I'm an American history teacher. My class recently finished the westward expansion unit. I'll show them your video during our enrichment period next week. The kids will love your mix of comedy and historical accuracy. Well done, lady!

"Your wife makes great soup" "Yea, but I'll miss her"

I love how she handles these topics. She makes jokes throughout it and keeps it funny but she also takes the time to look at it from a serious perspective and teaches the real history and psychology behind it

This was a sad story until we got to Nancy. Young child, cold and starving, eating her own mother but not knowing bc at least the adults around her had that kind of courtesy. But finding out later....I can't imagine. I really got emotional then, and when seeing the large rock memorial, it broke me. I really appreciate your videos on these subjects bc you understand where the humor should be placed and when we should be respectful.

When I was 14, my sister, dad and I, got stuck on top of Donner pass while driving to Susanville. The whole freeway was stopped, we couldn’t move, and there were people outside of their cars playing in the snow with their kids... MY dad took it upon himself to tell us this sweet story while we were stuck in the snowstorm for 4 hours. 🙂🙃 *Carson City! Not Susanville*

Someone get this woman a netflix show

i was listening to LPOTL's coverage of this story, and what john stark, an unpaid rescuer in the last group, did actually made me cry. he saved 9 people when the other two (paid) people with him just wanted to take one child each and leave the rest to die. he picked up a couple of the kids, moved them down the trail, went back for more, and did this over and over and over and didn't stop, rest, or eat until they were all safe and out of the snow. stark and the 9 people he rescued all made it back alive.

Thank you for discussing the Donner Party. It's a compelling story to actually read, and goes far beyond the cannibalism parts. Most intriguing of all the emigrants is Tamsen Eustis Donner. Simply an amazing gal, educated, a herbalist, a woman who'd already suffered personal loss, an interesting letter-writer. She kept a journal--which has never been found. When you read about Tamsen--who warned George: Let's don't take that shortcut--you have to admire everything about her. For instance, she sent her children ahead with one of the rescue parties while she stayed back at that grisly campsite to care for her mortally wounded husband, George. There are many good books--perhaps none as well written as Smoke Gets in Your Eyes--but the story itself is simply unforgettable.

Death Mama has uploaded, her children are fed

Eating establishments named after the Donner party? Welcome to McDonners, you want fries with him?

Yes. I knew. But I am a native Californian. (born here, not First Nation) Elitha Donner is buried about 2 miles down the street from my house. I travel 80 regularly and have seen snow depths similar to what the Donner Party experienced. That fact never fails to cross my mind. Even in the summer I think how they didn’t have a lovely highway to cross the Sierras. Elitha was a teacher here and now has a school named for her.

It makes a ton of sense that they would have resorted to cannibalism so quickly if they thought the people dying had starved to death rather than died from the cold. That would light a fire under anyone's behind if they have genuine fear that they're going to be next if they don't find something to eat *right now.*

I clicked "save" so I could add this video to my "Watch Later" playlist. KZfaq saved the video to my "Cooking" playlist 😬 dear god no why

Patrick Dolan: “Lets draw straws to see who gets eaten!” Patrick Dolan approximately 3 minutes later: “lol jk dudes that was a v crazy idea right?”

You definitely don't know how you'll react to a situation until you're in it. My sister was fiercely judgemental of women who got abortions and women who had sex before marriage in general. And then she got pregnant at the age of 17 and suddenly her view on these things changed verry quickly Edit: just to clarify, she didn't actually end up being pregnant (faulty pregnancy test) but the lesson she learned certainly stuck

As some who legit often struggle to just get out of the bed some mornings, I can't even begin to appreciate how difficult it would have been just to survive, let alone attempt to keep trudging on, or even just digging out the snow.

Years ago I worked with a Donner family member. She said to me, “Well, if you can’t beat em, eat em.” We all laughed.... I never forgot.

"If you're starving and you know it, eat your friends" 👏👏 If you're starving and you know it, eat your friends " 👏👏

I had a good friend named Rick Donner. We were radio DJ's at a station in Texas in the 1960's. His eponymous ancestor survived the disaster and opened a popular _restaurant_ in San Francisco.

Came back to watch this again. "Donner Camp: Picnic Area" Just now got this, no clue how I missed it before. Thanks for making such great, educational content.

If I was with a stranded group and I was dying, I’d totally be fine with the rest of the group eating my body to survive after I died. I mean, would I rather have them leave me for bugs and wildlife to decompose or would it be better for them to use my nutritious organs to stay alive possibly in time to be rescued. I’m dead, doesn’t change anything for me!

