or is marked with blood as the Dulahan's next
victim. There's only one way to ward off
this ancient Irish fairy, and that is by throwing gold in his
direction, Which I'm going to say if you want to ward me away,

(01:03:40):
that is also a really good way to do that.
That's how you can ward me away.OK, I know, I said I was leaning
towards the Welsh story actuallybeing the most likely reason
that Washington Irving made the Headless Horseman.
This one feels really. Compelling as well.
This one feels especially Krom Kroch or man, I know I'm

(01:04:05):
butchering that. Again, if you're you know what,
if you're Irish and you speak Gaelic of any sort, you don't
have to be Irish. If you speak any kind of Gaelic,
e-mail me madamstrangeways@gmail.com.
I will personally apologize to you as well or anyone that I
have offended with my terrible pronunciation.
I'm trying, you guys, please. I'm trying.
Anyway, I'm kind of leaning towards this one.

(01:04:26):
I'm leaning towards the Dulahan,honestly, like this is feeling,
I don't know. But we're not even done.
We have one more, one more, OK, one more.
Because something that I was reading specifically said that
it was probably Walter, Sir Walter Scott's poem, The Chase,

(01:04:47):
that was a direct inspiration for Washington Irving to create
The Headless Horseman. So Sir Walter Scott, who also
happens to be an actual Scott. So he was Scottish, he was
friends with Irving. And from what I understand, Sir
Walter Scott translated an old German poem again, Germany.
What going what? What's going on?

(01:05:09):
And it's not just a short poem, it's a very long poem that Sir
Scott translated about a devil chasing this guy just forever
and ever just endlessly chasing him.
I pulled up the poem and I skimmed it and I did do like a
control F looking for the word headless.
You know, I was trying to find any sort of like, is there a
Headless Horseman in the story? Is that where we're is that,

(01:05:32):
come on, is there anything? So I did do a control F for
headless, which came up with nothing.
So I tried just head and it did pull up this first instance of
the word head in the poem quote UN quote.
Here's the quote. And when the Brig of Turk was
one, the head most horseman rodealone head most horseman most

(01:05:57):
being the opposite of less, right?
The head most instead of Headless Horseman.
That's the opposite of headless head most.
It just means like the first horseman of the group of
horsemen, right? But honestly, maybe Washington
Irving saw the phrase head most 'cause, you know, he had a

(01:06:19):
really good eye for weird names,right?
And like things that he could just tuck away to use in a story
later. Honestly, I think it's
completely possible that Washington Irving saw the phrase
head most horseman and was like,I like that.
I like it's got a ring to it. But like, wait, what if we, what
if we flipped it and it was Headless Horseman, Dun, Dun,

(01:06:39):
Dun. I don't know.
I mean, it could be, you know, it could also be a combination
of any of these. It could be a combination with
rubitzal. It could be a combination with
the Green Knight in Arthurian legend or with the headless
woman. It could be a combination of
everything. Because isn't that what America,
especially early America was just like a melting pot?
Totally possible. So let me know.

(01:07:02):
Let me know we're we're moving on to setting in history.
But before we do that, let me know madness Strangeways at
gmailcom. Which of these stories do you
think inspired Washington Irvingfor The Headless Horseman?
Let me know. So the Legend of Sleepy Hollow
takes place about 14 years afterthe end of the American
Revolution, which is not that far.

(01:07:22):
That's not that long after. So just, you know, like I said,
the the Hessians, those are still on everyone's mind.
Also Americans are feeling very patriotic, but they're also kind
of having something of an identity crisis of sorts because
so much of their culture, like Isaid, is a melting pot.
And it's basically just hand me downs from the cultures that
they came to America with. So that's partly why Washington

(01:07:45):
Irving writing this first American, first Great American
ghost story is such a big deal because there wasn't really like
American culture because it was all borrowed or stolen, some
might say. But as you can see, he did just
take it from he did just take itfrom somewhere else in Europe.

