On Her Nerves

Hey true weirdos, at the end of this episode, stick around if you want for a little bonus content and conversation. Well Sam was a peculiar man. I was not allowed to keep a magazine and he wouldn't let me have a radio and he wouldn't let me go to the neighbors to watch television and if I turned on the electric fan at night he'd turn it off and he wanted me to go to bed early.

Said I would keep him awake. So in other words I just let it get on my nerves. I reckon. I didn't have any business doing it. And what she did, just added a little something extra to dessert and not for the person. True weird stuff. It was a doctor who caught it, an intern at the very beginning of his medical career, Dr. W. Dean Hidy.

His patient, Sam Doss, was sick. The 58-year-old employee of the Oklahoma State Highway Department was admitted to a Tulsa hospital with fever, abdominal pain, vomiting, low blood pressure. He was short of breath, complained of chest pain and dizziness. At first it looked like a bad case of the flu. Repeated tests found nothing and yet the man was clearly fighting for his life.

Eventually he was diagnosed with a severe infection in his digestive tract. And it was severe. It took more than three weeks for Sam Doss to stabilize and recover. Yet no sooner had the man recovered enough to be discharged and sent home, then he died. Standing over Sam Doss's body, Dr. Hidy flatly refused to sign a death certificate until an autopsy was performed.

And what that autopsy revealed was the work of a plump, rosy-cheeked, jovial and eccentric serial killer. A killer who loved romance novels and the Lonely Hearts features in newspapers and magazines. A killer who was a mother and a grandmother and a widow four times over. Her given name was Nancy, but everyone called her Nanny.

And Nanny had dosed her fifth husband, Sam Doss, with enough rat poison to kill a horse. Why? For the same reason she killed three other husbands. They rubbed her the wrong way. They got on her nerves. But husbands weren't Nanny's only victims. By the time it was all over, Nanny confessed to four murders and was believed to be responsible for seven other deaths.

Don't be scared though. You don't have to run and check that your doors are locked. You're safe. Because Nanny didn't kill just anyone. Nanny kept it in the family. The question of whether serial killers are born or made is one that's been debated for decades. A professor of forensic psychology and criminal justice at DeSales University, Dr. Catherine Ramsland, said that you can study case after case and find a handful of things in common, like childhood abuse or a head injury.

But no cluster of factors or influences will be true of all serial killers. Some experts argue that a psychopath is born that way. But a sociopath has been socialized that way. And a person can fit the clinical definition of psychopathy and not be even remotely violent or dangerous. Ditto for a sociopathic personality.

So let's take a look at Nanny's early life. She was born on November 4th, 1905 in Blue Mountain, Alabama. If you're looking on a map today, that's now Anniston, Alabama. Her parents, Louisa and James Hazle, christened their new baby daughter, Nancy. She was one of five children born to the Hazles. Four daughters and one son, all made to work on the family farm.

Her father, James Hazle, was a bad piece of work, described as controlling and abusive to both his wife and his kids, none of whom were allowed to finish school. Nancy, nicknamed Nanny, left school in the fifth grade. She was an imaginative child, obsessed with her mother's romance novels, daydreaming of her own future suitors, her own happily ever after.

Nanny was nine years old when the accident happened. The whole family was traveling by train to visit relatives when the train came to an abrupt halt and little Nanny struck her head on the metal back of the seat in front of her. The sharp metal edge gouged a deep cut, blood everywhere, headaches, blackouts and depression plagued her for years afterward.

It was something she talked about in 1955 during a hearing to assess her sanity prior to being tried for murder. I cracked my head open. Sometimes I think I might be thinking crooked. The accident and injury only complicated her already hardscrabble life. Her father, James, doubled down on the strict isolation of his children as they headed into adolescence.

Nanny and her sisters weren't allowed to attend dances or really any social events. James was fixated on the notion that given the first opportunity, a man would molest his daughters. The girls weren't allowed even a single pretty dress. Makeup was forbidden, which had to be hard on Nanny, whose free time was spent pouring over the lonely hearts column in the local newspaper.

She yearned to be courted, to be romanced and to be loved. It was the kind of dreamy, innocent yearning that no one could have guessed might turn so very deadly. Nanny was 16 when she got hired on at the linen thread mill with dark, glossy hair, dark eyes and an infectious giggle. Nanny soon caught the attention of a young man named Charley Braggs.

Charlie was handsome and tall with a thick head of curls. He was a hard worker, the devoted only son of a single mother. And that's where his paychecks went. Nanny's father approved. Here was a young man who didn't fritter away his time and money on jazz music and booze. Within four months of meeting, Nanny and Charlie were married.

Nanny began married life in her new mother-in-law's house, but it wasn't an easy adjustment. Well, I'm married as my father wished. It was 1921 to a boy I only know about four or five months who had no family, only a mother who was unwed and who had taken over my life completely when we were married. She never seen anything wrong with what she done, but she would take spells and she would not let my own mother stay all night.

Whatever Nanny's daydreams about marriage were, the reality was starkly different. She was not the apple of her husband's eye and she didn't have his full attention. His mother came first and Nanny burned with resentment. It didn't help that the couple's family grew so quickly. Four daughters born between 1923 and 1927.

Exhausted and miserable, Nanny took to drinking and chain smoothing. Charlie escaped the tensions at home by disappearing for days on end. Each suspected the other of cheating and then tragedy struck. In 1927, Nanny and Charlie's two middle daughters died suddenly. Zelmer was one and a half years old. Gertrude was two and a half years old when they passed away.

Food poisoning was suspected. Charlie, grieving and weary, was at the end of his rope. Our marriage started off pretty well, but after a couple of years, she started going off. She'd go to her folks or off with someone and I'd have to go get her back. About eight years of this was enough. Of the five children born to the couple, Charlie Bragg said, One of them died right after she was born.

