Dead Battery - The Crossroads

Rameen knows Gettysburg — the battles, the history. But when he picks up a night shift on the ghost tour, everything goes haywire. A strange message crackles over the radio from an unknown frequency, filled with urgency and desperation that feel all too real.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:07Glynn Washington?

  Who could steal the sunrise and wipe away your grin? Make you wish that you could scrub away your darker skin? The shadow man. The shadow man can.

• 0:24Glynn Washington?

  The shadow man can, cause he cheats out everyone and makes the world not good.

• 0:36Glynn Washington?

  You've almost arrived at the crossroads. Stay tuned.

• 0:52Speaker 01

  Why have so many crop circles appeared around Britain? How did thousands of people demonstrate powers of telepathy? Can the dead suck the life from the living? Join me, Tim Harford, for a trip into the paranormal throughout Halloween month on Cautionary Tales. Listen to Cautionary Tales on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 1:54Glynn Washington?

  Clocksdale, Mississippi. 1921, little Bobby was just eight years old when he discovered that sometimes with the grown folk, if you're quiet, if you stay in a corner, if you look really close at the floor or the wall, even your own shoes, they will talk like you're not even there, invisible. And this evening, when his mama sinks her voice down low, that's when Bobby's hearing leans in. Mama tells Hattie, "Don't you go out there. Not for love, not for money, not for nothing.

• 2:33Glynn Washington?

  But baby,

• 2:35Glynn Washington?

  baby, if you do go,

• 2:38Glynn Washington?

  don't you be late. And don't touch nothing to give you. Let him do exactly what you want. Only thing he want is whatever you can't give.

• 2:49Glynn Washington?

  Bobby's still invisible, still as a secret. Don't you go there, Hattie. Don't do it.

• 2:57Glynn Washington?

  Hattie's face set, and that look you get when you ain't gonna cry no more, 'cause crying time is over. Hattie, you hear me?

• 3:05Glynn Washington?

  Bobby bumped the fork off the table and it tinkled on the floor.

• 3:10Glynn Washington?

  Mama's head snapped back.

• 3:13Glynn Washington?

  Invisible no more. Boy, care your black behind outside, stop sneaking around. Yes, him. Bobby walks real slow toward the door, still listening.

• 3:26Glynn Washington?

  Now, Hattie, gotta bring him something. Something nice, make him think it's the most important thing you got.

• 3:35Glynn Washington?

  Bobby never asked why Hattie didn't come around no more.

• 3:40Glynn Washington?

  For his fifteenth birthday, running back home from Mr. Cooper's field, there wasn't a cake, no wrapping paper.

• 3:49Glynn Washington?

  And just when the grin was leaving his face, he looked at his pallet on the floor. And right on top, still in the not-new Montgomery Ward box, lay a wooden six-string guitar. Same one that been sitting in the display case at the Jones General Store for over two years now. Shit. He turned toward his mother to see her smiling back at him. "Gonna be your ticket, Bobby, I know it." Every night he plucked and picked and strummed and slapped and knocked until one night, the G-string snapped.

• 4:28Glynn Washington?

  He tied it back together the best he could till it broke again. And again.

• 4:35Glynn Washington?

  Then he just started over. Learned to play with five strings. Then four.

• 4:43Glynn Washington?

  Three, fingers sliding up and down till three strings wailed like six. Figured once harvest time come, he could purchase more. Mama loved hearing him play. She'd stomp her feet, clap her hands. That's your ticket!

• 4:59Glynn Washington?

  When she took sick, he played for her.

• 5:04Glynn Washington?

  Sometimes pressing wet towels on her burning forehead, sometimes strumming a song she might like. First she snapped her fingers to his time, then she didn't.

• 5:17Glynn Washington?

  Two strings left. On the third night, Bobby made himself look at her. Full on. Shrunken, tiny. Shivering underneath every blanket they owned, eyes squeezed shut, mumbling to someone he couldn't see.

• 5:37Glynn Washington?

  And he couldn't figure another way.

• 5:41Glynn Washington?

