June 26, 2025 • 55 mins
Welcome To The Oddity Shop, Where The Bizarre is Always on Sale. This week, your Curator Zach is talking about a WW2 Tragedy he found he has a personal connection to!
Have you ever experienced those spine-tingling moments when seemingly unrelated events align perfectly, revealing something profound you never knew you were searching for? That's exactly what happened during Zach's visit to Normandy, France.
The day began with a simple plan to tour the D-Day sites. Little did hhe know that weeks before his departure, a casual conversation with his mother would plant the seed for an extraordinary discovery. "I think we have family buried at that cemetery you're visiting, That cemetery was the Normandy American Cemetery, and that relative was John McGowan
Armed with just a memorial card and curiosity, what unfolded next was far beyond a typical cemetery visit. The staff welcomed him with unexpected ceremony, explaining that my relative was part of a classified World War II disaster that remained secret for over 70 years. The SS Leopoldville, carrying 2,200 American troops including John, was torpedoed by a German U-boat on Christmas Eve 1944, just miles from shore. In the chaos that followed, 763 soldiers perished – their stories immediately classified by military authorities to maintain morale during a critical phase of the war.
Have you uncovered unexpected family connections in your travels? Share your experiences with us, or join our Patreon community where we dive deeper into these historical mysteries that touch our personal lives in ways we never imagined.
References:
- https://www.honorstates.org/profiles/62632/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/66th_Infantry_Division_%28United_States%29?utm_source=chatgpt.com
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_L%C3%A9opoldville_(1928)
- https://www.abmc.gov/video/normandy-american-cemetery/?utm_campaign=Website
- https://www.abmc.g
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
I want to dance with the Malkman at the IA shop,
Baked in the moonlight at the IAshop.
Creep through the graveyard tothe IA shop.
The door's always open at theIA shop.
(00:29):
Welcome back to the Oddity Shop, you little oddballs.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
The podcast where we tell you creepy, odd, weird,
strange and bizarre stories fromaround the world.
Where we tell you creepy odd,weird, strange and bizarre
stories from around the world.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I'm your curator, cara, and this is the greatest
co-host slash curator zacharythat's ever lived the greatest
zachary that's ever lived.
I want that written on mytombstone one day um, okay, side
note do you see something righthere Like somebody?
Have you been seeing something?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
No.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Okay, no.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Are you seeing something?
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
I keep seeing it, I saw it the whole time I was
recording, like that lastepisode, like a shadow right
here.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Are you sure it's not your skeleton?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
No, no, no, no.
It's on my blinds, like it'sliterally in this big open.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
It's not the tree that's out there, because when I
stay in the room next that one,sometimes the shadow of that
tree creeps me out.
You don't have a tree or thebush or something, maybe I don't
know.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
There's something no, there's nothing there.
This is like I'm like, I'mseeing like a, you got a little
friend.
I do have a little friend.
I was just wondering if.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
No, we'll keep an eye on over there oh yeah, well,
now I'm gonna have to look.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
I don't know, I have to watch when I edit it because
it becomes so blurry but then itgets really clear okay guys,
maybe patreons will get mylittle ghosty back there okay
anyway, that was a random, sorry.
What's uh new boo boo?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
so remember how I told you that grass was doing
really well.
It did not.
So like two-thirds of it tookgreat and the spot that was the
most shaded you would havethought like would have been
protected totally washed away.
We just got so much rain.
When I left, I'm glad I cleanedup the entire yard.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
To come back to have to do it all again yeah, but can
you imagine, if you didn'tclean up the yard, it would have
been just 10 times worse though, oh my god, it would have dude.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
It was like we pulled up to the house and I was
literally embarrassed you waslike oh, we want trash, oh yeah,
no, we.
We definitely had a differentlook than the rest of the
neighborhood, but it's okay.
I got it cleaned up today, it'sfine, but a bunch of spiders
came in the house too.
Oh yeah, don't leave our housefor like 13 days or however long
(02:46):
I was gone.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
I don't know I I felt like you were gone forever, but
then also I had just such a badtime, like a hard time, not
because you were gone it wasbecause I was gone well, at
least that's what I tell myselfto you, though you know, so it
does right can't vent it out um,but I had just a really hard
time.
So the day that you came back,when you said just landed in
detroit, I internally panickedbecause I was like how did two
(03:12):
weeks go?
No, like I kind of was likefreaking out like, oh my god, I
thought I had like another fivedays before you got back.
Not that I needed more days,but it was just weird.
It just went fast, it was soweird.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I can't wait till the next time I see you, because I
have like a bag of goodies foryou and I'm excited about some
of them.
Some of them are just like yourtypical souvenir kind of stuff
that you like have to do, but Iam very excited about one part
of it, so I think you're goingto like it.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Just one, you're gonna like it.
Well, it's like three thingsfrom one place, but that's all
I'm telling you for now a littleteaser a little teaser um, oh,
I do have something to tell youoh delilah got a stroller and
it's the best thing ever,because it's one of the ones
like you zip them in or just situm you can zip her all the in
(04:04):
but she just sits in and it canbe open but she gets clipped in
so she can't jump out.
For those that don't know, mywonderful baby fucking hates
walks since the day she was born.
She is a pretty, pretty, prettypretty princess and she wants
to be carried everywhere.
Yeah, she needs a carriage usand she wants to be carried
(04:27):
everywhere.
Yeah, she needs a carriage.
So I love to go for walks andit's really hard because I feel
so guilty coming home from workand then going for like an hour
walk and leaving her here.
It's just like parent guilt.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Yeah, but she would hate it.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
I know, but like she likes it.
If you take her into like woodsand trails, totally fine, if
you're just going for a damnwalk, absolutely not.
So I bought her this stroller.
Aaron's like she's going tohate that.
I said no, she's not.
I know my child she's going tofucking love it because she
loves the swing.
So it's kind of like the sameconcept.
You're just like kind of likeyou know.
So I put her in it and I strollall around the house.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
She gets to be the center of attention, of course,
walked her all around the houseand she fucking loved it.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
So I walked to the driveway, loved it.
So I'm like cool.
So then the next day I'm likewe're going for a walk.
So me and aaron did some yardwork and then we went for a two
and a half hour walk.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
We walked like four miles.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
We walked everywhere we walked through all these
neighborhoods and we went totracy and gary's house.
We stopped and saw her grandpa.
Literally just saw an orb whereI just okay you do have a
little friend today so I tookher to see her grandpa.
Then we walked all the way, notthat you would know, but like
to where our old house wasacross the street, because
that's the um where aaron'sgrandma lives little old folks
(05:37):
home.
Then we strolled right on intothe little old folks home and
all the old people were like, ohmy god.
Then we tr Tracy was theredoing her grandma's laundry.
So then we went out and sawTracy did laundry and then we
walked all the way home and itwas glorious.
And then it's poured ever sinceand I haven't been able to take
her again yeah, it's been superrainy.
It's awful but Delilah has astroller now and it's so much
(05:58):
fun and everything's gettinggreen.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
It's perfect.
Yes, okay, even though todaywas cold.
Oh yeah, it was a little on thechilly side, but it's supposed
to be like in the 70s all nextweek yep, okay, what else you
got for me?
Speaker 1 (06:10):
that's it, you got, that's it I do have a question.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Okay, can you, and if you want to share it, you can.
If you don't want to, but canyou think of a moment where it's
like a bunch of random,unrelated events turned into
something that you just can'texplain?
Speaker 1 (06:23):
it's not.
Not that I don't want to share,but I just can't think of
anything.
But I feel like that's ourlives, this happens to us like
weekly.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
It's always so weird, though, and like jarring, when
you kind of start to put all thepieces together.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, I'm trying to think if I can think of one
major thing, but right now Ijust really can't Well if it
comes to you.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
You, and I'm sure you already will, but just
interrupt me.
Oh my god, it's not gonna cometo me, but I feel like I know
where we're going with this you.
You might or you might not.
I've given you the slightestteaser of this.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
This is something that even I I wasn't expecting
well, I don't know, I'm notgoing, I'm just going off of, I
think, like from your trip andwhat you kind of stumbled upon,
but then I don't really knowanything else.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
I'm assuming, yes, so it is from my trip, um and I'm
gonna caveat this one before weeven start of the fact that it
is going to be a differentepisode for the oddity shop, of
the fact that it's like there isa little bit of a mystery and a
cover-up in here but it's notreally ghosts, it's not really
haunting, it's not any of that.
(07:25):
It is just the weirdness of allthese seemingly unrelated
things that led me into a storythat I never knew, okay that
says what the oddity shop is.
It's whatever weird thingshappen and it's gonna be like
super personal, but also juststrange, so I told you a lot
about my vacation.
I did not tell you this wholestory, though, because I wanted
(07:46):
to just share it with you, andafter I talked to mom and made
sure she was cool with mesharing the story oh okay, I
decided I have to do an entireepisode okay, denise one of the
stops on the cruise was in.
So we did two days in paris.
One was on this like littlebeach town.
It was amazing, it was justlike a seaside beach place.
It was the only day the weatherwas like in the 80s.
(08:09):
But the other day was in theport of Le Havre, which is two
hours from anything you could do.
So it's in the Normandy regionof France and you could either.
So we had 10 hours at the port.
One of the things you could dowas take a two-hour bus ride
into Paris and then what youspend like four hours there to
take a two-hour bus ride back,that would have just been
(08:31):
literally the biggest tease.
So me and Julia were lookingfor other excursions and we
booked off the ship a 10-hourtour of the D-Day site in
Normandy Right, which is Heavy,yeah, so, so obviously 10 hours
10 hours, so it was an hour and40 minute drive each way.
(08:53):
Oh, okay, um, and then there waslike there were four stops, so
there's a little bit of drivingin between.
It did not feel like 10 hours,it flew by, but yeah, we, so we
went back and forth.
We're like, no, we're gonnafeel really teased about paris
and we're both kind of likehistory nerds anyway.
So we decided to book it.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Paris really doesn't do anything for me it.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
I've never heard anybody who went and they're
like came back and was like, ohmy god, it's great.
Everyone always says it wasreally dirty.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
But the tower was cool.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Yeah, that's literally all I ever hear, okay
so we booked this and we bookedthis months and months ago.
Okay, there's four stops on thetour.
The first one is la com, whichis the german war cemetery.
So there's like a bunch ofcemeteries out there, which is
interesting that they have thegerman war cemetery, since they
(09:42):
were the baddies, obviously.
Then the next up was at Pointedu Hoc, which is the German
artillery site up on the cliffsthat overlook Omaha and Utah
Beach, which is where the D-Dayinvasion occurred.
Okay, and then we did two stopsalong Omaha Beach.
That was where all the UStroops came in near the tail end
(10:04):
of the war.
That's what really turned andhelped like liberate europe and
really beat back the germanforces.
Right, and that's how theallies won the war.
It's the largest seaborneinvasion in history.
Um, and then the fourth placeit was listed as the saint
laurent cemetery in colvillesurmer, which we're like cool
cemetery at the end I didn'tknow.
(10:25):
The other name for this is theNormandy American Cemetery,
which has 9,400 soldiers fromWorld War II and they're all
American soldiers.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Right, and this is all you really told me.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Right, so I booked that.
Like a couple of weeks beforewe went, months after we booked
this, I was telling my parentsabout where we were going, like
all the stops and everything,and so I told them about the
Normandy I go and we're stoppingat this place called St Laurent
and mom goes wait.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Is it St Laurent or St Laurent?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
It's probably St Laurent.
There are going to be a lot ofFrench words today, it's okay
listen, I get to help you oncein every 500 episodes.
Yes.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
But it's St Laura.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
And especially since I was in France and heard
everybody speaking sobeautifully.
I know I'm not going to dogreat- oh, so, beautiful.
Oh God.
So I told mom, though, aboutwhere we're going, and you know,
mom has been doing theAncestrycom thing for forever,
right?
So she goes, wait, I'm prettysure we have family buried there
(11:29):
, your grandma's cousin.
That's wild, okay.
So she sends me this card, andI'm gonna give you all the
photos and videos for thisepisode, so I'll show you it now
.