(01:08:05):
So, you know, it's fine. Don't worry about it.
That's just the American way. It's the American way.
But Sleepy Hollow, the town you may read in some places if you
are so interested in doing such things, Sleepy Hollow is
sometimes said to either be one of two towns, like some people
say it was Kinderhook and some people say it was actually

(01:08:26):
Tarrytown. And you know, we don't know who
knows? Well, no, it's pretty well
documented. So the original name for the
village of North Tarry Town was Sleepy Hollow.
Officials changed the name from Sleepy Hollow to North Tarrytown
in 1883, but in 1996 they changed it back to the original
Sleepy Hollow. Not to settle the dispute that

(01:08:49):
was happening with the nearby Kinderhook, where U.S.
President Martin Van Buren wrongly insisted that Sleepy
Hollow was based on Kinderhook because he just wanted it to be.
But actually to they changed thename back to Sleepy Hollow to
capitalize on its name to attract tourists because the
General Motors plant in Tarrytown, AKA Sleepy Hollow

(01:09:10):
closed. So if the town didn't do
something drastic, it was going to become even more of a ghost
town than before. Oh, real ghosts.
No, not real ghosts. Oh, not real ghosts.
The Headless Horseman is the ghost, but it would be a ghost
town because GM plant made everyone have to leave.
Do you see what I mean? OK but imagine buying a car that

(01:09:34):
was assembled in Sleepy Hollow. Imagine they still have to be
kicking. Like if this was 1996 ish that
the GM plant closed someone still has to own a car.
Let me know Madam strangewas@gmail.com Do you have
a car AGM car that could have possibly been assembled in

(01:09:55):
Sleepy Hollow prior to 1996? I'm I can't wait to find out.
Is it haunted me know so Tarrytown slash Sleepy Hollow is
a real place in New York's lowerHudson Valley, and the first
Europeans to settle in the region were Dutch farmers, fur
trappers and fishermen around the year 1645.

(01:10:15):
So when the legend of Sleepy Hollow begins around 1790, the
town would have already had about 150 years of history,
which in American terms is a long time.
That is a very long time in in European history, history that's
just like a blip. It's just not that much time.

(01:10:36):
Also, fun fact, the high school school sports, the high school
sports team, I assume football, but did not check the high
school sports team is the horseman.
Isn't that fun? So I kind of accidentally
included all the other history points in some of the other

(01:10:56):
conversations that we've been having.
So that section is now done easynext, moving on to Washington
Irving himself. So Washington Irving, born 1783,
died 1859, published The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in 1819 as part
of a collection of stories titled The Sketchbook of Jeffrey
Crayon. We are here again.
Remember so long ago now I told you to put a pin in it.

(01:11:19):
Now take that pin out. We're addressing the pin.
So like I said, he is often considered the first Great
American writer, which mind you,at the time of publishing in
1819, Edgar Allan Poe was only 10 years old.
Walt Whitman was 0 years old. And prior to this, most of the
writing that came out of Americasince the 1700s was just

(01:11:40):
founding fathers yapping a bunchof hyper religio stuff.
And oh, the history. The history of the expedition.
Hold on the history of the expedition under the command of
the captains Lewis and Clark in 1814.
But that wasn't fiction, so theydidn't really consider it to be

(01:12:01):
the first Great American novel. Irving was one of the first
American writers to earn acclaimin Europe, and he encouraged
other American authors such as Nathaniel Hawthorne Hawthorne,
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. That's a long name for a
Longfellow, Herman Melville and like I said, Edgar Allan Poe.
So he was also a admired by someBritish writers, which is a big

(01:12:24):
deal because the Brits just didn't think very highly of us
at all. So some British writers that
admire him included Lord Byron, Thomas Campbell, Charles
Dickens, Mary Shelley, Francis Jeffrey and Walter Scott.
He also advocated for writing asa legitimate profession.
So kudos to him. And he argued for stronger laws
to protect American writers fromcopyright infringement.

