Too Good to Be True: The Colossal Book of Urban Legends by Jan Harold Harold Brunvand Page B
Authors: Jan Harold Harold Brunvand
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Seat”
As told on Late Night with David Letterman
Version #1: 1982
David Letterman: What about “The Killer in the Back Seat?”
Jan Brunvand: Yeah, that’s another car story, another horror story. There’s a woman driving home alone at night, she needs to stop for gas. She gets to a gas station, and the attendant fills the tank and takes her credit card. And he looks a little funny, and he says, “I’m sorry, lady, there’s something a little funny about this credit card. Would you step into the station, let’s check it against the numbers of…” discontinued cards or something. And she’s puzzled by this, but she goes in. And as soon as she gets in the station, he locks the door and says, “There’s a guy in the back seat with a meat cleaver!”
DL: Oh, a meat cleaver…
JB: Or a knife…
DL: Or a hook and a poisonous snake and a discount garment…
JB: Sometimes somebody follows her home on the freeway, flashing the lights behind her, and when she gets home the car’s right behind her—the pursuing car—a man jumps out, opens the back door of the car and pulls this guy out. Says, “I flashed the lights to keep him from killing you.”
DL: Now this one, up until the time I read your book, I believed.
JB: You believed it?
DL: Someone had told me that they were working in a store, working late one night, and that very thing happened. But more than likely, again, it never happened anywhere.
JB: The person who told you said it happened to whom? To himself?
DL: No, to a fellow employee.
JB: Yeah. We have here what we call the FOAF. The F-O-A-F, the “friend of a friend.”
Version #2: 1984, DL briefly alluded to the same legend in an interview with JB.
Version #3: 1986
DL: Years ago I heard one that I think we discussed one time on this program before, and that is the woman—usually a woman—pulls into a filling station to get gas and the gasoline attendant fills up the tank and asks her to step out of the car. And he says, “There’s a problem with your credit card.” And I heard this as happening, again, to somebody I knew that they worked with. And it turns out that there’s some kind of maniacal ax murderer in the back seat.
Version #4: 1987
DL: This is fascinating stuff. I remember, actually when I was a kid living in Indianapolis, I heard one of the classic stories about the woman pulls in for gas, and…
JB: [interrupting] You know what?…
DL:…the gasoline attendant says…
JB: You know, this is the third time you’ve told me that story…. I’m sorry I broke into it, maybe you’ve got a different ending. Let’s hear how it ends.
DL: What say we have a number from the band now…. You seem to have been here five times now, so…
JB: I’ve probably worn out my welcome.
DL: You see everybody doesn’t watch every night. I’m just trying to participate…
JB: That’s true. You really did hear it?
DL: I’m trying to feign interest in this whole damn topic, and to tell you the truth, I don’t give a rat’s ass.
It appears that this is Letterman’s favorite urban legend and one that he remembered spontaneously from his boyhood. My reaction to hearing it told repeatedly is a case study in how not to listen to a storyteller; whoever says, “Stop me if you’ve heard this,” doesn’t really mean it. In the next segment of the program Letterman apologized for his comment, and I responded by saying I was glad to have his version of the legend to use in one of my books. The freeway-pursuit version of the legend dates from the mid-1960s, while the gas station versions come later, first mentioning a suspected counterfeit bill, then a faulty credit card. In the early 1990s, tellers of the legend began to claim that the hidden assailant was a gang member, often a racial minority, undergoing initiation. Numerous local law-enforcement groups repeated this story, warning women always to check the back seats of their cars. This, of course, is perfectly good
As told on Late Night with David Letterman
Version #1: 1982
David Letterman: What about “The Killer in the Back Seat?”
Jan Brunvand: Yeah, that’s another car story, another horror story. There’s a woman driving home alone at night, she needs to stop for gas. She gets to a gas station, and the attendant fills the tank and takes her credit card. And he looks a little funny, and he says, “I’m sorry, lady, there’s something a little funny about this credit card. Would you step into the station, let’s check it against the numbers of…” discontinued cards or something. And she’s puzzled by this, but she goes in. And as soon as she gets in the station, he locks the door and says, “There’s a guy in the back seat with a meat cleaver!”
DL: Oh, a meat cleaver…
JB: Or a knife…
DL: Or a hook and a poisonous snake and a discount garment…
JB: Sometimes somebody follows her home on the freeway, flashing the lights behind her, and when she gets home the car’s right behind her—the pursuing car—a man jumps out, opens the back door of the car and pulls this guy out. Says, “I flashed the lights to keep him from killing you.”
DL: Now this one, up until the time I read your book, I believed.
JB: You believed it?
DL: Someone had told me that they were working in a store, working late one night, and that very thing happened. But more than likely, again, it never happened anywhere.
JB: The person who told you said it happened to whom? To himself?
DL: No, to a fellow employee.
JB: Yeah. We have here what we call the FOAF. The F-O-A-F, the “friend of a friend.”
Version #2: 1984, DL briefly alluded to the same legend in an interview with JB.
Version #3: 1986
DL: Years ago I heard one that I think we discussed one time on this program before, and that is the woman—usually a woman—pulls into a filling station to get gas and the gasoline attendant fills up the tank and asks her to step out of the car. And he says, “There’s a problem with your credit card.” And I heard this as happening, again, to somebody I knew that they worked with. And it turns out that there’s some kind of maniacal ax murderer in the back seat.
Version #4: 1987
DL: This is fascinating stuff. I remember, actually when I was a kid living in Indianapolis, I heard one of the classic stories about the woman pulls in for gas, and…
JB: [interrupting] You know what?…
DL:…the gasoline attendant says…
JB: You know, this is the third time you’ve told me that story…. I’m sorry I broke into it, maybe you’ve got a different ending. Let’s hear how it ends.
DL: What say we have a number from the band now…. You seem to have been here five times now, so…
JB: I’ve probably worn out my welcome.
DL: You see everybody doesn’t watch every night. I’m just trying to participate…
JB: That’s true. You really did hear it?
DL: I’m trying to feign interest in this whole damn topic, and to tell you the truth, I don’t give a rat’s ass.
It appears that this is Letterman’s favorite urban legend and one that he remembered spontaneously from his boyhood. My reaction to hearing it told repeatedly is a case study in how not to listen to a storyteller; whoever says, “Stop me if you’ve heard this,” doesn’t really mean it. In the next segment of the program Letterman apologized for his comment, and I responded by saying I was glad to have his version of the legend to use in one of my books. The freeway-pursuit version of the legend dates from the mid-1960s, while the gas station versions come later, first mentioning a suspected counterfeit bill, then a faulty credit card. In the early 1990s, tellers of the legend began to claim that the hidden assailant was a gang member, often a racial minority, undergoing initiation. Numerous local law-enforcement groups repeated this story, warning women always to check the back seats of their cars. This, of course, is perfectly good
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