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The Compendium: An Assembly of Fascinating Things

Strange True Stories with Kyle Risi & Adam Cox
  • 4.8 (115)
  • Documentary
  • Updated Weekly

The Compendium: An Assembly of Fascinating Things is a weekly documentary-style podcast about strange true stories, true crime, dark history, scandals, mysteries and remarkable people. Why listen to three podcasts when you can have it all in one? Hosted by Kyle Risi and Adam Cox, each episode takes one fascinating real-life story and gives you the full thing: the context, the characters, the chaos, the terrible decisions, and the tiny details that make you say, “Wait… how did this actually happen?” From infamous crimes and forgotten history to celebrity scandals, survival stories, cults, frauds and real-life mysteries, The Compendium is smart, funny, curious and thoroughly researched — made for listeners who want the whole story in one satisfying listen, without a ten-part homework assignment. New episodes weekly. Step inside the circus tent.

  1. Bob Lazar: The Area 51 UFO Claim That Changed Everything

    3d ago

    Bob Lazar: The Area 51 UFO Claim That Changed Everything

    Bob Lazar, Area 51, S-4 and Element 115 are concepts that all sit at the centre of one of the most famous UFO stories ever told — a claim that helped drag alien cover-up lore into the mainstream and turned Area 51 into modern conspiracy culture. Sounds wild, and the actual story will leave you questioning everything you know. Because in 1989, renowned investigative journalist George Knapp introduced America to a man claiming the US military was hiding alien spacecraft near Groom Lake. That man would later reveal himself as Bob Lazar. Today, we unpack Bob Lazar’s extraordinary claim that he worked at S-4 reverse-engineering extraterrestrial technology, inside one of the most secretive military sites in America. He says had seen alien craft, watched test flights, and even encountered the mysterious Element 115 — the supposed fuel source behind the technology. But today we proof test his claims, we’ll trace the missing credentials, the FBI raids, the shifting evidence, and the question that still divides UFO culture decades later: was Bob Lazar telling the truth or was he selling a myth. Topics Include Bob Lazar and the 1989 George Knapp broadcast Area 51, Groom Lake and the secret S-4 facility Element 115 and alien propulsion claims The alleged flying saucers and “sport model” craft Lazar’s missing credentials and credibility questions UFO lore, government secrecy and public belief Resources and Further Reading Bob Lazar’s 1989 interview - 8 News Now Out There - Desert Companion / KNPR The Secret History of the U-2 - National Security Archive Area 51 and the Accidental Test Flight - CIA Moscovium - Royal Society of Chemistry Bob Lazar & Jeremy Corbell - The Joe Rogan Experience Bob Lazar: Area 51 & Flying Saucers - Netflix documentary page S4: The Bob Lazar Story - WANA Channel documentary page Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 27m
  2. Anatoly Moskvin: The Russian Doll Maker Who Stole from the Dead

    4d ago ·  Bonus

    Anatoly Moskvin: The Russian Doll Maker Who Stole from the Dead

    A respected historian. A flat full of dolls. And a discovery that turned a cemetery investigation into something far darker. This bonus feed-swap episode is a special cross-promotion with our friends over at Fringe Beyond Limits, who bring us their take on Anatoly Moskvin, the Russian historian and linguist better known as the Doll Maker. In 2011, police investigating grave desecrations in Nizhny Novgorod searched Moskvin’s apartment and found what appeared to be life-sized dolls. They were, in fact, mummified remains taken from local cemeteries, dressed, arranged, and treated as if they were still alive. What makes the Anatoly Moskvin case so unsettling is not only the crime itself, but the belief system behind it: a fixation on cemeteries, burial rituals, resurrection, and the idea that the dead were calling out to be cared for. It is a strange true crime story about obsession, delusion, grief, and the uncomfortable line between punishment and psychiatric treatment. Topics Included Anatoly Moskvin and the Doll Maker case the 2011 Nizhny Novgorod grave desecration investigation the mummified bodies found inside Moskvin’s apartment Moskvin’s fascination with cemeteries and burial rituals the childhood story linked to his fixation on death the use of clothing, wigs, glass eyes, and music boxes the psychiatric evaluation and paranoid schizophrenia diagnosis the impact on victims’ families debates around justice, mental illness, and cemetery security Fringe Beyond Limits Hosts:  Frank, Brie and Lynette Website: https://fringebeyondlimits.com/ Listen on Spotify: Fringe Beyone Limits Listen on Apple: Fringe Beyons Limits Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 8m
  3. Silent Twins: The True Story of June and Jennifer Gibbons

