From the unexplained to the mundane, come join us on a journey to the fringe.
Hello and welcome to Journey to the Fringe, where it really hasn't been 48 hours since
we last talked to you guys, at least in our time, so we got no money to report back for
Chelsea anything.
Fun.
No.
It's important.
We are your podcast hosts of the same financial status as before Taylor and Chelsea.
Here today, I'm not actually sure this, I have no idea what you're doing, Chelsea.
All I know is you sent me a top.
What I asked you if you had an episode ready.
From the position that I sit with no money that nobody sent me and from.
Wait, Chelsea.
Yeah.
I just want to see, are you saying they're not deserving of an episode?
Yeah, that's voted guys.
If you're listening to Journey to the Fringe.
We're back.
We are hoping that you will send us money, so we'll just continue doing this.
I am so sick of keel and the mothman prophecies right now.
I was going to do something related and I thought it was like that.
Maybe in another time.
I decided to do a cryptid that I've been meaning to do.
Well, I don't know if he's a cryptid.
I guess we'll discuss that at the end, but I'm doing a thing that has been on my mind
for a while.
So buckle your seatbelts.
It's the story of Sam the Sundown clown.
Have you heard of this guy before?
I feel like it came up in an episode recently, but I can't say I know anything about him.
Maybe that's why I was thinking about him.
Anyhow, Sam the Sundown clown.
Damn, that is hard to say.
The Sundown clown was a strange being encountered by two young children while vacationing at
Lake Common, Sundown, Isle of Wight in the UK in May of 1973.
Oh, you've been saying Sundown?
Yeah.
Because I've been hearing Sundown.
Sundown is like people with dementia as the sun goes down, they lose mental capacity.
This really changes what I think of this clown now.
Now was I saying?
No, I'm pretty sure I was saying Sundown.
I think you were saying Sam's down.
I was just misinterpreting it, assuming that you were saying it wrong.
Okay, hold on though.
Because my document is labeled Sundown clown.
Now I don't know.
Was I saying the wrong anyhow?
It's the Sandown clown.
I caught it pretty early on in the episode this time.
So hopefully I continue on with saying that.
Just to set the scene, these kids have this encounter in Sandown in the UK when they're
on vacation and it's like a little seaside town in the southern end of the Isle of Wight.
The town has a rich history stretching back to the Roman period when the area was used
primarily for salt production and up until the 19th century, Sandown was exclusively used
as a military site since the beaches offered easy access to invading French troops.
Lots of history with the arrival of the train in the 1800s.
Sandown grew into the beach resort town that it would become known as in the 20th and 21st
centuries and today, Sandown is a traditional British seaside town featuring a long stretch
of sandy beach, a high street filled with restaurants and shops, various attractions
including a wildlife sanctuary and a dinosaur museum, lots of dinosaur bones there, and
a quintessential Victorian pier with large arcade and beautiful views of the cliffs and
sea.
Sandown apparently has its fair share of paranormal happenings as well, such as UFO sightings
and poltergeist activity.
I literally talk about none of that so I'm just going to take their word for it.
So the entity itself that the kids encountered was a shy but friendly being and spoke kindly
to the children for almost half an hour before they returned to their parents.
It seemingly vanished after the encounter and has never been seen again.
That's it.
That's the only encounter with this being ever recorded anywhere.
Is there a chance there was just a clown working the street?
Tell me if that's what you think it is after we talk about the encounter.
Okay.
I mean, I guess there's always a chance of that, I guess.
Like a hobo clown?
You know the kind I'm talking about.
Yeah, I guess it's not New Jersey.
Like that's, I would picture that in Jersey Shore, not fancy England.
True.
Yeah, England is so fancy.
British Andy Lizard.
Is anybody seeing Sam the Sand Down Clown and British Andy in the same room?
Oh no.
Never.
It's never come up.
Before getting into the actual encounter of Sam the Sand Down Clown, I want to first
introduce the primary source of the event, which is the British UFO Research Association
or Bufora, which is a very catchy name.
That's a beautiful acronym.
And now Bufora.
Bufora.
It's a brand makeup at that kind of acronym.
You could.
A brand makeup, but makeup nonetheless.
Yeah, totally off brand.
Bufora was founded in 1964 to investigate UFO reports around the British Isles.
According to their website, Bufora is a quote, non-cultist and scientifically evaluative
organization.
End quote.
I love how it's non-cultist.
Yeah, it's not a cult.
That's how you know it's not a cult.
They don't see way too fast.
We forgot to put that in our native.
