The Donner Party: What Really Happened?
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 22 мар 2019
- Who's hungry... for historical knowledge?
Thank you Patron deathlings, who make this all possible.
/ thegooddeath
The Co-op Funeral Home of People’s Memorial
funerals.coop/
Find our podcast on iTunes: apple.co/2yK6c6G
Find our podcast on Spotify: spoti.fi/2QZEVEM
Find our podcast on Google Play: bit.ly/2AdEvoj
My two books!: www.caitlindoughty.com
**WHERE ELSE YOU CAN FIND ME**
Website: www.orderofthegooddeath.com
Twitter: / thegooddeath
Facebook: ow.ly/Zz8PW
Instagram: / thegooddeath
**CREDITS**
Mortician: Caitlin Doughty
Producer & Writer: Louise Hung (@LouiseHung1)
Editor & Graphics: Landis Blair (@landisblair)
This video was largely informed by Daniel James Brown's excellent book, "The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride". Thank you for the inspiration, Mr. Brown!
**SELECTED ADDITIONAL READING**
"7 surprising facts about cannibalism"
www.vox.com/2015/2/17/8052239...
"'thus are our bodies, thus was our custom':
mortuary cannibalism in an Amazonian society"
lauer.sdsu.edu/courses/442-sp...
"There's More to Cannibalism Than Just People Eating People"
people.howstuffworks.com/diff...
"How the Pineapple Express Killed the Donner Party"
io9.gizmodo.com/how-the-pinea...
"Mmmm, Brains: Everything You Wanted to Know About Cannibalism But Were Afraid to Ask"
mentalfloss.com/article/31508/...
"Your wife makes great soup"
"Yea, but I'll miss her"
Hahahahha
Heh... Noice!
Lololol🤣
Lol
#CannibalComdey
When I was 14, my sister, dad and I, got stuck on top of Donner pass while driving to Susanville. The whole freeway was stopped, we couldn’t move, and there were people outside of their cars playing in the snow with their kids... MY dad took it upon himself to tell us this sweet story while we were stuck in the snowstorm for 4 hours. 🙂🙃
*Carson City! Not Susanville*
mndlgh Why are all dad’s like that tho?
Savannah Nason 😂 isn’t that the truth.
It's our duty lol
I CACKLED! at this!!! 🤣🤣🤣 we were driving through when I was 16, so I was aware of the Donner party. Same thing happened, my dad thought to bring up this story on our beautiful drive... then it turned into who in the family would have to go first (as a joke obviously.. he's not actually crazy! Lol)
Taylor Reiser our dad’s sound like they’d get along great! 😂
I love how she handles these topics. She makes jokes throughout it and keeps it funny but she also takes the time to look at it from a serious perspective and teaches the real history and psychology behind it
It's that her jokes aren't at the expense of the victims, that I love. She's making it funny but without lessening what everyone went through.
Interesting lady that popped up on feed. Subscribed and hope to see more. Great history of the Donner party !
@@oldtimer427you'll love the rest of her videos, she is very consistent with quality
This was a sad story until we got to Nancy. Young child, cold and starving, eating her own mother but not knowing bc at least the adults around her had that kind of courtesy. But finding out later....I can't imagine. I really got emotional then, and when seeing the large rock memorial, it broke me. I really appreciate your videos on these subjects bc you understand where the humor should be placed and when we should be respectful.
That's almost Hannibal Lecter's origin story, soldiers fed him his own sister
This might be messed up but I would gladly give my flesh/body/meat so my child could live. It would be an honor to feed my precious little one one last time 😢😢
I also thought that. Under such horrible circumstances I too would want my flesh to still nourish my living child.
I know that the Party at least had the courtesy (at least in the beginning) to make sure that no one ate the flesh of a relative
@@dianeaishamonday9125I think that is sooo much a thing of perspective. As a mother? 100%. Do I rationally understand my mothers feels the same about me and would want me too? Yes? As a daughter? No way. I don't think I could psychologically survive eating my own mother, at that point the outlook of the life I might survive to is so bleak I would think I would rather die.
But of course all that is speculation with my filled fridge 10 feet away. We never know how we would feel. I just think it's interesting how fundamentally different the thought of being eaten/vs eating is for me. It's easier to sacrifice and say of course, you have to survive! But simultaneously what a burden that survival would be
Someone get this woman a netflix show
Yes!!!
Yes!!!
Why? So we can have to pay to see her?
Dammit I'm watching this at night and in night mode and your profile pic looked like a shadow of something on my screen 😅😅
No, they lose creative control, just look at dr. Pimple Popper. I stopped watching her. Don't need each person's life story, only how they received whatever is wrong with them. It totally ruins the show they set out to build. So disappointed
I'm an American history teacher. My class recently finished the westward expansion unit. I'll show them your video during our enrichment period next week. The kids will love your mix of comedy and historical accuracy. Well done, lady!
Id love to be in your class!
Thank you! Need more teachers like you.
