Along Came a Spyder

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Speaker 2 In 1955, a small silver sports car rolled out of a California garage and into American folklore. It was sleek, fast and dangerous.
A machine built for the racetrack.

Speaker 2 But within weeks, its young owner would be dead and the car itself would become infamous.

Speaker 2 What followed were decades of bizarre accidents, unexplained fatalities, and eerie coincidences, all linked to the same deadly machine.

Speaker 2 Some now claim the car was cursed, others insist the stories are nothing more than myth. In this episode, we examine the legend of James Dean's Porsche, Little Bastard.

Speaker 2 Few cultural icons have burned as brightly and then disappeared as quickly as James Dean.

Speaker 2 Today, nearly seven decades after his death, his name remains synonymous with cool rebellion, youthful swagger, and a charisma so powerful that it transcended the few short years he spent in the public eye.

Speaker 2 For many, he is still the face of 1950s counterculture, the brooding outsider with a cigarette in his mouth, hair windswept and eyes troubled by thoughts no one else could see.

Speaker 2 Dean's rise to fame was meteoric. After a string of television appearances in the early 1950s, he was catapulted to stardom with his breakthrough role in East of Eden.

Speaker 2 His performance immediately caught the attention of audiences and critics alike.

Speaker 2 But it was Rebel Without a Cause released later that same year that cemented his status as the voice of a disillusioned generation.

Speaker 2 He embodied the frustrations and anxieties of post-war American youth, kids who felt out of place in the rigid social expectations of the era.

Speaker 2 Despite his stardom, Dean's personal life remained grounded in a handful of obsessions. Acting, his close circle of friends, and cars.

Speaker 2 Fast cars.

Speaker 2 Racing had fascinated him since his teenage years, and as soon as Hollywood money began rolling in, he indulged that passion fully.

Speaker 2 He purchased motorcycles, sports cars and eventually a Porsche 356 Speedster which he raced competitively and successfully.

Speaker 2 By 1955 however Dean wanted something faster, something that could match his rapidly growing ambitions on the track.

Speaker 2 That opportunity came in the autumn of that year when he purchased a brand new Porsche 550 Spyder, a sleek, low-slung machine designed specifically for racing.

Speaker 2 Its aluminium frame, mid-engine layout and aerodynamic bodywork made it unlike anything else on American roads at that time.

Speaker 2 Dean nicknamed it Little Bastard.

Speaker 2 A title reportedly inspired either by his own mischievous personality, the car's difficult handling characteristics, or as a tongue-in-cheek nod to his publicists' frustrations with him.

Speaker 2 The name, whatever its origin, would become forever tied to the tragedies that followed.

Speaker 2 The 550 Spyder wasn't just fast, it was aggressive.

Speaker 2 Its engine roared with a distinctive rasp and its lightweight construction made it nimble yet notoriously unforgiving.

Speaker 2 Fellow racer and Hollywood stuntman Bill Hickman vividly recalled warning Dean to be careful with the new machine. Even experienced drivers found the 550 temperamental.

Speaker 2 Dean, however, loved the danger.

Speaker 2 Shortly after purchasing the car, he had it customised by George Barris, the legendary Hollywood car designer known for crafting unique and iconic vehicles.

Speaker 2 The spider was painted silver and detailed with red leather seats. The number 130 was stenciled across its rear bonnet and the name Little Bastard painted on the tail end.

Speaker 2 Dean intended to race it at the upcoming Salinas Road Races on the 1st and 2nd of October that year.

Speaker 2 In the days leading up to the event, several strange incidents reportedly occurred.

Speaker 2 Actor Alec Guinness, best known for his later role as Obi-Wan Kenobi, claimed to have encountered Dean outside a restaurant in Los Angeles.

Speaker 2 According to his diary, Guinness told Dean the car looked sinister and felt an overwhelming sense of dread.

Speaker 2 He allegedly warned the young actor that if he got in that car, he would be found dead in it within a week.

Speaker 2 It was a remark Guinness later said he made without understanding why, an instinctive reaction that felt more like foreboding than simple caution.

