From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A production of I Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my name is Nol. They called me Ben. We are joined as always with our super producer Alexis code named Doc Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you. You are here, and that makes this the stuff they don't want you to know. It's Thursday if you're hearing this, the day it comes out, which means it's time for One of our favorite parts of the program are weekly listener mail segment, where we hear from the best part of the show, you and your fellow conspiracy realist. Uh. Today we're going to Today We're going to dive too, as always, some strange things, uh, some military secrets, some hidden US history, as well as what could accurately be described as a vonnegut esque think tank. I'm thinking particularly of a wonderful short story by Kurt Vonnegut where the protagonist finds out that all of the world's big decisions are made by this small group of people who are thought to be experts, but all they really do is like arbitrarily gamble on racing some kind of animal. It's it's very it's very weird, amazing. Yeah, but it turns out Vonnegut wasn't wasn't just exactly making this out of whole cloth, was well, Ben, I'm got to figure out what story that's from, big Vonnegut fan. And he really reminds me of um, I don't know, Doctor Strange Love, for example, where it's this amazing satire very much rooted in reality, but with a touch of the absurds, just enough to like make it feel whimsical or like Dr seucy In or something. Um. But I need Oh I too, buddy, I do too. I've got about fifteen audio books kicking at once, and that's not very good for a completion rate there, I'll tell you. But I need to read an actual book. And I think, Ben, you got me thinking. I think Vonna Get is the perfect combination of readability, um, intrigue, and storytelling. But also, like I said, it's got that whimsical thing that kind of really keeps you turning the pages. So maybe that'll help me get back into reading actual texts. It's bugging me that I that I don't remember the name here. I hope I'm not getting the author wrong. And I know a lot of our fellow listeners know exactly what story I'm talking about. It might be shouting somewhere in public, folks. I'm gonna try to figure this out and nail down the story. I know it exists. I thought the author was about to get But either way, this is this is a fantastic setup. And Vonnie gets great if you if you enjoy a good yard, just like Noel said, uh, incredibly original, wonderful, wonderful wit. Yeah, and in beautiful word play as well, and kind of you know, creates his own terms that very much mirror our own, but still again really great world world building. But we're talking about something that does feel maybe like something out of a Doctor Strange Love or something of Vonnegut would come up with, um this kind of idea of a secret group of of scientists that are sort of like plotting behind the scenes and solving Earth's most uh you know, um epic problems. You know, like things like climate change or nuclear proliferation or um building designing technology that could protect us from our enemies. But in really creative, almost Q from James Bond like ways. Right. UM. So the group we're talking about today is known as Jason or colloquially it looks like in a lot of reporting known as the Jason's in terms of the actual members UM. And it is a group that has been under contract by the Department of Defense and since the early nineteen sixties, in fact, nineteen sixty it's made up of twenty or so physicists. And it was initially called Project Sunrise UM. And while they've kind of over the years sort of expanded their customer base I guess beyond the Department of Defense, the Department of Defense has always remained their largest client or contractor I guess contract. So in nineteen sixty five, UM, they actually started developing technology for warfare. UH. They had actually developed something, uh that you could consider like an electronic barrier, UM that combines several different technologies to create essentially a barrier that would protect you know, camps from the viet Cong. UM. They also during the Vietnam War developed kind of a controversial technology that was air dropped into the jungle. UM because you know, we know that the North Vietnamese troops UM and their supplies were hard to locate because they knew their terrain so well, this very very dense jungle um and you know, very harsh climates and and you know impenetrable um terrain at times UM. And so the Jason's figured out a system of these remote sensors that you could actually air drop into the jungle to create kind of a grid. It makes me think of a little more rudimentary version of that, that that technology they use in the movie, uh Prometheus. One of the cool things about that movie where these little like kind of red orbs that were thrown into these dark caves and then like map kind of created a map of the of the space that you could then refer to. Definitely nothing quite that extreme, but not terribly far off. And it's the kind of technology that has certainly been developed and continued to be developed in terms of like remotely mapping things and all of the kinds of things that Google does, you know, with their mapping technology. So the old idea is, I mean, they really are this sort of elite kind of DARPA esque, uh, you know, a group of of of scientists. In fact, they were initially you know, part of the the DARPA program. UM. So