Did Jim Morrison's Dad Start the Vietnam War?

Summary

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Podcast Summary: American History Hotline

Episode: "Did Jim Morrison's Dad Start the Vietnam War?"

Host: Bob Crawford
Guest: Jake Brennan (Host, Disgraceland)
Release Date: July 1, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode tackles the viral internet question: "Did Jim Morrison’s dad start the Vietnam War?" Host Bob Crawford is joined by Jake Brennan, the creator of the music and history podcast Disgraceland, to separate myth from fact regarding Rear Admiral George S. Morrison's involvement in the Gulf of Tonkin incident. The conversation also delves deep into Jim Morrison’s life, the generational divide between him and his father, the strange circumstances around Jim’s death, and conspiracy theories that have followed the Morrison family.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Setting the Stage: Internet Myths and the Question at Hand

• Jake Brennan introduces his interest in "disrupting the truth" and myth-testing around music legends (00:00–00:39).
• The central listener question: Did Jim Morrison's father play a direct role in starting the Vietnam War? (01:28–02:06)

2. George S. Morrison: The Admiral and the Gulf of Tonkin Incident

• Background: George Stephen Morrison was a Rear Admiral in the U.S. Navy, commanding the Pacific Fleet during the Gulf of Tonkin incident in August 1964. (02:42–03:42)
• Gulf of Tonkin Recap:
  • Aug 2, 1964: North Vietnamese patrol boats reportedly attack the USS Maddox. No U.S. casualties, minor damage. (06:42–06:57)
  • Aug 4, 1964: Maddox and USS Turner Joy report unidentified vessels; confusion and questionable evidence of an attack. (06:58–07:23)
• Jake Brennan: "Johnson's depiction of what happened was not an honest depiction of what happened. And he used that deceit to justify our involvement in the war." (05:53)

The Chain of (Mis)Communication

• George Morrison relayed corrected information up the chain that the reported second attack did not occur. The ultimate distortion of events is attributed to political leadership, notably Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and President Lyndon Johnson, not Morrison. (07:23–09:34, 09:41–11:09)
  • "He [George Morrison] was actually one of the honest brokers here." – Jake Brennan (09:41)

3. Military and Civilian Roles in the Escalation

• Commissioned officers like Morrison typically act as "honest brokers," while the distortion came from the top civilian chain: McNamara and Johnson, seeking congressional support for war. (11:09–12:33)

4. The 1960s: Cultural, Political, and Family Discord

• Jim Morrison’s Life in 1964: College student at UCLA or junior college; Doors would debut in '66. The generational gap between a WW2-admiral father and a counterculture rock frontman was stark. (20:16–22:08)
• Intergenerational Clash: "He [Jim] basically starts the Doors, calls home, tells his parents ...and his dad is like, what are you talking about? You can't sing." – Jake Brennan (21:38)
• Bob Crawford: "Maybe some dads today would be supportive, but even for a musician host like me, I'd think twice if my kid did what Jim did." (22:10)

5. The Rise of The Doors: 1960s LA Music Scene

• Industry context: Labels were hungry for new acts in LA, and The Doors combined poetry, rock, and spectacle in a way that quickly propelled them to stardom. (23:10–24:21)

6. The Jim Morrison Myth: Drugs, Death, and Conspiracy

• Both hosts reflect on their changing perspectives on Jim—admiration for artistry, but sometimes discomfort with his behavior. (25:04–26:15)
• Death in Paris (1971):
  • Died at 27, in the bathtub, Paris, July 3, 1971; declared heart failure, but rumors of a heroin overdose linger. No autopsy performed. (27:46–29:52)
  • Brennan: "He [Jim] died officially of heart failure. The unofficial cause of death is a heroin overdose, which is strange for a guy who famously hated heroin and never did heroin." (27:17)
  • Pamela Courson, Jim’s partner, and their circle may have concealed the heroin angle to avoid scandal. (32:06–32:43)

The "Count de Brutel" Connection & Drug Culture

• A French count known as a major dealer in the LA and Paris music scenes is linked to both Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin’s final days. Theory: Morrison may have accidentally snorted heroin, mistaking it for cocaine. (33:07–36:57)
  • Brennan: "Marianne Faithful attests in her autobiography, the night Jim Morrison dies, the Count gets a call at where they're staying in Paris from Pam Morrison, who says, Jim has died." (34:22)

7. Conspiracies and Cultural Memory

• Satirical Claims: Brennan once jokingly posited Jim Morrison as the Zodiac Killer. Released as an April Fool’s joke, the episode went viral, showing how easily myths spread online. (37:36–39:38)
  • “Literally the first thing you hear in the episode is this episode is satirical. ... People just blew past that.” – Jake Brennan (39:39)

8. Jim and George Morrison: Estrangement and Legacy

• Jim cut off contact with his family during Doors’ fame, possibly to avoid jeopardizing his father's military career. After Jim’s death, George Morrison honored his son in his own way, despite public myths of total estrangement or animosity. (40:29–42:08)

9. Final Reflections: Gulf of Tonkin and the Cost of Vietnam

• Bob Crawford: "There were 58,000 American casualties in the war … More than 800,000 Vietnamese deaths. Could this have all been avoided if not for the Gulf of Tonkin incident?" (42:08)
• Jake Brennan: "I think Lyndon Johnson was going to get his war no matter what." (42:39)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Segments

