S2|E2: The Seed

Summary

The Sunshine Place: Season 2, Episode 2 – "The Seed"

Release Date: October 30, 2024
Host: Cindy Ettler

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Introduction

In the second episode of Season 2, titled "The Seed," The Sunshine Place delves deeper into the origins of the troubled teen industry by exploring the foundation upon which Straight Incorporated was built—the Seed rehabilitation program. This episode uncovers the beginnings of Straight Incorporated, tracing its roots back to the early 1970s and the charismatic yet controversial figure, Art Barker. Through survivor testimonies, historical context, and investigative storytelling, Cindy Ettler paints a comprehensive picture of how The Seed set the stage for what would become a widespread and often abusive network of teen rehabilitation programs.

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Background: The Seed of Hope

Art Barker's Origins

The Seed began in the summer of 1970 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, founded by Art Barker, a former alcoholic and stand-up comedian. Inspired by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Barker sought to create a community-based rehabilitation program aimed at helping teenagers combat drug addiction. The initial setting was modest—a yellow house donated by a local pastor, serving as both the headquarters and living quarters for Barker, his wife Shelly, and various addicts seeking recovery.

Program Structure

The Seed employed a confrontational and peer-led approach reminiscent of Synanon, another controversial rehabilitation program from the 1960s. Key components included:

• Rap Sessions: Intensely confrontational group therapy sessions where participants were encouraged to criticize and reform one another.
• Host Homes: Participants lived with families of other program members, fostering a tight-knit and controlled community environment.
• Open Meetings: Weekly gatherings focused on discussing progress and transformation, which often devolved into aggressive confrontations.

Notable Quote:

Craig (Participant) [01:11]: "You're not an invalid, right?"

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Key Events and Personal Accounts

Craig and Art Barker's Seed Experience

Craig, a 14-year-old participant, recounts his harrowing experience at the Seed. Upon entering the program with his sister, Craig quickly grasps the oppressive atmosphere orchestrated by Barker. The rap sessions become a venue for verbal abuse and manipulation rather than genuine therapeutic intervention.

Art Barker's Leadership and Methods

Art Barker's leadership style is heavily authoritarian. He positions himself as a savior capable of transforming rebellious teenagers into model citizens. His rhetoric is infused with fear, targeting parents' anxieties about drug use and the perceived moral decline of youth.

Notable Quotes:

Art Barker [02:27]: "I didn't put my hand up then they would have certainly called on me. They would have said, Craig, stand up. Why aren't you motivated to speak to your sister."

Craig [30:10]: "You are to successfully complete the SEED program. The rules of SEED are the rules of probation."

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Expansion and Influence

Growth of The Seed

By 1972, The Seed had expanded beyond its initial location, accommodating a growing number of teenagers. Art Barker aimed to replicate his success by opening additional Seed locations across Florida, particularly targeting conservative communities ripe with parental concern over rising drug use among youth.

Integration with the War on Drugs

The establishment and expansion of The Seed coincided with President Richard Nixon's declaration of the War on Drugs in 1971. Barker leveraged this national climate of fear and urgency, positioning The Seed as a pioneering solution to America's drug crisis. His claims of high success rates resonated with parents desperate for effective interventions for their troubled teens.

Notable Quote:

Art Barker [17:35]: "We're changing the way these kids feel about themselves, and we're changing the way parents feel about kids. That's how you change the world."

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Mechanics of Control and Abuse

Authoritarian Practices

Inside The Seed, Barker's methods deviated sharply from traditional therapeutic approaches. The rap sessions often turned into battlegrounds where participants were pitted against each other, fostering an environment of fear and obedience. Physical and emotional abuse became commonplace, disguised as tough love necessary for rehabilitation.

John Underwood's Testimony

John Underwood, a senior staff member and Barker's right hand, provides insight into the inner workings of The Seed. His background as a former addict and criminal underscores Barker's philosophy that only those with similar experiences can effectively manage and rehabilitate troubled youths. Underwood details the rigid and punitive measures employed to maintain control over participants.

Notable Quote:

John Underwood [22:14]: "There weren't that many senior staff members, six in total, the entire time I was there and I was the only male senior staff member."

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Impact on Participants and Communities

Long-Term Effects on Youth

Participants like Craig endured significant psychological trauma, struggling with feelings of powerlessness and isolation. The Seed's methods left lasting scars, contradicting the promising facade presented to both parents and the community. The program's aggressive tactics aimed to break down individuals before rebuilding them into what Barker deemed "model citizens."

Community and Political Connections

Art Barker successfully integrated The Seed into local law enforcement and judicial systems. By establishing connections with judges and probation officers, he ensured a steady influx of participants without the need for formal referrals. This synergy between The Seed and conservative power brokers facilitated its rapid expansion and entrenched its presence in multiple communities.

Notable Quote:

John Underwood [31:05]: "We've got 1700 kids straight now and we expect to have 5000 straight by the end of the year."

