Hold My Sweet Tea
Where True Crime collides with chilling ghost stories and Southern folklore. Join us, sip sweet tea, and uncover shocking tales of murder, mystery, and the supernatural, all with a healthy dose of Southern charm and a touch of sass!
Hold My Sweet Tea
Ep. 36-Tate Rowland: Death and Rumors in Childress, Texas
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A popular teenager found hanging from a tree. A sister who dies mysteriously three years later while investigating her brother's death. A small Texas town torn apart by rumors of devil worship and human sacrifice.
Welcome to Childress, Texas, 1988, where the death of 17-year-old Tate Rowland sparked a community-wide descent into fear and paranoia. Tate was known around town as a wild child with a mile-long streak of rebellion – tearing up the main drag in his blue Ford pickup, getting into scraps over his on-again, off-again girlfriend Karen, and occasionally crossing paths with local law enforcement.
When Tate's body was discovered hanging from a horse apple tree on the outskirts of town, the circumstances immediately raised questions. Two rope burns on his neck contradicted typical suicide patterns. The shifting story of the only witness, 15-year-old Chad Johnston, added to the suspicion. Yet authorities quickly ruled it a suicide without performing an autopsy.
What followed was a textbook case of satanic panic consuming a small American town. Strange occurrences at Tate's funeral – a mysterious veiled woman, chanting mourners – gave way to increasingly bizarre rumors. The discovery of what some called an "altar" near the hanging site fueled speculation about cult activity. Halloween night cemetery visits led to terrifying encounters near Tate's grave. Reports spread of strangers attempting to kidnap blonde, blue-eyed children for sacrifice.
When Tate's sister Terry died three years later under questionable circumstances while actively investigating her brother's death, the community's fears reached fever pitch. A suicide note from a local man claiming knowledge of Terry's death only deepened the mystery.
Was Childress truly infiltrated by satanic forces? Or did the power of gossip, fear, and 1980s moral panic transform ordinary tragedies into something far more sinister? Join us as we untangle the threads of this haunting tale where small-town dynamics, teenage angst, and America's obsession with occult conspiracy collide in the Texas panhandle.
Sources:
https://spellcasterghosttours.com/satanic-panic-texas/
Skip Hollandsworth; July 1992
https://www.texasmonthly.com/true-crime/possessed-by-the-devil/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_of_Tate_Rowland_and_Terrie_Trosper
Tate Rowland's Mysterious Death
Speaker 1Every town has its ghost stories, but the events in Childress, Texas, well, they were something else entirely. Too many unanswered questions, too many coincidences and way too many bizarre confessions. This is Hold my Sweet Tea. Thank you, Hello. Hello, this is.
Speaker 2Holly and I'm Pearl. Have you been keeping up with the Travis Decker stuff? I?
Speaker 1have a little bit. The stuff, the stuff, the tragedy. Yes, um, I have. It's a bizarre story like why would this man red rum his babies? Yeah, yeah this is crazy three little girls.
Speaker 2They were so cute and and then disappear almost like yeah, somebody else was involved, I don't know.
Speaker 1Right and like he's wanted. For you know, first degree murder and first degree kidnapping. But he was on visitation, so does that count as kidnapping?
Speaker 2I think yes, after if it's past. Okay, he didn't bring him back on a certain time, like if he doesn't bring him back on a certain time it is a violation, so it would be considered kidnapping at that point, especially if it goes on for days and days and days.
Speaker 1But my thing is like they said he was homeless and he was living in different camps and stuff in his truck. Yeah, but his truck was still there, his phone was still there. That seems a little suspish. His truck was still there, his phone was still there, that seems a little suspish.
Speaker 2Yeah, I was thinking like, okay, so either you just decided to go all the way off grid kind of disappear, yeah, or something happened.
Speaker 2Yeah, there's some foul plays in there To him also Right, like I guess we're not going to find out until they find him Mm-hmm, whether that be him alive or him not alive, unalive, and then just trying to put all the pieces together, yeah, but yeah, we'll be having a Brittany Robinson update soon. Absolutely, and that was something that happened in the beginning with her stuff. He was like arrested and did jail time for a custody violation because he didn't return his daughter on time. So it's a. Thing.
Speaker 1Yep. Well, I hope they find him and I hope they get some answers. They are doing they're supposed to be doing an autopsy in DNA on the girls, so I guess they can see if there's somebody else's.
Speaker 2Something on them.
Speaker 1Something on them?
Speaker 2Yeah, so just to see, to see if there's like else's something on them, something on them, yeah. So just to see, to see if there's like a third party involved.