The other two, some of the neighbors said there was something funny about the way they died because they turned black so quick. Some of my folks warned me about her. She got mad. I wouldn't eat nothing she fixed or eat nothing around the house. She was right mean. She made it like she was a church woman when we got married.

Some of my folks thought she was. But I found out she was no more Christian if she had never heard the Bible preached. I told my mother that. Charlie took their eldest daughter, Melvina, and fled, leaving Nanny with his mother and their other surviving daughter, Florine. In one more stroke of terrible fortune, Charlie's mother died not long after her son left.

Nanny was forced to take a job in a cotton mill to support herself and Florine. In 1928, Charlie divorced Nanny. He had no idea then how lucky that decision would prove to be, nor how much he'd later come to regret leaving his mother behind in the house with his ex-wife. Nanny, at just 23 years old, had buried three children, lost a fourth to divorce, and was on her own trying to raise a fifth.

No one expected her to bounce back so quickly from such tragedy. But remember, Nanny was in love with love. And by summer 1928, when Charlie Bragg returned Melvina to his ex-wife, Nanny already had her eye on a new man. His name was Robert Franklin Harrelson. They married in 1929 and set up house in Jacksonville, Alabama.

It wasn't long, though, before Nanny realized her second husband had a little problem with alcohol. He was an awful drunkard. Yet Harrelson was the man Nanny loved best, something she maintained right up to the end of her life. And the marriage, despite Harrelson's long deep dive into the bottle, lasted 16 years, an eon for Nanny.

Now, you can say that love is infinite, but Nanny's patience sure wasn't. One day in 1945, he came home drunk. Harrelson was blotto and aggressive. He insisted that his wife come to bed with him. He said, if you don't come to bed with me right now, I ain't gonna be here tomorrow. Nanny said that in this drunken fury, her husband raped her.

I thought I'll just teach him. She found a bottle of what she called Harrelson's rot gut whiskey and spiked it hard with rat poison. He was sick all week and the next Sunday he died. The not so grieving widow was fond of epitaphs. She buried Harrelson under a tombstone that read, God be with you till we meet again. She even purchased the plot beside her late husband, fully planning to join him for all eternity when the time came.

So sad, so wrong. But as the great Celine Dion has taught us, the heart will go on. It didn't take long at all for Nanny to jump back into the dating scene. She was traveling, roaming, God only knows where, because no one else seems to, when she eventually made her way in 1947 to Lexington, North Carolina. She'd spotted something in the Lonely Hearts section of a newspaper that sparked her interest.

His name was Frank Lanning. They called him Arlie. Nanny had a type and Lanning was it, a charming, drunken womanizer. Two days after meeting, the couple married, which fits given Nanny's passion for romance novels. Why should her life not be every bit as thrilling as the book she devoured? Was she so different from the heroines in those paperbacks?

Didn't she resemble Bedelia, the title character in Vera Kaspari's 1945 bestseller? It was the story of a newly married couple. Bedelia's husband, Charlie, considered himself the luckiest man in the world. She was lovable as a kitten. Her eyes were lively, dark, and always slightly moist. In contrast with her brunette radiance, her husband seemed more pallid, angular.

And restrained. His Christmas present to his wife had been an antique gold ring, twisted into a bow knot and set with garnets. She wore it on her fourth finger and held it out at arm's length, cocking her head to study the effect. How my little jackdaw loves finery, he said. The metaphor was literary. Charlie had never seen a jackdaw.

When he was a small boy, his mother had sung. Things are seldom what they seem. Skin milk masquerades as cream. Jackdaw's strut in peacock feathers. High lows pass as patent leathers. In the novel, Charlie begins to suspect that his new wife might be a serial killer. And he might be her next victim. Too bad that Arlie Lanning wasn't so clever.

The hasty marriage was rocky from the start. And this time it was Nanny who took to disappearing for days at a time. Nanny later said that she was jealous of the attention her husband gave other women. Lanning's relatives disputed this, saying that it was true that Arlie had sown his share of wild oats. But that upon marrying Nanny, he started going to church.

One family member said they tried to persuade Arlie to put a stop to Nanny's wandering ways that no man should tolerate that behavior from a wife. Arlie declared that he just didn't see it that way. Two years later, Arlie Lanning was dead. Heart failure was the suspected cause. But in 1955, Nanny offered up the true reason for her third husband's demise.

It was from running around with other women. Wait, that's how he died? Sounds more like why he died. He kept on arguing till it brought on serious trouble. And then I just put poison in his food. Ah, that's more like it. The last words Arlie Lanning said in this life were, It must have been the coffee. Nanny tucked husband number three into a grave marked with a tombstone reading, We will meet again.

Then she learned that the home that the couple shared had been left to Lanning's sister. It burned to the ground of all the darn bad luck. And Nanny pocketed the $1,400 in insurance money. Lanning's mother died in her sleep not long after the fire or bad luck. Nanny went to stay with one of her sisters named Dovey. Dovey was in poor health, bedridden, but delighted to have her sister Nanny come to stay.

It's just too awful that Dovey died shortly after Nanny settled in. My goodness, doesn't it seem that a big black cloud of sorrow dogged Nanny's every move? After all that, Nanny declared herself finished with marriage. Her first husband abandoned her, she said, and the Lord took the second two. She resolved to be through with romance forever.

But not surprisingly, that was a resolution that didn't stick. About a year later, Nanny joined a Lonely Hearts Club. She met a man named Richard L. Morton. He worked at a pool hall in Emporia, Kansas. Poor Arlie Lanning was in the grave for just over a year when Morton wrote a letter to the Lonely Hearts Club asking that he and Nanny be dropped as members.

We have met and are happily married. The newlyweds set up house in Emporia and Nanny's mother Louisa moved in with the couple. Unlike the other men in Nanny's life, Morton wasn't a drinker, but he liked the ladies and he wasn't shy about committing a little adultery here and there. You can't blame the arrival of his mother-in-law for Morton's extramarital bed-hopping.