Until 2005, they published a Bufora journal where the story of Sam the Sundown Clown appeared
in the January, February 1978 issue.
Cover the issue features of drawing of Sam, who appears as a tall robot like humanoid
speaking into a microphone hooked up to an audio device.
Then underneath dramatically asked quote, go store spaceman.
It's all in caps.
So I had to say it really loud.
End quote.
This is the sole location of the report of SSC.
I'm going to read to you the encounter right from Bufora because it was never a Bufora
publication because it's never reported anywhere else.
The encounter which starts with the father of one of the children's dad is Mr. Y.
So this is where the report start and I'm going to read it right now.
Let me just go to the top because I'm not prepared for this.
Okay, so report extra go store spaceman 73.
I'm indebted to Leonard Kramp for advising Mr. Y to write to me concerning his own and
his daughter's experiences and to Mr. Y himself for providing me with a very complete dossier
of events.
Of necessity these have had to be encapsulated.
Nevertheless, they make interesting reading.
Mr. Y has requested a nominity because of his daughter's involvement.
Ed.
So here's where it starts.
Tuesday, 20th of October 1970.
Around 7pm Mr. Y was driving from Shanklin to Ride by a Seaview to see a friend.
Passing through the village of Bradding, he turned right to St. Helens and then became
aware of a large multi-lit aircraft to his right about half way between the road and
Bembridge.
Bembridge Downs.
It looked enormous as it flew low over swampy terrain.
He stopped the car and watched.
The object hovered apparently aimlessly over the swampy margins of the river Yarr.
A wide ring of seven or more lights could be seen, each of them a large and clearly
defined sphere, like a bright red cherry.
An interspersed with a turquoise and white light, no sound could be heard.
Our witness drove on and the object flew parallel.
Once outside St. Helens, it cut across about 300 yards behind him and dropped slowly, meandering
above distant hedges, now appearing smaller with the number of red lights reduced to four,
which seemed to rotate slowly.
Mr. Y again stopped at this time and used his torch to signal for some 10 minutes, during
which time the object weaved backwards and forwards without settling.
He then continued on to his appointment.
When he reached his destination, the red lights were still there and he left his own rear
lights on to face the object.
Coming out of the house, his friend could see the thing also playing hide and seek between
the treetops.
As he continued on to ride, the lights were lost to view and our witness saw them no more.
On several subsequent occasions, he noticed signal, balls of red light in the sky, which
would hang stationary or follow him along as though checking his movements, but on the
first of March 1972, a considerably more frightening incident occurred.
Again, this is the father of the two kids who have the experience with Sam.
It was between 9pm and 10pm and Mr. Y was perched on the cliffside at Compton Bay, having
been driven there by an unexpected tidal surge seemingly caused in part at least by some
form of droning underwater craft.
From his vantage point, he observed two points of light, yellow and pure and up at me like
the eyes of some horrible sea monster.
He guessed the eyes were not much more than 40 feet away and were just below the surface
of the sea, like a sort of periscope.
It disappeared and as the tide gradually subsided, Mr. Y was able to get back to his car and
drive home.
At no time did he tell his young daughter of anything he had experienced, but at the
beginning of May 1973, when she was 7 years old, she claimed to have had a very weird
encounter indeed.
And this part is titled Sand Down Spaceman or Golf Link's Ghost.
Faye, or so we shall call her, was near Lake Common Sand Down on a Tuesday afternoon about
4 o'clock with a boy about her own age when they both heard a weird wailing noise not unlike
an ambulance siren.
They followed it across the golf links and threw a hedge leading to the swampy meadow
adjacent to a little used sand down airport the noise ceased.
As they were crossing a wooden foot bridge over a narrow brook, a blue-gloved hand appeared
from under the bridge and a strange figure emerged.
The figure fumbled with a book, dropped it in the water, then splashed about to retrieve
it.
They then watched the figure enter a metallic hut, similar to those used on building sites
except that it had no windows.
It moved along with a strange hopping motion with knees raised high.
The children wandered off and were over 50 yards away when the figure, Brackets, which
from now on will be referred to as He, I love that they clarify this in here, and Bracket.
They don't say why they come to that conclusion though.
He reappeared carrying a black-knobbed microphone with a white flex attached.
The wailing noise immediately returned, this time being so loud that the boy was scared
and began to run away.
Noise ceased and he spoke into the microphone and although so far off, the children could
hear his voice as clearly as though they were right near them.
Hello, are you still there? he asked, and in response to what sounded a friendly tone,
they ventured close enough to speak to the oddly attired person.
