Cultish - Exploring The Origins Of William Branham

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May I present my wife honey, this is brother Leroy and Paul cup of California Brother Branham in your two great campaigns at Los Angeles at Calvary Temple We noticed that the

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Lord Jesus Christ worked with you in a very special manner for these marvelous gifts these earning of the spirits of men's hearts as Well as the sicknesses of their body and the signs of healing and miracles that were wrought

00:31

We thought it was wonderful. We're interested brother Branham in hearing more about this unique minister that God has given you

00:38

Very well, brother cop. Let's go back to the beginning. I Was born in Eastern, Kentucky In a little log cabin near Burksville, Kentucky The morning of my birth

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I'm told of my parents that there was a light came into the room and hung over me

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My people was not a religious people They did not go to any church

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Of course this caused quite a stir among them. It's followed me all the days of my life

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Recently They took a picture of it in the scientific world as shown here

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You're probably familiar with this picture It was proven by science.

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That was the only Supernatural being that was ever scientifically photographed to my opinion

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It's the same angel of God That followed the children of Israel All right.

01:43

Welcome back. Ladies and gentlemen to cultish entering the kingdom of the cults. My name is Jeremiah Roberts I'm one of the co -hosts here.

01:50

I am here as always with Andrew the super sleuth of the show Tell me are you super excited about today?

01:58

I am very excited about today because like, you know The weird pair up like cowboys and aliens.

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This is kind of like the weird pair up with gangsters alcohol and prohibition prohibition and preachers in a weird sense and I I'm excited.

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I'm very excited for the guests that we have with us this awesome historian. Yes, absolutely And so we have gotten quite a few messages really since our inception about cultish and neat We every single time we've made a post about this just the response have been

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Astronomical regarding William Branham the Branhamites or also known as the message and So we got a whole we were doing our own research

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We came across our guest and just the amount of research that he has done. It's just been absolutely

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Fascinating and we are excited to unravel with you all really what this is going to be kind of a historical origins

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Story or origin series or sometimes you'll see another podcast I think there there's a podcast called the strange history podcast or weird history.

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There's a lot of those ones out there So we're kind of in uncharted waters as far as exploring into new territory

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But we have with us John Collins. How are you my friend? I'm good.

03:12

Thank you for having me absolutely, and so can you just tell everyone just a little bit about yourself and you are you've done a lot of history about William Branham just tell them a little about you a little bit about yourself

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And then if people are curious to find out more, where can they find you at on on the World Wide Web?

03:31

I'm on William dash Branham org and also on Amazon you can find

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The latest book is preacher behind the white hoods the critical examination of William Branham Also, I'm on the alternative considerations of Jonestown and People's Temple Right in their newsletter, so you can find various research about Many many subjects regarding the strange history

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Yes, and I'm sure I'm my go ahead Sorry, my family.

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My family was born and raised in the Branham cult My grandfather was a pastor at William Branham's Branham tabernacle in Jeffersonville for almost 50 years

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Until I started publishing some of the more critical and the more just the more

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Revealing information. He was actually pushed out of that church. Hmm Yeah, that's definitely very yeah

04:35

Well, I appreciate you sharing that and we're excited to delve into the origins of William Branham And so if you heard that audio, that's

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I've came across that on YouTube and it's an old Vintage video of some people in William Branham's home in Jeffersonville, Indiana And so what we want to do is that we want to go

04:54

Really as much my new detail as we can go into the origins of William Branham story as you heard in that audio

05:00

John I noticed that he mentioned he started in Kentucky and it worked its way over to Jeffersonville, Indiana And so he had a very interesting upbringing around some very interesting

05:12

Changing times in American history, you know, we think right now how interesting the 2020s have been so far

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This was roughly a hundred years ago around his upbringing so take us at the very beginning of the origins of William Branham where he was born in Kentucky and about his family and Maybe some of the sociological infrastructure that really made him into the person.

05:34

He was as a young man Well Honestly, it depends on which version of his stage persona that you subscribe to The one that has that seems to be lasting the longest through time was the version in which he was born in 1909 in Burksville, Kentucky in a log cabin and According to cult history a

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Light shone in on in the window and He he had a what they call a supernatural birth previous versions of his stage persona didn't have that part of the story and his actual birth year ranges from 1907 which appears to be his actual birth date

06:26

He signed I believe 1908 and one government document and then later versions of his stage persona are all using the year 1909 and The cult that I grew up in the version of the stage persona that we subscribe to We tied several supernatural events to that year of 1909 even though that Appears not to be his actual birth date birth year

06:56

His family according to What his statements that he made his family were from Paris, Texas right above Paris, Texas in Oklahoma and they migrated to Kentucky near the

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Cumberland River and lived there for approximately three years and For one reason or another they moved to Jeffersonville, Indiana The at the time

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Jeffersonville was a quickly growing town. It had quite a bit of opportunity, but it was also location of the state prison, so I I have questions as to why they moved but he for one for one reason or another they that's where they ended up and And like you say this was at a strange and unusual time in American history, especially with all of the the combination of Different influences that came it came to be in Jeffersonville, Indiana Hmm.