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Conclusion and Foreshadowing

The Downfall Begins

As The Seed continues to grow, the very practices that fueled its expansion also sow the seeds of its eventual downfall. The authoritarian control, combined with psychological and physical abuse, create an unsustainable and toxic environment. The episode hints at the impending collapse of The Seed, setting the stage for future exploration of Straight Incorporated's rise and the widespread consequences of such troubled teen programs.

Final Reflection

Cindy Ettler concludes the episode by highlighting the stark contrast between the program's outward success and the internal atrocities witnessed by participants. The narrative underscores the dangers of unchecked authority and the exploitation of vulnerable youth under the guise of rehabilitation.

Teaser for Next Episode:

Cindy Ettler: "Craig learns the hard way that the Seed's brand of therapy is not as advertised. Next time on The Sunshine Place."

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Notable Moments with Speaker Attribution and Timestamps

• Warning & Context:

  Cindy Ettler [01:03]: "This episode contains descriptions of physical and emotional abuse. Please take care while listening."

• Participant Struggles:

  Craig [03:16]: "It's not that Craig wanted to join in on the attack. He didn't have a choice because if..."

• Barker's Charisma:

  Art Barker [06:53]: "How many of you were stoned in school? Okay. How many of you were stoned in front of your parents and your parents didn't even know it? Okay."

• Barker's Philosophy:

  Art Barker [17:48]: "The lessons I learned were practical. They weren't theory. I learned organized groups don't make it. They've got to be informal. I learned the younger the people, the easier it is to help them."

• Expansion Plans:

  John Underwood [35:07]: "We've got 1700 kids straight now and we expect to have 5000 straight by the end of the year."

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Production Credits

The Sunshine Place is an Audacy original, executive produced by Robert Downey Jr., Susan Downey, and Emily Barclay Ford of Team Downey, alongside Josh McLaughlin of Wink Pictures. The episode was written, directed, and produced by Perry Crowell, with contributions from Margot Gray, Maddie Sprung Kaiser, Lloyd Lockridge, J.D. Crowley, Leah Rees, Dennis, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Curt Courtney, and Hilary Schuff.

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Content Warning

This episode contains detailed accounts of physical and emotional abuse experienced by teenagers in a rehabilitation program. Listener discretion is advised.

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Note: For those interested in further exploration of this topic, future episodes will continue to uncover the dark realities behind Straight Incorporated and its impact on countless families.

Transcript

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[Cindy Ettler]

This episode contains descriptions of physical and emotional abuse. Please take care while listening.

[Craig]

Why do you like to have everybody tell you what to do and have everybody make your decisions for you?

[Cindy Ettler]

You're not an invalid, right?

[Craig]

We're not going to lead you through getting straight. You're going to get straight by yourself on your own. You're going to put forth some effort.

[Art Barker]

What they would do is they would have these discussions, these rap sessions where they would be discussing a topic and when you stood up to respond, they would oftentimes attack you.

[Craig]

Make some of your own decisions and the first one you gotta make is that you want to get straight.

[Art Barker]

Sometime around the first week or so, my sister stood up and they started doing it to her.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is Craig. He's talking about being in a rap session, an intense and confrontational form of group therapy like the ones you heard about in the first episode. In this particular rap, Craig's sister was called on to stand up in front of the group.

[Craig]

You're as selfish as I was when I came in here, you know that and you're just as much a baby.

[Art Barker]

They were viciously ripping into her and she started crying and I had to put my hand up.

[Cindy Ettler]

It's not that Craig wanted to join in on the attack. He didn't have a choice because if.

[Art Barker]

I didn't put my hand up then they would have certainly called on me. They would have said, craig, stand up. Why aren't you motivated to Speak to your sister. Thankfully, they didn't call on me because I wouldn't have known what to say. I mean, I didn't know what to do, and I didn't like it at all. I remember her face being red and just looking at her and feeling like there was nothing I could do. If I said anything, it would just turn it to me, and I didn't want that. I would have liked to have been able to help her, but I couldn't. I felt very powerless to do anything about anything there.

[Cindy Ettler]

When Craig was 14 years old and his sister was 15, they were sent to a drug rehab program for teenagers. But it wasn't the 1980s, and this wasn't Straight Incorporated. It was 1973, and Craig and his sister were at a program called the Seed.

[John Underwood]

The Seed and deed is all you need to stay off the junk and the field. You call each day from 10 till 10, and if you screw up, then you'll start again. Beautiful.