He was nearly seven feet tall and had no neck, for his head appeared to be wedged straight
onto his shoulders.
He wore a yellow pointed hat, which interlocked with the red collar of a green tunic.
And black-knob was affixed to the top of his hat and wooden antennae were attached on either
side.
The face had triangular markings for eyes, a brown square of a nose, and motionless yellow
lips.
Other round markings were on his white paper cheeks and a fringe of red hair fell onto
his forehead.
Wooden slats protruded from his sleeves and from below his white trousers, his first
communication was in writing.
Hello, he wrote in a notebook in a large hand.
Hello, I am all colors, Sam.
The boy was hesitant, but Frey read each word as it was pointed to.
This was necessary as the words were not laid out in conventional sequence.
Children ventured closer and discovered that the creature could talk without the aid of
a microphone, so his lips did not move and speech was unclear, rather like that of a
person who does not open his mouth properly.
He asked the children about themselves, so they ventured to ask questions too.
He asked about his clothes, which were all ripped, and he told them he only had one set
so he could only wear those.
Because of his strange white features, they asked if he was really a man.
The answer was a chuckled, no.
I don't know how you'd chuckle that.
They also asked if he was a ghost.
A vague reply was, well, not really, but I am in an odd sort of way.
What are you then?
He continued, but only obtained the answer you know, with no further explanation.
Oh man, this guy's grace.
He also said- Stephen Greer needs to interview him.
Oh yeah.
He also said he had no name.
There are others like himself though, and he drew a rough sketch of one of them.
He also confided that he was frightened of people and scared they may hurt him.
Apparently, if attacked, he would not fight back.
They didn't test it?
No, I mean their kids.
At his invitation, the children crawled through a flap into his hut.
These freaking kids, I mean, they shouldn't do that.
It was the 70s though.
They didn't have the stranger danger we were taught.
Oh my god.
So into his hut, which contained two levels.
The lower had plenty of headroom and was wall-papered in blue-green and covered with a pattern of
dials.
It also had an electric heater and simple wooden furniture.
The upper level was less spacious and the floor was metallic.
He told the children that he fed upon berries, which he collected in the late afternoon.
He didn't say where, but did indicate that he had a camp on the mainland he could go
to.
He also said that the water from the river could be drunk once he had cleaned it.
Once inside the hut, he removed his hat to reveal round, white ears, and sparse brown
hair.
Before eating a berry, he performed an odd conjuring trick.
He placed the berry in his ear, thrust his head forward, and caused the berry to disappear
and reappear at one of his odd eyes.
Repeating the process, the berry traveled to his mouth.
In brackets, a possible explanation could be that he was wearing some kind of protective
mask and analyzing the berry to check it wasn't poisonous in brackets.
Could he not have just been doing a magic trick though?
Yeah, he could have.
That was what I was thinking, like a sleight of hand something.
Yeah, especially if they're seven years old.
If you know a magic trick, you're probably going to show it to them.
Yeah, I mean, and they're going to know no better.
I like that they jump to a wild one though that is wearing a mask and checking if it's
poisonous.
I mean sleight of hand.
He's been eating them for days and he's checking if it's poisonous.
I mean, this is kids, so I mean, it might not have even been a good sleight of hand
and they would have probably said, this is like it came out his mouth he put it in his
ear.
The children talked to the strange being for half an hour or more than after saying goodbye,
they rushed across the golf links to tell the first man they met that they'd seen a
ghost and merely laughed.
The children were convinced of their experience and that the being was either a ghost or someone
dressed up.
They told your father.
He dressed up.
He definitely or maybe didn't dressed up because his clothes were all ripped.
Yeah.
He put on his clothes.
They told her father for experience some three weeks later, Jesus, on the 2nd of June 1973.
At first, he found the story quite unbelievable, but was amazed at the detailed account and
faced certainty as to its truth.
She was quite upset when he suggested she'd made it up or invented it.
Mr. Y saw the boy, but found him not easy to communicate with, though he did get a statement
from him verifying that he'd seen it too.
Apart from make believe, other possibilities considered include a shared hallucination
and a deliberate hoax by someone.
There was such an extraordinary amount of detail, however, which included the further
point that the creature clearly only had three fingers on each blue-gloved hand and three
toes on his bare white feet making a deliberate hoax somewhat difficult and indeed why go
to all that trouble.
Why does that detail appear there in this article?
What an odd place for it to be.
Mr. Y tells me that although bizarre, certain elements of the story rang true to him and
he also took account of the possibility of some connection with his own previous experiences.
