The Unsolved Mysteries of Crater Lake National Park

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Upfront payment of $45 for three months, $90 for six months, or $180 for a 12-month plan required. $15 per month equivalent. Taxes and fees, extra cash, and more. New customer offer for initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy. See terms. Hello. Look what TJ Maxx dragged in. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is now streaming on Disney Plus and Hulu. We are digital. We are downloadable. We are streamable. The fashion event of the year is certified fresh. Pull yourself together. We have work to do. Critics say it's smart and witty and the perfect sequel. That's all. Get runway ready for The Devil Wears Prada 2 on Disney Plus and Hulu. In today's episode, we're exploring the dark side of Oregon's wilderness. We'll start by covering the most disturbing mysteries from Crater Lake National Park, and then we'll head deeper into the Oregon woods for the Cowden family case, a family camping trip that looked normal from the outside until their empty campsite turned into one of the most disturbing unsolved mysteries in the Pacific Northwest. Before we get into it, if you haven't done so, please leave the show a five-star review. My goal is to hit you up with the most disturbing and unsolved mysteries in the Pacific Northwest. Hit 1,000 five-star reviews, and we're actually getting kind of close, and so I would really appreciate it very much. I'm Kyle Haytyking, and listen on if you dare. Listen to me. There is something going on in Crater Lake National Park. I've been hearing rumors about this for years. All across the park, people are disappearing, or disappearing and then turning up dead, and this is not a new phenomenon. They won't admit it, but this is something that's been going on for literal decades, and I've got the receipts. I'm talking about things that are for example, how in October of 2006, a father and son accidentally ended up playing one of the deadliest games of hide and seek of all time, and so allow me to introduce you to an eight-year-old boy named Samuel Bolke. Now, Samuel was visiting Crater Lake National Park with his father, Ken. They lived in Portland, Oregon, and Samuel was known as this like energetic kid. From everything that I've read, Samuel apparently had a mild form of autism, which would sometimes make him sensitive to loud noises and bright lights, things like that, and Samuel also really loved to play hide and seek, and he was actually really good at it too. One time, he hid so well that his parents actually had to call the police and the firefighters to come search for him, and he only came out from his hiding spot when someone eventually called out, you win, which like, those are some pretty legendary hide and seek skills, and that means a lot coming from me because I was pretty much the king of the playground back in the day. I mean, you name it, I was the best at it, but I mean, Samuel was on an entirely different level when it came to playground games. However, my mom always told me that it's all fun and games until someone gets hurt, and well, Samuel and his father were about to find this out the hard way. Around 4 p.m. on October 14, 2006, Samuel and his father stopped on the side of the road while driving through Crater Lake's scenic rim drive. They had pulled over about 500 yards from the Cleatwood Cove parking area, and when they stepped out of the car, they were standing near a parking lot, and Samuel was on the side of the road, and Samuel was on the side of the road, and Samuel was on the side of the road, and Samuel was on the side of the road, that overlooked the forest and, of course, the beautiful lake below them. The sunlight was starting to fade, the air was turning colder, and they were on their way back to their cabin near Diamond Lake, but first, of course, it was time to play. In my research, I couldn't figure out the exact game Samuel and his dad were playing. I mean, maybe it was tag or hide and seek, but what I do know for sure is that the two of them were running around, chasing each other around a moment out in one of the most beautiful places on earth but sometimes majestic beauty can come with a very heavy price in the middle of their game samuel jogged up a hill that was like just above him and his father ken watched as his son crested the hill and then disappeared just out of sight as far as ken was concerned samuel was just playing around you know just like he always did ken was so like not worried about the situation that he didn't even immediately chase after samuel he was sure that his his little head would pop out from the other side of the hill any minute now right and so ken waited for another moment but samuel hadn't come back out yet and so ken began calling his son's name but he didn't get any response he called again and still nothing ken even turned back to the car for a moment calling out that he was gonna leave and expecting his son to come running after him right but that didn't happen either and so ken started to get a pit in his stomach playtime was obviously over ken ran up the hill calling out samuel's name over and over by the time that he turned a corner he actually saw his son roughly 50 feet ahead of him samuel was in the middle of climbing another hill heading into the nearby woods and so ken chased after him and told his son to stop running but whenever ken got close it felt like samuel was just out of reach almost as if it was all still part of the game samuel ran over the crest of another hill with his father right behind him but this time when ken reached the top the only thing he saw was wilderness his son was now nowhere to be found the terrain beyond the ridge that they had been playing on sloped down into like a forced area but it certainly didn't seem like it could instantly hide someone in just like a matter of a few seconds especially not a child wearing bright colors like samuel he was wearing this bright blue coat there were no immediate cliffs in the area no sudden drops and basically no obvious explanation for how samuel could have vanished so completely in that short amount of time and so ken was in the middle of the hill trying to find samuel but he was unable to find samuel he was in the middle of the hill trying to find samuel he was in the middle of the hill trying to find samuel he was in the middle of the hill trying to find samuel but regardless of all those facts ken just could not find his son anywhere and so he was forced to do the hardest thing any parent can ever have to do he reported samuel missing the search began almost immediately within hours the area around cleatwood cove filled with over 200 searchers that were combing through roughly six square miles of forest and slope terrain to make matters even worse a snowstorm hit crater lake in the days immediately following samuel's disappearance with over 200 searchers that were combing through roughly six square miles of forest and slope terrain to make matters even worse a snowstorm hit crater lake in the days immediately following samuel's disappearance and according to the sheriff's office the weather was like seriously hampering their initial search efforts specialized rescue teams came in from across oregon as well as neighboring states including canine units chasing samuel sent through the trees helicopters scanning from above and heat sensing cameras sweeping the ground below for any sign of this young fun loving boy and as all of this was going on of course you know the theories began to roll in knowing samuel's past some authorities wondered if he was out there still just playing i mean maybe he was in the woods somewhere hiding in like the most extreme way that we we know he was capable of maybe he had even dug himself into some kind of small space like a tree stump or a hole in order to