“He [George Morrison] was at the center of this action, but the core of the truth, I believe he was actually one of the honest brokers here.”
— Jake Brennan (09:41)

“I think at the core of a lot of epic mistakes in history … is hubris.”
— Jake Brennan (12:51)

“I always look at intention, like, what are the intentions of these folks and how do they stand to benefit by saying what they’re saying?”
— Jake Brennan (14:47)

“He was a drunken buffoon at times...but he truly was a poet. ... Even his father, later in life, had great admiration for his son’s intellect.”
— Jake Brennan (26:12)

“Literally the first thing you hear in the episode is this episode is satirical. ... People just blew past that.”
— Jake Brennan, on his viral April Fool’s episode (39:39)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• George S. Morrison’s Role in Gulf of Tonkin: 02:42–09:34
• Breakdown of the Incident & Chain of Command: 06:42–09:34
• Was There a Cover-up? (Civilian vs. Military): 11:09–12:33
• The Generational Divide (Jim & George): 20:16–22:10
• 1960s Music Scene & The Rise of The Doors: 23:10–24:21
• Jim Morrison’s Death & Heroin Theory: 27:46–36:57
• Satirical Conspiracy (Zodiac Killer): 37:36–39:39
• Estrangement/Legacy (Jim & George): 40:29–42:08
• Vietnam War’s Toll & Counterfactuals: 42:08–42:39

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Tone & Takeaways

The conversation is witty, reflective, and at times self-deprecating. While poking fun at conspiracy theories, both host and guest take seriously the importance of getting historical facts right and understanding the nuance behind famous myths and family legacies. The episode ultimately dispels the myth that George Morrison "started" the Vietnam War, tracing blame instead to political leadership and historical forces larger than any one officer.

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For Listeners:

• George Morrison did not orchestrate the Vietnam War; he faithfully relayed facts up the chain.
• Myths about famous figures' parents often obscure the real, human story.
• The strange case of Jim Morrison's death is a labyrinth of rumor, generational culture clash, and tragic circumstances—fueled by the same mythmaking that affects our reading of history itself.

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To submit your own questions or join the historical myth-busting fun, head to AmericanHistoryHotline.com.

Transcript

[Jake Brennan]

I'm really interested in disrupting the truth. You know, like, I wanted to talk to you. When it came up that I had the opportunity to talk to you, I wanted to talk to you about this because I'm in the midst of this research about Jim Morrison's death.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah.

[Jake Brennan]

And how he died is not at

[Narrator (History Channel or Documentary Voice)]

all

[Jake Brennan]

what they say the truth is. It's just not it. And I'm convinced of it. And there's a lot of cases like this that are super obvious that we just kind of accept. And that's not. To me, that's not conspiracy theorizing. It's getting at the truth.

[Bob Crawford]

You've reached American History Hotline. You ask the questions, we get the answers. Leave a message. Hey, there, American History Hotliners. Bob Crawford here. Thrilled to be joining you again for another episode of American History Hotline, the show where you ask the questions. And the best way to get us a question is through our new website, AmericanHistoryHotline.com. that's AmericanHistoryHotline.com. okay, today's question is about the Lizard King. Choose the day, the sign of the day, the day's divinity. The first thing you see, a radiant beach and a cool jeweled moon. Couples naked race down by its quiet shore. And we laugh like children in this. I don't remember it, but when I was a teenager, I knew by heart. Today we're going to answer Rick's question. He writes, I saw this thing online that Jim Morrison's father started the Vietnam War. I was like, what? Did that really happen? Well, Rick, as the kids say, that question was not on my bingo card. Luckily, I've got the perfect guest to get to the bottom of your question. Joining me now is Jake Brennan. He's the host of the podcast Disgraceland. It combines history and music. Sounds like it's right up my alley. And it's a little gritty, I have to say. Jake, welcome to the show.

[Jake Brennan]

Psyched to be here, Bob. Thanks for having me, man.

[Bob Crawford]

Jake, I apologize for my riffing on my teenage Jim Morrison poetry stance. I don't know what that is.

[Jake Brennan]

You were channeling the Lizard King.

[Interjecting Guest or Co-host]

Apologies.

[Bob Crawford]

I'm channeling my. What I'm really doing at 55 years old is channeling my youth is what I'm trying to do here.

[Jake Brennan]

Love it.

[Bob Crawford]

It doesn't hit as well at this age as it did at 19. Jake. I've read a little bit about this mystery. First off, tell me a little bit about Jim Morrison's father. What was his role in the military?

[Jake Brennan]

He was an admiral. He was the rear admiral. And he was in charge of the Pacific Fleet during the Gulf of Tonkin incident. But came. He's a military man, true and true. From. From World War II, where he was at Pearl. Pearl harbor, saw the destruction there, and he was on a fast track to becoming an officer. And Jim grew up. He's a, you know, born of the baby boom. And Jim grew up with his two siblings, as, you know, what they call military brats, so to speak. And he lived in and around bases. His dad was in the Navy, so it was a little different from, you know, being in the Air Force or in the army where, you know, not only are you going to where his. Your father is stationed, if you're Jim Morrison, but then your dad is off at sea for a large chunk of that time. And that was his upbringing, basically in and around these Naval bases throughout the United States while his dad is sort of climbing the ranks through the officer class.