I’m cool with people eating my dead body. hope I’m tasty, been self marinating In garlic dipping sauce for years lol

i love that you actually went into a bit of detail about the various kinds of cannibalism. i've been fascinated by mortuary cannibalism ever since i took a course on death and burial in college, and nobody ever talks about it. they'll even conflate pathological and survival cannibalism, it's bad. anyway awesome video, thanks!

I’m overwhelmed by all of the reasons I have for respecting, honoring and expressing gratitude for this woman’s involvement for sharing and dissecting history. I am a sociologist, 74 year old American woman who has spent the last 35 years of my life in Europe. Throughout these years I have been confronted by social norms which have shaken, and sometimes destroyed, my “comfortable secure and certain knowledge” of how society works. Sociology, from my perspective and belief, is primarily an intensely personal interaction reflecting every sociologists insights. From my perspective, I am convinced that a lively merger of various sociologist conversations must inevitably benefit all of us. As I have recently encountered on KZfaq “just saying”.

The people who are like "ew, I would NEVER resort to cannibalism" are probably the people who would resort to it first.

“Would you eat a person?” I’m not really in the *mood* for person... how about pancakes?

Dear Caitlin, I loved this video! I grew up in Northern California about an hour from Donner Lake, and lived in the area for a total of 30 years. It was fun to watch you explore and learn about it. Also, Donner Lake Kitchen used to make the BEST huevos rancheros on the planet! I haven’t been there in years, but if it’s still the same chef, or someone who learned from him, then they are probably still amazing!

I have been to Donner Pass and it is a quite an experience. You can feel the spirits of the ones who lived and died there. The day we were there a light mist was in the air and it was cloudy. It was in the spring/summer, but you could feel the hopeless of the people just the same.

I’m related to the survivors and I didn’t know some of this.

After watching this video I wanted to know more about the Donner party, so I went over to Google. Typed it in, and my phone autocorrected it to "Dinner party"... Freudian slip? 😂

I didn't know anything about the Donner party other than the rumors of cannibalism, because I didn't go to school in CA. But I read _Ordeal By Hunger_ and that's when I found out their situation was much worse than people talk about. For one, they were already starving when they stopped and made camp, having lost most of their animals and supplies (and water) crossing the desert. The book is just one long, detailed account of desperate day after desperate day. However, there was one family that survived and never resorted to cannibalism.

I had a survival situation in the Caribbean ocean many years ago. Nature can be your executioner and your strength. On a broken down boat....floating aimlessly. Kept alive by fishing and rationing water. Then , the storms come...then the hot Sun ...4 days...Thank you for this Donner Party story...

The saddest part for me was that the final rescue party had to leave some people behind because they had become catatonic and couldn't assist in their own rescue.

Here's a fun fact: Starvation makes you go crazy before it kills you. If someone goes with minimal food for long enough, they start to show paranoia, hysteria, depression, and other kinds of psychological distress. In one of the first studies of starvation (in the 40's) one of the participants cut off three of his own fingers and couldn't explain why.

As a Canadian, I'd never heard of the Donner party until I was skimming through your videos a few days back. I assumed it was about a German political group, and picked more interesting death related content. Then I saw a Puppet History video advert for the Donners, and I realized it might not be boring or political. So I clicked. When I watched that video I had **zero clue** what I was walking into 🤣 I watched this vid the same day as I watched the Puppet History vid. Wild wild stuff. I had no idea there were different kinds of cannibalism btw, so thanks for more learning! (Genuine not sarcasm)

I've often thought that if time travel were possible - you'd be with people that had gone through something like this and just say "oh yeah, in my time we can travel to California from Missouri in about 2 hours or so" - how quiet everything would get, and not just on account of being amazed at our technology. We really do take our times for granted!

I can't imagine living with the knowledge you ate someone you knew, my great grandfather is a holocaust survivor and he often goes to high schools and talks about how he survived, but cannibalism is the one thing he won't talk about, he acknowledges it happened but refuses to speak of it

"Do you kill the skinny guy because he can't fight back? Or do you all gang up on the body builder because of more steaks and chops? These are decisions people have had to make" -George Carlin

Caitlyn,I absolutely love your videos.Not only are they fascinating,your sense of humor is awesome!!!

to heck with 'desperation' and 'starvation'- if you slow down ahead of me in Walmart when I'm hangry, I'm liable to eat you

I’m related to the first survivors that traveled through Death Valley by way of covered wagon. They survived by eating their dead, including infants. I’m literally alive today because my family ate my family.

Thank you for reintroducing historical events. The way you do it is a great way to teach history.

your presentations are so informative, ascerbic and witty...truly a great pleasure to watch. donating now!

