The Morbid History Podcast

Thomas Gloom

A nonfiction podcast focused on the darker, stranger, and more mysterious aspects of history.

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20 episodes
Updated Wednesday

Episodes20

Newest first

Wednesday · 48 min
Episode 18: Dead Reckoning
A dead man's satchel. Nine handwritten pages. Thirty-eight years of silence. In this episode: the people who bet everything on the grave keeping their secrets. A knighted BBC icon who groomed an entire nation while institutions looked away, protected by charity and fame until fourteen months after his funeral. A quiet librarian who confessed to murder the same night he committed it, then carried the proof in a bag for four decades. Plus six more killers, hoaxers, and fugitives who all made the same calculation: that death was far enough away from accountability. Some of them were right. Some weren't. The grave is deep. It's not always deep enough. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
July 22 · 15 min
MM#17 Random Acts Of Evil
He buried the weapons before he even had a victim in mind. That was the system. Israel Keyes spent over a decade crossing the United States... flying into cities far from his targets, renting cars, driving hundreds of additional miles, paying cash for everything, turning his phone off while he drove. He had no victim type. No preferred location. No signature. Just buckets. Up to twelve of them, buried in remote locations across the country. Inside: guns, ammunition, rope, duct tape, Drano, lye. Hidden years in advance. In this episode, we open the bucket to step inside the most methodical criminal mind the FBI says it has ever encountered. Because the scariest killers aren't the ones who snap. They're the ones who plan. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
July 8 · 42 min
Episode 17: Danger In The Toy Aisle
They were approved, tested, wrapped, and put under Christmas trees. In this episode, we examine the dangerous, baffling, and occasionally radioactive history of American toys. From a 1950’s science kit that came with actual uranium ore and a government seal of approval, to a beloved Cabbage Patch doll with a motorized jaw, no off switch, and no ability to distinguish between a plastic carrot and a child's hair. Because progress in toy safety is real. It was also paid for. And not always cheaply. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
June 24 · 13 min
MM#16 Behind Confederate Lines
In 1861, Alabama seceded from the United States. Not everyone went along with it. Deep in the hill country of northwest Alabama sat Winston County—a place of shallow soil, steep ridges, and small farmers who had no slaves, no plantations, and no interest in dying for a cause that wasn't theirs. When the state sent a delegate to the secession convention, Winston County sent a 21-year-old schoolteacher named Christopher Sheats with one instruction: Don't sign. And he didn't. In this episode, we travel to the county that told the Confederacy no… and paid the price for it in blood, imprisonment, and eighty years of punishment from a state that never forgave them for being right. Because the South was never as unified as the monuments want you to believe. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
June 10 · 51 min
Episode 16: The Poison Parlor
Progress has a price tag. And in Victorian America, it was usually fifty cents. In this episode, we pull back the ornate wallpaper of the nineteenth century and look at what was underneath. From the snake oil industry that dosed babies with morphine and sold radium water as a health tonic, to the Civil War physician who turned embalming into a national institution—and left one very specific instruction about his own burial. Because the Victorians weren't primitive. They were confident. And confidence, it turns out, is the most dangerous ingredient of all. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
May 27 · 13 min
MM#15 Run Like Hell
She just wanted to run. That's all. Twenty years old, bib number 261, tucked into the middle of the pack on a cold, rainy morning in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. She had trained over a thousand miles for this. She was ready. The men in charge had other ideas. She finished anyway. In this episode, we lace up and follow Kathrine Switzer through the 1967 Boston Marathon that changed women's sports forever—the attack that tried to stop her, the men who failed her, and the twenty-four miles she ran alone after the world told her to quit. Because sometimes the most radical thing a woman can do is simply refuse to stop. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
May 13 · 47 min
Episode 15: Justice, Adjusted
Some crimes have consequences. Others have currency. In this episode, we examine history's untouchables—the scientists, executives, kings, and killers whose genius, wealth, or strategic value placed them beyond the reach of ordinary justice. From the Japanese bioweapons unit whose commanders were handed immunity in exchange for their data (Unit 731), to the Nazi rocket engineer America gave a new country and eventually the Moon (Wernher von Braun). Because there are two versions of justice. The one written in law. And the one that runs on who you are, and what you're worth, to the people in power. The price was always paid. Just never by them. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
