In 1944, the quiet town of Mattoon, Illinois was gripped by a bizarre and terrifying mystery. A phantom attacker. A town in panic. And a mystery that still doesn’t quite make sense. This week, The House Red dives into the strange case of the Mad Gasser of Mattoon.

After a plane crash deep in the Amazon, four children vanished into one of the most unforgiving environments on Earth. For 40 days, they survived alone—guided by the eldest, whose courage and instincts kept them alive against impossible odds. This is a story of survival, resilience, and a jungle that didn’t take them.

Out on the open ocean, there’s nowhere to run… and nowhere to hide.

In 2012, José Salvador Alvarenga set out on a routine fishing trip—and vanished into one of the most unbelievable survival stories ever recorded. For 438 days, he drifted across the Pacific Ocean, battling starvation, isolation, and the endless horizon.

This week on The House Red, we explore how he survived, what it cost him, and what happens to the human mind when it’s left alone with nothing but the sea.

A former cop. A Playboy Bunny. A brutal murder.

Laurie "Bambi" Bembenek's life reads like fiction—but her conviction was all too real. In this episode, we unravel how a woman with everything to lose became the center of a shocking case, and why many believe she never should’ve been found guilty.

At 17, Julianne Koepcke fell from a plane into the Amazon—and survived. Alone and injured, she spent 11 days fighting her way through the jungle in one of the most unbelievable survival stories ever told.

For one strange week in 2010, something bizarre seemed to be happening around the world. Birds fell from the sky, thousands of fish washed ashore, and animals began dying in sudden, unexplained events. Was it coincidence, natural causes, or something far stranger? This week on The House Red, we dive into the eerie seven days when the animal kingdom seemed to collapse all at once.

In 1903, thousands gathered at Coney Island for a spectacle unlike any other. At the center of it all was Topsy, a circus elephant with a troubled past—and a grim fate. In an era obsessed with electricity, showmen turned her execution into a public demonstration that would later become one of the earliest shocking films ever recorded.

He lost part of his brain but stayed awake. In this episode, we tell the unbelievable true story of Phineas Gage—the man who survived the ultimate workplace accident—and how the iron that should’ve killed him instead reshaped science, psychology, and the idea of what makes you… you.