[Bob Crawford]

So tell us about the Gulf of Tonkin incident. That's August of 1964. So where was that and what was Jim Morrison's father doing there?

[Jake Brennan]

So the Gulf of Tonkin incident, this is in and around Vietnam. And we had American warships stationed prior to the Vietnam War where we had a small amount of small military presence, quote, unquote, advisors, as they called them in Vietnam, who were, again, quote, unquote, advising the South Vietnamese in the conflict with the North Vietnamese. This is 1964, and Jim Morrison's father is there, and he's in charge of the entire fleet. He's the guy. He's the Johnny on the spot being commanded, I believe, from Pearl Harbor. But he is the guy who is there and, like I said, in charge of command of the fleet that is advising the South Vietnamese.

[Bob Crawford]

So the. But the attack itself, there's some mystery surrounding it, right?

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah, this is one of those. I have a complicated relationship with conspiracy theories.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah, me too. Tell me yours.

[Jake Brennan]

Well, I'm not a conspiracy theorist. And I. And I have a different. I don't. You know, a lot of people think conspiracy theories are like a bunch of guys get in a room and they kind of get their pens out and they make a plan, and then they go off and they kill the President and no one says anything. And that's just not how I think these things happen. I remember a time not too long ago when you were considered to be wearing a tinfoil hat if you thought that John F. Kennedy Jr. I'm sorry, John F. Kennedy was assassinated by anyone besides Lee Harvey Oswald and Now it's kind of grown into accepted fact. And I've always believed that somebody else was acting besides Oswald or perhaps with Oswald. But that's kind of the thing with Gulf of Tonka. There was a time when it was considered to be pure conspiracy. If you believed that anything nefarious went on there that the then President, Lyndon Johnson in 1964 used to secure support from Congress to fund the military conflict that became the Vietnam War. But now it's kind of accepted as fact where, yeah, it was. I don't want to say it wasn't a false flag. A lot of people say that. They say it was a false flag, but by the very definition of a false flag, it was not that, but it was not. Johnson's depiction of what happened was not an honest depiction of what happened. And he used that deceit to justify our involvement in the war.

[Bob Crawford]

So I'm going to just confess here. I don't know. I know general facts about the Vietnam War, but that World War II as well. Like, this is not my 20th century, is not my area of what I would say if I have one Expertise, like, sure, 19th century, 1820, 1850 is kind of my ball game.

[Narrator (History Channel or Documentary Voice)]

Yeah.

[Bob Crawford]

So. So I'm going on just what I've researched, but it sound. Sounds like on August 2, 1964, several North Vietnamese patrol boats attacked the destroyer the Maddox.

[Jake Brennan]

That's correct.

[Bob Crawford]

There were no US Casualties.

[Jake Brennan]

That's correct.

[Bob Crawford]

And the vessel escaped, having only been hit by a single bullet. Allegedly. Right. On August 4th, both the Maddox and the USS Turner Joy reported that several unidentified vessels were approaching their positions. So there's no evidence that the Vietnamese attacked the US Maddox or the Turner Joy on August 4, when you get

[Jake Brennan]

into the nitty gritty of it, you're absolutely right. The depiction is pretty spot on. August 2nd, shots were fired at US Naval at the destroyer the Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin. Now, whether the Maddox fired first on the torpedo boats from the North Vietnamese, that's up for debate. But there was a skirmish, and we essentially destroyed the North Vietnamese torpedo boats that were in the skirmish with the Maddox. Two days later, there's another skirmish. And what happens here, however, it's a different day on the 2nd. It's a beautiful day. It's sunny, there's no clouds. You can see forever. On the 4th, it's kind of the opposite. It's not raining, but it's cloudy. It's overcast, it's hard to see, you know, it's hard to see, you know, with the planes that were giving coverage and they couldn't. They couldn't see in the ocean as well either, because it was. The weather was different. Supposedly there's more shots are fired on these US Naval ships and they fire back. Now, what happens is immediately after this interaction, whoever's commanding the boat that was in the action, they immediately radio in that, oh, we got this wrong. We misread our intelligence. We don't believe we were at. That these boats were coming for us and that we're attacked. And as I've read it, Jim Morrison's father, George Stephen Morrison, who again is in command of these ships, he finds out what actually happened, and he actually radios into Pearl harbor, which is the command here, and says, hey, we weren't actually fired upon. And they then relay that information to the Secretary of defense, Robert McNamara. And as the story goes, which I don't necessarily believe, McNamara fails to give this crucial detail to President Johnson because they want the war. Or so the story goes.

[Bob Crawford]

So just to clarify here, there's no evidence that George Morrison lied about any of this.

[Jake Brennan]

No. But in the popular culture, there is this myth that exists, and you can go on YouTube and you can go on Twitter and you can watch clips of big name podcasters who are MMA fighters talking about. Talking about. And I've had fun with this as well, because it's. It's a cute story. You know, the singer of the Doors, his dad is responsible for the Vietnam War. It's not entirely accurate. He was at the center of this action, but the core of the truth, I believe he was actually one of the honest brokers here.

[Interjecting Guest or Co-host]

Right.