It's a card uh, you probablycan't see it that well, but it's
basically a um info card ofwhere in the cemetery he's
buried oh, okay, yeah, like theplot, like the plot, or whatever
(11:51):
yes, so it has his um servicenumber and it says permanent
cemetery, saint laurent, butdown below it it says temporary
cemetery and it has all the plot.
So I know the information I haveis not where he was actually
buried, because he hadn't beenmoved yet.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Gotcha um and his name is john mcgowan okay okay
oh, maybe, maybe you're relatedto rose mcgowan I don't know
that.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Yes, you do help me tatum riley from scream oh, my
god, okay, yeah, I shouldn'tknow, um, but I am related to,
not rose, but lily mcgowan, whoturns out to be, uh, john
mcgowan's mother.
Okay, so a different flower.
Um.
So anyways though, right, I'mlike, okay, that's really cool,
like I'm gonna take the photo.
(12:37):
Then, like, while we're outthere something to do, I'll go
see if I can find his plot inthe cemetery, right, I had no
idea the rabbit hole this wouldsend me down.
I don't know if I can find hisplot in the cemetery, right, I
had no idea the rabbit hole thiswould send me down I don't know
if I'm ready for this, yeah it.
Oh man, okay, so we start thetour.
The tour guide was great.
The tour guide was great, hewas kind of a sassy french man,
(12:58):
um, and the way there.
So it's an hour and 40 minutes.
He does kind of go through allof the end of world war one,
through the d-day invasion, likeso much history.
Admittedly, I did fall asleepfor a little bit of it, I know,
um, but it was really cute too,because when were you standing
walking?
Speaker 1 (13:17):
it was a coach.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
It was a bus oh you're on the bus right there oh
, the hour and 40 minute ridethere okay so he knows this must
happen, though, because he thenturns on all the lights when
they're about a half hour outand starts playing the song wake
up little susie, and he goesfor everyone who slept through
the rest of this.
This is when the tour starts toget good.
That's hilarious that.
So he starts then when we'regetting close to the german
cemetery, which, like reallycool that the french made it,
(13:40):
because obviously germansweren't that great, and this
place has a big mound in themiddle which is a mass grave,
and then it'll have, like thesevolcanic stone tombstones and
they're five crosses, and underevery set of five crosses is 400
bodies.
Like it looks like a reallyancient cemetery, and it was
(14:02):
like super cold and gray.
It was just like it was veryfitting.
So that was the calm.
Then we went up to the point duhoc, which is where, like, the
germans had the big howitzersthat they would fire like across
15 miles and they were takingout the ships that would have
come in to the normandy beachesokay so this is the part where
(14:22):
the americans had to, like,scale up a hundred foot cliffs
into machine gun fire and takeout the artillery before the
invasion could actually happen,and you can walk through, like
the german bunkers and thecasemates, where it was all, and
the crazy thing is is like thisplace is crater filled from all
the artillery and because it'son top of a cliff that you can
(14:43):
only go there.
For about 10 or 15 more yearsit's been slowly eroding, oh wow
.
So it's like the history is justreceding oh my god, that's
really weird then we got back inthe bus and we went to omaha
beach, which is like the beach.
Have you seen?
Saving private ryan?
Speaker 1 (15:00):
forever ago.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
I couldn't even say anything about it the beginning
25 minutes of that, that's justall absolutely horrific of
everyone storming the beach intomortar shells and machine gun
fire and, like thousands oftroops, die in a half an hour
maybe I haven't actually seenall of it but well, that's d-day
right yeah, yeah, yeah in yourhead, like you read about it in
(15:20):
history books and everythingwe're pulling up and it's a
little beachside town and peopleare walking their dogs on the
beach and there's a littleFrench bachelorette party and
they do have all these monumentsand reminders.
But it's just For me.
I was like the first two placeswere so somber and the third
place it just felt really livelyand me and Julia were talking
about it.
We're like well one.
(15:41):
If France really honored alltheir World War II sites, they
wouldn't have anything that theycould live in.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
And two it's like do we really want to let them win?
Like it was a beautiful beachbefore the war.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Right, that was really popular.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
It's tough.
Yeah, it was really interesting.
So the securing of the beach,though, right Horrific, right
horrific.
So 34 000 american troops camein the first wave, 160 000
allied troops all together stormacross mines, obstacles,
machine gun fire, like it's justhorrible, horrifying, um, and
that was where the us enteredinto world war ii, then the, and
(16:19):
they gave us lunch there andlike they had like handmade
desserts and stuff.
It was really cute oh so then wewent into the saint laurent
cemetery, which is the normandyamerican cemetery.
Okay, this was like pulling upto the arlington national
cemetery in dc, so we saw thegerman one, which looked like
really not run down, but it wasjust really like a classical old
(16:41):
cemetery.
This place is immaculate likethe grounds are the greenest
grass you've ever seen.
It's on the cliffs overlookingthe beach.
There's thousands uponthousands of marble crosses.
Or for the jewish who wereburied there, they had um the
star david instead of the crossreflection pools, giant statues
(17:01):
like manicured hedges, it'sbreathtaking.
So we're pulling up there and itwas like every stop he'd give
us some more history and thenlet us go free roam for like a
half hour or whatever.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Oh, okay.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Cool.
And then we get back on the bus.
So we're pulling up here and hegoes, okay, so we're going to
do an hour here.
So you know everyone, we'regoing to go in this entrance
over here you can walk aroundthe cemetery.
I'm like, oh cool, we'll beable to go find john's plot, you
know.
Oh yeah, yeah.
And he goes.
Uh, nobody on the bus hasfamily buried here right.
I raise my hand and go oh, I do, he goes.
You need to go to that buildingover there okay, like
(17:34):
information or like it is a likestone building with
floor-to-ceiling glass windows.
That looks insane.
Okay, and I kind of hesitatedat first.
I was like, oh, you know, we'll, we'll just like walk around
and find it like I don't youneed to go to that building over
there, you got orbs behind younow, boo-boo, okay um, so what's
(17:55):
happening?
We walk in through a securitycheckpoint.
Okay, like the hottestfrenchman I've ever seen, too at
this security checkpoint Ouioui, so then it is like this
place is ornate.
Okay, so they are like, sir, ifyou would step up to the desk,
(18:16):
we'll get some information fromyou, and it's like these people
are dressed like very fancy.
Oh, okay, and Were you nervous?
I was, and here's the thing Ionly found out about my family
member being buried there a fewweeks before it went.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
I just mean like, because it's so like upscale, it
was very official, yeah, andyou're just like what the heck's
happening and I like notimposter syndrome, but I was
almost like there's a lot ofpeople who come here for like
really.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
You know, the grandpa died here.
Yeah, yeah, or this or that,and Julia came with me.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
I don't think it's imposter syndrome, though,
because you're taking a tourabout the history as it is and
then you happen to like have afamily member that's buried
there.
I don't I get where you'recoming from, though.
Yeah, that would be.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
So we walk up to the desk and there's a really nice
lady there said yeah, she goes,what's his name?
So I pull out that picture andshow him yeah, or show her that
and she looks at, she startstyping and I'm holding my phone,
again she goes.
Can I see that again?
Like, yeah, sure she looks atshe goes, oh, okay, okay, this
comes back up way later, totallyunrelated to the rest of the
(19:17):
story I'm telling you, but sheturned like really white for
just a minute and that's goingto be the light thing that we
ended on.
So bookmark this because it'sgonna get heavy in the middle.
Oh my god.
So she goes.
Okay, I'm gonna go get someinformation, I'll be right back
and she's gone for like fiveminutes.
She comes back with this wholefolder, um, and she goes.
So you know who was this person?
To you I said he was mygrandma's cousin and she goes.
(19:39):
Do you know how he died?
And on this card it has hisdate of death listed as December
25th 1944.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
December 25th.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Mm-hmm.
So I was like, well, judging bythe dates, I would imagine it
was probably the Battle of theBulge, which started
mid-December and went tomid-January, and it was like the
Battle of the Bulge was kind ofafter Europe was starting to be
liberated, the German forceswere being pushed back.
The Germans do this campaignback into europe.
It was like their last ditcheffort, you know, and she comes
(20:09):
back.
Actually, she asked me thatbefore she went and she comes
back and she goes.
So I don't think that yourfamily member died in the battle
of the bulge.
Um, she goes, but he likely diedat sea and it was probably
pretty horrific oh sheintroduces herself to uh, oh,
first I go up to the desk rightto, and I'm like, oh, bonjour.
(20:29):
She says bonjour back.
I looked at him like, do youspeak english?
She goes this is the americancemetery.
Yes, so she introduces herself,she goes my name is matilda.
Like matilda, but without the amatilda she was wonderful and,
like everyone, was just very.
They talked slowly, peacefully,very friendly because they know
it's.
You know, people are coming toyou.
It's a hard place to be so, um,she says okay, so if you're
(20:53):
comfortable with it, what wewould like to do is do a
ceremony for your loved one.
Oh, I was like.
Oh, now I I'm like.
Now you feel very imposter.
Oh, yeah, I'm like I, I don'tknow.
Like I was like we have a tour,I don't.
Is it something that takes toolong?
Like I didn't even know himthat well, she goes this is
something you don't want to miss.
Oh, julia was like I think I'mgoing to hang back.
(21:15):
I looked at him like you knewhim as well as I did.
You're walking with her andshe's kind of explaining how
everyone set up.
So their stones do have namescarved into them, but it's hard
to see and everyone's buriedvery randomly because it's
(21:37):
supposed to be like nobody isdifferent than the other.
Okay, once they've given theirlife okay and she says you know,
you know, there's 9,500 peoplehere.
There's also about 1,100 peopleon the wall of the missing
Mm-mm, Like either they havesome of their remains and
haven't been able to identifythem, or their remains haven't
been found.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
The wall of the missing.
That's so sad.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
We're walking and she goes, so we're getting sort of
close to where John's buried.
She goes, and so in his likesquare area because it's kind of
set up in like squares Okay,are the Nyland brothers, who are
the brothers that the movieSaving Private Ryan was loosely
based on Probably two of themost famous graves there, about
(22:23):
five rows up from him, and oneof four females.
So she, this part was alsoroped off, okay, because, like
she said something like thegrass wasn't holding, so people
think that they can't go inthere.
You can.
So she steps on the rope wecross over.
She's showing us like how theykind of hid the markers and how
to find the graves.
So we walk up there and thewhole time, by the way, she's
(22:43):
carrying a bucket, okay, so I'dlike to explain to you.
You know, here's it, here's hisstone, and says john mcgowan,
private, uh, john mcgowan, 66thinfantry.
And she goes.
I'm gonna explain the ceremonyand then I'd, you know, like to
have you do it and she goes.
So what we do is we go and getsand from omaha beach okay,
which is the beach.
You know where d-day happened.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
She said this is where the americans yep and that
so you can see down onto thebeach.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And this is what we do, is you take the sand and you
rub it on the stone so it fillsin all the carved names, so it
becomes very visible, until thisrain comes and washes the sand
back down to the beach.
So for some time you'recommemorating him, you're
bringing visibility to the stone.
And then she said she has twoflags an american flag and a
(23:30):
french flag.
You put the american flag onthe left side of it.
That points towards the beachto show how the Americans came
from there to help win the war,and then the French flag to the
right side to show like, hey, itpoints to the French where we
came together to fight this off.
So we do that, we wipe the sandon there, put the flags out and
she's like you know, I'll kindof give you a minute and me and
(23:50):
Julia are standing there.
I don't know if I need thewhole minute, you know like
thank you, but this is reallycool.
And she, she starts to kind ofput together at that point that
it's not like a very closeperson to us, you know so.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
I don't want to interrupt you, but I don't know
what the fuck is going on,because there are orbs being
everywhere.
I keep seeing by you, I keepseeing behind me.
I don't know who be here.
What are you doing right now?
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I'm just going to keep telling you the story.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Okay, why are they here?
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Julia has pictures and videos of all this, by the
way, and it was like it wasreally emotional, just not even
one.
It was bringing attention to aname who you know he likely
hasn't been directly visited.
I was just going gonna say thatyou could have been the first
person I very well could have,and just being in this place,
you're seeing just how much lossof life there was, you know,
(24:41):
and this is only 9400 peoplelike there are so many more, and
so she goes.
