Charles Manson: The Family Part I

Prepare for a haunting journey into the life of a notorious figure that history won't ever forget - Charles Manson. Discover the shocking influences and events that molded this infamous cult leader. From his tragic childhood filled with neglect and abuse, to his early criminal activities and prison life, this episode of Rogue and Wicked pieces together the puzzle of Manson's life. 

Our exploration doesn't stop at Manson. We'll take you through the unsettling case of Lori Valo-DayBell who, despite her bizarre denial, was sentenced to two life sentences without parole for the murder of her children. The controversial release of Lesli Van Houten, a prominent Manson family member,  as we dissect this shocking parole decision. 

Strap in for a chilling ride as we unravel Manson's cunning manipulation that allowed him to amass a cult-like following. From his fascination with Scientology and his eerily captivating music, to his use of mind games and rituals, listen in as we reveal how he preyed on society's outcasts. This episode peels back the layers of Manson's disturbing control over his loyal followers, shedding light on the dark heart of the Manson Family saga. Tune in and prepare to be gripped by this chilling tale of manipulation, control and crime.

Transcript

Tiffany: 0:15

So Lori Valo-Daybell was sentenced to two life sentences without the possibility of parole. No shit, we didn't foreshadow that one. No, I just found a link today it was like 56 minutes ago or something that was posted and apparently Chad has yet to go to trial. But that's coming next. And Lori was given a chance to give a closing statement at her sentencing hearing. And boy was it a doozy. Tell me more about it. She never took any responsibility for the killings and claimed that there was no murder committed in her closing statement. Fuck, I know it was wild.

Wendy: 0:57

The fact that you can actually watch these things now.

Tiffany: 1:00

Well, I didn't see it, but like I heard about it and then I started watching the judges sentencing hearing, but it was way too long and drawn out with all that legal mumbo jumbo, so I just kind of gave up and then went to the articles to see like the summary of it Noted. She went on a long tangent quoting Bible verses and basically said that her son and daughter were busy up in heaven. Whoo yeah. And they said. She said that they visited her along with Chad Daybell's wife Tammy, who was also allegedly murdered multiple times, to tell her that they were happy. Probably the most deluded statement I've ever heard from a killer who was obviously extremely mentally ill, although the state found her competent enough to knowingly commit first degree murder. I am happy that she's going to be spent in the rest of her life in prison. But even the judge was like WTF.

Wendy: 1:51

I'm glad that that happened, because I have this really hardcore belief that anyone who kills another human being is crazy. So therefore, claiming to be crazy to get away with killing somebody seems like an oxymoron to me.

Tiffany: 2:05

Yeah, well, she didn't claim crazy, but they. She had to be psych eval like six or seven different times, right, oh yeah.

Wendy: 2:14

That would be like the only defense that she could even try to have. The part that I have an issue with is the fact that that's actually a thing at all, that somebody can throw the crazy card on the table. Because you're crazy if you kill somebody, if you have enough wrath in you to take the life out of somebody and no remorse following doing that, then you're still fucking crazy, yeah.

Tiffany: 2:35

I mean, she's obviously mentally ill. Yes, you know like it's, that's, that's evident. But she was found competent enough to know that she committed the murder. So I mean, at least the judge saw through it and obviously, and the jury did too. But in other news, yeah, lesbi Van Hooten from the Manson family was released on parole, you told me about that this week.

Wendy: 2:59

Tell our listeners this is crazy guys, yeah.

Tiffany: 3:02

So she was one of the main players in the Manson family murders and in lieu of her release I thought I'd bring the Manson family to light. So here goes you dig.

Wendy: 3:11

Always is always forever is one is one is one inside yourself. For your father, all is love. All is love is one. It's time to talk life off behind you. Illusion has been just a dream. The valley of death that I'll find you, I always went on a sunshine beat.

Tiffany: 3:34

So Charlie Manson was born on November 12th 1934 in Cincinnati, ohio, to a 16 year old runaway. Her name was Kathleen Maddox. On his birth certificate he was named no name Maddox and it was later changed to Charles Milley's Maddox. His father was Colonel Walker Henderson Scott big name who was stationed nearby his birthplace. When Kathleen told the Colonel about her pregnancy, he just like up and left and never returned.

Tiffany: 4:06

Kathleen started dating Eugene Manson in 1934 and Charles was renamed Charles Manson. Eugene was a heavy alcoholic who would disappear for days on end, leaving Charles and Kathleen on their own. Three years later she divorced Eugene, and here's the trauma part that comes in. Kathleen was also an alcoholic who would leave Charles for days on end while she was out on drinking binges. She frequented bars and was in the company of many, many men. Charles would often say that his mother sold him once for a pint of beer to another woman, that his uncle had come to get him and returned him the next day. Now his mother claimed later on that nothing ever happened to Charles, that he was not molested and that she was not a neglectful mother. But Charles was very adamant on this and he said this throughout his years, that she was in fact abusive.

Wendy: 4:59

You know that's a really common thing, but usually and I know this is the case for like most of my friends and myself you think that you're being abused when you're a kid because you're being disciplined and restricted from a lot of things that you love and want to do. But then, when you become an adult, you realize, wow, I was a little shit and they were just looking out for my best good.