Speaker 2 Whether this encounter happened exactly as remembered remains debated, but it became one of the earliest threads in what would later be described as the car's curse.

Speaker 2 Dean brushed off the warning. He had a new car, a race to prepare for, and a future he believed would stretch far ahead of him.

Speaker 2 But the spider, little bastard, would take him to Salinas in a way no one expected.

Speaker 2 And it was there on that fateful autumn day that the legend of the cursed car truly began.

Speaker 2 On the morning of the 30th of September 1955, James Dean prepared for what was meant to be a simple journey north, a drive to Salinas for the weekend's races.

Speaker 2 He had intended to tow the Porsche on a trailer behind his Ford station wagon, as he typically did for racing events.

Speaker 2 But as the day progressed, his plans shifted.

Speaker 2 The Porsche's engine was still being fine-tuned by his mechanic, Wolf Wutrech, a skilled German technician who had worked for Porsche's factory racing program.

Speaker 2 Wutrich suggested they should drive the spider to Salinas instead of towing it. Doing so would allow the engine to break in properly before the competition.
Dean agreed.

Speaker 2 It was a small decision, one that seemed practical at the time, but it would become the fulcrum on which history turned.

Speaker 2 Early that afternoon, Accompanied by Wutrich, Dean set off from Competition Motors in Hollywood.

Speaker 2 Following behind in the tow vehicle were Bill Hickman and photographer Sanford Roth, who planned to document Dean's preparations for an upcoming magazine article.

Speaker 2 The small convoy wound its way through Los Angeles traffic before merging onto Highway 99 and then heading towards Bakersfield.

Speaker 2 By all accounts, Dean was in good spirits. Roth later recalled that the actor appeared energetic, joking with Wutrich and discussing upcoming roles.

Speaker 2 The Porsche was performing beautifully, its engine crisp, its handling responsive.

Speaker 2 Dean was pleased. He had entered a period of professional success, his star was rising rapidly, and racing, his greatest passion, felt like a grounding force in that whirlwind of fame.

Speaker 2 Shortly after 3pm, the group stopped for fuel.

Speaker 2 Witnesses noted Dean's friendly demeanor, even as some recognised him and asked for photographs. He obliged.

Speaker 2 One of the last known images of him alive shows him leaning casually against the spider, unaware of the tragic significance the photograph would later hold.

Speaker 2 By late afternoon, they were approaching the small farming town of Sholam.

Speaker 2 The sun was lower in the sky and shadows were beginning to lengthen across the road.

Speaker 2 The route, US Highway 466, cut through long stretches of open land, undulating gently before straightening into a long fast run, leading towards the junction with Route 41.

Speaker 2 Travelling in the opposite direction was a 23-year-old college student named Donald Turnipseed, driving a 1950 Ford Tudor coupe.

Speaker 2 He was heading east, planning to turn left across the highway to join Route 41.

Speaker 2 His view of the oncoming westbound lane was partially obscured by the glare of the late afternoon sun.

Speaker 2 At approximately 5.45pm, turnipseed began his turn.

Speaker 2 Dean, travelling west in the Porsche at highway speed, had almost no time to react.

Speaker 2 Witnesses later said the two vehicles converged so quickly that neither driver had a meaningful chance to avoid the collision.

Speaker 2 Dean shouted something to Wutrek, reportedly, he's got to stop, he'll see us.

Speaker 2 But the warning came too late.

Speaker 2 The Ford cut across the spider's path. The Porsche left front of Turnipseed's car at a near head-on angle.

Speaker 2 The spider was so light and the Ford so heavy by comparison that the sports car crumpled instantly.

Speaker 2 The impact hurled Wutrek from the passenger seat and catapulted the spider off the road, where it spun and came to rest in a twisted heap of metal and dust.

Speaker 2 Dean was trapped inside, gravely injured.

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Speaker 2 Hickman and Roth arrive moments later.

Speaker 2 In the chaos of the scene, Hickman rushed to the wreckage and attempted to free Dean, who was still breathing but unresponsive. The Porsche's frame had collapsed around him.