[Jake Brennan]

And I don't believe that Robert McNamara was honest. I don't necessarily believe he withheld the information from his commander in chief. You know, maybe he gave him a version of the truth and they massaged the truth to get what they wanted out of Congress, which was funding for the military action. We never actually declared war. I don't believe in Vietnam, but it was just a prolonged action. But that was the point where he actually secured the funds to escalate. And within a year, we had 2,000 ground troops on the ground in Vietnam because of that incident. Now, Jim Morrison's dad, there was no stink on him after this. His career goes off like gangbusters after this. I mean, he has a pretty, pretty decorated career throughout the time that Jim's fame is sort of taking off and his celebrity is exploding. And even beyond after Jim's death, you know, it's.

[Bob Crawford]

I think my perception is that probably 90% of the time. The commissioned officers are honest brokers.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

They're calling it the way they see it.

[Jake Brennan]

Yep.

[Bob Crawford]

It's the civilian leaders. Right.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

We.

[Bob Crawford]

That's what we do in this country. We have civilian leaders in charge of the military, the Defense secretary. So it. It does not strain my credulity. Doesn't strain credulity for me to think that if there was a lie here, it came from the top of the chain, which, beneath Kennedy or beneath Johnson was McNamara. Tell me. So before the Gulf of Tonkin. Just. Again, I'm expressing my own ignorance here. It was a conflict. Right. Like we weren't at war in Vietnam until the Gulf of Tonkin.

[Jake Brennan]

That's correct. That's absolutely correct. And Kennedy had committed the troops there at first and was, by all accounts, going to scale back America's involvement in Vietnam. And Johnson wanted. Wanted the war, supposedly. For what reasons? I mean, there's some pretty craven reasons that people talk about. He held stock in some of the military industrial companies that would have benefited from the war. But this is so bleak.

[Bob Crawford]

What else you got?

[Jake Brennan]

I know. It's so. It's so bleak. It's so easy. It just. It doesn't. You know what I mean? I think. I think what's at a. At the core of a lot of epic mistakes in history, including the assassination of John F. Kennedy, is hubris.

[Bob Crawford]

That's right.

[Jake Brennan]

And I think that. That more than anything, had to do. Johnson saw himself as this, and he was. He was larger than life. And I'm sure he felt a level of invincibility after just assassinating the President. No, I'm kidding. After becoming president. And I'm joking about that. And. And really felt that he. He was doing what was in the interest of the American people. But as we all learned, it really wasn't.

[Bob Crawford]

I think we. People grab for conspiracy theories because they're looking for an easy answer. Like, that's the. That's kind of making sense of a world that makes no sense.

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah. Yeah. And I. I don't understand. I mean, I'm. I'm really interested in. In disrupting the truth. You know, like, I. I wanted to talk to you when. When it came up that I had the opportunity to talk to you, I wanted to talk to you about this because I'm in the midst of this research about Jim Morrison's death.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah.

[Jake Brennan]

And how he died is not at all what is ex. What the. What they say the truth is. It's just not it. And I'm convinced of it. And there's A lot of cases like this that are super obvious, that we just kind of accept. And that's not. To me, that's not conspiracy theorizing. It's getting at the truth. It's the same thing with the gentleman who was on your show a couple episodes ago talking about where Thomas Jefferson got the inspiration for the Declaration of Independence.

[Bob Crawford]

It's like, what?

[Jake Brennan]

We don't want to know the truth? Why wouldn't we want to know the truth? It doesn't make us conspiracy theorists.

[Bob Crawford]

You know, what gives credit to that claim for me personally is John Adams called him on it.

[Jake Brennan]

Right, right.

[Bob Crawford]

And that's totally. That's an area where I do have some expertise in the Adams family. And that is a first rate John Adams move for him to give Jefferson crap over that.

[Jake Brennan]

Right.

[Bob Crawford]

That's what buddies do.

[Jake Brennan]

And you. And, you know, the character of John Adams.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah.

[Jake Brennan]

And, you know, I always look at intention, like, what are the intentions of these folks and how do they stand to benefit by saying what they're saying? And oftentimes when somebody is saying that something is true and it.

[Bob Crawford]

And it.

[Jake Brennan]

It can come back, they don't benefit from, from saying it. You know what I mean? Like, what is John Adams? I mean, at the point he's saying that to Jefferson, These guys are in their 80s. They've already, like, outlived their life expectancy.

[Bob Crawford]

Right.

[Jake Brennan]

You know what I mean? Like, there was no X, There was no YouTube. They're not, they're not fishing for clicks, you know what I mean?

[Bob Crawford]

And they had, they had fixed their. They had repaired the breach in their friendship.

[Jake Brennan]

Right?

[Bob Crawford]

So, like, of course your buddy's going to call you and call you on your bs, Right? Right, right.

[Jake Brennan]

Exactly.

[Bob Crawford]

That's how we do.

[Jake Brennan]

Exactly.

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[Jake Brennan]

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[Bob Crawford]

This is American History Hotline. I'm your host Bob Crawford. Today my guest is Jake Brennan. He is the host of the podcast Disgraceland. We're talking about Jim Morrison's father, George Morrison possibly starting the Vietnam War. Remember, send us your burning questions about American history to our brand new website, American History Hotline.com AmericanHistoryHotline.com I want to say AmericanHistoryHotlineMail.com but we are no longer just a gmail account. We are now a bonafide webpage americanhistoryhighline.com now back to the show. Okay, so George Morrison. He is either unwittingly or wittingly getting us involved in the Vietnam War. The Conflict that will define the culture. Like. Right. Not only the direction of the country militaristically or in foreign affairs, but this war, 1964 is going to define the rest of the 60s and half of the 70s. And really, if you think about born in the USA and what comes in

[Jake Brennan]

the 80s even now, the.