08:08

So could you give us some examples of just what were things going on? We mentioned at the very beginning the

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Prohibition era This was very much a lot of racial tensions were going on This was you know way before the civil rights movement and that had a variable in play

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But specifically what would be some things that William Branham as a young? Boy, and ultimately a young man would have observed of the world around him that would have affected

08:36

Just where who he ended up becoming Yeah, so in Jeffersonville That you had it was right across the river from Louisville, Kentucky, so It was a gambling town.

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It was known as Little Las Vegas During the

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Prohibition era people like, you know, Al Capone or John Dillinger frequented the area.

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I Believe one of their I don't know if it's their largest supplier, but one of their suppliers of alcohol

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Had his distilleries in the area and His father grew up or his father worked for the for mr.

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Wathen who owned the Wathen distilleries So you had the you had the influence of the alcoholism and you had the influence that You know in a casino town during Prohibition Whenever a lot of government officials in Jeffersonville were purposefully turning a blind eye

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You had all the crime and the riffraff that came with that in this in this gambling town

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But you also had the influence of the Ku Klux Klan Who were quickly growing?

09:58

You know after 1915 I believe it was they were quickly growing in State of Indiana and they eventually would become the largest

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Klan sect in the United States That's huge. That's that's huge and so one thing that that you had just pointed out is that William Branham with his family moved from Kentucky when he was about three one thing

10:20

I found very interesting in your book as well Is that the the message and what William Branham likes to state is something different, right?

10:27

They believe something totally different about how old he was and things of that nature What is their story and what were some of the the underpinnings like what were you able to find that actually

10:38

Showed the different the different history to make you go. Well actually factually He they entered the town at a totally different age, right?

10:48

Um, could you talk about that right a minute, right? Yeah, even the the visual landscape that we were given as part of the

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I Call it the cult history because it's not actual history, right? They they make they make these coloring books that they give to the kids where it's showing

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Jeffersonville is this one horse town like you would see in Bonanza and You know, he would go to the general store and he would get his piece of candy at the general store when

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I actually saw the the photos from Various history sources in the area one of which being the

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Jeffersonville library, we also have the Jeffersonville Historical Society, I was just shocked that this is not the town that I knew as cult history and The timeline was

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I think most shocking because he claimed that in In some versions of a stage persona, he claimed that he received a vision as a small child before most children could even walk or talk and Told his family that he would be moving to a city you know near New Albany, which is

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Adjacent I guess two cities over from Jeffersonville and You know according to the timeline that he gives in that version of his life story compared to the government documents that I was able to uncover and the

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You know, the newspaper articles were his family's mentioning the timeline it

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None of it matched right? So that's what caused me. I think to dig deeper into You know just the basics.

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What is what is the actual history? What is the history that was concealed for me and why was it concealed?

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Hmm Yeah, and I think one of the things that's really fascinating when you talk about that again

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How how something that's a very well -known time in history and how this really? Affects someone it affected

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William Branham on a personal level. So in your book you had mentioned about You know the difference how

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India between Indiana and Kentucky and in your book you stated that Indiana, Kentucky it says they are both impacted by anti saloon legislation because when you think about the 1800s and kind of any of those old

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Westerns you have somebody, you know walking into the saloon and they're playing that classic piano saloon music and then there's the

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Showdown that was just indicative of just Western history and a lot of times depicted in the Clint Eastwood movies and things like that but what happened is that once this

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Let this a prohibition legislation came in there was this anti saloon legislation

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So it said that between 1905 and you think about to like all the small businesses that have been shut down and destroyed by the different Government regulations with Kovac.

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I mean that has really changed the nature of commerce and business and such But you know, you mentioned that Oh in that time frame more than 2 ,500

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Indiana saloons were closed between 1900 and 1910 and that affected

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William Brennan's childhood because his father became involved in prohibition and it says that one of the most impactful things that happened is that Charles Branham his father pulled him out of school

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And so that kind of really changed a lot as far as his upbringing. Can you kind of just elaborate on that?

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Yeah, so it's You know, it was very surprising to me to to see just how

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Dominant the gambling and the liquor industry was in this area There was there was a grocery store near my house that I used.

