Tales of Tomorrow - The Crystal Egg - by H G Wells

From 1951, comes The Crystal Egg by H G Wells, known for some of the greatest Sci Fi classics including the Invisible Man and War of the Worlds. In this episode of T O T, starring Thomas Mitchell, a crystal egg reveals a live tableaux of the planet Mars. A 19th Century scientist is obsessed with investigating the crystal, but the antique shop owner who came across the seemingly worthless glass hopes to sell it to a tall, insistent stranger, for whom no price is too dear.

Of Christmas - Bitter and Sweet, written by Bill Russo

Film Noir - "Detour" with Ann Savage - an Eddie Muller and Roger Ebert F...

Classic Film Noir from the 'Alley' but for Free!  You don't have to pay to watch "Detour' on the Bill Russo YouTube Channel

One Step Beyond - The Avengers - S 3 E 28

In the 1940s at the height of Hitler’s evil reign, while the planet is ensnarled in the Second World War, a Nazi general invites local citizens -- whom he intends to send to death camps -- to an elegant mansion for a celebration to mimic one from the late 1700s. However, the ghosts of the original celebrants return to stop his plan.

Jean Shepherd - WOR Radio - The Beatles Exposed

As only he can, Shep files a report on the two week's he spent, touring with the Beatles in England.   A very 'inside' look at the Beatles at the height of their popularity. 

One Step Beyond - The Sacred Mushroom - S 3 E 18

In this episode John Newland leads an expedition into Mexico to learn the truth about the Sacred Mushroom.  Newland and company sit at a table with the people who kept the secrets of the mushroom hidden from the world for centuries.  The host/director of the series eats the 'shrooms' and what happens next, is definitely a step beyond!

One Step Beyond - The Dead Part of the House - S 1 E 9

After moving into a new house with her dad and 

an aunt, a young girl meets three other young 

girls in an upstairs nursery.  Though they are 

ghosts, she becomes great friends with them. 

Her family assumes that the new friends she tells

them about are her three new dolls. 

 

This is Episode 9 from Season One.

One Step Beyond is an anthology series about the weird and unexplainable.  It is sometimes compared to the Twilight Zone, which showed its first episode nine months after the debut of One Step Beyond.

While the Twilight Zone was purely fictional, One Step Beyond claimed that its programs focused on actual people and events.  Host John Newland, who also directed every episode, said that the stories were based on ‘human record’ – but he never explained exactly what that meant.

The series was broadcast for three seasons by  the ABC Television Network from January 1959 to July 1961 and later spent several years in syndicated showings.

One Step Beyond - Epilogue - S 1 E 6

Nine months before 'Twilight Zone' John Newland introduced the weird world that lies just "One Step Beyond".  The chief difference between the two programs is that while T Z dealt with strictly fictional themes, O S B claimed that its tales were derived from 'The Human Record'. 

The 4th Bat in The Bat Collection - NBC -The Bat with Helen Hayes

The Bat Collection on the Bill Russo YouTube Channel

 consists of 4 films. Subscribe to get easy access to all 

the films. 

This episode features perhaps the best of the four most 

prominent of the Bat films - a 1960 TV version of the Bat. All

the films are derived from the 1909 book by Mary Roberts 

Rinehart, which was adapted into one of the most successful 

Broadway plays in history - and later into 3 landmark Bat 

films. 

One of them, the second in the series, inspired the creation of

the superhero 'Batman'

The 60 minute tv movie may well be the best of all the Bat films, due in large part to the presence of Miss Helen Hayes, the first lady of the American Theater, and Miss Margaret Hamilton who scared millions of American kids when she played the part of the Wicked Witch of the West in the Wizard of Oz.

The chemistry between the two great actresses is evident from the very first scene in which Miss Hamilton playing a maid to Helen Hayes' character, complains to her boss that she is afraid the Bat will come into the house and attack them.

"The Bat wouldn't come within a thousand miles of you," deadpans Helen Hayes, "You'd scare him to death!"

You can watch all four classic "Bat" movies on the Bill Russo YouTube channel, including the 1959 offering starring Agnes Moorhead and Vincent Price.  

Hit the subscribe button to get easy access to the movies.  