[Cindy Ettler]

In episode one, we talked about how Straight Incorporated was the catalyst for the troubled teen industry. But Straight didn't come out of nowhere. It was modeled after the Seed. Straight eventually eclipsed its predecessor, expanding into a national franchise and becoming a symbol of the war on drugs. But to understand how Straight operated, how it convinced parents to surrender their kids, how it indoctrinated those kids into the program, and how it disguised abuse as treatment, first you have to understand the Seed. In this episode, we explore the origins of the Seed, its charismatic leader, and how it set the stage for the rise of Straight Incorporated. My name is Cindy Ettler, and this is the Sunshine Place. When people talk about the troubled teen industry, they're referring to an interconnected worldwide network of youth rehabilitation programs that generate billions of dollars in revenue every year. And while these programs come in a variety of shapes and sizes, they all share a heredity that is infused with the DNA of Straight Incorporated. Straight conned parents into handing over their kids and tricked community leaders into supporting a program that too often resembled torture more than it did therapy, all while turning a profit. And Straight perfected a template for doing it, one that would be replicated again and again by thousands of teen rehabilitation programs that came after it. But Straight didn't create the template. Most people would point to Synanon as the source. But in order to get from Synanon to Straight, you have to stop at the Seed. Functionally, the Straight program was almost identical to the Seed because almost everything that Valerie described last episode came from the Seed. The rap sessions, led by peer staff, the host homes where kids lived with the families of other kids on the program and the weekly open meetings that everyone attended to talk about progress and transformation. But culturally, the programs were very different. Straight was a reflection of the 1980s. It was buttoned up and business like, right down to the name itself. Straight Incorporated. It had executive management and people with titles like the national clinical director, Dr. Miller Newton. The seed was a product of the 70s. It was more experimental and unconventional, like its founder, a former alcoholic standup comedian named Art Barker.

[John Underwood]

How many of you were stoned in school? Okay. How many of you were stoned in front of your parents and your parents didn't even know it? Okay.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is Art Barker from a documentary called A Seed of Hope, which aired on local television channels across the state of Florida in the early 70s. In this scene, Barker is leading a rap session. It's 1972. He's in his late 40s with Sandy blond hair that's going gray. He combs it over his forehead against his receding hairline. He's about 5 foot 7 and built like a welterweight boxer. He's wearing a loose fitting short sleeve shirt with an oversized collar tucked into his slacks. There's a hint of New York City in his voice. He looks and sounds like an everyman, unremarkable, if not a little odd. But he's got charisma. He's in total command of the room and his audience of teenagershundreds of them who are sitting in folding chairs and raising their hands yes, when his questions apply to them.

[John Underwood]

So all kids then who use drugs, sell drugs? True. Okay, good.

[Cindy Ettler]

This wrap is happening at the Seed headquarters in downtown Fort Lauderdale, north of Miami. He runs the program out of a big house with the space out back for the wraps. It's also where he holds the open meetings every Monday and Friday night, just like in Straight.

[John Underwood]

Most of you had doubts when you walked in here and you signed that kid up. You didn't know what it was going to be like until you could come.

[Narrator]

To an open meeting.

[Cindy Ettler]

But it's not just the parents who come to watch. There's all types of people from the community in attendance. From education, law enforcement, politics and the media.

[John Underwood]

You have to feel what's happening here, the love.

[Craig]

You feel it.

[Cindy Ettler]

They've all come to see Art Barker, the man who claims to be saving the teenagers of South Florida from drug addiction. He tells him that he can cure 90% of the kids who walk through the door without the help of any professionals. And when they walk out, they're rehabilitated. And totally transformed into Seedlings. And they go back into their communities to become ambassadors for the program and recruiters for Art Barker.

[Listener 1]

Barker boasts that 90% of his so called seedlings go straight, while other programs have only an 8% success rate and lie about having 15. Art Barker is a fanatic about his rehabilitation program that works in an age when others have failed.

[Cindy Ettler]

By the time the Seed of Hope documentary started airing on tv, the Seed had only been in existence for about two years. Art Barker started the program in the summer of 1970 in a little yellow house next to the First Lutheran Church of Fort Lauderdale, which was donated to him by the pastor there. Barker lived there along with his wife Shelly, and a rotating cast of alcoholics and addicts of all ages who came to Barker for help. Art Barker had gotten himself sober and Alcoholics Anonymous, and now he was using a modified version of the AA program to help his congregation of addicts at the Seed. Once he helped them get clean, they helped each other by holding each other accountable in rap sessions. This might sound familiar to you because Synanon started in almost the exact same way about a decade earlier and nearly 3,000 miles away in the beachfront slums of Santa Monica, California, where a group of heroin addicts gathered around a charismatic former alcoholic named Chuck Diederich. And Chuck had taken what he learned at AA and applied it to Synanon. What happened next was known in Santa Monica as the Miracle on the beach because Chuck seemed to be doing what nobody else had ever done before. He had helped rock bottom heroin addicts not only get clean, but stay clean. And he had done it without any formal training or qualifications. In Fort Lauderdale in the early 70s, there was a similar buzz around Art Barker and the Seed.

[Listener 1]

Art Barker is not a psychologist. He has no credentials to speak of, but he adapted from the Alcoholics anonymous program he 11 years ago. A new hope for an entire generation of youngsters destined to spend their formulative years caught up in a nationwide drug craze.

