The Black Tapes · Pacific Northwest Stories

Episode 208 - Riverview

June 21, 2016·40 min·2 clips

A patient at Riverview Hospital tried to peel his face off, blaming a figure called Mr. Splitfoot.

1. The Black Tapes Episode 208, 'Riverview,' follows Alex Regan and Nick Silver as they travel to Vancouver, British Columbia to investigate the disappearance of Thomas Warren and a newly discovered set of 1970s psychiatric records. 2. Alex Regan is the host and narrator; Nick Silver is the producer, a self-described book collector who owns multiple editions of Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger. 3. The episode's central question is whether a pattern of supernatural-adjacent mass hysteria in psychiatric patients stretches back decades — and whether someone has been deliberately spreading it. 4. Nick Silver deciphers a book cipher using Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger, with the message encoded as first letters of page-and-word combinations; the decoded text reads 'Leave me. Find advocate. Simon Rees.' 5. Dr. Richard Strand speculates that Coralie, who may be held against her will, is listening to the podcast and using it as a communication channel, and that her captors already know she is doing so. 6. At Riverview Hospital — a former psychiatric facility in Coquitlam, British Columbia, closed in 2012 after operating since 1917 and housing over 4,300 patients at its peak — security manager Alexander 'Xander' Komp found an unmarked box in a closet during a 1993 night-shift patrol. 7. The box, marked 'E. Hostorf,' contained moldy administrative papers dated 1971 to 1975, photographs of walls covered in hand-drawn numbers, and a sealed audio cassette tape. 8. The cassette tape, played back in Nick's hotel room, contains a series of clinical notes describing a patient named Hausdorff who experienced visions of 'the adversary,' caused mass hysteria among fellow patients, and eventually blinded himself while claiming to be trying to 'peel his face off.' 9. The clinical notes mention that Hausdorff blamed an entity called 'Mr. Splitfoot,' spread his behavior to at least six other patients who began drawing on their walls, and was eventually treated by a priest named Father Agostini whose 'procedure' temporarily stabilized him. 10. No patient named Hausdorff was ever registered in the province of British Columbia, and the Ministry of Health could not identify the records, leading Xander's boss to assume they were a film production prop. 11. Nick and Alex observe parallels between Hausdorff's behavior and that of Simon Rees, including drawings of shadow men similar to those found at Yuraka Mesa and the caves at Bath, and references to 'the adversary.' 12. Alex theorizes that whatever affected Hausdorff is spreading 'like a virus' across decades, while Nick counter-proposes it spreads 'like a meme' — an organized group delivering an apocalyptic gospel to captive psychiatric patients, possibly the same group behind teaching 'scary songs to children.' 13. A FaceTime call with Steve, a University of British Columbia mathematics professor and longtime Dungeons and Dragons player, reveals that the wall drawings encode sacred geometry: golden ratio equations, pentagonal sigils derived from 108-36-36 degree triangles, and concentric circles representing integrability. 14. Steve identifies a medieval pagan sigil in the drawings — a 'seal' used historically to conjure or imprison ancient demons — and notes the pattern also encodes a rejection of the Holy Trinity. 15. Steve connects the mathematical patterns to quantum mechanics, describing them as representations of 'gateways to other dimensions' that humans have sought for thousands of years. 16. At the energy conference in Vancouver, Thomas Warren does not appear, but a mysterious woman slips a cell phone into Nick's jacket and calls it from an unknown location, directing them to a parking garage. 17. The woman, who gives the name Sammy and disguised her voice using audio treatment, reveals she also traveled to Vancouver expecting Thomas Warren to appear — and is apparently connected to an earlier anonymous letter exchange through Portland, Maine. 18. Dr. Strand, upon reviewing the photographs from the box, identifies a reference to 'Watchers' — figures he compares to the mythological Pylori, described as guardians or stewards who intervene only when their charge is ready. 19. Listeners who enjoy slow-burn supernatural mystery with detailed investigative journalism structure will find this episode rewarding. 20. Listeners expecting fast narrative resolution or unfamiliar with the show's established mythology will find the episode difficult to follow without prior episodes.

As heard by us

An institutional case file slowly turns from diagnosis into dread.

An institutional case file slowly turns from diagnosis into dread. The episode keeps adding progress notes, staff reports, and half-credible sightings until treatment language starts to feel haunted, with the patient's obsession, the adversary, and the talk of ghostly visitors…

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Why you'd press play

When the ward notes stop sounding clinical and start sounding impossible.

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