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It's actually closed and replaced now with another building But when we first moved here, there's a grocery store called

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I think it was the Greyhound grocery and it used to be the dog track and this dog track they raced

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Greyhound dogs and people would you know bet on the dogs and there was liquor gambling, etc

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And they had monkeys that would ride on the backs of these dogs. That's wild and somewhere. I found a foot

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Yeah, somewhere. I found a photograph of these monkeys that were being jockeys on the dogs It's it it's just it's amazing the the history as it relates to the the organized crime

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We had the the distilleries here, right? I Never really thought about it when

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I was in the cult because most of this history. I did not know right even even general

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American history, I really To be honest, I was not interested in history growing up because we're going to be leaving this world

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It's gonna be demolished. Why do I care? Right, but This has just sparked a new fascination for history me history that I almost can't control

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So you have you have people like John Dillinger and people like Al Capone coming to do business in Louisville, Kentucky and there's a hotel,

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I think it's called the seal back hotel where they have the Al Capone room and you can go down in it and See all the tunnels where he escaped whenever the law came in During this time the government was cracking down on Alcohol production.

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Yeah, and a lot of the distilleries could not produce and sell to the casinos

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Wathen Re Wathen is a name that I heard her Otto Wathen His son was a name that I heard growing up because William Branham frequently mentioned that he lived near the

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Wathen house Said his dad was he called him. He said a chauffeur, but now that I'm understanding what this was he was a driver for Wathen and Wathen was able to Continue producing liquor under a medicinal license but his trucks kept getting caught taking liquor to Chicago and So what he did was quite ingenious

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He had several people either funded them or they bought the materials themselves and started

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Producing white mule whiskey in their backyards So it was out of his distillery, but then this was supplying the

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Chicago mob Wow and When when you piece that fact together with the history that William Branham gives

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Now, I understand that William Branham as a child was taken out of school to run his father's still to produce liquor directly for Al Capone Wow, Chicago mob.

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Yeah, so I got a question too because when you think about Al Capone that name just that would it like You think to our audience listening?

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What does that bring up? And for me? It's almost that that name it's almost sort of like the Michael Jordan of just Gangsters in the 1920s and he was just that's just the impact that he had

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I mean, he's been depicted several times in the films He was depicted I believe by Robert De Niro in the movie

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I can't remember the name all the top of my head with Kevin Costner and Sean Connery Yes. Yes, and and also he was depicted in the series

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HBO series boardwalk Empire Which I would jokingly said this whole story could literally be a spinoff of that show

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Just given the context of what took place there. So Al Capone was known really He was someone who was also known for the distribution of liquor and that's depicted in the films and you see that too in Boardwalk Empire, but I did have a question.

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I want to bring up because you mentioned Johnny Dillinger and so for anyone who knows and this is what

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I know I want to get your thoughts in this John is that he was depicted in the movie public enemies by Johnny Depp that I think

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Came out in 2009 and he was really known for just being so proficient at robbing banks he just said he was just good at it and people didn't have an answer how to stop it and That played a huge role in the formulation of the

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FBI that was started by I think the first director Was Pervis Ellison who was played by Christian Bale, which is one of my really well done film

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It's one of the first films that was done in the high -speed 4k cameras Watching the theater is at that higher speed rate.

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Sorry. This is my movie nerd Just saw it for the first time

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Okay, so with you met me you mentioned Johnny Dillinger so just in relation to Kentucky It was he and how is he aside from being involved in Kentucky as far as how this whole story unravels?

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What sort of influence that Johnny Dillinger had with what he did with his bank robbing? You know my areas of research so far have been limited to anything that I can tie directly to Branham or the people

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Branham knew Outside of the fact that John Dillinger came to Louisville and was doing business here.

20:04

I really haven't studied it that much Okay, I want to know the movie, but I'm not studied it yet, right?

20:09

But I mean it means to say it's still incredibly fascinating that a person like Johnny Dillard who

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Dillinger Who was depicted by Johnny Depp in a movie directed by Michael Mann? Who's done a lot of other fantastic films as well to just goes to show you?

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What are you? interesting and fascinating unique time in history this was and the fact that this

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Religious figure and really this movement came out. This is the sociological environment that created really

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What you know was your life and now you this has become really a passion subject for you as far as really

20:42

Digging out this history. It's definitely fascinating Absolutely Absolutely. So as a child, you know the version of the stage persona that I grew up with This was a hunter a fisher a trapper who lived in the wilderness

20:57

Previous versions of the stage persona. He actually claimed that he grew up in Kentucky He claimed that his father died at a at an early age.

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So he would hunt and trap to feed his You know his siblings in this log cabin.

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I never really thought about it Until after I left that even the ages of his sibling doesn't work with that stage persona.