Speaker 1I guess Right right, but it sucks, it's sad, it's very sad.
Speaker 2It's very sad, yes.
Speaker 1But you know, speaking of death, sucky sadness and sucky sadness, today's story, we'll have to do a disclaimer, because it is one of those unaliving stories and if that, you know, makes you squeamish or you don't want to hear about it, listener, discretion is advised.
Speaker 2Well, and from what I understand what you told me, it also is some odd lifestyle choices. There's some odd little things going on in this. I say odd lifestyle choices. I don't mean it that way.
Speaker 1I probably mean odd practices yeah, yeah, odd, odd things going on, but but was it or was it just rumors?
Speaker 2right, and that's yeah, because I wasn't blamed on odd practices right that may or may not have occurred exactly, exactly.
Speaker 1But you know sleepy little town and we are traveling to West Texas for all of our Texas listeners because we haven't done a Texas episode yet. So hello Texas, hello, open that panhandle. I just like driving through the panhandle of Texas. I'm sorry, but I just don't like it.
Speaker 2You could have ended that sentence with I just like driving through Texas it takes like 10 days to get through Texas.
Speaker 1Add the T at the end. I was like but the panhandle, like Amarillo, is nice and everything but like going through there. It's got a foul smell and it's just, oh, I Nothing.
Speaker 2I know it smells, whatever, but I'm also like when I drive through Texas and I'm trying to get to the other side, when I get over there, I'm like, yeah, I'm almost done Finally. I know, yeah, I'm almost done Finally.
Speaker 1I know, sorry that y'all are so large Texas, but you know it does suck driving through there.
Speaker 2Yeah, large and overly populated with cars.
Speaker 1A lot. But then there's the desolate areas and it's just like miles and miles and miles of nothing that make you tired. You're like oh look, there's a rest stop coming up and it's like literally a picnic table and a garbage can in one tree.
Speaker 2And a tumbleweed, and a tumbleweed Flows right across the road right as you're pulling into park. You're like where am I supposed to pee?
Speaker 1Behind that tree, or the tumbleweed, or the tumbleweed, no tumbleweed.
Speaker 2Or the tumbleweed, the tumble the way, Like come back. I have to pee Right.
Speaker 1Well, our story begins in the year of 1988 with a 17-year-old named Tate Rowland. Tate was a childress fixture in Texas. He was popular, he was good looking and he had a wild streak. A mile long. He was a wild, wild child, you know. The sheriff's office knew him well. Oh, good enough, he was a hot rodder, a drinker, tearing up and down the Child drag and in his tricked out blue ford pickup I'm so glad it wasn't a freaking fox body, mustang oh, he had his ford pickup.
Speaker 1He's like look at my. This is a stretch of US 287. In the heart of teenage life the Mighty Burger, the 24-hour's friend, Bobby Reynolds, chase girls, drink beer and get in a little trouble.
Speaker 2Well, at least he's honest, Right.
Speaker 1But Childress itself isn't your typical sleepy West Texas town. Isn't your typical sleepy West Texas town? I mean, they, you know they didn't have a lot going on, but they did have like a pretty thriving hospital, A new state prison bringing in jobs. I'm like, yay, prison.
Speaker 2So if you get hurt, you're covered. If you get in trouble, they got some place to put you Right. There you go.
Speaker 1And despite a hiccup with their sheriff getting caught selling marijuana. Sorry, folks in Childress back in 1988 like to focus on their wholesome all-American qualities.
Speaker 2Was it all-American quantities of marijuana?
Speaker 1Yes, just an eighth of quantity. I'm going to read, right, I swear I'm like looking at my notes and talking. Looking at my notes and talking. So this town, for all its charm it's small enough that everybody knows everybody's business One of those little towns, love, hate, gossip. It all ricochets through the flat landscape. Of course there's nothing for it to bounce off of Right.
Small Town Drama and Relationships
Speaker 1But it ricochets. It ricochets off the dirt Right and everyone knew Tate Rowland. So half the town liked him, half thought he needed a good kick in the ass. He was just that kind of kid. Even the district attorney McCoy called him a rabble rouser. You got the district attorney knowing who you are. Yeah.
Speaker 2I feel like you could be liked and still need a good kick in the butt. Yep, it's fine, you can need both.
Speaker 1And Tate. He was one of those kids he loved to scuffle, especially if he thought someone was putting a move on his on-again, off-again, pixie-sized blonde girlfriend, karen Hackler.
Speaker 2Karen Karen.
