Happy Halloween! Here are the top ten scariest things that have happened to me since I’ve started researching Ron Tammen’s disappearance

Happy Halloween, Good Man readers! For the past several days, I’ve been writing a post having to do with my latest rabbit hole, namely, how the FBI has been doctoring its records to mislead the public. But then I started noticing an uptick in new visitors on account of it being Halloween and all. As you know, Halloween is the time of year when people tend to think of Ron Tammen.

So I’m pulling a switcheroo. Instead of posting my latest findings that my diehard readers will surely love, although I’m not sure about anyone else, I’m going to discuss a more relatable topic for all of us. I’m going to tell you the top ten scariest things that have happened to me in my 16 years of researching Ron Tammen’s disappearance. (Note to diehards: we’ll discuss more of the FBI’s antics another day. I promise.)

Here’s my top ten list, starting with 10 and ending with numero uno. Some of these you probably know about. Others I’ve kept to myself, until now:

10. The minute I realized that St. Clair Switzer, Ron Tammen’s psychology professor, was mentioned on a CIA document as a potential consultant for Project Artichoke

Yeah, this scary realization kicked off the whole shebang regarding my theory of what happened to Ron Tammen. Because, if Ron Tammen’s psychology professor was working with the CIA, then they did it. They took him. I’m sorry, but they did. And you can just imagine how scary it was to realize that the person I’ve been inquiring about was taken by the CIA. With every FOIA request I’ve sent them, I’ve wondered if I was becoming a household name to our friends in the intelligence community. So that’s kinda creepy.

9. When I discovered the connection between Ron Tammen and James McCord

For 19 years, James McCord, of Watergate fame, had been employed by the CIA’s Office of Security, which oversaw Project Artichoke. When I discovered that he and Ron shared a stamp combination on their FBI records (ST-102, REC-19), it freaked me out. No, seriously. It was late at night and I remember sitting in my big comfy chair and looking out the window, as if someone out there knew what I’d just discovered. I think that’s when I implemented our current “don’t open the door for anyone unless you’re expecting them” policy. To date, it has proven to be a good strategy. I have one exception: I will open the door when my neighbor pops by with homegrown tomatoes. I have gotten to know his knock. Otherwise, if you’re not dropping off homegrown tomatoes, I’m not home.

8. When I learned that a French terrorist who’d been suspected of assassinating JFK has FBI records that look like Ron’s

The French terrorist I’m talking about is Jean René Souètre, a man I’d heard had been potentially linked to the JFK assassination. I didn’t even know his name at first. On a whim, again, late at night, I figured out what it was and then looked him up on the Mary Farrell Foundation website to see what his FBI records looked like. According to his records, he couldn’t have killed JFK, but the FBI had definitely been interested in finding out if he was anywhere near Dallas on November 22, 1963. When I saw all of the 10s on his records, just like Ron’s 10s, I freaked out again. I think that may have been the moment I thought, did the FBI consider Ron an assassin, just like Jean René Souètre? If so, he would’ve been government-sanctioned since, according to the FBI, he’d never been arrested. That’s…um…really scary.

7. The time in 2013 when some man who lived in the Bronx called my cell and I thought it might be Ron

In 2013, I was still living in D.C., and I was heavy into making phone calls to Ron’s family and friends. One Saturday morning, someone whose name had things in common with Ron’s name called my cell but he didn’t leave a message. I won’t tell you his last name, but his first name was John—Ron’s brother’s name—and his middle initial was H. I don’t know why, but I thought, what if it’s Ron? After all, I’d been emailing my cell number to God and everyone. What if one of those people—his brother John perhaps—forwarded it to Ron. I remember working myself up into a little frenzy. Then I got scared. What if he yells at me? What if he tells me to butt out and to stop calling everyone and to let him live his life? When I called him back later that day, he sounded elderly, which also tracked. Acting as nonchalant as possible, I asked him if he had called me earlier in the day. Mind you, that was a bizarre thing for me to do. I never call strangers who misdial my number, let alone doing so hours later. But this time was different. His response was just as weird. “Oh, I think the kids were playing with my phone.” As you diehards know, I now think that Ron had already died by that time—sometime between 2002, when the FBI expunged his fingerprints because of a conflict with the Privacy Act, and 2010, when the FBI sent me Ron’s missing person records without seeking third-party authorization. But it would have been so cool if it was Ron. And also kind of scary.

