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What It Was Like

#116
Language: en Society & Culture
Last Checked: 2025-12-08 06:42:15.832771

I Was Kidnapped By My Stalker and Locked in a Bunker

05 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2022, Samantha Stites was abducted by Christopher Thomas, a man who’d been stalking her for 13 ...

The Man Using Maths to Find Serial Killers

28 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Thomas Hargrove was an investigative reporter when he had an idea: use open-source FBI data to spot ...

The Hunt For A Killer Who Vanished

20 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2001, Detective Hugh Lockerby found a woman and two children murdered inside a burning home in Sc...

What Happened at Skeleton Lake?

15 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

High in the Himalayas lies Roopkund Lake: a frozen pond surrounded by the remains of around 700 peop...

I Lived as a Hermit in the Australian Bush for 10 Years

07 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

At 35, Gregory Smith walked into the rainforest of northern NSW, addicted, lost, and ready to disapp...

I Caught 'The Dating Game' Killer

31 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You might’ve seen 'The Dating Game Killer' on Netflix but this is the real story. In 1979, a 12-ye...

Catching My Sister's Killer (Classic)

24 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week we're re-running a favourite episode. In 1985, a 17-year-old girl named Shari Smith w...

I Cooked and Ate My Own Foot

17 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we’re speaking with a man who lost his foot in a motorcycle accident and then served it to ...

I Was Nearly Killed by the 'Killdozer'

11 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2004, a man named Marvin Heemeyer turned a bulldozer into a homemade tank and tore through Granby...

I Had an Affair With an AI Girlfriend

04 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Chris Smith started experimenting with ChatGPT in 2024 and quickly became hooked. Soon he’d custom...

I Dated a Billionaire Weapons Dealer

26 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Jill Dodd was a 21-year-old model when she started dating one of the world's richest men. Adnan Khas...

Lighting Bushfires Made Me Feel Less Alone

21 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the late 1980s, Steve was a teenage firefighter in a small Australian coastal town. Lonely and lo...

A Nearly Impossible Story of Survival on 9/11

11 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On September 11, 2001, Stanley Praimnath was on the top floor of the South Tower when he saw the sec...

I Discovered Brad Pitt

05 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

With Brad Pitt back in the spotlight thanks to F1, we’re revisiting a classic episode from 2022. C...

How it Felt Running a $700 Million Bank Fraud

29 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2003, a Wall Street trader named John Rusnak was convicted of bank fraud and sentenced to more th...

What We Found Hidden in our Walls

23 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A family moves into a new home in rural Pennsylvania and starts renovating. Only there's something i...

Three Deaths at a Spiritual Retreat

16 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2009, motivational speaker James Arthur Ray hosted a multi-day retreat in Arizona. On the final d...

The Meat Industry Veteran Who'd Seen Enough

10 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For decades, David Magna worked as a safety supervisor in Canadian slaughterhouses. But then a crisi...

I Called the Police on My Serial Killer Dad

01 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As a child, April Balascio noticed that people would often vanish. One time it was a labourer workin...

I Accidentally Turned ‘The Macarena’ Into a Global Phenomenon

25 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1995, Carlos de Yarza spent 90 minutes remixing a catchy Spanish song without giving it much thou...

One Night, 852 People Lost in the Ocean

18 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1994, a luxurious ferry called the MS Estonia sank in the Baltic Sea, drowning most of its passen...

I Solved the 'Doomsday Mum' Murders

13 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2019, two children vanished in Idaho, sparking an investigation that became one of America’s bi...

What I’ve Learned Stopping Suicides on the Golden Gate Bridge

03 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When Kevin Briggs joined the San Francisco Highway Patrol, he didn’t expect a key part of his job ...

I Imported Rave Culture (and Ecstasy) to America

27 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1991, Shaun Attwood arrived from the UK to find American rave culture in its infancy. Spotting an...

What Happens When Religious Leaders Take Magic Mushrooms?

19 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A new study gave psilocybin to religious leaders, just to see whether their faith would be...

He Cut Off My Arms and Left Me to Die

13 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Mary McGriff was 15 when she hitched a ride with a man named Lawrence Singleton. The next day, she l...