hide even better i mean after all we know that he would do basically anything to to win games like this during the search itself samuel's father can also told the media that he and the fbi believed his son thought running into the woods was just a game right another theory was that maybe samuel had gotten distracted while looking for gold and what i mean by that is is that ken also talked to the press about his son's obsession with finding little yellow pumice stones on the ground that he referred to as gold like not actual gold and so one theory that kept popping up was that samuel might have noticed a patch of yellow rocks on the slope above him and became hyper focused on chasing down as many of the shiny stones as he possibly could and maybe by the time he looked up from his mini gold rush well he might have found himself completely isolated and separated from his dad as well as any other kind of help from everything that i could find this theory mostly hinges on his dad's speculation and not from any other like hard facts and so i can't say either way if tiny yellow rocks are actually the thing to blame in this mystery it's just a theory and of course naturally we have to wonder if wildlife had anything to do with samuel's disappearance crater lake national park can be home to species like black bears coyotes um even mountain lions and so there is a chance that young samuel could have been a victim of some kind of attack from a predator like that especially a mountain lion from my understanding they they they don't attack very often but when they do they tend to favor children because they're just smaller however in all of their searching the authorities never found any evidence of an animal attack no tracks or torn clothing or any sign of remains that would that would lead them to believe that that there was an animal involved now i also read an article that stated officials ruled out foul play of any kind in this case and that initially made a lot of sense to me i mean after all ken literally watched his son run away from him but he didn't see anyone like scoop him up or kidnap him or something like that but then i wondered how authorities could be so certain that samuel didn't encounter anyone suspicious after he had disappeared like he had disappeared i mean how they don't know what happened to him and this is when i finally began to ask myself a really big question that i'm honestly a little afraid to ask and so this question is can we fully trust the original story from ken in the first place and look i want to be really careful here because all available evidence has shown that ken was a loving caring father who who has helped immensely in the search for his son but with that said um we don't have any other answers and i'm sure there were times where authorities wondered about him as well just like i'm doing right now i'm honestly a little bit confused by the fact that ken somehow couldn't run faster than his eight-year-old now i don't have kids so maybe that's entirely normal like i don't know but i was also confused as to why he stopped the car to play hide and seek or tag in the woods when it was also starting to get dark at that time of day and we also know that it was cold enough for samuel to be in a winter coat and that a literal snowstorm was going to be rolling in soon and so maybe that's just me being skeptical based on my experience reading disturbing mysteries like this all the time i can definitely admit that i've become a little bit jaded from these kinds of things i mean ultimately i really do want to believe that ken was just a dad trying to have fun with his son and he just got hit with with an insane tragedy in the process and of course i need to make it very clear that the authorities never arrested or charged ken in connection with samuel's disappearance at all so from everything i can tell i don't think ken was involved but in researching this story i did see a number of people that were a little bit skeptical of him and so i figured that was probably going to come up in the comments of this video and so i should at least address it show button here football is finally back and prize picks is going crazy with the deals to start the season giving out promos every day in september on prize picks you can make all the picks you want all in the same app and now prize picks is available nationwide so what are you waiting for lock in for kickoff because everyone and everything is on prize picks what you want download the app today and use code spotify to get 150 instantly in lineups if you win your first five dollar lineup prize picks run your game do you hear that that sound right that means that summer's officially here it means that grown adults just sprint into the street for a frozen dessert shaped like a cartoon but this summer mint mobile has a better treat every plan including unlimited is 15 a month and unlike ice cream it won't uh drip down your wrist or look nothing like the picture does anyone have any cash give it a try at mint mobile.com slash switch upfront payment of 45 for three months 90 for six months or 180 for 12 month plan required 15 per month equivalent taxes and fees extra new customer offer for initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy see terms hello look what tj max dragged in the devil wears prada 2 is now streaming on disney plus and hulu we are digital we are downloadable we are streamable the fashion event of the year is certified fresh pull yourself together we have work to do critics say it's smart and witty and the perfect sequel that's all get runway ready for the devil wears prada 2 on disney plus and hulu rated pg-13 tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just twenty dollars at bj's dot com slash mesquite and save ten cents per gallon for six months open soon limited time offer new members only bj's home of the save this episode is brought to you by txu energy for the first time ever texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings it's called free nights and cool summer you get free nights every night all year long plus a twenty five percent bonus toward your daytime use all summer it's a first of its kind plan created for how texans actually use energy discover how much more you could save with free nights and cool summer txu energy energy for everything visit txu.com for more information rep number one zero zero zero four after a full snowy week of theorizing and searching desperately for samuel crews still hadn't found anything at all no footprints no abandoned clothing and no definitive signs that samuel had either like fallen or wandered away or was hidden away somewhere by the end of that week the search for samuel was officially called off there were still some smaller searches as time went on but eventually even more snow came as fall slowly morphed into winter and suddenly crater lake and any possible clues behind samuel's disappearance would soon be buried under feet of snow and so to this day samuel is still very much considered missing and so man this one is just so sad i mean one minute he was having the time of his life playing with his father and then the next he basically vanished into thin air glenn allen was a 33 year old mechanical engineer from brea california and he had been traveling alone and was driving north towards crater lake national park in october of 1991 apparently he was on like a solo tour of national parks across the west now glenn was six foot one 165 pounds with brown hair and blue eyes and according to reports that i saw his family was somewhere back east and he didn't really have any known relatives in the brea area i don't know he simply seemed to be a relatively young man on a week's long adventure on october 14th glenn entered crater lake national park and received a receipt from the ranger he pulled into the rim village parking lot on the south