American Hysteria

Mall Santas pt. 1 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

15 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For this two-part holiday special, I tell Sarah Marshall all about the history of the American mall Santa Claus from the 1800s into the present day. F...

Three or More Is a Riot with Jelani Cobb

08 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Jelani Cobb is the Dean of Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism and the author of the new book Three or More Is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here...

The Rocky Horror Picture Show with 'This Ends At Prom'

01 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In honor of my favorite movie's 50th anniversary, I wanted to share an episode about The Rocky Horror Picture Show with all of you unconventional conv...

Listen Now: American Scandal | The West Memphis Three

26 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On May 5, 1993, three 8-year-old boys were brutally murdered in West Memphis, Arkansas. The tiny local police department launches an investigation but...

THE MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE (rewind)

24 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Brace yourselves, we are marching along with the Macy's Parade to learn about the chaos energy that has always animated this cultural institution, fro...

The Devil We Know with Sarah Marshall

17 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Marshall of You're Wrong About joins me to wade back into the tall tales that devil-spawned the friendship we have today. In honor of her brand ...

Disneyland’s Disastrous Opening Day with Riley Swedelius-Smith and Miranda Zickler

10 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Our associate producer (and my brother) Riley Swedelius-Smith is here to tell our producer Miranda Zickler and me about the chaotic opening day of The...

Bot Farms and the Troll Toll with Perry Carpenter

03 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever wondered if the person you are arguing with in a social media comment section is really a person at all? Perry Carpenter is a cybersecur...

BLOODY MARY

27 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Bloody Mary...Bloody Mary...Bloody Mary...For our Halloween special, we are going to trace the history of the slumber party ritual known as Bloody Mar...

Spontaneous Human Combustion with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

20 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Marshall is here to teach me about the confounding phenomenon of Spontaneous Human Combustion in which a person is found almost totally incinera...

12 Ft Skeleton (rewind)

13 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is a rerelease of our 2023 Halloween special about the 12 Ft Skeleton Halloween craze and the strange history of our relationship to skeletons, b...

Horror Movie Curses with 'What Went Wrong' Podcast

05 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What Went Wrong hosts Chris Winterbauer and Lizzie Bassett join me to tell the stories of three allegedly cursed horror movies and the unexplained eve...

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark with Liz "Cosbrarian" Gotauco

29 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For this episode, I get schooled on the history of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, the children's horror book series that terrified 80s and 90s kid...

The Kennedy Curse with George Civeris

22 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

George Civeris is the host of the comedy podcast Straightiolab as well as a new podcast called United States of Kennedy that explores our cultural fas...

Houdini's Afterlife with Sarah Marshall and Tim Harford

15 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tim Harford is the host of the podcast Cautionary Tales which recently put out a series on the most famous magician of all time, Harry Houdini. For th...

#Elsagate (rewind)

08 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is a rerelease of our 2021 episode. In 2017, YouTube Kids was embroiled in a major scandal when it was discovered that a dark underbelly of inapp...

Introducing: Conspiracy Theories, Cults, and Crimes

05 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

From Jonestown to Heaven’s Gate, to the Octopus Murders and the Waco Siege, the world is full of deception, manipulation, and destruction. Listen to...

The Disturbing World of Mobile Game Ads with 'Panic World' Podcast

01 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Warning: REALLY WEIRD EPISODE. On social media and YouTube, bizarre, shocking, disgusting, creepy, and confusing animated ads for simple mobile games ...

Dear Chelsey and Ask Sarah Marshall

25 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the spirit of American advice columnists Dear Abby and Ann Landers, I am joined by Sarah Marshall of the podcast You’re Wrong About to give our o...

DEAR ABBY AND ANN LANDERS

18 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Ann Landers and Abigail Van Buren, also known as Dear Abby, were newspaper advice columnists answering questions and printing statements from their 10...