Tiffany: 5:19

But if you continue to believe those things as an adult, you're probably right, yeah, especially when your mom's like an alcoholic who would leave the house for three days on end and just leave you alone.

Wendy: 5:30

Right, I mean, yeah, that's a form of neglect which in and of itself is abuse too. Yeah, and sexual abuse. When somebody is adamant about it, I don't think you should ever tell them that it didn't happen to them.

Tiffany: 5:42

Exactly. I concur with that. So in 1939, kathleen was involved in an armed robbery and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Charles was sent to live with his aunt and uncle in West Virginia until 1942. Manson's first known crimes included burglarizing a grocery store at age 12 and committing his first armed robbery by age 13. So it seemed his mother's criminal ways were rubbing off on her son.

Tiffany: 6:09

Charles was sent to Gibbelt Detention Center and had escaped from there twice. Once he went back to his home and his mother sent him back to the detention center the second time he escaped. He was committing burglaries and running a room in Indianapolis. He was eventually apprehended and sent to Boys Town Delinquents School in Omaha, nebraska. Four days later he and another boy from the center had stolen a car and drove to Illinois. He was caught after committing more robberies and then sent to Indiana Boys School. In Indiana Boys School Charles Manson claims that he was beaten and raped regularly. He attempted to escape three times. On the third try he was successful in 1951.

Tiffany: 6:52

After more thefts and robberies, manson was apprehended again and sent to another boys school in Washington DC. He was evaluated and was deemed aggressively anti-social. He scheduled for parole in 1952, but he was caught raping another boy at Knife Point. He was transferred to a federal reformatory in Petersburg, virginia, where he was caught committing rapes and some consensual fraternization with other boys in the reformatory. He was then transferred to a maximum security facility in Ohio. So child Charles Manson was abused beyond comprehension. I don't know if some of the abuse happened by the guards at this delinquency center or reformatory schools, or if it was just the other inmates, but he was being raped repeatedly in this so-called prison. How old was he around that time? Well, this is in 1952 and let's see he was born in 1934, and I'm really bad at math. So so Charlie was released to his aunt and uncle in 1954, at 20 years old.

Tiffany: 8:02

In 1955, charles married Rosalie Jean Willis and had a normal job, like a normal regular job. He convinced his pregnant wife to move to Los Angeles with him and on July 22, 1955, charles Manson had stolen a 1951 mercury from Bridgeport, ohio. And on the way he was pulled over and arrested. He pleaded guilty and on October 17, 1955, he was put on five years per ration after his sentencing in November. After his arrest, charles snitched on himself. During an interrogation he admitted to the feds that he had taken a car from a strip mine area of West Virginia and drove it to Florida. So in January of 1956, manson appeared before the federal commissioner in LA about a pending Florida case. Charles was ordered to drive back to Florida but decided to flee instead. A bench warrant was issued for Manson and he was arrested on March 14, 1956 in Indianapolis, indiana.

Wendy: 9:06

So they didn't send an escort or a police officer to send him back to Florida. They were like all right, I'm going to give you a couple of days to think about this while you're on the road and heading towards Florida.

Tiffany: 9:20

That's what they did, yeah.

Wendy: 9:21

Okay, okay, I just wanted to make sure I was right Remember we're in 1956. Wow.

Tiffany: 9:29

Okay. So he was sentenced to three years in terminal island penitentiary in San Pedro, cali. During his first year in prison, his wife gave birth to their son, charles Jr. But his wife soon took up with another man and filed for divorce. It's getting spicy. On May 24, 1957, charles tried to escape and was apprehended and pleaded guilty yet again. On June 10, 1957, he was given a suspended sentence and then placed on probation for five years. After August of 1957, charles was a single man.

Wendy: 10:08

Look out ladies, yeah that's what I was thinking.

Tiffany: 10:11

He's a lady killer. He really is, but the funny part about that is he actually didn't kill anybody. I mean no women.

Tiffany: 10:30

So Charles served a total of two years and five months of rehabilitation. As we know from earlier, charles was said to have an overtly active sexual drive. During his prison stay he sucked and fucked his way through his time without any qualms about doing so. He was also on the basketball team and boxed for a little bit. It wasn't all fun and games in prison, because he had also gotten schooled by seasoned criminals. These hardened criminals would have pimp talk sessions. Men would tell Charles how to control women to get them to do what you wanted them to do, and how to make one girl your number one. The number one would control the rest of the hose. Charles took mental notes on these conversations and they would come to good use later on in his criminal career.

Wendy: 11:20

He really does sound like he's having a great time in there.

Tiffany: 11:23

I know right, it's almost like he likes being in prison.

Wendy: 11:26

Yeah, he's learning how to scheme. He's having a sex fest. It sounds like a really good place for him Free resort.

Tiffany: 11:33

Yeah right. Well, he did spend a majority of his life there. So Charles bounced around to 20 different residences. During his first year and eight months out of prison, he was assigned to work by his probation officer and jumped around from job to job. He bartended, did freezer sales and was a service station attendant, a TV producer and a pimp. Charles was arrested yet again after trying to cash a stolen check at Ralph's Market. Now get this. Charles swallowed the check to get rid of the evidence after the feds accidentally left the check on the table.

Wendy: 12:12

That was clever, yeah, and plus he's probably a great swallower.

