 Stories and content in Weird Darkness can be disturbing for some listeners and is intended for mature audiences only. Parental discretion is strongly advised. A tulpa is a thought form or being created from the collective thoughts of separate individuals. The concept of tulpas is theoretical in nature and originates from the Tibetan Buddhism mythology where tulpas are described as extra bodies that were created from one person's mind in order to travel to spiritual realms. The tulpa effect is the name given to the unintentional creation of a tulpa based on collective belief of a being with similar traits. What example is that of Slenderman with numerous stories and online forums and boards devoted to people talking about what they believe Slenderman is, if he exists or not, etc. The tulpa effect is that all of these thoughts and devoted attention to the myth has in a way created the reality, a living, breathing creature who may or may not exist in our own dimension that we know as Slenderman. Many people believe that the tulpa effect may have some serious real life percussions. Slenderman was invented as a creepypasta story in 2009, originally pure fiction. If it is possible that something so recent could be created through the tulpa effect, what about something more ancient such as UFOs and extraterrestrials? Could it be that our fascination with them for so many years has in effect created the real thing? I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Welcome Weirdos, I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and unexplained. Coming up in this episode. Nearly two decades after the disappearance of Loria Bible and Ashley Freeman, a suspect was finally arrested. But did police have the right man? The town of Bath, North Carolina was a known port for pirates. It was even rumored that Blackbeard lived a second life in the town with a wife or two. With villainy and corruption rampant, it shouldn't be a surprise that the town might also be cursed. One of our Weirdo family members tells the story about how he came into contact with a Sasquatch. Your grandfather is the founder of one of the world's largest brewing companies and you are fortunate enough to not only work for him but to also be the heir to his brewing empire. Life was good. You were untouchable. Until one day, you weren't. But first, is it possible that UFOs and ETs exist simply because we believe they exist? Could it be that our minds are creating real extraterrestrial entities and alien spacecraft? We begin there. If you're new here, welcome to the show and if you're already a member of this Weirdo family, please take a moment and invite someone else to listen, recommending Weird Darkness to others helps make it possible for me to keep doing the show. And while you're listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com where you can send in your own personal, paranormal stories, watch horror hosts present old scary movies 24-7, see weird news items, listen to the Weird Darkness syndicated radio show, shop for Weird Darkness and Weirdo merchandise, listen to free audiobooks I've narrated, sign up for the newsletter to win free stuff that I give away every month and more. And on the social contact page, you can find the show on Facebook and Twitter and you can also join the Weird Darkness Weirdos Facebook group. Now, bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights and come with me into the Weird Darkness. One of the most fascinating and curious aspects of the UFO phenomena is the way in which over the course of the last century the appearance of both our alleged extraterrestrial visitors and their craft have changed dramatically. For example, in the latter part of the 19th century and early years of the 20th century, the skies of the United States and to a lesser degree Britain were filled with strange-looking flying machines known within ufological circles as phantom airships. As their name suggests, many of the aerial devices in question closely resembled the huge Zeppelin airships of the First World War. Essentially, the 19th century UFO invasion mirrored either what was on the drawing boards or what had been envisioned within the minds of both the military war machine and skilled inventors of the time. Then in the 1930s, as aviation technology progressed, reports began to surface of so-called ghost planes, aircraft that no one could seemingly identify. A decade later, at the height of the Second World War, the skies of war-torn Europe and the Pacific Theater were home to strange invaders known as Foo Fighters, small, glowing balls of light that furiously pursued both Allied and Axis aircraft. By 1946, when rocketry was seen as likely playing a dominant role in the future of warfare and eventually space travel too, the Foo Fighters had given way to the ghost rockets, missile-like vehicles that were the opening act