[Cindy Ettler]

Not a lot is known about Art Barker's life before he started the Seed. His influences and motivations are mostly speculative, and most of what is known about Art Barker comes from Art Barker.

[Narrator]

Every human being gets a second chance to become the person he was meant to be.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is a recreation of something Art Barker said in a Fort Lauderdale newspaper in 1972. He was never shy about telling his story to the kids in wraps, to parents at open meetings, or to newspaper reporters. But he often changed the details of his story and even contradicted himself depending on when and where he was telling it. But the following is the story of Art Barker. According to Art Barker, I'm an alcoholic.

[Narrator]

I don't dare take another drink or I might wind up in the back end of a car again.

[Cindy Ettler]

Barker is referring to his rock bottom moment when he was drunk and homeless, sleeping in the backseat of a car in New York City. Art Barker was born and raised in Brooklyn during the Great Depression. He was the middle child of three in an Irish Catholic family. He dropped out of school in the eighth grade and chipped in by selling sewing needles and razor blades door to door. His father was an alcoholic who died when he was a kid.

[Narrator]

He was a man that could do anything, including drink. I couldn't wait to become a drunk myself. Shows you learned nothing from the misery of others.

[Cindy Ettler]

As a teenager, Barker started getting in trouble with the law. At 16, he was arrested for burglary. Two years later, he was arrested for robbery and assault. But he avoided going to jail by joining the Army.

[Narrator]

The first vacation I had coming out of the Depression was World War II.

[Cindy Ettler]

Barker claims to have flown 51 missions over the South Pacific as a tail gunner during World War II, where he shot down six Japanese planes. He earned a handful of medals, including a Purple Heart. But he also picked up a heavy drinking problem which followed him home to New York City and into his next career as a standup comedian.

[Narrator]

If you're gonna be an alcoholic, that's the greatest way in the world to become one because you can drink a great deal and sleep all day and still do your shows. It's not like being an insurance man. You're all right as long as you're funny.

[Cindy Ettler]

Barker's comedy career never took off and the lifestyle took a toll on him. His drinking problem turned into full blown alcoholism. By his early 30s, he was living on the streets and sleeping in the backseat of a sedan in a used car lot. His only friend was a dog named Brandy who cuddled with him at night to keep warm.

[Narrator]

I wanted to die so desperately. I was at the point where I was dying a matter of a few weeks or a few days. Then one night I walked three blocks in the snow to a church and got down on my knees. I found myself saying a prayer to a God I didn't really believe in at that time. I prayed for a chance to use my potential.

[Cindy Ettler]

The owner of the used car lot found him and felt bad for him, so he called Alcoholics Anonymous. Barker ended up at a meeting and something about it worked for him. He committed himself to the program and got himself clean. Then he started helping other people get clean. He worked odd jobs to get back on his feet. And then he started doing standup again. He was better sober. He even tried acting and booked a few commercials and bit parts in movies. There's a lot of uncertainty about this time in Barker's life, But one thing we do know for sure is that in 1965, Art Barker sailed from New York City to Miami on a 46 foot sailboat, a 1926 Elko yacht. It's unclear when or how he got the boat, but it was his prized possession. And he docked it behind the Playboy Club where he had booked a comedy gig. And that's where he lived for the next few years. And he became sort of the resident comic. Barker had a girlfriend named Barbara who was with him when he got clean in New York and followed him down to Miami. She said to him, you are destined.

[Narrator]

To do something good. You have a second chance.

[Cindy Ettler]

Late one night in 1968, Barbara was on her way to see him at the club.

[Narrator]

She was crossing Biscayne Boulevard out in front of the Playboy Club when a car struck her down. A drunk driver. I heard the noise and ran out. She died in my arms. You know, I never told Barbara I loved her. All those years I went with her, I never said I love you. And when she died, I still hadn't three words. And look what I deprived her of. The seed was born when Barbara died in my arms.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is a sad and tragic part of Art Barker's story to the extent that it's actually true. But I cringe a little bit when I hear it because I have a lot of baggage around the words love you. We had to say it incessantly at Straight. And I'm still trying to untangle love from confrontation, shame, and punishment. That love you thing at Straight came from Art Barker and the Seed, and presumably from the moment that Barbara died in his arms on Biscayne Boulevard. In any case, it was a pivotal event in Barker's life, and he rededicated himself to helping other people get sober. But he noticed that a lot had changed since he got himself clean. It seemed like people were using more drugs than ever before, and they were starting younger.

[Narrator]

I saw the drug problem starting to really get bad. I really didn't think anyone had the answer.

[Cindy Ettler]

Over the next couple of years, Barker started to develop the ideas and practices that would eventually become the seed.

[Narrator]

The lessons I learned were practical. They weren't theory. I learned organized groups don't make it. They've got to be informal. I learned the younger the people, the easier it is to help them.