(01:12:47):
So I'm, I'm, I'm a fan. I'm a fan.
When he died in 1859, he was actually buried in the Sleepy
Hollow Cemetery because he endedup moving back there later in
his life. Now, you may have wondered
earlier who the heck Jeffrey Crayon is in the book titled The
Sketchbook of Jeffrey Crayon, because I told you just probably

(01:13:09):
one minute ago that we were going to address the pen.
And then I kind of kept talking.So here we are.
We're back to the pen. Well, Washington Irving, a man
with an already kind of weird name.
Washington Irving, his first name being named after George
Washington, but he wasn't named George Irving.
He was named Washington Irving, which is interesting.
But this man loved pen names. He loved pen names.

(01:13:34):
He used so many numbed plumes it's kind of crazy.
He even loved especially weird ones.
Those are his favorite ones to come up with.
These are just the few that I found, but I bet that there's
more. These are some of the names He
also, he loves an alliteration, loves them.
William Wizard. William Wizard Lancelot

(01:13:54):
Langstaff Actually, it's like Lance a lot.
Lau Lancelot Langstaff But you know what that means to me that
is giving more credence to the Arthur tale, to the King Arthur
tale. I feel like I feel like Wales is
now it's now winning in my head of OK, there's just something

(01:14:15):
there. OK, The next Jeffrey Crayon
Esquire. Not just Jeffrey Crayon.
And if you're curious, no, crayons have not been invented.
Yeah. Did I say that earlier?
If not, I meant to. Crayons had not yet been
invented, just FYI. So Jeffrey Crayon.
And remember, Geoffrey is how hespells it.
Jeffrey Crayon, Esquire. Esquire means he's an attorney

(01:14:39):
or a lawyer. It's one of those.
Then also Deidrick Knickerbocker, which we're going
to talk more about in just a moment.
Then Jonathan, old style gent. I assume that's a title just
like Esquire, meaning he's a gentleman.
Does that mean he's a landed? Maybe he's part of the Gentry.
I didn't go down that rabbit hole.

(01:15:00):
Do you want me to? No, you don't because we're
already over an hour, so we're just going to continue.
Then finally, the last name thatI found and this one he used in
Spain, I think when he was writing about the Alhambra.
Alehambra, Frey, Antonio Agapeda.
OK, this is Madame Strangeways from the future in which I am

(01:15:23):
editing this episode and realized I did not actually tell
you who Jeffrey Crayon is. So here we go back from the
future, which is similar to the movie.
Anyway, Jeffrey Crayon is just this fictional, fictional world
traveller character that that hecame up with.
Jeffrey Crayon, he sailed, you know, fictionally.

(01:15:46):
He fictionally sailed from America to England and explored
the English countryside and visited new places and met with
families and sat down and learned their local customs and
etcetera, etcetera. So there it is.
There it is. The the very anticlimactic

(01:16:06):
answer to the question, who's Jeffrey Crayon?
That's it. All right, back, back to the
past. So Irving completed A History of
New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the
Dutch Dynasty by Diedrich Knickerbocker in 1809.
The by Diedrich Knickerbocker isthe part where he's using a pen

(01:16:28):
name, except he's also assuming a completely different fictional
fabricated character in writing this history.
So he's writing this history of New York as if he is a man named
Diedrich Knickerbocker, and he doesn't sign his name on it at
all. So that was his first major
book, and it happened to be a satire on self important local

(01:16:49):
history and contemporary politics.
So I've heard him kind of just, I've heard him described a
little bit as like Mad magazine,but in the early 1800s.
So before its publication, Irving started a hoax about this
book about Diedrich Knickerbocker, which is This is
why this is such a big name. So Irving started a hoax by

(01:17:10):
placing a series of missing person advertisements in the OR,
if you're from the UK, advertisements in the New York
Evening Post seeking informationon Diedrich Knickerbocker, on
the whereabouts of Diedrich Knickerbocker, who was
purportedly A crusty Dutch historian who had allegedly gone
missing from his hotel in New York City.