side of crater lake very close to the crater lake lodge but from everything that i could find in my research he didn't check into the lodge itself in fact there are a lot of things that he didn't do once he got to the rim village he didn't sign his name into any of the trail log books he didn't use a pay phone to call any of his relatives back east to give them an update on what he was doing and as far as anyone can tell he didn't have any meaningful interactions with any strangers at least not with anyone who was willing to admit it anyways in fact we know so many things that glenn didn't do from this point in the story but we have zero idea of what he actually like did do because this is where glenn's trail went cold and for that matter so did he get to the crater lake national park on october 16th a massive storm hit the park and buried it in sheets and sheets of deep snow the rim village parking lot sits at roughly 7100 feet in elevation and so it was hit extra hard by this winter storm and when snowplow crews arrived to clear the lot they noticed that every car that had been parked there had been already claimed and moved except for one of them when park officials took a closer look at this car that's when they started to realize that something had happened to the car and it was a car that had been parked there for a long time they found keys a passport cash toiletries and a driver's license with the name glenn allen mackie they also found the park entrance receipt from october 14th which hinted that the car might have been sitting there alone for most of that week and that glenn might have been lost out in the snowy wilderness for that entire time as well and so with this discovery the search for glenn allen mackie was on the snowstorm had been covering trails and footprints for days by this point and so authorities were already starting from a major disadvantage but each day the crews grew larger and the urgency to find glenn kept mounting by saturday three different canine search teams and nearly 40 people were out in the park battling through waist-deep snow and scouring the frozen landscape however each day brought the same grim reality um that the search had turned up absolutely nothing there were no tracks no additional clues and no hint of where glenn might have gone and so the authorities and the searchers were forced to consider every possible theory the first thing they had to consider was that glenn might have been hit by that massive snowstorm i mean that that makes sense right authorities didn't know the exact moment when he disappeared and their best guess was that he was missing since at least last wednesday which was the day before they started the official search but i mean that's the only thing they kind of knew for sure they didn't know if glenn had parked his car in the rim village parking lot when the weather was perfectly fine only to get caught out in the heart of the blizzard later or if the storm was already in full force by the time he chose to set out into the wilderness and if he was caught out in the storm officials were not very confident that he would have been prepared for this weather at all which brings me to another interesting layer to this story that i'm still trying to wrap my head around i read in an article that authorities said quote glenn's car contained items that a person would not leave behind if he were going to make an extended side tour from the national park and here's my question um what exactly is an extended side tour from the national park did they mean that they didn't think he was gearing up for like a backpacking trip or a long through hike and if that's the case why didn't they just say that and what did they expect to find if he was on a backpacking trip like maps or food a backpack like wouldn't he have just taken all that stuff with him it feels important to point out this phrasing and it makes me more confused every single time that i read it i also have to wonder if there was even a small possibility that glenn had actually disappeared on purpose now in all of the articles i've read about this story they constantly point out that glenn had quote no known relatives in brea or nearby and we also know that he had been on an extended solo trip through multiple parks and so was he feeling isolated and just wanted to go completely off the grid i do know that rangers had information and they were gonna reach out to his relatives back east but that's that's pretty much the extent of everything i could find about any family or friends involved in the search process and for what it's worth the police never found any notes or any real indication that glenn was trying to like harm himself or anything like that but that just left them with even more questions than they already had five days would pass with the authorities failing to find any additional leads the snow continued to pile up over crater lake national park and with each snowflake it it felt like the hope of finding glenn was slowly being buried on monday october 24th the official search effort was scaled back the park's chief ranger george buckingham explained that the snow which was like five feet deep in some areas was basically erasing any possible traitors and the police were able to find any possible traitors and the police were able to tracks for them to follow their canine teams were working tirelessly but even the the dog's strong noses couldn't do much in this kind of weather buckingham said quote we'll still continue our investigation but we're just not putting people outside in a continued field search and so with that decision the search for glenn came to a crawl and his trail went cold that is until years later when a firefighter made a shocking discovery in a very remote area of the park that could have changed this case forever in september of 2006 a park firefighter was in a remote area known as bybee creek when he stumbled upon something that made him stop in his tracks the heat of the summer was starting to die down and you could feel the cool breeze of fall and winter weather in the air and as this firefighter walked through the woods he noticed something on the ground that looked like it was just out of place as he got closer and closer he realized that he hadn't discovered the cause of the fire and he was able to find out what it was he was able to find out what it was an animal or trash or anything else he assumed he might find out there on a normal day nope as he stood right above his discovery and then bent down for a clear view he understood that his day was suddenly very far from normal because he had found human skeletal remains he reported this chilling discovery to park officials immediately but they actually resisted the urge to tell the public i mean if these remains were connected to a crime for instance they they would want to complete a full investigation before making a statement and before they had a chance to do any real investigative work and another thing too before they even had a chance to do any like real investigating in the bybee creek area the winter weather hit crater lake like a freight train snow once again prevented anyone from reaching the site of the remains until the following summer in 2007 and so it was then that park rangers finally arrived alongside fbi agents and they were able to find the remains and they were able to find the bones and when they did the bones were weathered scattered and honestly held very few actionable clues for them to work with park ranger dave brennan said quote from the condition of the remains it was evident they had been there for some number of years now they were able to find a handful of personal belongings near these remains but i wasn't able to find like a list of what they actually discovered officials just said that the gear wasn't actually enough to help them identify the body however the