Speaker 1That's perfect. She hackles Yep, she's a hackler. He even got his jaw broken once by his buddy, bobby Reynolds, over Karen. You know he didn't know how to fight well, but he didn't back down. He did it anyway. Yep, he did it anyway. He was in there. He's like you hitting on my girl, I'm gonna hit on you, I'm gonna hit on you. Yep, got his jaw broke.
Speaker 1But tate's relationship was care with karen was a classic love hate affair, like they were, you know, always in their cars, chasing each other up and down the drag, mad or jealous at each other about something like you all know the type of person I'm talking about. They're constantly fighting and making up, fighting and making up. They're just toxic with each other. The Hackler family even called the police complaining about Tate harassing Karen, stealing her purse, slinging gravel at their house. Like this is the type of relationship they have. Oh, my goodness.
Speaker 1Yeah, there was even an incident involving tate's truck and kevin hackler with an axe handle. So that actually went to court. So the grand jury bless their small town little hearts couldn't decide who to believe, so they didn't indict either one of them. They were like I don't know who to, so let's just let them both go, it's fine. It's fine. Go home, boys Right. The tensions, though, between Tate and the Hacklers were reaching like a boiling point. In January of 88, tate was arrested for assault after Karen claimed he choked her at a convenience store. Yeah, so he was getting a little handsy. So it's like you should separate, you know. But it went to the grand jury and there was no indictment, because during the lunch break the jury saw Tate and Karen hugging and kissing in the courtroom hallway.
Speaker 1Of course they were Right Toxic toxic, toxic, yeah, oh, my gosh y'all. So you know, let bygones be bygones, they decided whatever. So soon after tate moved to louisiana with a relative of his um, his father, jimmy roland, who worked for the railroad, had been telling tate to stay away from Karen and the Hacklers. Brenda, tate's stepmother, and Jimmy didn't think they were good for Tate and him and Karen were not good for each other at all. It was kind of turning into one of those modern-day Hatfield-McCoy type feuds back and forth.
Speaker 2Yeah, I was about to say that.
Speaker 1Sounds like it Sounds like Yep. So then, in the spring of 88, while Tate was still in Louisiana, karen got married to a young man in Childress, texas.
Speaker 2Ooh, somebody gonna be mad, yeah.
Speaker 1So and this was like from early you know, january-ish of 88. And then by the spring she got married. I'm like, what were you doing? So when Tate came back at the end of summer, he was stunned. It was like what?
Speaker 1Yeah, Surprise surprise, exactly so. His friends and family, you know. They said that he tried to rekindle things, but Karen said he mostly like, contacted her to talk about his problems. He still wanted her in his life, like to talk about things. So while many people said that Tate like actually snapped back to his old self, one friend admitted tate showed some depression over karen, which I think would be normal and natural after you know. He had a beer or two. He would start talking and he would tell his friend he's like this is the song I want you to play at my funeral. He stopped loving her today. Oh my god, I was like oh no, not that song, that's wow come on tate, snap out of it right go see your doctor.
Speaker 2Homie, get you some meds.
Speaker 1You're gonna be okay, that's all right. So on july 26 1988, tate roland, he didn't seem upset at all. Around five in the afternoon he was seen at the United Supermarket making plans to catch a softball game the following evening and then he was going to go split a 12-pack with Bobby Reynolds after him and Bobby Bobby done broke my jaw, but we're still friends, it's fine. Karen done married somebody else.
Speaker 2It's all good yeah.
Speaker 1I'm over it, right. So after they left the supermarket, he and a younger friend, chad Johnston, drove off. So at six o'clock that evening Chad Johnston walked into Jimmy and Brenda Rowland's home and calmly told them that Tate had hung himself. Say huh, yeah, he just walked in Tate's dad's home and was like Tate hung himself.
Speaker 2Like just calm.
Speaker 1Like no tears in his eyes, nothing. So they rushed to the site where he was at and there's Tate hanging from this tree. So his father gets up there and cuts him down. Chad was only like 15. He was a really quiet, unpopular kid in town and he liked to hang around with Tate because Tate brought excitement to his life. Well, and Tate was popular. Everybody knew Tate. But to like, walk over there and go, hey, he hung himself in this tree over here and then like, yeah, that's kind of crazy. Yeah, so Chad's initial story to the sheriff was that they had driven out to a small grove of trees where they liked to listen to music. They would sit out there and drink some beer. This 15-year-old, 15-year-old, yeah.
Speaker 2Go ahead Tate beer. This 15 year old, 15 year old. Yeah, go ahead tate right.
