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The case of Bobby Dunbar

Another great-but-disturbing episode of This American Life: The Ghost of Bobby Dunbar.

Host Ira Glass plays the song “Mystery of the Dunbar’s Child” by Richard “Rabbit” Brown. It describes Bobby Dunbar’s disappearance and recovery and the trial of his kidnapper, all of which was front page news from 1912 to 1914. Almost a century after it happened, Bobby Dunbar’s granddaughter, Margaret Dunbar Cutright, was looking into her grandfather’s disappearance and found that the truth was actually more interesting than the legend. And a lot more troubling.

This one’s not as good as the switched at birth episode (which was amazing) but is still well worth a listen. (All this also reminds me a bit of Don Draper’s pre-Sterling Cooper life.)