One of the most outlandish and fascinating stories in barbeque history is that of Shannon Whisnant, John Wood, and the human leg. It is a true story entailing a BBQ Grill/Smoker and a custody battle over a mummified leg. It was not a tale that I at all anticipated finding when I began researching “The Most Spellbinding BBQ Stories.” It is one of the strangest feuds in the history of small-town America and the World of BBQ. This BBQ story was the galvanizing spark and catalyst for a documentary; “Finders Keepers.” Acclaimed and adored infamous movie critic, Roger Ebert, had written about this BBQ story that, “In a very rare reflex even for the movies that I already treasure, I was moved to watch “Finders Keepers,” again immediately after the first viewing. This documentary is just so welcoming—and for events that defy believability—that I wanted more time in its atmosphere,” www.rogerebert.com
The Story Behind the Spectacle
Filmmakers Bryan Carberry @carbsofficial and Clay Tweel @claytweel “dig deep” to get the truth regarding the eccentric, peculiar, highly unexpected and downright ODD story. “Yes, there’s this moment of hilarity of two guys fighting over a leg,”— FOUND IN A BBQ GRILL— “but then how does the rest of it play out? And where do their lives really go after all the media attention perhaps really dies down?” asks Tweel. “That is the meat of the story, pun intended,” says interviewer Travis Dale of www.critticks.com It is most assuredly, a BBQ story like no other!
“FINDERS KEEPERS,” A DOCUMENTARY FILM
In a stranger-than-fiction story about a BBQ Grill, 2 Men, and a severed leg, Bryan Carberry and Clay Tweel’s documentary film captures an absolutely ludicrous situation. “The 2 central characters display serious deficits of decency and humility, as well as common sense. But as the filmmakers follow the story over a seven-year time period, the movie becomes richer and more empathetic. The events are absurd, but the emotions merely human.”
John Wood
In 2004, John Wood survived a plane crash which killed his father, business owner-furniture-store-mogul, and airplane pilot, Tom Wood. John Wood’s leg needed to be amputated as a result of his injuries during that plane crash. Despite John Wood’s leg being damaged beyond repair, he wanted to keep his severed leg. John requested that the hospital return his amputated leg to him. After the amputation of his leg, John kept his limb on ice. John Wood had wanted to make “some sort of memorial to his father from the leg’s skeletal remains,” perhaps attempting to assuage his guilt at being the co-pilot during the fateful flight which caused his father to perish, despite the fact that Tom Wood was the pilot on that flight of Tom’s own Cessna182A. “John Wood was intending to turn his amputated leg into a shrine to his father as a way of coping with his grief,” according to www.npr.org
“John Wood was kind of the rich kid of this small town- Maiden, North Carolina. Everyone knew John; he was the cool kid; he was the rebel. He’s had 13 near-death experiences—he was
electrocuted twice and had a couple out-of-body-experiences. John lost his leg in the same plane crash where his father lost his life…. and John was the co-pilot that day; (John) kind of took home some guilt from that, even if it wasn’t his fault. And so, I think all of that got tied up in his wanting to hold onto this leg,” states Filmmaker Bryan Carberry.
John Wood’s Leg
Bryan Carberry continues: “John tried a few things. Number one was putting his amputated leg in the freezer. When his power got cut off, he even took his leg to a friend who worked at Hardees Restaurant. They put John’s leg in the freezer at Hardees, until the manager found it. John had a buddy who worked at a mortuary, so he borrowed some embalming fluid and embalmed his severed leg himself at home. He soaked his limb in embalming fluid, put it in a possum trap in the tree in his front yard to sun dry, and after 6 months his leg was mummified. While John’s life spiraled out-of-control and when John got evicted from his home, and had to resort to living in a van, then sleeping under a bridge, he wrapped up his leg and placed his leg inside of his BBQ Grill/Smoker. He then put his BBQ Grill/Smoker into a storage unit shed.” John relapsed into drug addiction after he began drinking beer while taking pain killers prescribed to him after his amputation surgery. John spent the rent money for his storage unit shed on drugs instead. John defaulted on the storage unit payments. The storage unit shed was then subsequently put up for auction by the owner of the storage facility.
Shannon Whisnant
In 2007, in the small town of Maiden, North Carolina, a man named Shannon Whisnant bought a storage locker unit at auction. Inside the storage locker unit was a BBQ Grill/Smoker. He took his newly purchased-at-auction BBQ Grill/Smoker home. When he opened up the BBQ Grill/Smoker, inside that BBQ Grill/Smoker, he “discovered something that he- nor anyone else– had been expecting: a mummified human leg. Most people- one presumes- would have wanted to get rid of the human leg as soon as possible…Whisnant, however, wanted to keep it. The trouble was, the original owner of the leg, John Wood, wanted it back. As you might imagine, what followed was a bizarre battle, a media frenzy, and a documentary film entitled: Finders Keepers,” reports www.npr.org NPR: National and Local News
Shannon Whisnant began “showing” on display the amputated limb while it was still inside the BBQ Grill/Smoker, for a small fee; charging local curiosity-seekers “for lookie-loos:” $3 for Adults…and $1 for children… Shannon would “POP” the lid of the BBQ Grill open…he also began selling hats, T-shirts, and other paraphernalia. He had a new vanity license plate made that read: “FTSMOKER.”