[Cindy Ettler]

In July of 1970, Art Barker moved into that little house next to the First Lutheran Church of Fort Lauderdale. He fixed up the house and painted it yellow with the seed in big letters on the awning out front. He said the name was inspired by the biblical parable of the mustard seed, where Jesus Christ compared the growth of his kingdom to a bountiful plant that emerged from a tiny seed.

[Narrator]

We're changing the way these kids feel about themselves, and we're changing the way parents feel about kids. That's how you change the world. I can't wait for a seed kid to become governor of this state. I want to open up seeds all over the country. Jesus said it a long time ago, you can't be a prophet in your own town.

[Cindy Ettler]

Art Barker's ambitions were much bigger than that little yellow house in Fort Lauderdale. But in order to realize his vision for the seed, he'd need to cultivate other true believers who were dedicated and loyal to add to his growing flock.

[Listener 2]

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[Art Barker]

Steve.

[Advertiser 2]

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[Craig]

There'S nobody who knows more about the goings on of the Seed than me. Nobody alive, and nobody more qualified to tell you.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is a recorded phone call with John Underwood. He was a senior staff member at the Seed and Art Barker's right hand man.

[Craig]

There weren't that many senior staff members, six in total, the entire time I was there and I was the only male senior staff member.

[Cindy Ettler]

Everyone on senior staff was part of Art Barker's inner circle. They were his most trusted seedlings and they ran the day to day operation of the program in his absence. Of that group, John says he's the only one still alive. But before he showed up at the seed in 1971, he was a young man. He was a man in his early 20s with a bad heroin habit which he supported through criminal activity.

[Craig]

I'm somebody who probably would have spent if I didn't overdose on heroin and die, I would have spent most of his life in prison.

[Cindy Ettler]

When John got arrested for trying to cash stolen payroll checks, he was taken to jail in Broward County.

[Craig]

Back in those days, South Florida cops, they didn't have a lot of empathy towards junkies. And Believe me, in 1971 this was still the South. They put me in the city, Hollywood Jail, put me back in this place they used to call the Hole. It was solitary confinement. Nothing in there except the toilet, the sink and ice cold concrete floor. When I got busted, I had a huge heroin habit and I had to take it cold turkey in there, John.

[Cindy Ettler]

Spent 18 days in solitary while he awaited trial on felony charges. Then he caught a break. Instead of sending him to prison, the judge gave him three years of probation with two conditions.

[Craig]

Number one, first six months of probation is to be spent in the Broward County Stockade, which back in those days, the Bower County Stockade was the chain gun. You guys see the movie Cool Hand Luke?

[Cindy Ettler]

The second condition of John's probation was that he attend a drug rehabilitation program.

[Craig]

The probation officer, he had a relationship with Art in the Seed. And he talked to me about going into the Seed. I said, sounds good to me. By going into the Seed, saved my life. I knew from day one that this was the place for me. You know why? Because the staff member, they were happy, and they had their shit together. I wanted what they had. I figured if it worked for these people, it'll work for me. I really felt like, man, you were free. This is an opportunity.

[Cindy Ettler]

By the time John showed up at the seed in 1971, Art Barker didn't live in the little yellow house anymore. He had moved the program into a bigger house down the street in order to accommodate everyone who was showing up at rap sessions. And more and more, the people showing up were teenagers. Barker's clientele was getting younger because he said that the problem of addiction was starting younger. He would always tell people at open meetings that 75 to 80% of high school kids are well into drugs and about 50 to 60% of middle schoolers. But in reality, there were no reliable statistics for that kind of thing until the mid-70s. And those surveys found that, yes, teenage drug use, especially marijuana, was on the rise. It peaked in 1979 with about 50% of high school seniors saying that they had smoked pot in the past year. But even at that peak, it was still significantly lower than what Art Barker was telling people. But people believed him, especially parents.

[John Underwood]

I've done everything from pot to cocaine.

[Art Barker]

For about five years.

[Cindy Ettler]

I smoked pot, I drank, and I sniffed.

[Advertiser 2]

I've done everything from pot to heroin for about two to two and a half years.

[Cindy Ettler]

And if they didn't believe Barker, they believed the young people who looked and sounded just like their kids when they stood up at open meetings and rattled off the punch list of drugs they used.

[John Underwood]

I've done everything from pot to heroin, cocaine.

[Cindy Ettler]

It was shocking. And whether it was true or not, it was convincing. And more and more parents started voluntarily dropping off their kids at the Seed.

[Listener 1]

Most of these kids are not hardcore drug addicts. The majority of them used lesser stuff, taking A puff, popping a pill, sneaking it and lying about it behind the backs of their parents and teachers. Since the time they were preteens, they represented type of adolescent drug problem that's been sweeping this nation in epidemic proportions.