(01:17:32):
And as a part of the ruse, he placed a notice from the hotel's
proprietor informing readers that if Mr. Knickerbocker failed
to return to the hotel to pay his bill, he would publish A
manuscript that Knickerbocker had left behind.
This is is a master class in marketing.
This is like the Blair Witch Project marketing all over again

(01:17:53):
where they put up wanted postersand missing poster, missing
posters for the three charactersand the Blair Witch Project and
then had all these like fake documentaries about the Blair
Witch and about the missing kids.
Like this is such good marketingand he was just a one man show.
So unsuspecting readers followedthe story of Knickerbocker and

(01:18:13):
his manuscript with interest. And some New York City officials
were concerned enough about the missing historian to offer a
reward for his safe return. I cannot stress enough, Diedrich
Knickerbocker was not real and no one was missing.
But New York City officials wereso convinced that they were
offering a reward. Irving then published A History

(01:18:35):
of New York on December 6th, 18 O 9 under the Knickerbocker
pseudonym, which immediate whichwas met with immediate critical
and popular success. So basically, oh, here's OK,
this is from Irving. Irving says it took with the
public and gave me celebrity as an original work with something
remarkable and uncommon in America.

(01:18:55):
So the name Deidrick Knickerbocker became a nickname
from Manhattan residents in general and was adopted by the
New York Knickerbockers basketball team.
And if that wasn't enough, Washington Irving also gave New
York City the nickname named Gotham, which is an Anglo-Saxon
word meaning Goatstown. So Batman fans, you have

(01:19:16):
Washington Irving to thank for Gotham ever existing.
So bringing this back to Sleepy Hollow, the man telling the
story in the story of the Legendof Sleepy Hollow in the book the
Sketchbook of Jeffrey Crayon, who do you think was the person
that was actually telling the story?
It wasn't Jeffrey Crayon, it wasDiedrich Knickerbocker was the

(01:19:41):
one telling us the story of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
So as so so as you can see, there is sort of this weird
Washington Irving literary universe basically, for lack of
a better term. And what I found especially
interesting about this is that typically my deep dive episodes

(01:20:01):
are about Ed and Lorraine Warren.
The. Alleged demonologists slash
paranormal investigators who, ifyou've listened to any of my
previous episodes about the Warrens, I do not believe a
single word that comes out of either of their mouths.
So I find it interesting that what you find in a lot of the

(01:20:22):
Warrens stories is that Ed Warren and Lorraine Warren, but
more to a greater extent, Ed Warren is just creating his own
Warren paranormal universe. He's writing his own lore, he's
making everything up, and he's selling these stories that are
definitely not real, but people are fully buying into it.

(01:20:43):
And then somehow the one other unrelated story that I'm doing
that has nothing to do with the Warrens that was suggested to me
by Keith, my patron, happens to also involve a man who makes up
stories and tricks people into believing them.
The difference, of course, beingthat Washington Irving didn't do

(01:21:05):
any harm. His was out of pure whimsy.
That's the difference. Washington Irving was doing this
out of whimsy. The Warrens were doing it out of
greed, and they were fear mongers.
And I do not like a fear monger.That's what I like, Washington
Irving. I'm a fan of Washington Irving
after doing all this research. So there it is.
That is the history, the folklore, the background of the

(01:21:30):
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, the story of the Legend of Sleepy
Hollow. There, that is.
I also want to make a note before we get to the story that
there are at least three parts in my notes where I typed Sleepy
Holly instead of Sleepy Hollow and why Sleepy Holly.
Everyone knows the Legend of Sleepy Holly.

(01:21:53):
I was tired. I don't know what to tell you.
I don't know what to tell you. OK, so now I will be regaling
you with a narration of an abridged version because it's a
very long story. It is an abridged version of the
Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Keep in mind, sometimes it just
jumps. Sometimes something is happening

(01:22:14):
and it's just going to jump to the next spot in the story.
And you know the story, though, you remember right, Ichabod
Crane, he's a school teacher. He is invited to Katrina Van
Tassels party at her family's house.
He wants to marry her because hewants her vast tracts of land.

(01:22:35):
Then he gets spooked by hearing a story about the Headless
Horseman told by Brom Bones who is also competing with him for
Katrina Van Tassel's hand. Then on his way back, after he
is turned down by Katrina Van Tassel when he's riding his
horse back home, a strange, scary rider starts tailing him.
And then it turns out to be the Headless Horseman.