remains did miraculously contain a jawbone and i say miraculously because a jawbone meant that they could use one very important tool in an attempt to identify their mystery victim and that of course would be dental records when the authorities finally released their findings months later in august of 2007 they acknowledged that glenn allen mackie's name was absolutely on their radar naturally they as well as everyone else wondered if the dental records might finally give them some kind of answers as to what happened to the poor young man that disappeared from the rim village parking lot more than a decade earlier ryan reynolds here for mint mobile with your summer price forecast now unfortunately we're seeing rising costs across the country with possibility that big wireless hates you 100 now over here at mint mobile we're seeing sunny skies and dropping prices every plan to just 15 a month give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch upfront payment of dollars for three months ninety dollars for six months or 180 dollars for 12 month plan required 15 per month equivalent taxes and fees extra new customer offer for initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy see terms show button here football is finally back and prize picks is going crazy with the deals to start the season giving out promos every day in september on prize picks you can make all the picks you want all in the same app and now prize picks is available nationwide so what are you waiting for lock in for kickoff because everyone and everything is on prize picks what you want download the app today and use code spotify to get 150 instantly in lineups if you win your first five dollar lineup prize picks run your game star wars the mandalorian and grogu is now streaming on disney plus what are you waiting for hop on the must-see galactic adventure comes home on disney plus this is the way our only chance is to work together i like this kid always wear your seatbelt star wars the mandalorian and grogu now streaming on disney plus read pg-13 hank joined bj's wholesale club the day he became a father of 30 i coach football now coach hank saves up to 25 off grocery store prices 30 pounds of pasta three cases of protein bars 75 sports drinks and that's just pre-game he knows teamwork and bj's knows savings this is your home coach home of the save join for just 20 minutes and you'll see what's next $20 at bjs.com slash mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months open soon limited time offer new members only bj's home of the save this episode is brought to you by txu energy for the first time ever texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings it's called free nights and cool summer you get free nights every night all year long plus a 25 bonus toward your daytime use all summer it's a first of its kind plan created for how texans actually use energy discover how texans actually use energy how much more you could save with free nights and cool summer txu energy energy for everything visit txu.com for more information rep number one zero zero zero four dave brennan was quoted saying we're certainly looking at that possibility the challenge in 1991 was we did not know where he went to brennan also described bybee creek as a very remote heavily wooded area that was quote not the kind of spot where people would tend to go so this breakthrough discovery seemed like the first step in the way we might finally get some real answers in this case all this build up and all the years of searching were leading to this moment we'd finally get to the bottom of what happened to glenn allen mackie right sadly that was not the case at least not based on all of the public information that that i was able to track down anyways as of august 2007 authorities have declined to release any more details about the mysterious remains or about glenn's case pending further investigation it's been almost 20 years since that time and i'm starting to think that maybe number one they weren't able to determine the victim using dental records at all or number two the victim wasn't glenn mackie or number three it was glenn and his family wished that the information was not made public now whether it's it's one of those options or some other reason i've become convinced that we we might not ever get another real statement on this case at all glenn's case might just be one of the rarest unsolved mysteries in national park history which is of course a tragedy and that also makes it really weird but this next case reached a whole new level of weirdness because investigators discovered a scene that they said looked like someone had literally melted into the ground i'm not making that up in january of 1975 a 19 year old man named charles mcculler was on a cross-country road trip to photograph america's national parks and by the way if the name charles mcculler sounds familiar to you i made a video about his story many many months ago and so i'm going to tell a briefer version of it here but it's just so significant that if i can't talk about crater lake mysteries without talking about charles's story after traveling through states like texas and arizona charles arrived in eugene oregon where he stayed with a friend for a few days his next stop was going to be crater lake where he planned to capture the stark beauty of of winter in the park but he severely underestimated how hard it would be to navigate nearly 90 inches of snowy hell which seems to be a theme in this video by the way the snow anyways before leaving eugene charles told his friends something something that like looking back seems pretty chilling charles told his friend that if he wasn't back by february 1st they should call the police and overall that that mysterious comment tells me that that charles mcculler is not going to be able to get out of the park charles he knew this trip could be dangerous but with that said i don't think he was being reckless either he he stayed in regular contact with his parents he packed warm clothing food camping gear even a little plastic sheet for shelter on january 29th charles left his volkswagen van in eugene and continued his journey by bus by hitchhiking and by walking and so the next morning charles hitched a ride with a logging truck driver heading east but was dropped off near Stump Lake, which was still like 30 miles away from the park. Driver watched as Charles walked along the snowy highway and folks that was the last time that anyone saw him. Three more days passed and Charles' friend and Eugene started to worry. Charles obviously still hadn't returned and he also hadn't called or sent any mail. His ominous final warning was slowly becoming a reality and as a result his friend knew exactly what to do. On February 2nd, 1975, Charles McCuller was reported missing. But then, nearly 18 months later, on October 18th, 1976, two hikers made a discovery in a remote area called Bybee Creek. These hikers found a weathered backpack and when they looked inside of it they found a set of car keys with a Volkswagen logo and so could they have finally found a clue that could lead us to Charles? When the rangers finally arrived in the area to search further, they found something truly disturbing. They reported that they had apparently discovered a pair of jeans on the ground but that the jeans were unbuttoned and the belt was undone and the strangest detail was that the jeans were also apparently standing in an upright vertical position. It gets even wilder. They looked into the jeans and when they did, they discovered a human shin bone and a pair of socks that still contained human foot bones. Other remains were scattered in the surrounding area as well, a jaw bone, part of a skull, and some other bone fragments spread all across the forest floor. Unlike the previous story, dental records were actually very useful here and they