[Cindy Ettler]

Art Barker was saying a lot of things that resonated with the parents of Fort Lauderdale. But he was tapping into something bigger in the national collective consciousness of America. America's public enemy number one in the United States is drug abuse. In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new all out offensive. In 1971, President Richard Nixon officially declared that the United States was in a war on drugs. It was a conflict that had been brewing for a long time, but the stakes seemed higher than ever after the paradigm shifting decade of the 1960s. The 60s had been one long existential crisis for America, defined by the threat of nuclear annihilation, the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and then Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King. And all of it was happening amidst the social unrest and revolution of the civil rights and anti Vietnam War movements. And at the center of those movements were young people who were rejecting the status quo and embracing a counterculture and the radical ideas and customs that came with it, which included drug use est, especially psychedelics and marijuana. And to cap it all off, in the summer of 1969, a group of young drug using counterculture disciples in Los Angeles carried out a series of horrific and ritualistic murders at the behest of their hippie cult leader, Charles Manson. So for Richard Nixon and parents across the country, smoking marijuana became synonymous with everything that was going wrong in the country. Less than a year after the Manson murders, Art Barker opened the seat in Fort Lauderdale and promised the parents of South Florida that he could reverse the disturbing trends that were leading their kids, and therefore the future of the country, down a path of self destruction. Barker was going to start a new trend. He was going to make doing drugs uncool.

[John Underwood]

Most of you get onto drugs, most of you, I guess almost all of you, because of acceptance, peer pressure, right? Because you wanted to imitate the older kids, right? You wanted to be accepted by them. What do they say to a chick, for instance?

[Cindy Ettler]

So Art Barker was in the right place at the right time, saying the right things to the right people. Because Broward county was traditionally conservative. And in South Florida during the 70s, the political influence of the Christian right was growing fast and so was the overall population of teenagers in the state. Florida had experienced one of the country's biggest baby booms after World War II. With its population doubling in just two decades. By the time the SEED was born, those babies were teenagers. So Art Barker was providing a service that was in demand to a growing demographic. And he was a gifted marketer of his program. And if that wasn't enough to sell prospective parents on the seed, he also had a price point that was hard to beat. The program was free. And it was all of those factors that caused the SEED to grow fast. And before long, parents from other communities outside of Fort Lauderdale were starting to send their kids to Art Barker. But he was running out of room for them. So he needed to figure out how to bring the SEED to them.

[John Underwood]

You are to successfully complete the SEED program. The rules of SEED are the rules of probation. And you will be in the custody of Mr. Underwood at this time. My counselor from the seed assigned to this court.

[Cindy Ettler]

And this is a scene from the documentary A Seed of Hope. Inside a Dade county criminal courtroom. John Underwood is there on behalf of the seed. A judge named Alfonso Cepe. Court orders a teenager into the seed. Instead of going to a state correctional facility, he's given into the custody of John Underwood. This was a regular practice for SEPPE and several other South Florida judges who were among Art Barker's biggest supporters.

[John Underwood]

I've seen it as the only alternative left to the administration of justice. Probation and jail don't work. We need a great, constructive program. This is the great, constructive program we have all been waiting for.

[Cindy Ettler]

Art Barker had a lot of friends in the law enforcement community. He made their lives easier. He kept kids out of courtrooms and jails. Cops would take kids off the street and drop them off at the SEED without having to do any paperwork. And it saved the state of Florida a lot of money, too, because it was one less kid being processed and housed on the taxpayer's dime.

[John Underwood]

I have total, complete faith, so much faith in the program that I rely solely and exclusively on my SEED counselor that I've assigned to my court. If he tells me that SEED wants a man, can help him, then I put him in seed.

[Cindy Ettler]

The SEED counselor he's talking about is John Underwood. John sat in Sepe's courtroom every day, and he would interview everyone who stood before the judge and make a determination whether or not they had a drug problem. And if he decided they did, Seppe would send them to the scene.

[John Underwood]

Mr. Underwood, have you interviewed Barry?

[Craig]

Yes, you, Honor, I interviewed Barry, as you instructed.

[Cindy Ettler]

Me, too. John was only a couple of years removed from committing crimes to support his drug habit, and he hadn't gained any legal qualifications in the interim, but now he was a de facto court clerk. It was all part of Barker's philosophy, since the best person to treat an addict is a fellow addict. The best person to identify an addict is a fellow addict. Jude agreed.

[Craig]

Just from the Dade county courts, we were probably taking half a dozen people every single day, sometimes more.

[Cindy Ettler]

By 1972, Barker said that well over a thousand kids had been through his program, and his goal for the following year was 5,000. But in the meantime, he already had more kids than he could handle at his facility in downtown Fort Lauderdale. So he moved the program into a 45,000 square foot factory building on the outskirts of town near the Everglades, with enough space to fit his ambitions for the program. But Art Barker still wasn't satisfied. He wanted the seed to keep growing and he wanted to expand. And his friend Judge Alfonso Cepe would help him do just that. Because even though Seppe's court was in a different county than the seed, he would send youth offenders who came before the bench to Barker. So they were creating pipelines from other communities in order to pave the way for the seed to expand into those communities. Less than a year after Barker moved the program into the warehouse near the Everglades, he opened a second seed location in neighboring Dade County. And there was no reason to stop there. He already had his eyes set on a city on the other side of the state, on the Gulf coast, with a whole lot of teenagers who needed saving in the untapped market of St. Petersburg, Florida.

