Ben 00:02-00:55

All right, Brian, welcome back to the show. Thank you so much. So, last week we traveled all over LA looking at some strange properties and the incredible story of the Hollywood sign, and today there is no easy way to introduce what we're about to discuss. But it's in your book, you have a whole chapter devoted to it, and I have to say, Brian, there is… I have not had this exceptional amount of joy in reading a chapter in weeks and weeks and weeks because it was about lizard people and I just I don't even know how to introduce that I mean lizard people what do you got there lizard people what are you talking about there's no lizard people that's what they want you to think

Brian 00:59-01:35

The lizard people actually came about in the book kind of in an amusing way. I was talking to my acquisitions editor, Lori Krill, and we were kind of going over some of the things that I wanted to put in the book, and I was kind of asking her advice on a few things. And I told her, I said, so Lori, don't worry, I'm not going to put the lizard people in there. And she went, what? Lizard people? What are you talking about? You are putting lizard people in there. And I was like, you're kidding, right? And she's all, no, I will not allow the book to be published if it does not have lizard people in it.

Ben 01:35-02:02

So here's what's funny, Brian. I gotta tell you, I gotta interview you one time to say we have had Laurie on the show. Laurie was a guest with her author Kate Zaliznok when we did the Doodler Murders a couple years ago, right? And I gotta tell you, Laurie's a pretty sane person. She's a pretty rational mind. I did not know that Laurie had such a stated interest in lizard people, but I'm here for it.

Brian 02:03-03:00

Yeah, I mean, I love Laurie to death, but when she was talking about lizard people, I really had to kind of think, okay, did somebody hit you in the head when you were a former police officer? To be perfectly honest with you, I have been working on a book called California Cryptid for a few years now, but I keep getting sidetracked. I first came across the Los Angeles Lizard People while doing research for that particular book. When I was told, hey, we want you to work on a book on Los Angeles, one of my first thoughts was the Los Angeles lizard people. And I was thinking, OK, well, you know, this is a haunted book. Do lizard people count? And then after talking to Lori, like I said, it's like, OK, she says they count. So good. I'll work on it.

Ben 03:00-03:23

And to be clear, we are not talking about the uniquely Los Angeles version of lounge lizard people who are You know, self-styled movie producers who really try to convince you to come by their sort of, you know, one-room production studio that has a couch and try out for that part in this amazing film that they're making. Those are a different kind of lizard people, aren't they?

Brian 03:24-05:13

They certainly are. Now, I'm not going to go into the whole story because it's a lot more fun to discover for yourself what the lizard people are all about by reading about it. But let's just say that there was a gentleman years and years ago who had the thought that the planet was originally inhabited by super intelligent lizard people. And these lizard people were more intelligent than humans were. But at some point, because of a natural disaster, and human, shall we say, viciousness and things like that, were driven underground, where they just developed this wonderful city underneath Los Angeles and a few other places. Believe it or not, there are stories of lizard people in New Zealand, Australia, Singapore. There was even a thought a few years back that And it actually came out of the news, and I just wanted to laugh, that Hillary Clinton was the queen of the lizard people, which is why she was going to move to New Zealand. So it's amazing what people come up with. So I started to do research on the lizard people and found that this gentleman had actually convinced the city council and mayor of Los Angeles to start digging. underneath the city, looking for the lizard city, which by the way, was supposedly shaped like a giant lizard. The city itself.

Ben 05:13-05:21

Yeah, of course it was. And you're thinking of George Warren Shufelt is the is the fellow from the 30s, right? Who kind of got this idea in mind?

Brian 05:22-05:47

Correct now he did find certain items But he really didn't come up with much of anything, but there were certain Aspects that made it kind of interesting a very interesting story And Let why don't we just leave it at that because there there's some interesting things that come across in that

Ben 05:48-06:02

There are, there are. Yeah, I gotta say, Brian, that the story of The Lizard People is absolutely worth a feature film all its own. I mean, preferably in the vein of like, Ed Wood or one of those like, celebration of the great, you know, like, B-movies of classic Hollywood, that sort of thing. But one of the things that at least keeps it from dwelling completely in the realm of totally delusional fantasy. The accounts that you get, you have a couple of them recorded in your chapter, of slightly more recent occurrences that folks have had. It's not just limited to Shufelt in the 30s. You have a guy named Jacob Cohen who was working in these giant tunnels underneath L.A. and he had some experiences which were a little unusual. You also have some police reports, actually, involving people who had been attacked and had strange wounds on them that aren't quite accounted for. I mean, we want to kind of dismiss this out of hand, and yet there's a little bit of extra documentation which is not from a hundred years ago, it's from a couple of years ago.