    Jun 24 • Subscribers Only

    Silent Twins: The True Story of June and Jennifer Gibbons

    Two sisters made a pact to stop speaking to the world, together they build a private language, wrote strange fiction, and ventured out into a life crime spree that ended with them being locked inside Broadmoor, Britains most notorious psychiatric hospital. Now to the world as The Silent Twins, June and Jennifer Gibbons, became one of Britain’s strangest and saddest true stories. Born to Barbadian parents and raised in Wales, the girls withdrew after years of speech difficulties, bullying, racism, and a bond so intense it became impossible to escape. They spoke only to each other, moved almost as one. Isolated from the world the twins poured their real personalities into plays, diaries, poems and novels, including June’s cult outsider book The Pepsi-Cola Addict. But the world outside their bedroom eventually came calling. Alcohol, boys, vandalism and arson led to court, psychiatric evaluation, and a sentence to Broadmoor Hospital that the twins badly misunderstood. What followed was more than a strange true story. It was a dark history of selective mutism, institutional failure, media sensationalism, and a final pact that seemed to end only when Jennifer Gibbons died. Topics Included June and Jennifer Gibbons why the Silent Twins stopped speaking selective mutism and twin language bullying, racism and isolation in Wales Kathy Arthur and the attempt to separate the twins The Pepsi-Cola Addict and the twins’ writing the 1981 crime spree and arson charges Broadmoor Hospital and institutional failure Marjorie Wallace and the campaign to help them Jennifer Gibbons’ death and June’s life afterwards

    1h 9m
  4. DashCon 2014: The Failed Tumblr Convention and the Ball Pit Meme

    Jun 23

    DashCon 2014: The Failed Tumblr Convention and the Ball Pit Meme

    DashCon 2014 was supposed to be Tumblr’s great real-world fandom convention. Instead, it became one of the internet’s most infamous event disasters: a chaotic weekend of guest cancellations, volunteer confusion, a sudden $17,000 hotel panic, the Welcome to Night Vale fallout, and one tiny ball pit that became a meme so powerful it practically achieved sentience. Today we unpack how DashCon went from sincere community dream to public internet humiliation. We’ll trace the Tumblr culture that made the convention possible, the amateur planning and budget fantasy that made it unstable, and the disastrous decisions that turned a fandom gathering into a cautionary tale about what happens when online enthusiasm meets real-world logistics. Was DashCon a scam, a failure of good intentions, or simply catastrophic incompetence with a ball pit attached? Today, we dive into the failed Tumblr convention that became internet history. Topics Include tumblr culture before it spilled across the wider internet how dashcon went from fandom fantasy to real convention the $17,000 hotel panic and the welcome to night vale fallout why the ball pit became the meme that outlived the event the difference between bad intentions and catastrophic incompetence Resources and Further Reading DisasterCon: how a fan convention’s big dream became a nightmare - The Verge The inaugural DashCon 2014 did not go as planned - The Daily Dot DashCon organizers tell their side of the con disaster story - The Daily Dot DashCon - Fanlore The Story of Dashcon - Youtube (Sarah Z) The Failure of Dashcon - Youtube Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 27m
  5. Taylor Parker: Part 2, Reagan Hancock, Braxlynn Sage, and the Lie That Collapsed