I'm happy you look at your videos before showint them to your students because one of my teachers just shows us useless docs and they're like 3 hour long
Joy T. Where were you when I was in school
Joy T. are you willing to come to chile to be my teacher 😔👉🏻👈🏻 we need more teachers like you here
i was listening to LPOTL's coverage of this story, and what john stark, an unpaid rescuer in the last group, did actually made me cry. he saved 9 people when the other two (paid) people with him just wanted to take one child each and leave the rest to die.
he picked up a couple of the kids, moved them down the trail, went back for more, and did this over and over and over and didn't stop, rest, or eat until they were all safe and out of the snow. stark and the 9 people he rescued all made it back alive.
Stories like this, even in such tragedy, always restore my belief that humanity is good.
It wasn’t John Stark, it was John Snow.
@@colinyandon6137 it was john schull stark. john snow was an english physician, unless you mean jon snow, the GOT character.
OMG I read about this today too and it also made me cry and cry. What a man. What a truly compassionate, kind-hearted, courageous, self-sacrificing example of humanity. I'm so glad I learned about that little piece of beauty amid such an atrocious, nightmare of a real life event. It was truly moving.
It makes a ton of sense that they would have resorted to cannibalism so quickly if they thought the people dying had starved to death rather than died from the cold. That would light a fire under anyone's behind if they have genuine fear that they're going to be next if they don't find something to eat *right now.*
I clicked "save" so I could add this video to my "Watch Later" playlist.
RUclips saved the video to my
"Cooking" playlist 😬
dear god no why
LMFAO NO💀💀
Get some Chianti and fava beans..
🤣
More like the dahmer party
Thank you for this, I just started laughing so hard
"If you're starving and you know it, eat your friends" 👏👏
If you're starving and you know it, eat your friends " 👏👏
This is most definitely my favourite comment 😂
If you’re starving and you know it,
And you really wanna show it...
💀
😂😂😂😂👏👏👏👏👏😂😂😂👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
If your starving and you know it Wtf and here goes it if your starving and you it eat your friends!!!!😲
....and your life will surely show it , if your starving and you know it eat your friends!!!!🍔
You definitely don't know how you'll react to a situation until you're in it. My sister was fiercely judgemental of women who got abortions and women who had sex before marriage in general. And then she got pregnant at the age of 17 and suddenly her view on these things changed verry quickly
Edit: just to clarify, she didn't actually end up being pregnant (faulty pregnancy test) but the lesson she learned certainly stuck
No offense intended here, but I often wish unplanned pregnancy on people like your sister (not your sister per say). Unfortunately I reserve some of my most scathing dislike for people who are self righteous on a subject ONLY because they feel safe from ever having to suffer from its effects. I am glad to hear that she came to her senses, though.
@@victoriadiesattheend.8478 AKA the Republican party
@@antony1397 killing your child isn't the best way to solve that problem
@@victoriadiesattheend.8478 I feel you. Maybe then they won’t be so judgy. But there are still plenty of prolife women that still think they’re above other women getting abortions… even tho they’re also getting an abortion.
Exactly. It’s easy to say or judge until you are in those shoes.
Thank you for discussing the Donner Party. It's a compelling story to actually read, and goes far beyond the cannibalism parts. Most intriguing of all the emigrants is Tamsen Eustis Donner. Simply an amazing gal, educated, a herbalist, a woman who'd already suffered personal loss, an interesting letter-writer. She kept a journal--which has never been found. When you read about Tamsen--who warned George: Let's don't take that shortcut--you have to admire everything about her. For instance, she sent her children ahead with one of the rescue parties while she stayed back at that grisly campsite to care for her mortally wounded husband, George. There are many good books--perhaps none as well written as Smoke Gets in Your Eyes--but the story itself is simply unforgettable.
What a shame her journal disapeared.
You must read The Mothers by Vardis Fisher. The children survived because the mothers kept them alive
The Indifferent Stars Above is another great book about the Donner party.
@@daniellebrothers3688 oh gosh, this just made me so emotional 😢 brave women. I'd give my life over and over again for my babies
Death Mama has uploaded, her children are fed
- chipped stars - >> Lol, that would be like a bird...wait...
Disturbingly accurate😂👀
Yet they crave MOAR
@@mik-exe- they hunger
@@mik-exe- for DEATH
Patrick Dolan: “Lets draw straws to see who gets eaten!”
Patrick Dolan approximately 3 minutes later: “lol jk dudes that was a v crazy idea right?”
HAHAHAHA!
draws straws..PD: "Well isn't this ironic? Its like rain on your wedding day."
😂😂😂
"Ummm.... do over. Best of two outta three?"
Everyone EXCEPT Patrick Dolan---No backsies!!! 🙄
Yes. I knew. But I am a native Californian. (born here, not First Nation) Elitha Donner is buried about 2 miles down the street from my house. I travel 80 regularly and have seen snow depths similar to what the Donner Party experienced. That fact never fails to cross my mind. Even in the summer I think how they didn’t have a lovely highway to cross the Sierras.
Elitha was a teacher here and now has a school named for her.
Miwok native here First Nations are Canadian
I had a good friend named Rick Donner. We were radio DJ's at a station in Texas in the 1960's. His eponymous ancestor survived the disaster and opened a popular _restaurant_ in San Francisco.