it's it's all about like solving problems, making the world a better place through technology and science. UM. And it's it's very very interesting. They've actually even helped the Department of Agriculture UH figure out how to understand data points that allow them to you know, increase crop yield. UM. They've advised the Census Bureau, for example, on how to you know, gather data better and kind of streamline their operations. There's a fantastic article and associated audio piece from NPR UM that was heard on All Things Considered in April of twenty nineteen. UM. And the main reason for the reporting of this kind of little known group at the time was the fact that in twenty nineteen, basically they were essentially, you know, set to lose their funding and their biggest you know employer, the Department of Defense, was going to drop them. UM. As we know, this was during the Trumpet administration, when the idea of scientists and you know, climate change UH kind of conflicted with I think the popular opinion of that administration. UM. I've buried the lead here as well. This came to us from a listener with an incredible nickname who you responded to Ben Francis Bacon, lettuce and or Tomato the one true. Yeah, it's really, really, really clever, whether they're referring to Francis Bacon the incredible surrealist painter or or Francis Bacon the scientist and naturalist and philosopher from history. Either one big fan of both. But Francis writes to us saying, good afternoon, gentle people. My partner brought this to my attention a few days ago, and I apologize for my tardiness. Have you ever heard of the Jason's had not groups like him, but hadn't heard of this specific exactly. Man, I know this is the one that you were looking into as well, as I said. You wrote back to Francis some what were some of the things that you uncovered when you went down this, uh, this fantastic rabbit hole as you described it in your response. Yeah, this is this is incredibly fascinating to me, and thank you so much for writing in Francis Bacon, let us hand or Tomato. One of the first things that stood out to Menial, and I think you you found this as well, is that there's been a lot of attention paid to the origin of the name, and apparently it has been explained as an acronym in the past. One of the official acronym was apparently July, August, September, October, November, meaning the time in which this group supposely met. Or there was the more kind of jocular one which was get this junior achiever somewhat older. Now that's funny. It's also clearly a reference to Jason and the Argonauts um and you know the search for the Golden Fleece from Greek mythology. Uh so, so definitely some some interesting or origin stories, you know, somewhat mythological. Even the true one, the one you're talking about, is the true one. The other one is just I think kind of an in joke. Oh, it's so, there's a lot exactly. It is very much. The whole thing is a bit of a bit of an in joke because a lot of because it's really something that doesn't get a whole lot of press. Even in stories about things and projects that they've worked on, you don't really hear it attributed to the Jason's There's one more theory, and this is my theory. It comes from the words of Pentagon spokesperson Heather bab who makes a comment in this NPR dot org article that Francis left us in her message and she just states that the d O D had a view. She's speaking very politically here, very being very careful. She's yeah, she's saying, they very often would let us know if they thought an idea was bad. Uh, and we're very blunt about it. And the d D decided they didn't want to pay for that service anymore. Basically, the d D wanted to pay didn't want to pay for Heckler's anymore, or or they had already kind of decided they were going to go down a certain technological or R and D route and they didn't like people not you know, playing ball, being on the team. Yeah, exactly, So I was gonna put forward Jason actually stands for, at least in the d O D S mind. I bet this is written on a whiteboard somewhere in the Pentagon, just tolls. And then I guess you guys would have to fill in the rest just tolls, seeking other nuisance? Is there? You go? Love it? No, this is great, we can do that. We can play the acronym game all day long. But it's true this. I mean whether, okay, whether or not the d o D themselves and the officials in charge of the d D itself are the ones that decided they no longer wanted to pay for this service or not is is up for debate. Again. I do feel like the administration in charge probably had a lot to do with why they maybe were no longer required. They were no longer needed because if you look at their their timeline, which you can find on a really great article from Science mag dot com from Ann think Biner, they begin to assess global climate models like in the seventies, UM, and we're certainly outspoken and internally as to what could be done too, you know, slow the the effects of climate change. UM. In the nineteen eighties they proposed something called a laser guide star UM that would allow you to use lasers to detect missile systems or missile launches that are that are directed at at the United States. UM. And they actually were quite the boys club until the mid eighties when the very first woman UH joined the group, an astrono remember the name of Claire Max, which is an awesome science name in my opinion. UM. But here's the thing. There contributions, though somewhat under the radar, are very