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It can't work. They're too old and So I've got this

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I've got this mental image of This guy who I thought was the

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Prophet. Yeah, who's You know running through the hills of Kentucky and somehow in my mind

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I had merged the two because I had heard both stage personas, right? So in my mind I'm thinking he ran through the hills of Kentucky hunting trapping fishing and he also ran through the hills of Jeffersonville, Indiana hunting trapping and fishing and then

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I saw the pictures. Oh my gosh, man you had Jeffersonville was the main hub of distribution for the

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Civil War Taking you know, the railroad across the Ohio River is where all the supplies went from north to south

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So you had the depot you had the train station They had all the infrastructure by the time the

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Branham's moved here. They actually had you know trolleys and railways and there was a

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Like a shuttle train that would take you around to four different cities and the the depot was right there in Jeffersonville So you've got this boy who's not hunting and trapping and fishing in the wilderness, right?

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Who's in this gambling town with the casinos with the mobsters whose father likely met with them?

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There's no way to prove that but he was a driver for the big man So there's there's no telling how much he knew and how and what he saw right?

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Like his father was even bailed out by auto right like from from prison wasn't that?

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Yeah, that that shocked me because I'm like you I'm picturing

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And in my mind, I'm thinking Robert De Niro and I'm I'm picturing yeah

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You know Al Capone if one of his guys that he had make lick make liquor got caught

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There's no way in heck. He's gonna go bail him out. So now you come to Jeffersonville.

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You've got the big man and you've got You know Charles Branham who's his driver and he's bailing out his driver for Producing liquor when all of the other people that were producing liquor for Al Capone I did not find a single newspaper article record government document anything of Anyone else being bailed out just Charles Branham.

23:46

Hmm Wow, that's fascinating and you know, it's really interesting John too is when you think about like what does this remind me of an

23:53

Andrea? I think about you know, we've done several episodes before and when we've had in regard in on Mormonism and You know,

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I went to a school that my high school I went to it was 98 % Mormon and a lot of my close friends were

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Mormon and you know I would spend time going to their house and I'd see some of their history of books

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There are these really nice cookie cutter stories about the Mormon pioneers and how they just wanted to live peacefully

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How Joseph Smith of 14 years old went out into the woods to pray and and just this very nice very

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Methodical very, you know, very almost a week like those precious moments books. Yeah, it's just very right

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That's the way it's just depicted a hallmark. Yeah, it's a very hallmark movie sort of moment, but there's almost a similarity to how

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William Branham's father Charles is involved, you know as a driver or just as involved in the

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Prohibition Movement Connected that's directly connected to Al Capone and a lot of these other organizations that are in this area

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But there's a similarity to I mean Joseph Smith's whole family Like they were involved in the aspects of treasure digging and glass looking and saying they had special Secret occultic esoteric insight to be able to find lost and hidden treasures in fact

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Joseph Smith is it was actually tried and convicted and there's an arrest record for him doing this which and this is a thing too

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I know people when they grow up with this perception of Joseph Smith when they find out this stuff

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There's a lot of cognitive dissonance that's happened. I'm sure that would be the case for a lot of people who look at this go ahead

25:30

Absolutely, I so you played that clip from the One single video of William Branham's home that exists.

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He had a video camera, by the way He mentions getting it for Christmas. So somewhere exists more videos of him, but that's the only one we're allowed to see but what's funny is you mentioned the cognitive cognitive dissonance

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I Had no choice. I was born and raised in this thing I was raised from birth to believe that every single part of this version of the stage persona was true and I really had no chance to even question it and By the time

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I was about 16 or so. I started listening to his recordings Over and over in my car at night in school between classes at lunch in school on the bus on the way home

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So I'm literally brainwashing myself, right? Yeah this was this stuff and I saw that video that that you referenced at the beginning of this show and I can remember sitting down and as a 18 year old boy crying because that's the

26:41

Prophet and how how it's how real this is man How how this is why can the world not accept this?

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I mean that was that's a true thought that was in my head I recently got done watching the series called

26:55

WandaVision on Disney Plus. Yeah, I don't know if you guys have seen this Yeah, so it's it's this world.

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That's Just like that video man. It's as fake as it can possibly be and It it dawned on me while watching that because you can see in the very beginning.

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They don't know it's fake and then Towards the middle of it of the first season. You can kind of start to see something's just not right and Vision starts to notice that Wanda's got this fake smile and she's saying that things that aren't real

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The moment I saw that I thought of this video that you played Because all of the faces look plastic the voices don't seem real

27:37

Wow. None of it seems real But when I was growing up, that was very very real to me.

27:43

Hmm Wow, wow So I was gonna ask something to and the dangers you have any other questions for a transition

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What are your thoughts right? I feel like I feel like your minds being blown. Yeah That was a very poetic way to put that John and I was just thinking like you're you're essentially right

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There's a script that he had, you know, there's a script a stage persona. There's the cult history that they went by and you you know, you had to go through that and then you got a glimpse behind the veil and It's it's everything changed after that you just yeah, it just it just hit me really hard when you're talking about that John Yeah, definitely

28:17

And so on top of the Al Capone and some of the prohibition movements what I noticed in your book you start talking about the influence that the

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Ku Klux Klan had on in Jeffersonville and also Just some of their influence and people especially now you think about this in today's

28:35

Day and age like the word white supremacy gets thrown around almost like a pejorative, but it had a very different meaning and context in the 1920s versus how it's depicted now nearly a hundred years later, but The Ku Klux Klan.