Eating establishments named after the Donner party? Welcome to McDonners, you want fries with him?
I just opened my casket and climbed right in after this comment. 💀☠⚰🤣
😄😆😆😅😅
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
This comment deserves 1000 likes, lmao
Don't forget the Frosty
Years ago I worked with a Donner family member. She said to me, “Well, if you can’t beat em, eat em.” We all laughed.... I never forgot.
Can you imagine having that as your family legacy, you'd have to have a sense of humor about it or it could really bum you out
@@crazyredheadgrl Could be worse, I'm related to several members of the SS Tottenkampfverbande and the SD.
@@johnathanblackwell9960 oh no!!! Yes it could be.
Johnathan Blackwell I’m so sorry if I sound ignorant, but could you explain to me what that is?
@@heysaucemikehere1804 Tottenkampfverbande were the nazi concentration camp guards, the SD was the SS equivalent of the Abwher or german intelligence agency.
As some who legit often struggle to just get out of the bed some mornings, I can't even begin to appreciate how difficult it would have been just to survive, let alone attempt to keep trudging on, or even just digging out the snow.
I have been to Donner Pass and it is a quite an experience. You can feel the spirits of the ones who lived and died there. The day we were there a light mist was in the air and it was cloudy. It was in the spring/summer, but you could feel the hopeless of the people just the same.
I felt how haunted it is.
I’m cool with people eating my dead body. hope I’m tasty, been self marinating In garlic dipping sauce for years lol
Harley Kelevra if I died of anything that isn’t murder I’d wouldn’t mind letting people live by eating me
I seriously told my family to eat me when I die. They were grossed out 😂😂😂
Bbq sauce here.
Mmmmmmm garlic !
🤣🤣🤣🤣
The people who are like "ew, I would NEVER resort to cannibalism" are probably the people who would resort to it first.
They would be those people beating others to death with the nearest heavy object. Or riling the group up to do crazy things in an effort to survive, then die anyway. It's kind of funny.
Why?
They would be the ones we ate.
I couldn't resort to cannibalism. I'd be the one who tells them look, just kill me quickly and tell people I was killed by an animal or something. I wouldn't mind dying to make sure my loved ones survived
Nah more like, time to commit seppuku man I’m out
i love that you actually went into a bit of detail about the various kinds of cannibalism. i've been fascinated by mortuary cannibalism ever since i took a course on death and burial in college, and nobody ever talks about it. they'll even conflate pathological and survival cannibalism, it's bad. anyway awesome video, thanks!
Just reading on Wikipedia, I learned that it actually got even worse than you mentioned here... it went from eating the dead to certain men who killed the guides with them, then soon killing a guide who had volunteered to return with the rescue party. These men did enjoy human flesh, and wanted more. Back in the valley, these not-so-weak men demanded a still-living baby and toddler, and took them from their weakened mother to kill and eat them. Meanwhile, the lake was full of fish that no one thought to catch... Really, once cannibalism started, thoughts went to consuming human flesh before even considering what else naturally around them could be eaten. Those men completely abandoned any thought of protecting the children and preyed on them.
Early Christians had to defend their practice of consuming the body and blood of Christ symbolically. They were often rumored to be cannibals because of this, which probably supported their persecution.
Came back to watch this again. "Donner Camp: Picnic Area" Just now got this, no clue how I missed it before. Thanks for making such great, educational content.
If I was with a stranded group and I was dying, I’d totally be fine with the rest of the group eating my body to survive after I died. I mean, would I rather have them leave me for bugs and wildlife to decompose or would it be better for them to use my nutritious organs to stay alive possibly in time to be rescued. I’m dead, doesn’t change anything for me!
But would you eat someone? Maybe if they gave consent before passing because they knew they were near the end? I don't think I couldn't handle carving up a travel companion. It would already have to be prepared. Heck I couldn't even slaughter animal. Then again, I dont know what my mind would be like in survival mode.
Burtasaurus Rex If you were gonna starve...It’d be horrifying but it’s better than death. We show the dead respect of course but not at the expense of the living.
Burtasaurus Rex I’d definitely need to hear them say that they were okay with being eaten. I feel like it would be hard to butcher them, I agree.
@@ButterflyGhostBFG well it depends. Again, I don't know the impact panic, fear, and starvation would have on my mental faculties. I do know I'd hate the idea of killing and butchering someone more than just eating them if that makes sense? Theres that level of seperation and delusion I could indulge in. That's why I love videos like this. It really makes you think.
Emily Garcia agree
“Would you eat a person?”
I’m not really in the *mood* for person... how about pancakes?
we can make braincakes!.... because eh, yes,..eh,.. sorry, we are right out of flower!
@Night Gardennone of them knew the lands and a lot of them were immigrants from the old world who never really experienced North American wilderness. The natives seemingly knew what they were doing but they couldn't communicate, and they ended up murdering them so yeah... And I guess when you're starving and cannibalism starts looking like a reasonable idea, the decision to eat the readily available dead becomes easier the further along they go
sourgreendolly ...... you missed the perfect opportunity to say “handcakes” and I’m very mad.
