Chapter 1a

“Bristol, KS: Revisited”
The American Continental
By Julia Townsend


There isn’t much to distinguish Bristol from its neighbors. Nestled in the southeast corner of the state between Kansas City and Wichita along I-35, the town itself blends in quite well with the surrounding community. Bristol is a quiet place. It’s the kind of town that embodies the midwestern stereotypes of humility and politeness. Its charm and quaintness washes over its visitors and warms them like a blanket. But the second the blanket is kicked off they quickly forget they ever stepped foot in the city limits.

“Life was quiet here,” Robert Schaff, age 47, recalls. A third-generation Kansas farmer, Schaff and his family have lived in Bristol since before the turn of the 20th century. “My great-grandparents eventually settled here when they immigrated from Germany and other parts of Europe. They moved west and eventually liked what they saw here and decided to make their home.”

The farmhouse that Robert and his wife Marcia, 42, live in is the same home that his grandfather Elias built in the 1940s. The house, located approximately 5 miles by county roads from downtown Bristol, has now housed three generations of his family. Along with Robert and Marcia are their children; Maycie, Alexandra, and Benjamin; ages 17, 14, and 13, respectively.

The story of the Schaffs is common amongst the other families in Bristol. Amongst the Schaffs are the Neumanns, the Richts, the Krauses, and so on. “Bristol was just your typical small, midwestern town,” Schaff says. “It was safe. It was quiet. You went to the football games on Friday nights. You got together and hung out with each other on Saturday. On Sunday you’d go to church and have lunch and chat afterwards. And then you’d see each other at work and around town the rest of the week.”

The Schaffs were pillars in the Bristol community. Robert, along with his siblings and relatives, were highly involved in town life. Robert volunteered in the Bristol Chamber of Commerce and served on the local school board. Marcia devoted much of her time to the local Heartland Ministries Women’s Auxiliary when she wasn’t at home taking care of the house and taking care of their children. Their children were precocious, athletic, and outgoing. “It was simple then. We really took for granted how comfortable life was here before everyone knew about Bristol,” Marcia remarked. “And then 2018 happened. And, as you can tell, everything changed.”

Sprawled in the seats of their living, the plus-sized Schaffs are almost unrecognizable from the photos hanging on their walls. “Before 2018 I weighed around 190 pounds,” the now morbidly obese Robert explains. “And last week I weighed in at almost 405 pounds.”

Marcia underwent a very similar transformation in the same amount of time. “Before The Incident, or whatever people are calling it now, I weighed around 150 pounds. And now I weigh 325 pounds.”

Looking at old photos of Robert and Marcia, it’s truly hard to believe they are the same people. Before The Incident, as most people have come to know the unexplained phenomenon, the two of them were a relatively thin, relatively fit couple. Robert was sturdy and solid, sculpted from years of handiwork around the family farm. Marcia dedicated a good portion of her time staying in shape with the other moms and women of Bristol. But fast forward 5 years, the Schaffs are a far cry from the couple they used to be. Not only has The Incident greatly affected the elder Schaff’s size, but their children have started to display the effects as well. Their oldest child, Maycie, has grown from a 95 pound 12-year old into 210 pound 17-year old. Alexandra has undergone a similar transformation weighing in at 190 pounds. And their youngest, Benjamin has begun to undergo his own change and is rapidly gaining weight.

The Schaff family’s transformation is not the only such story in Bristol. This October will mark 5 years since the beginning of The Incident as estimated by government investigators and other outside sources. The Schaffs, like other residents of Bristol, do not recall the exact date of when they noticed their growth. “It wasn’t like one night we went to bed our old weights and woke up this fat,” describes Marcia. “We didn’t wake up 200 pounds heavier the next morning. It was a gradual thing, more or less. A month went on and we both noticed we were getting heavier and we kept outgrowing all of our clothes. But it was just like, ‘Oh we need to really start watching what we eat, we need to get more active.’ But we just kept gaining weight, us and the girls. Ben wasn’t affected ”

It was when Marcia saw some of her friends for a girls night in early December that she realized that Schaffs weren’t the only ones who had changed. “I was really dreading going to see these ladies. We really prided on keeping in shape and not letting ourselves go. But then we all saw each and we were like ‘Oh my God.’ I had put on almost 30 pounds in the span of 6 weeks and was feeling really self-conscious. But I saw my friends Denise and Rachel and they looked even bigger than me. Seeing each other is when we realized that something was going on.”

It was just a few days after that incident that local coverage caught word about what was occurring in Bristol. Soon after that the national media picked up the story and state and federal government authorities descended on the town to investigate.

“It was just a whirlwind of stuff,” Robert recalls. “I just thought it was my metabolism slowing down and stuff like that. But I just kept putting on weight and putting on weight and nothing was working. And then you have the Army and the EPA and other people here in hazmat suits making sure an atomic bomb didn’t go off or anything. And they ran all sorts of tests on us and couldn’t find anything wrong with us. We were all just getting fat.”

Speculation and conspiracy theories began to flood social media as news began to spread. Everything from atomic radiation to foreign weaponry to actual sorcery were theorized by users on Twitter, Facebook, and other websites. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) along with Kansas authorities quickly quarantined the town for a short period of time in late 2018 to early 2019. Investigators found no sign of radiation, or disease, or any other possible cause. “The investigation into the Bristol Incident is ongoing with investigators looking into any possible lead or clue in what might have occurred,” the White House commented earlier this year when asked during a press briefing.

“We spent a little bit of time quarantined and that was tough,” Robert remembers. “It was a tough time being examined and poked and prodded at. I’m sure it was a scary time for the kids, especially. But then they told us we were safe to go home.”

What investigators were able to conclude were just the basic facts. People who lived and spent time within a 10 mile radius of the city of Bristol gradually gained weight. The amount of weight a person gained depends on the amount of time they spend in Bristol and how close they are to the city center. The average adult resident of Bristol has seen their weight increase by an average of 150% from baseline. The largest residents of Bristol are reported to weigh nearly 700 pounds while the vast majority of adults clock in in the 250-400 pound range. Investigators were also able to conclude that the fattening effects of Bristol do not manifest themselves in pre-pubescent children. Underage residents of Bristol do not begin displaying effects of The Incident do not begin their weight gain until they undergo puberty.

When the town was deemed safe by investigators and authorities and families moved back into their homes, many began to realize that life would change very drastically. The horror and fascination and sympathy the world had for Bristol soon turned into mockery. Bristol would soon turn into an internet meme and a punchline for late night comedians. An official slogan sprung up for the town of Bristol: The Obese City.

“People are always asking us and our neighbors ‘Well, why don’t you just move?’ and I tell them it’s not that simple,” says Robert. “This is our home. I’ve lived here my whole life. Marcia has lived here her whole life too. My kids’ friends live here. It’s not just that simple to move. Plus, other than our weight, we’re all perfectly healthy. We get regular check ups from the government and each time we hear that we’re fine.”

Indeed, while rates of obesity have skyrocketed amongst the citizens of Bristol, rates of hypertension and diabetes have actually declined since 2018. Increased access to regular health care has been cited by many as a possible explanation for the trend.

As to a possible explanation for what has happened to the Schaffs and the rest of Bristol, Robert and Marcia don’t concern themselves with that. “I think that people are a little too hung up on trying to understand what happened to us,” says Marcia. “Some people say it's God. Some people say it's aliens. But instead of getting hung up on that, I think it’d be better for everyone here and everywhere else to simply move on. Anybody who is waiting for a satisfying answer is going to be waiting for a very long time. Whatever happened here is just a thing that happened. Nothing more. Nothing less.”