Tiffany: 12:17

Yeah, he seems like he was man. He would be, A 19-year-old named Candy Stevens told authorities that she was pregnant and going to marry Charles and that he should be released so that they could start their lives together. But Candy was a working girl who Charles had turned out she was lying, she wasn't pregnant, but instead was doing sex work for him.

Wendy: 12:38

That must be the number one they taught him to have.

Tiffany: 12:41

Oh yeah, well, right now she is his number one.

Wendy: 12:43

No shit he's actually implementing?

Tiffany: 12:46

Oh yes, he is. So on September 4th 1959, charles had be given another psych evaluation. The report concluded that, and I quote he does not give the impression of being a mean individual, which I found extremely laughable. But the common sense theme here is that he is extremely charismatic. And he was tiny. Charles Manson was only 100.

Wendy: 13:11

That's it, that's it Again, again, you guys, I can't stress this enough on this podcast and in real life now, because it precipitates this fucking thought Dude, the nice ones, the really unassuming ones. That makes up the majority of these serial killers and it makes up the majority of how sociopaths behave for like precisely three months. Okay, they do it. It's real. It's a real fucking thing. Okay, let's move on.

Tiffany: 13:38

Yeah well, Charles Manson, he was 125 pounds, soaking wet. So you can imagine how fucking tiny he is, and I think some of that has to do with his little Napoleon syndrome that he gets later on. But he was a tiny, tiny little man.

Wendy: 13:54

He took the Napoleon words out of my motherfucking mouth.

Tiffany: 13:57

Yeah, he was a small dude man.

Wendy: 14:00

Oh, that's so almost cute, if it wasn't him.

Tiffany: 14:03

I know he's like a deranged little monster. The eval concluded again and I quote however, he was very unstable emotionally and very insecure. He tells us about his life inside the institutions in such a matter as to indicate that he has gotten most of his satisfactions from institutions. He said that he was the captain of various athletic teams and that he had made great effort to entertain other people in the institutions. In my opinion, he is probably a sociopathic personality without psychosis. Unfortunately, he is rapidly becoming an institutionalized individual. However, I certainly cannot recommend him as a good candidate for probation. So even the psyche valgred with your point and Candy came to Charles' hearings and was like literally weeping and making a spectacle in front of the judge. The judge suspended the sentence and Charles was given another five years probation. So he like took pity on Candy, the judge, and at this point he's 24 years old, in 1959.

Wendy: 15:11

He's seemingly smart, this guy. He knows how to manipulate? Oh, definitely, and I think the judge was smart enough to see that he could manipulate, which is why he empathized with Candy.

Tiffany: 15:21

Probably In November of 1959, he meets 18 year old Mary Jo, who was in LA because she's seen an ad for an airline stewardess school in a magazine. It turned out that the school was a fraud and she didn't want to leave LA, so Mary Jo convinces her parents to let her stay. Mary moved into an apartment with a friend named Rita. Mary Jo was conned into giving Manson money for three star enterprises, which was a nightclub radio and TV promotions that he was running with Tony Casino in Franklin Hollywood. He obtained the money as part of his quote unquote promotions but he was using it to sell women out of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel.

Wendy: 16:06

This guy's turning more into Joe Pesci every moment. Yeah, he's small like him too. Yeah, yeah. He's just becoming Pesci in my head right now. Make it stop.

Tiffany: 16:17

Manson was arrested a bunch of times for petty crimes in 1959 and 1960. We're talking fraud, theft et cetera, but he kept getting released. There was a federal investigation into Charles Manson but he stopped reporting to his parole officer on February 15th 1960.

Wendy: 16:36

Now, now you have to discipline sociopaths, guys. That's another thing.

Tiffany: 16:40

Get this. He gets Mary Jo pregnant but it becomes ectopic. She gets like super ill and was taken to the hospital. Manson called Mary Jo's dad and he flew to LA immediately to see his daughter. Manson mentioned to Mary Jo's dad all casually that he didn't have a driver's license and was a parolee. Mary Jo recovered and her dad whisked her off to a private recuperation home, like to hide her from Manson. But Manson tracked her down and started calling her. Mary Jo's dad gets super irate and he goes to the cops about Manson, mainly because dad learns that he's a pimp. He also heard that Manson was banging his daughter's friend Rita while Mary Jo was in the hospital pregnant with his child.

Wendy: 17:26

Daddy's trying to do his job and he is not in the wrong for feeling this way. Oh no, he's not.

Tiffany: 17:32

Not at all. He tried to get the Pasadena police to arrest Manson but they said no way. A neighbor of Manson said that he was a sex maniac, that he may have been taken vagina photos and sell in the amount of state, I'm assuming, of young teenagers Not sure if they were underaged or not, but I'm sure some of them were. Manson was on the run. He abandoned his apartment and in April of 1960, candy flipped on Manson. She snitched in front of the grand jury in violation of title 18, section 2421, which was transportation of women in interstate commerce for purposes of prostitution.

Wendy: 18:13

So to put it simply, he's a pimp yo, I don't know what you heard about me.

Tiffany: 18:18

What am I, motherfucking pimpin?

Wendy: 18:22

That song gonna be stuck in my head for days now. Yeah, I know.