...People Pancakes.
Maybe a youngish raw vegan who only ate organic food.
I didn't know anything about the Donner party other than the rumors of cannibalism, because I didn't go to school in CA. But I read _Ordeal By Hunger_ and that's when I found out their situation was much worse than people talk about. For one, they were already starving when they stopped and made camp, having lost most of their animals and supplies (and water) crossing the desert. The book is just one long, detailed account of desperate day after desperate day. However, there was one family that survived and never resorted to cannibalism.
Dear Caitlin, I loved this video! I grew up in Northern California about an hour from Donner Lake, and lived in the area for a total of 30 years. It was fun to watch you explore and learn about it. Also, Donner Lake Kitchen used to make the BEST huevos rancheros on the planet! I haven’t been there in years, but if it’s still the same chef, or someone who learned from him, then they are probably still amazing!
That is THE saddest looking snowman I have ever seen lol.
Olaf on drugs
@@AnnoyingAsianWitch There IS a lot of white powder around... 🤔
Olaf is about to be eaten by Frosty.
Reminds me of a little snowman I made when I was a kid, when we stopped near the Oregon California border in our RV. I made a little black top hat out of construction paper for it. It turned out really cute. Left it behind for someone to enjoy in the rest area.
This was in the early 70s.
Little ⛄Snow☃️ Deathling is our new mascot ❣
The natives didn’t eat the dead because they believe that cannibals turn to horrible monsters called wendigos
there's a great movie called Ravenous that includes this belief
Often medias sensationalize Witikos, often just proving the point of the original story. Its not only about cannibalism, its about greed and consumption(metaphysical and physical). Often they thought of english settlers as having Witiko spirits within them as the setters were zealous and greedy. Never satisfied and wanting more
From, someone who's heard the direct story from a local tribe and done much research!
If you’re interested in that you should play Until Dawn. It’s based off that
Now they turn into Karen's.
@@ilikecats392 It's kinda just related by name of the monster
I’m overwhelmed by all of the reasons I have for respecting, honoring and expressing gratitude for this woman’s involvement for sharing and dissecting history. I am a sociologist, 74 year old American woman who has spent the last 35 years of my life in Europe. Throughout these years I have been confronted by social norms which have shaken, and sometimes destroyed, my “comfortable secure and certain knowledge” of how society works. Sociology, from my perspective and belief, is primarily an intensely personal interaction reflecting every sociologists insights. From my perspective, I am convinced that a lively merger of various sociologist conversations must inevitably benefit all of us. As I have recently encountered on RUclips “just saying”.
We talked about the Dinner Party a lot in Marysville, CA. Mary Murphy settled here and was quite the celebrity when she arrived but mostly because of her ordeal. The local newspaper chronicles the Donner Party tragedy and her arrival plus lots of other stories on her. I believe I found an article where she gave an interview but I can't remember for sure.
I can't imagine living with the knowledge you ate someone you knew, my great grandfather is a holocaust survivor and he often goes to high schools and talks about how he survived, but cannibalism is the one thing he won't talk about, he acknowledges it happened but refuses to speak of it
dengoddaeng. your poor great grandfather. terrible memories for him. however, i've never seen anything wrong with cannibalizing the dead. killing to cannibalize is another story and i'd need more background. sometimes, it's not as wrong as people would like it to be. no, i've never eaten human flesh.
Unless i killed them to eat them, I would tell myself that they would have wanted me to eat them, because it's what i would want them to do if the situation was reversed. It's just a body. A shell. I'd rather the person i knew to survive.
But it would still have this horrid lingering feeling
I can’t imagine how horrifying it must have been especially for Jews. They believe in keeping their bodies whole in death.
@@RevertedRashidah And cannibalism is a very grave sin as well in the Abrahamic religions, except in the most dire situations which many Jews found themselves in. It's heartbreaking that the Nazis forced them to abandon so much of their culture and religion just to survive, like some kind of collective psychological torture.
I imagine there is a great deal he wont talk about.
After watching this video I wanted to know more about the Donner party, so I went over to Google. Typed it in, and my phone autocorrected it to "Dinner party"... Freudian slip? 😂
Hahaha!
He was like, "It was just a prank bro!"
Hahaha! Google, you so clever!!!!😂😂
Google is trying to protect you
I had a survival situation in the Caribbean ocean many years ago. Nature can be your executioner and your strength.
On a broken down boat....floating aimlessly. Kept alive by fishing and rationing water. Then , the storms come...then the hot Sun ...4 days...Thank you for this Donner Party story...
to heck with 'desperation' and 'starvation'- if you slow down ahead of me in Walmart when I'm hangry, I'm liable to eat you
lmfao omg this comment deserves 1000 more likes
Not the worst thing to ever happen at Walmart
Best comment ever 😂
Your profile pic makes this 1000x better
Lmao😂😂😂
I’m related to the first survivors that traveled through Death Valley by way of covered wagon. They survived by eating their dead, including infants. I’m literally alive today because my family ate my family.