The World's Fair - A Color Classic Cartoon

by Bill Russo

Once upon a time, the World's Fair was just about the biggest deal in the world - not so much anymore.  There hasn't been one since Italy's Expo in 2015. 

Dubai, in United Arab Emirates, was scheduled to be the site of the 2020 version of the World's Fair, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic it was been postponed. 

Buenos Aires, Argentina, had been scheduled to host a smaller version of a World's Fair, called a Specialised Expo, in 2023. But the city announced its withdrawal and apparently the event is definitely off the schedule.

Ah, but in 1939 there was a humungous World's Fair and it was one of the biggest and most famous cities in the world - New York City.  That fair was a classic - so much so that my Mom and Dad, Bob and Ginee Russo were still talking about it in the 1990s!

Albbert Einstein gave speeches about cosmic rays. There were hundreds of spectacular exhibitions. General Electric, RCA, and Westinghouse were pushing something called television!  It was a little box ranging from five inches all the way up to 12 inches.  There were fuzzy black and white images on the screen that were purported to be live representations of programs being broadcast from radio studios!  Many people thought the televisions were trick boxes playing movies, so David Sarnoff made one set with a transparent case so that the people could see inside and see that there was no minature projector playing the images. 

Most people thought that television could never compete against radio.  TV spent the next 80 years proving that theory to be correct!  Ouch.  Sorry for the jab against TV - but I agree with radio comic Fred Allen of Boston who said, they call TV a medium, because it is never well done!  

Okay, okay....on with the show....here's a Color Classic Cartoon about the 1939 New York World's Fair.  

 

Jevah notice that the Sunday Funnies Aren't Funny Anymore?

 

Jevah notice how the Sunday Funnies in the newspaper aren't funny anymore?

Let alone the fact that now there's only one page instead of ten or 12.

I'm a no talent bum, but the lamest of my comics is better than anything I saw in today's paper.

Case in point:

THANKSGIVING AT THE CLANKY HOUSE,

a cartoon by Bill Russo.

***

***
and then there's

***

Time to stop putting offensive labels on our furry neighbors living in the Bridgewater Triangle. Can't we all just get along?

"Nuff Ced"

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Christmas with the Abe Lincoln of 9th Avenue (Streets of New York)

Instead of watching Miracle on 34^th Street two more times this season, try a new Christmas Favorite from the golden age of films. 

The little known, heart-warming   “Streets of New York – also known as the Abe Lincoln of 9^th Avenue” will cheer you up and renew your spirit.  

Jackie Cooper stars as a struggling newspaper stand owner, who adopts a little crippled boy, single-handedly takes on a gang of thugs, and goes to night school in hopes of becoming a Lincoln Lawyer, not the rich guy written about in books and a movie, but a true honest man who is trying to make the world a better place. 

The Old American Barn Dance - Dumont TV Network1953

The Old American Barn Dance was a summer series that ran from July to September of 1953 on the old DuMont TV Network.  Dumont was the ‘fourth’ network, trailing by far the established operations of NBC, CBS, and ABC.

The network began broadcasting in 1942 and existed primarily as a vehicle to sell DuMont televisions.  In 1942 almost 100 per cent of Americans had radios but there were only about 5,000 tv sets in use at the time.

DuMont was a pioneer in television but never really succeeded as a Network.  It closed the television network in 1956 and sold its TV manufacturing division to Emerson Radio company two years later.

The Barn Dance is one of the few DuMont shows preserved in excellent condition.  It portrays western and country music in a very unsophisticated and ‘corny’ fashion, displaying the talent as ‘Hillbilly’ caricatures. 

Despite that, there are some good musical moments, especially in the performances by Patsy Montana, who in 1936 made musical history with her massive hit, “I Want to be a Cowboy’s Sweetheart.”  She was the first female country singer to have a recording sell over one million copies. 

. Host Bill Bailey sings the western swing number     

"No Supper Tonight". 

Other performers on the first show include Kenny Roberts 

("Cry Baby Blues"), 

also..............

Kay Brewer ("Boogie Woogie Yodel"), 

The house band The Saddle Pals ("Stomp"), 

Nancy Lee ("I''m Dyin' For Someone To Love Me"), 

Homer & Jethro ("A Screwball's Love Song"), 

The Candy Mountain Girls ("Night Train To Memphis") 

and Doc Hopkins ("Honey In The Rock").