Titanic in Real Time

11 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is a bonus episode from our subscribers-only podcast Hysteria Home Companion. Our associate producer (and my brother) Riley Swedelius-Smith is h...

Polybius: The Arcade Conspiracy

04 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is a bonus episode from our subscribers-only podcast Hysteria Home Companion. I share the history of an 80s urban legend with our producer Mirand...

Not Just a Phase: Goths Through History with Christine Laskowski

28 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Christine Laskowski shares her research into how an ancient barbarian people known as the Goths came to represent everything from edgy Hot Topic fashi...

The Imaginary Gods of ChatGPT with Journalist Miles Klee

21 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Miles Klee is the author of a recent Rolling Stone article titled People Are Losing Loved Ones to AI-Fueled Spiritual Fantasies which tells the storie...

The FBI's White Christian Nation with Lerone A. Martin

14 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Lerone A. Martin is the author of The Gospel of J. Edgar Hoover: How the FBI Aided and Abetted the Rise of White Christian Nationalism . For this epis...

Listen Now: American Scandal

08 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Every scandal begins with a lie. But the truth will come out. And then comes the fallout and the outrage. Scandals have shaped America since its foun...

Staring at the Sun on LSD with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

07 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever heard the urban legend about the group of hippie college students that went blind while staring at the sun during an LSD trip? This tale...

The Call is Coming From Inside the House with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

30 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You've probably heard the urban legend called the Babysitter and the Man Upstairs or at least know the idiom it inspired: “The call is coming from i...

THE HIPPIE BABYSITTER BABY ROAST

23 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Have you ever heard the urban legend about the babysitter who takes LSD and accidentally bakes a baby in the oven believing it to be a raw turkey? For...

Context Clues: Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's High

16 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This episode will give some extra context for our upcoming urban legend episodes: The Hippie Babysitter and the Baby Roast, The Babysitter and the Ma...

GENDER REVEAL PARTIES: Pride Rewind

09 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Happy Pride month to all who observe! This is a rerelease of one of our favorite episodes. Over the last ten years, Gender Reveal Parties have explode...

The Last Prison Rodeo with Journalist Adam Mahoney

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Since 1965, the Louisiana State Penitentiary, also known as Angola, has held an incredibly popular public event known as the Prison Rodeo where incarc...

Mayhem! at the Minecraft Movie with BJ Colangelo

26 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Over the last couple months, groups of Minecraft fans have been making TikTok videos of themselves wrecking havoc in theaters across the nation when t...

Lost Boy Larry with Producer Miranda Zickler

19 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1973, mysterious communications from a young boy came over CB radios in the Southwest, leading to a massive search and rescue mission that generate...

BALLOON BOY

12 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2009, the news reported live as a six-year-old boy careened through the air at 7,000 feet trapped inside a homemade balloon craft. Millions tuned i...

New Context: Gang Accusations and Initiations

05 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Right now we are seeing accusations of gang associations used to to justify abducting immigrants off the street and sending them to either US detentio...

Hoax Diary Spectacular with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Marshall takes me on a journey through two possible historical literary deceptions and asks me to try to figure out what is real, what is fake, ...

The Runaway Nun Hoax pt. 2 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

21 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

*Please listen to part one of our series first.* 'The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk' was an 1800s true crime memoir about the horrors a runaway nun ...

The Runaway Nun Hoax pt. 1 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

14 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

'The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk' was an 1800s true crime memoir about the horrors a runaway nun claimed to have suffered while living among debau...

Luxury Doomsday with 'This is Propaganda'

07 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The hottest new (and embarrassing) trend in the billionaire bubble is luxury doomsday shelters, wildly expensive bunkers that the ultra-rich believe w...

Hoax Spectacular! with You're Wrong About

31 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is a very special episode I did last year with the podcast You’re Wrong About in which Sarah Marshall and I swapped stories about some of our f...

Burlesque This Mess with Comic Stripper Woody Shticks

24 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Woody Shticks is a comic stripper and burlesque performer as well as the director, production manager, and co-star of our recent live stage show with ...