    Jun 16

    Taylor Parker: Part 2, Reagan Hancock, Braxlynn Sage, and the Lie That Collapsed

    Taylor Parker had already been caught in one impossible lie: she claimed she had given birth on the side of a highway, but doctors quickly realised she had not been pregnant at all.  In Part 2 of the Taylor Parker case, we go behind the fake pregnancy and into the years of deception prosecutors said led to the murder of Reagan Hancock and the death of Braxlynn Sage. This is the part of the story where the scattered lies start to form a pattern: invented illnesses, fake inheritances, forged paperwork, spoofed phone calls, false identities, and a relationship with Wade Griffin built inside a world Taylor had manufactured around him.  Then the story moves into the crime scene, the investigation, and the Taylor Parker trial, where prosecutors argued this was not confusion, panic, or a tragic misunderstanding, but calculated deception carried to its most horrific conclusion. A restrained but deeply unsettling true crime story about fantasy, control, and the moment a lie becomes too dangerous to survive.      Topics Include  the Taylor Parker case part two the fake pregnancy and Wade Griffin deception forged paperwork, fake identities, and invented inheritances Reagan Hancock and the final escalation the foetal abduction of Braxlynn Sage Jessica Brookes’ discovery of the crime scene Taylor Parker’s changing explanations after arrest the trial evidence and death sentence jailhouse schemes and fake confession letters why Reagan and Braxlynn remain the centre of the story Resources and Further Reading  Parker v. State of Texas - Justia Taylor-Parker-Probable-Cause-Affidavit - Document Cloud Texas woman sentenced - CNN   Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 10m
  6. Taylor Parker: Part 1, Fake Pregnancy, Inheritance Lies and a Foetal Abduction Case

    Jun 9

    Taylor Parker: Part 1, Fake Pregnancy, Inheritance Lies and a Foetal Abduction Case

    A woman is pulled over on a Texas highway with a newborn baby in her lap, covered in blood, claiming she has just given birth behind the wheel. But when Taylor Parker reaches hospital, the story begins to fall apart.  In part one of the Taylor Parker case, we follow the strange and escalating trail of fake pregnancy claims, inheritance lies, family sabotage, burner phones, alleged threats, arson, a multimillion-dollar ranch deal and a relationship with Wade Gryphon that becomes tangled in one impossible story after another. At the centre of it all is Parker’s need to keep the people around her believing that her fantasy life is real.  But while Taylor and Wade are counting down to the arrival of “Clancy Gale”, another young woman, Reagan Hancock, is preparing for her own baby. And by the time the truth emerges, this true crime story has already crossed into something far darker: a foetal abduction case that no one around Parker saw coming.  Topics Included  Taylor Parker and the fake pregnancy claim Wade Gryphon and the relationship at the centre of the story The alleged Blackburn Syrup inheritance Shona Prior and the mother-daughter sabotage narrative Fake documents, messages, phone calls and threats The Pecan Point ranch deal Pregnancy doubts, ultrasounds and the gender reveal Reagan Hancock and her connection to Taylor The roadside birth claim on Highway 82 The discovery that the baby was not Taylor’s Resources and Further Reading  Parker v. State of Texas - Justia Taylor-Parker-Probable-Cause-Affidavit - Document Cloud Texas woman sentenced - CNN   Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 2m
  7. Marilyn Monroe: Dark History of How Hollywood Built and Broke an Icon