Calvin & the Colonel 1961 the Thanksgiving Dinner

The cartoon series Calvin and the Colonel is actually the Amos and Andy show with the original voices of the A and A characters who were changed into a cartoon Fox and a Bear.  The radio series ran from 1928 to 1960 and was for many years the top rated program in radio. 

The first Amos and Andy TV series in 1950 was a huge hit and was loved by millions who can never forget Tim Moore’s brilliant performance of “The Kingfish”. 

After the show was forced off television in 1952, the creators tried to find a way to get the show back on the tube.  When they finally ended the radio version of the program in 1960 after 32 years , they made it into a cartoon series - changing the names of the two lead characters to Calvin and the Colonel.

If you liked the radio series and the first TV series, you will love Calvin and the Colonel – just close your eyes so you don’t have to watch the cartoon and you’ll be fine, it is vintage Amos and Andy!

Science Fiction Theatre 1956 The Man Who Didn't Know S01E12

Science Fiction Theatre (1956 ) The Long Sleep S 02-E02

Science Fiction Theatre (1956) The End of Tomorrow S 01-E13

Oh YouTube, What Have You Done to Christmas?

 

My annotated and updated version of the classic holiday tale Christmas Under the Snow, available in this blog, in my podcast - Short Story Theater, and on YouTube, has been listened to, watched, and read more than 25,000 times since I published it a few years ago.  

The  original version from 1905 by Olive Thorne Miller may have been read a million times or more and I'm pretty sure than not one single child has been harmed by hearing this ancient narrative.

OH YOUTUBE - WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?

In an age where seemingly anything goes in television, politics, radio, and film, YouTube has "Age Restricted" my annotated and updated retelling of "Christmas Under the Snow" which, as previously stated appears in this blog as well as in my podcast, Short Story Theater, and in my Book "Christmas Classics Refreshed".

Attention parents:

DO NOT ALLOW YOUR CHILD TO READ THIS HUNDRED YEAR OLD CHRISTMAS TALE,

they perhaps will be damaged forever because in the story, a rural family whose house is literally buried under the winter snow, captures and eats two rabbits to avoid starvation. YouTube doesn't want your children to know that in hard times people have had to resort to hunting and trapping animals for food.

Good Grief!

Don't tell them that their fish filet once swam in the ocean! Never let on that their Big Mac was slaughtered in Chicago before it got to swim in Special Sauce.

Wake up YouTube!

If you'd care to read or listen to this salacious tale, it is here on this blog. It is free to listen on my podcast, Short Story Theater, or on YouTube - but only if you are 18 or perhaps 21. Maybe you should be over 55 to hear about rabbits being used as food. Click the link if you dare! And if you do please tell YouTube you are a grown up and you know how hamburger is made and where the real Santa Claus lives! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKC6RhcLl8c

Science Fiction Theatre (1955) Project 44 S01E35

Here's another episode of "Science Fiction Theater", also known as "Beyond the Limits". 

"The Stranger" (perhaps the ultimate Film Noir) Starring Orson Welles & Edward G. Robinson (full movie, FREE)

Science Fiction Theatre (1955) "The Barrier of Silence" S01-E19

Science Fiction Theatre (1955) Target Hurricane S01-E26

Science Fiction Theatre - The Human Equation, Starring MacDonald Carey (Days of Our Lives)

Soap Opera Star Macdonald Carey races to beat the hangman, hoping to save the life of a colleague who committed a grisly murder. Carey sets out to prove his friend was not responsible, because he was inadvertently under the effects of a mind altering drug, perhaps LSD. 

Before the Twilight Zone, there was - Science Fiction Theater, 1955 "Marked Danger"

Dusty's Trail (Gilligan's Wagons) 318 "The Wizard of Ooze!"

Dusty's Trail (Gilligan's Wagons) #15 "My Fair Callahan"

Short Story Theater Coming to Cape Playhouse where Bogie and Bette performed?