for the era of the flying saucer that was ushered in during the summer of 1947. The true irony, however, is the fact that the one man who can lay claim to having brought the flying saucer into being, American pilot Kenneth Arnold, never saw saucer-shaped craft. Rather, while flying over Washington State on June 24, 1947, Arnold described seeing a fleet of objects that were of a distinctly wedge or delta shape. However, when Arnold specifically likened their movements rather than their shape to how a saucer would fly if it were skipped like a pebble across a body of water, the term flying saucer became commonplace. As did, interestingly enough, countless sightings of specifically saucer-shaped craft. In other words, people were seeing objects of a shape that was based around media-hyped terminology rather than what Arnold actually witnessed. Today, the flying saucers of yesteryear are largely gone and have been firmly replaced by the ominous-looking so-called flying triangles, huge, black, triangular-shaped aircraft that might accurately be described as next-generation stealth aircraft. Our reported alien visitors have also changed over the decades, and dramatically so. In the 1950s, numerous people all across the world claimed face-to-face contact with eerily human-like extraterrestrials who generally sported long, blonde hair and who suggested that we should lay down our nuclear weapons and live in peace and harmony with one another, and thus was born the cult of the contactee. The most famous of the contactees was undoubtedly George Adamsky, whose book with Desmond Leslie, Flying Saucers of Landed, forever made his mark in the world of ufology. Like nearly all of the contactees, Adamsky maintained that his alien friends came from planets within our own solar system, with Venus being a particular favorite. As science, space travel and astronomy progressed, however, two things became apparent. A, Venus, Mars and the several various other planets in our solar system that the contactees maintained were inhabited were in all likelihood, or at least to a highly significant degree, barren and inhospitable wastelands. And B, if aliens really did exist, the idea that they would resemble us to such a significant degree was highly unlikely. And as belief systems changed concerning alien life and as it became more and more apparent that the Earth was probably the only inhabited world in our solar system, lo and behold, the aliens and their points of origin changed too. The long-haired, kindly aliens of the 1950s were kicked into large-scale oblivion by the now ubiquitous black-eyed dwarfs known as the Greys, emotionless creatures whose points of origin are claimed to be light years away, and who are motivated by nothing less than the large-scale abduction of human beings as part of an attempt to create a hybrid species that will ensure the survival of the declining grey race. The dire warnings of the aliens have changed as well. At the height of the Cold War, the long-haired Blondes spoke of the perils of atomic weaponry. In today's world, however, it is global warming and environmental destruction that the Greys seem so concerned about, something that mirrors exactly our own concerns on such matters. Only the most hardened skeptic, or those whose belief in literal aliens is driven by an ex-files-like-I-want-to-believe approach that borders upon religious mania could deny that there is a distinct pattern at work here, and it is a pattern that suggests much of the genuinely unexplained facets inherent in the UFO puzzle might well be explained in a very strange fashion. It is quite clear from all the above that as our technology changes and as our knowledge of the universe advances and our beliefs are modified or altered, so our aliens and their craft change too. And why is it that from 1947 onward people were seeing flying saucers when the term actually related to their method of movement rather than their apparent design? In view of the observations and questions, I have to seriously consider the very real possibility that humankind's fascination with the idea of extraterrestrial life and UFOs has, whether consciously, unconsciously or subconsciously, led to the creation of belief systems of such intensity among the masses that they may as well have given birth to literal tulpas of the alien and flying saucer kind. And what might tulpas be? That depends on your perspective. In the 2018 book, The Slenderman Mysteries, the author addressed the possibilities that the Slenderman is a tulpa. He said, The phenomenon of the tulpa has its origins in the ancient teaching of Buddhism and is a Tibetan term that roughly translates into English as manifestation. It is a highly appropriate piece of terminology for the Slenderman. In essence, it is the process by which the human mind can allegedly bring some degree of alternative physical