Tiffany: 18:25

Oh man. So he transported Candy and Elizabeth to work in Gales to New Mexico in a stolen triumph convertible. He was picked up in Laredo, Texas, and charged with violation of the MAN Act, which was the White Slave Act. He was extradited to LA and spent most of the 1960s in prison. I'm assuming the White Slave Act meant that, because he was basically making these girls work, maybe not paying them or something. I don't know, but that's what he was charged with. I couldn't find much information on that, but I'm sure the Mansonites will email us about it and, if you want to, you can hit me up at roguenwicketatyahoocom. While Manson was locked away at McNeil Island, he was studying magic, how to become a warlock. Hypnotism, astral projection, masonic lore, Scientology, ego games, subliminal motivation and music All things that I absolutely fucking love.

Wendy: 19:22

I was just gonna say that that sounds like yours in my library right now.

Tiffany: 19:29

He wanted to learn to control other people, and some of these tactics proved very useful to Charles. He performed experiments with subliminal messages in prison by broadcasting messages at 3 am through headphones that were on prisoners' bed stands, loud enough for them to hear, but not loud enough as to alert the guards. Charles became fixated on Scientology after learning about it from his roommate, lanier Ramir. He didn't follow the religion, but he cherry-picked ideals from it, and we all know that Scientology is in itself a cult. I'm just gonna leave it right there because I don't want the Church of Scientology harassing me, but Charles learned key phrases from Scientology that he would use with his followers in the years to come. Manson learned hand signals from Scientology and from Masonic lore that he would use to communicate to other people. A specific book really resonated with him. It was called Transactional Analysis by Dr Eric Byrne, the psychiatrist. He used that end-group therapy to learn about humans' minds. Charles wasn't skilled in reading and writing, but was very resourceful in learning things that he was really into or that could be useful. This one really sat with me, though.

Tiffany: 20:49

The Manson family's theoretical basis was Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. The story was about a telepathic Martian, who was roaming the earth with a harem of women while starting a new religious movement. A lot of the ideas were taken from this book and terminology that he would use later. He identified with the story's hero, who was ultimately the leader of the movement. He took to killing his enemies and became the one in power until he was killed by an angry mob and ascended into the sky. Actually sounds like an interesting book. Sounds like a backwards Jesus, yeah, but with Martians.

Tiffany: 21:29

Charles took to singing and songwriting while in prison also, something he was really good at and was even allowed to have a guitar in a cell. A Mexican man in jail taught him how to play guitar and after he was released he went to LA to buy a guitar from a woman's shop and she said that she remembered him singing beautiful love songs in Spanish to her. Manson met a man named Phil Kaufman while he was in jail on a federal marijuana charge. Phil was impressed by Charlie's songwriting abilities and gave him some names of connections that he had at Universal Studios. Manson was able to make many more friends in prison, and some of his cellmates said that he planned on collecting an army of outcasts operating beneath the awareness of mother nature.

Wendy: 22:17

Oh my god, he's on another staycation.

Tiffany: 22:21

Yeah, well, he's already got plans for his release.

Wendy: 22:25

That prison facility sounds like quite an academic system.

Tiffany: 22:28

Yeah, I mean, well, at least he's learning stuff.

Wendy: 22:30

Oh, he sure as hell is. But you know what you put a certain type of mind in any environment and they're gonna learn, and that's one endearing quality that he has, even though he's a sick fuck who I can't stand. It's the fact that he does seem to suck and soak up ways to manipulate people everywhere he goes, when he could be absorbing a lot more good knowledge too, and I mean less counter-intuitive type shit.

Tiffany: 22:54

Yeah, it's probably all that prison cum.

Wendy: 22:57

Fucking sick. Well, it's true, because some of those topics that he was learning about, they teach you good fundamentals too. Listen, guys, philosophy has to be part of your agenda if you're gonna study this type of shit.

Tiffany: 23:09

So Manson was released from prison and on March 21st 1967, at 32 years old, charles was homeless and wandered on and off buses in LA for about three days. He hung around the Berkeley campus for a while singing songs with his guitar, and he eventually came across a girl named Mary Bruner, who was from Wisconsin and she was working at the library on the Univ at the University of California. Mary and Charles hit it off and he moved into Mary's apartment. He was offered a job as an entertainer and played at a club in San Francisco's Tenderloin district. During this time, lynn from aka Squeaky from was picked up at Venice Beach after Charles spotted her sitting on a curb crying her eyes out. Her father had thrown her out after they got into a fight and Charles used her daddy issues to take her under his wing. She claimed that after they made out he told her I am the God of fuck.

Wendy: 24:09

That sounds sexy. I hate it I hate myself for feeling that way, but it sounds like an original song. I'm the God of fuck.

Tiffany: 24:15

We gotta make a song called I'm the God of fuck.

Wendy: 24:18

Yeah, actually, you know that sounds more like a Manson song?

Tiffany: 24:21

Probably, and you mean Marilyn Manson, not Charles Manson, right? So Lynn Manson and Mary Joe all room together. In Hight Ashbury, Charlie started roaming the streets collecting runaways. When he first took acid. He said that he experienced the crucifixion of Jesus. He laid on the floor in the fetal position while the club lights were bouncing off of his body. It really resonated with him and the girl started to look at him like he was Jesus Christ himself. He would use wordplay to make himself appear like he was Jesus Manson, otherwise known as the son of man, also known as Jesus Christ, the Messiah.