would soon confirm what everyone feared. The remains belonged to Charles McCuller. The remains of Charles McCuller. Charles concluded that Charles died from exposure. The strange condition of the jeans could also be explained by something called paradoxical undressing, where hypothermia causes a person to feel overheated and then start to frantically remove their clothing. That could explain why his jeans were unbuttoned, but not why they were found standing upright. Maybe they had frozen that way, or maybe the denim had stiffened over time. No one has ever determined the truth about this. In the end, the official explanation points to a tragic miscalculation in extreme winter conditions, which does happen in these national parks. However the strange details, Charles' ominous warning, the location of his remains, his missing camera, all of those things, the jeans, still leave lingering questions. There's no doubt that whatever happened to Charles McCuller is one of the strangest scenes ever discovered in a national park. Now, when you hear a story about a bizarre pair of jeans standing perfectly upright, you might feel like Crater Lake is pretty much cursed. And if it is, then you can probably trace that curse all the way back to July of 1952 when Crater Lake was home to one of the darkest mysteries in United States history. In July of 1952, two businessmen decided to explore Crater Lake National Park near the town of Klamath Falls, Oregon: 56-year-old Albert Marston Jones from Concord, California, and 52-year-old Charles Patrick Cohane from Detroit, Michigan, were both executives at General Motors. They had come to Crater Lake with their wives to enjoy a beautiful fishing trip. Charles had just gotten a promotion that put him in charge of the Western Regional Operations and he was accompanying Albert, who was a regional sales manager, on multiple calls in the area. The two men decided to spend the weekend exploring Crater Lake since their next sales call wasn't until Monday. Charles and Albert met some friends of theirs named John Vague and Frank Eberlein for an afternoon of fishing on Union Creek. They'd also be joined by Alan's 13-year-old son, Alan Eberlein. Charles and Albert checked out of their Klamath Falls hotel right around 11:30am on July 19th and decided to stop for lunch on their way to the fishing spot. John, Frank, and Alan arrived at the Annie Creek Canyon overlook around 2:45pm, but when they got there. The group drove around the parking lot area until they came across the green 1951 Pontiac they knew the executives had been driving. John and Frank hopped out of the car to get a closer look. They were shocked to discover that the keys to the Pontiac were still in the ignition. Alan got out of the car too and as they were all investigating for themselves, they even checked under the hood of the car. John, Frank, and Alan got in the car and took the car keys, the hot radiator, and put it in the car. They were shocked to discover that the car had been in the ignition for a long time. John, Frank, and Alan were shocked to discover that the car had been in the ignition for a long time. himself quote oh lordy there they are turns out they had finally found charles and albert but based on the state they were in i bet they almost wished that they hadn't because well neither one of them were alive rex yelled out to the rest of the crew and almost immediately he was joined by two dozen other searchers everyone was now looking upon a truly grisly crime scene the men's bodies were found five feet apart from each other not very far from highway 62 and well it shocked everyone when they realized that both of the men had been tied up both were missing their shoes and both were found to have been shot execution style albert was found seated against a tree with a wound in the back of his head investigators were able to find out what was going on and they were able to find out that the men had been taken to the police station and they were able to look at the powder burns that both men had suffered that indicated that whoever hurt them had done so from extremely close range albert and charles both had their hands bound and they had been gagged using pieces of torn clothing now i mentioned that both men were missing their shoes but it's worth pointing out that both of their socks were totally clean suggesting that they had walked to this area in their shoes before ultimately taking their shoes off or having their shoes taken off for them albert's shoes were actually found nearby the crime scene but charles's shoes were suspiciously nowhere to be found and another extremely puzzling part of this already extremely gruesome scene was the fact that both men had actually seemed to remove their dentures and then place them in their shirt pockets the men had clearly been victims of some kind of attack but was there any particular reason that either of them or maybe their attacker were so focused on shoes and dentures while in this moment and that's just one of so many questions that this terrifying case had everyone asking investigators were able to recover two 32 caliber shell casings but for some unknown reason they were unable to match those casings to any weapon and additionally the two men had been carrying about three hundred dollars each in cash which was you know basically a small fortune back in 1952 and all of that money was now gone along with the men's shoes however their wallets were still with their bodies and plus the items in their car which included some rather nice luggage and a camera well all that stuff was completely untouched when the full autopsies came back they revealed that both men had suffered severe trauma including being kicked repeatedly it was clear that something unbelievably awful had gone down in the woods of crater lake maybe this was a completely random crime or maybe it was it was calculated no one knew what was going on and so they were able to find out that the men had no one knew for sure but it was time to get to the bottom of it the discovery of albert and charles sparked one of the most extensive investigations in the history of the national park service and since the park itself falls under federal jurisdiction the fbi was all over it agents interviewed more than 200 park employees tried to explain the insane details of the crime scene and they chased after every single lead that they possibly could the first big lead comes directly from albert and charles and they were able to find out that the men had suffered severe trauma in the woods of crater lake and they found out that the men had suffered severe trauma in the woods of crater lake and they were able to find out that the men had suffered severe trauma they left 13 year old alan to wait in the abandoned 1951 pontiac all by himself and while waiting for them to come back alan told authorities that a mysterious black car pulled up beside him i didn't think much of it at the time alan would later say he then went on to say that the operators of this black car were so startled when they realized a young boy was sitting in the back of it that they peeled out of the gravel parking lot and then sped off in a hurry now years later alan would go on to tell reporters that he'd always wondered if that black car might have been driven by the men who hurt albert and charles unfortunately young alan wasn't able to piece together many other details about this encounter and that threatening black car was never seen again another potential lead came from a park employee named lincoln lintz lincoln was driving a truck to the crater lake lodge on the same day that albert and charles had gone missing and while he was driving he said that he saw two men in work clothes that that seemed like they were taking two white collar types into the woods the same exact woods where the bodies were later found now at first he didn't really