Louisa had hardly unpacked before dropping dead. Another shocking loss for poor Nanny. How can any one person bear so much pain? It hurt Morton to see his wife suffer. She is a sweet and wonderful person. Sweet and wonderful. And just three months later, spooning a fatal dose of rat poison into Morton's morning coffee.

Nanny felt she simply had no other choice. And he was fixing to run around with another woman. Morton died on May 19, 1953. Nanny didn't bother writing an epitaph for this dead husband. Instead, the word chief was carved into his headstone out of respect to his Cherokee heritage of birthright. He was 64 years old when he died and already in Nanny's rearview before they'd even finished shoveling soil onto his coffin.

We met Sam Doss at the beginning of this story. After he'd become Nanny's next pen pal paramour. After they'd married in June 1953. Nanny's last husband was barely a month in his grave when the couple said their I do's. Doss was nothing like the other men Nanny had romanced. He was a teetotaler, a non-smoker, neatly dressed, thrifty, even-tempered, devoutly Christian.

He knew little about his new bride. Only that she was a widow, a terrific cook, and always smiling. The kind of woman he saw himself growing old with. Spending quiet evenings together by the fire. Doss was 59 when he married Nanny. But all that clean living had paid off. He looked younger, was energetic, and best of all, Sam Doss was a man with a trusting nature.

There's an old saying, marry in haste, repent at leisure. Poor Sam had no idea what he'd gotten himself into. Nor did Nanny. Her new husband scorned her beloved romance novels. They were evil. And time spent reading that kind of trash was a waste in his opinion. He would not even entertain the idea of having a radio or a television in the house.

Using electricity was wasteful. Nanny was forbidden from turning on lamps except to read scripture preferably. And never a cheat magazine or a lonely hearts advice column. Bedtime was strictly enforced. Sex was expected on schedule. What had looked to Nanny in the beginning like sober thriftiness. Now felt like miserly penny pinching.

She was frustrated and exasperated. And took off to Alabama for a visit home. Sam Doss was desperate to bring his bride back. He showered her with letters pleading for her to forgive him for failing to cherish her. As the treasure she was. He showered her with gifts. So out of character for the man. Nanny was not convinced that these changes in her husband were real.

Or that they'd last. He still controlled all the money. Could make every decision. How could she ever trust him? How could she take him at his word? Well Doss showed her. He added Nanny to his bank account. She was free to use it however she wished. And then he did the thing that sealed his fate. Doss took out not one but two life insurance policies.

Naming his wife Nannie Doss the sole beneficiary. Finally satisfied Nanny returned to Oklahoma. And her fifth marriage. It was a pleasant crisp fall evening. Nanny had prepared a delicious meal. She really was an excellent cook. And Doss was looking forward to dessert. It was Nanny's prune cake. Rich and redolent of cinnamon and cloves.

And swimming in fresh cream. Sam cleaned his plate. And licked the spoon. Hours later he was doubled over in agony. Sweating and groaning. And barely able to speak for the pain. He couldn't get out of bed. Weight fell from his already trimmed frame. His bewildered doctor finally insisted that Doss be taken to the hospital now.

He sure did like prunes. I used a whole box. You know what happened next. Sam Doss fought for his very life. And was finally able to return home after 23 days. Nanny settled her considerably diminished husband into his favorite chair. Promising to serve him that night. The best home cooked dinner she knew how to make.

You already know that Nanny was not a patient woman. Perhaps she just simply could not believe. That Doss had survived the walloping dose of rat poison. She added to that prune cake. Could not believe the man was home. And would expect her to go back to that rigid life. No romance. No radio. Barely permitted to even turn on a lamp in the evenings.

Had she grown to loathe his touch. Coming as it did right on his preferred schedule. Was she to live forever without a single sweet word. Live forever without feeling the rush of passion. Denied even the simple joy of an evening out. Dining and dancing. Was she never ever to have the life she'd been dreaming of since she was a girl.

It was October 5th, 1954. If only Nanny had waited just a little longer. Maybe she'd have gotten away with it. After all Sam Doss had been so gravely ill. Had barely made it out of the hospital. A man his age and poor health. Things happen. But Nanny with those two life insurance policies in hand. Decided that she had to be free now.

And the only thing standing between Nanny and her freedom. Was her fifth husband Sam Doss. On October 12th, 1954. After just five months of wedded bliss. Nanny went into the kitchen. To prepare a cup of fresh coffee for her husband Sam. She stirred in sugar and cream. And a heaping helping of rat poison. Nanny had learned from experience.

What science had long known from research. The taste of arsenic. The fatal ingredient in rat poison. Is best concealed in wine. Milk and coffee. Sam Doss had gotten on Nanny's nerves. For the very last time. The autopsy demanded by rookie doctor W. Dean Hidy. Came back with damning results. Sam Doss had died by poisoning.

A massive dose of arsenic. Nanny was immediately arrested. And charged with his murder. Nanny denied everything. How dare the police even suggest such a thing. He was her husband. And she loved him. But the Oklahoma cops were not buying it. They pushed and pushed. And to their disbelief. Nanny giggled her way through their questions.

Paging through a drugstore. True Confessions magazine. Insisting they had it all wrong. I don't know what you're talking about. Me? Poison? And again that weird. Unsettling. Inappropriate. Giggling. Oh boys. Come on now. I killed nobody. I don't know why you think I did. I married those men because I loved them. It was a seasoned homicide detective.

Named Captain Harry Stege. Who finally succeeded. In coaxing a confession out of Nanny. Not that it was easy. Nanny withstood seven hours of interrogation. With four rotating teams of two interrogators each. Hammering away at her. I feel awful bad about keeping you fellas up this way. I'm sorry to be so much trouble.

