Conspiracy Theories — Holiday Favorites: The Tape Library

Podcast: Conspiracy Theories (Spotify Studios)
Episode: Holiday Favorites: The Tape Library
Date: December 31, 2025

Episode Overview

The featured “Tape Library” episode is a chilling, atmospheric deep-dive into the legends, folklore, and mysteries of the Arctic, focusing on both supernatural stories and true, unsettling events from the frozen North. From haunted trappers to vanished villages, the episode explores how the harsh Arctic environment fosters tales of spirits, monsters, and historical tragedies that blur the line between legend and reality. It's presented with a tone of “cozy horror”—inviting listeners to contemplate terrors lurking just outside the limits of understanding, all set against the stark, unforgiving backdrop of the Arctic.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction to Arctic Legends

• [00:36 – 01:53] The host sets the mood, introducing the Arctic as a land rich with darkness and unexplained mysteries, carrying tales that span indigenous folklore, explorers’ accounts, and modern legends.
• Arctic is depicted not as a singular locale but as a mythic expanse—where reality “thins, and anything can happen.”

2. The Legend of Esau, the Phantom Trapper

• [01:58 – 09:17]
  • Story: A traveler, badly injured in a snowstorm, is mysteriously rescued by a figure in white fur and a dog sled, then found unconscious on the steps of a village bar.
  • The villager George tells him:
    “You met him then? Esau. ...You can’t thank Esau. He’s dead. He’s been dead for a long, long time.” [07:26]
  • Backstory: Esau was a violent, ostracized trapper who died in a storm. After death, reports began of a spectral figure helping lost or dying travelers, leading people to safety before vanishing.
  • Interpretation: The tale paints Esau as a tragic antihero, condemned in the afterlife to guide lost souls and make amends for his life.
  • Quote:

    “They call him the Phantom Trapper, and he is just one of the horrifying legends of the Arctic.” [09:09]

3. Explorers’ Uncanny Experiences & Indigenous Folklore

• [10:42 – 23:32]
  • Setting: The Arctic’s darkness is not just literal but mythic—a place where “sound itself had frozen.”
  • Strange Encounters:
    • Robert Peary (American explorer, 1909): Describes unexplained lantern-like lights hovering on the ice, wavering shapes.
    • Fridjof Nansen (Norwegian explorer): Heard “a babble of indistinguishable words, as if the ice itself were speaking,” and a “metallic ringing that started and ceased without calling.” [Approx. 13:10–14:15]
    • Roald Amundsen: Allegedly saw tall silhouettes and strange lights; Soviet radio operators later reported voices from the ice.
  • Skepticism: Scientists often chalk these up to natural phenomena—auroras, ice noise, hallucinations—but the lore lingers.

Notable Inuit & Arctic Myths:

• Qalupalik:

  • Lures children to icy water with a humming sound, then drags them under.
  • “Described as a green-skinned figure, human-shaped but wrong in every way...long black hair...fingers tapered into claws.” [16:32]

• Idlirviit Song / Laughing Spirit (Shadow Jester):

  • Approaches travelers by mocking their shadows, causes disorientation and madness.
  • “The laughter is its calling card...If the Idlirviit Song laughs at you, you must not laugh back. To do this is to invite the spirit into your mind.” [18:11]

• Tornit:

  • Giant, strong, human-like beings—timid, fled to the north after conflict with Inuit.

4. Other Haunting Arctic Legends

• [24:27 – 36:52]

  • Ki Vittok (“Mountain Walker” – Greenland):

    • Human-like spirits, sometimes vengeful, who wander the horizon and may abduct people at night.

  • Augustus Piers (Canada):

    • A fur trader who, after being buried against his wishes, was said to protect those moving his remains—his voice warning of wolves and wolverines, and his spectral presence seen by the men.

  • Lapland Haunted Cabin:

    • Origin of reported poltergeist activity, including items being thrown, wood chopped with no one present. A skeleton was found in the attic, deepening its mystery.

  • Arctic Spring Hotel (Alaska):

    • Rumored hauntings: unexplained noises, doors slamming, a phantom woman in the library, and a three-headed, seven-foot-tall entity said to radiate hostility.
    • Bill, the caretaker, believed, “it wasn’t malicious… it just seemed to like me.”
    • Psychic Amy Allen: “Many of those spirits warned her about a large, dangerous man haunting the building.” [approx. 33:40]
    • The hotel remains closed.

