True Crime Historian

Crimes of the Scoundrel Clarence V.T. RichesonJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 74 explores the tawdry case of Clarence Virgil Thompson Richeson, who was apparently an eloquent preacher and a rising star in the Baptist community, as well as a notorious scoundrel. The tangled web of deceit he wove between three women finally ended in the mysterious death of the unmarried mother of his expected child. Richeson would later confess that he gave her poison, telling her that it was medicine to induce an abortion. This case is historically significant in that it...

Father George Rapp ran the Harmony Society at Economy, Pennsylvania, by two commandments: celibacy for men whose wives he had evicted, and poverty for workers whose gold he hoarded. By 1846 the prophet was burning ledgers and stashing half a million in coin beneath his floor. He had it coming.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get...

The Trial and Execution of Amelia Dyer Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 43 comes at the request of a listener across the great pond in the United Kingdom. We will be exploring the testimony from the trial of Amelia Dyer, who would take in infants and toddlers for adoption for a fee, and then murder the poor children for the profit. She is said to have once referred to herself as an angel maker. I’ve seen estimates of her carnage at as many as 400 young souls, but she was convicted on only one cou...

For ten years, George Cassiday, known on Capitol Hill as the Man in the Green Hat, ran liquor to the United States Congress while four out of five of his customers voted dry. When Prohibition agents finally caught him in February of 1930, he took the hypocrites down with him.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get...

The Nebraska Spree KillerJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 475 takes us on a wild ride across Nebraska with Charles Starkweather, a 19-year-old with a stolen shotgun, a 14-year-old companion who may or may not be kidnapped, and a string of dead bodies across the American plains that shocked a nation.Hear more stories about SERIAL & SPREE KILLERS.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just...

"The Merry Widow of Bicester" takes us to battle-torn England during World War II, when as if there wasn't already enough death and suffering, a jealous mistress plots to take out her man's wife.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get access to over 400 ad-free episodes from the dusty vault, Safe House Exclusives, direct access to the Boss, and whatever personal services you require.<...

Born Elizabeth Bigley in a Ontario railway camp, she died Cassie Chadwick in an Ohio prison cell — and in between, she convinced the banks of northern Ohio that Andrew Carnegie was her shamefaced father and they were sitting on a gold mine. They were sitting on forged paper. The Queen of Ohio. Circa 1897–1904.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and...

The Reckless Reno GangJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 92 takes place after the Civil War, when the Reno Brothers explored a new way to rob trains that inspired the James and Younger gangs. But even the wild and wily Reno brothers were no match for Allen Pinkerton and his detectives. Although it takes place in Indiana, this story has the trappings of a tale of the Old West: Daring robberies, fugitives from justice, clever arrests, and a final showdown in the New Albany jail. Adapted from "The Pinkertons: A Detective Dynasty" by Richard...

Andrew Jackson's Secretary of War spent a decade courting a married woman, arranged her husband's convenient posting to the Mediterranean, and married her six weeks before the 1829 inauguration. The Cabinet collapsed. Calhoun was destroyed. Jackson never recovered. John Henry Eaton walked away clean. Washington City's most elegant arsonist.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get access...

Family Tragedy in Rising SunJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 89. In a lot of these stories from the old newspapers, the press coverage and the locale itself often take on the attributes of characters in the drama. In this case, the town of Rising Sun, Indiana, seems to evolve as the story progresses. When one of the town matrons, the spinster Lizzie Gillespie is found assassinated in her parlor, townfolk tell reporters she had no enemy in the world and there could be no logical reason for the murder. Then they start thinking...

Clyde Tolson ran personnel and discipline at the FBI for 44 years — the man who hired, promoted, and silenced the agents who carried out J. Edgar Hoover's illegal surveillance campaigns. He built the compliant machine. He signed the memos. He inherited the house. History gave him the quiet burial he counted on.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you ca...

The Case Of Bathsheba SpoonerJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 474 takes place in 1788 when the secrets of a prosperous Massachusetts family are revealed, beginning with a dead body in the bottom of a well. By spring, four people would hang because of what came to light. One of them was a woman. One of them was pregnant.Hear More Stories About FEMMES FATALE!!!!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at...

Wu Zetian entered the Tang court as a teenage concubine in 638. By 690, she'd murdered her way to the Dragon Throne — the only woman in Chinese history to rule as Emperor. She stuffed rivals into wine jars, built a secret police, and spent her final years afraid of house cats.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get ac...

Episode 130Murder By Fire, by Brandon WhiteThe Abominable Mr. Yelverton, by Edmund PearsonThe American Exchange Bank Robbery, By Cleveland MoffatJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get access to over 400 ad-free episodes from the dusty vault, Safe House Exclusives, direct access to the Boss, and whatever personal services...

William N. Roach embezzled sixty thousand dollars from a Washington bank, fled to Dakota Territory, and returned the money just fast enough to dodge prison. Fourteen years later, a Republican civil war handed him a U.S. Senate seat nobody voted for. The Senate tried to expel him. Time said no.Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you...

The Mysterious Death of Louise Monteabaro InJump To The AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 20, Police Chief Henry Blake’s story stays consistent throughout, from the time he reported the incident to the judge/acting coroner to the time that the dead girl’s aunt stabbed him in the neck: Miss Louise Monteabaro used her own gun to commit suicide in the passenger seat of her car. But according to those who knew the young sewing machine saleswoman, that seemed unlikely. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcas...

Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 22 is an exciting story that has many of the elements of classic noir: A deadly robbery, an exhaustive manhunt, a daring escape from the county jail and a tense showdown ending with a clever police ploy. In the spring of 1918, three men burst into a business meeting and steal a mere pocketful of cash, but leave three men, including one of their own, dead in a fusillade of bullets.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more...

Gilded Age New York. William Magear Tweed rode Tammany Hall to the top and looted the city treasury through padded bills, phantom invoices, and kickbacks buried in plaster. His crowning theft was a courthouse whose $250,000 budget swelled past $12 million. In November 1873, a jury convicted him inside it.AD-FREE Safe House EditionBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at the Safe House is still just a buck a week, and you can get access to over 400 ad-free episodes...

The Assassination of Huey P. LongJump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionEpisode 473 takes us to Baton Rouge on the night of September 8, 1935, when a quiet young doctor walked into the Louisiana State Capitol and never walked out. He left no note. No confession. No explanation. Six people who stood beside him — or over him — tell the story he never told.Hear more episodes about ASSASSINATIONS!!!Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-historian--2909311/support.You can pay more if you want to, but rent at t...

The Complicated Romance of Fannie Brice and Notorious Nicky Arnstein Jump to the AD-FREE Safe House EditionIn Episode 60, we take a little break from murderous mayhem for a love story with a different kind of mayhem. The world of Broadway was quite aghast when Fannie Brice, a star of the Ziegfield Follies, took up with New York gambler Julius Wilford Arnstein, better known as Nicky, whose story was adapted into the musical “Funny Girl.” The first act is a Sunday magazine article that was published while Nicky was serving time in the Leavenworth prison, and a...