Captain Stege with his FBI training. And years of experience. Never tired. He would not be put off. Nanny finally gave in. And admitted that she poisoned husband Sam Doss. Richard Morton. Arlie Lanning. And Frank Harrelson. And Stege. Who just about seen it all in his 24 years of police work. Said of Nanny. That the whole case defied description.

That she'd look you right in the eye. And smile. As she admitted to killing this husband. Or that husband. Nanny was arraigned in November 1954. And ordered held without bail. Pending a preliminary hearing. The judge in the case. Entered a plea on her behalf of innocent. On the advice of her attorney. Who claimed that she was not mentally competent.

To enter a plea herself. The county attorney. Prosecutor J Howard Edmondson. Had it entered into the record. That he was not opposed to Nanny. Being remanded to an asylum. For an evaluation of her sanity. As for Nanny. She spent the entire proceeding smiling. And chewing vigorously. On a mouthful of gum. I don't understand big legal words.

They said something about a mental checkup. And I guess I need one. Maybe those docs at the hospital. Teach me to think straight. The news spread like wildfire. Nanny Hazle Braggs Harrelson. Lanning Morton Doss. Had been charged in the poisoning murder. Of her husband Sam. And had confessed to killing. Three of her other husbands.

The same way. From Kansas to Alabama. To North Carolina. A whole lot of people. Were suddenly asking. A whole lot of questions. About a whole lot of others. Sudden and even mysterious deaths. Oklahoma police could hardly keep up. With the flood of phone calls about Nanny. The woman the press dubbed. The giggling grandma.

Had apparently left a trail of death. And heartache. Everywhere she'd been. But Nanny was done confessing to her crimes. Now my conscience is clear. You can dig up all the graves in the world. And you won't get anything more on me. And so the exhumation of the bodies began. Poisoning a husband or four was one thing. But it seemed unthinkable.

That this woman could have so coldly murdered. Her own daughters. Her grandchildren. Her mother. Her sister. Her mother-in-law. Remember what first husband Charlie Bragg said? They called him the one that got away. One of them died right after she was born. The other two. Some of the neighbors said there was something funny.

About the way they died. Because they turned black so quick. Annie's first born child. Daughter Malvenia came forward. With a story that was utterly heartbreaking. If mother is guilty. I want her to suffer for it. But if she's innocent. I want it all stopped. Still I admit that I've been suspicious of her for a long time.

Malvenia recalled the night she gave birth to a son. She'd long been troubled by a waking nightmare. She'd witnessed her mother nanny. Take the newborn into her arms. And slowly plunge a long hat pin. Into the soft spot on the infant's head. That had a lot of ether. And later I made myself believe I was dreaming. No but I saw my mother pick up my little baby.

And stick a pin into its head. No but it wasn't a dream. It was real. And we were very poor. And we had no money to buy a casket. Oh my baby. The orders for exhumations of bodies began rolling out. Arlie Lanning's body tested heavily for arsenic. As did the body of nanny's mother Louisa Hazle. I didn't poison my mother.

I loved my mother more than I love my own life. Authorities in Alabama opened the graves of Frank Harrelson, husband number two. Dovie Weaver, nanny's sister. And Robert Higgins, a grandchild who died at two months old. Harrelson's brother Ernest recalled asking nanny back in 1945 when that infant died. If she had any notion of what might have caused such a sorrowful thing.

Nanny's answer? I don't really know but that baby toddling around might have gotten a hold of some rat poison. Except two and a half month old infants are incapable of toddling around aren't they? Baby Robert was Melvina's son being cared for by his grandmother nanny. While his mother recovered from an illness. Two of Melvina's children murdered by her own mother.

The state of Oklahoma moved forward pursuing murder charges. But only for the death of Sam Doss. This despite nanny's confession of three more murders. And the suspicion that she was guilty of as many as seven more killings. In April 1955 a jury found nanny mentally competent to stand trial. I'm as sane as anybody. I guess I ought to know better than anybody if I'm crazy.

I never felt more sane in my life. Nanny's trial was scheduled to begin in June 1955. She was facing life in prison or death by electrocution. But don't you know that the giggling grandma had one more trick up her sleeve? On May 15 1955 Nannie Doss entered a surprise plea of guilty. In the poisoning death of fifth husband Sam Doss.

There would be no big murder trial now. Only a sentencing. As for possible murder charges in Alabama, Kansas and North Carolina. No authorities expressed any desire to extradite nanny to try her in those cases. Instead they opted to place hold orders on her. Something that would prevent her from ever being paroled in Oklahoma.

The judge who sentenced nanny acknowledged that the Oklahoma courts had no authority to punish her for the murders of Frank Harrelson, Arlie Lanning or Robert Morton. And informed her that the authorities in Alabama, Kansas and North Carolina. Had every right to pursue extradition. Judge Elmer Adams also stated that he accepted the opinions of medical experts.

Who'd found Nannie Doss to be a quote-unquote mental defective. And that those findings compelled him to pass a sentence of life in prison. Instead of death by electric chair. He added. This court has never heard of a woman being put to death for any crime in Oklahoma. It may happen someday. But it would be a poor precedent.

And the people of this state would very reluctantly see such come to pass. Nanny spent the rest of her days in the Oklahoma state penitentiary. It's just like home. We get to go to movies. We go to church. And have television. And sometimes we have dances. Nanny spent 10 years in prison before dying of leukemia on June 2nd, 1965.

She was described as a model prisoner. Always ready with a joke. A smile forever creasing her plump cheeks. Nanny though knew full well what her reputation was. Not long before she died. She told a reporter who asked her about her life behind bars. When they get shorthanded here in the kitchen. I always offer to help out.

But they never do let me. Next time on True Weird Stuff. The thing about death is. You never really give a lot of thought to how strange the rituals around death are. Especially because you've grown up with the idea of embalming. And open casket viewings. And graveside ceremonies. And crypts. And vaults. And all of that.