  Bobby kissed her on the forehead, set his jaw like had he done all those years back.

• 5:48Glynn Washington?

  And took the only thing he owned, besides the clothes on his back.

• 5:53Glynn Washington?

  Guitar.

• 5:57Glynn Washington?

  Bought with long hours under the Mississippi sun. She said it was his ticket off the plantation because her dreams were always bigger than his.

• 6:07Glynn Washington?

  The dream time was over.

• 6:11Glynn Washington?

  He stepped out into the night and pressed the door closed behind. His walk turned into a run. Can't be late. The way looked different at night. Moon shadow swept the gravel road, past row after row of devil's weed. He ran and ran and finally came to the place where his road intersected with the other. There he stood. Right in the middle. The center like he'd heard her tell person after person to never do.

• 6:44Glynn Washington?

  Then he whispered the words she told person after person to never say.

• 6:51Glynn Washington?

  Starlight shone bright enough to read by, no one for miles down either stretch of the road. Then... Hello. Bobby spun round to see the Shadow Man, or Conturbo. Only thing kept him from screaming was his mission. "Yes, yes sir, yes sir. Said my mama's sick. Thought you might have some, some medicine for, for to make her better."

• 7:17Glynn Washington?

  Bobby kept his head down. "Don't look in his eyes, only take what you come for." "I, I brought you my, my guitar in trade. It's a fine guitar. I- i- it's, it's real fine, r- real fine." Bobby lifted the instrument out of the cardboard box he still carried it in, held it out to the man. "Just, just he's sprang it is all. Thought maybe you might have some, some medicine in trade."

• 7:47Glynn Washington?

  Bobby felt the instrument lifted from his hands, then the man, like he was testing the quality. Like he was weighing the terms, he beat on the guitar like a drum.

• 8:01Glynn Washington?

  Started tuning it to a scale that Bobby didn't know. Tapping and straying, stretching notes, high, low, low, high, high, low, wails, screeches, grinds. "I, I thought you might have some, some medicine." The man played wild, frenetic howling shrieks. Bobby's guitar calling angels and demons and sorrow and pain and mercy and lashes and cotton and chains and fire.

• 8:28Glynn Washington?

  Then the man stopped.

• 8:31Glynn Washington?

  He held the guitar out.

• 8:34Glynn Washington?

  Bobby snatched it back.

• 8:37Glynn Washington?

  It wasn't until he saw the man's eyes did the horror come.

• 8:43Glynn Washington?

  A million times she'd said it, "Don't touch nothing he give you. This is what you came for." The man smiled. No, sir, I come for medicine. The man turned away. I need medicine, for my mama.

• 9:00Glynn Washington?

  The road sat empty.

• 9:03Glynn Washington?

  Quiet except for the buzz of the crickets.

• 9:07Glynn Washington?

  The negros silent as well.

• 9:10Glynn Washington?

  He looked down and stumbled back, six gleaming red strings shone fire from the guitar.

• 9:18Glynn Washington?

  And even as he wanted to throw it down, he held it close. Back down the road, past the field, to the shack where he'd left her shivering just a few hours before, and terrified. He cracked open her door. Darkness. Stillness.

• 9:38Glynn Washington?

  Then...

• 9:40Speaker 02

  Boy?

• 9:42Glynn Washington?

  Mama!

• 9:43Speaker 02

  Boy! But what did you do?

• 9:48Glynn Washington?

  He saw her, both upright on the side of her bed, desperate, searching for his eyes. And horrified when she saw him clutching the guitar.

• 10:00Speaker 02

  He touched it, didn't he? He touched it!

• 10:04Glynn Washington?

  Bobby couldn't answer. Couldn't even look at her yet.

• 10:07Speaker 02

  Take it back, boy! Take it back! He just strung it from us all. He just give me the strings. He don't give nothing, baby! He takes!

• 10:20Glynn Washington?

  He saw her then. Cheeks flushed, eyes bright. Medicine.

• 10:28Glynn Washington?

  That's what he called a guitar now. Medicine.

• 10:33Glynn Washington?

  He knew the price. She did too.