28:50

I mean, that's that's something that's very when you think about that That's something people see in the white hoods and the burning crosses out in the woods and such

28:57

But then in your book you talk about the relationship that the Ku Klux Klan had

29:02

With the Brannan family specifically. There's a point we were said, uh, you know,

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Charles was arrested and then He had a bill posted and there was there were just there were some relations between the

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Ku Klux Klan and Charles Brannan Can you talk to us a little bit about that and what sort of effect that would have had on William?

29:23

It's so that's a very interesting history that could probably take the next five podcasts

29:30

Cover yeah, I will try to limit it to just the brief overview.

29:35

Sure and Anybody who's interested in seeing further can you know, read my book or go to my website?

29:43

But there were the white supremacy in this area came from multiple angles Interestingly growing up in the cult

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I would frown upon people who Said who

29:59

Claimed to be white supremacists. I did not like the Klan. I you know,

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I thought I was I Was you know a person who supported equal rights?

30:10

It wasn't until after I left that I realized just how racist I actually was. I had no idea

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Right down to the doctrine that William Branham taught there is so much racism

30:23

Flowing through it, which I'll get into a bit further probably in the show, but The the influence in Jeffersonville specifically

30:35

So the 1915 Ku Klux Klan, I don't know how much you guys know about the

30:40

Klan but in 1915 it was rebirthed from a

30:47

Previous version of the Klan There was an event that happened in Atlanta, Georgia Series of events that happened in Atlanta, Georgia There was a lynching of a

30:59

Jewish man who They claimed raped a white woman The Klan was not not just against blacks as is commonly mistaken.

31:09

They They were white supremacists. So you basically had to be white but not just white

31:15

They were against the Catholics they're heavily anti -catholic ism they discriminated against Jews African Americans Basically, if you did not have white skin and you did not have the culture of the people who were enforcing it

31:33

They looked down upon you So in 1915, the Klan was rebirthed and it was extremely popular

31:43

It spread throughout the United States People did not really know what this was, but they saw it as like unsung heroes

31:51

There was a movie that came out Drawn a blank birth of a nation.

31:58

Yeah, and that that movie was played across the United States, right and it made the

32:04

Previous version of the Klan look like heroes. So in 1915 on Stone Mountain Stone Mountain, Georgia a group of men recreated the

32:12

Klan Created as a pyramid scheme and it was a religious pyramid spring

32:18

Spread throughout the United States and around 1921

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I believe it was the government started realizing that these Forces are actually controlling got small governments.

32:34

So it divided into separate sects and The Indiana sect grew to be the strongest so their influence in Indiana from Indianapolis was just dominating, you know in the

32:51

United States There was a Klan headquarters on Spring Street in downtown,

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Jeffersonville I believe is right across the casino or maybe adjacent to the biggest casino and The Klan wanted to clean up the mob so you had

33:10

Charles Brown the father who's working for supplying the Chicago mob. You had the

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Klan who's coming in trying to stop it and the the

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Indianapolis Klan newspaper started publishing all the various cities that they went in and cleaned house and It's they started waging war against Jeffersonville specifically

33:35

Jeffersonville had several people who were Catholics who were in positions of power or position positions of influence

33:42

You had the mob the casinos You also had quick marriages

33:49

People would come from Louisville to the casinos There were a series of small

33:58

Not really churches, but they called them churches where people could go get married go sleep with one another

34:03

Go get divorced and go back home. And this was a huge problem in in this era

34:11

So the Ku Klux Klan came in and cleaned house And they bragged about it in their newspaper in Indianapolis During the time that they came in and cleaned house in Jeffersonville William Branham whose father is out making whiskey

34:30

His father gets stopped put into jail and William Branham gets shot, right?

34:36

There's no way of knowing other than his statement who shot him But you can see that this happened during the exact time that the

34:43

Klan came in and cleaned house Hmm and he was in critical condition to like it was like a serious wound when he was shot, right?

34:53

It was a serious According to the newspapers. It was a serious state of affairs on all sides

35:02

You had two Branham boys who were in critical condition I'm trying to remember which in the series of time which they were but you had

35:13

One of the Branham brothers had shot another person Another one had been in a severe injury

35:22

Fell off of a truck. I believe it was William Branham had been shot. The father was in jail.