Speaker 1Contributing to delinquency of a minor right so after you know, after a few beers, tate strung a rope over a horse apple tree limb and announced that he was gonna hang himself and told chad he wanted where he wanted his funeral at. He was like this is where I want my funeral, I'm going to hang myself. Chad thought he was kidding. So Chad had walked behind the car to toss a beer can and to check and see if anybody was watching. I guess I'm like were you not concerned that he was hanging himself or did you just think he was joking? But why are you watching? Are you watching because y'all are drinking or hanging himself, or did you just think he was joking? But why are you watching? Are you watching because y'all are drinking or what? I'm confused by that.
Speaker 1But okay, three minutes later tate was dead. But this story has like a big problem because tate roland had two rope burns on his neck, one above the adam's apple and one below the adam's apple. Suspicious, suspicious, yeah. So in a typical hanging body weight pulls the chin down so it leaves a mark above the Adam's apple. So could he have been strangled?
Speaker 2and then hung up there to look like a suicide. Right, because it like forces your ear. Up toward your ears that way.
Speaker 1So two days later Chad was interviewed again. This time he changed his story. He said Tate tried to hang himself twice and you just stood there, yeah, the first time the rope broke and Tate said I can't even kill myself. They went back to Tate's house a five minute drive to get another rope and return back to the tree. He said Tate stood on the hood of his car, tied one end around the limb and the other around his neck, and stepped off. And again, you didn't try to stop him. He did nothing he never told anybody anything.
Speaker 1You went to his house. You could have went in and told his parents Right the same house.
Speaker 2You just went back to and said, hey, guys, but you waited long enough for him to be dead first.
Speaker 1Yeah. So Chad later said he had told different stories because he feared getting in trouble for not stopping Tate Insisting. Tate had been talking about suicide and was upset over Karen. Again, who cares? Right, I don't care if I get like no, you're not going to kill yourself. I don't care how strung out you are over a girl.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1So the sheriff's department at the time ruled it a suicide. The judge saw no reason for an autopsy. Tate was buried.
Speaker 2You know what? There's always a reason for an autopsy. Tate was buried. You know what? There's always a reason for an autopsy. Yeah, like that was it. I don't care if your grandma died in the hospital and you knew she had cancer. Autopsy please. Literally Like that is the dumbest shit.
Rumors of Cult Activity Emerge
Speaker 1They're like he's got two rope burns, but we don't need to look into it, it's fine, he killed himself. It's Tate, like what. So this is where things get weird. So at Tate's funeral, whispers were happening.
Speaker 2Please tell me, nobody played that song.
Speaker 1No, I don't think so. Maybe I don't know. It didn't say I was just like. Please tell me. No one played this off. So they said that you know Tate's aunt who had driven from Amarillo. She was at the funeral and she like asked one of the people she's like who was that woman in the back back there with a black veil over her face?
Speaker 2Yes, Was it Karen I?
Speaker 1don't know. They were like packed in the Calvary Baptist Church and so she was like I'm going to find out who she is. So once the service was over, the woman was gone. So they were like, who was that? Like you couldn't even see who it was. Then, in the middle of the service, a young man in the front row of the church started chanting over and over a single word Suicide, suicide, suicide. Like he just kept saying it. Hmm, like it's weird, weird, yes.
Speaker 2Very weird.
Speaker 1A few days later, a tip from a high school student led Child's Police to a spot a quarter of a mile from the hanging tree. There, a cow skull was lodged in a small tree and beneath it logs surrounded a pile of rocks. The officers concluded they were staring at an altar. I don't know about that, but okay, no way. Right Another night an officer was doing rounds through the town. He drove past the cemetery and he saw a tall figure standing by Tate Rowland's grave. When he went to check it out he found spit all over the tombstone.
Speaker 2Okay, so tall, slender figure, they're like sitting over there hocking loogies on it.
Speaker 1Hocking loogies on it. Other unsubstantiated reports poured in a burning cross over Tate's grave, a school teacher's dog stolen in sacrifice. Were these just antics of pranksters? Like children's kids, they loved a good boogeyman tale, you know. But the town had a strange connection to the Texas Chainsaw Massacre Thanks to a line of dialogue in the film. So Nevermind, it was filmed near Austin and loosely based on events in Wisconsin. Like it, just like because of they mentioned it in the film. So they were like, oh you know, they had slumber parties and they would be like tales of, like this killer on the loose. So like it was just urban legends would take hold and everything. Tate himself for kicks, once put on a mask and overalls, borrowed a chainsaw without the chain and chased giggling girls into the cemetery. So you know, they were all doing funny like Goofy stuff.
Speaker 1Yeah goofy stuff.
