Freedom Part 1: Butchered Up

Murder In The Rain

True Crime

4.4 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 2 April 2024

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Part 1: "Butchered Up" By the mid-nineteen-nineties, the United States population of train tramps and hobos dropped to only a few thousand from their Depression-era numbers of two million plus. This turn-around began in 1941, when the U.S. began actions during WWII, which led to the military draft, and "the creation of millions of jobs in defense and war industries.” The man we're telling you about today started hopping the rails as a full-time hobo lifestyle in 1991, half a century after the Second World War. He lived as ruler in a kingdom as expansive as the contiguous United States, yet as slim as the space between the rails of the nearly 140,000 miles of freight tracks crisscrossing the country. A nearly unstoppable man, in a world where violence was the law. He called himself Sidetrack. Episode Host: Josh McCullough For photos and sources for today’s episode, check out the Murder in the Rain Episode Blog. If you’d like more episodes of Murder in the Rain, Patreon members at the $5/mo+ level, gain access to exclusive episodes, ad-free episodes, bonus content, and more. Join us this year at the True Crime and Paranormal Podcast Festival July 12th-14th in Denver Colorado! Don’t forget to use our code RAIN15 to get 15% off of your tickets. It’s a great time to connect with podcasts as well as families impacted by the cases we discuss. We had a blast last year and we think you will too. Join us this year at True Crime Fest Northwest in Portland, Oregon August 30th-Sept 1st. You can get your tickets at TrueCrimeFestNorthwest.com! Follow us on: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/murderintherain/ Facebook https://www.facebook.com/mintherain/ Twitter https://twitter.com/murderintherain TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@em_murderintherain Website https://www.murderintherain.com/ Email [email protected] Our Sponsors: * Check out Armoire and use my code RAIN for a great deal: http://www.armoire.style * Check out undefined: undefined Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/murder-in-the-rain/exclusive-content Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Transcript

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0:20.0	This is murder in the rain where where each week Emily Rowney, Alicia Holland, and Josh McCullough tell true crime stories of the Pacific Northwest.
0:57.0	Murder in the Rain contains graphic content, listener discretion is advised. Oh, 1993, the height of the Great Depression, Hobos roamed the land, writing the rails in a desperate search for jobs. Spurned by society, unwanted and homeless, they became a breed apart.
1:02.0	Nomads who scorned the law and enforced their own.
1:06.0	Dedicated to their destruction was the railroad man who stood between them and their only source of survival, the trains.
1:13.4	That's the preamble from the 1973 film Emperor of the North,
1:17.2	which stars Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine,
1:19.7	and Keith Carradine.
1:21.4	The plot concerns a Hobo tramp named A number 1, determined to ride the number 19 train and contend with the brakeman,
1:28.3	Shack, a brutal railroad worker with no qualms about killing train hoppers with a hammer blow or by letting them get sucked
1:35.0	under a moving freight train. A number one and his unwanted sidekick cigarette pull a bunch of
1:41.4	Looney Tunes style sabotage on the train, in part to break
1:44.8	shacks will, but mostly to slow down number 19, so they can scramble aboard.
1:50.5	The film's climax arrives in the form of a Lee Marvin versus Ernest Borgnine fight on a moving flat car.
1:56.0	A number one has an axe and Shaq is armed with a thick chain length.
2:00.0	And it ends with A number one proving that he is the king of the northwest hobos by launching
2:04.8	Shack off the train and tumbling down a hill.
2:08.1	The last we hear of him is a booming declaration that we haven't heard the last of Shack,
2:12.2	as his voice shrinks away.
2:13.7	Yahoo!
2:14.9	At that moment, Shaq is the world that denigrates Hobos and bums, their terminology,
2:23.2	and A-Number one is every person struck down by the Great Depression.
2:26.9	It is a pitiable victory.
	...

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