I Picked Up "Tex" Watson Hitchhiking AFTER the Manson Murders

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Tackle these situations in stride and and you of course be annoyed when an unplanned expense comes up but not let it be something that slows me down right as I did with repairing my credit you know hiring somebody to do credit repair for me but that was a gift that I gave myself that allowed me to then you know get my first apartment. Like a good neighbor State Farm is there. State Farm proud sponsor of my cultura podcast network. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories and we tell stories about everything here on this show from the arts to sports and from business to history and everything in between including your stories send them to our americanstories.com they're some of our favorites and this next story comes to us well Greg Hengler brings it to us and actually the person providing this story is a listener in Colorado. Charles Tex Watson was just a young guy from Texas in 1969 when he came under the spell of drugs in Charles Manson and helped kill seven people. Watson attended Cal State Los Angeles but dropped out less than half a semester later got a job selling wigs and began living it up in the party scene of Los Angeles. One fateful evening he was driving home and picked up a hitchhiker in Watson's words hitchhikers were pretty common on Sunset Boulevard and I pulled over to pick one up when he told me his name was Dennis Wilson it didn't mean anything to me but when he said he was one of the Beach Boys I was impressed. Wilson the Beach Boys drummer then directed Watson to his home on Sunset Boulevard in the Pacific Palisades area of Los Angeles. Watson was shocked when he pulled up. In the living room Watson found a man sitting on the floor with his guitar surrounded by six young women. He looked up, Watson later recalled, and the first thing I felt was a sort of gentleness an embracing kind of acceptance and love.

Another man at the house introduced them. This is Charlie. Charlie Manson. On August 9th 1969 under the direction of Charles Manson Watson and three other Manson girls murdered pregnant actress Sharon Tate and four other people on Benedict Canyon. The following night Manson accompanied the previous night's killers and supervised the murder of two more victims in Los Feliz. These murders are considered some of the most gruesome and shocking in American history. Tex Watson stayed in Los Angeles for almost two months before fleeing to Texas where he was arrested but it's those two months following the Manson murders where the story from our listener in Colorado picks up.

Here's Patty Kingsbaker. This story happened in 1969. I had graduated from high school in Miami and moved out to California to live with my brother who was living in Los Angeles at the time and it was the 60s. My brother was 10 years older than me so we kind of you know it felt like we had really grown up in different generations.

I mean our ideals and he was a little uh worried about me being hippie and maybe going down the wrong path with him at this time of my life. So I had been in Los Angeles for a year um had gotten to know a few people and you know was doing the things that kids in the 60s did you know. One of the days I was with a friend of mine and I'm not sure why I was hitchhiking either I didn't have a car yet it was kind of probably right after I got there but we had hitchhiked from the valley, San Fernando valley over to the beach and when my brother heard about it he about lost his mind and he was like no no you were not hit anyway. So I eventually got a car and you know it was a time when things were just more opened and a lot of people were hitchhiking and you know we picked people up you know it was just what happened. But this one night I had been over in Malibu with some friends and I was coming back into the valley and I was coming through Topanga Canyon and when I made the turn off Pacific Coast Highway there was this guy it was raining it was like torrential raining and there was this guy on the side of the road and so I pulled over.

A he was out there in the middle of this rainstorm and B that's just what we did back then. So I pulled over but as soon as he opened the door and got in my car I just got this sick feeling. I it was I don't know what evil is I don't know what it is but I felt it. I was scared. I was absolutely scared and I was like I knew right then I hadn't made a mistake letting this guy in my car but there was nothing I could do.

He's there. So we're driving through Topanga Canyon now I mean and it is torrential rain and there are mudslides on the road. I'm scared. I'm having to go much slower than I would have gone through the canyon.

I'm just thinking God get me to the other side of this canyon and he was going to Reseda. I remember that and I lived in Woodland Hills which is another part of the San Fernando Valley but I just wanted him out of my car and he was trying to engage me in conversation and I was just like I finally just said you know I really can't talk. I can't talk. I really just need to concentrate on the road and my driving.

I just can't talk. I was I've never felt anything like that before so when we got to the other end of Topanga Canyon I just pulled over and I said I'm really sorry but I'm going a different direction and I need to leave you here but and he was like okay and he got out and there was no incident. I mean there's nothing nothing bad happened but it was just that feeling just stuck with me and I was just like I didn't get it. It was a few months later that I picked up the paper one day and on the front of the paper were the pictures of the Manson family and the guy who was in my car that night was Tex Watson. Needless to say I've never picked up another hitchhiker ever. That was enough.

That night just that feeling taught me not to do that and there's been times I've passed people that I think oh that I just have never been able to bring myself to do it. Well that's a heck of a hitchhiker story picking up Tex Watson one of the worst killers and murderers of all time and she could feel evil. Patty Kingsbaker's story, a great listener's story, a really awful hitchhiker story here on Our American Stories. Here at Our American Stories we bring you inspiring stories of history, sports, business, faith, and love. Stories from a great and beautiful country that need to be told but we can't do it without you.

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