(01:22:58):
Or does it? We'll find out in this abridged
version of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow written by Washington
Irving. But before I get started, I also
just want to make sure everybodyhas a really happy Halloween.
Happy Halloween, everyone. Thank you so much for listening
to the show. And I hope everyone had a great
strange Topper. Oh.

(01:23:19):
Did you hear that Thunder? Very realistic.
It sounds like it's about to rain Hellcats and hell hounds
out there, so you know what thatmeans.
On to our not true at all Strange Halloween story here on
Madam Strange Ways. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
abridged by Washington Irving inthis byplays of nature, they're

(01:23:44):
abode in a remote period of American history, that is to
say, some 30 years since. A worthy white narrator's note
here that's Wight, meaning a person of a specified kind,
especially 1 regarded as unfortunate.
A worthy white of the name of Ichabod Crane, who sojourned, or

(01:24:05):
as he expressed it, tarried in Sleepy Hollow for the purpose of
instructing the children of the vicinity.
He was a native of Connecticut, a state which supplies the union
with pioneers for the mind as well As for the forest, and
sends forth yearly it's legions of frontier woodsman and country
school masters. The cognomen of Crane was not

(01:24:26):
inapplicable to his person. He was tall, but exceedingly
link, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that
dangle the mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have
served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung
together. His head was small and flat at
top, with huge ears, large greenglassy eyes, and a long snipe

(01:24:50):
nose so that it looked like a weathercock perched upon his
spindle neck. To tell which way the wind blew.
To see him striding along the profile of a hill on a windy
day, with his clothes bagging and fluttering about one might
have mistaken him for the geniusof famine descending upon the
earth, or some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield.

(01:25:12):
When school hours were over he was even the companion and
playmate of the larger boys, andon holiday afternoons would
convoy some of the smaller ones home who happened to have pretty
sisters or good housewives for mothers noted for the comforts
of the cupboard. Indeed, it behooved him to keep
on good terms with his pupils. The revenue rising from his

(01:25:34):
school was small, and would havebeen scarcely sufficient to
furnish him with daily bread, for he was a huge feeder, and
the lane had the dilating powersof an Anaconda.
But to help out his maintenance,he was, according to country
custom in those parts, boarded and lodged at the houses of the
farmers whose children he instructed with fees.

(01:25:56):
He lived successively a week at a time, thus going the rounds of
the neighborhood, with all his worldly effects, tied up in a
cotton handkerchief from his half itinerant life.
Also, he was kind of a travelingGazette, carrying the whole
budget of local gossip from house to house.
So that his. Appearance was always greeted
with satisfaction. He was, moreover, esteemed by

(01:26:18):
the women as a man of great erudition, for he had read
several books quite through, andwas a perfect master of Cotton
Mather's History of New England Witchcraft, in which, by the
way, he most firmly and potentlybelieved.
He was, in fact, an odd mixture of small shrewdness and simple
credulity. His appetite for the marvellous

(01:26:39):
and his powers of digesting it were equally extraordinary, and
both had been increased by his residence and this spellbound
region. No tail was too gross or
monstrous for his capacious swallow.
It was often his delight, after his school was dismissed in the
afternoon, to stretch himself onthe rich bed of Clover bordering

(01:26:59):
the little brook that whimpered by his schoolhouse, and there
con over old Mather's direful tales until the gathering of
dusk of the evening made the printed page a mere mist before
his eyes. Then, as he winded his way by
swamp and stream and awful woodland to the farmhouse where
he happened to be quartered, every sound of nature at that

(01:27:21):
witching hour fluttered his excited imagination.
The moan of the whipper will from the hillside, the boding
cry of the tree toed that harbinger of storm, the dreary
hooting of the screech owl, or the sudden rustling in the
thicket of birds frightened fromtheir roost.
The fireflies, too, which sparkled most vividly in the

(01:27:42):
darkest places, now and then startled him as one of uncommon
brightness, would stream across his path.
And if by chance a huge block head of a beetle came winging
his blundering flight against him, the poor Violet was ready
to give up the ghost with the idea that he was struck with a
witch's token. His only resource on such

(01:28:02):
occasions, either to drown thought or to drive away evil
spirits, was to sing Psalm tunes.
And the good people of Sleepy Hollow, as they sat by their
doors of an evening, were often filled with awe at hearing his
nasal melody and Lincoln sweetness, long drawn out,
floating from the distant hill or along the dusky Rd.