existence to an entity that is created solely within the depths of the imagination and from within the dream state, too. In other words, and as incredible as it may sound, each and every one of us may well possess the ability to give life to certain things that don't exist in the same way that we do. It is very important, too, to note the words of magician and exorcist Ian Vincent, who told the author, I ended up writing a scholarly paper on the fact that the Western version of the tulpa has absolutely nothing to do with the actual meaning of the word in Tibet. In the original, the thought form is just the thing you picture in your head when you are meditating as an offering to the gods like an apple as an example. The tulpa is the visualization of the apple in your mind when you pray, that's all it has ever been. But it's mutated so much to a point where it's now just this go-to idea of if enough people believe in it, it becomes a thing. Perhaps we really are all alone in the universe, but maybe our desire to think there is something more out there has inadvertently led us to give various phenomena life. And now, with belief firmly instilled, it is escaped from the moorings of its creators, us, to terrorize and mystify drivers on lonely stretches of road late at night or to invade people's bedrooms after darkness has fallen. Loria Bible and Ashley Freeman have been best friends since kindergarten. Loria's mom fondly recalls their friendship. Loria and Ashley would call each other at least once a week, she said. What one was thinking, the other was thinking. It's kind of like when two people, one can finish the sentence when the other one starts one. The two girls lived in a small town in rural Oklahoma. Ashley played basketball and Loria was a cheerleader. Ashley loved to hunt and fish. Loria raised hogs to show at livestock competitions. December 29, 1999 was Ashley's 16th birthday and the girls planned to celebrate with a sleepover at Ashley's. After eating pizza at a local restaurant, Ashley, Loria and Ashley's mother were treated to the Freeman's home. Mere hours later, around 5.30 a.m., firefighters were summoned to the Freeman's mobile home. The whole trailer was engulfed in flames. After extinguishing the fire, the firefighters located the body of Kathy Freeman, Ashley's mother. She'd been laying near the bed, shot in the head before the fire started. Ashley's father, Ashley and Loria, were missing. The first theory, Danny had killed his wife, kidnapped Ashley and Loria and burned the home down to ruin any evidence. This theory, however, was quickly disproven. When Loria's parents came to the charred remains of the mobile home to search for a clue as to their daughter's whereabouts, they discovered new evidence. What remained of Danny's Rottweiler lay next to a pile of debris and, underneath, was Danny Freeman's body. It was clear that Danny had been shot prior to the fire as well. With Danny's body now located, more questions arose. Where were the girls? Who shot the Freeman's? Did the shooter take the girls? The next discovery made by authorities was Loria's purse. Inside, they found her driver's license and almost $200. Authorities drew two conclusions from this discovery. First, Loria, in leaving behind her purse, likely did not leave the home willingly. Second, robbery seemed less plausible as the reason for the violence as any thief would have taken the money. Theories continued to abound. Danny was a rumored drug dealer. Perhaps the homicides had been a drug deal gone bad. Ashley and her father didn't get along. Maybe the girls murdered Ashley's parents and then fled. Yet none of the theories held up to scrutiny. While the authorities knew for sure, a couple was dead and two girls were missing. The local authorities launched a search for the teenagers. Nearby lakes, mineshafts and quarries were searched to no avail. The search stretched far beyond Oklahoma's state lines but to no avail. At least two convicted killers even confessed before recanting their documents. Soon the case went cold. Then, in 2017, nearly two decades after that fateful December night in Oklahoma, there was a break in the case. The Craig County Sheriff's Department discovered a box of previously unknown notes and documents related to the investigation. The previous sheriff's administration had reportedly stashed the documents. Among the cash were the names of witnesses and statements providing fresh leads. One of the most important pieces of evidence rediscovered was an insurance card found at the crime scene. The insurance card belonged to a woman who lived with a man named Phil Welch who had borrowed her car around the time of the murders. Phil Welch was a meth dealer with a criminal record. Researchers believed that Welch and two of his cronies, David Pennington and Ronnie Buzyk, visited the Freeman home that night about a drug