Speaker 2 Emergency services were summoned, but rural California in the 1950s was not equipped for rapid response.

Speaker 2 Dean was finally pulled from the wreck and placed into an ambulance bound for Paso Robles War Memorial Hospital. He was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.

Speaker 2 Wutherich survived, though badly injured. Turnipseed, who had walked away with minor cuts, was left traumatised for the rest of his life.

Speaker 2 He never gave a formal interview about the crash, choosing instead to retreat from public attention.

Speaker 2 For decades he avoided media approaches, carrying with him the unimaginable burden of having been the other driver in one of the most infamous accidents in American history.

Speaker 2 News of Dean's death spread rapidly.

Speaker 2 Within hours, radio broadcasts announced the tragedy and by morning, newspaper headlines around the world declared the young star's life cut short at the age of 24.

Speaker 2 Fans gathered outside cinemas and studios. Vigils were held in towns and on campuses across the United States.
Hollywood mourned, stunned by the sudden loss of its brightest rising star.

Speaker 2 Dean's death alone was enough to solidify the tragic mystique surrounding him, but the story did not end with the crash. In fact, the legend was only just beginning.

Speaker 2 As the wrecked Porsche was hauled away from the scene, rumours began to stir. Whispers that something was wrong with the car.
That it had always carried an aura of danger.

Speaker 2 That the vehicle itself, now a mangled ruin, was about to begin a second life, as one of the most cursed objects in automotive history.

Speaker 2 In the months that followed James Dean's fatal crash, the wreckage of his Porsche spider was transported to a secure yard where it remained under under a police guard during the investigation.

Speaker 2 When officers had completed their work and the vehicle was released, the mangled steel was purchased by a man named George Barris, a Hollywood car builder already well known for designing custom vehicles for film and television.

Speaker 2 Barris had not bought the car out of morbid fascination nor as a collector's prize.

Speaker 2 His intention was simply to strip the wreck for salvageable parts and potentially display the remains for educational talks on road safety.

Speaker 2 But the moment he took possession of the twisted chassis, a string of misfortunes began to follow him. Barris would later become one of the strongest voices behind the notion that the car was cursed.

Speaker 2 Transporting the remains for the first time, Barris hired a flatbed truck to move the crumpled portion to his workshop.

Speaker 2 As the vehicle was being unloaded, the spider slipped from the rig and fell onto a mechanic standing below. The man's legs were crushed and he was taken to hospital with severe injuries.

Speaker 2 Barris noted that although accidents in a workshop were not unheard of, the timing within minutes of Little Bastard's arrival deeply unsettled him.

Speaker 2 He then decided to sell several components of the car to reputable racers, who believed Dean's high-performance parts might enhance their own vehicles.

Speaker 2 Two of those buyers, Troy McHenry and William Esgrid, fitted parts of the Spider's engine into their own race cars and within days, both men suffered catastrophic crashes.

Speaker 2 McHenry was killed instantly when his car spun out of control and struck a tree during a race at Pomona. Esgrid, who had purchased the transmission and other mechanical components, survived.

Speaker 2 but sustained grave injuries after his car locked up mid-turn and rolled multiple times across the track.

Speaker 2 Word of the incident spread quickly through the racing community, and rumours began circulating that the parts harvested from Dean's Porsche carried a malign influence.

Speaker 2 Barris himself seemed both troubled and fascinated by the growing pattern. The more he tried to store, sell or transport the remains, the more destructive the car appeared to become.

Speaker 2 Not long after, Barris loaned the remaining wreckage to the California Highway Patrol for a travelling road safety exhibition. But shortly after being placed on display, disaster struck again.

Speaker 2 A fire broke out in the warehouse where the spider was being stored overnight. The blaze spread rapidly, destroying nearly everything inside, except Dean's Porsche.

Speaker 2 When investigators examined the wreckage, they found that Little Bastard's twisted shell had suffered remarkably little damage, despite the intensity of the flames around it.

Speaker 2 By this stage, Barris had begun referring to the car, privately at least, as a curse on wheels.