(01:28:23):
All these, however, were mere terrors of the night, phantoms
of the mind that walk in darkness.
And though he had seen many spectres in his time, and been
more than once beset by Satan indiverse shapes in his lonely pre
ambulations, yet daylight put anend to all these evils.
And he would have. Passed a pleasant life of it,

(01:28:44):
and despite of the devil and allof his works, if his path had
not been crossed by a being thatcauses more perplexity to mortal
man than ghosts, goblins, and the whole race of which is put
together. And that was a woman.
Among the musical disciples who assembled to receive his

(01:29:05):
instructions in psalmody was Katrina van Tassel, the daughter
and only child of a substantial Dutch farmer.
She was a blooming lass of fresh18, plump as a Partridge, ripe
and melting, and rosy cheeked asone of her father's Peaches, and
universally famed not merely forher beauty, but her vast

(01:29:25):
expectations. She was withal a little of a
coquette as one might beaten. She was withal a little of a
coquette, as might be perceived even in her dress, which was a
mixture of ancient and modern fashions, as most suited to set
off her charms. She wore the ornaments of pure
yellow gold, which her great great grandmother had brought

(01:29:46):
over from SAR Dom, the tempting stomacher of the olden time, and
withal A provokingly short petticoat to display the
prettiest foot and ankle in the country round.
As the enraptured Ichabod fancied all of this, and as he
rolled his great green eyes overthe fat Meadowlands, the rich
fields of wheat, of rye, of buckwheat and Indian corn, and

(01:30:11):
the orchards burdened with readyfruit which surrounded the warm
tenement of Van Tassel, his heart yearned after the damsel
who was to inherit these domains, and his imagination
expanded with the idea how they might be readily turned into
cash, and the money invested in immense.
Tracts of wild. Land and shingle palaces in the

(01:30:33):
wilderness. His busy fancy already realized
his hopes, and presented to him the blooming Katrina, with a
whole family of children mountedon the top of a wagon loaded
with household trumpery, with pots and kettles dangling
beneath. And he beheld himself bestriding
A pacing mare with a colt at herheels, setting out for Kentucky,

(01:30:56):
Tennessee, or the Lord knows where.
Ichabod was a suitable figure for such a steed.
He rode with short stirrups, which brought his knees nearly
up to the pommel of his saddle. His sharp elbows stuck out like
grasshoppers. He carried his whip
perpendicularly in his hand likea scepter, and as his horse

(01:31:17):
jogged on, the motion of his arms was not unlike the flapping
of a pair of wings. A small wool hat rested on the
top of his nose, for so his skinT strip of forehead might be
called, and the skirts of his black coat fluttered out almost
to the horse's tail. Such was the appearance of
Ichabod and his steed as they shambled out of the gate of Hans

(01:31:39):
van Ripper, and it was altogether such an apparition as
is seldom to be met in broad daylight.
It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day.
The sky was clear and serene, and nature wore that rich and
golden livery which was always associated with the idea of
abundance. The forests had put on their

(01:31:59):
sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind
had been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange,
purple, and scarlet. Streaming flies.
Nope. Streaming files of wild ducks
began to make their appearance high in the air.
The bark of the squirrel might be heard from the Groves of the
beach and Hickory nuts, and the pensive whistle of the quail at

(01:32:21):
intervals from the neighboring stubblefield.
From Bones, however, was the hero of the scene, having come
to the gathering on his favoritesteed, daredevil, a creature
like himself, full of metal and mischief, and which no one but
himself could manage. He was, in fact, noted for
preferring vicious animals givento all kinds of tricks which

(01:32:45):
kept the rider in constant risk of his neck, for he held a
tractable, well broken horse as unworthy of a lad of spirit.
The immediate cause, however, ofthe prevalence of supernatural
stories in these parts was doubtless owing to the vicinity
of Sleepy Hollow. There was a contagion in the
very air that blew from the haunted region.