deal. The confrontation grew heated. The men killed the Freemans. After killing the couple, the men abducted the girls and set the home on fire. According to witnesses, the trio took Ashley and Loria to Welch's trailer where they would be bound and raped. After a matter of days, they were strangled and thrown in a pit. Welch, the sick ringleader, supposedly covered the walls of his trailer home with the missing posters of Loria and Ashley. He also took disturbing pictures of his victims. Welch possessed about a dozen Polaroids documenting the torture he inflicted on the young girls. He kept them hidden in a leather briefcase. When his girlfriend discovered the pictures, she said that he threatened her life. Don't you ever tell anybody or you'll end up in a pit like those two girls, he said. Another witness claims that Welch and Pennington had shown him the pictures of their own volition bragging about what they had done. While Oklahoma law enforcement never recovered the photos, they had received reports of images. The three suspects were even on their radar, yet there was never enough evidence to secure a conviction. The newly discovered cash from the witness reports to the borrowed car and insurance card was enough to pursue charges. Both Welch and Pennington had passed away though before this major break. However, Ronny Busek, now 66 years old, was still alive. In April 2018 he was arrested in Wichita and charged with four counts of murder. Despite the arrests, the family of Loria and Ashley have yet to find solace. As stated in a post on their Facebook page, the Bible family will never find peace until the bodies of the two teenagers are found. At this time, all focus is on finding Loria and Ashley. We welcome all information leading to their recovery. Until they are home with us, this will never be over. Are you a loyal listener to Weird Darkness? Want even more Weird Darkness content? If you become a member of the Darkness Syndicate, you will receive commercial-free episodes of the podcast as well as crossword puzzles and word searches based on episodes of Weird Darkness several times a month. Being a Darkness Syndicate member means you can also listen to chapters of audiobooks I narrate even before the publishers or authors hear them. You get exclusive Weird Darkness merchandise. You get video updates of future projects and events I am working on before anyone else. You can share your own opinions on ideas to help me decide upon contests, events, merchandise and more in the Weird Darkness universe. You get all of these benefits and more, starting at only $5 per month. Find the Darkness Syndicate at WeirdDarkness.com slash Syndicate. That's WeirdDarkness.com slash Syndicate. Bathtown sits on the mouth of the Pamlico River. In the 18th century, Bath was an important port for the Carolina colonies. Ships traveling across the Atlantic community would stop there, selling, resupplying and trading. And not all of this traffic was legitimate. Bath was a favored haunt of pirates. The pirates appreciated Bathtown's habit of not asking too many questions about where a cargo came from. It was also very conveniently located, with easy access to both the open sea and the mazes of inlets and hidden coves that shape the North Carolina coastline. This gave those with reason to hide many routes to quietly sail off into when the British Navy showed up. The most famous of North Carolina's pirates, Blackbeard himself, is said to have had a house and a wife or two in the town. With all of this money pouring in, Bath soon developed a reputation as a freewheeling, easygoing kind of place. Liquor flowed freely, parties lasted all night long, and there was a good time easily had by anyone who wanted it. But, as is the way with these things, inevitably someone shows up who not only doesn't want a good time, but who doesn't want anyone else to have one either. The traveling evangelist George Whitfield was one of the first celebrities in the American colonies. This staunch, cross-eyed, strictly Calvinist evangelist was reputed to have a voice that would carry for five miles. He used that voice to preach a grim vision of hellfire and damnation all up and down the American colonies. Whitfield was one of the prime movers of the wave of religious fervor that swept the American colonies just before the revolution. His sermons and the passion they inspired came to be known as The Great Awakening, and those who were generally concerned with just getting on and enjoying life instead of worrying so much about hellfire and damnation were a particular target of Whitfield. Like many of these preachers to this day, Whitfield was also a showman. One of Whitfield's pieces of evangelical stagecraft was to always travel in a wagon in which he carried his own coffin. Whitfield used the coffin to illustrate that he was prepared for death and confident in his