clearly pretty important, and a lot of independent scientific authorities, let's just call them, really felt like this is a short sighted thing to like cut them loose. And they were told in the fashion that many folks who were running counter to the administration's attitudes were told via tweet or something like that, or at the very least very abruptly, with very little time to prepare, and they were I think given like a month or less to clean out their desks and you know, move on um. And thankfully, the I believe a Department of Energy decided they would pick up that contract. Because you know, all these independent agencies, you know, do have their own leadership. So some I think are maybe more beholden to the administration than others. I mean, I don't know. I know, the president isn't technically you know, the buck stops there, but uh, it does seem like the Department of Energy was interested in, perhaps more interested in their advice. Then the Department of Defense might be. Department Defense being you know, literally the war wing of the United States government and the president being commander in chief. Imagine that would hold a little more weight is a quick question, because I think that the Department of Energy contract started in twenty nineteen, and it was not it was for a limited time originally. Right. I do think that's right between when the story you know, happened. That's when like this, this is not like a today thing. This this is twenty nineteen during the Trump administration, when um, this was an issue. Um, and it's something they have. You know, they knew that they may not be you know, completely dependent on the US government forever, so they certainly did things to kind of diversify a little bit. Um. But some of the things that they really did help in when they initially were assembled was, like I said, these Cold War kind of things, this nuclear missile races, and the US government really understood that they needed to evolve or they'd be left behind and and the technology would outpace them or US as a country. Um. And as time has gone on, you know, the government certainly has begun to employ its own scientists. And we know, you know from conversations we've had on the show that when you're a scientist and you're working in government or with government, like we're talking about with the with the CIA and the space program, right, being sort of a front for the c i A. You have to kind of make some sacrifices sometimes in the name of continuing to get funded. So I imagine this could happen in this situation too. And if you are constantly being outspoken and criticizing the people who are paying you, I imagine that you might not be long for this world. And that seems like that's what happened here. And here's my theory. Guys, the group of just a holes saying only negative stuff. That's there, you go, it's just no yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's it, saying only negative stuff. Though. We gotta fire with these theories. Man. Well, so I think this is my theory. Uh. We know, the Pentagon and DARPA and you know, the groups that were working together on research and development are getting into some just highly technical stuff that maybe a little out of the range of some of the military expertise there when you're thinking about artificial intelligence and quantum computing, some of these things that are so at the edges of research and development and science in general right now. Uh, you know, the military is trying to develop stuff specifically for themselves in those realms. I guarantee you that Jason's were like, guys, maybe let's not you know, make make the artificial intelligence uh capable of killing things and dropping bombs and deciding when those things happen. And you know, I bet you there's a bunch of negative feedback on some of these pretty terrifying things that perhaps the military is attempting to produce or wants to produce in you know, the decade, in the next decade or so, and they're like, yeah, we actually need we need people to be on board. I don't that's my theory. That's just Matt Frederick. Well. Also, um, some degree of autonomy is desirable in think tanks, you know, and there are a lot of very powerful think tanks that people don't really dig into. RAND would be another one, the Rand's Corporation, uh, And there's nothing wrong with searching out that expertise. I believe that DARPA actually parted ways with the Jason's when they got in a fight over adding new members. Apparently one part of the autonomy of the Jason's was that the new members would be selected by existing members, and DARPA wanted to put some of their own people in there, so so they're there they've got their boundaries. Yeah. Interesting on a couple of levels, they are definitely still around UM. And then one of the big things that they're doing is publishing advisory you know, can the kind of consulting UM white papers, I guess, you know on things like climate change. There's actually a really excellent article in The Guardian called sixty years of Climate Change Warnings the Signs that were missed and ignored by Alice bell Uh and it refers to he's done by by the Jason's that they're continuing to UM talk about ways that we can mitigate some of these things that were missed. I'd love to do this as a as a full episode. I think stuff I've found is pretty fascinating the same Yeah, Yeah, we both found some great suff One thing that I thought was really interesting is there's a fun line just the wording in and of itself is great