Speaker 2 Yet he continued allowing the wreckage to be displayed, hoping that the educational value of the exhibit might outweigh the unnerving incidents that followed it.

Speaker 2 The next major event occurred whilst the car was being transported to a high school for a safety demonstration.

Speaker 2 The truck carrying the remains skidded violently on the motorway, flipping and throwing the spider's carcass off the bed of the rig.

Speaker 2 The driver was badly injured, and although the cause of the accident was officially attributed to tyre failure, the wreck's reputation continued to darken.

Speaker 2 Even when standing still the car seemed to caught disaster. On one occasion a young boy reportedly climbed onto the wreck out of curiosity.

Speaker 2 Moments later he slipped and injured his arm badly enough to require hospital treatment.

Speaker 2 Another instance saw a security guard break his hip after tripping near the exhibit, an incident he later attributed to feeling suddenly faint while standing beside the Porsche.

Speaker 2 As time went on, the growing list of accidents surrounding the wreck prompted deeper investigation, including from skeptics.

Speaker 2 Some suggested that confirmation bias was to blame. Because the car was already linked to a famous tragedy, people were more inclined to attribute unrelated mishaps to its presence.

Speaker 2 Others argued that the wreckage was simply unstable and dangerous, with sharp edges, loose components and a weakened frame that could shift unpredictably.

Speaker 2 Yet even these rational explanations struggled to justify what happened next.

Speaker 2 In the spring of 1959, the remains of Little Bastard were being transported once again, this time by rail.

Speaker 2 Upon reaching the destination, it was discovered that the freight car containing the Porsche had been forcibly opened.

Speaker 2 The crew assumed it was an attempted theft until they discovered that the wreck was missing entirely.

Speaker 2 No torch cutting equipment had been used, no tracks or tyre marks were found at the site, and no scrap dealer in the region reported receiving anything resembling the Porsche's remains.

Speaker 2 The entire chassis had seemingly disappeared. To this day, its whereabouts remain unknown.

Speaker 2 Following the disappearance, the cursed narrative only intensified.

Speaker 2 Reporters revisited the numerous injuries and fatalities connected to the wreck.

Speaker 2 Paranormal enthusiasts drew comparisons to other cursed objects, items believed to carry residual energy from violent or tragic events.

Speaker 2 Dean's status as a cultural icon only amplified the story, giving the car an almost mythical quality.

Speaker 2 Even Barris, a seasoned showman, admitted that the string of disasters had made him reluctant to go go anywhere near what remained of the spider.

Speaker 2 Yet the supposed curse did not end with the car's physical remnants.

Speaker 2 Some enthusiasts pointed to bizarre coincidences surrounding the people involved with the original crash.

Speaker 2 For instance, the doctor who attempted to save Dean's life at the scene was allegedly involved in a fatal car accident himself later that year.

Speaker 2 Donald Turnipseed, the man who collided with Dean, withdrew almost entirely from public attention and struggled with recurring nightmares and anxiety for much of his life.

Speaker 2 Of course, none of this proves anything, but when woven into the narrative, each detail contributed to the growing aura of doom surrounding Little Bastard.

Speaker 2 By the late 20th century, the curse had become a staple of Hollywood folklore. a tale told with equal parts fascination and dread.

Speaker 2 Whether or not the events were truly connected, they formed a web of misfortune that spanned years and left a trail of pain, injury and mystery in its wake.

Speaker 2 And all of it traced back to one car, one crash, one moment in time that claimed the life of a rising star and created one of the most enduring legends in history.

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Speaker 2 With the curse incidents catalogued, the obvious question remains, what exactly was going on?

Speaker 2 Were these tragedies and mishaps genuinely linked to the twisted remains of James Dean's Porsche 550 spider?

Speaker 2 Or had a web of half-truths, exaggerations and outright fabrications been woven so effectively that it became almost impossible to separate fact from folklore?

Speaker 2 From the outset, skeptics have maintained that the so-called curse is nothing more than a myth.

Speaker 2 a dramatic narrative built upon coincidence, mechanical failure, and the tragic aura that surrounds Dean himself.

Speaker 2 And in many ways, this perspective deserves fair consideration.