own salvation. To drive the point even further home, Whitfield always slept in that coffin. When he heard about the fun going on in Bath, of course it made his list. Needless to say, a strange cross-eyed preacher who slept in a coffin and shouted about eternal damnation was not a welcome presence in a town that had come to accept the idea that doing what you wanted, when you wanted, was actually a pretty good way to go through life. When Whitfield visited Bath, he was met by a delegation of locals who suggested that he might just want to turn around and head back the way he came. They may even have suggested that, should he choose to stick around, he'd have an opportunity to put that coffin he was so fond of dragging around with him to its proper use. Whitfield took the hint, but he couldn't leave without at least making some kind of show. Whitfield climbed back on his wagon, took off his shoe, and waved it at the assembled crowd and proceeded to place a curse on the town. If a place won't listen to the word, Whitfield said, you shake the dust of the town off your feet and the town shall be cursed. I have put a curse on this town for a hundred years. Shortly thereafter, the nearby town of Washington and its larger and more easily accessible port began to suck away Bath's prosperity. The money stopped rolling in, and the good times came to an end with them. By the middle of the 19th century, Bath had dwindled to a small, sleepy backwater, the same quiet little hamlet that's there today. Whitfield took this as evidence that his curse had had an effect, and smugly spread the story of how he had brought down the town. I was working for a private security company, withholding the name of the company for personal reasons. I was securing the site of a natural gas pipeline that was open for repair. The first night my wife had come to visit me on the site, the big halogen work lights at the other end of the site were on, but the set by my parking spot were not. While she was there, we heard very heavy footsteps in the woods near the site by the river. The rancid smell of sewage and rotten meat or fish wafted through the area. My wife asked me to go turn on the lights to scare off whatever it was that was there, so I walked over to the generator and work lights and started it up. The same heavy footsteps retreated back into the woods and the smell abated. Okay, about a week later, I'm on the same site on the same shift when I hear those footsteps again, only this time on the other side of the river. Well, I was curious and I used a massive spotlight I carried in my car for those sites and shined it across the river. Standing there, approximately eight foot tall was what you could only describe as a classic Sasquatch or Bigfoot, bipedal, ape-like, very muscular, with leathery skin on its face, hands and chest. It shielded its eyes with one hand from my light and let out a tremendous bellowing scream that was both high and low pitched. I felt the power of it hit me in the chest. I lowered the light and drew my pistol just in case and said, sorry, big guy, didn't mean to startle you. What happened next was a bit of a shock. The thing actually grunted at me in response, then it just walked away at a very reasonable speed and fairly quiet for a creature that large. You can see why on my actual report it read, large furry creature probably a bear. I still got harassed about seeing a bigfoot for the two years that followed before I lost that job. Born on January 12, 1915, Eddolf Kuhers III lived a remarkable life. He grew up in New Hampshire and attended Phillips Exeter Academy before moving on to Cornell University. He was president of the Quill and Dagger Society, as well as a member of the Kappa Alpha Society. Not only that, but he was also a semi-professional baseball player. In November 1940, he married Mary Urquhart Grant and together the couple had four children. Being the grandson of Eddolf Kuhers had its benefits as well, and by 1960, Eddolf had been named CEO and chairman of the board of the Kuhers Brewing Company in Golden, Colorado. All his good fortune was about to take a turn. On the morning of February 9, 1960, Eddolf's international travel hall was discovered on Turkey Creek Bridge, near Morrison, Colorado. There was no one inside the vehicle, but the radio was still on. Police immediately identified the vehicle as belonging to Eddolf Kuhers and immediately began to search the area. All they found was his hat, glasses, and a blood stain. The next day, still no sign of Eddolf, but then his wife Mary received a ransom note in the mail. The note requested $500,000 for the safe release of her husband. Under the guidance of law enforcement, she followed the instructions to contact the kidnapper but never heard anything back. The FBI was now involved and began working tirelessly to analyze the little evidence they had. They