Speaker 2Natural child Right. I mean, when I was young Back then. Yeah, Teenage things In the 80s, like we did the whole Bloody Mary and the neighbor Light as a feather stiff as a board.
Speaker 1Yes, and all that stuff, all that stuff but, like the story about Tate's death, were like far from funny. When school started in the fall, every high school student seemed to have heard that Tate was a cult member Murdered by members of his cult that he was supposed to be in because he refused to bring them a blonde haired, blue eyed child for sacrifice. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed child for sacrifice. The child was supposedly one of his stepmother's daughters or one of his sister, terry Trosper's four blonde daughters. I'm like all these rumors like flying around. It's the 80s, so all of a sudden, satanic panic.
Speaker 2Yeah, mm-hmm, and this is what I meant by practices. Yes, in the beginning exactly.
Speaker 1And to make it even more chilling, district attorney mccoy confirms about the same time as these rumors had started, we had strangers in cars showing up at the local elementary school parking lot trying to pick up little kids, oh hell no. Hell, no, is that your daddy? No, you ain't getting in the car with him.
Speaker 2Like what.
Speaker 1What's wrong with people? But no arrests were ever made in the attempted kidnapping cases. Poor, why not? But people were spreading rumors like wildfire. So this town was getting weird, Like Twin Peaks weird. I was about to say I miss Twin Peaks. That was such a good show.
Speaker 2Next, thing, you know, aliens Right, because that's the only thing we've got left here, exactly the only thing we've got left here, exactly.
Speaker 1So brenda, roland tate's stepmother, started getting at least 10 calls a day from people spreading cult stories. Oh my god right. I don't know if I believe it, they'd say, but this is what I heard, and another version of tate's death would be born. So what started as an embellished high school speculation transformed into a full-blown community menace. Like even Cotton Farmer who was plowing nearby in July told investigators that he only saw two boys at the hanging tree leave and return. But those rumors didn't stop.
Speaker 1So Tate is causing a ruckus from the grave, still causing a ruckus Like he's like hold my beer, there you go. They were like these tales aren't just coming from anybody, they're just coming from, like good, ordinary people in our all-American town, that doesn't make them true at all, and so I mean even they had stories of like one of the mothers in town said that she was seeing teenagers in the park gathering gravel while heavy metal music was playing, and then when they left, she found gravel shaped into like 666 outside. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2Oh, my girl Rihanna shaped some gravel into it. I love you, mom. Oh, rihanna shapes some gravel into it. I love you, mom, oh.
Speaker 1Rihanna is an occult. Oh no, no. But then they did get a bizarre phone call from the Lockhart Police Department in Central Texas. A Childress girl visiting Lockhart had told a local girl she dreamed of a boy being hanged by a satanic cult. She dreamed the cult met at an abandoned house with a red porch light in Kirkland, east of Childress. Parents were involved, she said, and they used a car to run the boy down a few times a few years earlier, like a boy. That was like a few times, yeah, a few years earlier, sorry, not a few times. Sheriff deputies like, check this out. They were like, ok, we'll check. And yes, a haunted quote, unquote house with a red porch light and Kirkland had just burned to the ground. A couple of years prior a 15 year old kid had been hit by a car and killed while walking home. This reminds me a lot of the the Springfield.
Speaker 2That's what I was thinking too, like Michael.
Speaker 1What's his name? Michael Brown Brown, yeah, brown story, which was crazy because it's just a weird little spun story.
Speaker 2I guess we need to do that one, we should, we'll do that, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1So on Halloween night, our favorite night, well, the night before Devil's Night.
Speaker 2Fire it up All right the night before Devil's night.
Speaker 1Bye, Randall.
Speaker 2Bye, all right.
Speaker 1So on Halloween night in 1988, rumors spread that the cult planned to dig up Tate's body to extract his collarbone and pinky knuckle for a ritual.
Speaker 2Wow, how specific.
Speaker 1Right, no, just the pinky, just the pinky knuckle. Right there, you got it All right.
Speaker 2Good job.
Cemetery Scares and Halloween Panic
Speaker 1So a group of eight teenagers met at the cemetery gates to visit Tate's grave. One of them, 17 at the time, told grand jury what happened next. They piled into a pickup and drove slowly toward Tate's grave. As they got closer, someone asked Is that music? The driver stopped to listen and then, all of a sudden, he recalled some headlights turned on where Tate's grave was supposed to be. We all started going crazy and screaming. He whipped his truck around as fast as he could. They roared back through the gate. Someone spotted pentagrams drawn on the cemetery shed, sending everybody screaming again. The headlights kept coming closer. People jumped out of the pickup and into their cars, scattered in separate directions, and the young man sped toward town in the pickup, saying the lights followed him all the way to the courthouse before finally turning off. This is a whole bunch of like hoopity, hoopla, hoopity, hooplaity, hoopla, like just but I'm just laughing urban legends.