April 29 · 17 min
MM#14 New Deal, Same As The Old Deal
They called it the New Deal. A promise. A lifeline. It was the most ambitious expansion of federal protection for working Americans in the nation's history, and was designed to pull a broken country back from the edge of collapse. But buried in the fine print were some sneaky words that changed everything. In 1935 and 1938, Southern Democrats struck a deal with the Roosevelt Administration. They would support the New Deal, but made sure to carve out the occupations held overwhelmingly by Black Americans. Three laws. Three trapdoors. In this episode, we pull back the curtain on the New Deal's darkest compromise—how the legislation that saved white America was deliberately engineered to leave Black America behind. Because sometimes the most effective forms of racism aren't the ones written in fire. They're the ones written in fine print. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
April 15 · 46 min
Episode 14: The Promised Land Lie
Every utopia has a founder. Every founder has a vision. And someone always pays for it. In this episode, we examine the dark history of intentional communities — promised lands built on someone else's labor, someone else's body, or someone else's silence. From a New York commune that ran America's first eugenics program and pivoted to silverware, to a 64,000-acre Oregon ranch whose vision of enlightened community ended in the largest bioterrorism attack in U.S. history. Because utopias don't fail because people are incapable of community. They fail when perfection becomes more important than consent. And the walls go up before anyone notices. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
April 1 · 18 min
MM#13 When Mama Sued The KKK
He was just going to the corner store. In 1981, Michael Donald never made it home. Two members of the Ku Klux Klan had been driving the streets of Mobile, Alabama with a gun and a rope — looking for any Black man they could find. But this isn't just the story of a murder. It's the story of what his mother did next. In this episode, we follow Beulah Mae Donald — a single mother from a Mobile housing project — as she took the most powerful Klan faction in America to civil court, and didn't stop until she had bankrupted the entire organization. Because sometimes justice doesn't come from a gavel. Sometimes it comes from a mother who refuses to quit. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
March 18 · 34 min
Episode 13: The Version They Cut
Some stories are too strange for fiction. Others are just too inconvenient for runtime. In this episode, we go behind the screen — examining the true events Hollywood borrowed, polished, and quietly edited before selling them back to us. From Hugh Glass, mauled by a grizzly and left for dead in the Dakota wilderness, to twenty-one men adrift in the Pacific after a sperm whale sank their ship — and what they did to survive. Because the real stories are full of people who don't get monuments. Who don't get to the third act. Who drew the wrong lot. Based on a true story. But which true story? And whose? Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
March 4 · 16 min
MM#12 They Were Small Enough To Fit
They were small enough to fit. That’s why they chose them. In 18th- and 19th-century England, thousands of young boys were forced to climb inside narrow chimneys to scrape away soot. They were underfed to keep them small. Burned if they hesitated. Suffocated if they slipped. But the worst horror didn’t come in childhood. Years later, many of these former climbing boys developed a brutal and highly aggressive cancer known as Chimney Sweep’s Carcinoma... a disease that slowly rotted their bodies from the inside out, killing many before their 30th birthday. In this episode, we descend into the ash-covered truth of Victorian industry, where comfort was built on child labor, and warm hearths were purchased with young lives. Because sometimes the darkest things in history aren’t monsters. They’re systems. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
February 18 · 38 min
Episode 12: The Art Of Theft
Some crimes are chaotic. Others are calculated. In this episode, we examine history’s most notorious heists—beginning with the 1990 robbery at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, where thieves walked out with priceless masterpieces that have never been recovered. From there, we trace legendary robberies across trains, sewers, skies, and vaults—culminating in the audacious Antwerp Diamond Heist, a crime so precise it shattered the myth of an impenetrable fortress. These weren’t just thefts. They were demonstrations. Because sometimes crime doesn’t look violent. Sometimes it looks brilliant. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
February 18 · 44 min
Episode 11: Institutional Cruelty
