From Nob Hill to Hill House - The Mysterious Murder of an San Francisco Heiress And The Birth of American Horror
Hello Seekers! Well, I'm still rockin' that Shirley Jackson podcast angle this week! After last week's podcast, I ended up falling into quite a deep Shirley Jackson internet history hole and discovered that Mrs. Jackson is connected (however tenuously) to an infamous and unsolved murder case of one of the most important American heiresses within the U.S.'s Gilded Age "royalty." Jane Stanford was the wife of prominent robber baron/ railroad tycoon and founder of Stanford University, Leland Stanford. She was also the victim of a notorious case of murder by poison! This week's podcast is a twisted game of "six degrees of Kevin Bacon," but with Shirley Jackson swapping places with the ol' Footlooser, her famous great-great-grandfather inspiring The Haunting of Hill House and Mrs. Jane Stanford of San Francisco's horrific and untimely demise. Thanks for getting weird with me!
--------
10:33
--------
10:33
The Haunting Mind of Shirley Jackson
Hello Seekers! This week, we take a look at the author who inspired modern day horror writers such as Stephen King and Guillermo Del Toro by turning her ordinary suburban American life into quiet horror. Shirley Jackson lived in a house full of noise - four children, a controlling and flandering husband and a typerwrite on a kitchen table within the middle of it all. From that chaos she wrote fantastic short stories and novels revolving around the seemingly calm surface of the suburbs and the evil truth bubbling just underneath, such as is, The Lottery, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle. This episode unpacks her marriage, her fascination with magic and the occult and how the control she tried to manifest within her writing became her personal spell for survival. I hope you enjoy today's episode and I also hope you go and read some of her works - they're EXCELLENT psychological horror and thanks for getting weird with us!
--------
24:01
--------
24:01
The Hot Mess Romantics
Hello Seekers! Last week we went into the connections between the top 3 Romantic writers of their era: Mary (Godwin) Shelley, Percy Shelley and Lord Byron. But that just SCRATCHES at the surface of these lunatics (and their friends). This week's episode goes more "behind-the-scenes" of what famously went down at that villa in Switzerland (hint: It wasn't all writing. There was also a fair bit of sex, drugs and rock n' roll), as well as, everyone's messy personal lives and Percy's creepy and slightly paranormal death at a very young age. I hope you enjoy today's more personal episode regarding the illustrious 3 and thanks for getting weird with us! **Thumbnail image: "The Funeral of Shelley (1889) by Louis Édouard Fournier**
--------
19:09
--------
19:09
Reason's Monster: Frankenstein, the Illuminati & the Birth of Fear
In 1816, under a sunless sky, 18 year old Mary Godwin dreamnt of a man who could re-animate the dead. But the story of Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus wasn't born out of superstition, it was born out of the Ennlightenment itself. This episode unravels how a secret Bavarian order, a volcanic winter and one radical family's obsession with reason combined to create the world's first modern monster. From the real Illuminati in Ingolstadt to the electric horros of Galvanisim, discover how humanity's pursuit of perfection became its own cautionary tale. Thank you for getting weird with us, -The Occulture Shock Podcast
--------
20:02
--------
20:02
FLUSHED: The Unique History Behind Japan's Hi-Tech Toilets
Hello Seekers! Welcome to an episode that I've done inn combination with: A). Just getting back from a weeks long vacation in Japan and B). Popular demand for this particular subject matter. What is that subject matter, you ask? It's actually about one of my favorite things in Japan - their toilets! Specifically, their high-tech Toto ones. Because the Japanese didn't just re-invent the toilet into something spectcacular, they actually turned it into a cultural icon! Today on the Occulture Shock podcast, we're talking about "night soil" and its ties to farming, French courtesans with their first bidets and how Japan took that tech and turned it into a point of pride. Thanks for getting weird with us! -Jessica PS: For those interested inn early and ad-free episodes, you can join the Occculture Shock Patreon at Patreon.com/OccultureShockPodcast. Their bare Tier groups for every type of listener. Enjoy the show!
Step beyond the veil and into the shadows of forgotten history, fringe science, and the strange rituals shaping our world in plain sight.
Occulture Shock isn't just a podcast — it's a guided descent into the unknown. Hosted by TV & web personality, Jessica Chobot, this show unearths the real origins of ghost hunting techniques, exposes occult influences hiding in pop culture, and tracks the eerie overlap between conspiracy, memory, and myth.
New episodes every Tues. Follow if you dare.
Ireland