Speaker 2What if somebody was in their car out there? And they're like somewhere else and they're like I'm gonna mess with these kids yes, you know, and then they go home like dying laughing and these kids are like oh my god, right, I'm so scared Like.
Speaker 1And if that wasn't enough, shortly after Halloween, ray Wilkes, one of the town's more renegade teenagers, was arrested for stealing a car and drunkenly crashing it into a utility pole.
Speaker 1Officers say when Ray was booked he confessed to being a member of a satanic cult and claimed that he was at the tree when tate was hanged. Of course he did right. Those at the jail that night described described ray's voice as very spooky and told ray ray sports a swastika and the words heavy metal tattooed on his forearm but you know that is always a sign of a cult member right.
Speaker 1But you know, the next day he's like I didn't tell you that, I was just drunk, I don't know like what y'all are talking about. So like y'all silly, this, this incident made people like start talking about the wilks. So frank, wilks of 44. He was 44 and two of his four sons had a reputation with the police. Of course they did. They were a bunch of outlaws, according to the cops. Could they be a part of the cult? And what about those words painted and then covered up on the back of their ranch shackle home in the poorer southwest part of town, in the poorer southwest part of town. So people thought it said the devil's den or the devil's bin. Or the courthouse secretary swore it said we worship the devil.
Speaker 2Like it went from two words to a whole entire sentence.
Speaker 1So Frank Wilkes, an unemployed carpenter with a thick hillbilly style beard and accent, said oh hell, that was the doing of ray, my youngest son. He was trying to win the affection of a girl. So he wrote I love letty, so it doesn't look like the devil at all. I love what he doesn't look like the devil's den or the devil's bed. So he made him go out there and cover it up. So Frank insisted he's like my two sons couldn't have been at the hanging tree with Tate that day and he said it so proudly.
Speaker 1My oldest son, Darwin, was in jail and Ray was being held at a youth detention center. I was like Lord, this town is all hell Right. But the rumors persisted and kids accused each other of being in cults. They'd be like you're in a cult. So Brenda Rowland, while not believing everything, fueled the fires herself, calling kids at home and asking them point blank if they were cult members. Kids at home and asking them point blank if they were cult members. Tate's friend, clifton hodge, said he would even check out. He wouldn't even check out an occult book from the school library because you would have the fear of being labeled a cult member.
Speaker 2I'm like me, I can't even research it right, I can't even read about it.
Speaker 1No one's name was slandered like Tate's old girlfriend Karen, though. So Karen was still slandered. For the first time, kids seeing her on the drag would hold up their fingers in the shape of crosses as if to ward her off. She was rumored to have witchcraft books and a Ouija board Old she-devil Town. Gossip said Karen had lured Tate into the cult and one mother even called her the cult's Queen Bee.
Speaker 2Ooh, look at you, got all the power.
Terry Trosper's Suspicious Death
Speaker 1So then this is a few years later, all these cult rumors, you know, swirling. In May of 1991, nearly three years after Tate's death, tate's older sister, 27-year-old Terry Trosper, was found dead face down on a bed because of the cult. That's when Childress, like the people of Childress like it, hit them like a clap of thunder. They like hardcore panicked.
Speaker 1Terry, by all accounts, had been going through hard times, though she had separated from her husband. She gave custody of her four girls to her husband and then she just started running with like a party crowd.
Speaker 2The devil.
Speaker 1The devil, he was like a party crowd, the devil. The devil, he was in a party cult, her new boyfriend, ricky Bradford. He was an ex-convict and a close friend of old Frank Wilkes' son, darwin.
Speaker 2Oh, they were all in the same circle, here they come again.
Speaker 1Right, Both Darwin and Ricky had served time for aggravated assault and one night on the night of her death, Terry, Ricky, Bradford and Darwin had some friends were like drinking at the Wilkes' house, the one with the graffiti on it, you know, that says the devil's been or the devil's been.
Speaker 2I love.
Speaker 1Libby Right, I love Libby. And Frank Wilkes wasn't there. He was in jail for assaulting a police officer. Just to let you know, oh, he was busy. Daddy was busy in jail, it's his turn now. He was busy being a really great father and mentor.
Speaker 2He's like I, father, and mentor.
