Medical Mysteries - "Blood Feast"
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What is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries podcast about?
Hey, Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Hey, it's Mr. Ballin here. If you're a fan of The Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, then you should check out my other podcast, Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries. Each week, I dive into some of the most bizarre, mind-bending medical stories you've ever heard. Cases that leave doctors scratching their heads, miraculous recoveries that defy logic, and strange medical mishaps that seem too wild to be real. These stories are more than just eerie. They are a reminder of how unpredictable and sometimes terrifying life can be. Up next is one of my recent favorites from the series. Whether you're new to Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries or a longtime listener, I think you'll find it just as captivating as I did. If you like this content, make sure to follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.
We put out new episodes every week, and each one dives into a bizarre, mind-bending medical mystery that will leave you questioning what you thought you knew about the human body. In 1944, a doctor covered a deceased patient's body with a sheet and then wheeled their stretcher out into the hallway. The morgue at the Oregon State Hospital was already full, so the doctor planned to put this body in the chapel. But when he pushed open the chapel doors, there were already so many stretchers with dead patients with sheets on them inside that there was no room for this patient. The doctor closed the chapel's heavy wooden doors and just stood there, his mind racing. More than 400 patients had fallen violently ill in the past 12 hours, and dozens had died. The doctor had no idea what the cause was, and if he couldn't figure it out, he knew more bodies would be joining the ones already lining the inside of the chapel.
From Ballin Studios and Wondery, I'm Mr. Ballin, and this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery originating from the one place we all can't escape, our own bodies. If you liked today's story, please invite the follow button on an African safari, but before you go, make sure you sneak 27 raw steaks into their backpack.
This week's story is called Blood Feast. It was late in the afternoon on November 18, 1942. A cook named Mickey McKillop opened the lid of a giant metal vat, then asked his volunteer sous chef, 27-year-old George Nosen, to carry it over to an industrial oven. Mickey and George were starting to prepare dinner for almost 500 patients across five wards at the Oregon State Hospital, a public mental facility for psychiatric patients. Tonight's menu was scrambled egg yolks and toast, and Mickey, along with his boss, Mary O'Hare, were the only two cooks on duty. The hospital had been understaffed for a year now, ever since the United States entered World War II. Many members of the nursing staff had left to volunteer for the war effort. During the day, there was about one attendant for every 16 patients, but at night, that number swelled to one attendant for every 150 patients.
Mickey and Mary were so desperate for help in the kitchen that they had started asking trustworthy patients to help them prep for each meal. And one of those trustworthy patients was Mickey's volunteer sous chef, George Nosen. George placed a frozen 16-pound canister of eggs onto the countertop beside the oven. Mickey liked George, and he felt a little sorry for him too. George's parents had originally brought him to the hospital for help with his epilepsy, which is a disorder of the brain characterized by repeated seizures. At this time, people were just beginning to understand how epilepsy actually worked. George's parents most likely saw it as a mental condition, which is why they brought him to the state hospital.
They probably didn't think he was crazy, they just wanted help with getting his seizures under control. But during George's initial evaluation, the staff psychologist would diagnose George with paranoid schizophrenia, and then they had George involuntarily committed for life. Mickey didn't understand how that was possible.
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