For centuries, mental illness wasn’t treated… it was controlled. In this episode, we step inside the brutal history of insane asylums and early psychiatric “care,” beginning with Bethlem Royal Hospital, where madness became public spectacle. From there, we trace the rise of lobotomies in the United States and examine the therapies that promised healing while delivering silence: insulin comas, ice baths, rotational chairs, hysteria diagnoses, and institutional abuse at places like Willowbrook State School. These weren’t cures. They were compliance—disguised as medicine. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
February 4 · 16 min
MM#11 Blood On The Senate Floor
He didn’t die on the Senate floor. But a part of him never left it. In this episode, we examine the life and legacy of Charles Sumner—an abolitionist senator who stood against slavery, demanded Black equality, and bled in the halls of Congress after a brutal caning by Representative Preston Brooks in 1856. The attack left him with brain trauma and what we now call PTSD. But it didn’t end his mission. We follow Sumner through the Civil War, Reconstruction, and into his final battles for justice. It's a story highlighting how one man’s refusal to stay silent reshaped the American conscience… and cost him everything. Because sometimes, progress doesn’t come from handshakes. It comes from standing up after the blows. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
January 7 · 13 min
MM#10 Selling The Supernatural
Ghost stories used to be whispered around campfires. Now they’re printed on mugs. In this episode, we explore how ghost lore in America went from local legends to full-fledged tourism industry... complete with haunted hotels, cemetery tours, and “spirit weekend packages.” From Victorian mourning rituals to Stephen King’s night at the Stanley Hotel, from Salem to Savannah, we follow the ghostly transformation of fear into profit. Because when it comes to American hauntings, the spirits aren’t the only ones trying to make contact. So check in, if you dare. And don’t mind the knocking. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
Dec 24, 2025 · 39 min
Episode 10: Fatal Frames
Hollywood loves a good curse. But what if the real horror isn’t supernatural at all? In this episode of Morbid History, we step behind the camera to examine the films said to be “cursed”—from The Twilight Zone: The Movie, where a fatal on-set disaster changed Hollywood forever, to The Omen, a production haunted by a trail of eerie coincidences and tragedy. Along the way, we explore the chaos surrounding The Exorcist, the deaths linked to Poltergeist, the fatal negligence that killed Brandon Lee during The Crow, and the obsession-driven productions of Apocalypse Now and Fitzcarraldo. These aren’t stories about haunted sets or angry spirits. They’re stories about pressure, ambition, and what happens when no one says stop. Because sometimes the most dangerous thing in Hollywood isn’t a curse... it’s the belief that the shot is worth the cost. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
Dec 10, 2025 · 13 min
MM#9 How Not To Train A Dolphin
It started with a flooded house and a dolphin named Peter. It ended in LSD, obsession, and death. In the 1960s, a young woman named Margaret Howe Lovatt moved into a house filled with water to teach a dolphin how to speak. Backed by NASA and fueled by fringe science, the experiment soon spiraled into something far more disturbing. LSD got involved, and what followed was a bizarre and tragic chapter in the history of animal research… This tale is a haunting reminder that intelligence doesn’t equal consent. This isn’t just weird science. It’s the moment science stopped asking if it even should. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR
Nov 26, 2025 · 49 min
Episode 9: Maritime Nightmares
The sea is beautiful... until it isn’t. In this episode, we plunge into the darkest waters of maritime history: the doomed Franklin Expedition, frozen in the Arctic and driven to madness and cannibalism, and the Batavia, where a shipwreck unraveled into a brutal cult of murder and terror on a barren island. Along the way, we examine ghost ships drifting without crews, lighthouse keepers who vanished into thin air, sailors devoured by hunger after a whale attack, and an entire vessel found with its crew dead, faces twisted in fear. These aren’t just shipwrecks. They’re reminders that the ocean keeps secrets... and it rarely gives anything back. Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR www.MorbidHistoryPod.com
Nov 12, 2025 · 10 min
MM#8 Ice Cold Negligence
She didn’t die because of the cold. She died because no one fixed the door. In 2023, 63-year-old Nguyet Le was found dead inside the walk-in freezer of an Arby’s restaurant in Louisiana. In this episode, we examine a horrifying case of corporate neglect, corner-cutting, and quiet cruelty... and how it led to one of the most preventable workplace deaths in recent memory. Horror doesn’t always wear a mask. 🎧 Take a bite of this Morbid Morsel. www.MorbidHistoryPod.com Original music in this episode is provided by the talented: SHDWLRKR