UM in the Science mag article that we talked about, and it talks about the pay that these scientists received and it says I'm just gonna quote it because it's very delightful. It says they're reportedly paid twelve dollars per day, a goodly amount, but less than what many of them could make as industry consultants. Not no, it is not, that's right. But the thing is, um, you know, because of their association with the government. Not only are they making less money than they could be if they just went fully independent and did their own consulting work as individuals, um, but a lot of the study ease that they do and they are commissioned by the government around of them end up remaining classified. Um. It's also why the identities of the members, aside from a few historical ones we know, uh like I believe her name was Claire Max the astronomer, are kept under wraps and according to the Science mac article six of the seventeen Jason's at the time of this piece, uh would we're not would not comment, would not do interviews because they just don't want to be I guess um it was the term compromised new theory. The Jason's is completely made up of Russell Hemley and various sock puppet accounts that he runs. Uh. Counter theory, Matt is the Jason's. Oh my god, this is just the Kaiser Soze. Is this the Kaiser SoSE moment of this episode? Like where I look at the look at the wall and just see all of the things that Matt has been using to assemble his theories. Um, you're brilliant, Matt, You brilliant bastard. You know what I would give to get paid twelve What was it a day? Yeah? Yeah, just to just to sit around and save the save the world. Uh. We definitely should look into more about the Jason's for a future episode. So thank you Francis Bacon, lettuce and or tomato a very underrated sandwich by the way, UM for hipping us to the Jason's. Are gonnake a quick sponsor break and we'll be back with more listener mail. And we're back, and we're going to jump right into a voicemail left by list person. I'll tell you their nickname after Hey, Matt. Then no super producers or multiple names. Um, just got listening to the Big Hole listener mail episode. I thought it was rather interesting. Um you yeah for ustion to use my voice or play whatever you want to get ship. Um, here's the thing. I live in place, and we have a pretty substantial coast guard here and crazy. But if you weren't a hide like keep it low key, you know, here's an idea once he's put it in an old Walmart, like not even kidding people have they have to live here for their whole life and have never known that in an old Walmart there is no age sixty helicopters fully armed parked in a pharmacy. He blows your mind. I mean, we had to do some work mixing gates or something warm. We got sub contracted to do it. We went in there and of course can't take pictures, but we can talk about it. And you know, all they did was just keep everything low key. They have guards, there's no nothing, there's an event, there's not thing, and it's amazing. But I mean there's actually a chunk of it cut out and and rented like a harbor freak, and you wouldn't believe what's inside there. It's bizarre to go into Walmart and all the pucherman of Walmarts still on the walls, you know, and there's still a pharmacy and it's still has everything intact Walmart floors and everything, and there happens to be an hpet helicopter. Anyway, Just remember, guys, seeking stuff is everywhere. We just we just don't know. And the best way to keep us. Okay, put it somewhere no one't expects anyway. Oh and we also have one of those crazy phone buildings with no windows in our town and it's kind of thirty dollars people A see you guys. Uh yeah, so Walbart's selling helicopters. Not surprised, We'll see that's what I's Yes, So I I called this per person who wishes that I refer to him as dad Joke sixty nine and that it's like writing the line of a dad joke in a dirty joke. And I think that's what he likes about it. Those are called daddy jokes. Oh maybe maybe it's daddy joke. Okay, okay, okay, so dad joke. He had a logic behind this, right uh there, yeah there, Well, there's a lot to talk about. We had a pretty great conversation. He does contract work for metalworking, and uh he has gone into this specific location before. Now we're taking his word for what this place is, what's in there in all of the details, because there's not information that you can find online anywhere that specifically pertains to this old Walmart to what's inside it. Uh there, But there are bread crumbs that we can follow. So that's really what we're gonna do here, if that's okay with you guys. Oh, this is amazing and and thank you Dad Joe. This is uh, this is true. It's it's not something that has a web presence documented other than honestly, man, you're called to us in your conversation. This has a lot of echoes of Jade Helm. I'm not mistaken just throwing that out there. It seems like that on the surface. What I'll say is that I think there's a simpler explanation here, and I I'm not gonna give a lot of details away, but I'm gonna leave these bread crumbs and we're gonna talk about that very thing you just mentioned. Okay, So the place where he lives, there are thirty thousand, roughly residents people that live in this town. It's in North Carolina. There is a substantial Coast Guard presence there. I'm not gonna say the name of the town, but if you're really interested and you want to look it up right now, Uh, this is the place from where Hales and Dad Joke sixty nine actually