• 10:37Speaker 02

  Smash it, baby! It's gonna kill ya! Smash it!

• 10:43Glynn Washington?

  But Bobby couldn't do that.

• 10:46Glynn Washington?

  Because that would kill her.

• 10:50Glynn Washington?

  Instead, there in the dark, it called to him and he reached for it.

• 10:55Glynn Washington?

  And he played. As she wept, his fingers sliding up and down the blood red strings. It growled, low and hungry like a living thing, breathing, laughing, spitting. Some of his life or hers, it tasted like a pretty good deal. "Please, please smash it, baby. It will kill you."

• 11:18Glynn Washington?

  Even as he felt the darkness like a drug, he felt too the thrill. The magic, the hurt, the growl, the wolf. "Don't worry, mama." Bobby smiled, fingers dancing down the glimmering strings. "Don't worry, cuz I ain't dead yet."

• 12:01Glynn Washington?

  'Tis the season. Today, the very first step of a spooked journey like no other. The crossroads. Be careful what you ask for, because the crossroads start now.

• 12:49Glynn Washington?

  This episode is sponsored by Vinted. Imagine, opening my closet, looking for a shirt, and I see that jacket. That jacket, that jacket I got for that party I never went to three years ago. That jacket, it's still there, it's still mocking me. Well, it was still there. Because then I stopped and I reached for my phone because Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app where you can sell clothes that you no longer wear. Listing on Vinted is quick and simple. Once an item sells, Vinted creates the prepaid shipping label for you. And Vinted has no seller fees, meaning you keep every dollar you earn.

• 13:32Glynn Washington?

  And I could get a little more room in my closet, you know, for that next jacket. Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free and start listing. No seller fees, so you keep everything you earn.

• 14:21Glynn Washington?

  A story today comes from Ramin. He's an apprentice violin maker in a tiny Pennsylvania town.

• 14:29Glynn Washington?

  Now, Ramin is working for free, so he starts looking for a night gig, something to keep the lights on. And one day, as he wanders around the nearby town of Gettysburg, he spots a sidewalk sign reading "Tour Guides Wanted." Normal enough, but when he takes a closer look at the sign, he learns the company is actually looking for someone to lead ghost tours.

• 14:52Glynn Washington?

  Now, Ramin, he's not really into that kind of stuff, you know, the spirits, the hauntings, everything. But a job is a job, right? So he signs up to be a Gettysburg ghost tour guide.

• 15:07Glynn Washington?

  Spooked.

• 16:00Speaker 03

  My first tour ever, I introduced myself as Ramin. And some snarky little eight-year-old boy looked at me and said, "Ramin? That's not a Civil War name." And everyone laughed, and I was a little bit embarrassed. On the one hand, I knew that he was right. And on the other hand, I felt kinda bad, actually. It was like, I can't be myself and give an authentic experience. But if this eight-year-old is having his suspension of disbelief just because of my name, that's a problem. So, from there on out, I decided that I would conduct these tours under my alter ego of Charles.

• 16:51Speaker 03

  I'd bring my violin along, and I would play spooky songs as I was walking around town telling these ghost stories. I'm a terrible violin player, by the way. Like, really, cat strangling bad.

• 17:06Speaker 03

  Tonight, my name is Charles. I'm dressed as a soldier from the 10th Virginia Infantry, wearing gray wool clothing. My guests will be following my small candle that I have in my lantern. We'll go up the hill, past the National Cemetery, and we'll go up to the abandoned orphanage, where, after the war, children found only horrors at the hands of a terrible woman named Rosa Carmichael. She kept the children in the basement, in pits, in chains. Eventually, the townsfolk found out. She was run out of town, never to be heard from again.

• 17:47Speaker 03

  The guests, they are horrified. They're shaking their heads in sadness and disbelief. Some of them, who have children with them, reach down and squeeze their kids' shoulders to comfort them, maybe to reassure themselves a little bit. But it's a true story, and it's absolutely horrifying. But then, at the end of the story, in order to make it paranormal, then I'm saying, they say to this day, "Some of the children that met their end at this orphanage still haunt the grounds. They may tug on your dress. You may hear them pattering around across the street. And if you listen very carefully, you can still hear their chains jangling

• 18:31Speaker 03

  from the basement windows where they were kept under horrific conditions."