6. When I realized that the FBI had been lying to the Butler County cold case detective about not knowing what happened to Ron’s fingerprints

It’s one thing for the FBI to lie to me, which it does all the time. But when the FBI lies to a member of law enforcement, someone in a profession with whom the FBI is ostensibly in a working partnership, that’s saying something. When Butler County’s cold case detective, Frank Smith, contacted the FBI in 2008 seeking Ron’s fingerprints, they pretended not to know anything. Frank knew that they’d had his fingerprints at one time because he saw the fingerprint notations on one of his missing person documents. But when he reached out to them, they merely told him that they’d looked everywhere and couldn’t find them. They gave him no other info. They didn’t tell him that the fingerprints had been expunged in 2002 and they certainly didn’t tell him that they were permitted to expunge them 30 years early due to Record Schedule N1-065-88-3 item 1A, which means that they did so based on a court order or a conflict with the Privacy Act of 1974. (I later narrowed it down to the latter.) Why would the FBI lie to a cold case detective? Because he was investigating something that’s bigger than anyone knows. And now I’ve picked up the baton, which is…you guessed it…scary.

5. Podcasts

You all know I’m an introvert, right? My comfort zone is sitting in front of the fire writing, which is something I happen to be doing at the moment. What’s scary is sitting in front of a Zoom camera for an hour or two trying to reel off the specifics of my 16 years of Ron Tammen research without forgetting anything important. Names, dates, and places are my phobias. Brain freeze is my bogeyman. What’s the lady’s name who lived in Seven Mile who had a guy show up on her doorstep late at night on April 19, 1953? Oh, right, Clara Spivey! What was the little town where H.H. Stephenson saw a guy who looked like Ron eating with several other young men? Of course, Wellsville, NY! What’s the name of the Air Force base near San Antonio where Louis Jolyon West was stationed during a time I believe he was in communication with Ron Tammen’s psychology professor, St. Clair Switzer? It’s Lackland Air Force Base, Jenny. Don’t forget!

I’m grateful to the podcasters, and I’ve enjoyed every interview I’ve done. It was awesome talking with them. Also, I’m sure I will happily accept future invitations to talk about Ron Tammen to get the word out about his story. But that doesn’t mean I won’t be in a subdued state of panic leading up to and during our conversation. Scary, but still worth it.

4. Every time I place a phone call to a potentially hostile source

If you think talking to nice podcasters is scary for an introvert, imagine talking to people who, for whatever reason, don’t want to talk to you about Ron Tammen or various related subjects. These are the hostiles, the people who say things like “Hey, what’s all this about??” or “I think we’re done here!” and hang up on you. They’re the ones who block you after you’ve left a well-meaning message hoping for a sit-down. Most of the people I’ve spoken with have been wonderfully helpful and they, too, are interested in seeking the truth about Ron. But there are others who want nothing to do with me or my project. I can’t imagine pulling one of those 60 Minutes Mike Wallace in-person pop-ins to someone who won’t pick up their phone. That, my friends, is not in my DNA and I’ve had zero training in it. I suppose I’ve gotten a little crustier on the exterior after starting this project, and I’ve made some calls in which I was expecting some pushback but instead had a delightful convo. Let’s put these in the scary, but worth it category as well.

3. Every time my computer acts up

To be sure, I’m no computer whiz. I’ve been known to press the wrong key or to misplace a file from time to time. But I’m also not a beginner. I know…um…things about computers. When one of those AI chat bubbles pops up in the bottom right corner of my screen asking me if I want more info, I will sometimes ask for more info. If I accidentally click on a bad link that has compromised my bank card, I know to jump on my bank’s web page lickety split and cancel that card asap. If MS Word is acting all wonky, I remember to turn off my computer and turn it back on again, without anyone telling me to. I guess you could call me semi-literate. But after I started conducting research into Ron Tammen, it seems that computer problems have happened more frequently to me. One time I lost an entire email conversation with someone from the FBI and I don’t remember hitting the delete key. Maybe this isn’t fair, but every time something happens—every downage, every outage, every blank screen, every lost file, every lost conversation—is, in my mind, courtesy of the FBI or CIA sabotaging my research. That never fails to make me shudder in fear.

2. When I was on my walk-run this past summer

I’ve been living with this secret since this past July or so. One day, while I was on my walk-run, I felt something sting me in my lower right back. It felt like a bee or something and it hurt really bad. But I didn’t see any insects flying away afterward. When I got home, I took a look at it, and there wasn’t just one bite. There were six large bumps and, get this, they were shaped in an arrow formation. I kid you not.  Do you know what else? They’re still there. They’re smaller and lighter and I think they’ll go away at some point, but this was no ordinary insect bite. I’ve told people that I thought I may have been hit by a poison dart gun, which was 95% just joking and 5% OMG, what if? I didn’t feel woozy or weird after it happened. It just hurt for a long time. Nevertheless, I’ve changed my walk-run route, and that information will remain classified.

1. When I found out that a retired special agent for the FBI lives really close to me

One day, I was attempting to locate some retired special agents from the FBI to fill me in on their experiences. I wanted operational details. So, imagine my astonishment when I located one of the men and found that he lived mere blocks from me. I wrote him a letter. I’m sure he was surprised to hear from me as well. I won’t tell you his name. I won’t say if we met or not, but I will say this: he knows who I am, he knows what I’m doing, and he knows where I live, which is super close to him. So yeah…the homegrown tomatoes policy still applies.