went to the same high school as and they were very close in age. There pretty cool right. Um? Um, so this this place, this specific location, I looked at it on Google Maps. You can actually find it. It is indeed an old walmart And if you look at the satellite imagery on Google Maps, you can see a truck backing up into the loading bay area and it is very very close to a high school. Um. The reason why this is weird is because he said H sixty helicopters. Are you guys familiar with what those are? I was not there? Are they? Are they black Hawks? Yes? That is one of the versions of the H six helicopter, the as well known the black Hawk. Yeah, so, I mean, if you can picture it, it's the type you see and like, say, you know any traditional war movie where you've got the side door that slides open and you've got gunner seats there, and it's like meant to transport a small, uh group of troops, you know, and when you're in a conflict zone. Ye, yeah sure. And and they also have versions that are specifically used by the Navy. They have a different name to them. The Coastguard has versions of this that they use. You've seen likely images or video of the Coastguard going in for rescue using one of these helicopters in H sixty, just again a modified version that doesn't have the heavy weaponry. There's medical evac versions as well, and things like that exactly. Ones that lay mines like helicopters are around because they still have a ton of uses there. The utility vehicles, you're very nimble and they can maneuver much more easily in land, much more flexibly. I think the aircraft's amazing technology. But what are they doing in a Walmart now? Well? Okay, so according to Dad Joke, these ares Sikorski H sixties that were at one point owned by the Navy that were then purchased by the Coastguard. Much in the same way a surplus situation that we've discussed before, almost like Jade Hellman in some ways, where it's attempting to sell off surplus equipment heavy equipment in this case to another organization or you know, like a local law enforcement or in this case the Coast Guard. Um. The weird thing is that in that call, Dad Jokes says, there's one in there on our When I talked to him, he said, oh, there are there's eight or or a dozen. If if you looked, if you looked in this old Walmart. You would just see these decked out helicopter there's with fifty cow weapons on them. Like we're talking the large weapons that a black Hawk would have, or perhaps a one of the Seahawks that the Navy uses. UM. And they're just sitting here and it's literally across the road from a high school, and nobody knows that these helicopters are in this thing? Was this Should we be talking about this? Guys? Yeah? I was gonna say nobody did know. And for anyone that's yelling at the radio about with the w tf is jade Helm? Just a quick reminder, it was some military maneuvers, some training that were done on private property in a civilian area in a disused Walmart, UM, which is I think the only reason I think we all heard the connection there. Yeah, it was a huge thing that they are. They're actually selling arms as well. Right, it was always like an expo when it when this occurred, we did um an episode for I believe that jade Helm update. Uh do check that out for more information is tied into other reports, typically ones that allege that Uncle Sam is preparing to wage war on its own. For in one way or another towards one group or another. You'll often see. Another example of this would be reports of FEMA creating tons and tons of coffins and shipping them off in preparation for something some sort of martial law situation. Right, it's a martial law related belief system, and there there are some crazy things. You know, you are likely living more closely to military infrastructure than you think if you live in the United States. I I couldn't agree more. And according to Dad Joke, this building itself isn't owned by Walmart. It is in fact a Coast Guard or the majority of that large building is owned by the Coast Guard. In is a warehouse. And if you go on Google Maps and actually says that you click on it, it says Coastguard warehouse. Actually says something like Coastguard base, I think if you click on it. But then in the comments people are like, no, this isn't the base. This is just a warehouse. And you can find the Coastguard base which is just down the way by the little airport that's there. It was so fun talking to this person to Dad Joke because he was just making such a I don't know, it's just almost a joke to him. He's like, yeah, man, it's crazy, like there's all these this serious equipment right there. Nobody knows it's there. And we both felt it was very odd that these these helicopters weren't kept on the Coastguard base, which is not that far away, and if you look at it, you know, from the top down, there's a ton of space over there. You could easily put him down there, unless you were hiding them for some reason. Yeah, and then they're also you know, there are things that could be done to render them unfliable or unusable that might not be readily apparent. They do, he said, they always take the propellers off. Yeah, okay, Yeah, so you wouldn't want to try to take one in a hurry because you have some assembly required, like idea. But also I'm wondering too, how many people in that area would know how to fly one. Well, the Coastguard folks, I bet there's just quite a few over there, That's what I'm saying. It's not like a car that could get stolen. M hm. You know, you helicopter