• 18:40Speaker 03

  And is this true? Like, no, I don't think it's true, but it ties the true history into the paranormal experience in such a way that I'm sort of covering my bases now.

• 18:57Speaker 03

  When I first found this opportunity to work as a tour guide, I was so excited to combine my interests in history and military history in particular, and to tell the guests the reality of life in the 1860s that, to me at least, are terrifying, even without a paranormal component. But these were not the stories that people expected. And then I kind of got a talking to from my boss, who very gently told me that, "I

• 19:35Speaker 03

  need you to spook things up a little bit here. Dumb down the history and amp up the paranormal." I, myself, am not a hardcore believer in the paranormal. I'm ambivalent, agnostic, but I recognize that this is the job. This is what people expect. And who am I to say whether a paranormal experience that someone else has is or isn't real?

• 20:03Speaker 03

  Now I incorporate some of the more terrifying paranormal stories that I've heard from other tour guides.

• 20:22Speaker 03

  Our next stop will be the old creek bed at Weinbrenner's Run. This creek used to meander its way all the way around the battlefield, and at the time of the battle, it was the site of terrible horrors.

• 20:36Speaker 03

  The Battle of Gettysburg occurred between the 1st of July and the 3rd of July 1863. And then on the 4th of July, there was a torrential downpour.

• 20:50Speaker 03

  All of the creeks were swelled up, there was flooding throughout, and in this particular little area of Weinbrenner's Run, the story goes that there was this wooden grate that had been placed there, right where the creek sort of meets the edge of the town, to catch tree limbs and other things that would naturally fall into the creek or be swept up if the creek got really full.

• 21:14Speaker 03

  Unfortunately, there had been established during the battle, a couple field hospitals on the banks of this creek. And so, when the medical staff were doing amputations, they were piling up these limbs, they were working as quickly as they could to try to save lives, and the carnage was just sort of laying on the side of the creek.

• 21:42Speaker 03

  In the aftermath of this rainstorm, hundreds of limbs and many dozens of bodies of men who had become wounded and had sought shelter in the creeks, get swept up in the engorged creek until they encounter this wooden grate.

• 22:04Speaker 03

  And you've got this dense mass of just horrible stuff that has blocked the flow of water going through the town.

• 22:20Speaker 03

  So at the end of the tour, this older gentleman comes up to me and he's got a beard and a hat and he has a walking stick with him. And he says, "Look, look, I've captured something here. You need to take a look at this."

• 22:38Speaker 03

  I'm looking at this picture and he says, "You can see between the spokes of the cannon's wheel, there's a boot." And sure enough, I'm looking at this picture and there's a knee height leather boot. And he says, "I think this might be the boot of a cavalryman."

• 22:59Speaker 03

  And I smile and nod and I say, "Wow, that's, that's really something. I've never seen anything like this before." And meanwhile, out of the side of my peripheral vision, I'm looking at the footwear of everyone that is along on this tour. And of course, there's a woman wearing riding boots. And of course, these are her shoes in the picture, but I'm not going to burst his bubble.

• 23:25Speaker 03

  I encourage him to email it to the company email address and we'll take a look and maybe we'll add it to our own archives. And that, that seems to quite satisfy him.

• 23:40Speaker 03

  It is a normal afternoon at the Ghost Tour Company. It's too early to be taking guests out, so I'm getting some hours in on desk duty, helping people with their reservations and advance bookings. And my coworker, who is one of the paranormal investigators, comes up to me and says, "Hey, we are short-staffed for a ghost hunt later this week. Do you want to do it?"

• 24:04Speaker 03

  And at this point, I have never done a ghost hunt for a few reasons. Number one, it's really not my bag. Number two, the hours are rough. I'm not going to be done until four o'clock in the morning. My coworker says, "Look, the money's really good." And it turns out that the pay for conducting these ghost hunts is like four times as much money as I'm going to make from giving tours that night.