WOW
That’s pretty gnarly. Thank you for being candid and sharing that with us. I’m glad we’ve not had to endure those situations.
Yeah, wow is right, that’s crazy. I didn’t realize such an untenable dilemma was faced in multiple situations. Statistically, I guess it’s pretty obvious the Donner party couldn’t have been the only ones, especially given the difficulty of the terrain and the distance necessary to traverse. Wow. I just can’t imagine. Glad you’re alive, Jessica.
Your brilliant, tongue-in-cheek comment, "I'm alive today because my family ate my family," shall stay in my mind forever, since it's probably true for lots of us. 😱
You're not you when you're hungry
As a Canadian, I'd never heard of the Donner party until I was skimming through your videos a few days back. I assumed it was about a German political group, and picked more interesting death related content. Then I saw a Puppet History video advert for the Donners, and I realized it might not be boring or political. So I clicked.
When I watched that video I had **zero clue** what I was walking into 🤣
I watched this vid the same day as I watched the Puppet History vid. Wild wild stuff.
I had no idea there were different kinds of cannibalism btw, so thanks for more learning! (Genuine not sarcasm)
I work as a substitute teacher and during the Westward Expansion unit for 8th grade one day, we watched a documentary that went pretty deep into Donner party lore, albeit made for school age children. I had the best day of my life watching their eyes just get wider…and wider…and wider 😅 total schadenfreude but so worth it
Whoa, Abraham Lincoln really dodged a bullet. Wait...
princesstamika BBBBOOOOOOO!!!!! 🙈🙉😆
NOOOOO WHY TAMIKA 🤣🤣🤣
TOO SOON
ROFLMAO!
I actually hate myself for laughing way too hard at this!! LOL You are an evil genius!! 😂😂
I’m related to the survivors and I didn’t know some of this.
Cody'sLab hi Cody! Wow so cool seeing you here!
I would ask if you have any stories from them but I feel like thats one thing you dont really pass down to your children and grandchildren.. Being forced to eat your family and friends isnt really a fun bed time story
Cody'sLab nice to see you here, Cody(: best wishes to the misses! ❤
I was just wondering about the generations that came after them.
Hey i love your videos! I had no idea you were related to some of the survivors, that's so interesting
I've often thought that if time travel were possible - you'd be with people that had gone through something like this and just say "oh yeah, in my time we can travel to California from Missouri in about 2 hours or so" - how quiet everything would get, and not just on account of being amazed at our technology. We really do take our times for granted!
I've been to the Sierra dozens of times as ( we are only 2 hours away) and I have to admit this lake is absolutely beautiful.
The Lake itself is gorgeous.
Yeah it's absolutely beautiful up there. I live in Reno, NV nearby, and it's always a treat to go up to either Tahoe or Donner lake
This would be the BEST season of AHS
YES
Umm... FUCK YES!!!
dude....YES
We already had a cannibalism/early American season in the one with the reality show
Wasn't there an episode of Bones on this?
The saddest part for me was that the final rescue party had to leave some people behind because they had become catatonic and couldn't assist in their own rescue.
Dolores J. Nurss how come they became catatonic
@@thetillerwiller4696 Crashed blood sugar, extreme cold, and trauma could each have done it all by themselves. Collectively it was too much. Some of the people could not be stirred enough to get them to walk out of there or even look up, and the rescuers had no means to carry them.
My ancestors were in that rescue party.
@@GloryInWonderland is it John Stark? I hope it was John Stark cuz he was a hero among the rescue party.
Some others were not as noble sadly.
@@johanvajse8410 I'm not sure. I have a story written by like my great-great-aunt second removed. She was writing about all of the stories she could remember from her mother and grandmother. In it, she mentions that my family was traveling with the Donner's initially. They decided to go the long way around and not go through the pass. And then they went back in the rescue party, but she doesn't mention any names specifically.
I’ve been reading a book based on the journal of a member of the party & what was pieced together by others along the way to the relief parties, & when they died, the survivors filled in the gaps. The book is very graphic & would upset the feint hearted.ah, you just showed the book I’m reading.
This is a good summary, though there are more details to the story (as always). If I'm remembering correctly, they were already hungry by the time they reached Truckee Lake because they had already started running low on supplies thanks to the Hastings Cutoff (and some of their previous delays). Several wagons had gotten stuck in the salt flat and had to be abandoned. They were traveling with a large herd of cattle, but the herd essentially evaporated thanks to either dying of thirst in the desert, running away to find water, or by being stolen at various points in the journey. So they had few of their cattle left to eat. Even when they were still in what is now Nevada, they had to send someone to Fort Sutter to get additional food and provisions, but many of the families were low on money, due to not having many resources and to having to abandon what little they had to get out of the Great Salt Lake Desert before dying of thirst, so they quickly ran out of whatever provisions they obtained. I don't think they were in great condition when they reached Truckee Lake, and because most in the party were city dwellers, they didn't have much experience hunting and couldn't catch many animals in the poor, wintry conditions. It's really a tragic story the more you read about it. As Caitlin said, it's not just one bad thing that happened to them, and it's not like they made one monumentally stupid decision. They put their trust in the wrong people, made decisions based on misleading information, and started experiencing setback after setback...the situation snowballed into a tragedy. It's quite sad.