Summing up, he says, quote, I get the impression that Faye was somehow taking into a bubble
of alien reality created by this strange personage.
He told them he had just made the hut.
Also Faye told me that while they were talking to this ghost, two workmen nearby were repairing
a post.
They paid no attention to the weird charade as though they could not see it, end quote.
Or they're used to the guy.
Oh, that's just Sam.
He got three fingers, three toes.
He's got that one magic trick.
We keep giving him poisoned berries, which is why it's so bloated.
Yeah, and he's high as fuck that's why he's using a microphone.
We gave him the microphone too.
Well ghost, basement, imagination, hoax, or hallucination?
Take your pick.
Does the childs make believe?
Perhaps there are a number of unusual elements of the story and it is very detailed.
Remember too that quite a percentage of reports of sightings come from children.
Brackets, the Welsh flap is a case in point.
In particular, the box dropping incident and the humanoid report from Broad Haven School,
C volume six, number one.
What the fuck is the box dropping incident?
Yeah, I think Chelsea, we just got a ton of things for our research document.
One last point.
Mr. Y visited the spot but could find no metal hut anywhere in sight, nor any indication
of one.
Not really surprising, no matter in what light one views the children's story for.
To make a comparison, how often are traces found in reported UFO landings?
The case rests.
I mean, it's, I don't think it's that surprising that the construction huts had been moved
after he lured two children into it for half an hour and people saw it.
We didn't see it, apparently.
No, the two construction huts were to have seen it.
So that's the sighting.
What do you think of it?
In my mind, this is really just kids meeting a homeless person for the first time and kind
of embellishing, not embellishing, but like seeing something that wasn't quite there with
the experience because that matches up a lot with just how I feel a kid would interact
with an outsider.
Yeah, that's true.
Yeah.
I mean, there are other explanations, even like it happening, not just like a ghost or
you know, it's just a child's interpretation.
I mean, the thing that's creepy about it is the physical appearance with the clown, like
the red hair and like the triangle eyes and stuff and the mouth not moving.
Yeah, which I mean, also, they did say that it sounded like his mouth wasn't opening when
he was talking.
There's a chance this guy had a stroke and only a part of his mouth opened.
That's true.
Some people do talk like that with very little mouth movement.
You know, the people I'm talking about.
And my other thought while I was reading it was how much of this with the dad's background
in his sightings when they kind of said that they thought it was a ghost, how much was he
kind of feeding the paranormal details into it?
Not only that, the fact that like at home, there may be kind of a culture of talking
about these things.
So seeing something outside of what you're normally expecting.
Yeah, you get that feeling of this is what's happening.
So you add these details.
Yeah, I mean, there are details that are in that article that I wouldn't expect a child
to come up with.
And they do even speculate in there with the mask and the poison berry that they are putting
it through a mask, which is just a wild thing to jump to, I think.
Yeah.
So there is a little bit in the article and some of the stuff I think a kid wouldn't come
up with.
And he certainly probably said, oh, like, did he do this?
I can't think of a specific example because that's how I work.
But yeah, creepy the way that it's presented.
And then the last.
Yeah.
I mean, if everything is just taken as true, yeah, it is a truly bizarre story.
And either way, it is a bizarre story, particularly the fact that their stories do match up in
particular points, like the fact that they both say there's three digits on all extremities.
Yeah.
And what do you think?
Like, it was three weeks later that she brought it up.
Yeah.
And how do you think they came to the conclusion that he had three fingers and three toes?
Do you think that's a detail that the children noticed?
I think so.
Although it could have come up in questioning them both together, I don't know for sure.
That is part of the problem of it being three weeks later and then that it not coming out
with actual investigation, but a dad forcing a kid to give us a statement.
I don't even know that as an adult, if I was just having a regular interaction with something,
I probably just think that everything's normal if I come across a clown in the woods.
I don't know that I'm going to pay attention to the fingers.
Yeah, fair enough.
Like it might pull over my head.
I mean, it was a 30 minute encounter.
It is a 30 minute encounter.
And if somebody has never met somebody who's missing digits or you're just used to normals,
like if one kid pointed it out, that would be something that they would remember.
That's true.
But it doesn't sound like they pointed it out to maybe they did because it doesn't say
everything that they asked them.
Maybe they're like, I see you only have three fingers and three toes.
Yeah, well, yeah, the entire story does not take up 30 minutes of conversation.
So maybe they bring it up.
I just see I'm the same person.
You know, they were sitting around at the table and the dad asked like repeatedly, how
was your day over the course of three weeks?
And she just said, good.
Like, do you do anything now?
No.
