Podcast Summary: Stuff You Should Know

Episode: Short Stuff: The Call is Coming... FROM INSIDE THE HOUSE
Hosts: Josh and Chuck
Date: October 8, 2025
Podcast Network: iHeartPodcasts

Episode Overview

This short episode dives into the origins, cultural resonance, and chilling reality behind the urban legend and enduring horror trope: "The call is coming from inside the house." Hosts Josh and Chuck explore how this story evolved, why it has such enduring power, and the true-crime inspiration behind it. The duo also discuss the trope’s place in pop culture and share personal stories about being scared at home.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Urban Legend: “The Call Is Coming From Inside the House”

• The trope is also known as "the babysitter and the man upstairs."
  • Chuck, 01:23: "The call is coming from inside the house is also often called the babysitter and the man upstairs."
• Common setup: A young girl (often a babysitter) gets increasingly creepy phone calls asking, “Have you checked on the kids?”
  • The calls escalate in menace until police inform her, “the call is coming from inside the house.”
• The terror hinges on the shocking twist: the threat was inside the house all along.

Why It’s So Scary

• Part of what made the original legend terrifying was technological—calling your own phone line from inside the house wasn’t actually possible for most people in the rotary-phone era, making the concept unsettling and almost supernatural.
  • Chuck, 03:18: "If you had two lines in the house, maybe only the richest of your friends had two lines...fact that it's coming from inside the house means that it's the last place you'd expect somebody to be calling from. Which made it even scarier."
• The effect is diminished in today’s cellphone era, where the technical impossibility is gone but the scare lingers.

Related Legends & Stories

• The trope belongs to a wider universe of scary urban legends, such as “the hook” and “the vanishing hitchhiker.”
  • Josh, 04:38: "It goes along with some of the great scary legends of the day. Like the hook, the vanishing hitchhiker..."

“Drip Drop Maniac”

• Josh shares another disturbing legend involving a German shepherd and a murderer under the bed:
  • Josh, 04:58: “...German shepherd that sleeps under the bed...the reason and the way they would not be scared is they would put their hand down and the German shepherd would lick their hand...they hear drip, drip, drip...there was a dude under the bed licking the person's hand.”

Personal Experiences of Fear

• Josh and Chuck swap stories about being easily scared at night, even as adults, especially after watching horror movies alone.

  • Chuck, 08:43: “If I'm watching like a particularly a good ghost movie...I will basically run down the hall to the bedroom.”
  • Josh, 09:08: “I'm truly scared by a movie and I'm up late by myself, the getting back to the bed scene is truly ridiculous for a 54 year old man.”

• Childhood/college pranks:

  • Josh, 09:43: “Chris went home and unscrewed all the light bulbs in the main room and we hid in the closet...we jumped out of the closet and got him pretty good. I think he knocked a frame picture off the wall and broke it.”
  • Chuck, 11:01: “I just immediately jumped up and started running for the door. Like, I didn't go to look...And my dad came barreling out of the closet like, rawr...I just basically flipped on my back like a turtle and started screaming.”

The Real-Life Tragedy Behind the Trope: Janet Christman (Starts ~12:00)

• The urban legend is thought to be inspired by the 1950 unsolved murder of Janet Christman, a 13-year-old babysitter in Columbia, Missouri.
  • Josh, 12:05: “In the 1950s...there was a young 13 year old named Janet Christman hired to babysit a 3 year old for the Romax.”
• On the night she was killed, Janet received a loaded shotgun for protection and was told not to open the door without turning on the porch light.
• At about 10:30 pm, police got a call from a girl shouting for help before the line abruptly went dead.
  • Chuck, 13:00: “At some point around 10:30, the police in her town got a call from a girl just shouting, come quick. And then the line suddenly was cut off."
• When the parents returned at 1:30 am, they found Janet murdered. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled; the phone was ripped from the wall.

Suspect: Robert Mueller

• Main suspect was Robert Mueller, a family friend with a reputation for inappropriate behavior, but he was never charged.
  • Chuck, 15:18: “He had actually asked her to babysit that night...He was an odd duck, to say the least...he was always suspected by them.”
  • Josh, 15:38: “He apparently had groped Mrs. Romac...told Mr. Romac that he liked Janet...that he could have murdered Janet and just forgotten about it.”
• Janet’s murder was never solved and became the inspiration for the trope.

Pop Culture Legacy

• The trope (and Janet’s story) inspired numerous horror films:
  • Josh, 16:16: “That is the story that inspired the Call is Coming in from the House, or at the very least, inspired. When A Stranger Calls was probably the most famous use...1979.”
  • Also influenced: Black Christmas (1974), Halloween (1978), and Scream (1996, Drew Barrymore’s opening scene).
  • First on film: The Severed Arm (1973), though it wasn’t the main plot device.
    • Chuck, 16:46: "First instance...was a 1973 movie called the Severed Arm. But...it wasn't like a plot driver."
• The trope has become less effective in the age of mobile phones.

Fun Fact

• “When a Stranger Calls Back,” the sequel (1993), is highly recommended for a comedic riff ("Rifftrax") viewing.
  • Chuck, 17:04: “When a Stranger Calls back...is one of the finest Rift tracks you can see.”

Notable Quotes & Moments

• "It’s genuinely scary to think about, obviously...the prowler has murdered those kids upstairs already." — Josh (02:36)
• "It makes it a little harder to understand or grasp in the age of cell phones, where...it's entirely possible the call was coming from inside the house." — Chuck (04:17)
• "Drip Drop Maniac was some version of a thing where...there was a dude under the bed licking the person's hand." — Josh (04:58)
• "I try not to and I just can't not." — Chuck on running to bed after horror movies (08:45)
• "I was probably like 14 or something...I just immediately jumped up and started running for the door...my dad came barreling out of the closet like, rawr." — Chuck (11:01)

Timestamps of Key Segments

• [00:48] Trigger warning and episode setup
• [01:23] Introduction to the urban legend and trope variants
• [03:18] Why the "inside the house" call was so scary pre-cellphone era
• [04:38] Related urban legends — “the hook,” “the vanishing hitchhiker”
• [04:58] “Drip Drop Maniac” story
• [08:14] – [11:47] Personal stories of being scared at night and college/childhood pranks
• [12:05] The real story: Janet Christman
• [14:36] Robert Mueller, the main suspect
• [15:38] Details on suspicions and the unsolved nature of the case
• [16:16] How the legend influenced horror movies
• [17:04] “When a Stranger Calls Back” and closing out the short

Conclusion

Josh and Chuck unpack the story-behind-the-story of a classic horror trope, blending pop culture, folklore, and a chilling real crime. The episode is a reminder of how legends take shape from real events and why the idea of danger “inside the house” still haunts us today.

RIP Janet Christman.

Short Stuff is out!