THONGS

17 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Exposed thongs were all the rage in the early 2000s thanks to a handful of massive pop cultural moments, but as the craze reached the mainstream marke...

Context Clues: Let Me See That Thong

10 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Thongs and the battles waged on their backs will be the focus of our upcoming episode. This collection of excerpts from previous episodes will provide...

Erasing History with Philosopher Jason Stanley

03 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

American philosopher Jason Stanley is the author of Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future. For this episode, Jason help...

David Lynch's Mulholland Drive with 'You Are Good' Podcast

24 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

RIP David Lynch, beloved director and otherworldly weirdo. The You Are Good feelings podcast about movies graciously invited me to talk about one of t...

Invasion of the Drones with Podcaster Gabe Lenners

17 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Gabe Lenners is the host of the new podcast Obscurum: Invasion of the Drones, which explores a mysterious wave of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena tha...

THE JERSEY DEVIL

10 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This Urban Legends Hotline episode features listener Brandon's inquiry about the legend of the Jersey Devil, a cryptid that has haunted the Pine Barre...

Context Clues: The Devil Went Down to Jersey

03 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The famous cryptid known as the Jersey Devil will be the focus of our upcoming Urban Legends Hotline investigation. This episode will provide some con...

You Just Lost The Game with 'Spirits' Podcast

27 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Julia Schifini and Amanda McLoughlin are the hosts of the podcast Spirits, a history and comedy show focused on mythology, folklore, and urban legends...

Chicken Soup for the Soul pt. 2 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

20 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Marshall and I are back for a second helping of Chicken Soup for the Soul, the 1993 best-selling collection of "inspirational" and "true" storie...

Chicken Soup for the Soul pt. 1 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

13 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Many of you will remember the 1993 best-selling book of inspirational stories, Chicken Soup for the Soul, and its bite-sized, sappy triumphs of the hu...

(Throwback) An Irresistible Movement with Reproductive Justice Activist Loretta J. Ross

06 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Since the 1970s, Loretta J. Ross has been an instrumental activist in the fight for 'Reproductive Justice', a framework she and her colleagues created...

In Pursuit of Pardons with Podcaster Shannon Lynch of 'The Alley: DC’s 8th and H Case'

30 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Shannon Lynch is the host of the podcast The Alley: DC’s 8th and H Case, a detailed look at the 1984 murder of DC resident Catherine Fuller and the ...

(Throwback) The Horror of Hallmark with Podcasters Sarah Marshall and Alex Steed of 'You Are Good'

23 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Because so many Hallmark writers and directors also make horror movies, I called in podcasters Sarah Marshall and Alex Steed of 'You're Wrong About' a...

Beyond Belief: Fiction or Fiction with Guide to the Unknown Podcast

16 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Remember the late '90s mystery show Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction? where you had to figure out which stories were true and which were fake? For this...

The Great Glawackus Hoax with Pat and Val of Connecticut Cryptids

09 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Patrick Scalisi and Valerie Ruby-Omen are the creators of the 2023 book Connecticut Cryptids: A Field Guide to the Weird and Wonderful Creatures of th...

The Donner Party with 'You're Wrong About'

02 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is a special episode I did for the podcast 'You're Wrong About' in 2022, and I wanted to finally bring it to you directly since the deep snowfall...

THE MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE

26 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For the 100th anniversary of the Macy's Parade, we are looking at the chaos energy that has always animated this cultural institution, from its explos...

Context Clues: All the World Loves a Parade

18 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This episode will give some context for our upcoming episode about the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, its unbelievable chaotic origins and its totall...

Artificial Unintelligence with Perry Carpenter

11 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Perry Carpenter is the author of the new book FAIK: A Practical Guide to Living in a World of Deepfakes, Disinformation, and AI-Generated Deceptions. ...