Speaker 1He's like I got an alibi. I was in jail. I assaulted that guy right over there, Safe. So Terry had been drinking heavily. Her blood alcohol level when they tested it was .23. More than twice the legal limit. Ricky Bradford stated that they went to bed in one of the small bedrooms and at one point he said he got up, terry was like staggering around the living room and then she collapsed. So he helped her back to bed. The next morning when he got up and he touched her, she was cold and stiff. Fun time, yeah, an autopsy. They did an autopsy. Look at that Determined that Terry had died by choking on her own vomit. Oh good Lord. Face down, though. But they found her face down on a mattress. Yeah.
Speaker 2I was like let me reiterate that, yeah, that's why I went wait, face down, though.
Speaker 1Childress police found no evidence of foul play and closed the case.
Speaker 2Okay, so I guess it doesn't really matter if you have an autopsy in this town or not.
Speaker 1But then allegations quickly started surfacing that Terry's death was linked to Tate's death.
Speaker 2In a cult.
Speaker 1Yeah, she never believed that Tate took his own life, said Lisa Barber, a courthouse secretary and longtime friend of Terry's, Right up to her death. She never accepted it. She was hell-bent on finding who killed her brother. She was hell-bent Hell-bent In the cult. In the cult She'd been in the hell.
Speaker 1Ricky bradford admitted to me that terry once told him tate had warned her to keep her daughters in the house because the cult was going to sacrifice one of them, but ricky scoffed. I've lived here all my life and I've never seen any kind of cult. You like how I slip into those voices? Huh, yeah, my whole life. Right, and like Frank, Wilkes gave a statement to the police that Ricky once boasted that he was the devil. But Ricky scoffed at that too. Oh God, he said, rolling his deep blue eyes I don't believe in no Satan. In fact, other members of the Bradford family said it was the wilkes brothers who were associated with devil worshiping. And he was like I'm an atheist, I don't believe in all that so I don't believe in either one I don't believe in either one.
Speaker 1So all of this, there was people in black capes and having their Ouija boards out and loading goats into their car.
Speaker 2Ouija boards and goats, not the goats.
Speaker 1They were in the graveyard trying to call up spirits. They need the goats so they can make candles later, Like it's hard to imagine capes and Ouija boards.
Speaker 2Capes, ouija boards and goats With all these like blue-collar beer-drinking good old boys. Well, you know, sheep go to heaven and goats go to hell. That's right I forgot all about that song. So it makes sense, goats, totally make sense.
Speaker 1Totes my goats Totes my goat. So all of these rumors about devil worshipping in this town were just made up bullshit. Like people who were scared, still something felt off about Terry Trosper's death. That's because she was found face down on a mattress but choked on her own vomit.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1No, she was the fourth of Jimmy Rowland's six children to die.
Speaker 2What in the?
Speaker 1actual One died in infancy, another in a car wreck at age four. Then Tate, now Terry, they're cursed, holly Right, jimmy and Brenda demanded an investigation. They were like something's going on, our children are dying.
Speaker 2Well, I mean, yeah, something's definitely up right there.
Speaker 1The former Childress County Sheriff, claude Lane, had stubbornly refused to investigate Tate's case, insisting it was a suicide, leading to predictable rumors that he too was in the cult and he was covering it up. This town's a little cuckoo.
Speaker 2It's just, you try to get out of it and it goes right back into the cult Cuckoo. It's just, you try to get out of it and it goes right back into the cold.
Speaker 1But after Sheriff Lane went to jail for dealing marijuana, the case was reopened by the new sheriff. He said I ain't drinking that Kool-Aid Right. Reese Bowen, a red-headed, straight-backed Childress native, and his young deputy, kevin Overstreet Both men re-interviewed witnesses. Overstreet went to Lockhart to double-check the story of the children's girls' dreams. Then, a few weeks after Terry's death, came yet another astonishing twist.
Speaker 2Darwin Wilkes attempted suicide by swallowing 25 to 30 Elavil pills a mild antidepressant.
Speaker 1Interesting he left a suicide note that read I know something that the cops don't know. I know who killed terry. I can't live anymore. Was it a confession? Or was he like saying he knew who murdered her? When he recovered he claimed he didn't remember writing the note and certainly didn't know who killed Terry Bruh.
Speaker 2Boy, these guys like to blame it on their drink and the pills, and the pills. Like I, was under the influence. I have no idea what you're talking about, and the sheriff.
Speaker 1he wanted Darwin to take a lie detector test. But Darwin Darwin, not Darwin Darwin.
Speaker 2Hello Darwin, hello Darwin, he left for Dallas, darwin to take a lie detector test.
