Strange Country Episode 179: Body Snatchers

In the days before the board game Operation or Play Doh's dentist head, doctors needed something to hone their knowledge of the human anatomy. So they hired people to bring them dead bodies dug up fresh from the graveyards. Strange Country co-hosts Beth and Kelly talk about these night doctors and resurrectionists who gave a new meaning to the phrase the big sleep. You might want to make yourself a stiff drink before tuning in.

Theme music: Big White Lie by A Cast of Thousands

Cite your sources:

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“Body-Stealer: the Creepiest Bill in Va, General Assembly.” Fredericksburg.com, 4 Aug. 2020, fredericksburg.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/body-stealer-the-creepiest-bill-in-va-general-assembly/article_b20fd5b8-93ba-5973-aaec-d820a08d367f.html.

Brooks, Vince. “Chris Baker: ‘Cheerful Among Corpses.’” The UncommonWealth, 25 Sept. 2020, uncommonwealth.virginiamemory.com/blog/2010/10/27/chris-baker-cheerful-among-corpses/.

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Dickey, Colin. “Night Doctors.” The Paris Review, 12 Oct. 2016, www.theparisreview.org/blog/2016/10/11/night-doctors/#:~:text=Also known as “Ku Klux,using their bodies in anatomical.

Garrett, Nick. “Known but to God: The Story of the Resurrection Man.” Jagwire, 16 Mar. 2017, jagwire.augusta.edu/known-but-to-god-the-story-of-the-resurrection-man/.

“Joice Heth.” Museum of Hoaxes, hoaxes.org/archive/permalink/joice_heth.

Kapsidelis, Karin. “Confronting the Story of Bones Discarded in an Old MCV Well.” Richmond Times-Dispatch, 25 Sept. 2019, richmond.com/news/confronting-the-story-of-bones-discarded-in-an-old-mcv-well/article_4a784033-ca30-5a30-be4d-80c7fd9a3783.html.

Roach, Mary. Stiff: the Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. Penguin, 2012.

Washington, Harriet. Medical Apartheid The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present. Anchor Books, 2008.