think too much of this but as lincoln continued driving towards the lodge he apparently heard two loud bangs from the back of the forest and they sounded like fire crackers basically and as if this wasn't already wild enough of an account lincoln says that he was later followed and harassed by two scruffy looking men he even claims that one of the men looked clearly older and was wearing a distinct beaded belt that spelled out the name ralph lincoln told the authorities all of these very specific details but apparently at the time they just completely dismissed him and after the lodge closed in the fall lincoln went back to college and claimed that he tried to contact agents several more times but they never returned his calls he wondered if they thought that he was just crazy but he knew deep down that his information could be the key to solving one of the most disturbing and puzzling murders in national park history now when i personally think about lincoln's witness statement i can genuinely understand some of the reasons that the authorities might not have taken it too seriously i mean he claimed that he was the man walking into the woods and then heard two loud bangs not long after that but i mean how could all of that have happened so close together when the bodies were found you know not super far but at least a quarter mile away from the road it just seems like his account might have been a little bit inaccurate misremembered or extremely unlikely several theories have been proposed over the years like for instance maybe it was a botched robbery of the two rich looking businessmen or maybe it was a targeted execution that somehow tied back to labor disputes within the car industry or maybe there was even some kind of involvement by a criminal gang believe it or not despite all of these interviews theories and leads in the case of albert and charles well it's still completely unsolved 70 years later none of these questions have been officially answered but that hasn't stopped a man named monty orrick who claims to have solved the most unsolvable murder case in history monty is a photo journalist from portland oregon and in 2023 he published a book called the crater lake murders in that book monty explains that the murder case had indeed already been solved and that the fbi and the friends of the murderers have suppressed the truth for years for different reasons and at different times that's what he said monty has gone on to say that in 1966 a man named oscar errol from silverton oregon made a deathbed confession to his wife revealing the murderer's real identities oscar reportedly named two men one named kenneth moore and one named john wesley cole apparently kenneth moore actually just straight up admitted his guilt to oscar years earlier but oscar never told a soul until right before he passed away monty fully believes oscar's deathbed confession and he argues that the fbi's case files also back up this story and monty also claims that the fbi's case files also thinks that since kenneth and john had already been dead for four years by the time they got the confession the fbi realized they would never actually be able to bring anyone to justice and they just swept everything under the rug show button here football is finally back and prize picks is going crazy with the deals to start the season giving out promos every day in september on prize picks you can make all the picks you want all in the same app and now prize picks is available nationwide so what are you waiting for lock in for kickoff because everyone and everything is on prize picks what you want download the app today and use code spotify to get 150 instantly in lineups if you win your first five dollar lineup prize picks run your game do you hear that that sound right that means that summer's officially here it means that grown adults just sprint into the street for a frozen dessert shaped like a cartoon but this summer mint mobile has a better tree every plan including unlimited is fifteen dollars a month and unlike ice cream it won't uh drip down your wrist or look nothing like the picture does anyone have any cash give it a try at mint mobile dot com slash switch upfront payment of 45 for three months 90 for six months or 180 for 12 month plan required 15 per month equivalent taxes and fees extra new customer offer for initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy see terms i'm not giving up i am selling the building the final season of fx is the bear the restaurant is flooded everything's either gonna be okay no stop or not we are outgunned and we are outmanned but we have each other fx is the bear the final season all episodes now streaming on disney plus tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just twenty dollars at bj This episode is brought to you by TXU Energy. For the first time ever, Texans have an energy plan that combines free nights all year with daytime summer savings. It's called Free Nights in Cool Summer. You get free nights every night, all year long, plus a 25% bonus toward your daytime use all summer. It's a first-of-its-kind plan created for how Texans actually use energy. Discover how much more you could save with Free Nights in Cool Summer. TXU Energy. Energy for everything. Visit TXU.com for more information. Rep number 10004. He ultimately said, quote, it would have been professionally embarrassing to them. For decades, this case has loomed over Crater Lake like a black cloud. There are still so many bizarre, unanswered questions, like who was driving that mysterious black car that Alan saw, or why did both men have their dentures in their pockets when they were driving that mysterious black car that Alan saw, Oh, and why did the FBI seem to dismiss multiple actionable leads? But beneath the media frenzy and all the investigative mistakes and the speculation, we have one of the most violent and bloody crimes imaginable happening right in the middle of a massive national park. And 70 years later, police still don't know who the hell was responsible for it, at least not officially. Now we're moving. Deeper into Oregon, to a family campsite that almost looked normal. That is, until people realized what was missing. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever seen something and then immediately wished that you hadn't? Well, in April of 1975, two campers were hiking through a national forest in Oregon when that's exactly what happened to them. They accidentally stumbled upon something so horrifying that they, they immediately wished that they had never laid their eyes upon it. But unfortunately, it was now too late. Their eyes had stared directly at the kind of thing that's just so absurdly horrific and real that it's basically impossible to unsee. And as today's story unfolds, you're going to understand exactly why I say that. And so with that said, let's take a virtual trip together right now. to the Oregon wilderness for the Cowden family. Labor Day weekend in 1974 was supposed to be pretty low-key. Richard Cowden, the father and the husband of the Southern Oregon family, well, he was planning on using the long weekend to catch up on some work around the family property. The 28-year-old Richard was filling in the driveway with gravel when all of a sudden the truck that he was using stubbornly decided to just quit on him I'm sure that he could have spent the rest of the weekend fixing it and he could have gotten back to work. But instead, Richard decided to make other plans. It kind of seemed like his truck's failure was actually the perfect excuse to put off the rest of that yard work and instead take the family up into the mountains for a fun camping trip. And so just like that, on a complete whim, Richard, his 22-year-old wife Belinda, his five-year-old son David, and his five-month-old daughter, they all piled into the family's other truck and they drove