Speaker 2 One of the most widely cited alternative explanations revolves around the basic physics of the 550 Spyder.

Speaker 2 Porsche's lightweight aluminium bodywork, tight wheelbase and low profile made the car both agile and unforgiving.

Speaker 2 Even for skilled drivers, the early spiders were notoriously difficult to control at high speed, especially on uneven or poorly maintained roads.

Speaker 2 Contemporary reviewers described the 550 as twitchy with a tendency to break traction abruptly.

Speaker 2 This was not a vehicle that tolerated errors, even small ones.

Speaker 2 It is entirely feasible then that those who later used salvage components from Dean's wreck may simply have taken on those same inherent risks.

Speaker 2 Another layer of skepticism lies in the storytelling itself.

Speaker 2 Many researchers have noted that the man most responsible for popularizing the curse narrative was George Barris himself, a talented showman and self-promoter who understood, perhaps better than anyone, the marketing potential of a good creepy story.

Speaker 2 Barris openly admitted that he embellished tales surrounding the wreck, often leaning into the supernatural because it kept the car and James Dean's legend firmly in the public eye.

Speaker 2 Some incidents attributed to the curse stem entirely from Barris' press releases, magazine interviews and promotional appearances during the 1960s and 70s.

Speaker 2 As a result, the distinction between genuine eyewitness accounts and manufactured drama became increasingly blurred over time.

Speaker 2 This raises an important point.

Speaker 2 If Barris did exaggerate elements of the story or invent some incidents outright, how much of the curse can we reliably trace back to verifiable sources?

Speaker 2 Historians who have attempted to cross-reference the timeline of supposed accidents often encounter discrepancies. Dates conflict.
Names vanish from public records.

Speaker 2 Some mechanical failures attributed to parts of the spider cannot be conclusively linked to Dean's car in the first place.

Speaker 2 The deeper one digs, the more the mythology begins to fray.

Speaker 2 Yet, despite these contradictions, something about the legend persists.

Speaker 2 Part of the enduring fascination lies in the aura surrounding James Dean himself.

Speaker 2 His sudden death at 24 at the height of his fame created a powerful cultural archetype. the talented rebel taken too soon.

Speaker 2 Over the decades, others who met met similarly tragic fates

Speaker 2 have all accrued their own mythology.

Speaker 2 Human beings are drawn to stories that feel bigger than one person's life.

Speaker 2 In Dean's case, the violent collision in Sholam became a symbolic endpoint to an unfinished career, and the wrecked Porsche became the physical relic that embodied that abrupt ending.

Speaker 2 When the remains of the car were later involved in mishaps and injuries, whether real or exaggerated, the narrative almost wrote itself.

Speaker 2 There is also an element of survivor psychology to consider.

Speaker 2 For those who interacted with the spider after the crash, mechanics, collectors, showmen and spectators, any unsettling event, no matter how ordinary, could take on amplified meaning.

Speaker 2 A slip, a fall or a mechanical fault suddenly felt charged with significance.

Speaker 2 In this way, the curse became self-reinforcing. Once the idea took root, people began to interpret misfortune through a supernatural lens.

Speaker 2 What in isolation would be dismissed as bad luck now appeared connected to the lingering presence of the smashed aluminium shell.

Speaker 2 But the legend of the spider does not rest solely on speculation and psychological framing.

Speaker 2 There is the unresolved question of the wreck's final whereabouts. After its final verified exhibition in the late 1950s, the remains of Little Bastard effectively disappeared.

Speaker 2 Numerous rumors circulate that the car was stolen from a locked trailer, that it was quietly taken overseas, that the remnants were scrapped and buried, that a private collector acquired them and continues to hide the wreck to this day.

Speaker 2 None of these theories have ever been proven. and the disappearance itself has become part of the mythos.

Speaker 2 When an object vanishes, it becomes easier for the imagination to fill the void. Meanwhile, cultural momentum continues to build with each passing decade.

Speaker 2 The curse has been referenced in documentaries, dramatizations and countless articles.

