Hey everyone, and welcome back to Big Mad True Crime, where we get Big Mad over True Crime.

I'm your host, Heather Ashley, and today's case is that of Oklahoma and Wyoming.

Small talk sucks, so let's dive in.

Yeah. Linda Shadrick grew up in Oklahoma and lived in overtly normal life.

Nothing too crazy, just simple and pleasant, the kind of life where no one, and I mean, no one could have predicted that Linda would go on to start a cult, so let's

figure out how we got here. Linda went to Capitol Hill High School where she was dedicated to her school newspaper,

so dedicated that by her senior year, she was made editor-in-chief. Linda's passion for writing

was undeniable. One summer, she even took a summer workshop at Princeton University, which was a

pretty big deal for a high schooler out of Oklahoma.

Linda had big dreams, but life happens, and in 1969, when she was just 18 years old,

Linda gave birth to twins with her high school boyfriend. The two got married that same year,

but unfortunately, as high school romances tend to go,

their relationship did not last. Following their fallout, Linda enrolled at Oklahoma State University,

but this time it wasn't to study writing, she went into nursing, and after graduating,

she started her career as an RN, specializing in hospice.

By the late 1970s, Linda had been married two more times, neither of which stuck, but she had another shot left in her.

In 1981, she tied the knot with her fourth husband, a doctor this time, and they actually welcomed a son together later that year.

Since we're counting, this is husband number four, baby number three.

The twins would have been about 12 at this point.

In 1983, the Sunday Oklahoman featured Linda in an article about her work with Hospice of Central Oklahoma,

and the piece included a poem she'd written called Promise from a Nurse. It read,

I will not leave you to face the hollow night alone. My arms are thin, but big enough to hold you till the

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