Brian 07:30-08:19

Exactly and you know what one of the things that I get a kick out of with Bigfoot people They like to explain away the reason that we've never been able to find a Bigfoot is because they are Interdimensional and they just keep popping between dimensions with the lizard people it actually could make sense and I know how I'm sounding here, but it could actually make sense due to the fact that There are tunnels underneath Los Angeles. There are caves that we may or may not know about that they could potentially hide in and just pop up every once in a while when they don't think people are around, especially if they're as intelligent as myth has them to be.

Ben 08:19-08:51

Who's to say? Who's to say? This is where I would like to just issue a public call to all available Drone operators in Southern, California and just be like, all right guys like army up. Let's go Let's let's get as many drones in those tunnels as possible and get them on like like afterburners, right? We want fast drones, please I would like I'd just like to get a little systematic mapping here because I mean What can I say? Curiosity is gonna kill this cat

Brian 08:51-09:20

One of the things that, and this actually did cross my mind, there is a Cajun restaurant right next to the Cecil Hotel. Now, there are supposedly some of these tunnel entrances very near the Cecil Hotel. So if I ever decide to go to this Cajun restaurant and they are serving alligator, I am going to have second and third thoughts about ever ordering something with alligator in it.

Ben 09:22-09:32

Well, speaking as one who lives in South Louisiana and who has sampled the delicacy known as Gator on a Stick, it ain't bad. A little chewy, but you know.

Brian 09:32-09:42

Yeah, no, my brother-in-law is a full-blooded Cajun, lives in Lafayette, Louisiana, and yeah, we've had alligator, and it's actually very, very tasty.

Ben 09:43-10:45

Pretty darn good. Well, if the lizard people come calling asking what you were doing eating their cousin, I'll do my best to cover for you while you make an escape. I appreciate that. Thank you. You got it. You got it. Well, let's turn from one… I know that lizard people are not strictly a haunting, but, you know, we did have to go there. Now, back to hauntings, back to paranormal, but with some other animals this time. This is an animal-themed show today. You have a great chapter in your book on the ghosts of the old Los Angeles Griffith Park Zoo and you know, I just I just want to thank you for writing that chapter because every now and then you need some ghost cats or some ghost critters. Like, I mean, what is this world without them? I don't know that I want to live in it. So, tell me, how did you first come on to the story of the haunting of the old Los Angeles Zoo?

Brian 10:45-11:21

Believe it or not, It came on my radar probably about seven or eight years ago when I was at a paranormal Halloween event vending my books. And I had somebody from the Los Angeles Zoo come up to me and say, have you ever thought about writing a book about the Los Angeles Zoo? And I was like, no, why would I? And she goes, well, it's haunted. That was kind of like, you're kidding, right? And she goes, no, not only the new zoo, but the old zoo is really haunted.

Ben 11:21-11:26

So when… Music to your ears.

Brian 11:26-11:51

Yeah. So when I was told that they wanted a book about Los Angeles, one of my first thoughts was, oh my gosh, the old zoo. So I started doing research and what I found was just sort of incredible with Incredible might not be the correct word. Sad and incredible. Let's kind of mix those two.

Ben 11:51-11:55

Yeah. It's a powerful story. It actually is. Yeah. Yeah.

Brian 11:55-13:08

Yeah. And, you know, as a major animal lover, to hear about the suffering of the animals that took place at the old zoo, you know, was heart-wrenching. And the fact that they are still there and people can hear the animals crying is just so sad. But I do have to admit, I sort of enjoyed the stories of the one lion chasing people. It was kind of like, revenge! But yeah, it's really an interesting story. It's kind of funny, when I went there to try and get some photos and do a little bit of research, it's almost like you can feel the animals still there in the cages. Now, it might have just been empathy, but it was a very odd feeling, especially when you look at the original cages and how small they are, how tight the living quarters were for these animals.