  • Icelandic Christmas Folklore:

    • Yule Cat: Enormous feline “that eats anyone who hasn’t gotten new clothes before Christmas Eve.”
    • Grýla & the Yule Lads: Ogress and her 13 mischievous sons who originally terrorized children, now softened in modern stories. Rotten potatoes for bad kids, small gifts for good.

  “So if someone buys you a boring jumper or some socks this Christmas, this is a much more thoughtful gift than you may have first thought. They just saved you from being eaten by a giant Icelandic cat.” [36:45]

5. True Tragedies & Unsolved Arctic Mysteries

• [38:23 – 58:48]

The Lake Angikuni Disappearance (Canada, 1930):

• Trapper Joe LaBelle found an entire Inuit village empty—food, belongings, and sled dogs left behind and a grave dug up by human hands.
• No clear evidence of where the people had gone; theories range from mass migration to UFO abduction to folklore explanations.
• “But of course, some just point to this being a cover up, that something truly disturbing happened here, something that we are not allowed to know.” [40:54]

The Franklin Expedition (Canada, 1845):

• Sir John Franklin’s attempt to navigate the Northwest Passage went missing; later found to be marooned by ice, with starvation, scurvy, and lead poisoning decimating the crew.
• Eyewitness Inuit accounts describe “pale, skinny men wandering the ice, … neither fully alive nor fully dead, drifting across the frozen landscapes like ghosts.” [45:32]
• Evidence of cannibalism confirmed—historically dismissed by English society, with Charles Dickens calling Inuit testimony, “the vague babble of savages.” [49:22]
• The Erebus and Terror were only found submerged in the 21st century; much about the fate of the men remains mysterious.
• “It’s hard not to see the Arctic as a place of mystery. ...Maybe these stories we tell are just a way to rationalize the horror the natural world can bring—a way to paint it as evil, when in reality it’s just indifferent to us.” [58:13]

The Lady Franklin Bay Expedition (1881):

• Relief ships failed to reach them; only 6 of 25 survived after years of isolation, starvation, and possible cannibalism. Survivors denied cannibalism, but evidence was found.

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• On the spirit of Esau:

  “Dare to make sure they don’t suffer the same fate he did.”

• On indigenous folklore vs. explorers:

  “Before any explorers showed up, it was them who would tell the stories of what lay in the darkness.” [13:41]

• On the Arctic’s power:

  “This is a land where reality thins, where anything can happen.” [12:48]

• On the Franklin expedition:

  “If the claims of the Inuit groups who encountered the Franklin Expedition had been taken more seriously, maybe it wouldn’t have taken so long for these discoveries to be made.” [56:41]

• Closing reflection:

  “Maybe these stories we tell are just a way to rationalize the horror that the natural world can bring, a way to paint it as evil, when in reality it’s just indifferent to us.” [58:13]

Important Segment Timestamps

• 00:36 – 01:53 — Introduction to the Arctic’s enigmatic, mythic “dark North”
• 01:58 – 09:17 — The legend of Esau, the Phantom Trapper
• 10:42 – 23:32 — Explorers’ creepy accounts and indigenous monsters/spirits
• 24:27 – 36:52 — Arctic ghost stories, haunted buildings, and Icelandic Christmas folklore (the Yule Cat & Grýla)
• 38:23 – 58:48 — True historic mysteries: The Lake Angikuni vanishing and the Franklin Expedition tragedy
• 58:13 – End — Reflections: Rationalizing the Arctic’s threat through story; gratitude to listeners

Tone & Takeaway

The host’s tone is immersive, patient, and quietly unnerving: inviting listeners to sit with the “cozy horror” of the Arctic’s stories, mixing gruesome historical detail with a storyteller’s warmth. Whether dissecting myth or fact, the episode repeatedly returns to the idea that the Arctic is ultimately unknowable—its dangers may be supernatural, legend, or simply the merciless indifference of nature.

Final Reflection:
The tales of the Arctic help us grapple with the limits of human understanding and the harshness of survival. Whether monsters are real or metaphoric, the North remains a place where the strange and unexplained still linger—hidden in the snow, waiting.