Wendy: 25:06

That motherfucker better be able to turn water into wine and do all kinds of shit.

Tiffany: 25:11

Yeah, because I need some wine after reading this fucking story.

Wendy: 25:15

I mean, Jesus could heal people. He could do so many amazing things. So I mean, there's that part too. You're gonna need that to convince me. You're even a prophet at all.

Tiffany: 25:25

All right. Well, I got some stories for you that might convince you that maybe Charles Manson is the Messiah. Yeah, okay, let's see about that. All right, well, let me keep going, I'll tell you about it. So Charles bartered and traded a piano for a Volkswagen bus to get around for a while. In 1967, mary Brenner became pregnant by Charles, and also as soon as she became pregnant, he was arrested again for trying to help a runaway when she was being apprehended by the police. The girl was the daughter of Reverend Morehouse, the same man who gifted him the piano he traded for the bus. The Reverend called the police on Manson once he found out his daughter had run away with him. Manson received a suspended sentence yet again.

Wendy: 26:07

That is so malchemy. He did turn a piano into a bus. He did. That's a fucking miracle Back out, I'm convinced now.

Tiffany: 26:17

So this was a crazy time. The music scene was popping in California. The dead was on tour. Women's liberation was happening. There was free health clinics and free concerts going on in the park. San Francisco was the flower power movement of the time. People would flock from all over the country to go to San Fran. Bikers were selling LSD and gang wars were happening. There was racial tensions and people were being robbed and ripped off in the parks. Height was becoming trodden with trouble.

Tiffany: 26:49

At the end of 1967, the family set out to wander the California coast. They did odd jobs and cleaning services. Charlie was good at convincing people to give him things and was able to panhandle. In addition to the girls working for money, squeaky Fromm, mary Brunner and Charlie moved to Santa Barbara, california, for a while. On September 8, 1967, the three visited a guy by the name of Green about an apartment in Manhattan Beach near LA.

Tiffany: 27:20

Visiting Green in prison was none other than Patricia Crenwenkel. She was 18 years old, from Inglewood, california. Patricia was a former Sunday school teacher and really into the Bible. She was unhappy with her life, depressed and insecure. She was relatively shy and didn't believe that she was pretty. Patricia was great at quoting Bible scriptures and spent four days with Charlie doing just that, except she did it on acid. The two made love and Charlie kept telling her how beautiful she was. Patricia never had anyone tell her that she was pretty before. She was under the impression that Charlie was going to be her new boyfriend. So she decided to abandon her job and join the family on September 12, 1967.

Tiffany: 28:06

Patricia turned over her father's credit card to Charlie, which funded the group for a while, because her father kept paying it, because he said, and I quote, that he loved his daughter. On their way to Oregon to find Charlie's mother, they met 25-year-old Bruce Davis, who was from Monroe, louisiana. He was a transient. After dropping out of school. When he met the family, they picked him up and he became one of the flower children. The group was becoming increasingly larger. At this point they couldn't all fit into the vaults wagon anymore, so they traded the wagon in for a down payment on a school bus.

Wendy: 28:43

It's a goddamn miracle, he's like the alchemist, traveling from place to place and ascending a little more each time.

Tiffany: 28:52

Yeah, in his mind that he definitely was. I'm sure his followers thought the same. They bought it from a Dutchman who claimed to have fished the bus out of the bottom of a river. Inside housed a bunch of dead children. Apparently, I had been in some sort of accident that killed a bus full of kids, which I think adds to the ominous nature of the family's new ride.

Tiffany: 29:11

The family pimped this thing out. They tore the back seats out and made a living space. They hooked it up with a floating coffee table and peacock feathers. This thing was like pimp as hell. They spray painted the bus black and even the windows, and had a French girl paint Hollywood productions on the side of it. But because she wasn't fluent in English she misspelled Hollywood. So they have pictures of this bus. I didn't see any, but I'm sure I could dig them up, because there's Mansonites all over the place and there's so many websites that you can pull pictures of the Manson family and, you know, spawn ranch and all that. I'm going to look for them when I post the episode and I will try to find a picture just for you. Oh, that'd be great.

Wendy: 29:52

I'd love to see inside that thing.

Tiffany: 29:53

Yeah, I don't know if there's a picture of the inside, but I could probably get a picture of the outside. Because of his parole, Manson was transferred from San Fran to the LA office. When he was in San Fran on November 7th or 8th he met Susan Atkins. She was living with some dope dealers in Hashbury, which I thought was kind of ironic because she was living with dope dealers in a town called Hashbury. No, not funny. All right, I'll move on.

Wendy: 30:19

It's my stupid fucking button, I just want to just have it, I'm laughing at myself.

Tiffany: 30:25

Janice Joplin lived right near Susan Atkins and she loved sitting on her porch listening to Janice rehearse. She and a few other women joined the group as they headed back to LA. Susan Atkins was 19 and from San Jose, California.

Wendy: 30:40

I can't imagine how amazing, how fucking amazing it would be to be able to listen to Janice Joplin practice.

Tiffany: 30:49

Oh my god, I know I love Janice Joplin.

Wendy: 30:52

What a dream Holy shit.