straight for the Rogue River Siskiyou National Forest. They also brought along their dog, which was a basset hound named Droopy. Now, Rogue River Siskiyou National Forest is actually a place that I've been to a couple different times. It kind of straddles the Northern California-Southern Oregon border and both times that I was there was when I was hiking through on the Pacific Coast. Which goes very close to the area that we're going to be talking about in this story. That being said, the Cowdens, well, they obviously were not hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. They instead took up a campsite right next to Carberry Creek, only about one mile outside of the town of Copper, Oregon. On the morning of Sunday, September 1st, 1974, Richard and his son David walked that one mile from their campsite directly into the small town. And since their campsite was so small, and the camping trip had been planned so last minute, it was just this impulsive thing, it appears that the family actually forgot to pack a few items. One of those items was milk. And thankfully, the Copper General Store had plenty of it in stock. The father and son duo paid for their milk and then, well, they just kind of left the store. It was pretty uneventful. However, you know, nobody knew it at the time, but this quick stop into the general store would go on to be the last time that anybody from the Cowden family would ever be seen alive. Now, the wife, Belinda Cowden, well, her mother actually lived in the town of Copper, which was probably the reason why the Cowdens decided to camp in that area in the first place. That's an assumption, I don't know for sure, but it really did sound like the perfect last-minute getaway, right? I mean, the Cowdens could spend some time in the great outdoors, decompressing, letting the kids run around and play, and they could also visit some family at the very same time. It was just a very convenient plan. The Cowdens were actually expecting Belinda's mother to join them for dinner that night. But when Belinda's mother pulled up to the family's campsite, she didn't see any children running around and playing. She also didn't see any adults enjoying the fresh air and decompressing, like I just mentioned. In fact, there were actually no children or adults or children anywhere in the campsite at all. When Belinda's mother pulled into the campsite, she was met with a very disturbing sight. But the thing is, it wasn't a disturbing sight in the way that you might be thinking. So Belinda's mother is supposed to be joining the Cowdens for dinner on this particular night, and she pulls up to the campsite where, once again, her daughter, her son-in-law, and her two grandchildren should have been waiting for her. But, once again, when she pulled up, there was nobody there. And it was now dinnertime, and so I can only imagine that when she saw this empty campsite, she probably knew deep down in her gut that something was wrong. But with that said, a quick glance at the campsite wouldn't have really indicated any problems. I mean, the site wasn't trashed. There weren't any obvious items missing. It didn't really look like anything bad had actually happened, right? The family's truck was still sitting there. The only red flag so far was the glaring absence of the family themselves. But, as Belinda's mother got out of her own car and then began kind of picking through the campsite, the more subtle, kind of less obvious red flags, well, they began to pile up and pile up quickly. First of all, just kind of lying there on the ground was Richard's wallet, and all of a sudden, it was also Belinda's purse. I mean, they were just kind of sitting there. And if the family had decided to leave the campsite voluntarily, why would those items have been left behind, especially in plain view for any passerby to see and potentially steal? I also found a few sources which stated that Richard's expensive watch had been found lying on the ground as well. Apparently, the keys to the family's truck were also visible as well as the house. It was a half-drank bottle of milk that Richard had bought earlier that morning. So it's definitely a bizarre scene, but once again, there's no indication that something violent or something bad happened. I mean, the only things that appeared to be missing from the campsite were the family's bathing suits, their dog, Droopy, and of course, the family themselves. And so Belinda's mother, she sees this empty campsite. She's running around observing all these things. She's just kind of taking it all in. And after doing this for a few minutes, she decides to look inside of Richard's wallet. And when she did this, she found the 2025 equivalent of over $130 cash just sitting in the wallet, completely undisturbed. And while it was good, I guess, that nothing had been stolen from the campsite or this money stolen from the wallet, the discovery of this money would only end up worrying Belinda's mother even more. After frantically searching the campsite, she just had this, yeah, this unshakable gut feeling that the Cowdens had been kidnapped. Whoever confronted them had no interest in robbery. I mean, that much was clear. They left the money there. They left the watch there. Nothing had been stolen. And so if theft wasn't the motive, then what was? The answer could only be something far more sinister. Belinda's mother was left with no choice but to do one of the most painful things of her entire life, something that no mother should ever have to do. She had to leave the campsite, leave the campsite so that she could go contact the police and tell them that her daughter and the rest of her daughter's family had all gone missing. Within a few hours, the sheriff, multiple state troopers, and state investigators had all arrived at the campsite to begin what they all hoped would be a very brief and successful rescue mission. Just like Belinda's mother, when she first rolled up to the campsite, they too were extremely baffled by what they saw. The scene at the campsite was it was just extremely creepy and again there was nothing blatantly wrong but things just fell off you know what i mean it just felt weird it just felt like something had happened but at the same time there was no evidence that anything violent had went down at the campsite it was just a very bizarre scene and one of the lead investigators was later quoted saying that camp was spooky even the milk was still on the table the area that immediately surrounded the campsite was searched that very first night they searched until it got too dark at which point the investigation was essentially paused and this is pretty frustrating to be honest because the scene at the campsite was giving everyone really bad vibes i mean clearly something had happened there but it was standard policy at the time for the investigators and the searchers to kind of wait a day or two in missing persons cases like this and i don't know exactly why this was the policy it probably had something to do with the assumption that the missing people would eventually just kind of turn up on their own i don't know it's super frustrating because that's pretty much what happened i mean after that initial search the very first night they kind of just stopped and just waited for a day and they lost a lot of very very valuable time that they could have used to find the family and so the morning after the cowdens were reported missing you know while investigators were kind of just sitting there waiting for the family to find them twiddling their thumbs waiting for the family to magically reappear a very eerie clue just kind of presented itself at the copper general store on the morning of september 2nd the cowden's dog droopy mysteriously just appeared at the front door of the store he was found actually scratching at that very door as if he was trying to kind of get inside