Here's a fun fact: Starvation makes you go crazy before it kills you. If someone goes with minimal food for long enough, they start to show paranoia, hysteria, depression, and other kinds of psychological distress. In one of the first studies of starvation (in the 40's) one of the participants cut off three of his own fingers and couldn't explain why.
Da literal fuq. Why’d they LET him?
@@FIRING_BLIND wondering about that too. Weren't too worried about ethics I guess 😅
Cool fact!
Extreme hangryness.
@@FIRING_BLIND that was before laws were put in place to protect human test subjects. Laws weren't put in place until at least the 70s. In the 40s you could force people to do whatever you wanted for an experiment. Some of it was for the greater good. Some of it was for a scientist's own sadistic purposes.
Louis and Salvador: "these white people are crazy" lol
I know, right? I'd be like, dude, I don't know about you, but I am so out of here.
AND THEN THEY STILL GOT MURDERED AND EATEN
WOW
2020 and this statement hasn't aged at all!
White people just be getting more crazy!!! 😳🤦
@@Lucy-fn9rj this surprises me as the Miwok were from western side of the Sierra Nevada mountains. Those 2 should have been able to survive.
@@EvilEves1 yeah, but not if the white people who travelled with them found them and murdered + cannibalised them
I have backpacked their route through the mountains and down into Salt Lake City. They had to cut trees to climb to that final pass and it took them two weeks to get through. Wagon wheel marks are still visible on rocks.
I took that same route when I moved from WI to Yuba City California (right next to Sutter.) We went through Donner's pass in late April. Our whole way was nice and sunny, but there it was a total blizzard. Scary to drive through
"Would you eat a person?"
They have to be organic, preservative free, and free range.
We're all just free-range humans on the government's tax farm. :)
Reminds me of that commercial "I'm non-geni-modi-scuit." Triscut commercial
Kim Kardashians?
Well, that leaves me out. Sell me to a fast food franchise.
so eat a vegan.
"Do you kill the skinny guy because he can't fight back? Or do you all gang up on the body builder because of more steaks and chops? These are decisions people have had to make" -George Carlin
... is there ever a situation where there isn’t a fitting George Carlin quote? 😂
@@kidragakas I can't think of a person (outside of my family and friends) who has had a greater influence on my thinking and thought processes than George
@@zenjon7892 I frequently ask myself WWGCD, and inevitably, he HAS said something on the subject 😂
George Carlin is like that wise old uncle everybody really needs
Body builder 100%, the more people that are eaten before the body builder goes, the harder it’ll be to take out the body builder when it comes to it.
I think when I was younger I went to that museum and they had a pot that was either from the camp or a similar that they would've had. I recall my dad describing how they (the party) would put the bones in the pot to cook them. After they'd boiled their shoe leather and pine needles of course. I learned a lot more about the party that stayed then the people that left for help.
The author and the book "Under the Indifferent Stars Above" are fantastic. While listening I found myself crying for their fate at several moments.
I forget how young American history is, 1840 was not long ago at all.
American history goes back to the 1500’s its not that young. It’s not old by any stretch but it didn’t start in 1776 lol...
Hahahaha
That's getting close to 200 years.
Angus McFife not too long ago
@@LaDivinaLover 500 years is still super young compared to most European and Asian countries
You should do a video about Chernobyl
Gage Ferland that would make an amazing video, I’d love to see her cover it!
Yes, please!
Ohh PLEASE PLEASE, you MUST....... My dear, you MUST!!!
+
Oh my yes!!!
I live in Placer County, California, and the dark history of the Donner Party is well known in my area. But I can't judge. What might any of us do when it comes to our own survival? Thanks, Caitlin! I love your channel.
I was born in Placer County and lived part of my childhood in nearby Truckee. We learned about the ordeals in school.
Excellent, Caitlin!! HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!
Cannibal Caitlin has a nice ring to it know ?
Cannibal Caitlin carves corpse for consumption in California
(Try saying that 5 times fast)
How about Magic Caitlin? "Abra-cadaver! The sawed-in-half corpse is whole again!" 😀
Why did I just picture her belting out death metal songs.
Bahahaha this made my day. Thank you
I was gonna say it but then i realised someone might hear me XD
lol
99 times out of 100: Wow the actual story isn't nearly as bad as the legends.
This time: Wow, the actual story is so much worse. So... much... worse...
This is such an underrated part of history. I am glad she did a video on it.
You are so in depth with all of your topics. I'm so happy that I have run across your path.
Thank you so much!
I absolutely love your videos !!! Thank You for sharing!!
When my husband and I went to restaurants, I used to always give our name as “Donner”. When our name was called they always called for “the Donner party”. I always got a chuckle from that. The host/hostess never seemed to notice! 😂
This reminds me of when people make kahoot names like hugh jass and stuff
it's also fun to mess with the numbers - like, "Donner party of six!" ..."Um, five?" ....."I'm sorry, four?"