 

News from Bill Russo's Short Story Theater

"The Book of Gord" was our most popular episode last week (week ending 11-07-2020) on Short Story Theater, followed closely by "From the Halls of Carrabba's Italian Grill", and then by our all time most listened to episode, "The Cold Touch of Death".

We wish to thank our 2500 regular listeners. Season two is about half-way over, there's lots more to come. If you like our work, please do so on social media. Likes and shares will help us get a higher ranking on podcast listings, allowing us to reach more listeners.

Here's a message from our author and publisher, Bill Russo, who celebrated his 77th birthday on November 7. The number seven crops up again in Bill's birth year it was 1943 - 4 plus 3 = 7.

"Hello folks. Our goal this second season is to get to 5000 listeners. Our podcasts are experimental audio plays using actual people as well as computer voices. My budget is very limited and I bear all of the expenses myself. I hope in future we will get big enough so that we can have full cast productions with live actors and actresses."

"One day, when the virus finally goes away, I hope we can go from a virtual theater, to staging an actual broadcast in the great and historic Cape Playhouse in Dennis on Cape Cod, where stars such as Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart, Shirley Booth and Robert Montgomery made appearances early in their career."

Our listeners will be invited to play the roles in our live performances! Stay tuned, and please like and share our stories, most of which I have written especially for Short Story Theater."

Here's our newest play, which had the most unusual ending ever! Bill said .....

"When I was tapping away at my laptop, reaching the end of the story "Jilted", where a Yellow-Hammer Woodpecker is tapping away at a tree, I heard a loud tapping at my window - it was a Yellow-Hammer wood pecker who would not go away!' Hear the details on the podcast of "The Jilted Arbor of Bell's Neck" https://www.spreaker.com/.../the-jilted-arbor-of-bells-neck

Here are a few of the photos Bill took of the Yellow-Hammer with a two foot wingspan, which was tapping on the window of his writing room on Cape Cod, three stories up from the ground. 

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Bill Russo, best known for his appearance on Monsters and Mysteries in America on Destination America, and in the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary; is the author of more than four dozen books and shorts stories, available on all major bookselling sites such as Amazon, Apple, Barnes and Noble and more.  Much of his work is FREE on Smashwords.  

He is also the producer, writer, director, and sometimes performer in the free podcast,

Bill Russo's Short Story Theater.

The program is currently in its second season with more than 50 episodes available for listening on all podcast sites from Apple to Zebra, World-wide.

The original audio play of 'Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod' has had thousands of listeners and even drew high praise from a Sherlock Holmes society based in London. Google Bill Russo's Short Story Theater, Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod, to listen for free. https://www.spreaker.com/user/11578348/sherlock-holmes-on-cape-cod

 

"Dusty's Trail" Episode #05 "DUEL FOR DAPHNE"- (Gilligan's Wagons)

“Dusty’s Trail”, which you could call “Gilligan’s Wagons”, is a 1973 series meant to capitalize on Bob Denver’s fame, first as Maynard G. Krebs in Dobie Gillis and later as Gilligan in Gilligan’s Island. The series just scraped the bottom of the top fifty during its run of 26 episodes and was not renewed for a second season.

Lights Out: "Strange Legacy" Starring Robert Stack

"Lights Out" TV - Curtain Call with Otto Kruger (1951-NBC)

"Lights Out" starring Basil Rathbone in "Dead Man's Coat"

Lights Out (TV): Yvonne De Carlo in "Another country"

Joubert the Wolf Catcher - the Video Version of a Short Story Theater presentation

Lights Out TV Series: The Upstairs Floor, starring Dynasty's John Forsythe

The Veil, starring Boris Karloff - Food On The Table

The Veil: 'WHATEVER HAPPENED TO PEGGY?' - Boris Karloff

THE VEIL - BORIS KARLOFF - The Crystal Ball, from the Greatest Series Never Seen!

THE VEIL BORIS KARLOFF Destination Nightmare

Vision of Crime - The Veil - The Best Show Never Seen!

Boris Karloff : The Veil - The Gloucester Captain

THE VEIL - BORIS KARLOFF - The Girl on the road (The Greatest Show Never Seen!)

THE VEIL BORIS KARLOFF Jack The Ripper - The Greatest Show Never Seen

THE VEIL - BORIS KARLOFF: The Doctors - The Greatest TV Show, Never Seen!