So it's shocking to look at the way someone else celebrates death. And realize we're just as weird as we can be. On the next True Weird Stuff. So we had lots of fun with this incredibly terrible awful tragic horrifying true story. We decided to lean into those old-fashioned radio days. Of like dramatic radio serials. You know that.

Let's see it would have to be I guess our great great grandparents. Might have been able to listen to. So we want to thank Rick Sullivan for taking on the part of Judge Adams. Max of course handling Morton. One of the dead husbands. Elizabeth Jordan played the role of Malvenia. Nanny's daughter. Poor Arlie Lanning was played by our very own Lamar Richardson.

Our romance novel narrator was Heather Furr. The part of Charley Braggs. The one that got away was taken by Kevin Nash. And the star of today's episode. Absolutely slaying Nannie Doss. Joanie Case. Round of applause. So here's a little fun. Here's a little fun fact. Kevin Nash is my husband. Joanie Case is Kevin's first wife.

That's my we call her my sister wife. So listen listen. In this episode she plays a woman who kills a husband every time he gets on her nerves. And Kevin plays the one husband she didn't kill. And someday won't their grown children enjoy listening to this. Hey you guys you're welcome. What a little gift. That is so funny.

Do you know who this reminded me a bit of? What was her name Blanche Moore? Yes Blanche Taylor Moore. Blanche Taylor Moore who was the serial killer. I believe in North Carolina. Who would poison. But it does seem and I don't have the statistics in front of me. But it seems like I've read that poisoning is is there's a lot.

Women are more likely to poison than men are. Men are more likely to murder if it's like a spouse or something by. You know shooting them. Yeah you know strangling. This is I've always thought this about this way of killing somebody is. You're not only killing them but you're watching them go down fast. And really it's agonizing.

Being poisoned by rat poisoning is a terrible way to die. But you just kind of watch it on the sidelines. Well we sick. Oh yeah. You seem sick. And well and the thing about Nanny like. She for the most part. She would hit these men hard and take them down in one in one dose right. Yeah like Arlie Arlie Lanning had about an inch worth of rat poison in his coffee.

And coffee back then must have really tasted like. So pissed because I can't believe you. I know that they say that dairy products wine and coffee are the best way to conceal the flavor of arsenic. But holy macaroni that must have been some bad coffee. OK because an inch of rat poison is a lot in a cup of coffee. I know that said that it's best if it was it milk wine coffee.

But it's got to be some kind of a taste. I would think that's what I'm saying. Like that must have been some crap coffee that he was able to chug a lug that down with all that rat poison in it. Richard Morton. She got him with a single dose in his quote unquote rock whiskey. Sam Doss here was the problem. She tried to kill him in a single dose and miscalculated and he was able to come home from the hospital.

Had he died with the first dose like the other husbands. I don't know that we'd be having this conversation. I don't know that she'd gotten caught Max honestly. Because you look at her track record. Four husbands dead. Two children. Two grandchildren. A mother in law. A mother. A sister. Hello. Everything this woman touched abruptly and mysteriously died.

And nobody was suspicious until husband number five. Till the very end of her murder career. If she would have been more aggressive on his first dose in that cream on his prune cake. Buddy. We wouldn't be having this chat would we? No. It makes you wonder has this happened and somebody went through and was able to do this and nobody found out.

I think so. And what it really comes down to because we have very good tests. We've had the ability to test for the presence of arsenic since like the late 1800s. We have really good tests for this. And anyone that's watched a single Dateline episode knows that it's one of the things they look at right away. But this is the 19.

This is happening in the 1940s and early 1950s. I guess maybe without the internet and mass communication and all of that she could hop from Alabama to Kansas to North Carolina to Oklahoma leaving a trail of destruction in her wake and nobody put the pieces together. Nobody. Well and you know the thing is you could move from place to place and start over and there was no connections like you have now with social media and things are so much more connected now.

The credit bureau. Yeah. The credit bureau now. Like you simply do not have the ability to dodge and duck and weave like people did you know 80 years ago. The thing about Nannie Doss like everybody always talks about her you know the giggling grandma the husband killer. I'm sorry. Where were y'all when she was sticking a hat pin into a baby's head.

She killed her newborn grandson as he lay in her arms. Like I'm not saying that well you know a husband killed here and there. None of us are perfect. I'm not saying that. I'm saying like isn't it wild how all the other deaths just get sort of kicked to the side in this story. The thing about the hat pin was when I when you read that I was like oh to an infant.

Oh what kind of a monster would do such a thing. So here's a little something something to think about. Um I referenced the forensic psychologist at DeSales and this idea that when they look at the the lives of known serial killers child abuse and a head injury are dominant factors that they have in common that serial killers have in common.

And Nanny did suffer a pretty severe head injury in that train accident at nine years old leaving her with a lifetime of debilitating headaches and scrambled thoughts. And clearly whatever part of the brain holds your conscience or your sense of remorse or decency that got knocked slam out of that girl because she really did not have any regret or remorse.

She wasn't even all that sad to get caught. I'll tell you that. And when the the Oklahoma cops finally broke her Harry Stege Captain Stege when they finally broke her and got a confession they they couldn't believe how like giggly and happy a matter of fact she was and they pressed her team. Do you not know what you did.

And she would just look at them and say my conscience is clear. My conscience is clear. And and when they pressed she said I told you I did it. Now my conscience is clear. The act of confessing wiped out the crime for this woman. Think about that for a second. Like I said I did it. We're done now. What else is there to talk about.

Something very interesting that you talked about at the beginning because this is a question that frequently comes up about what is the difference between being psychotic and sociopathic and it does seem that sociopath is is a learned behavior where if you're psychotic you're born that way that doesn't seem to be any psychopathic.

That didn't mean psychotic. I mean psychopathic. It seems like you know you there's nothing there's nothing you can point to to say this is why this person is this way. So what's interesting is her hers is probably sociopathic due to the abuse with with the head injury. But we'll never know if it was one or the other or both that caused this behavior.