Tiffany: 30:55

She had an awful childhood and her mother died of cancer when Susan was 13. When Susan was 15, she quit school and left for San Francisco. In 1966, she was waitressing and living in a hotel. She met two men who were armed robbers. She was in and out of trouble before becoming an exotic dancer. When she met Charles Manson, he sang her songs and told her to pretend that he was her father while they were making love. She said it was the most ennobling experience of her 19 years and it was to me probably the most disturbing thing that I've heard thus far, because I ain't calling nobody my daddy while they're banging me. Ain't happy. Yeah, no, she clearly has daddy issues. Yeah, she agreed to come with them and Charles renamed her Sadie Mae Glutz, aka Sexy Sadie.

Tiffany: 31:48

Susan told her probation officer that there were seven women with a roaming preacher named Charlie. Two of the seven were pregnant and that they were going to go with Charlie to LA, then to Florida. Susan was supposed to go into court for a revocation of probation hearing but instead took off with Charlie's girls. Phil Kaufman's reference to Universal Studios had gotten Charlie hooked up with Gary Stromberg. Charlie had a contract with Universal to record a few songs. They agreed to pay him for his recording costs.

Tiffany: 32:18

Ruth Ann was lured back to the family after Charlie stopped by the old Reverend's house. The Reverend was pissed off as his daughter took off with Charlie yet again and he followed them and confronted Charles Manson, slipped the Reverend some LSD and convinced him to leave his daughter with him. The Reverend went home and his wife divorced him because he let their daughter go. So because Charlie now had his claws into Reverend Morehouse, he started to believe Charlie's ideals. Charles was amazing at deception. If you haven't already figured that out, he started using LSD to get his spiritualist types to see him as Jesus.

Tiffany: 32:54

One specific event he called the parable of the beam-dried biker. There was a biker on the bus with a group who had started freaking out. Charles stood up and yelled in a commanding voice for the biker to lay down and die. The family perceived the biker to be choking and gagging. Under their drug-addled state they saw the biker shrink and the meat fall off of his bones as green smoke went upward off of his body. Then Charlie started an incantation that brought the biker back to life, or so that's the way the story goes. This was something unusual. I covered about the ritual that developed in the family. Manson took to kissing the feet of Squeaky Fromm and she his. This became a thing between the family members and everyone started kissing each other's feet as a sign of submission and love, even though the connotation is control. There's something absolutely adorable about this and I can't explain why I feel that way.

Wendy: 33:50

It seemed very fetish to me.

Tiffany: 33:52

I mean, it wasn't like he wasn't like playing with their feet or anything. She went and kissed his feet one day and so then he kissed her back and then the whole family started doing it as a way to say hello, almost.

Wendy: 34:06

As someone who loves forehead kisses because it's less sensual and more pure, I can understand why you feel that way a little bit. But also because I'm into SNM, I can't escape that connotation right there where foot fetters sit right.

Tiffany: 34:22

I don't like feet, so I ain't kissing nobody's fucking feet, but I found it kind of cute. I don't know why. I just can't explain why You're so weird.

Wendy: 34:30

I love it.

Tiffany: 34:31

The family was traveling all over the deep south. Before landing back in Cali, the family ended up at a hog farm in San Fernando Valley. This hog farm was the commune of spiritualists. That is where he met Fusher devotee Diane Leake and her mother Shirley. Shirley and her husband let the family stay on the property. It was short lived because Manson was eventually kicked off of the commune for making fun of Shirley's communal friends. They were sitting in a circle doing a Buddhist om chant. You know, om Diane pretended to choke while they were doing the om sounds and the girls kept yelling for them to stop because they were killing their leader. So he was kicked out for trying to bang Shirley in a shed also and yes, her husband caught the two of them.

Tiffany: 35:19

The family moved back into the famous spiral staircase house with the permission of a 45 year old Satanist who let an English Satanist hold rituals there. So they had already stayed prior to this at the spiral staircase house and then came back again. Diane Leake followed the group back to the house to meet with Charlie. Shirley and her husband allowed their daughters to travel with the group but tried to get her back when they settled into the famous spawn ranch. Unfortunately, by that time it was a little bit too late. The bus broke down in Arizona and had to be towed, so the family stayed there for about 3.5 months until April of 1968. At this point there were too many members on the bus anyway. The family tried to settle in an abandoned home and crash camps in the area, but they had to just keep moving because they couldn't stay somewhere too long and in February of 1968, they were homeless. Robert Bucalil allowed the family to stay on his property in Topanga. They set up Camp Downhill from the house and lived on the property for about six weeks. There they picked up three more members Linda Baldwin, brenda McCann and Yeller. Robert and Manson formed a six-piece rock band called the Milky Way and it was short-lived. But they did have one public performance.

Tiffany: 36:38

On April 1, 1968, mary Brunner gave birth to Valerie Michael Manson in a shack on Summit Trail. She did it naturally with nothing but weed to help her relax during labor. Her friends attended the birth. Sandy Goode flew down to see the family and she ended up sleeping with Charles that night. Sandy submitted to the family and was conned out of her father's money.