Falling for Fascism (re-release)

04 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This episode was originally released right before the 2020 presidential election and is even more relevant as we face the 2024 election. Political phi...

BURIED ALIVE!

28 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the 19th century, America and Europe experienced a panic over premature burial, believing that anyone could be accidentally declared dead and entom...

Context Clues: Grave Mistakes

21 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

'Buried Alive,' our upcoming Halloween special, looks at the American fear and fascination with premature burial. We'll explore the panic that swept t...

A MASSIVE SEANCE Live Show Tour with YOU'RE WRONG ABOUT

18 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

What could possibly go wrong when two skeptical podcasters try to summon a ghost? Join Sarah Marshall of You're Wrong About and Chelsey Weber-Smith of...

I Was a Teenage Poltergeist with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

14 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Today Sarah Marshall transports us to the old world of British Hysteria to reveal the mysterious story of the Enfield Poltergeist and joins me at the ...

SKIBIDI TOILET

07 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Generation Alpha has made the uncanny, creepy, and chaotic YouTube series 'Skibidi Toilet' into a viral YouTube sensation, so much so that a famous di...

Context Clues: Brr Skibidi Dop Dop Dop Yes Yes

30 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Our upcoming episode is about the massively successful and deeply uncanny YouTube series Skibidi Toilet, the first content that Generation Alpha's inf...

The Untold History of the NYPD with Chenjerai Kumanyika of Empire City

23 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Dr. Chenjerai Kumanyika is a Peabody Award-winning audio journalist and an assistant professor of journalism at New York University. His latest podcas...

Taylor Swift Decoded with Pop Music Journalist Brittany Spanos

09 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Brittany Spanos is a senior writer for Rolling Stone Magazine who has taught a course at NYU called Topics in Recorded Music: Taylor Swift, which anal...

ELVIS IS ALIVE!

02 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The life of the conspiracy theory that claims Elvis Presley faked his death is an almost unbelievable journey through gimmick-crazy hucksters and true...

Context Clues: The King is Dead Probably

26 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The idea that Elvis Presley did not die in August of 1977, that he instead faked his death, has become one of the most famous and enduring conspiracy ...

The Disney Gimmick That Conjured a Ghost with Jim Perry of Euphomet

12 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Our paranormal correspondent Jim Perry is back to tell us about his recent ghost hunt inside the Queen Mary ship, where he discovered that Walt Disney...

Tarantism: Dancing Mania pt. 2 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

05 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For part two of our series, we are returning to the phenomenon called 'Tarantism' that began in the Middle Ages in southern Italy where the bite of a ...

Tarantism: Dancing Mania pt. 1 with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

29 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The phenomenon called 'Tarantism' began in the Middle Ages in southern Italy where the bite of a local spider caused bizarre symptoms almost like that...

Spider Slander: Confronting the Myths with Expert Rod Crawford

22 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Rod Crawford is the curator of the arachnids and related research collections at Seattle’s Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture. His website...

THE AVERAGE PERSON SWALLOWS EIGHT SPIDERS A YEAR IN THEIR SLEEP

15 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For this Urban Legends Hotline episode, we are dissecting the myth that the average person swallows a certain number of spiders in their sleep by foll...

Rewind: BELIEVING IN THE BLAIR WITCH (Updated!)

24 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is an update on the new developments surrounding one of my favorite movies of all time, The Blair Witch Project, paired with our 2019 minisode. W...

Pretendians: Indigenous Identity Fraud with Robert Jago and Angel Ellis

17 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For this episode, the hosts of the new podcast Pretendians, Robert Jago and Angel Ellis, explain Indigenous Identity Fraud, the phenomenon of scam art...

A Terrorist Attack on the Furries with Nicky Woolf

10 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Fur and Loathing is a new investigative podcast from Nicky Woolf about an unsolved 2014 chlorine gas attack on the world’s largest Furry convention,...