    Jun 2

    Marilyn Monroe: Dark History of How Hollywood Built and Broke an Icon

    Marilyn Monroe is one of the most recognisable women who has ever lived, but the version the world fell in love with was, in many ways, built in a studio.  Today, we trace how Marilyn Monroe emerged from Norma Jean’s unstable and abusive childhood to become the Hollywood icon everyone thinks they know. We follow her early modelling career, her studio-made voice, and the blonde bombshell image she spent years trying to outrun. But there is a darker side to this story too: the marriages, the power struggles, and the myths that shaped her final years. Marilyn Monroe’s story is what happens when public fantasy grows far bigger than the woman forced to carry it.  Topics Include  norma jean’s childhood, foster homes, and abuse how marilyn monroe was made by hollywood the breathy voice, the bombshell image, and studio control joe dimaggio, arthur miller, and public fascination jfk, conspiracy theories, and the final unraveling Resources and Further Reading  Marilyn Monroe - Encyclopaedia Britannica Marilyn Monroe - FBI Vault Marilyn’s Method - The Criterion Collection Host & Show Info  Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam Cox Intro Music:Alice in dark Wonderland Community & Calls to Action  Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple Podcasts Instagram: @theCompendiumPodcast Website: TheCompendiumPodcast.com Support us: Sign up to Patreon We’re Hiring: Find the perfect job at the circus Share this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 51m
  8. Zodiac Killer: Unsolved Mysteries, Ciphers and the Dark History of the Hunt

    May 26

    Zodiac Killer: Unsolved Mysteries, Ciphers and the Dark History of the Hunt

    The Zodiac Killer did not just murder people; he turned the case into a public game of fear, symbols, letters and unsolved ciphers. This episode follows the Zodiac Killer from the first lovers’ lane attacks in Northern California to the murder of taxi driver Paul Stine, tracing how a string of true crime cases became one of America’s most enduring unsolved mysteries. We unpack the Zodiac Killer murders, the taunting newspaper letters, the coded messages, the Z340 cipher, surviving witnesses, and the strange public performance that made the case feel bigger than the crimes themselves. We also look at the suspects and theories that have kept the case alive, including Arthur Leigh Allen, Lake Berryessa, Lake Herman Road, Blue Rock Springs, and the haunting question of why the Zodiac Killer was never caught. This is dark history, historical true crime, real life mysteries and true crime stories at their most unnerving: a serial killer podcast deep dive into what really happened, what remains unknown, and why the hunt still fascinates listeners decades later. Topics Include  zodiac killer murders zodiac killer letters and ciphers z340 cipher and the unsolved codes arthur leigh allen and other suspects why the zodiac killer was never caught Resources and Further Reading  The Zodiac Killer Part 01 - FBI Vault The Zodiac Killer Part 02 - FBI Vault Zodiac Killer - Wikipedia Who Is the Zodiac Killer? - Biography The Solution 340-Character Cipher - Wolfram Blog Host & Show Info  Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam Cox Intro Music:Alice in dark Wonderland Community & Calls to Action  Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple Podcasts Instagram: @theCompendiumPodcast Website: TheCompendiumPodcast.com Support us: Sign up to Patreon We’re Hiring: Find the perfect job at the circus Share this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Host & Show Info Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam CoxIntro Music: Alice in dark WonderlandCommunity & Calls to Action Review & follow on: Spotify & Apple PodcastsInstagram: @theCompendiumPodcastWebsite: thecompendiumpodcast.comSupport us: Sign up to PatreonShare this episode with a friend! If you enjoyed it, tag us on social media and let us know your favourite takeaway. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

    1h 24m
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Trailer

4.8
out of 5
115 Ratings

About

The Compendium: An Assembly of Fascinating Things is a weekly documentary-style podcast about strange true stories, true crime, dark history, scandals, mysteries and remarkable people. Why listen to three podcasts when you can have it all in one? Hosted by Kyle Risi and Adam Cox, each episode takes one fascinating real-life story and gives you the full thing: the context, the characters, the chaos, the terrible decisions, and the tiny details that make you say, “Wait… how did this actually happen?” From infamous crimes and forgotten history to celebrity scandals, survival stories, cults, frauds and real-life mysteries, The Compendium is smart, funny, curious and thoroughly researched — made for listeners who want the whole story in one satisfying listen, without a ten-part homework assignment. New episodes weekly. Step inside the circus tent.

Information

  • Creator
    Strange True Stories with Kyle Risi & Adam Cox
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    156
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2025 The Compendium: An Assembly of Fascinating Things
  • Show Website
    The Compendium: An Assembly of Fascinating Things
  • Provider
    Kyle Risi

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