Had a cousin who heard that call out and they changed the number in mid statement. "Donner party of 8- i mean 7!"
"They *BECAME* cannibalism."
They went all in 😁
"I AM the liquor"
-Jim Lahey
Hey man, if you've ever been in a Cascade blizzard, you might too.
6 feet of snow can drop in a single night.
I was like ohhh did they lol
your presentations are so informative, ascerbic and witty...truly a great pleasure to watch. donating now!
Thank you for reintroducing historical events. The way you do it is a great way to teach history.
i dont know about killing someone for food...but if the person is already dead and im starving to death im sorry but im eating them.
Word
Yeah, I found that to be _infinitely_ more morally wrong.
All my friends know I would eat them if I needed to, I would also expect them to eat me if it was for survival.
The people with the Donner party only ate people who were already dead.. They also made sure to not eat any of their own relatives. It was a really rough time. They actually ate all the cowhide and bufflo hide tents and rugs and basically anything remotely edible before they became desperate enough to actually eat human flesh..
Shame
Oh my god I grew up right next to Donner Pass. When I was a kid we took field trips to Donner Pass and actually made us role play as members of the party. As a nine year old I thought it was awesome, but now that I'm older I wonder what creepy adult had that idea.
You kidding? I've had to teach nine year-olds and man... anything to get them interested. Annnnyyyythingggggg... Acting out cannibalism? if it keeps a classroom of kids occupied, do eet.
Grew up in Reno, NV, and YES. SO. MANY. TRAUMATIC. FIELD. TRIPS.
@Kale Ling You just described my childhood.
@@CastielWillow yesssss it was my Reno elementary school!
I grew up by columbine high school and one teacher made us play a game about it. The principal suspended him for a while. That was terrible.
Wow, almost 2 Million subscribers~!
You deserve every one, your videos are always ( morbidly ) interesting and informative.
Caitlyn,I absolutely love your videos.Not only are they fascinating,your sense of humor is awesome!!!
“Patrick Short-Straw Dolan” sounds like a frat bro who _really_ got screwed during the hazing process and never lived it down.
Julian Fantasia Lol...it does!😂
24 minutes?? caitlin has blessed us 🙏🏽
Exactly!!
And 16 seconds of glory my dude
Yaaaaaaas 🙏🙏🙏
Caitlin is the shit!
Yaaas
Ty so much for all this information. I was always interested in this tragic story and to see the actual location is mind blowing. You are a wonderful storyteller; loving your sense of humor,
I know that this is a grim story, but something about the little snowman in front of the memorial stone cracked me up a little
I watched a documentary way back in the '90s called "the Donner Party" with my parents. The irony is it was on a VHS with a very poorly hand written label - We thought the tape was called "The Dinner Party". o.O
Drewcatmorris 😂😂😂
Baaahahahahahahaha!!!!
Omgggg 😂😂😂
Well it kind of was a dinner party they just ate long pork.
@@stefangingrich2373 lmao I was about to say that well, technically, that's not wrong
**suggests eating a person and draws the shortest straw**
Me
... "It was at that moment he realized... He done goofed." >)X^D
"Nah, guys, I was totally kidding."
Y’all, as someone who frequents the Sierra Nevada’s, the snow isn’t 20 feet tall for 2 months, it goes from November to April
you're a great teacher! will definitely check out your other videos this is really easy to follow
Hi, love your channel. There is another RUclipsr by the name of Wonderhussey, who did a series about the Donner tragedy. If they had made it though the area a day earlier the group would have made it.
The Donner party story has been sanitized for the history books. I’ve never heard a lot of this and definitely didn’t hear about them killing the natives and eating them.
Oh I thought she said that after they got scared and took off, they caught up with them later and ate them.
Thanks for clarification.
@@OKae88 ....and then they ate them.
Lewis and Salvador (the savages) refused to eat human flesh.
Violet Brown probably because they didn't want to turn into wendigos
They didn't eat the indians, the Indians where smart and left them in the middle of the night. Go back and listen to it.
Rule number 1 of cannibalism - *_never eat the brain!!_* You'll get Kuru!
aw! so disappointing! they are so delicious chilled with lime juice!
Or other prion diseases, potentially.
Prions are a bad time.
How were the mountain oysters?
How were the mountain oysters?
I particularly love the Donner Camp Picnic Ground sign at Tahoe National Forest... I shouldn't laugh, but I can't help it.
Interesting that you said that many who died died of hypothermia not starvation. Any mammal that's died of starvation will have little to no fat on it. Ironically, having a high protein diet can also lead to starvation since the living body must have fat in order to utilize the protein. This is also know as "rabbit starvation" since a diet of just rabbits doesn't have enough fat.
This was a well done educational video. Thank you for it.
You asked about archaeological evidence... at Jamestown they really do have bones with teeth marks in them as evidence of cannibalism in that colony, so that's a fun thing.
I have an archaeological report somewhere in my stacks of Donner Party books for an excavation at one of the cabin sites I might have to pull it out, a little light reading before bed tonight.