The natives didn’t eat the dead because they believe that cannibals turn to horrible monsters called wendigos

When my husband and I went to restaurants, I used to always give our name as “Donner”. When our name was called they always called for “the Donner party”. I always got a chuckle from that. The host/hostess never seemed to notice! 😂

I’ve been reading a book based on the journal of a member of the party & what was pieced together by others along the way to the relief parties, & when they died, the survivors filled in the gaps. The book is very graphic & would upset the feint hearted.ah, you just showed the book I’m reading.

This is a good summary, though there are more details to the story (as always). If I'm remembering correctly, they were already hungry by the time they reached Truckee Lake because they had already started running low on supplies thanks to the Hastings Cutoff (and some of their previous delays). Several wagons had gotten stuck in the salt flat and had to be abandoned. They were traveling with a large herd of cattle, but the herd essentially evaporated thanks to either dying of thirst in the desert, running away to find water, or by being stolen at various points in the journey. So they had few of their cattle left to eat. Even when they were still in what is now Nevada, they had to send someone to Fort Sutter to get additional food and provisions, but many of the families were low on money, due to not having many resources and to having to abandon what little they had to get out of the Great Salt Lake Desert before dying of thirst, so they quickly ran out of whatever provisions they obtained. I don't think they were in great condition when they reached Truckee Lake, and because most in the party were city dwellers, they didn't have much experience hunting and couldn't catch many animals in the poor, wintry conditions. It's really a tragic story the more you read about it. As Caitlin said, it's not just one bad thing that happened to them, and it's not like they made one monumentally stupid decision. They put their trust in the wrong people, made decisions based on misleading information, and started experiencing setback after setback...the situation snowballed into a tragedy. It's quite sad.

That is THE saddest looking snowman I have ever seen lol.

I seriously thought that the Donner party was just like a family of like 14 who got stranded in a mountain cave in Colorado for 3 or so months, and went insane and killed each other and ate the bodies as both part of their descent into madness and as a survival tactic. I had no idea that it was close to a hundred people who only cannibalized when they believed it was absolutely necessary to their survival. Edit: Autocorrect changed Donner to dinner for some reason, had to fix that.

You are so in depth with all of your topics. I'm so happy that I have run across your path. Thank you so much!

Ty so much for all this information. I was always interested in this tragic story and to see the actual location is mind blowing. You are a wonderful storyteller; loving your sense of humor,

I just can’t get over how accurate and chillingly beautiful the title “The Indifferent Stars Above” is.

“Patrick Short-Straw Dolan” sounds like a frat bro who _really_ got screwed during the hazing process and never lived it down.

I've been to the Sierra dozens of times as ( we are only 2 hours away) and I have to admit this lake is absolutely beautiful.

Wow, almost 2 Million subscribers~! You deserve every one, your videos are always ( morbidly ) interesting and informative.

24 minutes?? caitlin has blessed us 🙏🏽

The Donner party story has been sanitized for the history books. I’ve never heard a lot of this and definitely didn’t hear about them killing the natives and eating them.

The author and the book "Under the Indifferent Stars Above" are fantastic. While listening I found myself crying for their fate at several moments.

I really like your shows. So much information about what happened. Thanks for the explanation.

Louis and Salvador: "these white people are crazy" lol

**suggests eating a person and draws the shortest straw** Me

I think when I was younger I went to that museum and they had a pot that was either from the camp or a similar that they would've had. I recall my dad describing how they (the party) would put the bones in the pot to cook them. After they'd boiled their shoe leather and pine needles of course. I learned a lot more about the party that stayed then the people that left for help.

you're a great teacher! will definitely check out your other videos this is really easy to follow

Cannibal Caitlin has a nice ring to it know ? Cannibal Caitlin carves corpse for consumption in California (Try saying that 5 times fast)

You asked about archaeological evidence... at Jamestown they really do have bones with teeth marks in them as evidence of cannibalism in that colony, so that's a fun thing.

Excellent, Caitlin!! HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!

I live in Placer County, California, and the dark history of the Donner Party is well known in my area. But I can't judge. What might any of us do when it comes to our own survival? Thanks, Caitlin! I love your channel.

I once read that a surviving member of the party was interviewed years afterwards and she said something like this, “Don’t take any shortcuts and hurry along every chance you get.” Our ancestors certainly paid a heavy price. Further, Caitlin please stay awesome!

Whoa, Abraham Lincoln really dodged a bullet. Wait...

I absolutely love your videos !!! Thank You for sharing!!