35:28

The family was destitute and The Klan according to William Branham the

35:34

Ku Klux Klan came in and saved the day not only for rescuing him from producing liquor apparently right but also paid his his hospital bills and Shortly after he had several a series of new cars

35:50

So things weren't very well after that happened. Yeah, that's definitely very interesting.

35:55

In fact, one of the things that fast that is just Fascinating about this period of history and this also has to do with the world of calls that we study.

36:02

It's just the effect of Persuasion and undue influence when it comes to Propaganda and how people can be indoctrinated

36:12

So really just jumping back a little bit the film birth of a nation while I have not seen it in entirety

36:18

I have no intentions to I've stabbed seeing just little bits and clips and believe me as as someone who is a

36:25

Christian where I believe that all men are equal before the eyes of God They're all are we are all our image bearers of God the way that people are depicted in that are is just Horrific when

36:38

I see that but what's unique about that film though? It really has become a really it's almost a case study in and of itself

36:46

For the effectiveness of propaganda because this was made and I believe in 1915 and Just the the effect that it had was just astronomical and I mean it changed really the landscape even post -civil war that which the

37:02

Civil War is fought over that really influenced this Hatred towards so many other people that was unprecedented going working all the way to William Branham and affecting him.

37:14

So so what was so now We had the Ku Klux Klan coming to the rescue paying hospital bills and making an impact on William Branham's life and you said that now

37:23

William Branham had vehicles. So what can you can you tell me what the cult history was of William Branham's life at this point in comparison to his to the actual historical records of him

37:34

Going like moving away from Jeffersonville. Could you could you highlight that for a minute? That that is the most interesting thing and that is what

37:44

Drove me mad for several years There there was a missing piece of his history

37:51

I At that time when I first started looking at that I didn't know I didn't yet recognize that there were different versions of the stage persona

38:00

The way see we had I believe it was 1 ,500 1 ,400 sermons recorded by William Branham from 1947 to 1965

38:11

Wow, I as a child probably by age 16 or 17 had heard every one of those multiple times and could probably quote at least 15 or 20 of them almost verbatim as he was talking.

38:27

I'd heard him so many times What happens is that Whenever you have two conflicting histories cognitive dissonance, especially in a cult

38:39

Your brain will try to reconcile both So what happens is you have one story which can't be reconciled with the other story?

38:48

So your mind creates a new story that uses elements of both But in effect, it's a story that is neither because it's it's a mixture of the two that didn't really happen, right?

38:59

so in in my mind, I'm Part of my mind

39:05

Remembered the version of his stage persona where his father died at a very early age and William Branham told these stories that I remember growing up and just laughing and laughing how he and all his brothers were in this log cabin in Kentucky because His father had died

39:24

He was hunting and trapping to feed them and his mother would pour coon grease in their eyes to open them in the morning and I you know, that's a story that I I always wondered about the coon grease.

39:38

I remember Vividly, you know that story, but I also believe that he was in Jeffersonville I can't explain that but my mind had reconciled the two right and I I believe that this happened, right?

39:52

Well when this happens and your mind creates this new story that doesn't exist

39:57

What happens is you overlook all the details that should be there and aren't?

40:03

so the the Branham family history goes up to a certain point where the two stage personas diverge and Then there's this missing history that is unaccounted for there is

40:15

I Believe there was one You see the one or two of the different versions of stage personas where he talks about going out west and he is wants to be a rodeo rider and That's that's the only thing that really you get that That even gives you a hint of what happened

40:38

But according to what little information I was able to gather It appears that he got a brand new vehicle

40:49

You know back at it back at a time whenever he was so claimed to be so poor

40:54

He couldn't scrape two pennies together, right? He headed out west It looks like he went to Phoenix, Arizona there are a couple of quotes where he mentions being on a specific

41:07

Street in Phoenix and Then I found this series of old photographs from that era and It looks an awful lot like he went to college

41:17

Which would completely defy all of the stage personas that I'm familiar with Do you know what it is?

41:26

Sorry, John. Did you know what activities he would have participated while he was in Arizona? Just I'm curious as well.

41:33

Just because we are we're hosts. We're both from Arizona at least we're in Arizona now Andrew went up to Utah in a couple months, but But yeah, what what do you know his activity or what his proposed activity was when he was here in our great state.

41:47

I Don't the only thing close he talks about He talks about breaking horses, but the street that he mentions

41:56

I was able to find old archives from the Phoenix Historical Society of the street where he's mentioning and It blew my mind because as I'm trying to piece all of this together and I'm picturing this barren wilderness and he's out bucking

42:13

Broncos he's near a skyscraper I mean, he could have probably looked out his back window and saw a skyscraper being built, right?