Long Live the Ray Cat with Emperor X and Matt Kielty

20 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Reporter and Radiolab producer Matthew Kielty and musician Chad Matheny (AKA Emperor X) were both part of a 2014 episode of the 99% Invisible podcast ...

TALKING TO THE FUTURE: NUCLEAR SEMIOTICS

13 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How do we warn people 10,000 years in the future about nuclear waste sites that will remain extremely dangerous for longer than human civilization has...

Context Clues: Going Nuclear

06 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For some context for our upcoming series that we have not yet revealed, we will revisit excerpts from our past episodes: Horror Movies pt. 1, The End ...

Magical Overthinking with Amanda Montell

29 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Amanda Montell is the host of the podcast Sounds Like A Cult as well as the author of the new book The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Ir...

Francine and the Wolves of Wall Street with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

22 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Sarah Marshall joins me to chat about how, in 1968, one unsuspecting young woman’s bustline almost caused a stock market bust when thousands of Wall...

THE SOCIETY FOR INDECENCY TO NAKED ANIMALS

01 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the late 1950s, an organization known as SINA started a campaign with the mission of clothing naked animals for the sake of decency. Today we will ...

When Conspiracies Aren't Just Theories with Journalist Tom Risen

25 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Journalist and author Tom Risen is here to tell me about some of the real conspiracies that the CIA and the FBI were involved in from the 50s to the 7...

Bigfoot's Big Adventure with Author John O'Connor

18 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

John O'Connor is the author of The Secret History of Bigfoot: Field Notes on a North American Monster, a cross-country adventure and investigation int...

GANG INITIATIONS (part two)

04 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For the second part of this Urban Legends Hotline episode, we are continuing to explore various tall tales of ruthless gang initiations from the 1990s...

GANG INITIATIONS (part one)

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

For this Urban Legends Hotline episode, we are answering a listener message about a story of street gangs initiating wannabes with frightening rituals...

Context Clues: Ganging Up

19 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

'Gang Initiations' is the topic of our upcoming series, and this episode will provide extra context using excerpts from three previous episodes—Urba...

Alligators in the Sewer with 'You're Wrong About' [Live at SketchFest]

12 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Live at SF Sketchfest, Sarah Marshall tells me about the urban-legendary alligators in the sewers of New York City. But of course, that's only one of ...

The Paranormal Entertainment Industry with Sapphire Sandalo and Jim Perry

22 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Today I'm joined by paranormal corespondent Jim Perry of the podcast Euphomet and Sapphire Sandalo of the podcast Stories With Sapphire as well as the...

The Indiana Cyclone: America's First Munchausen Case with Sarah Marshall of 'You're Wrong About'

15 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode I tell podcaster Sarah Marshall a truly wild story I uncovered about the first recognized case of Munchausen Syndrome (Factitious Diso...

We Are All Pro Wrestlers with Entertainment Journalist BJ Colangelo

08 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Pop culture correspondent and major Pro Wrestling fan BJ Colangelo and I discuss the quirky history of this manly soap opera, its changing landscape i...

Talking Crap with Historian Wendy Woloson

27 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Author of the book Crap: A History of Cheap Stuff in America, historian Wendy Woloson joins me to discuss the long-time American obsession with pointl...

SEA MONKEYS

18 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The novelty pets known as Sea Monkeys have delighted and disappointed millions of American children since they were first marketed in the early 1960s,...

Hallmark Christmas Movies [rewind]

12 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This is a rerelease of last year's holiday special! Find our new merch at americanhysteria.com/merch They usually go something like this: A cranky car...

The Many Lives of a Carnival Corpse | Subscriber Sneak Peek

27 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This is a story from a recent episode of our exclusive Patreon/Apple + talk show Hysteria Home Companion, where producer Miranda and I take turns shar...

MARILYN MANSON'S RIB REMOVAL

20 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

(explicit content warning) This *Urban Legends Hotline* episode dives deep into the viral myth that 90s shock rocker Marilyn Manson had ribs surgicall...