MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories
Medical Mysteries - "Blood Feast"
Thu, 27 Mar 2025
This story is a fan favorite from MrBallen's Medical Mysteries.One night in 1944, over 300 patients at a mental hospital in Oregon become violently sick after eating dinner. Many of them die. An investigation is quickly launched to determine the source of this deadly illness. Was there something wrong with the food itself? Or could it have been the work of a deranged killer?Listen Now: Wondery.fm/MBMMFor 100s more stories like this one, check out my YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallenIf you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @MrBallenSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries podcast about?
Hey, Prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Hey, it's Mr. Ballin here. If you're a fan of The Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, then you should check out my other podcast, Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries.
Each week, I dive into some of the most bizarre, mind-bending medical stories you've ever heard. Cases that leave doctors scratching their heads, miraculous recoveries that defy logic, and strange medical mishaps that seem too wild to be real. These stories are more than just eerie. They are a reminder of how unpredictable and sometimes terrifying life can be.
Up next is one of my recent favorites from the series. Whether you're new to Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries or a longtime listener, I think you'll find it just as captivating as I did. If you like this content, make sure to follow Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.
We put out new episodes every week, and each one dives into a bizarre, mind-bending medical mystery that will leave you questioning what you thought you knew about the human body. In 1944, a doctor covered a deceased patient's body with a sheet and then wheeled their stretcher out into the hallway.
The morgue at the Oregon State Hospital was already full, so the doctor planned to put this body in the chapel. But when he pushed open the chapel doors, there were already so many stretchers with dead patients with sheets on them inside that there was no room for this patient. The doctor closed the chapel's heavy wooden doors and just stood there, his mind racing.
More than 400 patients had fallen violently ill in the past 12 hours, and dozens had died. The doctor had no idea what the cause was, and if he couldn't figure it out, he knew more bodies would be joining the ones already lining the inside of the chapel.
From Ballin Studios and Wondery, I'm Mr. Ballin, and this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery originating from the one place we all can't escape, our own bodies. If you liked today's story, please invite the follow button on an African safari, but before you go, make sure you sneak 27 raw steaks into their backpack.
This week's story is called Blood Feast. It was late in the afternoon on November 18, 1942. A cook named Mickey McKillop opened the lid of a giant metal vat, then asked his volunteer sous chef, 27-year-old George Nosen, to carry it over to an industrial oven.
Mickey and George were starting to prepare dinner for almost 500 patients across five wards at the Oregon State Hospital, a public mental facility for psychiatric patients. Tonight's menu was scrambled egg yolks and toast, and Mickey, along with his boss, Mary O'Hare, were the only two cooks on duty.
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Chapter 2: What happened at the Oregon State Hospital in 1944?
Allie wanted to help, but she told the detective that she hadn't seen anything suspicious. Until that horrible dinner, she'd been on duty taking care of patients. She watched the detective as he scribbled something down on a notepad and she started to feel nervous. Allie assured the detective that the other nurses would confirm her story too.
The detective wrote a few more things down and then looked up at Allie and thanked her for her time and told her she was free to go. Allie breathed a sigh of relief and stood up to leave. As she reached the door, the detective told an officer standing outside to bring in the next person to be interviewed, assistant cook Mickey McKillop. Allie passed Mickey as she was walking down the hallway.
He was waiting in a chair outside the office, bouncing his leg up and down. Allie couldn't help but think that he looked anxious, or like a man who was hiding something. By late that same evening, Mickey McKillop had been in Dr. Lidbeck's office for hours. The detective had asked him the same few questions over and over, pressing him about the way the kitchens were run.
Mickey thought he'd kept his story straight, but he'd told it so many times now that it was hard to be sure, and he knew he was likely starting to confuse the details. All Mickey wanted to do was sleep. He had a migraine that was making it hard to focus, but every time he closed his eyes, the detective would shake him awake.
and so Mickey was feeling like he would do just about anything to make this interview end. It was obvious the police were suspicious of him, and Mickey knew they would not give up until he, Mickey, told the police what they needed to know. So Mickey decided it was time to come clean.
Mickey sat up in the stiff wooden chair, and while avoiding eye contact with the detective, Mickey would admit that he did know more than he had told them. Mickey said that he could tell them exactly who had poisoned the eggs. In fact, he had watched it happen. And worst of all, he had not done a thing to stop it.
An hour later, Mickey and his boss, Mary O'Hare, were being led from the Oregon State Hospital in handcuffs. A police officer read the charges. Mickey was charged with manslaughter. Mary was charged with accessory after the fact. Then the officer loaded them into a police van.
Mickey took one last look at the hospital and caught a glimpse of a few patients staring out the windows, terrified looks on their faces. One of the faces he recognized was George Nosen, the psychiatric patient who volunteered in the kitchen. Mickey shook his head. He knew that what he had just told the detectives would change George's life forever.
When Mickey the cook finally told the truth to detectives, he began by telling them about the terrible evening the sickness broke out. While the nursing staff was running around treating all these patients who were vomiting up blood, Mickey saw George Nosen cowering in the hallway and suddenly Mickey had a terrible thought. He grabbed George and asked him to retrace his steps from that afternoon.
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