specific guy on your highst team, just like an a team, he's the chopper pilots in that crew scenario really really quickly. I just wanted to double back to the jade Holme thing. Um, it was a series of training exercises, um that we're taking place in civilian areas. The Walmart part of it was part of a big group of conspiracy theories not confirmed. There were a bunch of Walmart closings that took place around this and there were theories that they were directly caused by the using them as some sort of base or some sort of um hub, you know, for this martial law takeover that year that we're talking about, but it wasn't confirmed. Yes, But ultimately jade Helm fifteen was a military exercise and weapons sales opportunity, well also information war warfare opportunity. That's how I would That's how I would classify in retrospect. But what I like about this story Dad, Joke and Matt is that this, first off, this is clearly a true event. Uh. Secondly, it reminds us of the interaction between public and private entities, Like the military buys up a ton of private stuff forget every year, every month in our own home base of Atlanta, Georgia, quite large military installation was actually sold to a filmmaker of note, Tyler Perry, so it became a film studio. This kind of stuff happens. Uh, it's a way streets, so it's not with that context, it's maybe not so surprising that these copts are housed or warehouse literally in a former Walmart. But it is surprising that everything seems, as you said, Dad jokes so low key about the parting quote. One of the parting quotes from Dad joke was, you think you've got it all figured out, the government's all these powerful people hiding all these secrets. Then you just realize it's a bunch of local guys and they put all their stuff in the old walmart. Just thought that was fun. Well, we're running up on time here, guys. But I just wanted to know a couple of other things about this place. Right up the way, a little north north east of here, like very close is the Academy training facilities. You may recognize Academy the folks that were once Blackwater and x E and all these other things. And I all live with it. I instead of why I don't know that I messed up And I said, oh wait, ACADEMI and he's like, you mean Academy. I was like, yep, sorry, yep, Academy. That's it. Well, you know that honestly, Um, I was often saying Academi because I wanted to separate it from Academy. So I got it. I think we both did that. Really Near perfect film series? Would ever get involved with Near Perfect? Okay? Agreed to disagree. Oh you know who would have been great for this episode? Who's that dude that makes the helicopter sounds? Michael Yeah, Winslow right from the Police Academy movies. Dang, he would have been perfect for this police Indeed Man, which is your favorite Police Academy movie number number four. Yeah, for incredibly profound reasons, which we will leave to the imagination. We will leave to the imagination. Check out Rotten Tomatoes rating. That's that's all you need to know about that and other masterworks such as Jeff Goldbloom's vibes. I'm sorry, Matt as you always vibes the last things. The last things. Um dad joke says, never ever take Assessna plane or like a small plane. He said, never do it, and I mentioned, yeah, you know, we hear a lot about when planes crash it's like those single engine sometimes twin engine smaller planes. And he's like, I'm telling you, I have done work on these small planes where I am just welding the most crucial parts of these planes and they just go and fly. And I swear to you I'm doing great work, but I'm just welding these really important components and scares the crap out of me knowing somebody's gonna fly it. Um. Just something to think about. And the last thing here is that dad Joke has come upon and expired not I guess a vial or a bottle of one of the COVID vaccinations that he's got. He was he was given to him because it's expired and they were going to throw it away. So he was just like, well, can I just have it? And they gave it to him. He wants to send it to us so we can, you know, study it further in the future when we find out I guess about something, but the vaccines, I don't know. Just look out for that. Guys. If if you get a weird package in the mail and it's a vial, that's that's all I'm saying. One person is weird, it's another person's Wednesday, Matt, you know, well, hey, consider this our Wednesday or Tuesday. But yeah, all right, that's it, and we're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back with more listener mail. And we have returned for one last act in our weekly Listener Male segment. We are not returning on our lonesome. We are joined by Andrew, who wrote an email about something we've alluded to in the past. Here's what he said. Andrew said, Hey, realist, I can't be the only one who went into a full existential crisis when they found the word malungeon next to an ancestor's name. Here we go. Being of a family who left Kentucky for Illinois in the late eighteen hundreds, I had never heard a single thing about my Luncheon's and was never given any explanation for our family's distinctive look beyond a vague Cherokee princess in our past. Yours had already been one of my favorite podcasts for a couple of years when Quarantine sent me onto a journey into my past. Imagine my surprise when I saw Maluncheon and Ben's bio. I am feeling pretty lost in the weeds. With all of the new information coming at me, I'd love to hear more about the mysteries of these people