You know I mean I don't think we're ever going to know that as somebody who's had some head injuries and most probably had a concussion when I played football because I was knocked flat out. I mean I was out and came to with them having those awful ammonia smelling salts under my nose to bring me back. You know and I sat out a few plays and then I continued playing but they didn't know you know they didn't know back then.

Which leads me to my confession of lots of psychopathic behavior. Well you do like when you and in no way are we excusing any of this. Nannie Doss like you were you familiar by the way let me ask you because you know your serial killers better than the average bear. No I didn't. Much familiar with her case. But I can tell you from looking at pictures of Nannie Doss she must have been really hella charming.

That's all I'm going to say or had a trick hip or something. Yeah I mean she's not. You know I mean look you know she's kind of ordinary. I mean maybe below ordinary. I when I was like you we've been kind of conditioned by the movies. I was expecting a bombshell I think. But you know then she's very when we when they called her the giggling grandma.

She she has a very grandmotherly kind of like big bosom matronly vibe about her. She does. You won't you won't find a picture of her where she's not just beaming. She was always happy always smiling. Even in prison. She loved prison. She freaking thrived in prison because in prison she was allowed to do all the things that she wanted.

Read her romance novels. When she said they had dances it was just all the female inmates. They didn't do coed dances. Right. I wasn't guessing they were doing that. And at that point she was kind of you know kind of older and maybe done with marrying husbands. I think you know she married Sam Doss because she imagined that he could give her like some sort of stable secure life.

I think he was the first one that she married that had that love really had nothing to do with it. Thoughts. Yeah you're probably right about that. Yeah you're probably right about that. But hey if you're the first husband. What are you thinking. Charlie. Dodged a bullet there. So Kevin and I talked a lot about Charlie Bragg because he wanted to know who the guy was before he said that he had kind of an idea who he was playing in the episode.

Right. So the thing about Charlie. Charlie was he was a good kid. Very devoted to his mom. His mom had never remarried. It was the two of them against the world. He was head over heels smitten by a 16 year old nanny and her father sort of like pushed you know you won't be around my girl. You don't put a ring on it. So they ended up married.

They had all the kids one right after the next. And Charlie. You know Charlie could not handle the conflict between his wife and his mother. So he was always disappearing. And you kind of read between the lines. I think he was unfaithful pretty consistently. But he's not all that great a guy. Now in 1940s terms they people had a lot of sympathy for Charlie.

But it's 2024. And let me tell you something. Two kids died. And it was suspicious. Now that doesn't necessarily mean that you immediately go to your wife. You killed our kids. But two kids have died under suspicion. And he takes one daughter. He takes Malvenia and disappears. And leaves her with the other child. Eventually Charlie is going to remarry.

He comes back home and gives Malvenia back to her mother. I don't think that's like all the behavior of a good guy. You know like there's some real selfish stuff on Charlie's part too. Oh yeah. And and then of course you know Malvenia gets married and just trying to live her life. And her mother kills a newborn and the toddler.

I'm sorry and the two and a half month old. It's unspeakable. Like like I said again it's not that we go well. I mean if you poisoned your husband shit happens. No judgment girl. But like the idea this woman killed her own children and grandchildren. That's a special kind of black widow spider. Am I right? Like how how is this woman not a bigger player in the serial killer trading card game?

So how do you go about finding out the information of how much rat poison it will take to kill somebody? How do you come upon that information? Because it seems like she was pretty successful from the get just about. Yeah. How do you read it in a book? How do you know that? How do you know what is the best kind of food to disguise rat poisoning if you want to commit murder on your spouse?

I think she got I'm going to tell you with the dose and the food I think she got really lucky. But it's not it's not crazy luck because if arsenic is best concealed in coffee dairy products and wine most adults and especially back in the 1940s most adults could be counted on to drink some coffee. Right. And children were given cow's milk.

So is it you can easily see how she had no problem handing a glass of milk to a child or a cup of coffee to a grown man. She now she killed the one husband with she killed Arlie Lanning with coffee and she killed Morton with whiskey. Or was it Harrelson? I mean I get I get all the way she killed the husband's confused.

Harrelson was whiskey. Harrelson was whiskey. Yeah I think Morton was coffee again. And Sam Doss his second dose the one that killed him was coffee. The first dose that put him in the hospital was dairy products. So I think she got lucky in what she put the rat poison in. And as far as knowing the dose she put insane quantities of rat poison in these drinks.

Sam Doss was the only one where she didn't get the dosage high enough. The pathology on one of the dead husbands the pathologist came from Duke University to exhume the body and test it. And there was enough arsenic in there to kill six men. So Max I don't think she was really calibrating the dosage. I think she was dumping the box or canister or whatever rat poison was sold in directly into the drink.

Even more about the question of could you not taste it. Could you not taste it. And it seems like all of these men consumed all of whatever they were eating or drinking. And they consumed all of it. They didn't get like two bites in and go this really tastes funny. Well the and the only one the only one that realized what was killing him was Arlie Lanning.

And his last words his last words must have been the coffee. It's such dark comedy right. But he was the only one. And honestly so it was a combination of being too aggressive with Sam her fifth husband Sam. Girl the day he gets home from the hospital you're going to kill him. Think let's use our noggins. He's already been in the hospital with a mysterious illness that no one can really name for 23 days.

You're going to take him out the night he gets home. That is how pissed off that woman was because she wasn't allowed to watch TV and turn a lamp on. I want you to think about that for a second. She was just not having it. So the doctor who refused to sign Doss's death certificate who demanded an autopsy is the reason that there was an arrest and a conviction.

That's it. He's the he's the reason. And can I tell you something. He was a baby doctor and he had to risk a lot to hold his ground on that. Because all around him his his senior doctors and people in the hospital were like oh my God it's probably a heart attack. I mean look at the guy. You look at him. Look he just got out of the hospital and Dr. Hidy was like uh uh uh uh I'm his doctor and I'm not signing that.