• 24:29Speaker 03

  So I'm convinced. All right. I agree to go on my first ever ghost hunt.

• 24:38Speaker 03

  This evening, there are three of us from the tour company that are in charge of the ghost hunt and our guests, who number about 10, are gathered around in the gravel parking lot of this building. And it is a hulking old mansion.

• 24:57Speaker 03

  We're all decked out with vests and ball caps and flashlights and this, you know, tactical equipment looking like a bunch of mall cops, but conducting a ghost hunt. And the people on the hunt love it. They are so into it.

• 25:15Speaker 03

  This house is a prime location for a paid ghost hunt. My two co-hosts are doing a great job of setting the scene. They are being cryptic about things that have happened in the house. And it turns out, bad things did happen in this house. A young woman hanged herself in the attic of this house. The home was used as a field hospital during the Civil War with limbs piling up to the window sills that floorboards had to be replaced due to blood soaking them.

• 25:56Speaker 03

  We start distributing equipment and the first thing we have to do is conduct a demo to demonstrate to them how do they use the equipment. We have EMF detectors. That stands for electromagnetic frequency. It basically looks like a gun and you point it in the direction of where you think a spirit is. Now, my coworker, who's a very industrious young guy, he's making these devices. He's going to Radio Shack, he's getting bits and bobs, he's buying paintball guns and taking them apart to create this really tactical looking device.

• 26:39Speaker 03

  And then there's this other device we have called the Spirit Box. It's like a pocket radio. It's got an antenna and it doesn't have a microphone on it. It's got a very primitive LCD screen. And essentially what the Spirit Box does is that it cycles through radio frequencies and you hear snippets of words where it might say,

• 27:07Speaker 03

  but every so often it's going to pick up a word or it's going to pick up a snippet of sound and that if you are an imaginative person, you're going to hear what the Spirit Box is telling you and thus interact with a spirit.

• 27:24Speaker 03

  I believe that it is utter garbage.

• 27:28Speaker 03

  Frankly, I feel guilty. I feel like I'm participating in a scam. Not because I was worried about people finding ghosts, but because I was so certain that they were not going to and that I was selling them a false dream.

• 27:53Speaker 03

  My coworker, the same one who is making EMF detectors, is leading tonight's ghost hunting expedition.

• 28:03Speaker 03

  He is like a drill sergeant of fear. He is completely deadpan, saying that the energies that inhabit this space are very unsettled and that bad things have happened in various areas of the house and we want you to go in there and see what you can feel. And then at the end of the tour, you can tell us where you found evidence and where you felt energies.

• 28:33Speaker 03

  And I'm just sort of taking it all in at this point, thinking that these are fools who are paying for the privilege of terrifying themselves in a building with no electricity, no running water, and God forbid, one of them has to go to the bathroom in the next four hours.

• 29:23Speaker 03

  Once we make our way through telling people the ground rules, we basically cut them loose. And our job is not to helicopter over them so much, but to allow them to spend time within their groups and allow their group dynamic to play out however it's supposed to play out.

• 29:48Speaker 03

  So the groups are out investigating. And there's a group cycling in and out of the attic where this "death by hanging" took place. Myself and the other two guides, we meet up outside. We're smoking some cigarettes, we're chatting. And then every 15 minutes or so, we think, okay, it's time to go check on the groups, see how everybody's doing.

• 30:14Speaker 03

  So it's most of the way through the evening. It's, oh, probably 2:30, 3 o'clock in the morning at this point. And I'm doing my little walk through. I'm walking toward the parlor. This room has some windows and a radiator that is looking like it's got leprosy, just paint falling off of this thing. Then I get summoned by one of the groups. They say, "Hey, we're having trouble with our spirit box. It's telling us that the battery's dead." It's saying "battery dead" through the speaker.

• 30:51Speaker 03

  And this is unusual because there is a battery indicator on the box. And I can see that the battery's full. But if they're telling me that the battery's dead, very well, I have a pocket full of AA batteries. So I go ahead, I pop the back off the spirit box, put some new batteries in there. I can see still that the battery indicator says that it's full. And I hand it back to them and I turn to walk away.