(01:33:07):
It breathed forth an atmosphere of dreams and fancies, infecting
all the land. Several of the Sleepy Hollow
people were present at Van Tassels, and as usual we're
doling out their wild and wonderful legends.
Many dismal tales were told about funeral trains and
mourning cries and wailing heardand seen about the great tree

(01:33:29):
where the unfortunate Major Andre was taken, and which stood
in the neighborhood. Some mention was also made of
the woman in white that haunted the dark Glen at Raven Rock, and
was often heard to shriek on winter nights, before a storm
having perished there and the snow.
The chief part of the stories, however, turned upon the

(01:33:50):
favorite specter of Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman,
who had been heard several timesof late patrolling the country,
and, it was said, tethered his horse nightly among the graves
in the churchyard. All the stories of ghosts and
goblins that Ichabod had heard in the afternoon now came
crowding back upon his recollection.

(01:34:12):
The night grew darker and darker.
The stars seem to sink deeper inthe sky, and driving clouds
occasionally hid them from his sight.
He had never felt so lonely and dismal.
He was, moreover, approaching the very place where many of the
scenes of the ghost stories had been laid.
In the center of the road stood an enormous Tulip tree, which

(01:34:35):
towered like a giant above all other trees of the neighborhood
and formed a kind of landmark. It's limbs were gnarled and
fantastic, large enough to form trunks for ordinary trees,
twisting down almost to the earth and rising again into the
air. Ichabod, who had no relish for
this strange midnight companion,and bethought himself of the

(01:34:57):
adventures of Brom Bones with the galloping Hessian, now
quickened his steed in hopes of leaving him behind.
The stranger, however, quickenedhis horse to an equal pace.
Ichabod pulled up and fell into a walk, thinking to lag behind.
The other did the same. His heart began to sink within
him. He endeavoured to resume his

(01:35:19):
Psalm tune, but his parched tongue clove to the roof of his
mouth, and he could not utter A stave.
There was something in the Moodyand dogged silence of this
pertinacious companion that was mysterious and appalling.
It was soon fearfully accounted for on mounting a rising ground,
which brought the figure of his fellow traveller in relief

(01:35:42):
against the sky, gigantic in height and muffled in a cloak,
Ichabod was horror struck on perceiving that he was headless.
But his horror. Was even more increased on
observing that the head which should have rested on his
shoulders, was carried before him on the pommel of the saddle.

(01:36:02):
Kicks and blows. Upon.
Gunpowder hoping by a sudden movement to give his companion
the slip, but the spectre started a full jump with him.
Away they dashed through, thick and thin, stones flying and
sparks flashing at every bound. Ichabod's flimsy garments
fluttered in the air as he stretched his long, lanky body
away over his horse's head in the eagerness of his flight.

(01:36:25):
An opening in the trees now. Cheered him with the.
Hopes that the church bridge wasat hand, The wavering reflection
of a silver star in the bosom ofthe brook, told him that he was
not mistaken. He saw the walls of the church
dimly glaring under the trees beyond.
He recollected the place where Brom, Bones's ghostly
competitor, had disappeared. If I can but reach that bridge,

(01:36:47):
thought Ichabod, I am safe. Just then he heard the black
steed panting and blowing close behind him.
He even. Fancied that he felt his hot
breath after convulsive kick in the ribs, and old gunpowder
sprang upon the bridge, he thundered over the resounding
planks. He gained the opposite side, and

(01:37:07):
now Ichabod cast a look behind, to see if his pursuer should
vanish according to rule in a flash of fire and brimstone.
Just then he saw the goblin rising in his stirrups, and in
the very act of hurling his headat him.
Ichabod endeavoured to dodge thehorrible missile, but too late,

(01:37:27):
and encountered his cranium witha tremendous crash.
He was tumbled headlong into thedust and gunpowder at the black
steed, and the goblin rider passed by like a whirlwind.
The next morning the old horse was found without his saddle,
and with the bridle under his feet, soberly cropping the grass

(01:37:47):
at his master's gate. Ichabod did not make his
appearance at breakfast. Dinner hour came, but no
Ichabod. The boys assembled at the
schoolhouse and strolled idly about the banks of the brook.
But no, schoolmaster Hans van Ripper now began to feel some
uneasiness about the fate. Of poor Ichabod.