THE VEIL, BORIS KARLOFF, Summer Heat - The Greatest TV series Never Seen!

The Real Life Ending to 'The Jilted Arbor of Bell's Neck' is Stranger Than the Fiction....

 by Bill Russo 

So because of not being used to the clocks being turned back, I woke up at 3:55 a.m. this morning, the day after daylight savings time ended (November 2, 2020) and could not go back to sleep.

I began writing a story called 'The Jilted Arbor of Bell's Neck" which ends in a tree where the enigmatic word 'Jilted' had been carved in huge letters.

As I ended the story with a bird pecking away at those letters, I was distracted by a rhythmic tapping on my window. The window by the way is on the third floor, some 30 feet above the ground!

I was wrapped up in finishing my story with a bird tapping away at the carving on the tree....

but the tapping persisted at my window...and when I looked i was shocked to see............

a large white bird with black speckles, and a big red dot on the back of its head, tapping on my window.

I grabbed my camera and took several pictures of it. Then I tapped back at it and joined it in a duet of tapping, me on the inside and the bird tapping and walking across the window as if it had magnetic feet!

This continued for two full minutes, until finally the strange bird had its say and left.

It left behind however the photographic evidence that you see below!

This is not the first encounter I have had with the weird (Think ee-wahn chu, puckwudgies and the Bridgewater Triangle) and I guess it will not be the last!

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Bill Russo, best known for his appearance on Monsters and Mysteries in America on Destination America, and in the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary; is the author of more than four dozen books and shorts stories, available on all major bookselling sites such as Amazon, Apple, Barnes and Noble and more.  Much of his work is FREE on Smashwords.  

He is also the producer, writer, director, and sometimes performer in the free podcast,

Bill Russo's Short Story Theater.

The program is currently in its second season with more than 40 episodes available for listening on all podcast sites from Apple to Zebra, World-wide.

The original audio play of 'Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod' has had thousands of listeners and even drew high praise from a Sherlock Holmes society based in London. Google Bill Russo's Short Story Theater, Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod, to listen for free. https://www.spreaker.com/user/11578348/sherlock-holmes-on-cape-cod

 

 

 

Dick Curless Tombstone Every Mile

Daylight Savings Time Was Invented by the Devil

 Daylight Savings Time Was Invented by the Devil 

by Bill Russo

(The Day After The Day We Changed The Clocks Back)

So the clock says it's almost four a.m. but my body says it's time to get up because it's really almost five a.m. I got the "Why the H E Two Sticks Do We Have to Turn the Clock Back, Blues!" Takes me almost three months to get used to the change, and by the time I am used to it, it's almost time to change again. The devil invented Daylight Savings Time - either that or it was an axe murderer. I know this, cause it's killing me!

The Dot to Dot Detective and the Morello Murder

Don't Ghost Hunt Without a Guide

 

Don't Ghost Hunt Without a Guide

by Bill Russo

 

I’m pretty sure that the huge interest today in the paranormal is all the fault (or credit) of Orson Welles. On radio, on Halloween Night in 1939 he staged a live re-enactment of ‘War of Worlds’ that was so realistic it sent hundreds and perhaps thousands of screaming people streaming from their homes into the streets.  Apparently a great number of listeners believed that Martians really were attacking New Jersey and that they were hearing the war being broadcast live over the CBS Radio Network.

There certainly were discussions of ghosts and such long before Orson Welles figuratively put on a sheet and went ‘boo’ to the entire United States. As early as the 1870s, Conan Doyle, the literary father of Sherlock Holmes was writing about it and attending seances.  He was not alone, many famous figures from the period including the great illusionist Houdini dabbled in the paranormal. 

But after The War of the Worlds broadcast, and the thousands of newspaper stories that followed it, ghost hunting, UFO watching, and other paranormal activities went mainstream.  Today there are thousands of shows, articles, podcasts, and films about everything from Bigfoot to the ancient civilizations we have yet find on distant planets.

How about you?  Have you ever heard an unexplained knocking in the dark of night while you are resting quietly in your bed? 

From an open window in your living room on a warm evening do you ever hear clearly and distinctly the sound of someone breathing, and yet there is no one there?

