This episode contains graphic content that may not be suitable for all ages.

Listener discretion is advised.

If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available.

Call or text 988 or chat with someone at 988 lifeline.org. Those outside of the U.S. reach out to someone at your local

crisis center or hotline. Please do not suffer in silence. The dawn of June 10th, 1912, broke gently over Velisca, Iowa.

The first shafts of sun struck the white clapboard houses of East 2nd Street, and for a while,

everything seemed exactly as it should be.

The lilacs in the yards were heavy with bloom.

A rooster crowed somewhere behind the grain elevator. It was an ordinary

Monday in a town that believed itself protected from anything truly terrible. At 7.30 that morning,

Mary Peckham stepped out her back door to hang her laundry. Her house stood next to the Moore

family, close enough that she could usually hear the soft chaos

of their mornings.

The mother, Sarah Moore, bustling in the kitchen, the scrape of chairs, the rising laughter

of children who always seemed half ready for school.

The Moors were early risers, and their routine rarely varied.

That morning though, the house next door was silent.

The stillness unsettled Mary Peckham. Sarah Moore, her neighbor's matriarch, wasn't the kind

of woman to sleep in, especially on a Monday. Mary lingered on her porch, folding and unfolding

a towel in her hands. The Moor's blinds were drawn, their curtains closed tight.

Even the chickens in the yard had not been fed.

So Mary waited another half an hour, before knocking on the door.

...