Filmmaker Clay Tweel declares, “Shannon Whisnant was a kind of self-made man, an entrepreneur of sorts. He dealt in kind of found goods- trying to resell them for a profit and he was always looking for a way to turn a buck. I think what happened was, he saw that the local media took to the story so quickly, and it gave him this kind of sense of fame and sort of energy being on camera that he so longed for. He did a very good job, and it (the story) started getting (featured) on nationally syndicated radio shows and eventually international and national TV. Whisnant saw this as an opportunity to fulfil his lifelong dream of being a rich and famous TV personality.”
Battle of the BBQ Leg
When John Wood went public with his request for his leg’s return, the appeal made the local news and “got the 2 antagonists invited to talk shows as far away as Germany,” ….and both men made the media trek to Germany, as well as battled out their respective positions in an ensuing media frenzy as to who was the “rightful owner” of the leg in the BBQ! Shannon Whisnant refused to return the leg from inside the BBQ Grill, claiming, and invoking the time-honored rule: “Finders, Keepers.” “It was inevitable that the dispute would ultimately be settled on a TV judge show.” Yet, “a more nuanced story emerges from interviews with family members. Although the 2 men are from different worlds regarding upbringing, the film presents both men as sons of demanding, hard-to-please fathers. Observers suggest John is still battling to please his parents, including the father who’s long gone…Childhood memories and parental expectations can endure longer than flesh—even flesh preserved in a BBQ Smoker,” quotes NPR Writer, Mark Jenkins.
Emmy-Winning Judge Greg Mathis
When Judge Greg Mathis learned of the feud between the men, he agreed to have them on his TV courtroom show. A summary of the television episode is as follows: “Judge Mathis questions Shannon Whisnant: “WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVE A HUMAN LEFT FOOT???” The courtroom TV drama continues: “Judge Mathis chastised Whisnant for his behavior and ordered him to return the leg to John but tells John that he must reimburse Whisnant $5,000 for the cost of the BBQGrill/Smoker and the cost of the locker unit at auction. Judge Mathis notes that John has arrived in court under the influence of drugs; the Judge offers to help John get treatment. John agrees and Judge Mathis pays for John to go to a rehab facility. John successfully recovers from his addictions, returns to work, and gets engaged. An area vet agrees to taxidermy John’s amputated leg for him, and John completes the memorial for his father. Shannon Whisnant remains bitter over the loss of the amputated leg from within the BBQ Grill and tries to continue to make himself a local celebrity. Shannon is hired to appear on a reality TV show, but he gets into an argument with producers and is fired. Shannon finally concludes that the barbeque grill in which he found the leg is cursed and decides that he can only lift the curse by throwing the barbeque grill into the ocean.”
Conclusion
“Finders Keepers” was released on January 27th, 2015 at The Sundance Film Festival.
Both John Wood and Shannon Whisnant watched the documentary film a multitude of times. Below is a still photo of both of them from the film, Finders Keepers; John Wood is on the left, Shannon Whisnant is on the right.
In 2014, Shannon Whisnant was arrested after employees found him driving around a Wells-Fargo building brandishing a .38 revolver. He was released into the care of a local hospital for unspecified reasons.
Upon reviewing the film in 2015, Shannon commented that:
- The documentary “could have been a little longer,” AND
- Shannon felt as if “Finders Keepers,” could have featured MORE of him!
After years of struggling with morbid obesity, Shannon Whisnant suffered a fatal heart attack in November of 2016.
As of late 2021, John Wood was living in Brevard, North Carolina and working at the Transylvania County landfill; primarily focused on maintaining his sobriety and “cleaning up his life,”…literally and figuratively.
Filmmaker Carberrry exclaims, “There definitely was a time when we had to say, ‘That’s enough. We’ve got to stop filming. It’s been 7 years.’ There’s always going to be more that could be added to the movie, like with any good documentary. Or like a lot of good documentaries. There’s like 10 movies in here (among the 2 main characters and their families) …We tried to find the best one. I think this story, the cosmic relationship between these 2 guys, seems to be the best story that we could mine out of our footage.”
“The acclaimed documentary is funny, grotesque, and surprisingly touching: a story about universal human struggles and the power of the media, wrapped in a crazy news item and hidden in a barbecue smoker,” Gwynne Watkins, Writer, Yahoo Entertainment
So, www.ribbqnews.com Readers, Fans, and BBQ-ers…Have you EVER heard of such a fantastical BBQ tale? Were you previously familiar with this far-out true story? What is the most PREPOSTEROUS thing that YOU have found inside your BBQ Grill or Smoker??? Please share your thoughts with us on all of our Social Media Platforms: Facebook, Instagram, REELS, and our Newsletter, Podcast and Websites!
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