Do the fixed shadows cast by objects in your home sometime move four or five feet quickly in your direction as though jumping at you, before dashing back to their original places?

If so, you are not alone.  Many people see these things and much, much more. The majority of us shrug these sightings off because they are infrequent and sometimes ambiguous.  A number of others yearn for explanations.

Is the knocking in the night, an attempt by an ancestor to get in touch with you?  Did an uncle you did not even know you had, bury a sack of gold somewhere and he wants to tell you where it is? 

Sometimes people attempt on their own, without training to investigate the paranormal.  This can be a very dangerous thing. There are many documented cases of people being very seriously injured and even killed, in their quest for ghosts and such.

Don’t fear!  It’s not the ghosts that hurt them.  Most of the injuries are caused by the amateur ghost hunters fleeing the spot where they may have seen something!  They often run off in the dark and trip over both seen and unseen obstacles.

Here’s some advice for would-be ghost hunters.  Seek out the aid of an expert.  I have two people of the highest quality that I can recommend to you. 

Laurie Champion of Florida is a veteran in the ghost hunting and paranormal field.  She is the Director of Hostile Haunts https://www.pinellaspascoparanormal.com/ On the website you will find an enormous amount of interesting materials as well as the contact number for Laurie and her people.  They are fearless investigators and ghost hunters who will aid you in your quest. They are not entertainers! They are investigators.  If you want a good ghost story, read one somewhere but don’t contact Hostile Haunts for one.  Contact the group if you are experiencing paranormal situations.  They can help.  Laurie’s contact information is listed on the website.  Her group handles dozens of investigations every year in a fairly large part of Florida. Laurie is also a published author and her books are widely available.  Contact her for more information.

If you’re located in New England, contact Andrew Lake of Greenville Paranormal, http://www.greenvilleparanormal.com/ located in Rhode Island.

I met Andrew in 2013 when we were both involved in the filming of the award winning documentary (now on Amazon Prime) ‘The Bridgewater Triangle’.

Andrew is a no-nonsense, serious investigator of all things paranormal.  Very knowledgeable, he has several books available.  His contact information is listed on the website.

 If you are not in Florida or New England, I don’t have any sources for you, but here are some tips if you have a situation that does need investigating. If the area of your interest is a location that may possibly be haunted.  DO NOT GO THERE AT NIGHT….before you begin, you should examine the scene in the daytime.  ‘Case the joint’ as they might say in a horror or gangster film. 

Learn the landmarks.  Learn the escape routes so well that you can locate them blindfolded, for in effect if you have to flee in the dark of night, in a sense you will be blindfolded.  Having a mental map of the area is your best defense if you begin to have feelings of fear and panic that often occur on a ghost hunt, even when there are no ghosts present. 

Remember, the only thing scarier than an empty cemetery at midnight, is a cemetery at midnight that is full of ghosts!  I don’t really know what that means but I was trying to come up with a snappy ending.  I guess I failed.  But you will not fail in your ghost hunt if you contact Laurie or Andrew, or if you keep your head while exploring your haunt.

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Bill Russo, best known for his appearance on Monsters and Mysteries in America on Destination America, and in the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary; is the author of more than four dozen books and shorts stories, available on all major bookselling sites such as Amazon, Apple, Barnes and Noble and more.  Much of his work is FREE on Smashwords.  

He is also the producer, writer, director, and sometimes performer in the free podcast,

Bill Russo's Short Story Theater.

The program is currently in its second season with more than 40 episodes available for listening on all podcast sites from Apple to Zebra, World-wide.

The original audio play of 'Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod' has had thousands of listeners and even drew high praise from a Sherlock Holmes society based in London. Google Bill Russo's Short Story Theater, Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod, to listen for free. https://www.spreaker.com/user/11578348/sherlock-holmes-on-cape-cod

 

 

 

 

The Man Who Died Twice

 

The Man Who Died Twice

by Bill Russo

James Olbrich died for the second and presumably final time in 2019.  According to all reports, it was a normal death and it is expected that Mr. Olbrich will not be returning to the beaches of St. Augustine Florida that he so dearly loved in his first two lives.