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[Cindy Ettler]

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[Cindy Ettler]

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[Cindy Ettler]

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[John Underwood]

We've got 1700 kids straight now and we expect to have 5000 straight by the end of the year. And that keeps growing and growing and going. And that's the whole Point. This is the beginning here. And this particular.

[Cindy Ettler]

This is Art Barker from the Seed of Hope documentary. It's hard to hear him over the chorus of seedlings in the background, but he's talking about expanding his program.

[John Underwood]

Then I think the next shot would be probably Pinellas county. And then maybe up Gainesville, Jacksonville, and then Atlanta. And churches keep growing. I say this.

[Cindy Ettler]

He said the next chapter would be in Pinellas County. And the biggest city in Pinellas is St. Petersburg.

[Art Barker]

My father sat us down and made us watch the Seat of hope on channel 44, St. Pete. And he started talking about it. You know, what do we think about it?

[Cindy Ettler]

This is Craig. He spoke at the very beginning of the episode about being in a rap session at the Seed. Before he got to the Seed, he was a pretty average teenager living in St. Petersburg. And that meant he was exactly the kind of teenager that Art Barker was telling parents to keep an eye on. But Craig didn't know that. The first time he became aware of the Seed was sometime in 1972, when his father showed him that documentary on TV. And Craig's father wasn't the only parent in St. Petersburg who was interested in Art Barker's program. Some of them were already sending their kids to the Seed, all the way in Fort Lauderdale.

[Art Barker]

There was a contingent of kids from St. Petersburg that went there, most of them from wealthy families. And they came back with their parents to St. Pete as ambassadors and started holding meetings. And they would bring these kids from St. Pete in there to tell their story. And then the parents would watch that Seed of Hope. And then they'd tell them that their kids were in danger.

[Cindy Ettler]

They met at schools, churches, town halls, social clubs. Anywhere you might find concerned parents, and not just any parents, but ones with influence in the community. Teachers, priests, cops, businessmen, politicians. They were Art Barker's target market.

[Art Barker]

He had major power brokers in these towns on his side. He was seen as some type of miracle worker by a lot of people in power. A lot of these people, like my father, who had a fear of losing their country to a new wave of, you know, hippies and in their eyes, Communists. Not just pro drug, but, you know, anti America. And that was a lot of his rhetoric. These kids come out of here believing in God and the USA and the flag and becoming, you know, model citizens. He was speaking the language of fear to the power brokers, and they were eating it up and spitting out more seedlings to him.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig and his friends, meanwhile, weren't as enthusiastic about the idea of the Seed coming to St. Petersburg.

[Art Barker]

All the kids were starting to talk about it. They were calling to see kids, robots. They all looked the same. They all dressed the same. It was scary. So people knew. People knew what was coming.

[Cindy Ettler]

Rumors about the seeds spread quickly around the school that Craig and his sister attended and in the apartment complex where they lived. They moved there with their father after their parents got divorced. And there were a lot of other kids their age and in similar circumstances who lived at that apartment complex.

[Art Barker]

It was kind of cool, actually, because it bordered woods on one side and Tampa Bay was behind it, so I could go down and go fishing. And then on the other side, there was a big orange grove. And it also bordered a bunch of rich houses. So there was a lot of kids in the neighborhood. And then on the other side of that was the bad side of town. A lot of those kids would come over and hop the wall and hang out with us, and they were bad kids. They were really bad kids. We all kind of just mishmashed together and hung out. It was a lot of fun because we could pretty much do whatever we wanted to do. Kids just ran wild in this place, you know, getting into scrapes and fights and smoking pot and, you know, drinking and some pills here and there, because whatever the kids were doing, we would do as well. So we spent the next couple of years, you know, running around with the other kids that were not getting very much attention at home. There was a lot of them.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig's father wasn't around very much, even before the divorce. He worked long hours as a middle manager at a big insurance company, and he didn't come home until late at night, usually after sitting at a hotel bar for a few hours.

[Art Barker]

My sister would call the bar at times and say, is my dad there? I wouldn't bother, but she would.

[Cindy Ettler]

When his father was around, he noticed that Craig's hair was longer, his music was louder, and he was dressing differently, looking more like the new kids he and his sister were hanging out with.

[Art Barker]

But now my father's angry. He's angry that we're not like him and we're part of the counterculture and smoking pot. And if his kids were doing those things, they needed to be fixed.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig's father was precisely the kind of person who Art Barker was targeting with his rhetoric. He was a teenager during the Great Depression. He was a World War II vet. He was politically and socially conservative. And it seemed like his own son was becoming the kind of teenager that Art Barker was warning everyone about. But he didn't have any proof until one night in the fall of 1972.