42:22

That's how Right it right in the heart of it. He was I Really haven't been able to tell and a lot of the records that I want to Find would no longer exist from that era

42:35

Yeah But you know, I I can tell you that there is a strong cult presence in that in Arizona, Tucson Arizona is the second part of the dual headquarters that he had so You you may be able to find some people there who know more than than I do.

42:54

Oh, that's that's interesting idea Yeah, so I always found that really interesting when I was watching your videos that you did on your website

43:01

So Jerry where where he was living was nowadays 16th Street and Buckeye So you don't go around there at nighttime anymore by yourself, but yeah, that is close to downtown

43:12

Phoenix and I thought you did a really good job in the videos I watched online in terms of deducing that he was most likely in school because the photos they there's about four different photos and you

43:21

Can see him aging one by one. They look professionally done He looks like he's in a school uniform and actually the photo cover on the front of your book preacher behind the white hoods

43:30

That's one of those photos while he was in Arizona. There's a reason why I chose that too because Even when

43:37

I found those photos and even as I'm piecing all of this together I fully discounted the notion that he went to college

43:44

It wasn't until I actually had to go back and rewrite parts of my book because the stage persona that we were

43:54

We were had accepted was this hillbilly from Kentucky who was raised to only have a sixth or seventh grade education and he speaks

44:07

Now that I'm looking at it and understand it he speaks with a fake Kentucky accent but after I found those photos and started piecing all this together and After I found a earlier version of his stage persona where he speaks very very good

44:25

English Then it suddenly hit me. Wait a minute. Could he have gone to college and That's whenever I went back.

44:33

And yes, these photographs are One year after a part, I mean, they're for they look like yearbook photographs from college.

44:40

I agree. So that's why I chose my book That's awesome. Yeah, so my

44:46

I guess what I'm curious about too because we're kind of getting the point where You know, William Branham is how this influence growing up and he comes across some very other interesting characters

44:56

Which we'll probably explore in the next episode But in his upbringing he's evolved with the

45:02

Ku Klux Klan Prohibition and he eventually Starts this religious movement and he he ends up meeting up with someone where that takes place

45:13

But prior to him inter meeting this particular person that we'll introduce that we also will explore in the next episode and that became the catalyst for William Branham and the message

45:25

What sort of influences were on him or what might have motivated him in regards to the aspects of preaching?

45:33

Healing doing the faith healing the ministry all those things that really became a catalyst for who he was as the prophet

45:39

What sort of things in his upbringing besides the aspects of the prohibition the Ku Klux Klan?

45:44

Might have had undue influence or pushed him in that direction During the years that that did not exist in the stage persona

45:55

I could not find anything even remotely related to religion and even in the stage personas themselves

46:01

He mentioned that his family did not have a religious background and that he Avoided religion till until his later years

46:12

There were some influences indirect that may or may not have came into play

46:21

There was a There's a preacher by the name of John Alexander Dowie who in the late 1890s became known as the richest man in the

46:32

West. So The his fame was, you know spread throughout the entire nation

46:38

I believe that may have influenced some of the other men that you're referring to So it's possible that you know that made some

46:48

Connection or talk just through the fact that Dowie was Dowie had control of Chicago at one time but also

46:59

There was an event in Jeffersonville that a character named

47:04

Roy E Davis were One of the men that you'll probably want to examine in your next episode

47:10

He came He came and Basically wowed

47:17

Jeffersonville with the other big influence that was happening at the time

47:23

During this time in the United States, there was this big fascination with spiritualism

47:30

I don't know how much you guys have studied this but sir, author Conan Doyle who wrote the

47:37

Sherlock Holmes series He actually came to the United States. So hit so that his wife could perform seances

47:44

Wow there was more money in that than writing Sherlock Holmes, believe it or not and All through the nation this was this was just spreading quickly

47:56

Indiana there was a Spiritualist camp that was a strong driving force for the spreading of spiritualism and in the

48:08

United States and one of the statements that William Branham makes Leads me to believe that he was actually at that spiritualist camp

48:19

So you had the Klan you had the spiritualism you had the alcohol slash prohibition

48:26

Well a preacher shows up in Jeffersonville Claiming that he used to be a spiritualist and that he had figured out all of the demonic tricks that they were practicing and so he converted to Christianity and Basically Started this small revival in Jeffersonville that William Branham appears to have taken part in and That's the first instance in which

48:56

I see anything remotely religious with William Branham And yeah, this was the guy too and it wasn't that and I remember reading this in the book

49:04

He had done this other gentleman He had it was really like a stage persona that he was sort of a sage or a medium

49:10

So he kind of had it wasn't just a regular Church service in the 1800s, but it would be something that you would see as far as like showmanship

49:19

Hey, look exactly I can have these particular things which is just interesting given who

49:26

William Branham became and in doing things in very Extraordinary claims about miracles and healings, you know live on stage, which we'll probably get into as we unravel this

49:37

One other thing I want to just bring up to Because we'll wrap up here in a moment and then we're gonna jump into the next episode.