It was just after a visit to America’s oldest city several years ago, that Mr Olbrich’s initial passing occurred. He drove back to his home in Orlando after spending a day in the storied city of St. Augustine, founded in 1565 by Spanish explorers.  Nothing unusual had happened.  He had not been in an accident.  He didn’t hit his head on anything and was not a victim of a falling coconut.

But something did happen.  He didn’t know exactly what was wrong, but he knew that he was off the beam.  After Jim had driven the two hours back to his home in Orlando, he felt odd but chalked it up to being tired.  He went to bed and found that he couldn’t sleep, had trouble rolling over and just wasn’t able to get into position for sleep.

During the night it seemed that invisible hands pulled him out of bed. Making his way to the bathroom, he found himself stumbling.  His head hurt just behind his right ear and the left side of his body was beginning to go numb.  Banging into the walls, he struggled to get to the bathroom, crawling the last few yards. He remembered lying face up on the floor for a long time.

He did not remember that ultimately help came and he was transported by helicopter to a hospital. A cracking noise inside his skull woke him up. He was on a bed in the intensive care unit.  “I have a headache”, he mumbled to a nurse who replied, “I’ll get you a couple Tylenol.”

By the time she returned Jim had lapsed into a coma. In the operating room the surgeons worked for hours to save the life of their patient. As dawn came, they faced the fact that he was dead. 

A while later his corpse was moved to the morgue. An attendant was assigned the job of putting a tag on the big toe of the lifeless body. With a body bag close by, the nurse was placing the tag on Jim’s toe, but the elastic band became entwined with the hairs on his big toe.  Quickly yanking on the rubber band to free it, she was shocked to hear an “Ouch” come from the lips of the dead man.

Screaming in fear, she ran for the nearest exit, but missed and crashed into a wall, knocking herself out.  Jim Olbrich meanwhile was conscious, but was partially paralyzed and had to wait for the nurse to regain consciousness before he could get help.

Soon, he was wheeled to a hospital bed.  Spending many weeks in recovery, Jim regained partial use of his limbs.  He was able to walk, but his left side was still partly paralyzed so when he walked his gait reminded people of Frankenstein shambling along as he did in the ancient film from long ago.

Jim Olbrich did not complain though.  He made the best of the situation and was thankful for his second life.  Over the years his condition continued to improve by slight degrees and he had a number of good years between his first and second deaths. 

He passed away for the final time in late 2019 at the age of 70 and right up to the end he said that he was very happy to have led two lives.

My Notes:

I can’t verify all points of this story.  I am able, however, to certify that Mr. Olbrich’s second death did indeed occur on the first day of December in 2019.  I have seen the obituary notices.  I can further stipulate from the same sources that his birth date was January 28, 1949.

The details of his stroke and subsequent, death and return from death, are to be found in a number of articles floating around the internet, none of which cite any credible sources.  The story may well be true and I have no reason to think it is not. There have been a number of similar cases. 

From my research into the tale, I could find no evidence that Mr. Olbrich had any memory of the hours during which to the satisfaction of competent medical personnel, he was dead. His conscious memory recalled the Tylenol incident, just before his descent into the coma. His next memory was the pain of hairs being forcibly yanked out by that elastic band the nurse put on his big toe. He had no visions or thoughts from his dead time.

Since this story has been in circulation for some time now, I am surprised there is not more information available in news archives and on social media. 

At any rate, it is a strange case, and I hope you enjoyed reading about it.

 

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Bill Russo, best known for his appearance on Monsters and Mysteries in America on Destination America, and in the Bridgewater Triangle Documentary; is the author of more than four dozen books and shorts stories, available on all major bookselling sites such as Amazon, Apple, Barnes and Noble and more.  Much of his work is FREE on Smashwords.  

He is also the producer, writer, director, and sometimes performer in the free podcast,

Bill Russo's Short Story Theater.

The program is currently in its second season with more than 40 episodes available for listening on all podcast sites from Apple to Zebra, World-wide.

The original audio play of 'Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod' has had thousands of listeners and even drew high praise from a Sherlock Holmes society based in London. Google Bill Russo's Short Story Theater, Sherlock Holmes on Cape Cod, to listen for free. https://www.spreaker.com/user/11578348/sherlock-holmes-on-cape-cod