You know, uh, do you have somemore time?
I'd like to show you something.
We look and really, yeah, sowe're she goes, okay, so follow
me.
And we're like, yeah, so shegoes, okay, so follow me.
And we're walking with her andI looked at her and I'm like you
have to have one of the coolestjobs in the world.
And so she starts telling usabout she gets to do this three
or four times a day and that oneof the best parts of her job is
(25:06):
helping to identify the bodieson the wall of the missing.
So they do like years and yearsof research on them to make
sure they have a 99 match.
Then they go and they exhumethe body, test that body and are
able to rebury them and givethem a stone.
I just literally busted open myshirt, apparently, so, yeah,
(25:29):
she just leaned back.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
I'm like because I'm like, my eyes are water, I'm
crying, there's orbs fuckingeverywhere and I guess I had to
flash.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yeah, so, anyways, we're telling her about us,
she's telling her about, or youknow, we're, yeah, learning
about each other and matilda'sgreat um and we're walking over.
So she goes, this is the wallof the missing.
She goes.
I want to point something out,and this is where the 1100 names
are of the people they're stilltrying to identify.
Right, she goes because theyhave their remains okay, some
(25:56):
they do, some they don't andthey're either trying to find
them or identify the remains andshe said look around this wall
for a minute and just youknow, tell me what you see.
Oh no, I said there's a lot ofthem are the 66th battalion,
which is what john was a part of, and she said it's very rare.
And not only that he was buriedaround such good company, she
(26:17):
said, but that your familymember was from this division,
the 66th infantry, and has astone.
So I looked at her and I said,okay, do you know what happened?
Like you said?
I know you said it's prettyhorrific, and it sounded like
she didn't want to talk about itin that office.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
And so she goes again .
She said it was, it was prettyawful, and all she really said
was is that he was on a ship andthat ship got hit by a torpedo
from a German U-boat.
It was after the war waswinding down, on Christmas, and
in this event, most of the 66thInfantry was lost, and because
of the way they were lost, mostof their remains were never
found, and that's when she.
(27:06):
you know we're looking at thewall of the missing and you see,
just over a third of them areall from this one incident.
So it was 493 of the 1,100names.
Wow, and you know these peopleare now kind of.
The families are thinking theirkids are coming home soon and
they get notified right aroundChristmas.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
that Stop it.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
I have goosebumps Boat mishap.
You know me, I'm like I have toknow about this, so I start
researching it.
Oh, she did also say that thename of the ship was the
Leopoldville.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Leopoldville OK.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Yes, I start researching on the way home and
everything else.
So here's the story.
The 66th Infantry Division wasa unit of the US Army and they
arrived in Dorchester, england,on November 26, 1944, with some
of the rest of the divisioncoming in December 12th.
So between the end of November,beginning of December, the
division coming in december 12th, so between the end of november
(27:55):
, beginning of december, theytrained, they prepared for
deployment and on december 24ththey were supposed to be
transferred from southampton,england, across the english
channel to cherbourg, franceokay uh, there are two transport
vessels that they were loadedonto, one the ss cheshire, and
the other one was a belgian shipcalled the leopoldville.
Okay, so their primary objectivewas to destroy the remaining
(28:18):
german troops left over in portcities in western france, as the
german troops are retreating.
So it was like the cleanup crewsort of yeah so the 66th
infantry was split into one ofthose two boats and John McGowan
, my grandmother's cousin, andabout 2,200 others were led onto
(28:38):
the Leopoldville History on theship.
The SS Leopoldville was apassenger liner originally that
carried people between Belgiumand the Congo, because the Congo
at that point was a colony ofBelgium Okay, Basically slaves.
Let's be for real.
The ship was 478 feet long.
(28:58):
It was built in 1929.
And during the war in May of1940, she was converted to be a
troop ship after the Germansinvade Belgium and they become
involved in the war.
So it makes tons of treksduring the war back and forth.
It's not really meant for thecolder parts of the ocean
because it was going to africa.
Um, she took some damage eachtime and all in all she did
(29:21):
transport 124 220 troops oh, wowand was at normandy on d-day.
Wow, yeah, very, very seen it,yeah.
So, going back then to Infantry, basically, they would have
been on the ship heading towardsthe Battle of the Bulge and
then becoming the cleanup crew.
(29:42):
So there were reinforcementslate in the war and the 66th
Infantry, when those who made itto the land were really
successful and actually had veryfew casualties other than
getting into the war.
So they were harassing Germaninstallations, conducting
limited objective attacks andthen running recon missions and
(30:04):
gathering intelligence.
But the Leopoldville right.
So what kind of happened here?
So it's going from Southampton,england, to Cherbourg, france,
like we said, on christmas eve.
Troops are loaded really hastilyinto the ship.
The crew, though, is mostlybelgian or belgian congo, and
they only speak flemish.
(30:25):
Okay, I was captained by, uh,captain charles limbaugh, who
spoke no english.
There was a safety meeting thatwas rushed, um, and there were
not enough life jackets on board, nor lifeboats.
Okay, and the reason they kindof rushed the safety yeah, the
safety of how to get intolifeboats and everything is
(30:47):
because all these troops werereally pissed off about getting
loaded into a ship on 9 am onchristmas eve.
So it begins to make its wayacross the english channel.
They're in a diamond formationwith four other ships, so there
are three other ships making adiamond of four.
Okay, two destroyers the hmsbrilliant and hms anthony.
These are english ships, okay,um.
(31:09):
And then there was a, um,british frigate, which is just
like a supply ship.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Okay, okay.
Where are we in this formation?
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (31:19):
That I don't know Okay.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
I'm just trying to get a visual, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
So they're making their way across, and about five
miles from the coast ofCherbourg, so they've already
made it across the channel.
They're very close to wherethey're going.
At 5.56 pm, German U-boatnumber 486 sees the incoming
formation, fires two torpedoesand one strikes the starboard
side of the Leopoldville,resulting in an explosion in the
(31:46):
number four hold thatimmediately kills about 300 men.
Oh so the crew spring intoaction and they start giving
orders on abandoning the shipokay however, remember, the crew
doesn't speak english and theorders are only given in flemish
.
Oh, the troops do see the crewleave, but it wasn't sinking
(32:08):
very quickly, so, notunderstanding what was happening
, being so close to the shore,they thought that the crew was
going to go get a um tugboat totow them into shore.
Only a handful of the troopsactually get off with the
lifeboats.
Most of the rest of theformation they've been traveling
with, they take off to try tochase down the u-boat.
(32:30):
Oh, my god.
So this is when the troops onboard start to realize that
things are not going very welland that the ship is sinking and
it's sinking quickly yeahthe waters are also very rough
in this part of the channel.
The hms brilliant, the britishship, though, does kind of
(32:50):
realize what's happening, andthey stay behind to help, so
they pull up alongside thesinking ship.
It gets really bad from here.
So I found a write-up from agentleman named jack dixon.
He was a 21 year old seaman.
He was on board the hmsbrilliant um and he was one of
the crew members that battledagainst the condition to try to
rescue as many of the soldiersas possible, and here's what's
(33:14):
on his website the hms brilliantwent alongside the port side of
the troop ship um.
We had our starboard fendersover the side.
The sea cell swell was causinga rise and fall of 8 to 12 feet.
The scrambling nets werehanging down the leopold's port
side and US soldiers were comingdown onto our upper deck.
As the seas got rough, some ofthe men had to jump down from a
(33:38):
height.
The waters that evening wererough and cold, and the
Leopoldville sat much higher inthe water than the Brilliant.
As the swells came up, whatwould be a 6 to 20 feet jump
quickly became a 40 foot jump.
Unfortunately, limbs were beingbroken when they landed on the
torpedo tubes and other fixedequipment on the starboard side
(33:59):
of the upper deck.
Most who landed in the waterwere unfortunately crushed
between the hulls of the twoships as they crashed into each
other.
To avoid any further injuries,if possible all of our hammocks
were brought up from the messdecks below and laid on the
starboard side upper deck tocushion the fall of the soldiers
.
As they landed, the hmsbrilliant and the uh
(34:24):
leopoldville were sending outdistress signals, but the rest
of the escort had gone too farto see that as they were chasing
down the u-boat, oh my god ittook nearly an hour for the
shore to realize theleopoldville was sinking.
There were several hundredallied ship vessels in the
harbor at cherbourg that couldhave come to save them oh my god
(34:46):
had it not been the evening ofchristmas eve.
They all had cold engines andthey were all celebrating off
the ship.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Oh, my God.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
Not only were the engines cold, but the torpedo
took out communications on theLeopoldville.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
So the English ship was on a different frequency
than the American ships theywere trying to reach.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
Oh my God the Brilliant had to contact
Portsmouth, which telephonedCherbourg, and then they tried
to get ships to come to therescue.
So it was super, super delayed.
Speaker 1 (35:20):
This is so awful.
Speaker 2 (35:22):
I know.
So approximately two and a halfhours after being hit, the
Leopoldville completely goesunderwater.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Oh goodness dark it's , it's, I was Also.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
I still don't know what's going on behind me with
you know, this is.
It's not somebody I knew, butit's a family member.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Well, that's why I feel like.
I feel yeah like, because it'syour family.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
It's like it's just, and you know of how horrible
world war ii is and I don't knowwhy it took it putting into
perspective of a bloodline toreally drive that home.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So of the 2,200 servicemen on board, 763 passed
away on Christmas.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Eve.
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Oh my god 505 on board either to the explosion,
who went down, 248 from injuries, hypothermia or drowning, and
the 493 names on the wall of themissing are from those who are
never recovered from the 48degree water oh my god, I am
like crying yeah, captaincharles limbaugh and three of
(36:31):
the congolese crew members do godown with the ship and actually
there's some rumors thatCharles Limbaugh was trying to.
He passed maybe helping try topull some of the bodies out of
the water.
Ugh, so the cemetery is part ofthe American Battle Monuments
Commission and they have this ontheir website.
So on Christmas Eve 1944, adisaster happened in the Channel
(36:54):
C, not far from Cherbourg.
More than 2,000 Americanservice members from the 262nd
and 264th Regiments, 66thInfantry Division, were aboard
the troop ship SS Leopoldvillewhen it was torpedoed by a
German U-boat and sank in thecold waters.
Approximately 800 servicemembers were killed that day and
(37:16):
500 were never recovered.
They are remembered at thenormandy american cemeteries
tablets of the missing.
The cemetery only contains 77gravestones of members from the
66th okay, that's what I wasgonna ask you, because she was.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
it's rare for your uncle, or what is he Cause?
A grandma's cousin?
Speaker 2 (37:36):
I know it's my mom's second cousin.
I think it would be my secondonce removed, if I'm correct.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Well, your relative.
She said it was rare that yourrelative was like buried or
whatever.
Is that just because everybodyelse was like?
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Because very few bodies were able to be
identified or found yeah, okaywhich is actually my next line
about matilda telling us it wasrare.
Um, now we know this story today.
However, at the time thisoccurred, the english and
british government go straightinto secrecy.
Oh so authorities classifiedthe incident as confidential to
(38:12):
protect troop morale.
During the Battle of the Bulge,families were only told that
their loved ones died in action.
The reasons for the secrecy?
One is the morale.
It was a critical turning pointduring the war.
High US casualties were alreadythere and coming from basically
negligent and logistic failureswould not have been a good look
(38:32):
Right.
Negligent and logistic failureswould not have been a good look
right.
Um, they thought because therewas miscommunication between
british and american forces thatit might damage relations.
And it was military failures.
There was an untrained crewwith not enough lifeboats for
the troops they put on there andfailed rescue efforts.
So basically, christmas tailend of the war, families
(38:55):
expecting their loved ones tocome home just get absolutely
devastating news.
It was not until 1996 that thiswas declassified oh shit um, so
thankfully, then, some bookshave come out and a lot of
memorials have been put up forthe legalopoldville 96.
Yeah, it is one of the worstmaritime disasters involving us
(39:18):
troops of any time ever oh mygod it took over 70 years before
most families learned the fullstory of what happened to their
loved ones that is fucked up sothis would mean that my mother's
great aunt Lily and great uncleWilliam likely never knew the
fate of their son.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
What yeah?