Speaker 2 Motor historians, paranormal enthusiasts and pop culture academics have all contributed to the growing mosaic.

Speaker 2 Museums and collectors have displayed replicas and tribute pieces, sometimes blurring the lines between authentic relics and artifacts created purely to capitalize on the story.

Speaker 2 Another factor worth considering is the broader tradition of cursed or ill-fated objects in folklore.

Speaker 2 From the Hope Diamond to Ertzy the Iceman's belongings, humanity has long assigned malevolent qualities to items linked to tragedy. Sometimes this stems from superstition.

Speaker 2 Other times it serves as a way of explaining events that feel random, senseless or cruel.

Speaker 2 The death of James Dean certainly fits into the latter category.

Speaker 2 For his fans and for the broader public, attributing ongoing misfortune to the remains of his car have offered a way to externalise the pain of his loss, transforming grief into a narrative structure that felt easier to grasp.

Speaker 2 Even so, not everyone agrees that the curse can be explained away so neatly.

Speaker 2 Some automotive historians argue that too many of the mishaps involving Dean's car or alleged parts of it feel statistically improbable.

Speaker 2 Two serious racing accidents linked to salvage components. A fatality involving Barris's promotional showpiece.

Speaker 2 A near-fatal incident involving a mechanic who had never previously suffered workplace injuries.

Speaker 2 And of course, the disappearance of the car itself during transport, an episode that conveniently removed any remaining physical evidence.

Speaker 2 To this group of researchers, the pattern is too uncanny to dismiss entirely.

Speaker 2 They also note that many of the details surrounding the spider, including its disassembly, its transport between exhibitions and the accidents involving other drivers, were documented contemporaneously.

Speaker 2 Even if Barris did exaggerate aspects of the story later on, he did not invent every element from nothing.

Speaker 2 The car was real, the crash was real, the injuries suffered by McHenry and Eskrid were real, the fire and the collapsed display stand were real.

Speaker 2 And facts, when framed compellingly enough, can often blur into legend.

Speaker 2 There are even those who entertain more esoteric explanations.

Speaker 2 suggestions that an object involved in such a violent end can retain a kind of energetic imprint, a residual echo of trauma.

Speaker 2 While such ideas sit firmly outside the realm of science, they persist in paranormal discussion forums, spiritualist circles, and corners of folklore where stories of haunted vehicles, aircraft wreckage and railway disasters circulate freely.

Speaker 2 Though not evidence, these perspectives illustrate the human tendency to assign meaning to death, even in the absence of logic.

Speaker 2 Ultimately, the truth of the matter may never be known. The wreck of Little Bastard remains missing, perhaps destroyed, perhaps hidden, perhaps simply lost to time.

Speaker 2 Without it, researchers can only work from incomplete records, aging testimonies, and the enduring mystique of James Dean himself.

Speaker 2 What began as a tragic road accident has, over 70 years, evolved into a legend that refuses to fade.

Speaker 2 Whether the curse was real, imagined or carefully cultivated, its staying power is undeniable. Every generation rediscovers the story, explores its contradictions and debates its plausibility.

Speaker 2 Some view it as a cautionary tale. Others see it as an intriguing puzzle from Hollywood's golden age.
But for many, the fascination lies in the unanswered questions.

Speaker 2 a lingering sense that perhaps there was something unusual about that small silver Porsche. something that defied the ordinary and slipped into the realm of the uncanny.

Speaker 2 Whatever the case, the legend of James Dean's car endures, gripping the imagination of those who hear it and inviting each listener to draw their own conclusions.

Speaker 2 And until the final resting place of Little Bastard is found, if it ever is, the story will continue to exist in that strange, compelling space between tragedy and myth.

Speaker 2 In closing, we leave you with the words of the eagles.

Speaker 2 Little James Dean up on the screen, wondering who he might be.

Speaker 2 Along came a spider, picked up a rider, took him down the road to eternity.

Speaker 2 James Dean, James Dean, you bought it, sight unseen.

Speaker 2 You are too fast to live, too young to die.

Speaker 2 Bye-bye.

Speaker 2 Bedtime is Marius.