and was wondering if you've done an episode or would consider doing one in the future. Thanks for reading. I'm anxious to hear more, Andrew Proud the Lungeon Roma. It's a good question, Andrew, Um. This is a story that's close to my personal experience, as Matt and Noel are well aware, I do come from a historically a Maluncheon family and this word, this concept is filled with all sorts of fascinating legends, if untrue, fascinating and what I'd like to do, what I'd like to do for you today, Andrew, is tell you the legend as I heard it growing up, and then tell you the truth or what is the current accepted science, and then maybe explore a little bit of how how the this story became so confusing through his Jory's pal obsessed for the game of telephone and Noel Matt, I apologize to you guys because you have heard this story before when we've been hanging out off air. I'm excited about this. We also made a TV show about this Ben Treasure, right, that's right. It was not our original choice. It was not our first choice. Wasn't Elvis a malungeon or in some some way connected with that group. So there's speculation that Elvis is uh. One of his parents, his mother specifically, was a ma Luncheon, that Abraham Lincoln had some sort of connection. The thing about this is a lot of it's based on legend, but there is there is a true story, and the Luncheons are a real part of the world here in the United States. So the stories I heard it dot, could we get like a corny once upon a time queue? Perfect? Thank you all right? So, as I heard it way way back in the day, when Europeans were first going into the hinterlands of the Appalachian Mountains, they encountered people they had never seen before. These people had darker skin, but they seem to have European facial features. They lived in long houses, communal living quarters, and they, surprised, seemed to speak some incredibly antiquated version of English. Who are you? People said the Europeans, Uh, We're We're uh, We've just always been here. Why they're like, well, because if you are Native American, that's not the word they would use at the time, but they said, if you're Native American, you have to g t f O when you get out. This is our place now. And they said, oh, no, we're not uh no, we're um. And they looked around and they were kind of thinking, like what else could we be? What else do you have? And they said, right mel Lune, No, not not yet, they're not at that point yet. They say, oh, we're We're Roma, you know, that's that's that's what we are. And so fast forward, however, many years, however, many decades, Europeans returned to this isolated area and they say, hey, did you all say you were Roma? And they're like, well, what happens if we're Roma? And they say, well, if you're Roma, g t FO you gotta get out. They're like, oh no, we're something, we're uh something else. And so from that's the stories I heard it, and from that for centuries, people have been trying to guess what these people were, some of the first free people of color legally in the US uh and the subject of all sorts of legends, many of which you probably wouldn't hear outside of Hancock County, East Tennessee, where historically they're based so Andrew. The the answer is that Melungeons, as a group, or as a name for many other similar groups, Melengs are real thing. Today we would call this group tri racial isolate. The DNA mixture is from Native American populations, people from Sub Saharan Africa, and Europeans. So this all kind of mixed together. And as far as experts can pinpoint, it began in Wise, Virginia or somewhere thereabouts around the sixteen hundreds. That's where they think the population originated. But still, you know, science, science has a hard time going up against legends and tradition. So over the centuries, Millungeans have been associated with things like hidden treasure, which uh, which I wish we could find, don't don't get me wrong, I hope we find it. Uh. And then the allegations extraordinary powers or occult covenants, things like that. Those were things that people really believe. But I want to ask you. I want to ask you, guys, Noel Matt, had you ever heard of this term before we met? No? No, I haven't. No. Yeah, it was something that I was learning. I've learned about honestly, but through through you. And then I think we've done. We've done some episodes about it in the past that explored it a little bit more, you know, deeply. But um, it's definitely not something that was ever on my radar. So I thank you for that, Ben, just so you know, personally been for me. It's a term I I guarantee you I had seen before, but not until we had a conversation about it did I begin noticing it where I had that effect where now I see the word when it when it's in an article or something, and I now I recognize it. I guess if that makes sense. I didn't know what the word melungeon meant until we talked about it and I learned about Silverado and the lost silver of the Appalachians. That part wasn't us folks. But but yeah, so so yeah, Without going into some autobiography or personal life monologue, let's let's take a look at the larger issue here. There there is a ton of folklore associated with this. Um, the typical description, the historical description of what would qualify as a ma luncheon. Uh, You're not going to see a lot of people like that in Tennessee today unless you're in very specific, isolated pockets of eastern Tennessee. You'll see people who have last names, surnames associated with Malungeon's, and you'll see