Speaker 2 (39:38):
So honestly like learning about that First of all
.
It's it's just so weird.
The pieces fit together.
I booked this randomly.
It happened to end at thatplace.
Mom happened to find this cardon Ancestry.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
How weird.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
The other thing that's strange to me is why have
I always been drawn toshipwrecks?
So it was just.
It seemed like one of thosethings where everything really
came together and it was such acool honor and retrospect to be
able to share his story.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You know, especially since his parents never knew no,
and to learn about it and to beable to do the ceremony to
honor him.
It's like the least I could doto I can't be crying this whole
time I did talk to mom beforedeciding to write this yeah
(40:25):
because you know, grandma, mygrandma would have grown up with
john yeah my mom was at.
She remembers going to lily andyou know aunt lily and uncle
william's house like it's notlike this.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Is that far removed?
Speaker 2 (40:41):
no, oh.
So we talked about this and shesaid you know, it doesn't feel.
She said everything happens fora reason, it doesn't feel like
it was just by chance no and soit was like and the tour guide
too earlier I was like, hey, I'mjust gonna walk around.
Had I done that, I would havenever learned the story like
he's like no, you have to go tothat yes, make sure you go to
(41:02):
that building it was just thatwas like fate, or john, like
something, had a hand in wantingthe story to be told.
I have goosebumps so I did wantto do it.
I wanted to do it with respect,um, but I also think you know
it's.
It's an interesting failure ofof some of the like the terrible
parts of war that weren't indirect.
So with that, do you want tolearn a little bit more about
(41:25):
john?
Because we found some stuff atthe cemetery in the packet they
gave us.
Mom had some stuff online chat.
Gpt was actually able to pullsome stuff I'm gonna fucking cry
.
I don't think I could take it Iknow it honestly, I I feel you
so from what we could puttogether.
So he was two years older thanmy grandma and, like I said,
(41:47):
they would have grown uptogether.
He was born in Romulus,michigan, on September 28th 1926
to William and Lily.
So how old?
18.
Which I mean most of the boysfrom World War II were between
16 to 18.
So many of them lied abouttheir age to enlist that they
were even younger.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
Oh, my god 18.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
So his father, so William was from Scotland, lily
was from Canada.
Originally.
Father was an auto factoryworker and a crane operator, his
mom was a homemaker, and Johnwas their only child.
Oh my god, he grew up inRedford, though.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Stop breaking my heart.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Grew up in Redford, outside of Detroit.
He did graduate, high schooland now this is one of the cool
things is and Mathilde showed usthis on his stone with his
number is he wasn't drafted forthe war.
He actually chose to enlist.
That's even sadder, but it'samazing that he decided to make
(42:47):
the sacrifice for his countrybecause so many people world war
ii, so many were drafted youknow, so by his number.
We do know that he enlisted outof the army on may 9th 1944, so
already into the war, and the usentered world war ii.
The d-day invasion happened onjune 6th, so he knew we were
(43:07):
entering the war.
He enlisted from michigan andwould have been stationed at
fort sheridan in illinois wherehe held the rank of private.
And then we do know his deathdate is december 25th 1944.
Because of his service and hissacrifice, uh, private m Private
McGowan was posthumouslyawarded several commendations,
including a Purple Heart, aWorld War II Victory Medal,
(43:29):
combat Infantryman Badge,american Campaign Medal and an
Army Presidential Unit Citation.
So he's now, like I said, he'sinterred at the Normandy
American Cemetery in Colville,surmer, france, specifically
(43:52):
plot F, row 19, grave number 12.
That's the story about myfamily member.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
John McGowan.
Wow, I'm like really so um,that's so sad I hate.
You Did his family, though, gethis purple heart and all his
medals and awards.
So this is what his family wedon't know that's so sad.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
So william, on that temporary card that I have,
william was listed as the nextof kin, so he likely had it.
But in that packet they gave usall this information on where
we can go to look up moreinformation.
So we're gonna do that.
And matilda said if you findanything, share it with us yeah,
and we'll add him to the tours.
Oh so, if you give thebackground information, so his
(44:34):
legacy can live on a bit, sowe're gonna do that yep oh my
god, I can't stop yeah.
So when she kept just saying itwas pretty horrific and given a
little bit of the details, thecrazy thing was too.
This is how well these peopleat the cemetery knew.
She didn't look any of this up.
She knew, and probably becausethere's 500 people on that wall.
So I told you I would end it alittle bit lighter.
(44:58):
I know I see your eyes.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
When I first handed her my phone, I told you she
looked at it, handed it back,looked at it again and it just
had a very just strange look onher face okay, so explain to me
matilda, how old do you thinkshe is?
So matilda is probably aboutour age.
She has red hair.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
She's very sweet okay she was very reserved until she
kind of realized that weweren't, it wasn't going to be a
very emotional thing for us,okay.
And then she started telling usso this is her summer job.
Then she, uh, she teachesschool.
Uh, she's like a um tutor,basically not a tutor but uh
like private teacher forone-on-one students, okay, and
(45:42):
she's like I have the best jobin the world.
You know that.
She was telling us about how shedoes three or four of these
tours a day in the off seasonyou know, she gets to help with
the identifying of the bodiesand she's been there when, like,
the secret service and thepresident's come through, like
she's just so proud of what shedid and it was cool because we
got her talking.
Of course, you know me, we'rewalking how did she get?
Speaker 1 (46:02):
how do you get that job?
Speaker 2 (46:03):
I don't know we're walking, though I have to ask
her.
I'm like okay, so does anythingstrange happen here?
She looks at me, she goes.
I don't know.
I've been told we have prettyquiet neighbors around us.
But uh, she said, you knowthere's, there's some whispers.
So anyways, on the bottom ofthat temporary card it says next
(46:23):
of kin William McGowan.
At the top it says John McGowan, but if you look at it really
quickly it's plot number andthen the name.
It looks like it's WilliamMcGowan.
So when we're standing at thewall of the missing, she goes.
So I have to apologize for myreaction at first, gotcha, I
started to get very excited.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Oh, she thought she solved it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
She's pointing out.
So on that wall at the end oftheir name, if they have this
medallion, okay, those are thepeople who are originally on the
wall, whose remains have beenidentified.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (46:54):
And the remains of a William McGowan had been
identified two weeks prior andshe thought that we were coming.
She was like I thought at first.
When I looked at that I sawwilliam mcgowan stick out to me
and she goes.
We like we just identified andyou just show up oh, that's so
sweet right.
So she, she was like reallyexcited about that for a minute.
Then she, like julia, had askedsomething along the lines of
(47:17):
like you know, how, how do thesebodies just kind of you know,
she was well, sometimes they'reburied there already and it's
they.
They're in like the unknownpart of the cemetery, without
stones and because of all thefamily, dna stuff and everything
else going on, they'll researchit for years.
She says, until we know for 99.
(47:38):
Sure we, we can't do anything.
When we're at 99 they'll exhumethe bodies and test.
Or sometimes bodies are stillfound.
Because, you know, sometimespeople in france during covid
decide to renovate their gardenand dig up an entire plane with
a body still in it.
Jesus, yeah, I mean, it's justwild, it was.
(48:01):
That was the whole thing to me.
It's's one thing to learn aboutWorld War Two and you know it
happened in France and all over,you know and it's another thing
to just stand there in theplaces where it happened and it
was just mind blowing.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
Oh my God.
Ok so, zachary.
Why do we have orbs and weirdthings all around us right now?
Speaker 2 (48:21):
That I'm not sure of.
Like I said, I felt like it wasa little bit faded to tell the
story.
The way all things cametogether I don't know if
somebody guided my hand at allin it I'm not going to claim
that but it has been a verystrange feeling while writing
this and I'm going to leave itat that.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Anyways, that's the story of the insane experience
that I was not expecting to getfrom the Normandy tour and the
story of the SS Leopoldville andmy family member, john McGowan.
So I hope I did his storyjustice and I hope that other
people can either learnsomething from it or remember
his name, because I think now onChristmas it's definitely
(49:01):
something I'm going to have todo a little ritual for and he's
going to go up on my familymember altar as well.
Stop crying, tara.
Speaker 1 (49:10):
I am literally like blubbering, like a baby.
Speaker 2 (49:13):
Oh my god, I can't it's just incredible, isn't it
like?
Speaker 1 (49:18):
and it's just so sad, but also it's so weird.
Speaker 2 (49:22):
I know weird, but like just how it all happened,
like how it all happened andlike, for some reason I've
always been drawn to stories ofshipwrecks, shipwrecks, you know
.
Maybe there there's some, someancestral part of that there,
but uh yeah that is very cool,that's really cool it was
definitely and not selfishly forme.
(49:42):
It was just an amazingexperience to be able to do that
for him.
So that's why I talked to momand I said hey, you know, I want
to write an episode about it,not to make a big deal about the
story, or anything but just toshow.
Speaker 1 (49:52):
But that is how devastating it was and how.
The cover-up and everythingelse like well, just the events
that led you there is just likehow do you not tell that story?
Yeah, like how?
Speaker 2 (50:03):
since then, too, I've been on such a world war ii
kick.
I'm like listening to podcastsand youtubes and everything, and
it's just I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (50:09):
It just really makes me sick.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
I just I, I think it's important to remember,
though, because history isdoomed to repeat itself, and
it's, I think, we now we're so.
There's so many less survivorsfrom world war ii and veterans
that it's easy to forget howhard people fought for the
freedoms we had.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
Yeah, you're right, and how?
Speaker 2 (50:27):
quickly.
People have come to power andwere able to change the world
not for the good, so you'reimportant to remember those
things.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
And with that now we have influencers.
Speaker 2 (50:39):
There we go, right, okay, so something good that
happened to you this week,because we need to lighten this
up.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
I don't have anything good.
This was so sad I'm.
I'm like I'm very, very, verycurious as to who the fuck is
here right now, Because I don'tknow if you were seeing every
orb that was around me, and thenthere was a ton behind you, but
that never happens whenrecording.
Speaker 2 (51:07):
It's happened a handful of times that we've been
shocked by it before, that it'snot like something we haven't
noticed, but not as much as whatwas just fucking happening
while we were just recording.
Speaker 1 (51:16):
Now, that was so weird.
I've never and normally I seethem behind you, I don't ever
see them by by me and I justkept seeing weird light flashes
and then a ton of like weirdlittle orbs around me I think
that's the part of when you'retalking about the ancestry.
It's so powerful, how, howthose it is, but now I'm
freaking out members and guidescome through why are they here?
Speaker 2 (51:37):
I just have to wrap it up and have a little
conversation with them.
Maybe.
Speaker 1 (51:40):
Maybe you have a story you need to tell I was
just thinking like did I havesomebody on that ship?
How fucking weird would that be?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
that would be very strange, dude.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
We'll have to do some digging oh my god, all right, I
cannot stop crying um.
So the emoji for this episode,I know I don't want to do that,
I think a gravestone and aflower, not to be morbid, but a
gravestone is just nice, okay.
Speaker 2 (52:06):
Or an American flag and a French flag.
Oh my God, there we go.
It's a mess.
I know Kara's trying to pull ittogether.
Speaker 1 (52:15):
You could just put cry tears.
Speaker 2 (52:17):
Here's the ask for this week, and we could always
do a special episode about this.
But if you have a family memberthat you'd want to honor with
their story, oh my god, we wouldlove to have you write it in.
And you know, it's that wholething of you die twice right,
when you, when you pass and whenpeople say your name for the
last time.
So if you have some ancestorsstories you want to share, send
(52:38):
them to us and we would love todo an episode honoring your
loved ones.
Speaker 1 (52:41):
Yeah, even if it's not like a war story.
No.
Speaker 2 (52:44):
Anything Like anything.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
Oh my God, Tell me about your grandma.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
We talk about so many things like this without being
connected to it and without someof the emotion and to the
ghosts.
You know, it's easy to forgetthe people that they were.
So when I give back to thepeople they were, kara is
bawling again.
So, we're're gonna close theshop up.
I'm so sorry I made you cry, um, we love you.