He held the line so hard on that autopsy and I followed his career after that. He had an incredible career in medicine. He in any state in Oklahoma. He was beloved and his obituary. He died of course many decades after this event. And his obituary led with Dr. W. Dean Hidy who came to fame when he discovered that Samuel Doss had been murdered by notorious serial killer Nannie Doss.

His obituaries led with that. That's how critical and pivotal his refusal to toe the line was. And let this be a lesson to all of us. When you know what's right and other people want you to do what's easy. Stick to it. Stick to it as hard as you can. Dig in to do what's right. Because that that man is the reason this woman was stopped.

And it would have been very easy for him to let it go. And she just would have gone on killing and gone on giggling. Yeah. Until so she died of leukemia in 1965. And leukemia was going to was going to get her anyway. Right. She was she would have had I think early 60s at that point. Yeah. Yeah. She would have had another decade of murder to commit.

Had Dr. Hidy not pushed back so forcefully against the doctors above him who had more experience and more clout and authority and all of that. So yeah when you're choosing between what's right and what's easy try to go with what's right because that may help you stop something unspeakable like this from happening. And by the way just because I'm sure you want to know Blanche Taylor Moore is still in prison at the age of 91 who has a similar story of murders where they they ended up uncovering bodies that had been long dead after they realized that she was the one that murdered them.

Well something that you think about with a poisoning murder very very often not always but very often the perpetrator will describe themselves as being absolutely nonviolent and non confrontational. And that's true. Right. This is someone who would know I could never fire a gun or I could never stab someone. And poisoning seems to them like the kinder way to go.

But of course an arsenic death a poisoning death is a terrible terrible thing. But they don't they don't see it that way. Max you see it that way. They don't see it that way. They will they will be the first one to put a cool compress on your head knowing that they're the reason that you're in this agony. It's a very strange.

It's also interesting that in Oklahoma which you know I would figure would be a place that would put somebody to death given the opportunity. They didn't want to put a woman to death. I wonder if that if that would change today because I'm trying to Carla Faye Tucker. You remember her? Carla Faye Tucker. That was Texas wasn't it?

That was Texas. Yeah yeah. And while that isn't Oklahoma it's nearby. So you know I just wonder whether if this were to happen today whether they would have put her to death. I think if this were to happen today the only way she wouldn't have gotten death is if she'd have taken a plea deal of some sort which she may have done because I also think that those other states especially because of the number of children that she killed.

I think there would have been extradition and and she would have stood trial in at least one of those three states. It's hard for me to believe that like Alabama where she had she racked up probably five murders. It's hard for me to believe that Alabama was going to just look the other way on that in 2024 right. Yeah.

But but then again you know in Alabama an embryo has personhood a woman not so much so who can say really what might happen. I don't know what it is about the state of North Carolina because you have Blanche Taylor Moore you have Velma Barfield who was from North Carolina and and then this woman who also killed in North Carolina.

What is it? I was going to say what's in the water but after all those Camp Lejeune ads I think we know there was something in the water. But it's just it's very it's a very interesting coincidence. It's what is amazing to me is that her story is is not better known. That's all because we do have a fetish in this. We have a crime like we have a true crime fetish in this culture but we for sure have like a rogues Hall of Fame serial killer fetish not just you and me.

I mean full stop everybody but it does seem that there have been some books and it is up in some some periodicals and that sort of thing about you know female serial killers but there's been no TV movie. There's no you know loosely based on or anything else that I can find of this story. So you're right for some reason this story just doesn't have enough sizzle to it.

And it's crazy because she in some ways again you know it's not like you know girl you killed her husband. I mean that's real. It's not that it's she she killed her mother she killed her mother-in-law she killed her sister and then of course she killed children grandchildren and children and all the husbands and there is a period of time where nanny was on the wander and her whereabouts are unaccounted for because you could disappear more easily back then.

And by the way she thought nothing of leaving these children behind you know the surviving children to be looked after by whoever but she disappeared for a while and some there is some thought some conjecture that she may be responsible for a couple of very old very cold cases. It's possible because with that load of sexy I'm sure she was getting a lot of attention.

She had something. Girl had something and it wasn't just her cooking. I loved when Charlie Bragg's was like she was mad we wouldn't eat or drink nothing. Okay that's her first husband y'all it was kind of like these people sometimes get away with stuff and it's only afterward that everyone goes oh yeah I knew you didn't know everybody I thought everybody.

Can I say that this man was getting really excited about prune cake. Oh yeah he loved prunes. He loved prunes. I don't know what was going to kill him first the enormous explosive bowel movement or the arsenic because she fed him an entire box. He had a lot of that damn prune cake. That's the only way it had to have been in a big mixture of it.

You had to have eaten a lot of it. Well you remember like I added a detail so that you would catch it. The prune cake was served in a bowl and it was swimming in cream and dairy products hide arsenic. So I think he had him a slab of prune cake and I think he had enough arsenic to kill a cow in that cream. It's you know the devil's in the details and she she knew what she was doing even though I do believe that the head injury in childhood was probably a factor in her complete lack of remorse or empathy.

But you want to talk about pulling the wings off of flies. She had zero empathy for even her own flesh and blood. Even I've read some things about you know serial killers through the course of time and that sort of thing and and who knows whether they were being honest or not. But there are times when somebody who has committed some really monstrous crimes will say the family really does deserve to know need to know what happened to their loved one that I killed and will say something and seem like there is almost a twinge of remorse or a twinge of humanity in there because that's what you hope you hope that nobody is so far beyond reclamation that they have no opportunity to have any sort of humanity about them.