looked at the ransom note and discovered that it had a distinct typeface and was written on paper with an uncommon watermark. Local authorities focused on other leads and soon a witness came forward claiming to have seen a yellow 1951 Mercury on the bridge around the same time that Eddolf Kuhers disappeared. The car had a license plate with the letters AT and numerals 6-2 on it. However, police were unable to trace it with the information they had. Just eight days after Eddolf Kuhers was taken, the yellow Mercury was found in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The car had been deliberately set a fire. However, the gasoline-fueled fire could not destroy the serial numbers imprinted on the engine. Authorities were able to trace the car back to a Colorado resident named Walter Osborn. The FBI learned that Walter Osborn had purchased a gun, handcuffs and a typewriter. He had been living in Denver until the day after Eddolf Kuhers went missing. Looking into his employment, it was discovered that he had an insurance policy that designated Joseph Corbett as his beneficiary. This Joseph Corbett had a son, Joseph Corbett Jr., who had previously been convicted of murder but had escaped from a California prison. He became the chief suspect, and the FBI obtained a fugitive warrant and placed him on the 10 most wanted fugitives list. The car alone couldn't be directly linked to Eddolf, except through witness statements. Fortunately, dirt from the car was taken and ultimately traced back to the exact area where Eddolf had been taken hostage. No one knew for sure what had happened to Eddolf Kuhers, whether he was dead or alive. That question was answered September 11, 1960, when some hikers came across a pair of trousers in the woods, approximately 12 miles southwest of Sedalia. The pants had a key ring with the initials AC-3. Some other articles of clothing and skeletal remains were uncovered and determined to be those of Eddolf Kuhers. The jacket and shirt were covered, had bullet holes indicating he had been shot in the back. Further analysis of the shoulder bone confirmed Eddolf Kuhers had been murdered. Being the grandson of the Kuhers empire, the case became an international obsession. As a result, a picture of Joseph Corbett was included in an issue of Reader's Digest magazine where he was recognized by two neighbors in Vancouver, BC. John Corbett was arrested October 29, 1961 in Vancouver by Canadian police and sent back to Colorado to face murder charges. On March 19, 1961, Joseph Corbett Jr. was convicted of the murder of Eddolf Kuhers III and sentenced to life in prison. He was released on parole in 1980 for good behavior and drove a truck for the Salvation Army until he retired. In August 2009, Joseph Corbett Jr. committed suicide. He lived just 10 miles from where he had killed Eddolf Kuhers and maintained his innocence until the day he died. Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please share it with someone you know who loves the paranormal or strange stories, true crime, monsters or unsolved mysteries like you do. You can email me anytime with your questions or comments at darren at WeirdDarkness.com. Darren is D-A-R-R-E-N. And you can find the show on Facebook and Twitter, including the show's Weirdo's Facebook group, on the Contact social page at WeirdDarkness.com. Also on the website, you can find free audiobooks that I've narrated, watch old horror movies with horror hosts at all times of the day for free, sign up for the newsletter to win free prizes. Grab your Weird Darkness and Weirdo merchandise. Plus, if you have a true paranormal or creepy tale to tell, you can click on Tell Your Story or call the dark line toll free at 1-877-277-5944. That's 1-877-277-5944. All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true unless stated otherwise, and you can find source links or links to the authors in the show notes. Could UFOs be Tulpas was written by Nick Redfern? The disappearance of Loria and Ashley was written by Allison Wilde. The Bath Town Curse was posted at North Carolina Ghosts. I saw Bigfoot while working security is from Weirdo family member Clayton Blackwell. Coors, Death of an Air, is from the Scare Chamber. Again, you can find links to these stories in the show notes. Weird Darkness is a production and trademark of Marlar House Productions. Copyright, Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. Romans 12 verse 9. Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil. Cling to what is good. And a final thought. Your current situation is not your final destination. I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness. I post videos seven days a week. And while you're at it, spread the darkness by sharing this video with someone you know who loves all things strange and macabre. If you want to listen to the podcast, you can find it at WeirdDarkness.com.