49:45

We'll be talking about a person by name of Roy Davis and That's a fascinating story in and of itself and then we're gonna talk about his connection to Branham But that was a person we were mentioning earlier

49:56

But this is a fascinating instance of it's almost the apple doesn't fall far from the tree So you're talking about there really is not too much

50:05

Records of any religious interest in William Branham's upbringing but what we do have tons of records of is a lot of crime a lot of very close proximity to both

50:18

Al Capone and Johnny Dillinger, which still Fascinates me. It's almost like this could be the spin -off of Boardwalk Empire directed by Martin Scorsese That's really the nature of this so this is also just interesting

50:34

What I noticed and maybe you can kind of elaborate maybe talk a little more about is that there's a point to Where William Branham had he had a large family?

50:44

It was ten children, right? Right, right. So ten very large family one of his brothers was named it was

50:52

Edward Branham and according to some of your research in your book you mentioned that That Edward brother had shot and killed a man and that Edward was trading a firearm for the automobile and he killed a man by the name

51:06

John John Burse and The witnesses say that the gun was in Branham's hand when he fired at the home of his father

51:13

Charles Branham So and then he ended up being charged for first -degree murder So that's another aspect where it's just this is right directly in the family where this

51:21

Murder happens. What were you gonna ask Andrew and then Edward Branham dies a few months later

51:27

It's no it's listed as as uh, what was it heart like a heart disease a rheumatic heart disease, but I just find that interesting

51:34

Yeah, tell us more a little more about that. That just sounds very very much in the realms of previously on boardwalk

51:41

Empire Yeah, I mean Again, it's just so vastly different from the stage persona that I grew up with.

51:50

I'm I'm picturing The way it was described For me it was like picturing

51:58

Several kids in this log cabin again in Kentucky not in, Indiana and Even the version of the stage persona where they're in,

52:08

Indiana. I'm picturing kids. I'm picturing, you know Boys who are out playing with sticks shooting, you know pretending to be

52:16

Cowboys and Indians or whatever I did not picture a crime family Where one brother is shooting another brother another guy to get his automobile during a time whenever an automobile was a

52:31

Good way to make money, especially when your father's got a bunch of liquor in his still and supplying the

52:38

Chicago mob so there's there's just so many aspects of this that Whenever I begin

52:46

My research I was researching William Branham from a historical slash

52:51

Religious aspect because I truly thought that he was a religious man

52:58

I truly thought that he had Some experience whether it was a true experience or a false one

53:04

I don't know But I thought he had some religious experience that made him want to became you become a religious person

53:11

But I'll be honest after The research that you've mentioned and some of the research that we'll be discussing in the next episode.

53:20

I Actually took a different pathway in my research and started studying all of the men who went into hiding

53:26

After Prohibition was lifted. I don't know if you have studied this but during the time that it was

53:35

Illegal to get the alcohol These guys were like heroes they would walk out and they're like movie stars, right?

53:43

they're walking out in their fancy suits and they're You know dodging the government somehow and they're getting the people liquor

53:52

Well, once people could get it for themselves. These were no longer heroes. These were just common criminals and They all had to go in hiding.

54:00

I found this one mountain I can't remember what state that was in but the entire mountain there was a hotel built in the face of the mountain and It was the hideout for all of the big names that just literally couldn't hide

54:16

The hotel was a front and then there was a false door that went way deep into the mountain and there was a second living space back there

54:25

So you had all of these mobsters who went into hiding and you know

54:32

Caves and whatnot, but you also had people that went into hiding in public view

54:37

And so the thought occurred to me did William Branham was he part of this did he go in hiding in public view or did he have a real conversion and That question led me to Researching what we'll be covering in the next episode

54:54

What he claims is his conversion in some of his stage personas. Yes Excellent, I'm excited to get into that and also get into Roy Davis, so John, I appreciate you coming on today and we'll go and wrap things up on that note so I'm sure this is if you've enjoyed the first part of our historical

55:16

Weird history historical origin story version of cultish as well. It's uncharted wars for us.

55:22

We're having a blast so far So if you're enjoying this episode or you have thoughts on this first section on William Branham with John Collins again

55:31

John just real quick to tell them again Where can they find you again that they want to look further into these materials you're discussing

55:39

You can find me on William dash Branham org also on Amazon in the book preacher behind the white hoods a critical examination of William Branham and his message and Last on alternative considerations of Jonestown and People's Temple you'll find several articles in the newsletters

55:59

Okay, excellent Well, thank you all for listening and we will talk to you all next time on cultish and as always if you feel led

56:06

To partner with us and donate be part of this ministry You can always go to the cultist show and calm where you can donate one time or monthly