Laughing Coyote share your findings!
Suggestion: leave the night light on. @@laughingcoyote8789
The problem with the Donner camp evidence is that as mentioned, there was a point at which another party 'cleaned up' most of the evidence by incinerating it in one of the cabins. There was plenty prior to that which adds to the written accounts of the time, it's just been lost by actions taken shortly after the tragedy so while written descriptions of the butchered bones remain, the actual bones are not able to be displayed or studied. What is left is mostly cremated and under that monument.
@@laughingcoyote8789 Yes, there is a particular pattern of cut marks on the bones, including the skulls, on several of the recovered Jamestown skeletons.
I just can’t get over how accurate and chillingly beautiful the title “The Indifferent Stars Above” is.
Finally someone acknowledged how amazing that title is.
I thought the same thing. It's poetry.
We are not separate from those stars, we are all made of star stuff. Yet they are so far away and we are so alone
Tragically poetic!
Where does that stand?
Fantastic video! ❤ Can't wait until you are back!🎉
I really like your shows. So much information about what happened. Thanks for the explanation.
Caitlin, I'm curious.....
Did they sell jerky at the Donnor museum?
If so that would be in poor taste.
Thanks for the chuckle 😂😂
That is so funny.😊
Honestly, that would be so morbid that it'd be hilarious hahahhahahaha
Omg lololol
Bahahahahaaa!!!
I seriously thought that the Donner party was just like a family of like 14 who got stranded in a mountain cave in Colorado for 3 or so months, and went insane and killed each other and ate the bodies as both part of their descent into madness and as a survival tactic. I had no idea that it was close to a hundred people who only cannibalized when they believed it was absolutely necessary to their survival. Edit: Autocorrect changed Donner to dinner for some reason, had to fix that.
i mean....dinner party DOES fit
JESUS CHRIST THAT TYPO
Oh no…
I mean autocorrect was kinda right...
Living in Reno for many years we still hear the joke when eating out at various restaurants. When the establishment take names for the waiting list to get in, someone always gives their last name as Donner. When their table is ready the hostess calls over the PA system, "Donner party of 6, your table is ready." I still think it's humorous.
Hunger is the best spice 😉
my family and i used to travel to donner lake every year and stay at a cabin, the hike right by us was called donner trail. it wasn’t until like- years into it did i put two and two together but it’s so cool seeing you visit the places i’ve been to so many times!! and interacting w the museum like i did !
I'm surprised you referred to them as "the snowshoe party" and not the highly more foreboding name they gave themselves: "the forlorn hope"
Sidney how...optimistic.
I agree
Every time she referred to them I was thinking…”aka The Forlorn Hope”.
You forgot autocannibalism! It's like a depressing meal for one.
Hopefully ya don't engage in autofellatio XD
CSSLZT13 autofellatiocannibalism!🌭 nomnom!
auto-erotic cannibalism
I visited the Donner Museum last time I was traveling cross the States and I was really excited to explore some of this grim history. (My mother, who was not as enthused, waited in the car) It is in fact a very eerily quiet place, and all I could think about when I was outside there was how horrible the circumstances were, the time of year they chose, and having to go pretty much entirely on foot for their long journey. Nowadays, it's easy to take for granted how easily we can drive up the mountain in our cars, and so easily we can cross the Mojave Desert and see it as merely a very cumbersome and repetitive drive, rather than the natural danger it is. I recommend visiting if you're passing through, as the museum has a lot of information. I didn't realize when I first went that the statue was meant to be the same height as the snow that year, nor that that's where the cabin was burnt down. Now the eerie feeling makes a little more sense, and I'm glad I took the time to sit and reflect on that area when I was there.
I read about this , back in Highschool.
Great video.
My little cousin had to read a book about the Donner's in like 5th grade. The book was called "Donner Dinner Party", I gasped at that title.
@Kale Ling you must love the word 'yikes' huh
I would've appreciated that dark humor in 5th grade tbh.
that is very disturbing. what school would make them read that to children.
yarixza mendoza I mean they tried to force young adults to read the bluest eye in my school. Yeah it was high school but they didn’t send out a letter about the book or let anyone opt out. Many students had actual legit traumas they didn’t need forced to read. Even in high school or past
@@Lokimamabear hold on, what's The Bluest Eye about?
Please forgive my Scandinavian ignorance, It sounds like the worst party ever. And believe me, i have been to a few really bad ones in my life
Most of us in the US would agree.
@@Joeybagofdonuts76 We Canucks too!
party can mean a group of people not necessarily a celebration
@@TheLurkerAtTheThreshold i understood the joke but since they said that there scandinavian i figured english probably isn't there first language i would make sure they weren't confused by the wording as they might not know the other meaning for party
@@piarateking8094 We speak English a lot more grammatically correct than most Americans, I've been corrected some southerners grammar far too often on Reddit. Northern Europeans are literally the last people you should assume need help with their English.
so fascinating !! love this video 🤍 also ur enunciation is very pleasing to listen to
I love how the cougar is schooling the rabbit on cannibalism. That just made my day.