The protagonist of the true crime podcast I Was Never There went missing in 1988. Over 30 years later, no one still knows what happened to Marsha Ferber. There is no body, witnesses, or new leads to follow. Marsha's disappearance is now a cold case, one that law enforcement has long given up on. But the hosts of the podcast refuse to call it quits. Mother-and-daughter duo Karen and Jamie Zelermyer have made it a mission to solve Marsha's disappearance once and for all.
In the small town of Morgantown, West Virginia, Marsha, nicknamed "Mudd," was almost a local legend. She ran two successful music venues that made the town a source of attraction. Everyone from the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Bo Diddley played there. She also mentored troubled teens, who even referred to her as "Ma." To the hosts of the podcast, she was more than a hero. She was family.
Karen first met Marsha in the suburbs of New Jersey. In the 1970s, they both decided they wanted to live in harmony with the land. So they moved with their husbands and kids to rural West Virginia, where they joined a hippie colony. They both divorced their spouses and raised their children in the counterculture community. That's where Jamie got to know Marsha as a second mother for most of her childhood.
While everyone seemed to adore Marsha, she wasn't without her faults. In that hippie commune, everyone did drugs. It was a sign of the times. But Marsha was into harder substances. This also led to selling and relationships with shady people. That is why many theories were floating around when she disappeared in 1988. People thought that she might have run from the FBI. Others believe the Mafia got her. There are stories about her helping immigrants get into the country. Some think she overdosed.
The hosts of I Was Never There embark on a journey to see which of those probabilities can be true. Along the way, they also explore their own unusual relationship. The podcast has eight main episodes and several crossover episodes.
Episodes