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Historical True Crime
The Man in the Yellow Skirt
In 1934, Paul Ostin was a husband, a father, and a working man in Detroit. Then he was found dead-- posed beneath a tree, dressed in women's clothing. For a few weeks, the newspapers couldn't get enough of the story. The speculation was feverish, the headlines sensational. And then, nothing. The press went silent. The public moved on. Paul Ostin's name was lost to history. Until now.
The Last Witch of Kalamazoo
In 1929, the body of Etta Fairchild was found at the bottom of a backyard cistern in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Her skull had been shattered. Her body was wrapped in wire and weighted with a cement block. Her killers didn't deny what they'd done-- they insisted it was necessary. Because they believed Etta was a witch. This episode unearths a forgotten crime that feels centuries older than it is. A tale of paranoia, religious fear, and a mind coming undone. Of a woman marked by her differences-- and destroyed because of them. Because the witch trials never truly ended. They just changed form.
Only to Pray
In the spring of 1922, 25-year-old Gertrude Hanna stepped out into a rainstorm and vanished. Nearly a month later, her body was found in the basement of a vacant church parsonage-- bound, poisoned, and six months pregnant.
The case drew headlines across the country. But there were no arrests. No answers. And no justice.
This episode explores a story of mental illness, family secrecy, and a desperate silence surrounding reproductive rights in early 20th-century America.
Only to Pray
In 1935, the body of seven-year-old Richard Streicher Jr. was found beneath a footbridge in Ypsilanti, Michigan-- cleaned, staged, and partially frozen. His murder shocked the town, but within months, the case went cold. Nearly a century later, it remains unsolved. In this episode, we revisit the quiet snowfall of that March afternoon, the frantic search that followed, and the uneasy details that still don't quite add up.
Sharp Edges
In the fall of 1898, a wealthy former legislator in Battle Creek, Michigan, died quietly in his home. He was 80. His new wife was 28. And just weeks after their wedding, he was gone. At first, no one questioned it. Until a servant came forward with a story-- one so strange, so specific, it cracked the case wide open. But the question didn't end with one death. They spread-- through old family wills, upstairs visitors, and a string of illnesses no one could explain. This is the story of Mary Butterfield Sanderson. And the house on East Main Street where everything began.
Six Blocks Away
On a warm August evening in 1930, fifteen-year-old Alice Collier was sent to the corner store to buy a dozen eggs. She never came back. What followed was a city-wide search, a grieving mother's voice on the radio, and months of rumors that led nowhere-- until a rabbit hunter stumbled across Alice's body in a field nearly ten miles from home. This episode traces the disappearance, the brutal discovery, and the confession that cracked the case open, revealing not just one horrifying crime, but something far worse.
Michigan's Unknown First Serial Killer: Scott Mauselle
Michigan's first "official" serial killer is usually dated to the 1960s. But the records say otherwise. In 1916, a new husband, a picnic, and a bag left at a Grand Rapids grocery store unraveled a man of many names-- James Allen, James Curtis, John Allerton-- until only one remained: Henry Scott Mauselle. We trace the pattern that shadowed Masuelle for years: a dead son, two sisters in a staged scene, and countless women who answered his letters and disappeared.
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