Ben 13:09-13:47

No, it's a very, very moving story and anyone with half a heart is going to feel something as they read through your account. The nutshell version, of course, is classic. You have, you know, a facility opens up in the early 20th century, kind of rides a wave of Progress and optimism very quickly, you know, falls into disrepair. You know, eventually there's infighting, and, you know, the resources begin to dry up for it, until in the mid-50s, it becomes no longer tenable, and then you get, you know, this new facility constructed. Am I right in remembering, you write that the old zoo lasted for about 50 years, is that right?

Brian 13:47-14:05

Give or take, in one form or another, yes. And, I mean, if you want to throw the ostrich farm in there, because the old zoo was put basically where the ostrich farm used to be as well.

Ben 14:05-14:21

So, kind of add a little bit to it. I mean, you write that the access to the area is actually pretty decent, and there are parts of it that have, there's like picnic tables, and you can kind of take your lunch and kind of explore a little bit. It's not completely cordoned off, is it?

Brian 14:21-15:01

No, not at all. As a matter of fact, you can drive to, they have signs that point to the old zoo. You go to the parking area, you hike up maybe a mile, mile and a half at the most. You come to the old zoo, and as you were saying, there are picnic benches in the old bear habitat. So, you know, it's very well kept. As a matter of fact, when I was up there for photos, there was a crew working to clean everything up and throwing out trash and making sure everything was, you know, very well kept. So it is definitely a very accessible area.

Ben 15:02-15:28

Yeah, no, it's remarkable. Last week when we were speaking to Mariana Randazzo, she described a story from all the way across the country of a ghost dog in Staten Island, which is, you know, really interesting to kind of look into. Multiple sightings, different people over the years, you know, that sort of thing. This one is fascinating because it's just right there, you know. Anybody can go check it out, like right now.

Brian 15:29-15:45

Yeah, absolutely. And anybody in L.A. that has ever thought about going there, I would highly recommend taking a trip. Take your lunch with you and enjoy the entire area and especially the zoo, the old zoo itself.

Ben 15:46-16:23

Yeah. Now, what's funny, Brian, is that you mentioned after your long discussion of the specific, you know, ghost lions and ghost critters and so forth that are said to still populate the area, you write as this kind of interesting tease about there are some other guests who will occasionally stroll through the abandoned Zoo, and these are people that had populated the earlier pages of your book. I'm thinking of Doña Petronilla and Don Feliz, sort of these key figures from Los Angeles history, every now and then they show up. Why is that?

Brian 16:23-18:40

So that is where the curse of Griffith Park originally stems. When Don Feliz owned the property, He was a very wealthy man, and at the time he was starting to pass away, his mental faculties were sort of failing him. So a couple shysters, shall we say, came in right before he passed away and changed his will, leaving Donna Petronella with nothing. So she got extremely upset when the judge, she tried to sue the estate. The judge ruled against her, so she cursed the entire Griffith Park area that was owned by Don Antonio Feliz. And that is where the actual curse comes from. And it is amazing that Feliz himself is actually sometimes seen on top of one of the mountains right there by the zoo. And Donna Petronella, she is actually seen at the zoo on occasion. But she is also seen in quite a few other locations within Griffith Park. And the curse itself actually and I'm gonna say that it's kind of an odd way to say it but is the Catalyst for Griffith Park being named Griffith Park Griffith W Griffith owned the land that he actually believed in the curse and He had attacked his wife ended up in prison and then I guess he was going bankrupt. The story's a little hazy in some areas as far as this goes. And he donated most of the land to the city of L.A. But he probably would not have done that if he hadn't gone a little bit nuts and tried to kill his wife, which kind of falls right into the particulars of the curse.

Ben 18:41-18:50

Yeah, absolutely. There's a lot of layers there which are overlapping kind of all at once in one specific spot, too.

Brian 18:50-19:15

Right. And, I mean, I'm not going to go too far into the curse because, again, as you said, there are so many different layers to it, it would take two or three shows just to go into the curse itself. But let's just say that the curse is is Griffith Park. I know how that sounds, but you cannot separate the two.