So every once in a while you hear that doesn't seem like with her there wasn't even wasn't even a micron of humanity. So I don't think so. And so like her mother Louisa had fallen and broken a hip and was you know that's a bad thing to happen to an older person today. It was a death sentence back then and the woman was really struggling and came to live with Nanny and the new husband and you know died like pretty much when when she got there it was like Nanny was like oh I'm not dealing with this like it didn't matter who it was her mother her daughter her grandson the the husband that she loved but the one husband that she loved that she was with for 16 years she still killed him.

So I think there was just whatever whatever that empathy chip is whatever that is she either was born without it or it got knocked askew in the head injury. She did not feel anything for anyone except herself or the abuse was so severe because she was abused. I mean let's be honest the whole family was her father was a piece of work.

I mean he was not he was not a good guy and none of those kids thrived. I mean they they didn't all become serial killers Nanny owns that patch of land but none of those kids thrived in that home. None of them did. The idea that you know you're going to prevent your children from going to school and it's trippy to me it's trippy to me that that we're living in times like when I was a kid and tried to imagine 2024 I legitimately thought we would have flying cars stuff like that I didn't imagine that I would be seeing the jack offs on Twitter.

I'm sorry ex excuse me Elon Musk on Twitter is saying you know the worst thing we ever did was give women the vote like what like how are we here you know and so when I look at when I look at what went on in Nanny's young life there are people that think that's better way to go than how we live now that you know maybe maybe get those kids out of school after fifth grade they can read and write their own name that's all they really need there are people that endorse that and that endorse that kind of heavy handed authoritarian control that Nanny's dad exerted over that family.

Well there was in some areas not too far from where we live there is there was always this suspicion of people who got education who got higher education there was there was always a suspicion of people that did that and they would rail against it because they just didn't feel that they were honest people it was the craziest thing but they absolutely believed that they absolutely believed anybody that had any fancy book learning that there was something wrong with that.

It just comes down to human beings we are born we are born free should quote that old song we are born free and you can clamp down and suppress and oppress and repress and control but that that soul that you're doing all those things to it will find a way to express itself it will that will leak out from under your iron grip and it will find expression and sometimes that expression is beautiful and sometimes it's dark and in Nanny's case dark this isn't someone who rose from the ashes and you know became a great contributor to humanity a poet an artist a healer no this is someone who did the way that her soul expressed itself was in violence and that's so like I'm not a big fan of the child rearing strategy that is oppression repression suppression because I think it doesn't typically end well it always leads to just in some cases rebellion in some cases despair and you'll get acquiescence there are people that'll just go along you know they'll be they'll do what they have to do to survive and you might you might get a nanny yeah you might get this and if you have a trick hip you can go far in life with that so and we don't know that she did we don't know that she did but that's kind of my thought in this case so I just need to say that if you're listening to this and you're like oh coffee wine dairy good to know you have to understand something you won't get away with it not not today not with the forensics that we have now I mean Nanny only got away with it because she committed these murders in small rural communities in the days of before there was the internet and one hand didn't know what the other was doing so a dead husband here a dead husband there it didn't really add up to a story but Tulsa was a big city for Nanny big city compared to the smaller places she lived like Blue Mountain Alabama Lexington North Carolina Emporia Kansas Tulsa was the big time and that doctor was destined for a big career in medicine and that's how that's how she got caught no matter how much coffee wine and dairy products you dump rat poison into you're going to get busted because they're going to test for it they're going to test for the presence of arsenic that's how they got Blanche remember how many husbands did Blanche Taylor Moore take out how many men did she get I want to say four she I know it was four murders so yeah that does seem to be the magic number for these ladies doesn't it was a small town where nothing much happened and then a grandmotherly giggling woman came to town they say that they say that Arlie Lanning just lit up the room hey listen if you're lighting up a room that means you're going to be dead soon yeah you want you want to be somebody that nobody's glad to see coming if people say of you we're going to be in great shape then listen if people say of you oh my god everyone loved her she never met a stranger girl update your will you are on your way out of here hey sherry that's a great thing nobody says here comes max and sherry they're lighting up a room well yeah nobody's gonna kill us people go oh my god don't don't engage those two in small talk it'll be very uncomfortable so um I am I believe I'll just throw this out here I'm with uh team

conjecture that there are a couple of very cold very unsolved cases that will never be solved those people are long in their graves they died mysteriously and abruptly and they had contact with this woman in the handful of uh time periods where she kind of disappeared from view I do not believe that we know all the murders that nanny dos committed I just don't and I also know that no amount of anything would have coaxed any more confessions out of her she felt like she had given and she was clear about it my conscience is clear I've given you enough that's it and she took the rest of what she did and giggled her way all the way into the ground when she died in that penitentiary but I do not believe we know all of her victims and on that cheerful note want to thank uh thank all of our voice actors again for um helping us out on this episode it was super fun to do that kind of old time radio drama thing and I know max I'm also going to tell the people how disappointed you were that you didn't get to play nanny dos listen that was the part to play in this I'll just say we're going to say goodbye now and tell you that we're going to see you next week for a really interesting episode about I'm going to tell you about a death practice of a people right here on this beautiful world with us and you're going to be like oh my god oh my god that was just but have you ever thought about our death practices and what we do and how we treat our dead because I'm here to tell you we're the weirdos not them so that's next week on true weird stuff and if you listen to us on apple podcast hit the plus button in the top right corner and now it and we really appreciate it if you subscribe rate and review true weird stuff hit our website true weird stuff.com for show notes and photos and videos when we have it and bonus content everything true weird is waiting for you at true weird stuff.com and follow true weird stuff on instagram and twitter true weird stuff is a Now! Media production our executive producer is anthony along with my deeply weird director Max Sweeten our equally odd producer is Kary Bowser additional production by the mysterious Stephen Call our digital witch and social media cult leader is Heather Furr original graphics by kevin nash original artworks by Olivia Axland true weird original music composed and performed by jack griffin and Zane Nash copyright 2024 now all rights reserved all wrongs remembered