in order to seek help for the rest of his family the dog was alone and he was trying to find the family and he was trying to find the family alone there was no one else with him and as far as i can tell there weren't really any other clues associated with the dog's reappearance like this i'm sure that there was some relief that the dog was okay you know obviously like we want the dog to be fine but the hard truth is that the dog's reappearance only deepened the mystery of what had happened to the cowdens and so by the next day finally investigators were done waiting around for the case to solve itself and what would end up turning into one of the largest searches in oregon state history was launched searchers from multiple different organizations and agencies began combing through the rogue river siskiyou national forest there were officers from oregon state police the national forest service central point police the oregon national guard and hundreds of non-paid volunteers they used helicopters and planes search dogs even in the middle of the night it was hard to see where the dog had gone but it was clear that the dog had been in the area the investigation was still very much in its infancy though there wasn't any hard evidence to suggest it an abduction just seemed like the most likely scenario that was the unofficial leading theory behind the family's disappearance and that's not to say that there weren't other theories being considered but the eeriness of the campsite the fact that no trace of the family had been found despite such a large search well all of the evidence that was found was not all of the evidence that was found was not all of the evidence that was found was not all of these things just everything about the case just kind of pointed towards some sort of elaborate kidnapping and yet there was a huge problem with this theory and that of course was that nobody knew why this kidnapping might have happened i mean the family had no known enemies they didn't owe anyone large amounts of money i mean who could have possibly wanted to harm them like this and why the end of the summer turned out to be a turned into the fall and then the fall turned into the winter the months began to fly by and just like the frozen oregon mountains that had seemingly consumed them the cowden family's case turned cold but eventually spring arrived and those very same mountains began to heat back up and just like clockwork so too did the cowden family's case in april of 1975 some seven months after the cowdens had disappeared two men decided to go camping in the rogue river siskiyou national forest just a few miles outside of the town of copper i'm not even sure if they were aware of the events that had transpired the previous year but within a very short period of time these two men would be thrust front and center into this family's disappearance the very same disappearance that had mesmerized the pacific northwest for months on april 12th these two men were hiking through the woods near carberry creek when they accidentally stumbled into a total nightmare scene i don't use that word lightly either and so i'm actually going to take this as an opportunity to warn you uh things are about to get a little graphic and so you good you good here's your chance to skip ahead a little bit okay so first the two men noticed what was tied to the tree in front of them it was the very badly decomposed body of a man again completely tied to this tree completely helpless and then the men noticed the cave the cave that was next to the tree there was this this little cave there and there were actually a few rocks kind of stacked up at its entrance blocking the view inside of it the men moved these rocks out of the way and when they peered inside the cave they saw not one not two but three more dead bodies inside one was clearly an adult female and the other two were clearly children these men had obviously came across something that nobody was ever meant to see and so after you know after having these these awful images burned into their eyeballs the men turned around and of course they got the hell out of the woods they reported their findings to the authorities who quickly swarmed that very same scene and when they did this they made some even more grisly discoveries it was evident that belinda and her five-year-old son david had both been killed by a 22 caliber rifle the only one bullet was actually recovered from the scene five-month-old melissa however had not been shot like her mother and her brother had but rather she died due to blunt trauma to the head which is just awful and then there's richard of course and so remember he was tied up in the tree when he was first found and so investigators brought his body down but it turns out that it was so badly weathered from an oregon winter in the mountains that they couldn't even determine what the cause of death was which is obviously a big question in this case and it could provide a lot of crucial evidence but even putting richard's cause of death aside there's actually a much bigger question at play here uh quite quite an obvious question to be honest and of course that is who in the hell was responsible for killing this family in such a brutal way and i actually kind of have an answer to that question and it's technically a very simple answer but in reality it's actually extremely complicated so here's what i mean believe it or not the very first person who was looked at as a potential suspect after the bodies were found was actually richard cowden himself investigators wondered if it was possible that he took the lives of his family put them in that cave and then took his own life after the fact i mean this this might explain how the abduction went undetected despite happening in the middle of the day but with that said this theory was ultimately discredited actually discredited quite quickly i mean richard had no motive to do such a terrible thing and there was also no weapon found at the scene making it impossible for him to have taken his own life also how would he have gotten up into the tree it didn't really make sense and so investigators quickly moved on from that theory and eventually they put together a timeline of events that kind of went like this on the morning of september 1st richard and david returned from their walk to the copper general store the family then changed into their bathing suits and they went for a swim in the nearby carberry creek they eventually returned to the campsite and then right around lunchtime they were abducted at gunpoint the next part of the timeline is a bit harder to pin down but it basically goes like this at some point the cowdens were obviously brought to what i'm I'm going to call the cave area, which is where their bodies were found, but investigators were actually unsure if this was the area where they were killed or if they were killed somewhere else first. This cave area was located just about seven miles as the crow flies away from the Cowden's original campsite. In a shocking twist of events, one searcher actually came forward and claimed that during the initial missing person search, the one that had happened at the end of the previous summer, he had actually stumbled upon the cave where the bodies were later found. The searcher claimed that the cave was empty at the time, and the police were actually somewhat hesitant to believe him. They probably thought that he had searched a different cave or that maybe he was just making the entire thing up, who knows, but in order to put this man to the test, the police actually asked him to take a look at the cave and see if he was able to find the body. He was able to take a look at the cave and see if he was able to find the body. He was able to take a look at the body and see if he was able to take a look at the body and see if he was able to take a look at the body