Ben 19:15-21:20

More tall words after last week's, you know, major claims. I love it. I love it. Now, I have to say, I have to say, um, and we're gonna, we're gonna leave everybody here because this is, this is, this is too much to, uh, to handle, uh, at, at one time. You want to talk about that curse? You want to talk about Griffith Park? There is one place, and I mean one particular five by five square meter section of ground that seems to embody it more than anywhere else. And I don't know, Brian, when I read this chapter in your book, I nearly put it down, you know? And this was, this was not quite like, you know, the Cecil Hotel version, where it's just like, well here's a hundred years of constant suffering, you know, that kind of wanting to put This was more, this is the weirdest thing that I have read in a long, long time. Of course I'm talking about Table 29, and I'm gonna let our listeners go and pick up a copy of your book and read about Table 29 for themselves, but I'm just wonder. It's real weird. It's beyond weird. And I'm just struck by one fact about Table 29 that I have to ask you, okay? Something terrible happened there some years ago. Utterly bizarre instances have happened right at that location in the years since. And it's so strange that that the site has been left virtually undisturbed, even by the municipal agency charged with maintaining it in all of that time. Like, city workers won't even go and touch the place now. Right. Dude, that's messed up. I'm sorry.

Brian 21:20-22:25

Well, and it's not only that, but they have completely closed the road so you cannot drive up there anymore. The only way to access Table 29 is to, one, go by Griffith Observatory and walk up about two and a half to three miles up the road. Or you can actually get there by hiking from the old zoo up a dirt trail up to the road itself. So they have actually made it so it is harder to get to the table than it was, because you used to be able to drive right to it, and they stopped doing that. And they have never said why they have closed the road. There really is no reason for them to have done it, other than, to me, the table itself being so… how should I put it? Charged? I don't know what the word is. That's actually a good word. And it's definitely not charged with what I would call good energy.

Ben 22:25-22:30

Yeah, it's not Pio Pico handing out gifts to everybody.

Brian 22:30-22:57

Exactly. The couple who was killed at Table 29 is very adamant, shall we say, about being left alone and not having the table or tree disturbed. I don't think I would ever actually do that. I did go up there, I did snap a couple pictures, but I made very sure that I did not disturb anything there.

Ben 22:58-23:21

Yeah, there's a photo in your book, and, you know, I was, that was kind of enough for me. I was impressed that you actually, you know, like from author's collection, right, in the caption, it's sort of like, after everything I read about Table 29, man, I would not even so much as look in its direction. So, yeah.

Brian 23:24-23:38

Well, here's the thing, as a paranormal investigator, I was definitely looking to see if anybody would pop up, shall we say? Yeah. At which point, that's when I would decide, let's see, I'm getting a little older, should I run, or?

Ben 23:38-24:40

Right, exactly. You know, bring your ectoplasmic backpack, you know, Ghostbuster style, just in case, just in case. Well, it's a remarkable story, just like all of the accounts in Haunted Heart of Los Angeles. And I swear, you know, reading through this book, I have yet another Brian Klune title to throw in the back of my car next time I visit LA and, you know, the southern part of the state. And it's like, you have given us such a gift with all these cool places to go and check out, some of which are cool places to not go and check out, right? Like Table 20. But at the same time, you know, it is just always a joy to get to Toodle around the region with you and thank you so much for making some time for us Okay, it was my pleasure and my apologies for the sudden whistle No problem. I'll just say that again so that we can maybe get another recording Thank you again for making some time for us Believe me.

Brian 24:40-24:43

It was my pleasure. I always love coming on your show. I

Ben 24:44-24:51

Well, tell us, Brian, before you go, where can folks get a copy of Haunted Heart of LA?

Brian 24:51-25:13

So pretty much anywhere. You can order it off of Amazon. You could go to the Arcadia website in the Haunted America series. Or you can go into any bookstore, and if they don't have a copy, you can order it through them. But I really hope everybody that gets it enjoys it.

Ben 25:15-25:33

Coming at you live from the USS Iowa battleship of the United States Navy, and not just the battleship, but coming at you from the most historic bathtub in American history, Brian Klune. Thank you so much.

Brian 25:33-25:41

My pleasure. It is always a pleasure being on.