Tiffany: 37:04

16-year-old Paul Watkins was the next member to join the family. He was wandering through the hills when he spotted a bus with a bunch of naked-ass women. He was instantly drawn in and they nicknamed him Little Paul. That night LSD was given as a sacrament, as if it was given to a church. But instead of repenting for their sins, the family had group sex. They left a canyon and during 1968, the family developed hatred for the police. Buses were happening all around the area for like minor infractions, like marijuana. Because of the police, the family became more rigid than they were before. Before. They were all peace and love.

Tiffany: 37:41

During this time the Vietnam War was also going on. Martin Luther King was assassinated and the Black Panthers started calling the police pigs. The term pig was adopted when the Democratic Presidential Convention adopted piggies for president proposal. The Beatles recorded a George Harrison song called Piggies and it was released in December of 1968. Bruce Davis wrote up to the family's camp and became a member. Manson gave speeches on religion and philosophy regularly. Charlie would take less LSD than his group members to keep control over himself and over the members. They kept moving around from beaches to camping in the woods and one night the police were investigating the great Oxnard bust and accidentally stumbled upon a group of naked hippies living in the woods. Some of the members were arrested for possessing counterfeit driver's licenses. Mary Brenner was arrested for breastfeeding in a ditch, which I thought was weird as fuck to arrest a woman for feeding her children. They were soon released and decided to move back to the Topanga Canyon, but were raided and arrested again.

Wendy: 38:52

If she was doing it in a ditch. It sounds like she was trying to be discreet, but I honestly don't think that we should have to be discreet about those types of things. The idea of not being able to like I'm somebody who is not into full nudes, that much. I mean I can appreciate people who do stuff like that. I'm like more about body language and things like that. When I think of like breasts, I do not think they're these provocative and dangerous and dirty things that they've been made out to be, particularly when they're in an infant's mouth. Yeah, me either. At that point they're food, exactly. And the fact that it has been taken out of context to that level is it upsets me.

Tiffany: 39:30

I know that bothers me too and I pissed me off when I read that. But we have to remember also. We're back in the 60s, when it was like I do neem and my balls running around.

Wendy: 39:39

Well, yeah, I mean, I agree, but it's also. You know, there were times where there were statues that were painted, and admirable statues of even goddesses that didn't have shirts on. I think it's just ridiculous that we've come to such misogyny in that regard, like men can walk around topless but we can't, because they're dangerously attractive to men, and that's really why. Oh, I know it's a disgusting, yeah, like we should be allowed. Is it really Like I? Just I fucking can't and especially pertaining to breastfeeding.

Tiffany: 40:11

Yeah, I agree. Musician Gary Hinman bailed two family members out of jail and let the family stay at his house for a couple days. May 6, 1968, the family drove to Spawn Ranch in Chatsworth, cali. All of the 1950s Western movies were filmed there. It was an entire Western town that was basically an abandoned movie set. The set was pretty dilapidated and it wasn't ideal for living. But the family said it seemed like the perfect isolated spot away from prying eyes.

Tiffany: 40:41

So Manta made a deal with Mr Spawn, who was almost completely blind. The girls would cook and take care of him, they would help with the 50 or 60 horses that were rented out on day trips and they could live there in the movie shacks. The bus consisted of about 20 people at this time, mostly women. Mr Spawn didn't know how many people were going to be there, but Charlie snuck most of them in, so Mr Spawn really didn't know. But Mr Spawn was not innocent. It was said that Mr Spawn was kind of a pervert. He reveled in the attention that he received from the barely legal and underaged Manson family girls. Squeaky Fromm got the name Squeaky from her encounters with Mr Spawn. He would run his dirty fucking old man hands up her thigh while she was close enough to him that he could, and then she would squeak from disgust at his physical touch. Squeaky admitted that she had given him fallatio on occasion, I'm assuming so that they could stay at the ranch.

Wendy: 41:42

He was purposely turning a blind eye. It's not that he didn't, he was blind.

Tiffany: 41:47

That's why that was funny.

Wendy: 41:50

I knew you didn't mean it, but it was funny. That's what I'm saying. I was going to make a joke about the one-eyed monster.

Tiffany: 42:00

Every day at dawn Mr Spawn would clang a dinner bell to wake up all the hippies to commence the chores of the day. The family saddled the horses and fed them. They would prepare them for the day's rentals. Some of the members positioned themselves in the front of the property to guide the riders down various trails for day trips. The group would clean the stalls barefoot and be completely covered in horse excrement by day's end. In the book that I was reading, they were talking about how the warm fecal matter would squish between their toes because they were literally stepping in horse shit in bare ass feet. I stepped in dog shit once and it was the most disgusting feeling that I ever had Once.

Wendy: 42:41

You've only stepped in dog shit once. No, multiple times. I was going to say, damn girl, I've lost count at this point. But are they still kissing each other's feet at this point?

Tiffany: 42:51

I think so, which makes it even grosser to me. The group started spreading out near the woods and streams. They built sections with tents set up and Manson would roam the woods supervising their movements. He was quoted as saying all my women are witches and I am the devil, and he wasn't lying. What solidified his thought process was the various altars built around the property. The family would gather skulls and bones and decorate them with emblems and runes. Some were staked like Viking markers all over the woods, which was kind of cool. Manson's tent was painted with eyeballs, the sun symbol and strange scrolls.