Fantastic video! ❤ Can't wait until you are back!🎉

I was laughing so hard at the zoom in on the mopey snowman in front of the memorial.

Poor Louis and Salvador 😭 I was hoping they'd escape

I took that same route when I moved from WI to Yuba City California (right next to Sutter.) We went through Donner's pass in late April. Our whole way was nice and sunny, but there it was a total blizzard. Scary to drive through

Your video was amazing and very informative, I enjoyed it alot while driving

I watched a documentary way back in the '90s called "the Donner Party" with my parents. The irony is it was on a VHS with a very poorly hand written label - We thought the tape was called "The Dinner Party". o.O

I was scared as a child when before Christmas break of my sixth grade year, my history teacher put on a documentary on it. It wasn’t one of those documentaries where they visit the memorial or anything, it was one of the documentaries where they acted out what was happening. And let’s just say I will not forget that day ever.

I visited the Donner Museum last time I was traveling cross the States and I was really excited to explore some of this grim history. (My mother, who was not as enthused, waited in the car) It is in fact a very eerily quiet place, and all I could think about when I was outside there was how horrible the circumstances were, the time of year they chose, and having to go pretty much entirely on foot for their long journey. Nowadays, it's easy to take for granted how easily we can drive up the mountain in our cars, and so easily we can cross the Mojave Desert and see it as merely a very cumbersome and repetitive drive, rather than the natural danger it is. I recommend visiting if you're passing through, as the museum has a lot of information. I didn't realize when I first went that the statue was meant to be the same height as the snow that year, nor that that's where the cabin was burnt down. Now the eerie feeling makes a little more sense, and I'm glad I took the time to sit and reflect on that area when I was there.

Wow. With every one of your videos that I watch, my respect for you grows. And I would definitely have a night out with you. Your hilarious, intelligent, interesting and compassionate. I love the way you bring those qualities to each of your videos. Thank you. 💀🏛⚱⚰🪦

My archeology classes taught me that if one finds poop one can test for proteins that only are found if one has engaged in cannibalism

This would be the BEST season of AHS

I love how you just snuck in some Werner Herzog! 😂This is one of my new favorite channels so thank you for the delightfully bizarre, well researched education.

Welcome back! You have the info, no one what's to dig for. Entsrtaining!

I love your story telling style. That combined with your attention to historical details, and (most importantly) your respect for the dead, make your videos absolute treasures.

Oh my god I grew up right next to Donner Pass. When I was a kid we took field trips to Donner Pass and actually made us role play as members of the party. As a nine year old I thought it was awesome, but now that I'm older I wonder what creepy adult had that idea.

so fascinating !! love this video 🤍 also ur enunciation is very pleasing to listen to

I have backpacked their route through the mountains and down into Salt Lake City. They had to cut trees to climb to that final pass and it took them two weeks to get through. Wagon wheel marks are still visible on rocks.

Y’all, as someone who frequents the Sierra Nevada’s, the snow isn’t 20 feet tall for 2 months, it goes from November to April

You forgot autocannibalism! It's like a depressing meal for one.

Learned about all this when I was in the fire academy. They used the donner party to help train people in wilderness survival. So we had to find ways to find the food they didnt know existed with the same tools they had.

Hi, love your channel. There is another KZfaqr by the name of Wonderhussey, who did a series about the Donner tragedy. If they had made it though the area a day earlier the group would have made it.

my family and i used to travel to donner lake every year and stay at a cabin, the hike right by us was called donner trail. it wasn’t until like- years into it did i put two and two together but it’s so cool seeing you visit the places i’ve been to so many times!! and interacting w the museum like i did !

The best content on KZfaq! Intelligent, coherent, funny, informative, fascinating... Love you!!!

My little cousin had to read a book about the Donner's in like 5th grade. The book was called "Donner Dinner Party", I gasped at that title.

Its a. Beautiful place!! The museum is great! Thank you for taking us with you!

I’m a new subscriber and I love the shows…especially your humor.

I lived in the city where Jeffrey Dahmer killed 17 people. They tore the building down and had to hire security because people wanted pieces of it. Someone offered money to buy his apartment contents. Thankfully it was destroyed. I think the fascination with cannibalism is still very real.

Would you do a video on Julia Buccola Petta ""The Italian Bride" Julia died in childbirth at the age of 29. After her burial, her mother experienced dreams of Julia telling her that she was still alive. After six years, Julia's body was exhumed. The body was found to have not decayed at all." She is buried in Mount Carmel Catholic Cemetery in Chicago.

Excellent video. Well done.

I really wish that I had her video available whenever I had to learn all about this back in high school many years back because this is just amazing information.