• 31:23Speaker 03

  No sooner have I done so than they call me straight back and they say, "The batteries are dead again." And I just got this weird feeling. I know that these batteries are not dead. I know they're good. And sure enough, the, the radio scanner, which is really all that this device is, says, "Clear as day. Battery dead." The voice coming through the machine,

• 32:05Speaker 03

  it's a male voice, is clear, it's strong. It is not like the snippets of speech that sometimes we hear from this device as it's cycling through radio frequencies. There's an urgency to the words. I am still highly skeptical about the prospects of speaking to a spirit through a broken radio. But I have a role to play, which is to help these guests get their money's worth.

• 32:47Speaker 03

  And I don't know what has come over me exactly, but I get this feeling that I ought to see if the box is gonna tell us anything else. So without thinking, I said, "Is there someone there?" The box says in the same voice,

• 33:16Speaker 04

  "Yes."

• 33:20Speaker 03

  All of the people that I'm with, this group of three or four people, they're like giddy with excitement.

• 33:28Speaker 03

  The thought crosses my mind that maybe someone is listening and manipulating the local radio channels to try to fake this out. And I realize that it's not possible through a device that I know full well has no microphone on it.

• 33:50Speaker 03

  So I go ahead and ask a follow-up question. "Are you a soldier?"

• 33:57Speaker 03

  And the box says, "Yes."

• 34:05Speaker 03

  I am feeling like my entire insides are made of ice. This voice, it sounds like it's coming from far away. It is really freaky.

• 34:25Speaker 03

  And at this point, my guests, they are discussing amongst themselves very excitedly what types of follow-up questions they should ask. And one of them says, "Are you a Union soldier or a Confederate soldier?"

• 34:39Speaker 03

  And the box says, "Blue."

• 34:44Speaker 03

  This, of course, we interpreted to be a reference to the Union uniform, which is blue, as opposed to a Confederate uniform of gray.

• 34:57Speaker 03

  This carries on for a little while, and they're asking yes or no questions. "Are you cavalry?" "No." "Are you artillery?" And the box says, "Yes." Battery dead. Battery E, dead.

• 35:22Speaker 03

  Now, at this point, my stomach is down in my shoes. I have managed thus far to not allow myself to believe in the legitimacy of any of this technology. And here I am, I'm supposed to be the one that is playing it cool.

• 35:46Speaker 03

  I am so shaken.

• 35:50Speaker 03

  I cannot stay inside the house. I need to get out.

• 35:59Speaker 03

  I make my way out of the mansion as quickly as I can, and I'm back out into the gravel parking area where my coworkers are hanging around, waiting for things to wrap up. There's only a couple minutes left before our folks are gonna be coming outside, and I tell them what has just happened.

• 36:21Speaker 03

  One of them says, "Are you okay?" And I said, "Yeah, I don't know, I think so."

• 36:26Speaker 03

  They were pretty understanding about my being freaked out and not wanting to go back into the building. Neither of them are particularly shocked. This was something that they expected, almost.

• 36:41Speaker 03

  They said, "Yeah, well, that's what happens."

• 36:51Speaker 03

  My coworkers congratulate me on my first ghost hunt, "Job well done." And I decided that I was never coming back to that spot ever again.

• 37:07Speaker 03

  Later on that week, it's a sunny day, I'm walking the battlefield, I wasn't working that night. This day, I just felt compelled to go walking.

• 37:23Speaker 03

  And as I'm walking along the road near this house, I come across a memorial marker. It's a seven and a half foot tall granite monument with a cannon parked right in front of it. And I'm reading, "Rhode Island Light Artillery, three killed, 12 wounded.

• 37:44Speaker 03

  Battery E."

• 37:51Speaker 03

  I just stand there, speechless. So we're hearing "battery dead, battery dead." And we were thinking, "Oh, okay, time to go grab some more AA batteries." But a battery is also a term that would refer to a group of guns, horses, carriages full of ammunition, all the men that were part of the battery. And as I looked at this monument and read, "Three killed, 12 wounded," thinking to myself, "Is it possible that I actually encountered one of the men who fought in this unit?"