[Bob Crawford]

Yes, it's going to define the rest of the 20th century.

[Jake Brennan]

I mean, think of our politics today and, and, and the, the, the people, the baby boomers who are still in power and they are still, they have massive influence on us. And all that was born of Vietnam, of that conflict.

[Bob Crawford]

So while George Morrison was doing this, what was Jim Morrison doing in 64?

[Jake Brennan]

In 64, Morrison, I think is at UCLA at this point and he just graduated college and he, by the way,

[Bob Crawford]

just a little table setting. The Beatles have just performed on Ed Sullivan. Like, you know, that's 64, right?

[Jake Brennan]

Yes, 64. Early 64 is the Beatles. Kennedy, of course, is assassinated in late 63. Morrison might be in junior college before UCLA. Before UCLA. First Doors album comes out in 66, I think. So 64, 65, he ends up in UCLA. But he, he famously had a, the depiction of his relationship with his family is really sad. It's, it's really, it's too simplistic. You know, it's there. He basically starts the Doors, calls home, tells his parents he's going to be in a rock band, he's not going to go to Hollywood and make films. And his dad is like, what are you talking about? You can't sing. His dad has an honest reaction. And I know that sounds so harsh through the lens of modern parenting, but you have to keep in mind the context of the difference in those generations. You have a military man, a World War II veteran, and you have the first and most radically different generation of children compared to their parents that America's ever seen. Like, this is like long hair, meaning just hair beyond your ears. You know what I mean? Everything is extremely radical and these parents don't understand. And it comes off now as being completely insensitive and ignorant. But I can understand how a father would be like, well, I've heard you sing, man.

[Interjecting Guest or Co-host]

You can't. What are you doing? You can't.

[Bob Crawford]

Any father, you don't want your, you know, I mean, it just right. I mean, maybe some dads today.

[Jake Brennan]

I mean, yeah, I mean, look, I was a full time musician myself and I have, I, I, I'm gonna, my kid plays bass and you know, God bless him. But if he comes to me when he's 18. He's like, dad, I'm gonna start a band and go on the road. Basically, what I did, I'm gonna be like, don't do that.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah, you're gonna be.

[Jake Brennan]

It's so hard.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

It's so hard.

[Jake Brennan]

Let's find an easier path.

[Paramount/BET Advertiser]

So.

[Jake Brennan]

But he got the 19, the early 60s version of that from his dad. And the Doors take off very quickly. Very quickly. And there's a story about his younger brother is at home one day, and his friend comes over the house, and he's like, dude, check this out. And he shows him the first Doors album with Jim on the COVID And he's like, oh, my God. And the young brother realizes, I've been listening to Light My Fire now for months, and I didn't know it was my brother. No idea.

[Bob Crawford]

So why did the Doors take so quickly? Like, what was it? Was it that the Beatles had hit and then the Stones hit and, like, labels are just signing these bands left and right? Or is it, like. Was it something else?

[Jake Brennan]

I think it was a combination of a little bit of what you're talking about. It was right place, right time. It was Southern California, it was Venice, it was Los Angeles, Sunset Strip and the Whiskey. Right when that scene was a hotbed for the music industry looking for new acts. You have the Laurel Canyon thing starting to take place up there. And you have. Honestly, you have the record industry spending a lot of money to make a lot of money. There wasn't a ton of competition. Competition. And the Doors were great. I don't care what anybody says. And I've had my ups and downs with the Doors. They were an objectively great band. And Jim Morrison was objectively one of the greatest front men to ever do it. And at the time, he was completely unique. There was no one like him that had that. That. The poetry, plus the sort of rock star piece of it as well. And he was a phenomenon. The band. They wrote hits, man. They wrote huge hits.

[Bob Crawford]

Yeah, there's no. There's no, like, look, I think the Soft Parade is incredible album.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

I think. What is the One Love Street?

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

What else?

[Bob Crawford]

What song? What albums that on? Waiting for the Sun. Waiting for the Sun's incredible.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

I mean, I think.

[Bob Crawford]

I think they have a lot of great songs. They were a great band. You know, I started this episode by quoting. Is it Ghost Dance or Ghost Song? One of his. Jim Morrison's poems that I just remember from being a teenager. And I want to ask you what I was going to lead into here before I got on this little Tangent is drug culture and how important drug culture was to music culture at this time. At this particular time.

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah.

[Bob Crawford]

And so I hit a point going through a lot of the things that I've had to challenges I've had as an adult where I look at Jim Morrison, I'm like, man, he was just an ego maniac, drug addict kid who really hadn't lived. You know, he just. He was just so. So anyway, I was. I was critical, you know, to my wife about him a few times. And I will never live it down, I'm sure. And if I do compliment his music, it just. Whatever, but. But no, I have to say that I went through a period where I absolutely love their music and I still appreciate the musicality of it. I just hit a point in life where the personality of Jim Morrison I could no longer relate to.

[Jake Brennan]

Oh, yeah, I hear that completely. And I've had my same bouts with the caricature of Jim. And we did a whole series in our 27 Club series. We did like 10 episodes on Jim where we really get into the buffoonery of it. That's part.

[Bob Crawford]

Right, right. That is it.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

That's it.