Oh, we do so much.
Hug your family hard and do you?
(53:10):
Do you want to say the magicwords, or do you need me to help
you out this time around?
Speaker 1 (53:13):
oh my god, the most important thing you could do for
us is to creep it.
Speaker 2 (53:17):
Really oddballs goodbye, bye, bye At the Ali
(53:40):
Shop, locked in the shadows Atthe Ali Shop, at home with the
oddballs At the Ali Shop.
The door's always open At theAli Shop.
I want to dance with the Malkman at the IA shop,
Baked in the moonlight at the IAshop.
Creep through the graveyard tothe IA shop.
The door's always open at theIA shop.
(00:29):
Welcome back to the Oddity Shop, you little oddballs.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
The podcast where we tell you creepy, odd, weird,
strange and bizarre stories fromaround the world.
Where we tell you creepy odd,weird, strange and bizarre
stories from around the world.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I'm your curator, cara, and this is the greatest
co-host slash curator zacharythat's ever lived the greatest
zachary that's ever lived.
I want that written on mytombstone one day um, okay, side
note do you see something righthere Like somebody?
Have you been seeing something?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
No.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Okay, no.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
Are you seeing something?
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (01:08):
I keep seeing it, I saw it the whole time I was
recording, like that lastepisode, like a shadow right
here.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Are you sure it's not your skeleton?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
No, no, no, no.
It's on my blinds, like it'sliterally in this big open.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
It's not the tree that's out there, because when I
stay in the room next that one,sometimes the shadow of that
tree creeps me out.
You don't have a tree or thebush or something, maybe I don't
know.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
There's something no, there's nothing there.
This is like I'm like, I'mseeing like a, you got a little
friend.
I do have a little friend.
I was just wondering if.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
No, we'll keep an eye on over there oh yeah, well,
now I'm gonna have to look.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
I don't know, I have to watch when I edit it because
it becomes so blurry but then itgets really clear okay guys,
maybe patreons will get mylittle ghosty back there okay
anyway, that was a random, sorry.
What's uh new boo boo?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
so remember how I told you that grass was doing
really well.
It did not.
So like two-thirds of it tookgreat and the spot that was the
most shaded you would havethought like would have been
protected totally washed away.
We just got so much rain.
When I left, I'm glad I cleanedup the entire yard.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
To come back to have to do it all again yeah, but can
you imagine, if you didn'tclean up the yard, it would have
been just 10 times worse though, oh my god, it would have dude.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
It was like we pulled up to the house and I was
literally embarrassed you waslike oh, we want trash, oh yeah,
no, we.
We definitely had a differentlook than the rest of the
neighborhood, but it's okay.
I got it cleaned up today, it'sfine, but a bunch of spiders
came in the house too.
Oh yeah, don't leave our housefor like 13 days or however long
(02:46):
I was gone.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
I don't know I I felt like you were gone forever, but
then also I had just such a badtime, like a hard time, not
because you were gone it wasbecause I was gone well, at
least that's what I tell myselfto you, though you know, so it
does right can't vent it out um,but I had just a really hard
time.
So the day that you came back,when you said just landed in
detroit, I internally panickedbecause I was like how did two
(03:12):
weeks go?
No, like I kind of was likefreaking out like, oh my god, I
thought I had like another fivedays before you got back.
Not that I needed more days,but it was just weird.
It just went fast, it was soweird.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I can't wait till the next time I see you, because I
have like a bag of goodies foryou and I'm excited about some
of them.
Some of them are just like yourtypical souvenir kind of stuff
that you like have to do, but Iam very excited about one part
of it, so I think you're goingto like it.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Just one, you're gonna like it.
Well, it's like three thingsfrom one place, but that's all
I'm telling you for now a littleteaser a little teaser um, oh,
I do have something to tell youoh delilah got a stroller and
it's the best thing ever,because it's one of the ones
like you zip them in or just situm you can zip her all the in
(04:04):
but she just sits in and it canbe open but she gets clipped in
so she can't jump out.
For those that don't know, mywonderful baby fucking hates
walks since the day she was born.
She is a pretty, pretty, prettypretty princess and she wants
to be carried everywhere.
Yeah, she needs a carriage usand she wants to be carried
(04:27):
everywhere.
Yeah, she needs a carriage.
So I love to go for walks andit's really hard because I feel
so guilty coming home from workand then going for like an hour
walk and leaving her here.
It's just like parent guilt.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Yeah, but she would hate it.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
I know, but like she likes it.
If you take her into like woodsand trails, totally fine, if
you're just going for a damnwalk, absolutely not.
So I bought her this stroller.
Aaron's like she's going tohate that.
I said no, she's not.
I know my child she's going tofucking love it because she
loves the swing.
So it's kind of like the sameconcept.
You're just like kind of likeyou know.
So I put her in it and I strollall around the house.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
She gets to be the center of attention, of course,
walked her all around the houseand she fucking loved it.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
So I walked to the driveway, loved it.
So I'm like cool.
So then the next day I'm likewe're going for a walk.
So me and aaron did some yardwork and then we went for a two
and a half hour walk.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
We walked like four miles.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
We walked everywhere we walked through all these
neighborhoods and we went totracy and gary's house.
We stopped and saw her grandpa.
Literally just saw an orb whereI just okay you do have a
little friend today so I tookher to see her grandpa.
Then we walked all the way, notthat you would know, but like
to where our old house wasacross the street, because
that's the um where aaron'sgrandma lives little old folks
(05:37):
home.
Then we strolled right on intothe little old folks home and
all the old people were like, ohmy god.
Then we tr Tracy was theredoing her grandma's laundry.
So then we went out and sawTracy did laundry and then we
walked all the way home and itwas glorious.
And then it's poured ever sinceand I haven't been able to take
her again yeah, it's been superrainy.
It's awful but Delilah has astroller now and it's so much
(05:58):
fun and everything's gettinggreen.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
It's perfect.
Yes, okay, even though todaywas cold.
Oh yeah, it was a little on thechilly side, but it's supposed
to be like in the 70s all nextweek yep, okay, what else you
got for me?
Speaker 1 (06:10):
that's it, you got, that's it I do have a question.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Okay, can you, and if you want to share it, you can.
If you don't want to, but canyou think of a moment where it's
like a bunch of random,unrelated events turned into
something that you just can'texplain?
Speaker 1 (06:23):
it's not.
Not that I don't want to share,but I just can't think of
anything.
But I feel like that's ourlives, this happens to us like
weekly.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
It's always so weird, though, and like jarring, when
you kind of start to put all thepieces together.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Yeah, I'm trying to think if I can think of one
major thing, but right now Ijust really can't Well if it
comes to you.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
You, and I'm sure you already will, but just
interrupt me.
Oh my god, it's not gonna cometo me, but I feel like I know
where we're going with this you.
You might or you might not.
I've given you the slightestteaser of this.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
This is something that even I I wasn't expecting
well, I don't know, I'm notgoing, I'm just going off of, I
think, like from your trip andwhat you kind of stumbled upon,
but then I don't really knowanything else.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
I'm assuming, yes, so it is from my trip, um and I'm
gonna caveat this one before weeven start of the fact that it
is going to be a differentepisode for the oddity shop, of
the fact that it's like there isa little bit of a mystery and a
cover-up in here but it's notreally ghosts, it's not really
haunting, it's not any of that.
(07:25):
It is just the weirdness of allthese seemingly unrelated
things that led me into a storythat I never knew, okay that
says what the oddity shop is.
It's whatever weird thingshappen and it's gonna be like
super personal, but also juststrange, so I told you a lot
about my vacation.
I did not tell you this wholestory, though, because I wanted
(07:46):
to just share it with you, andafter I talked to mom and made
sure she was cool with mesharing the story oh okay, I
decided I have to do an entireepisode okay, denise one of the
stops on the cruise was in.
So we did two days in paris.
One was on this like littlebeach town.
It was amazing, it was justlike a seaside beach place.
It was the only day the weatherwas like in the 80s.
(08:09):
But the other day was in theport of Le Havre, which is two
hours from anything you could do.
So it's in the Normandy regionof France and you could either.
So we had 10 hours at the port.
One of the things you could dowas take a two-hour bus ride
into Paris and then what youspend like four hours there to
take a two-hour bus ride back,that would have just been
(08:31):
literally the biggest tease.
So me and Julia were lookingfor other excursions and we
booked off the ship a 10-hourtour of the D-Day site in
Normandy Right, which is Heavy,yeah, so, so obviously 10 hours
10 hours, so it was an hour and40 minute drive each way.
(08:53):
Oh, okay, um, and then there waslike there were four stops, so
there's a little bit of drivingin between.
It did not feel like 10 hours,it flew by, but yeah, we, so we
went back and forth.
We're like, no, we're gonnafeel really teased about paris
and we're both kind of likehistory nerds anyway.
So we decided to book it.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
Paris really doesn't do anything for me it.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
I've never heard anybody who went and they're
like came back and was like, ohmy god, it's great.
Everyone always says it wasreally dirty.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
But the tower was cool.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Yeah, that's literally all I ever hear, okay
so we booked this and we bookedthis months and months ago.
Okay, there's four stops on thetour.
The first one is la com, whichis the german war cemetery.
So there's like a bunch ofcemeteries out there, which is
interesting that they have thegerman war cemetery, since they
(09:42):
were the baddies, obviously.
Then the next up was at Pointedu Hoc, which is the German
artillery site up on the cliffsthat overlook Omaha and Utah
Beach, which is where the D-Dayinvasion occurred.
Okay, and then we did two stopsalong Omaha Beach.
That was where all the UStroops came in near the tail end
(10:04):
of the war.
That's what really turned andhelped like liberate europe and
really beat back the germanforces.
Right, and that's how theallies won the war.
It's the largest seaborneinvasion in history.
Um, and then the fourth placeit was listed as the saint
laurent cemetery in colvillesurmer, which we're like cool
cemetery at the end I didn'tknow.
(10:25):
The other name for this is theNormandy American Cemetery,
which has 9,400 soldiers fromWorld War II and they're all
American soldiers.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
Right, and this is all you really told me.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Right, so I booked that.
Like a couple of weeks beforewe went, months after we booked
this, I was telling my parentsabout where we were going, like
all the stops and everything,and so I told them about the
Normandy I go and we're stoppingat this place called St Laurent
and mom goes wait.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Is it St Laurent or St Laurent?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
It's probably St Laurent.
There are going to be a lot ofFrench words today, it's okay
listen, I get to help you oncein every 500 episodes.
Yes.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
But it's St Laura.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
And especially since I was in France and heard
everybody speaking sobeautifully.
I know I'm not going to dogreat- oh, so, beautiful.
Oh God.
So I told mom, though, aboutwhere we're going, and you know,
mom has been doing theAncestrycom thing for forever,
right?
So she goes, wait, I'm prettysure we have family buried there
(11:29):
, your grandma's cousin.
That's wild, okay.
So she sends me this card, andI'm gonna give you all the
photos and videos for thisepisode, so I'll show you it now
.
It's a card uh, you probablycan't see it that well, but it's
basically a um info card ofwhere in the cemetery he's
buried oh, okay, yeah, like theplot, like the plot, or whatever
(11:51):
yes, so it has his um servicenumber and it says permanent
cemetery, saint laurent, butdown below it it says temporary
cemetery and it has all the plot.
So I know the information I haveis not where he was actually
buried, because he hadn't beenmoved yet.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
Gotcha um and his name is john mcgowan okay okay
oh, maybe, maybe you're relatedto rose mcgowan I don't know
that.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
Yes, you do help me tatum riley from scream oh, my
god, okay, yeah, I shouldn'tknow, um, but I am related to,
not rose, but lily mcgowan, whoturns out to be, uh, john
mcgowan's mother.
Okay, so a different flower.
Um.
So anyways though, right, I'mlike, okay, that's really cool,
like I'm gonna take the photo.
(12:37):
Then, like, while we're outthere something to do, I'll go
see if I can find his plot inthe cemetery, right, I had no
idea the rabbit hole this wouldsend me down.
I don't know if I can find hisplot in the cemetery, right, I
had no idea the rabbit hole thiswould send me down I don't know
if I'm ready for this, yeah it.