• 38:34Speaker 03

  It really, to me, brought the whole experience full circle.

• 38:43Speaker 03

  I'm upset. I feel as though we have disturbed a spirit. This is an entity, if you believe that, that is stuck in a moment of great distress and is trying to communicate a message of great urgency, that there has been death in their military unit. Battery E, dead.

• 39:22Speaker 03

  I continued working at the tour company on a part-time basis for the next, probably, year. My attitude toward tours definitely changed. I think my storytelling became a lot more somber. When I told people to pay attention to their surroundings, I really meant it.

• 39:50Speaker 03

  One of the things that I told my groups regularly was that the men who fought and died here were young men by and large. That they had more life to live, they had more things to do. And

• 40:13Speaker 03

  now I wonder if the energy, that desire to stay,

• 40:21Speaker 03

  is something that sticks around in a place. And that just maybe if you go out looking for it, you might be able to interact with that energy.

• 40:41Speaker 02

  When Johnny comes marching home again, hurrah, hurrah. When Johnny comes marching home again, hurrah, hurrah. When Johnny comes marching home again, we'll give him a mighty welcome. Then we'll all go marching.

• 41:43Glynn Washington?

  Thank you, Ramin, for sharing your story at the Spook. Now, Ramin, he works full-time currently as a guitar maker and musician in Nazareth, Pennsylvania. But occasionally, Ramin does lead tours at the Guitar Factory. The original score was by Nicholas Marks. It was produced by Casey Georgie.

• 42:13Glynn Washington?

  Now then, what you've just experienced is but the first foray through that liminal space that connects and bars the gate, long it's been known across time, across cultures, that some entities routinely pass through the shadow side in this world. And on the next crossroads, we're chasing after creatures straight from native Blackfoot lore, from one young person who always wondered, starts to question what he wished for. On the next crossroads, the Goatman. And no, you've never walked this way before.

• 42:55Glynn Washington?

  The Crossroads is brought to you by the Spooked Team, who wherever they go, always sign up for the Haunted House tours. Except for Mr. Mark Ristich, he just likes to pop out of closets when people least expect it. And it's David Kim, Zoe Fregno, Eric Yanez, Teo Decot, Marissa Dodge, Miles Lassie, Elliot Lightfoot, Su Yi Chu, Evan Stern, Eves Jeffcoat, Michelle Lopez, Jack Darrell, Doug Stewart. The Spooked theme song is by Pat Messina Miller. Transgressors, both here and in the shadows, should know that no Snap Studios content

• 43:36Glynn Washington?

  may be used for training, testing, or developing machine learning or AI systems without prior written permission. Take that, Skynet! On Team Spooked, the union represented producers, artists, editors, and engineers, are members of the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, Communications Works of America, AFL-CIL Local 51. My name is Glynn Washington, and it's long been understood that what you put into something or someone is reflected in what comes out.

• 44:09Glynn Washington?

  We treat children with love and kindness because we want to nurture the goodness that lies within. We first tend the flocks to harvest the wool. We paint the pictures to expand the beauty. We write the books to share the knowledge because care and intention are seeds. We know this. Why then are we surprised? That when we drench the land with blood, that it bears a very strange fruit from the poplar trees? We call forth monsters and wonder why they answer "no." We are holders of the sacred gift, the power of intention, the ability to construct our angels and our demons alike.

• 44:53Glynn Washington?

  There is no horror we cannot manifest, and no joy we cannot sing to life. The shadow cannot move its own volition. We must light the pyre. We must sacrifice the lamb, the ground. And no, they will unleash abominations in your name. They are doing so right now, terrors.

• 45:18Glynn Washington?

  So ask yourself, what will you unleash? What will you call forth?

• 45:27Glynn Washington?

  Always remember to never, ever, never, never, ever, never, never, ever, never,

• 45:38Glynn Washington?

  turn out your light.