(01:38:08):
And his saddle. An inquiry was set on foot, and
after diligent investigation they came upon his traces.
In one part of the road leading to the church was found saddle
trampled in the dirt. The tracks of horses, hoofs
deeply dented in the road, and evidently at furious speed, were
traced to the bridge, beyond which, on the Bank of the broad

(01:38:31):
part of the brook where the water ran deep in black, was
found the hat of the unfortunateIchabod, and close beside it a
shattered pumpkin. The mysterious event caused much
speculation at the church. On the following Sunday.
Knots of gazers and gossips werecollected in the churchyard, at

(01:38:52):
the bridge, and at the spot where the hat and pumpkin had
been found. The stories of bones and the
whole budget of others were called to mind, and when they
had diligently considered them all, and compared them with the
symptoms of the present case, they shook their heads, and came
to the conclusion that Ichabod had been carried off by the
galloping Hessian. As he was a bachelor and in

(01:39:14):
nobody's debt, nobody troubled his head any.
More about him. The school was removed to a
different quarter of the hollow,and another pedagogue reigned in
his stead. It is true, an old farmer who
had been down to New York on visits several years after, and
from whom this account of the ghostly adventure was received,

(01:39:34):
brought home the intelligence that Ichabod Crane was still
alive. That he had left the
neighborhood, partly out of fearof the goblin in Hans Van
Ripper, and partly in mortification at having been
suddenly dismissed by the heiress.
That he had changed his quartersto a distant part of the
country, had kept school and studied law at the same time,

(01:39:55):
had been admitted to the bar, turned politician,
electioneered, written for the newspapers, and finally had been
made a justice for the 10 LB court.
Brom Bones, too, who shortly after his rival's disappearance
conducted the blooming Katrina in triumph to the altar, was
observed to look exceedingly knowing whenever the story of

(01:40:16):
Ichabod was related, and always burst.
Into a hearty. Laugh at the mention of the
pumpkin, which led some to suspect that he knew more about
the matter than he chose to tell.
The old country wives, however, who are the best judges of these
matters, maintained to this day that Ichabod was spirited away
by supernatural means, and it isa favorite story often told

(01:40:39):
about the neighborhood round thewinter evening fire.
The bridge became more than everan object of superstitious awe,
and that may be the reason why the road has been altered of
late years, so as to approach the church by the border of the
mill pond. The schoolhouse, being deserted,
soon felt a decay, and was reported to be haunted by the

(01:41:00):
ghost of the unfortunate pedagogue.
And the plowboy, loitering homeward of a still summer
evening, has often fancied his voice at a distance, chanting A
melancholy Psalm tune among the tranquil solitudes of Sleepy
Hollow. Thank you for joining me for

(01:41:23):
more true strange stories of theunexplained.
Remember that you can feel afraid and not be in danger.
You're. Safe here with me probably.
Please follow the podcast, leavea rating on Spotify or Apple, or
tell your friends and. Foes about the show it would
mean the world to me the underworld, obviously, I mean,

(01:41:47):
come on, was that not was that not clear?
Madam Strangeways is produced and.
Narrated by me, Madam Strangeways.
Thememusicisbymarina.ryan@marinamakes.coCover art is by Andrea Chisel
Roldan at Cult of Teddy on Instagram.
You can submit your own true strange story at

(01:42:09):
madamstrangeways.com or e-mail it to
madamstrangeways@gmail.com. See you soon, she said
ominously. On Madam.

(01:42:36):
Strange ways. Here, here, here on, Madam.

All Episodes

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow AKA Brom Bones Apologists Anonymous | Halloween Strangedive | Ep #43

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

The Male Room with Dr. Jesse Mills

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}The Legend of Sleepy Hollow AKA Brom Bones Apologists Anonymous | Halloween Strangedive | Ep #43