Oh man, okay, so we start thetour.
The tour guide was great.
The tour guide was great, hewas kind of a sassy french man,
(12:58):
um, and the way there.
So it's an hour and 40 minutes.
He does kind of go through allof the end of world war one,
through the d-day invasion, likeso much history.
Admittedly, I did fall asleepfor a little bit of it, I know,
um, but it was really cute too,because when were you standing
walking?
Speaker 1 (13:17):
it was a coach.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
It was a bus oh you're on the bus right there oh
, the hour and 40 minute ridethere okay so he knows this must
happen, though, because he thenturns on all the lights when
they're about a half hour outand starts playing the song wake
up little susie, and he goesfor everyone who slept through
the rest of this.
This is when the tour starts toget good.
That's hilarious that.
So he starts then when we'regetting close to the german
cemetery, which, like reallycool that the french made it,
(13:40):
because obviously germansweren't that great, and this
place has a big mound in themiddle which is a mass grave,
and then it'll have, like thesevolcanic stone tombstones and
they're five crosses, and underevery set of five crosses is 400
bodies.
Like it looks like a reallyancient cemetery, and it was
(14:02):
like super cold and gray.
It was just like it was veryfitting.
So that was the calm.
Then we went up to the point duhoc, which is where, like, the
germans had the big howitzersthat they would fire like across
15 miles and they were takingout the ships that would have
come in to the normandy beachesokay so this is the part where
(14:22):
the americans had to, like,scale up a hundred foot cliffs
into machine gun fire and takeout the artillery before the
invasion could actually happen,and you can walk through, like
the german bunkers and thecasemates, where it was all, and
the crazy thing is is like thisplace is crater filled from all
the artillery and because it'son top of a cliff that you can
(14:43):
only go there.
For about 10 or 15 more yearsit's been slowly eroding, oh wow
.
So it's like the history is justreceding oh my god, that's
really weird then we got back inthe bus and we went to omaha
beach, which is like the beach.
Have you seen?
Saving private ryan?
Speaker 1 (15:00):
forever ago.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
I couldn't even say anything about it the beginning
25 minutes of that, that's justall absolutely horrific of
everyone storming the beach intomortar shells and machine gun
fire and, like thousands oftroops, die in a half an hour
maybe I haven't actually seenall of it but well, that's d-day
right yeah, yeah, yeah in yourhead, like you read about it in
(15:20):
history books and everythingwe're pulling up and it's a
little beachside town and peopleare walking their dogs on the
beach and there's a littleFrench bachelorette party and
they do have all these monumentsand reminders.
But it's just For me.
I was like the first two placeswere so somber and the third
place it just felt really livelyand me and Julia were talking
about it.
We're like well one.
(15:41):
If France really honored alltheir World War II sites, they
wouldn't have anything that theycould live in.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
And two it's like do we really want to let them win?
Like it was a beautiful beachbefore the war.
Speaker 1 (15:53):
Right, that was really popular.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
It's tough.
Yeah, it was really interesting.
So the securing of the beach,though, right Horrific, right
horrific.
So 34 000 american troops camein the first wave, 160 000
allied troops all together stormacross mines, obstacles,
machine gun fire, like it's justhorrible, horrifying, um, and
that was where the us enteredinto world war ii, then the, and
(16:19):
they gave us lunch there andlike they had like handmade
desserts and stuff.
It was really cute oh so then wewent into the saint laurent
cemetery, which is the normandyamerican cemetery.
Okay, this was like pulling upto the arlington national
cemetery in dc, so we saw thegerman one, which looked like
really not run down, but it wasjust really like a classical old
(16:41):
cemetery.
This place is immaculate likethe grounds are the greenest
grass you've ever seen.
It's on the cliffs overlookingthe beach.
There's thousands uponthousands of marble crosses.
Or for the jewish who wereburied there, they had um the
star david instead of the crossreflection pools, giant statues
(17:01):
like manicured hedges, it'sbreathtaking.
So we're pulling up there and itwas like every stop he'd give
us some more history and thenlet us go free roam for like a
half hour or whatever.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Oh, okay.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Cool.
And then we get back on the bus.
So we're pulling up here and hegoes, okay, so we're going to
do an hour here.
So you know everyone, we'regoing to go in this entrance
over here you can walk aroundthe cemetery.
I'm like, oh cool, we'll beable to go find john's plot, you
know.
Oh yeah, yeah.
And he goes.
Uh, nobody on the bus hasfamily buried here right.
I raise my hand and go oh, I do, he goes.
You need to go to that buildingover there okay, like
(17:34):
information or like it is a likestone building with
floor-to-ceiling glass windows.
That looks insane.
Okay, and I kind of hesitatedat first.
I was like, oh, you know, we'll, we'll just like walk around
and find it like I don't youneed to go to that building over
there, you got orbs behind younow, boo-boo, okay um, so what's
(17:55):
happening?
We walk in through a securitycheckpoint.
Okay, like the hottestfrenchman I've ever seen, too at
this security checkpoint Ouioui, so then it is like this
place is ornate.
Okay, so they are like, sir, ifyou would step up to the desk,
(18:16):
we'll get some information fromyou, and it's like these people
are dressed like very fancy.
Oh, okay, and Were you nervous?
I was, and here's the thing Ionly found out about my family
member being buried there a fewweeks before it went.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
I just mean like, because it's so like upscale, it
was very official, yeah, andyou're just like what the heck's
happening and I like notimposter syndrome, but I was
almost like there's a lot ofpeople who come here for like
really.
Speaker 2 (18:40):
You know, the grandpa died here.
Yeah, yeah, or this or that,and Julia came with me.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
I don't think it's imposter syndrome, though,
because you're taking a tourabout the history as it is and
then you happen to like have afamily member that's buried
there.
I don't I get where you'recoming from, though.
Yeah, that would be.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
So we walk up to the desk and there's a really nice
lady there said yeah, she goes,what's his name?
So I pull out that picture andshow him yeah, or show her that
and she looks at, she startstyping and I'm holding my phone,
again she goes.
Can I see that again?
Like, yeah, sure she looks atshe goes, oh, okay, okay, this
comes back up way later, totallyunrelated to the rest of the
(19:17):
story I'm telling you, but sheturned like really white for
just a minute and that's goingto be the light thing that we
ended on.
So bookmark this because it'sgonna get heavy in the middle.
Oh my god.
So she goes.
Okay, I'm gonna go get someinformation, I'll be right back
and she's gone for like fiveminutes.
She comes back with this wholefolder, um, and she goes.
So you know who was this person?
To you I said he was mygrandma's cousin and she goes.
(19:39):
Do you know how he died?
And on this card it has hisdate of death listed as December
25th 1944.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
December 25th.
Speaker 2 (19:46):
Mm-hmm.
So I was like, well, judging bythe dates, I would imagine it
was probably the Battle of theBulge, which started
mid-December and went tomid-January, and it was like the
Battle of the Bulge was kind ofafter Europe was starting to be
liberated, the German forceswere being pushed back.
The Germans do this campaignback into europe.
It was like their last ditcheffort, you know, and she comes
(20:09):
back.
Actually, she asked me thatbefore she went and she comes
back and she goes.
So I don't think that yourfamily member died in the battle
of the bulge.
Um, she goes, but he likely diedat sea and it was probably
pretty horrific oh sheintroduces herself to uh, oh,
first I go up to the desk rightto, and I'm like, oh, bonjour.
(20:29):
She says bonjour back.
I looked at him like, do youspeak english?
She goes this is the americancemetery.
Yes, so she introduces herself,she goes my name is matilda.
Like matilda, but without the amatilda she was wonderful and,
like everyone, was just very.
They talked slowly, peacefully,very friendly because they know
it's.
You know, people are coming toyou.
It's a hard place to be so, um,she says okay, so if you're
(20:53):
comfortable with it, what wewould like to do is do a
ceremony for your loved one.
Oh, I was like.
Oh, now I I'm like.
Now you feel very imposter.
Oh, yeah, I'm like I, I don'tknow.
Like I was like we have a tour,I don't.
Is it something that takes toolong?
Like I didn't even know himthat well, she goes this is
something you don't want to miss.
Oh, julia was like I think I'mgoing to hang back.
(21:15):
I looked at him like you knewhim as well as I did.
You're walking with her andshe's kind of explaining how
everyone set up.
So their stones do have namescarved into them, but it's hard
to see and everyone's buriedvery randomly because it's
(21:37):
supposed to be like nobody isdifferent than the other.
Okay, once they've given theirlife okay and she says you know,
you know, there's 9,500 peoplehere.
There's also about 1,100 peopleon the wall of the missing
Mm-mm, Like either they havesome of their remains and
haven't been able to identifythem, or their remains haven't
been found.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
The wall of the missing.
That's so sad.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
We're walking and she goes, so we're getting sort of
close to where John's buried.
She goes, and so in his likesquare area because it's kind of
set up in like squares Okay,are the Nyland brothers, who are
the brothers that the movieSaving Private Ryan was loosely
based on Probably two of themost famous graves there, about
(22:23):
five rows up from him, and oneof four females.
So she, this part was alsoroped off, okay, because, like
she said something like thegrass wasn't holding, so people
think that they can't go inthere.
You can.
So she steps on the rope wecross over.
She's showing us like how theykind of hid the markers and how
to find the graves.
So we walk up there and thewhole time, by the way, she's
(22:43):
carrying a bucket, okay, so I'dlike to explain to you.
You know, here's it, here's hisstone, and says john mcgowan,
private, uh, john mcgowan, 66thinfantry.
And she goes.
I'm gonna explain the ceremonyand then I'd, you know, like to
have you do it and she goes.
So what we do is we go and getsand from omaha beach okay,
which is the beach.
You know where d-day happened.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
She said this is where the americans yep and that
so you can see down onto thebeach.
Speaker 2 (23:10):
And this is what we do, is you take the sand and you
rub it on the stone so it fillsin all the carved names, so it
becomes very visible, until thisrain comes and washes the sand
back down to the beach.
So for some time you'recommemorating him, you're
bringing visibility to the stone.
And then she said she has twoflags an american flag and a
(23:30):
french flag.
You put the american flag onthe left side of it.
That points towards the beachto show how the Americans came
from there to help win the war,and then the French flag to the
right side to show like, hey, itpoints to the French where we
came together to fight this off.
So we do that, we wipe the sandon there, put the flags out and
she's like you know, I'll kindof give you a minute and me and
(23:50):
Julia are standing there.
I don't know if I need thewhole minute, you know like
thank you, but this is reallycool.
And she, she starts to kind ofput together at that point that
it's not like a very closeperson to us, you know so.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
I don't want to interrupt you, but I don't know
what the fuck is going on,because there are orbs being
everywhere.
I keep seeing by you, I keepseeing behind me.
I don't know who be here.
What are you doing right now?
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I'm just going to keep telling you the story.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Okay, why are they here?
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Julia has pictures and videos of all this, by the
way, and it was like it wasreally emotional, just not even
one.
It was bringing attention to aname who you know he likely
hasn't been directly visited.
I was just going gonna say thatyou could have been the first
person I very well could have,and just being in this place,
you're seeing just how much lossof life there was, you know,
(24:41):
and this is only 9400 peoplelike there are so many more, and
so she goes.
You know, uh, do you have somemore time?
I'd like to show you something.
We look and really, yeah, sowe're she goes, okay, so follow
me.
And we're like, yeah, so shegoes, okay, so follow me.
And we're walking with her andI looked at her and I'm like you
have to have one of the coolestjobs in the world.
And so she starts telling usabout she gets to do this three
or four times a day and that oneof the best parts of her job is
(25:06):
helping to identify the bodieson the wall of the missing.
So they do like years and yearsof research on them to make
sure they have a 99 match.
Then they go and they exhumethe body, test that body and are
able to rebury them and givethem a stone.
I just literally busted open myshirt, apparently, so, yeah,
(25:29):
she just leaned back.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
I'm like because I'm like, my eyes are water, I'm
crying, there's orbs fuckingeverywhere and I guess I had to
flash.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yeah, so, anyways, we're telling her about us,
she's telling her about, or youknow, we're, yeah, learning
about each other and matilda'sgreat um and we're walking over.