Tiffany: 43:32

The ranch hands were meat eaters, but the family were mainly vegetarians. They ate in a large circle and used communal bowls in which they passed counterclockwise. After dinner, lsd and marijuana would be passed around to the group and Manson and they would play the guitar and sing for everyone. Every day the family had to make garbage runs. Basically it was dumpster diving. It was a mission in which the girls would travel out in groups and map supermarkets around the area of the San Fernando Valley.

Tiffany: 44:04

Movies were always being filmed at spawn ranch, so whenever that would happen, the girls would be scarce. They would go play games like Cowboys and Indians, mexican knife fighters and Flatlanders vs the Hill people. I don't know what that ensued, but it sounds interesting. Manson would play rape games pretending to be a Mexican gang member and he would, like you know, kidnap and rape some of the girls on the, but they were role-playing so I don't think it wasn't consensual.

Tiffany: 44:33

The biggest number of recruits happened in the summertime. Manson did not like all these people coming, so he would walk up to them and throw lit matches at the recruits to see who would bail at the site of his crazy and who would stay. If a person stayed, that Charlie didn't like, he would mock them and then mirror all their facial expressions back to them and make them feel uncomfortable. I wish you could see my face right now, because I in my mind, like I'm sitting here thinking like he's making these weird little faces like Eeeeeee, eeeeeee Back at them, because I've seen him do that in interviews. So I literally have a visual picture in my head of what that looks like and it looks ridiculous.

Wendy: 45:14

That's some really petty bully shit there.

Tiffany: 45:17

Yeah, it's like very immature.

Wendy: 45:19

Right. I mean, he has done some really methodical things up until this point, for sure, but that just seems like he's regressed back to some of his tendencies that started this whole escapade, you know, back maybe third, fourth grade or something? Yeah, I know you are, but what am I?

Tiffany: 45:35

Yeah, you guys remember this this dude's 32 years old with like a bunch of like 18, 17, 16, 15, 14 and 19 year olds, so he is immature, emotionally immature.

Tiffany: 45:48

Yes he is. Yeah, the recruits he hated the most were what he called the gorillas. They were the guys the girls would bring back to the ranch to join the group. These guys would hang around just to get the girls to sleep with them and weren't there for the right reasons, which I could see because he wants to maintain total control over the group. He doesn't want these guys coming in and hanging around just to bang his girls. He wants them if they're going to stay. He wants them to follow him and do what he wants. And at this point I'm going to cut the episode off here, because this is the family part one and I want to come back next week with the family part two, and this is going to be a four part series.

Wendy: 46:31

I've already divvied up the episodes, so girl, I have to tell you that lately, especially this particular podcast it feels like that druid is that sits around a campfire and tells a story has come out in you. It's not just a conversation about the studies. At this point you are telling this story and actually I feel immersed in the storytelling, which is such a great experience and has inspired me to want to take that route a little bit more myself, within my own script Writing. That was so well done, thank you.

Tiffany: 47:03

Thanks. You know, what I was trying to go for was the family, this so many people have done the Manson family murders and they fixate just on the victims and the key points of the Manson family and nobody really deep dives into like how they lived, where they went, what they were doing, how these people were picked up along the way. Like I wanted to immerse our listeners in the actual family, because you see so many documentaries and books about the Manson family and there's a lot of information in those books and movies but they don't show them all in the documentaries and a majority of people don't read books, they watch it.

Wendy: 47:49

Right, and that's okay. You know it's okay. It doesn't exercise really important aspects of your mind. That's the one part that makes me sad, because it's like, yeah, it is, it's an easier medium, it's more concise, and so on and so forth, but where the lack of discipline lies is a whole bunch of things that are advantageous for your mind. It exercises an entirely neglected, in my opinion, part of the mind. When you don't read.

Tiffany: 48:16

Yeah, I do agree with that, but at the same time I feel like we're in a society now where 15 second videos are what we watch, so people's attention spans are a lot shorter than they used to be, you're totally right.

Wendy: 48:28

But that's exactly that's what I mean. It's a byproduct of it. It just regresses more and more. In that regard, I know that if I don't read a book and it's been a long time, it's it's. My mind goes into disarray and I really actually it's funny because I need to read a book right now. I'm at a point where if I don't read a book right now, I'm going to get too whimsical and I need that so. But you know, you have dove deep for these details and you have brought to the surface an awesome curation. You did a great job telling that story Like I felt, like I was there, yeah.

Tiffany: 49:05

And I want to keep telling it because there's so much more and just immersive myself in this world has brought me a very well-rounded understanding of the Manson family, and bringing those little details that you don't see in the documentaries to the listeners, I think is like the most important thing. So thank you very much for saying that and that's it. Great work. If you'd like to check us out on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube or TikTok, then you can find us under Rogue and Wicked Podcast. If you'd like to join our Patreon and become a subscriber, then you can find us at wwwpatreoncom.

Tiffany: 49:47

Slash rogue and wicked. Our tier one listeners get pictures, polls and exclusive content. Our tier two listeners get all that plus a bonus episode monthly. Our tier three listeners get two bonus episodes monthly and all tiers get a shout out on the pod. Grab a copy of Wendy's book Sage. It's available at roguepoetnet. Any cool stories, questions or case suggestions should be sent to our email at rogueandwickedyahoocom. And don't forget to give us a five star review on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts. The more reviews that we get, the more pod episodes that we can bring to you you dig. Thanks for listening and until next time.