The Lovers That Burned Down 77 Houses

06 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we're re-running a classic. When abandoned farm houses started catching fire in rural Vir...

I Got Eaten By a Hippopotamus

30 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 90s, Paul Templer ran a business guiding clients down the Zambezi River near Victoria F...

I Led the Manhunt for a Killer Who Lived Like a Hermit

23 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2005, Malcolm Naden murdered two women and vanished into the Australian bush. For seven years he ...

How Cocaine Killed the Car in 'Back to the Future'

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

John DeLorean was a star auto designer in the 1960s, but his own car company—the DeLorean Motor Co...

My School Was Kidnapped at Gunpoint

09 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1976, 20-year-old Rob Hunter was a month into his first teaching job at a remote Australian schoo...

I Had Sex With 100 Men in One Day

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last year, 23-year-old British porn star Lily Phillips announced plans to break the world record for...

Everyone Said 'Dirty Dancing' Would Flop. I Made It Anyway

25 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the mid-80s, producer Linda Gottlieb heard a friend’s story about “dirty dancing” at summer...

I Got Pregnant to a Man Who Doesn't Exist

18 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2024, Cass Taulaki fell pregnant to the man of her dreams—a 32-year-old engineer in the Austral...

I Lived in a Haunted Apartment That Didn't Like to Be Alone

10 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 2000s, musician Nathan Munn moved into a tiny, ornate apartment in Montreal. At first, ...

How a Sinking Ship Refloated our Marriage

03 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2012, a cruise liner named the Costa Concordia sank off the coast of Italy, killing 32 people. Bu...

I Visited an Uncontacted Tribe in the Amazon

27 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Awá, an Indigenous group in Brazil's Amazon, had no contact with the outside world until recent...

I Slept With New York's Elite to Rob Them

20 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2009, Kari Ferrell was outed by the media for writing bad checks and robbing trust fund babies ac...

SCAMMERLAND: How a Fake Job Offer Landed Me in Slavery

15 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This is the first episode of our new What It Was Like series, SCAMMERLAND. It's based on an epi...

Wellness and Lies: My Friendship With Belle Gibson

07 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2015, wellness influencer Belle Gibson was outed for pretending to have cancer. Now she's back in...

I Watched Tornado Chasing Go from Subculture to Saturation

27 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tornado chasing was a niche hobby when Tim Marshall started in the 1970s. But over time, he watched ...

Discovering My Grandfather's Secret Nazi Past

20 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Julie Lindahl always knew there was something different about her family. Her German grandparents ha...

Getting Stuck in a Washing Machine Changed My Life

13 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2014, Laurence Hearn was drinking too much and struggling to make ends meet. Then he accidentally...

Why Did My Schoolmate Murder His Family?

07 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 1989, Melissa Fyfe was a high school student in Tasmania when her classmate killed his parents an...

The Great Australian Coffee Shop Joke War

30 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2019, a man named Fraser Harvey nominated himself 'Customer of the Week' at a Melbourne coff...

We Hunted Down a Mystery Killer in the Outback

23 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It was June 1987 and an unknown person had murdered five campers in Australia's remote northwest. In...

I'm the Lowest-Ranked Tennis Player to Ever Win a Grand Slam

17 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Edmondson was ranked 212th when he was invited to compete at the 1976 Australian Open. He was a...

Inside the Life of the Pizza Bomber

09 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In 2003, a pizza deliveryman robbed a Pennsylvania bank with a bomb locked to his neck—a heist tha...

I Dated a Celebrity as a Non-Famous Person

02 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Myah Morgenstern isn't famous. But when she met actor Tony Revolori, (Spiderman, The Grand Buda...

The Woolworths Christmas Bombers (Rerun)

27 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the lead up to Christmas of 1980, three Woolworths stores were bombed around New South Wales. It'...

My Husband's Client Stalked Us for Years

20 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Sandra Miller wasn't overly concerned when her therapist partner's client admitted to eavesdropping ...

How I Got Revenge for My Parking Fines

12 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Julian Morgans, host of What it Was Like, gets parking fines all the time. In his own words "I ...

What I Learned After 27 Years Investigating Violence Against Women

05 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Narelle Fraser spent much of her career in Victoria's Rape and Homicide squads, placing her at the c...