Derry

All right.

Well, we're going to Derry, New Hampshire.

Do you remember what famous... movie character is from Derry?

I think there's like a UK and a US Derry, right?

Derry America.

Okay.

No.

It.

And, you know, I've heard from a lot of people that they think the approach we're taking here, in terms of the framework for this, the requirements for this, the way to think about this, is the way we should be going across the country.

Let's go to Carol in Derry, New Hampshire.

You're on with the governor of Massachusetts.

Maura Healey, welcome.

For suggested phone numbers for confidential support and for a more detailed list of content warnings, please see the show notes for this episode on your app or on our website.

[music] On the night of Tuesday, May 1, 1990, a group of family and friends gathered at a home on Misty Morning Drive in the town of Derry, New Hampshire.

At around 10:00 PM, as they broke out into a joyful rendition of Happy Birthday, their celebration was abruptly cut short by a blood-curdling scream.

Fred Lombardi, the host of the party, rushed outside to see what was going on.

But none of these leads went anywhere.

A significant development finally emerged on Monday, May 14, two weeks after Gregory Smartt's murder.

That night, the Derry Police Department received an anonymous phone call.

[tense music] Case File will be back shortly.

I mean, if there's a website we don't have, he'll provide that information to us.

And, you know, from the 1960s music like Dino, Desi, and Billy, a deep regional history in a place near his hometown, if that's where he was originally born, Derry, New Hampshire, the early days.

But long before you two, Gary and I, we were in the trenches of 1990s telecom together.

You know, we even lived through the Y2K scare.

And as I stated, or if I didn't state it, I'll find – the blog the video blog that i listen to to be very spiritually profound and i do know that that information will connect with um the listeners that listen uh to uh those video blogs now um is there anything else that you'd like to say about yourself where you're from uh Were you born and raised here in New Hampshire?

No, actually, I grew up on the South Shore in Massachusetts in Pembroke, Massachusetts.

But I lived up in Derry for 25 years.

But my wife and I divorced in 2017.

Yes, that is a term, flavorist.

Her grandmother, Luella Lowe, had this sweet concoction of brown sugar and butter that she served over rice at her home in Derry, New Hampshire.

That's right, horror fans.

The town's name was Derry, D-E-R-R-Y.

And if you ever wondered why Cap'n Crunch is so evil and addictive, knowing that it comes from Derry and that it destroys children [laughs] makes a lot of sense.

You'll float too, Crunch Berries.

Anyway, the cereal's cartoon mascot became Cap'n Horatio Crunch.

Okay, let's get into today's story.

On an afternoon in June of 2005, a 57-year-old truck driver named Jack Reed took a sip of his margarita at a barbecue in a park in Derry, New Hampshire.

Now, he usually didn't drink, but today he was celebrating.

It was his daughter Megan's high school graduation party.

And the whole time they're calling him over and over again, but it just kept going straight to voicemail.

And then finally, around 6.30 p.m., when still they had not seen or heard from Jack, they decided it was time to call the police.

On Tuesday, July 5th, so six days after Jack was reported missing by his family, Derry police detective Mike Houle pulled into the parking lot of a Target store about an hour's drive south in Saugus, Massachusetts.

Houle slowed down and began to sort of slow roll through the rows of cars, keeping an eye out for one particular vehicle.

So here we are, Londonderry, New Hampshire.

And I love Londonderry, Derry, Chester, all of those towns.

I've been very, very lucky over the years to spend time in a lot of these towns, Plastow, Newton, whether it was going to do storytelling or doing a presentation on haunted New Hampshire.

So I have an affection for all of these towns.

So another great 19th century story.

Now, this, as I said, was a very strange case that was brought to the Superior Court of New Hampshire.

And this particular house was on the road from Nashua to Derry.

So it's a, you know, really nice sort of... old you know old path if you could imagine and um the house was actually as i mentioned located in londonderry and the estate by the way was known as the barker farm so hmm does that conjure up in your mind so this um this case is actually one of the strangest that is in the court records for the time in the 19th century New Hampshire and the story really was described as having circumstances that reached out from the beyond and in the old newspaper accounts it was described as sort of bringing about the thoughts of the quote-unquote superhuman like how often do you see that you know that word in the newspaper anymore that something superhuman was going on and So the case was between a man named George Butler of Pelham and Miss Morse.

Broadcasting live

from Derry, New Hampshire.

We are here together, which is good.

That's right.

And so we had to drive to New Hampshire.

And we drove to Derry, New Hampshire, where the Bayon Clinic, was, which is four or five brothers, and it was upper cervical practice.

So Dr. Bayon started adjusting my atlas, and within two or three months, all my health problems cleared up.

My whole family started going there.

Peter Wolfe has announced new concerts that will bring him back on the road this fall.

The short run of six dates begins November 5th in Derry, New Hampshire.

Tickets are already on sale for November 5th at the Tupelo Music Hall in Derry, New Hampshire.

November 12th at the Academy of Music Theater in Northampton, Mass.

November 14th at the Infinity Music Hall in Hartford, Connecticut.