And then just like out of nowhere one day, she just kind of brings it up.
Yeah.
Remember when we were in Sandown, we saw a clown in the bush and we went into his house.
For 30 minutes.
He ate those berries, only had three fingers.
Put the berries in his ear, came out his mouth.
Do you remember?
That was fun.
Oh yeah, I could would bring it up that would be too.
And it was like when they were late for something too.
So they're really rushing.
Oh, that's how kids always bring things up.
So no spacecraft or even terrestrial vehicle was observed at the time of the incident.
And only the children saw and spoke to the being.
It's shack had vanished before for the research could be carried out and workmen near the site
reported nothing out of the ordinary, which Taylor brought up a good point.
That just means that he wasn't potentially out of the ordinary.
And that's him is always there.
The children were insistent that this encounter really happened for the remainder of their
life.
Their parents initially disbelieve them.
But when they continue to talk about the encounter in vivid detail before it was contacted by
the parents and all details logged in the archives.
So that's the end of that.
I think we just had a pretty lengthy discussion about possible explanations.
I feel like our explanations make sense.
But let's talk about some more.
There are several explanations as to what the being could have been.
Theories include a human wearing a costume, a fairy, a ghost or other type of paranormal
or supernatural creature, a robot, an extraterrestrial possibly wearing a costume, a shared hallucination
or a folly adieu.
I'm just going to scratch that one out.
I don't think it was a shared hallucination unless they were also eating the poison berries.
The creature could have also been made up by the kids who saw it.
I think that one's probably unlikely because the people who were working close by did remember
the kids walking past them.
As far as Sam being an alien, Sam's story with the hut could have potentially been a
UFO.
And it also seems to be what Mr. Y is implying by tying Faye's interaction with Sam to
his own UFO sighting.
I agree with that one because he clearly, that's why he tells the story.
And then, you know, I think he probably jumps to conclusions and leads it a little bit there
was my thought.
Yeah, well, he's not an investigator, so I don't blame him for asking leading questions.
Unlike people that we've looked at in the past who definitely do that.
Who should be, you know, not asking leading questions.
Sam as a ghost, Faye and Harry were convinced Sam was some sort of wandering specter.
When the children asked Sam if he was a ghost, Sam seems to consider the possibility with
his cryptic response.
Well, not really, but I am in an odd sort of way.
Maybe.
If we not just interpret that as him saying like he didn't feel like he was human because
he's a homeless person who people look down on.
He's not quite saying this could also be somebody with a mental illness.
Yeah.
He's had a stroke that isn't seeing reality properly.
I mean, why they're dressed up as a clown.
Maybe it was the Joker.
I don't know.
I'm just having some word vomit at the moment as to what it could be.
But I really don't think it's a ghost.
It would just it would just make it more confusing if he was a ghost.
Why would he be a ghost?
Why would he say he wasn't a ghost?
Why would he be a ghost?
I don't know.
Sam is a human not to make the story dark, but Sam's interest in the children and inviting
them into his weird swampy shack certainly sounds like a kidnapping attempt.
I don't know about that because he let him go.
Yeah.
Well, maybe the family he knew the family didn't have any money at a certain point.
Maybe.
The fact that the children didn't mention being held captive or feeling threatened makes
me think this wasn't necessarily an encounter with malicious intent.
If Sam was a human, his strange appearance and mannerisms could very well have been linked
to drug or alcohol abuse, mental health, poison berries or similar reasons.
Children are likely to conjure up bizarre descriptions of people that appear odd to them.
Yeah, that that one I think is yeah.
Sam is a shared hallucination.
I'm not even reading this one because that's not what it is.
Sam is a prank.
Children get bored when children get bored.
They make up stories to entertain themselves.
Children have such a vivid and wonderful imagination.
So this could have been a childish prank that Faze father took seriously because of his
prior experience.
Sam the underappreciated cryptid.
So this is the end of the episode.
We've given our opinions throughout.
Do you have anything else left to question?
After them, we do need to invest in mental health facilities and treatments.
I feel like this might be a good story that gives an example of why.
Yeah, I mean, this was the 70s, so I'm sure it's come a hell of a far ways since then.
It's actually a little better back then just because we had sanitariums at the time.
Yeah, it's definitely something we still need to invest in.
Population goes up.
We need to expand.
I only say that because I was just talking about it.
Yeah, but yeah, I'm keeping up with the population and the housing being built.
But I digress.
Yeah, and with that, I have been Taylor here with Chelsea.
We are Journey to the Fringe.
Thank you all for listening.
We'll see you next week.
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