[Art Barker]

When I was 13, I went to my first concert. It was a Jethro Tull concert. And my neighbor was 18 years old and she gave me acid. And I actually did a tab of AC and went to this concert. And I came home and it was probably midnight or 1:00 in the morning, and I couldn't get into the house. The apartment was on the second floor. So I tried to break in the window that went into the kitchen and it was locked. And so I walked down the stairs and I walked around the building. He was standing there and he knew I was high. That was really the only time I'd ever been caught. And then the next day I told him I'd smoked pot for the first time and I'd never do it again because it was awful. I had no reason to be honest with him. I didn't have a relationship with my father in any kind of father son relationship. He never looked at my grades. He never did anything with us. We didn't go to the movies, we didn't. I mean, there was just nothing. His life was his job. We felt alone. My sister and I, we were raising ourselves, basically.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig's dad resented him for the kind of teenager he was becoming, but he didn't put any time or attention into doing something about it. He was barely around at all. But all of that changed when he got remarried to a woman he was dating who had teenage kids of her own. He bought a house and moved everyone in together. All of a sudden, Craig was seeing his father a lot, too much.

[Art Barker]

I didn't like my father very much. He had neglected me. He had chosen another family over us. And I just really didn't care what he thought. So there was a lot of tension, which came to the point where he took a swing at me and I just dodged it and kind of laughed at him and walked out the door. And then it was over. He didn't want me around there anymore and I didn't want to be there.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig's father sent him and his sister to stay with their mother in Fort Lauderdale. At the beginning of the summer in 1973.

[Art Barker]

The environment was a lot calmer and we were just kind of taking it easy and having a nice summer, reconnecting with our mother. And my father called about a month later and said, I'm going to be going out of the country. I need to spend some time with you. So he drove down and picked my sister and I up and drove us back to St. Pete.

[Cindy Ettler]

They made the Long drive across the state back to St. Petersburg. But once they got there, Craig noticed that they were going the wrong way to get to the house. They were in an unfamiliar part of town where there were mostly industrial buildings. Then he noticed that they were slowing down and the turn signal was on and they were pulling into the fenced in parking lot of a warehouse.

[Art Barker]

I said to my sister, I think something's wrong. I think we're at the Seed. My father even turned around and said, we're here to get you some help and these people are going to help you. Two big teenage boys came out, opened our doors, and said, you guys need to come inside. We need to talk to you.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig was dropped off by his father at the Seed in the summer of 1973. By that time, Art Barker had built a mythology around himself and his program. He had become something like the Pied Piper of Florida, performing miracles on teenagers, leading them through transformation to salvation. It was a story that Barker was telling to parents in communities across Florida. And that story, much like his own backstory, was crafted and curated by him. But when kids like Craig got to the Seed, they became witness to a side of the program that the parents weren't allowed to see. And that was a very different story. Next time on the Sunshine Place.

[Art Barker]

I knew you out there, and you were nothing. You thought you were hot, but you were just a little child. You know, I would have beat the out of you.

[Cindy Ettler]

Craig learns the hard way that the Seeds brand of therapy is not as advertised.

[Art Barker]

It just seemed like I had been thrust into jail, but it wasn't jail. I felt trapped, and I was trying to figure out how to get out of the trap.

[Cindy Ettler]

As the Seed continues to grow, so does Art Barker's profile. Art would walk through the building, and.

[Art Barker]

It was just like you would have thought that Jesus Christ had just come in the room. And we were so grateful.

[Cindy Ettler]

But the same qualities that made the Seed so successful would lead to its downfall.

[Craig]

There were lots of potential constitutional questions coming up. These were all elements of the Seed.

[Cindy Ettler]

That were inherent to treatment. This is why the Seed worked, but it's finally being articulated. This is why it's illegal. The Sunshine Place is an Odyssey original podcast. It's written, directed and produced by Perry Crowell. Our writer producer is Margot Gray. Our story editors are Maddie Sprung Kaiser and Lloyd Lockridge. Executive produced by Robert Downey Jr. Susan Downey and Emily Barclay Ford from Team Downey, Jenna Weiss Berman and Maddie Sprung Kaiser from Odyssey and Josh McLaughlin. Edited by Perry Crowell. Mixing and mastering by Bill Schultz. Production support from Sean Cherry and Paul Anderjack and narrated by me, Cindy Ettler. Special thanks to J.D. crowley, Leah Rees, Dennis, Maura Curran, Josephina Francis, Curt Courtney and Hilary Schuff. If you want to hear more of the Sunshine Place, please take a moment to rate and review the show. It really helps.

[Advertiser 2]

You might think financial crime is all about money, but sometimes it ends in murder. I'm Nicole Lapin, host of Money Crimes, a Crime House original podcast. Each episode features a thrilling story about the dark side of finance and how to protect yourself from it. Follow and listen to Money Crimes, an Odyssey Podcast in partnership with Crime House Studios. Available on the free Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcast.

[Art Barker]

Th.