Speaker 1But darlin darwin, not darlin darwin, hello darlin, hello darlin. He left for dallas. A couple miles north of childress, near curving dirt road intersecting two cotton fields, stands a drooping, wide-limbed horse apple tree with its largest branch nearly broken in half. It's the hanging tree, a landmark most residents know only by hearsay. They'd prefer not to go out there, if you know what I mean, but I'm sure teenagers are out there all the time and stuff, because teenagers aren't scared of shit, they'll just go out there.
Speaker 2They just go do dumb stuff.
Speaker 1But you know people say it's haunted. They hear voices out there. They just go do dumb stuff. But you know, people say it's haunted, they hear voices out there, things like that. For those and children who believed in the growing international satanic conspiracy, the news about tate and terry only confirmed their fears that the devil had come to town. Satan hunter hunters had been warning that deadly occult organizations were moving into America's heartland, luring youth with sex, drugs and heavy metal and fantasy games. Good old D&D Law enforcement agencies across the county were adding quote-unquote cult cops to their staff and cult awareness agencies warned that today's candle burning teenager could be tomorrow's baby killer.
Modern Day Witch Hunt Conclusion
Speaker 1Small town experts said we are particularly susceptible to cults looking for remote areas where activities could be concealed. It's no surprise then that the satanic, like panic, had overwhelmed childress, like it just took over. Everybody was like satan, let's go to church. The investigation into the deaths of tate, roland and terry trosper became the focus of the entire community. But for some town people the cult stories possessed a different threat entirely the corrosive power of gossip. They saw rational thinking consumed by fright apprehension and the sheer pleasure of swapping third-hand information over coffee. When these people looked back on these events. They didn't see the devil exposed. What they saw was a modern day witch hunt. So what do y'all think? Do you think it was a cult, a string of suicides or something else entirely? Like they never. Even though they looked into it, they never found anything they never did anything.
Speaker 1They never, yeah, come to any conclusion except oh well, they were both suicides, or she choked on her vomit or you know something like that. Whatever, yeah, like accidental death, suicide, whatever. But it always went back to the cult stuff. Yeah, like the devils in the town.
Speaker 2Well, my brain, my brain. Every time you say horse apple tree, I get an image of horse poop in my head. And then I'm over here the whole entire time thinking are you, are you going to the tree?
Speaker 1I'm like stop it, stop. I think of the tree Pay attention.
Speaker 1Stop it Every time I heard that I was like thinking of the tree in Game of Thrones the big tree, the big tree. I don't know if it's that spectacular or if it's surrounded by other trees, but it's now considered the hanging tree and people are warned not to go out there because that's where the Satanists go out and do their Ouija boarding and goat herding. I got to get these goats in my car. We got to go to the tree. The goats are like meh.
Speaker 2And fainting, and fainting, they bring them out to the tree and they just fall over. I'm like, not the goats, give them to me, I'll take them.
Speaker 1Poor goats got such a bad rep, but you know it was a cool little story about childress texas for all of our texas listeners. I hope you enjoyed it. And sorry I keep tripping over my words today. You're fine. I don't know what's wrong with me. I think I just said Childress too many times and every time I look at it it looks like Childress, yeah, and I'm like I want to say it, or Childress, and I'm like Childress, childress, yeah. But I mean, you know, let us know your thoughts, let us know what you think. Do you think it was a suicide, or was it the satanic panic For sure, or do you think it was actually the devil in Texas?
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, you can send it to steeped at holdmysweetteacom, or you can message us on social media. Yeah, facebook, instagram, tiktok. Comment on the episode in YouTube Yep, we answer everything.
Speaker 1We would love to have some interaction on our socials. That would be so great. Always We've had some yes, and we appreciate them all. We just want more yes.
Speaker 2We're greedy. We are greedy. Give us more Talk to us Right Now. D-m-s. Don't make us get our Ouija board out, just so we can have some conversation here.
Speaker 1I've got the goats in my car already. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2That's hilarious. Our theme music is by patty salzetta, I bet patty likes goats too.
Speaker 1Let us know, patty have you ever sang?
Speaker 2sheep go to heaven, goats go to hell. I mean, I've never heard her do that but I'm just just wondering. I'm sure she knows it, though. It's a fun good time. That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1So do all of those cool things and Hold my Sweet Tea is a drunken bee production and you guys stay safe out there and remember, just because we're dipping doesn't mean you can't keep sipping or cow tipping or cow tipping.
Speaker 2Bye. Bye, meh mean you can't keep sipping or cow tipping or cow tipping bye. Thank you, bye.