[Bob Crawford]

Yes.

[Jake Brennan]

He was a drunken buffoon at times.

[Bob Crawford]

That's right. That's what I'm getting at.

[Jake Brennan]

There's no denying it. But he had a very juvenile point of view on drugs and alcohol and living life. And his idea of living life. You say he hadn't lived, and there's an argument to be made for that, for sure. But he would, I think, tell you that he lived more full than most people ever did. And that was part of his whole trip. But he comes off, like I said, as a drunken buffoon a lot of times. Meanwhile, I actually think he truly was a poet. I mean, truly, truly. And he was very well read. And even when you see interviews with his father later in life, he has great admiration for his son's intellect, if not his singing ability. But I think that he died at 27, and the story ends for us there with him. I think had he lived, his artistry would have taken on more of a serious tone. That assumes that he would have gotten through his alcoholism. And the drug culture thing that you reference is kind of misleading with Jim Morrison because, you know, he died officially of heart failure. The unofficial cause of death is a heroin overdose, which is strange for a guy who famously hated heroin and never did heroin.

[Bob Crawford]

All right, well, let's talk about this. I was going to save this for later, but we're here, so let's just talk about this talk about his death and what you've learned about it.

[Jake Brennan]

Well, he dies in Paris. And of course, the myth we heard growing up, we're relatively the same age, was that he faked his own death so that he could escape the trappings of rock stardom.

[Bob Crawford]

Yes, of course he did.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

And.

[Jake Brennan]

And there's actually. If you know the details that were known at the time when he died, first of all, faking his own death is in character with how he lived.

[Bob Crawford]

Right.

[Jake Brennan]

Even his sister is like, oh, yeah, that's totally something he would have done. But. And the details we had is a guy from the management company heads over to Paris immediately after he finds out that he died, and there's a death certificate, and the casket's closed, and they're, like, gonna bury him that day. And there was no autopsy. And this is. This information starts to peter out, and people are like, well, that's sketchy. And then the myth takes hold that he. That he faked his death. But there are numerous accounts since then of. Of tens of people in and out of that apartment in the. In the immediate hours and day after he died with the body just lying there.

[Bob Crawford]

Like, how long did the. How long was he dead before he was discovered? He was.

[Jake Brennan]

He was discovered that, like, hours after he died. And there's some debate about how many hours by his common law wife, Pamela Corson, who calls author, and she calls a couple of friends, and they come over, and it's like. It's kind of a shit show. It's like cops, detectives, investigators, firemen. Everyone's coming, the doors open. I've read depictions of. Of, like, neighbors who lived in the building who just kind of wandered in to see what was happening. And there was Jim's body lying on the bed. You know, so there. There's a lot of. A lot of credible evidence of people seeing the body, even though nobody besides Pamela and two of his friends who were there in the immediate aftermath can attest to seeing the body. But those two friends, their. Their accounts didn't come out until years later.

[Bob Crawford]

But there's confirmation that he was dead.

[Jake Brennan]

There's confirmation that he was dead. There is no autopsy. There's a.

[Bob Crawford]

But, but. But we do know that. And again, I know nothing about this or if I knew anything about it

[Jake Brennan]

as a younger man when I was

[Bob Crawford]

really into this stuff, I've forgotten it.

[Paramount/BET Advertiser]

So.

[Bob Crawford]

So. But just so I understand this, so he. He dies.

[Taco Bell Advertiser]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

His. His wife, for all. For, you know, lack of better description, finds him, know something's wrong. He's not responsive. He's unresponsive. She calls friends and she calls the authorities. Yes, the authorities come and they're like, he's dead.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

And they put him in a bag and they zip him up.

[Jake Brennan]

No, no, no, no.

[Bob Crawford]

Oh, okay.

[Tom Hanks (Narrator for WWII Documentary)]

Okay.

[Jake Brennan]

He's dead. He's in the tub filled with water.

[Bob Crawford]

Dies.

[Jake Brennan]

Dies in the bathtub.

[Bob Crawford]

Okay.

[Jake Brennan]

They. It's 4th of July weekend. Not that that mattered over there. It mattered here, but it is the weekend. He dies on a Friday night going into a Saturday.

[Bob Crawford]

Okay.

[Jake Brennan]

And they're French. I don't know, but it's something with the culture. They're basically like, we're not moving the body.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

What?

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah. And she doesn't want them to move the body yet because she wants to have more time with Jim. So they.

[Bob Crawford]

But he's in this way. Like, I'm just imagining the physics of this, or the. He's there. You have a dead body, which is probably immediately begins to decompose in some ways. And he's in water, which I know if you take a long bath, your fingers prune.

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah.

[Bob Crawford]

So what's going on here?

[Jake Brennan]

They pack the tub with ice.

[Bob Crawford]

And the authorities are okay with this?

[Jake Brennan]

They're okay with this.

[Bob Crawford]

And she blur.

[Interjecting Guest or Co-host]

She.

[Jake Brennan]

She stays with her beautiful Jim, as she calls him, for a couple days, until.

[Narrator (History Channel or Documentary Voice)]

Days?

[Jake Brennan]

Yeah, I think it was. It was at least a night. It might have been two nights. I'm not exactly sure. This has nothing to do with the mystery.

[Bob Crawford]

However, we know. We know this. This is all fact.

[Jake Brennan]

This is all fact. However, the official cause of death.