So she goes, this is the wallof the missing.
She goes.
I want to point something out,and this is where the 1100 names
are of the people they're stilltrying to identify.
Right, she goes because theyhave their remains okay, some
(25:56):
they do, some they don't andthey're either trying to find
them or identify the remains andshe said look around this wall
for a minute and just youknow, tell me what you see.
Oh no, I said there's a lot ofthem are the 66th battalion,
which is what john was a part of, and she said it's very rare.
And not only that he was buriedaround such good company, she
(26:17):
said, but that your familymember was from this division,
the 66th infantry, and has astone.
So I looked at her and I said,okay, do you know what happened?
Like you said?
I know you said it's prettyhorrific, and it sounded like
she didn't want to talk about itin that office.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
And so she goes again .
She said it was, it was prettyawful, and all she really said
was is that he was on a ship andthat ship got hit by a torpedo
from a German U-boat.
It was after the war waswinding down, on Christmas, and
in this event, most of the 66thInfantry was lost, and because
of the way they were lost, mostof their remains were never
found, and that's when she.
(27:06):
you know we're looking at thewall of the missing and you see,
just over a third of them areall from this one incident.
So it was 493 of the 1,100names.
Wow, and you know these peopleare now kind of.
The families are thinking theirkids are coming home soon and
they get notified right aroundChristmas.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
that Stop it.
Speaker 2 (27:20):
I have goosebumps Boat mishap.
You know me, I'm like I have toknow about this, so I start
researching it.
Oh, she did also say that thename of the ship was the
Leopoldville.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Leopoldville OK.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Yes, I start researching on the way home and
everything else.
So here's the story.
The 66th Infantry Division wasa unit of the US Army and they
arrived in Dorchester, england,on November 26, 1944, with some
of the rest of the divisioncoming in December 12th.
So between the end of November,beginning of December, the
division coming in december 12th, so between the end of november
(27:55):
, beginning of december, theytrained, they prepared for
deployment and on december 24ththey were supposed to be
transferred from southampton,england, across the english
channel to cherbourg, franceokay uh, there are two transport
vessels that they were loadedonto, one the ss cheshire, and
the other one was a belgian shipcalled the leopoldville.
Okay, so their primary objectivewas to destroy the remaining
(28:18):
german troops left over in portcities in western france, as the
german troops are retreating.
So it was like the cleanup crewsort of yeah so the 66th
infantry was split into one ofthose two boats and John McGowan
, my grandmother's cousin, andabout 2,200 others were led onto
(28:38):
the Leopoldville History on theship.
The SS Leopoldville was apassenger liner originally that
carried people between Belgiumand the Congo, because the Congo
at that point was a colony ofBelgium Okay, Basically slaves.
Let's be for real.
The ship was 478 feet long.
(28:58):
It was built in 1929.
And during the war in May of1940, she was converted to be a
troop ship after the Germansinvade Belgium and they become
involved in the war.
So it makes tons of treksduring the war back and forth.
It's not really meant for thecolder parts of the ocean
because it was going to africa.
Um, she took some damage eachtime and all in all she did
(29:21):
transport 124 220 troops oh, wowand was at normandy on d-day.
Wow, yeah, very, very seen it,yeah.
So, going back then to Infantry, basically, they would have
been on the ship heading towardsthe Battle of the Bulge and
then becoming the cleanup crew.
(29:42):
So there were reinforcementslate in the war and the 66th
Infantry, when those who made itto the land were really
successful and actually had veryfew casualties other than
getting into the war.
So they were harassing Germaninstallations, conducting
limited objective attacks andthen running recon missions and
(30:04):
gathering intelligence.
But the Leopoldville right.
So what kind of happened here?
So it's going from Southampton,england, to Cherbourg, france,
like we said, on christmas eve.
Troops are loaded really hastilyinto the ship.
The crew, though, is mostlybelgian or belgian congo, and
they only speak flemish.
(30:25):
Okay, I was captained by, uh,captain charles limbaugh, who
spoke no english.
There was a safety meeting thatwas rushed, um, and there were
not enough life jackets on board, nor lifeboats.
Okay, and the reason they kindof rushed the safety yeah, the
safety of how to get intolifeboats and everything is
(30:47):
because all these troops werereally pissed off about getting
loaded into a ship on 9 am onchristmas eve.
So it begins to make its wayacross the english channel.
They're in a diamond formationwith four other ships, so there
are three other ships making adiamond of four.
Okay, two destroyers the hmsbrilliant and hms anthony.
These are english ships, okay,um.
(31:09):
And then there was a, um,british frigate, which is just
like a supply ship.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Okay, okay.
Where are we in this formation?
Do you know?
Speaker 2 (31:19):
That I don't know Okay.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
I'm just trying to get a visual, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
So they're making their way across, and about five
miles from the coast ofCherbourg, so they've already
made it across the channel.
They're very close to wherethey're going.
At 5.56 pm, German U-boatnumber 486 sees the incoming
formation, fires two torpedoesand one strikes the starboard
side of the Leopoldville,resulting in an explosion in the
(31:46):
number four hold thatimmediately kills about 300 men.
Oh so the crew spring intoaction and they start giving
orders on abandoning the shipokay however, remember, the crew
doesn't speak english and theorders are only given in flemish
.
Oh, the troops do see the crewleave, but it wasn't sinking
(32:08):
very quickly, so, notunderstanding what was happening
, being so close to the shore,they thought that the crew was
going to go get a um tugboat totow them into shore.
Only a handful of the troopsactually get off with the
lifeboats.
Most of the rest of theformation they've been traveling
with, they take off to try tochase down the u-boat.
(32:30):
Oh, my god.
So this is when the troops onboard start to realize that
things are not going very welland that the ship is sinking and
it's sinking quickly yeahthe waters are also very rough
in this part of the channel.
The hms brilliant, the britishship, though, does kind of
(32:50):
realize what's happening, andthey stay behind to help, so
they pull up alongside thesinking ship.
It gets really bad from here.
So I found a write-up from agentleman named jack dixon.
He was a 21 year old seaman.
He was on board the hmsbrilliant um and he was one of
the crew members that battledagainst the condition to try to
rescue as many of the soldiersas possible, and here's what's
(33:14):
on his website the hms brilliantwent alongside the port side of
the troop ship um.
We had our starboard fendersover the side.
The sea cell swell was causinga rise and fall of 8 to 12 feet.
The scrambling nets werehanging down the leopold's port
side and US soldiers were comingdown onto our upper deck.
As the seas got rough, some ofthe men had to jump down from a
(33:38):
height.
The waters that evening wererough and cold, and the
Leopoldville sat much higher inthe water than the Brilliant.
As the swells came up, whatwould be a 6 to 20 feet jump
quickly became a 40 foot jump.
Unfortunately, limbs were beingbroken when they landed on the
torpedo tubes and other fixedequipment on the starboard side
(33:59):
of the upper deck.
Most who landed in the waterwere unfortunately crushed
between the hulls of the twoships as they crashed into each
other.
To avoid any further injuries,if possible all of our hammocks
were brought up from the messdecks below and laid on the
starboard side upper deck tocushion the fall of the soldiers
.
As they landed, the hmsbrilliant and the uh
(34:24):
leopoldville were sending outdistress signals, but the rest
of the escort had gone too farto see that as they were chasing
down the u-boat, oh my god ittook nearly an hour for the
shore to realize theleopoldville was sinking.
There were several hundredallied ship vessels in the
harbor at cherbourg that couldhave come to save them oh my god
(34:46):
had it not been the evening ofchristmas eve.
They all had cold engines andthey were all celebrating off
the ship.
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Oh, my God.
Speaker 2 (34:56):
Not only were the engines cold, but the torpedo
took out communications on theLeopoldville.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
So the English ship was on a different frequency
than the American ships theywere trying to reach.
Speaker 2 (35:11):
Oh my God the Brilliant had to contact
Portsmouth, which telephonedCherbourg, and then they tried
to get ships to come to therescue.
So it was super, super delayed.
Speaker 1 (35:20):
This is so awful.
Speaker 2 (35:22):
I know.
So approximately two and a halfhours after being hit, the
Leopoldville completely goesunderwater.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
Oh goodness dark it's , it's, I was Also.
Speaker 2 (35:37):
I still don't know what's going on behind me with
you know, this is.
It's not somebody I knew, butit's a family member.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Well, that's why I feel like.
I feel yeah like, because it'syour family.
Speaker 2 (35:47):
It's like it's just, and you know of how horrible
world war ii is and I don't knowwhy it took it putting into
perspective of a bloodline toreally drive that home.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (35:59):
So of the 2,200 servicemen on board, 763 passed
away on Christmas.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Eve.
Speaker 2 (36:06):
Oh my god 505 on board either to the explosion,
who went down, 248 from injuries, hypothermia or drowning, and
the 493 names on the wall of themissing are from those who are
never recovered from the 48degree water oh my god, I am
like crying yeah, captaincharles limbaugh and three of
(36:31):
the congolese crew members do godown with the ship and actually
there's some rumors thatCharles Limbaugh was trying to.
He passed maybe helping try topull some of the bodies out of
the water.
Ugh, so the cemetery is part ofthe American Battle Monuments
Commission and they have this ontheir website.
So on Christmas Eve 1944, adisaster happened in the Channel
(36:54):
C, not far from Cherbourg.
More than 2,000 Americanservice members from the 262nd
and 264th Regiments, 66thInfantry Division, were aboard
the troop ship SS Leopoldvillewhen it was torpedoed by a
German U-boat and sank in thecold waters.
Approximately 800 servicemembers were killed that day and
(37:16):
500 were never recovered.
They are remembered at thenormandy american cemeteries
tablets of the missing.
The cemetery only contains 77gravestones of members from the
66th okay, that's what I wasgonna ask you, because she was.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
it's rare for your uncle, or what is he Cause?
A grandma's cousin?
Speaker 2 (37:36):
I know it's my mom's second cousin.
I think it would be my secondonce removed, if I'm correct.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Well, your relative.
She said it was rare that yourrelative was like buried or
whatever.
Is that just because everybodyelse was like?
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Because very few bodies were able to be
identified or found yeah, okaywhich is actually my next line
about matilda telling us it wasrare.
Um, now we know this story today.
However, at the time thisoccurred, the english and
british government go straightinto secrecy.
Oh so authorities classifiedthe incident as confidential to
(38:12):
protect troop morale.
During the Battle of the Bulge,families were only told that
their loved ones died in action.
The reasons for the secrecy?
One is the morale.
It was a critical turning pointduring the war.
High US casualties were alreadythere and coming from basically
negligent and logistic failureswould not have been a good look
(38:32):
Right.
Negligent and logistic failureswould not have been a good look
right.
Um, they thought because therewas miscommunication between
british and american forces thatit might damage relations.
And it was military failures.
There was an untrained crewwith not enough lifeboats for
the troops they put on there andfailed rescue efforts.
So basically, christmas tailend of the war, families
(38:55):
expecting their loved ones tocome home just get absolutely
devastating news.
It was not until 1996 that thiswas declassified oh shit um, so
thankfully, then, some bookshave come out and a lot of
memorials have been put up forthe legalopoldville 96.
Yeah, it is one of the worstmaritime disasters involving us
(39:18):
troops of any time ever oh mygod it took over 70 years before
most families learned the fullstory of what happened to their
loved ones that is fucked up sothis would mean that my mother's
great aunt Lily and great uncleWilliam likely never knew the
fate of their son.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
What yeah?
Speaker 2 (39:38):
So honestly like learning about that First of all
.
It's it's just so weird.
The pieces fit together.
I booked this randomly.
It happened to end at thatplace.
Mom happened to find this cardon Ancestry.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
How weird.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
The other thing that's strange to me is why have
I always been drawn toshipwrecks?
So it was just.
It seemed like one of thosethings where everything really
came together and it was such acool honor and retrospect to be
able to share his story.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:04):
You know, especially since his parents never knew no,
and to learn about it and to beable to do the ceremony to
honor him.