some Malungeon traits. But because of the way this group has been defined over time and the way in which it tried to work within the United States, they've been largely assimilated. So it's not like it's not like you're gonna drive past some railroad tracks and then all of a sudden have somebody say next to you in a hushed whisper, we're in Maluncheon nown No, it's it's it's not that extreme. But the bigger question is one of the history of North America because what we are often taught in this country is relatively sanitized or it has its own agenda that it is pushing. That has historically been the case, and what we see when we look at actual history is that the narrative is rarely as clear cut as a textbook. Uh. The way that the story or the idea of a Malungian community Melnian communities, I should say, the way it got muddied is pretty interesting because it became a catch all term for people who would now be described as, you know, members of a tri racial isolate community, and that means that there may be people who have nothing to do with East Tennessee who identify themselves as malungeons or historically the community in which they lived identified them as such. And this is I think this is fascinating because it proves that there is still a lot of historical mysteries on this continent. It doesn't stop at what Croaton that's how you say it, No, for sure, then I was looking just at what you're talking about. There, the the history, even the word that's used, and like what it means and why it's why it's used. I was looking at the book Children of Perdition from Tim Hashaw. I think that's how you say his name. Um. You can definitely see where there was a there was a lot of prejudice and racism around Um, centered around malungeons and the population at the time. Yeah, yeah, that's true, and there are you can easily search the internet and see historical pictures of this. There are also works of fiction. They're also plays. Notably there there's one play, most notably a play called Beyond the Sunset, which came out in the late sixties. I want to say this, this conversation is important because for a long time, in my family and extended community, the question of origin was a matter of which legend a person preferred. And as the United States went through its trials and tribulations, the narratives of these people also changed in step with that. It was until the emergence of better genealogical tools that more people were able to trace this sort of this sort of lineage or this sort of family history. And we have one example in the stuff they don't want you to know, family of someone who did take uh, did take a DNA test, and that's our very own Noel Brown. And we've talked about this a little bit in the past, Noal, But I think you were you were a little surprised by your results. Well, I was surprised, and that I was kind of underwhelmed. Um, I was just kind of like it was just kind of like a big swath of like basic Nordic kind of uh you know, heritage, um, without much super interesting um you know connectivity. But I did find out that there's like another step you can do, or you can take those results and get them further analyzed that give you a little bit more of a sexy breakdown in terms of like specifics. But yeah, the the out of the box um results were a little bit man man, for that's a that's a steel weren't there early DNA test something like you are from Earth that will be five dollars, probably from one of the continents. Yeah, but thanks for your right here. Yeah, we'll give you right here. So uh In in real terms, Andrew, what this means is that people who are from families that have been historically identified as maluncheon will often not physically resemble the malungeons who would see in an historical search. And people like this are not alone. A ton of people in the US have more to their family tree, you know, than they would guess. And I'll say, honestly, a lot of people have stuff in their family tree that would unpleasantly surprise them. Because history is a very very long thing, right, and we're just the newest part of it. So what does this mean today and what does this mean for you? Well, this means that you have an entirely new book or chapter in the story of everything that led to you writing to us and hearing this podcast. Now, if you want to learn more about the current malungeon community, which is still active, that, and if you have Facebook that I would recommend checking out several Facebook pages. You can find them pretty easily. It's a bunch of people sharing genealogical information up to and including some of their DNA info. That last part I would be mindful of, but it is up to you, and I would love to hear back from you. We'd also love to hear I personally would love to hear from more people who are historically part of a tri racial isolate community, because these are stories that don't often make it to the mainstream because it might not be a huge community of people, or it may be a group of people who are historically disadvantaged and kind of ignored by the mainstream. So if you have a story like that, I would love to hear it. If your Walmart is housing helicopters or something that you don't think of Walmart pharmacy would normally sell, we'd love to hear it. And if you are one of the Jason's, would also love to hear from you. You don't have to be one of the elite scientists Jason's. You could just be Adjason, Oh yeah, a Jason and Steve or whatever you might be. 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