[Narrator (History Channel or Documentary Voice)]

What?

[Jake Brennan]

They were very concerned, they did not want it to get out, that he died from a heroin overdose.

[Bob Crawford]

Who was they?

[Jake Brennan]

Pam, his common law wife, also a notorious heroin addict. And again, Jim did not do heroin. And he has two friends there, Alan, his last name is escaping me, and a female filmmaker at the time. They're both there. And they didn't want the heroin news to come out because it's just then it was so much more risque than it is now. And they didn't want that to be the cause of death. So they get the heart failure, cause of death that they want. There's nothing to do with heroin on the death certificate.

[Bob Crawford]

And so was it easy to work the refs, if you will, to work the French authorities, the Parisian authorities, and say, we prefer you not write heroin here.

[Jake Brennan]

But you say, there's no autopsy.

[Bob Crawford]

So how do you prove heroin?

[Jake Brennan]

Exactly. And now here's where it gets really interesting. Again, he didn't use heroin. She did Use heroin.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

Right.

[Jake Brennan]

But he did not use heroin. This is the thing. You talk to anybody who knew him, and he did not use heroin. And there's this really shady character who Pamela was seeing over the course of her relationship with Jim. The guy's name is Count de Brutel, who was a French. Literally a French count. He was a young, young guy who had diplomatic parents and used those connections after he started going to ucla, use those connections to curry drugs from Turkey and Morocco into Los Angeles. And he was basically the heroin dealer to the stars.

[Bob Crawford]

So do. How do we know this aspect of it?

[Jake Brennan]

This is who this guy was, and

[Bob Crawford]

was he ever caught doing this?

[Jake Brennan]

This is very well documented by numerous people in the music industry. In fact, it's. I haven't been able to totally lock this down. I will at some point or I won't. But it's believed that he supplied Janis Joplin with the heroin that killed her.

[Bob Crawford]

Okay, who do we. Do we have any musicians that we would know?

[Jake Brennan]

Oh, yeah.

[Bob Crawford]

Okay, give me a couple names. A name.

[Jake Brennan]

So the Count. Okay.

[Narrator (History Channel or Documentary Voice)]

Okay.

[Jake Brennan]

The Count. The day Janis Joplin dies in Los Angeles, which is like couple months or the year, six months before Jim Morrison, something like that. Jim's in LA when she dies. Nine other people die from heroin that weekend in. In Los Angeles, all connected to the same connection of heroin, including this comes from a singer named Ms. Mercy, who was part of the GTOS, which was part of Frank Zappa's Cavalcade of Stars. They were a band that he was mentoring. But that's. That's small potatoes compared with the next bit of information we get. While the Count was seeing Pamela Morrison, who Jim hated the Count, he was also seeing Marianne Faithful, who he hooked up with through his affiliation with Keith Richards. Now, you have to remember this exact same time that Jim Morrison dies in France. The Stones are at the south of France making exile on Main Street. And the Count, prior to coming to France, was living in Keith Richards home in England, which is where he connects with Marianne Faithfull. Goes to Paris with Marianne Faithfull. Okay. Marianne Faithfull attests in her autobiography, the night Jim Morrison dies, the Count gets a call at where they're staying in Paris from Pam Morrison, who says, Jim has died. Right. Marian Faithful doesn't know what's going on on the phone yet, but she just knows that. That she has an opportunity here to potentially meet Jim Morrison. So she's like, great, I want to come, you know? And then all of a sudden, he's like, no, you're staying Here, I'm going by myself. He goes over there. There's other accounts. Again, this Allen guy, whose name is escaping me, and the. The filmmaker, the friends of Jim Morrison, who are at. At the home when the Count gets there. So basically, the Count is summoned, the theory is, by Pamela on cleanup duty. Because if you've seen the movie the French Connection, that heroin, which had. Which the Count was trafficking, was a type of heroin that was called cotton candy because of the way it looked. It was pink. It was whitish. It looked like cocaine. And what Marianne Faithful attests to. And again, we talk about John Adams and the incentive here to lie or to tell the truth. Marian Faithful has no incentive to lie. Her take is that Jim Morrison found what he thought to be cocaine in the apartment, snorted it. It was actually Pam's heroin, and that's how he overdosed. And that the Count was there on cleanup duty with Pamela.

[Tom Hanks (Narrator for WWII Documentary)]

Wow.

[Jake Brennan]

Pretty nuts. And there's a lot more to it. I'm gonna have it all in an episode. I'll have it all laid out, sourced, the entire thing. But when you look at Marianne Faithfull's account of this, there's no incentive for her to lie. In fact, it's the opposite.

[Bob Crawford]

So it's funny. We start this on one conspiracy theory about the. About Jim's father in the beginning of the Vietnam War.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

And here we've come to this other conspiracy theory, but there's yet another conspiracy theory involving Jim Morrison.

[Jake Brennan]

Okay.

[Bob Crawford]

And I want to pivot to that for a moment before we can conclude you made the claim that Jim Morrison was the Zodiac Killer. Yes, but it's. It was a joke. Yes, it was a joke. Right.

[Jake Brennan]

Total satire.

[Interjecting Guest or Co-host]

Yes.

[Bob Crawford]

But it went viral.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes, it did.

[Bob Crawford]

So where did you get the idea? And did you expect it people to be so receptive to it?