It's like the least I could doto I can't be crying this whole
time I did talk to mom beforedeciding to write this yeah
(40:25):
because you know, grandma, mygrandma would have grown up with
john yeah my mom was at.
She remembers going to lily andyou know aunt lily and uncle
william's house like it's notlike this.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Is that far removed?
Speaker 2 (40:41):
no, oh.
So we talked about this and shesaid you know, it doesn't feel.
She said everything happens fora reason, it doesn't feel like
it was just by chance no and soit was like and the tour guide
too earlier I was like, hey, I'mjust gonna walk around.
Had I done that, I would havenever learned the story like
he's like no, you have to go tothat yes, make sure you go to
(41:02):
that building it was just thatwas like fate, or john, like
something, had a hand in wantingthe story to be told.
I have goosebumps so I did wantto do it.
I wanted to do it with respect,um, but I also think you know
it's.
It's an interesting failure ofof some of the like the terrible
parts of war that weren't indirect.
So with that, do you want tolearn a little bit more about
(41:25):
john?
Because we found some stuff atthe cemetery in the packet they
gave us.
Mom had some stuff online chat.
Gpt was actually able to pullsome stuff I'm gonna fucking cry
.
I don't think I could take it Iknow it honestly, I I feel you
so from what we could puttogether.
So he was two years older thanmy grandma and, like I said,
(41:47):
they would have grown uptogether.
He was born in Romulus,michigan, on September 28th 1926
to William and Lily.
So how old?
18.
Which I mean most of the boysfrom World War II were between
16 to 18.
So many of them lied abouttheir age to enlist that they
were even younger.
Speaker 1 (42:07):
Oh, my god 18.
Speaker 2 (42:09):
So his father, so William was from Scotland, lily
was from Canada.
Originally.
Father was an auto factoryworker and a crane operator, his
mom was a homemaker, and Johnwas their only child.
Oh my god, he grew up inRedford, though.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Stop breaking my heart.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Grew up in Redford, outside of Detroit.
He did graduate, high schooland now this is one of the cool
things is and Mathilde showed usthis on his stone with his
number is he wasn't drafted forthe war.
He actually chose to enlist.
That's even sadder, but it'samazing that he decided to make
(42:47):
the sacrifice for his countrybecause so many people world war
ii, so many were drafted youknow, so by his number.
We do know that he enlisted outof the army on may 9th 1944, so
already into the war, and the usentered world war ii.
The d-day invasion happened onjune 6th, so he knew we were
(43:07):
entering the war.
He enlisted from michigan andwould have been stationed at
fort sheridan in illinois wherehe held the rank of private.
And then we do know his deathdate is december 25th 1944.
Because of his service and hissacrifice, uh, private m Private
McGowan was posthumouslyawarded several commendations,
including a Purple Heart, aWorld War II Victory Medal,
(43:29):
combat Infantryman Badge,american Campaign Medal and an
Army Presidential Unit Citation.
So he's now, like I said, he'sinterred at the Normandy
American Cemetery in Colville,surmer, france, specifically
(43:52):
plot F, row 19, grave number 12.
That's the story about myfamily member.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
John McGowan.
Wow, I'm like really so um,that's so sad I hate.
You Did his family, though, gethis purple heart and all his
medals and awards.
So this is what his family wedon't know that's so sad.
Speaker 2 (44:12):
So william, on that temporary card that I have,
william was listed as the nextof kin, so he likely had it.
But in that packet they gave usall this information on where
we can go to look up moreinformation.
So we're gonna do that.
And matilda said if you findanything, share it with us yeah,
and we'll add him to the tours.
Oh so, if you give thebackground information, so his
(44:34):
legacy can live on a bit, sowe're gonna do that yep oh my
god, I can't stop yeah.
So when she kept just saying itwas pretty horrific and given a
little bit of the details, thecrazy thing was too.
This is how well these peopleat the cemetery knew.
She didn't look any of this up.
She knew, and probably becausethere's 500 people on that wall.
So I told you I would end it alittle bit lighter.
(44:58):
I know I see your eyes.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
When I first handed her my phone, I told you she
looked at it, handed it back,looked at it again and it just
had a very just strange look onher face okay, so explain to me
matilda, how old do you thinkshe is?
So matilda is probably aboutour age.
She has red hair.
Speaker 2 (45:21):
She's very sweet okay she was very reserved until she
kind of realized that weweren't, it wasn't going to be a
very emotional thing for us,okay.
And then she started telling usso this is her summer job.
Then she, uh, she teachesschool.
Uh, she's like a um tutor,basically not a tutor but uh
like private teacher forone-on-one students, okay, and
(45:42):
she's like I have the best jobin the world.
You know that.
She was telling us about how shedoes three or four of these
tours a day in the off seasonyou know, she gets to help with
the identifying of the bodiesand she's been there when, like,
the secret service and thepresident's come through, like
she's just so proud of what shedid and it was cool because we
got her talking.
Of course, you know me, we'rewalking how did she get?
Speaker 1 (46:02):
how do you get that job?
Speaker 2 (46:03):
I don't know we're walking, though I have to ask
her.
I'm like okay, so does anythingstrange happen here?
She looks at me, she goes.
I don't know.
I've been told we have prettyquiet neighbors around us.
But uh, she said, you knowthere's, there's some whispers.
So anyways, on the bottom ofthat temporary card it says next
(46:23):
of kin William McGowan.
At the top it says John McGowan, but if you look at it really
quickly it's plot number andthen the name.
It looks like it's WilliamMcGowan.
So when we're standing at thewall of the missing, she goes.
So I have to apologize for myreaction at first, gotcha, I
started to get very excited.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Oh, she thought she solved it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
She's pointing out.
So on that wall at the end oftheir name, if they have this
medallion, okay, those are thepeople who are originally on the
wall, whose remains have beenidentified.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (46:54):
And the remains of a William McGowan had been
identified two weeks prior andshe thought that we were coming.
She was like I thought at first.
When I looked at that I sawwilliam mcgowan stick out to me
and she goes.
We like we just identified andyou just show up oh, that's so
sweet right.
So she, she was like reallyexcited about that for a minute.
Then she, like julia, had askedsomething along the lines of
(47:17):
like you know, how, how do thesebodies just kind of you know,
she was well, sometimes they'reburied there already and it's
they.
They're in like the unknownpart of the cemetery, without
stones and because of all thefamily, dna stuff and everything
else going on, they'll researchit for years.
She says, until we know for 99.
(47:38):
Sure we, we can't do anything.
When we're at 99 they'll exhumethe bodies and test.
Or sometimes bodies are stillfound.
Because, you know, sometimespeople in france during covid
decide to renovate their gardenand dig up an entire plane with
a body still in it.
Jesus, yeah, I mean, it's justwild, it was.
(48:01):
That was the whole thing to me.
It's's one thing to learn aboutWorld War Two and you know it
happened in France and all over,you know and it's another thing
to just stand there in theplaces where it happened and it
was just mind blowing.
Speaker 1 (48:13):
Oh my God.
Ok so, zachary.
Why do we have orbs and weirdthings all around us right now?
Speaker 2 (48:21):
That I'm not sure of.
Like I said, I felt like it wasa little bit faded to tell the
story.
The way all things cametogether I don't know if
somebody guided my hand at allin it I'm not going to claim
that but it has been a verystrange feeling while writing
this and I'm going to leave itat that.
Speaker 1 (48:38):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Anyways, that's the story of the insane experience
that I was not expecting to getfrom the Normandy tour and the
story of the SS Leopoldville andmy family member, john McGowan.
So I hope I did his storyjustice and I hope that other
people can either learnsomething from it or remember
his name, because I think now onChristmas it's definitely
(49:01):
something I'm going to have todo a little ritual for and he's
going to go up on my familymember altar as well.
Stop crying, tara.
Speaker 1 (49:10):
I am literally like blubbering, like a baby.
Speaker 2 (49:13):
Oh my god, I can't it's just incredible, isn't it
like?
Speaker 1 (49:18):
and it's just so sad, but also it's so weird.
Speaker 2 (49:22):
I know weird, but like just how it all happened,
like how it all happened andlike, for some reason I've
always been drawn to stories ofshipwrecks, shipwrecks, you know
.
Maybe there there's some, someancestral part of that there,
but uh yeah that is very cool,that's really cool it was
definitely and not selfishly forme.
(49:42):
It was just an amazingexperience to be able to do that
for him.
So that's why I talked to momand I said hey, you know, I want
to write an episode about it,not to make a big deal about the
story, or anything but just toshow.
Speaker 1 (49:52):
But that is how devastating it was and how.
The cover-up and everythingelse like well, just the events
that led you there is just likehow do you not tell that story?
Yeah, like how?
Speaker 2 (50:03):
since then, too, I've been on such a world war ii
kick.
I'm like listening to podcastsand youtubes and everything, and
it's just I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (50:09):
It just really makes me sick.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
I just I, I think it's important to remember,
though, because history isdoomed to repeat itself, and
it's, I think, we now we're so.
There's so many less survivorsfrom world war ii and veterans
that it's easy to forget howhard people fought for the
freedoms we had.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
Yeah, you're right, and how?
Speaker 2 (50:27):
quickly.
People have come to power andwere able to change the world
not for the good, so you'reimportant to remember those
things.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
And with that now we have influencers.
Speaker 2 (50:39):
There we go, right, okay, so something good that
happened to you this week,because we need to lighten this
up.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
I don't have anything good.
This was so sad I'm.
I'm like I'm very, very, verycurious as to who the fuck is
here right now, Because I don'tknow if you were seeing every
orb that was around me, and thenthere was a ton behind you, but
that never happens whenrecording.
Speaker 2 (51:07):
It's happened a handful of times that we've been
shocked by it before, that it'snot like something we haven't
noticed, but not as much as whatwas just fucking happening
while we were just recording.
Speaker 1 (51:16):
Now, that was so weird.
I've never and normally I seethem behind you, I don't ever
see them by by me and I justkept seeing weird light flashes
and then a ton of like weirdlittle orbs around me I think
that's the part of when you'retalking about the ancestry.
It's so powerful, how, howthose it is, but now I'm
freaking out members and guidescome through why are they here?
Speaker 2 (51:37):
I just have to wrap it up and have a little
conversation with them.
Maybe.
Speaker 1 (51:40):
Maybe you have a story you need to tell I was
just thinking like did I havesomebody on that ship?
How fucking weird would that be?
Speaker 2 (51:47):
that would be very strange, dude.
Speaker 1 (51:50):
We'll have to do some digging oh my god, all right, I
cannot stop crying um.
So the emoji for this episode,I know I don't want to do that,
I think a gravestone and aflower, not to be morbid, but a
gravestone is just nice, okay.
Speaker 2 (52:06):
Or an American flag and a French flag.
Oh my God, there we go.
It's a mess.
I know Kara's trying to pull ittogether.
Speaker 1 (52:15):
You could just put cry tears.
Speaker 2 (52:17):
Here's the ask for this week, and we could always
do a special episode about this.
But if you have a family memberthat you'd want to honor with
their story, oh my god, we wouldlove to have you write it in.
And you know, it's that wholething of you die twice right,
when you, when you pass and whenpeople say your name for the
last time.
So if you have some ancestorsstories you want to share, send
(52:38):
them to us and we would love todo an episode honoring your
loved ones.
Speaker 1 (52:41):
Yeah, even if it's not like a war story.
No.
Speaker 2 (52:44):
Anything Like anything.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
Oh my God, Tell me about your grandma.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
We talk about so many things like this without being
connected to it and without someof the emotion and to the
ghosts.
You know, it's easy to forgetthe people that they were.
So when I give back to thepeople they were, kara is
bawling again.
So, we're're gonna close theshop up.
I'm so sorry I made you cry, um, we love you.
Oh, we do so much.
Hug your family hard and do you?
(53:10):
Do you want to say the magicwords, or do you need me to help
you out this time around?
Speaker 1 (53:13):
oh my god, the most important thing you could do for
us is to creep it.
Speaker 2 (53:17):
Really oddballs goodbye, bye, bye At the Ali
(53:40):
Shop, locked in the shadows Atthe Ali Shop, at home with the
oddballs At the Ali Shop.
The door's always open At theAli Shop.
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