[Jake Brennan]

I did not expect the reaction. This is back in around. I released that episode in 2019. Here's what happened. I heard someone made the claim that Ted Cruz was. Was the Zodiac Killer. And I was really. Oh, my gosh. I was really offended by the lack of intellectual curiosity that's behind that, because it just doesn't line up. Like, his height doesn't line up. His age doesn't line up. And I started to think, because I had started disgrace. I watched the music podcast. I was like, what rock stars could actually be? Because you make the claim with the Zodiac Killer, and I mean, what time

[Bob Crawford]

period is the Zodiac Killer?

[Jake Brennan]

Oh, this exact same time. This is the beauty of this theory that is complete and total.

[Bob Crawford]

Just I mean, because you've got Charles Manson around this time doing causing mayhem and murder and whatnot. So it's not completely out of the realm of at least conceiving it. Right. Putting a rock star in that situation.

[Jake Brennan]

Yes, exactly. And when I looked into the Doors tour dates and I realized that the off dates were days when zodiacs victims were killed in California, I really knew I was onto something. Not to mention the. The height and weight of Jim Morrison is a big guy. You could make that correlation as well. So I released it as a April Fool's episode on a day, on a Monday. My episodes typically come out on Tuesdays. And I came in with an emergency episode on a Monday. And literally the first thing you hear in the episode is this episode is satirical. That's the first thing you hear. But people just blew past that.

[Bob Crawford]

Of course they did.

[Jake Brennan]

And thank God. And it took off. And it actually. I mean, it was covered. It was all over the Internet, but it was covered. In Boston, where I'm from, it was covered. A news station ran with it. It really freaked me out. It really was like a lot of people were writing in, they missed the joke part of it. Even at the end, I say, this is an April Fool's joke. You know, it was released on the 1st of April, and it really freaked me out. But, you know, since then, the joke is obvious. And if you listen to it, I mean, come on, it's so. It's so crazy.

[Bob Crawford]

So circling back to the original topic of this conversation, the Gulf of Tonkin and George Morrison and his involvement in that. Do we. Did Jim Morrison ever talk about this?

[Jake Brennan]

No. He distanced himself from his, like, completely just clean break. Yeah, he. He even claimed they were killed.

[Bob Crawford]

So he never. So from the time the Doors began to his own passing, he never spoke with anyone in his family.

[Jake Brennan]

He spoke with his mom a couple times on the phone. He did. He did speak with his sister. I'm not sure about his little brother. I think he had a pretty good relationship with his sister, actually. And, you know, the dad. I believe it's the family's contention that the reason Jim estranged himself was because he didn't want to mess up his dad's career.

[Additional Guest or Commentator]

He didn't.

[Jake Brennan]

He didn't want to become this sort of famous albatross to his father, who was climbing the ranks. And if you.

[Bob Crawford]

If you.

[Jake Brennan]

Actually, it's quite heartbreaking, and I have a large amount of empathy for. For George. Stephen Morrison, if you. If you watch the interview with. That he gave toward the end of his life about his son. It's, it's very honest and it's, it's kind of heartbreaking and just in it's, it's brutally honest. This guy who never really knew his son, but clearly has a lot of reverence for, for what his son achieved and went to great lengths to make sure that his grave, that the, the, that the monument that's there is, is in keeping with what Jim would have wanted. He hired like a, a guy who is a Greek guy to come up with the quote and made sure that it, that it was something that Jim would want. And it's really a, he gives a beautiful tribute to his son, which completely is in contrast with the depiction of their relationship, the rock God and the sort of rear admiral naval officer father.

[Bob Crawford]

Well, because of the direction this conversation turned, I've enjoyed every, every minute of a minute of it, by the way. But circling back to the Vietnam war, there were 58,000American casualties in the war, according to the National US National Archives. A majority of those were killed in action. There were more than 800,000 Vietnamese deaths. Could this have all been avoided if not for the Gulf of Tonkin incident?

[Jake Brennan]

I think Lyndon Johnson was going to get his war no matter what.

[Bob Crawford]

No matter what. Yeah. Well, Jake, this has been an incredible conversation. I've enjoyed our time together. Really excited about your podcast. I'm going to dive in after talking with you today and become an expert on all you do. And I hope you would consider coming on the show again sometime.

[Jake Brennan]

Bob would love it. Your show is my new favorite podcast. I'm pumped to have been given the opportunity to come on here and talk to you today and to your fans. So thank you so much.

[Bob Crawford]

Jake Brennan is the host of the Disgraceland Podcast. It is a fun show. Please add it to your list. Jake, thanks for joining us today on American History Hotline.

[Jake Brennan]

My pleasure.

[Bob Crawford]

You've been listening to American History Hotline, a production of Iheart Podcasts and Scratch Track Productions. The show's executive producer is James Morrison. Our executive producers from IHEART are Jordan Runtal and Jason English. Original music composed by me, Bob Crawford. Please keep in touch. Our email is americanhistoryhotlinemail.com if you like the show, please tell your friends and leave us a review in Apple Podcasts. I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Feel free to hit me up on social media to ask a history question or to let me know what you think of the show. You can find me bobcrawford Bass. Thanks so much for listening. See you next week.

[Reese Witherspoon]

Reese witherspoon here, checking into my favorite hotel in Paris.

[Jake Brennan]

Bonjour. Bonjour.

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That was a lot. I need to lie down. Is the room ready?

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