Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
Speaker 1: for tuning in. Big big shout out to our super producer,
Speaker 1: mister Maxwilliams. I'm Ben your nol and we're kind of
Speaker 1: like joining the show in media arrests.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, yes, res Es. Let's jump right in with
Speaker 2: mo Raka.
Speaker 1: There's something else that we have to get to here.
Speaker 1: At the risk of sounding a bit pretentious, there is
Speaker 1: this amazing audio texture. I would haul it to mobituaries
Speaker 1: in podcast form because you have this tremendous prowess with
Speaker 1: research and with archival footage. Could you know one of
Speaker 1: the I think it's actually the very first episode, right
Speaker 1: about the.
Speaker 3: Kennedy impersonator bond meter. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so in there you're going to the secret
Speaker 1: CBS vault and pulling footage and stuff. Could you could
Speaker 1: you tell us like how finding that stuff works?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, so, I mean CBS and there aren't a
Speaker 3: lot of them, my guests with CBS News a legacy,
Speaker 3: you know, news Broadcaster is a is kind of a
Speaker 3: gold mine of history. I mean, the archives go back
Speaker 3: at this point, I think you know basically I think
Speaker 3: about one hundred years they are. I'm not, you know,
Speaker 3: not flattering my bosses by saying this, but it's a
Speaker 3: mess in there. The archives stuff is just kind of
Speaker 3: thrown around. It's not They're trying to get it organized,
Speaker 3: I think. And we were in there. My producer at
Speaker 3: the time, Megan Marcus, was in there I think essentially
Speaker 3: in the Kennedy section, and her sister Zoe had said,
Speaker 3: you know, if you find anything on von Meter, that
Speaker 3: could be pretty great. So they initially had the idea,
Speaker 3: and the guy who was working in the archives who
Speaker 3: was found this great tape, found this great raw tape
Speaker 3: of a man named von Meter, who was once wildly
Speaker 3: famous as a Kennedy impersonator, whose career forgive Me, died
Speaker 3: with the assassination, had much later in life, given an
Speaker 3: extraordinarily raw interview about what his life was like, I
Speaker 3: mean really from the beginning. And this was shortly before
Speaker 3: he died, and only seconds of this interview had ever
Speaker 3: aired in an overnight show that was long forgotten. So
Speaker 3: this was virgin material and just so raw and frankly,
Speaker 3: when I looked at it, I thought it sounds like
Speaker 3: a sort of Academy Award obsessed. I don't think I am.
Speaker 3: But I looked at and I thought, this is like
Speaker 3: a Bill Hayter oscar like the guy, like the way
Speaker 3: he just he looks, and I could see Bill Hatter
Speaker 3: basically doing this. But to find that kind of archival
Speaker 3: stuff is a real gift, you know, especially if no
Speaker 3: one's ever heard it. And to hear this guy telling
Speaker 3: a story that only he could tell. What was it
Speaker 3: like to be incredibly famous, impersonating this president who, whether
Speaker 3: you liked him or not politically, was incredibly glamorous, and
Speaker 3: who was the center of American life, not just political
Speaker 3: but pop cultural life. And then this tragedy happens, this
Speaker 3: assassination happens. You become a living reminder of this horrible day.
Speaker 3: And he lived for significantly, I thought, forty years. More
Speaker 3: so it was almost like biblical forty years in the
Speaker 3: desert there the archival really led. It was also just
Speaker 3: a really great episode to begin with, because it was
Speaker 3: about politics, about comedy, about pop culture, and in a
Speaker 3: very dramatic way.
Speaker 2: I would like to take this opportunity if I could
Speaker 2: give a quick shout out to a good friend of
Speaker 2: Ben and mine as well as the brother of super
Speaker 2: producer Max Williams Alex Williams, whose podcast Ephemeral is a
Speaker 2: fantastic example of diving through the refuse of history. He
Speaker 2: has a great line and his description the best sources
Speaker 2: on our cultural identity is not the official historical record,
Speaker 2: asking the anthropologist, it's the town dump. And I just
Speaker 2: think that is very akin to what you do with
Speaker 2: digging through these things that a lot of people don't
Speaker 2: think about or they don't really have a shelf life
Speaker 2: beyond their functional first appearance. I wonder, you know, especially
Speaker 2: when you start to use those as jumping off points
Speaker 2: to dig into these amazing archives you have access to.
Speaker 2: Do you have any any thoughts just about like what
Speaker 2: obituary represents in terms of like the historical record or
Speaker 2: is it just a starting place, like you know, I
Speaker 2: don't know.
Speaker 3: First time, Yeah, I think it's I think I think
Speaker 3: it's the first shutter of history. I think it's a
Speaker 3: I think it's a starting point. I think what's kind
Speaker 3: of I mean, I don't know. I want every every story,
Speaker 3: every person's life to kind of represent something beyond just
Speaker 3: their life. So Lawanda Page, who was hysterical as Aunt
Speaker 3: Esther and Sanford and Son. If people remember with Red
Speaker 3: Fox in the seventies. I was on Twitter one day
Speaker 3: and I saw this picture, this beautiful woman in a swimsuit,
Speaker 3: young woman, and people somebody said, who does anybody know
Speaker 3: who this is? And I thought she looked familiar and
Speaker 3: it turned out to be Lawanda Paige, who on Sanford
Speaker 3: and Son played this battle axe, this Bible toting battle
Speaker 3: axe or the adversary. I love that term battle axe, right, yeah,
Speaker 3: the Bible total battle axe, the adversary of Fred Sandford.
Speaker 3: And I thought, all right, immediately, there's a great story here.
Speaker 3: But then it also turned out to be a story
Speaker 3: about party records because she had become a really big
Speaker 3: deal comic in the nineteen sixties and seventies, or these
Speaker 3: things called party records that Red Box really helped Spearhead
Speaker 3: and Richard Pryor really found his voice on, which were
Speaker 3: largely black, not entirely, but were these these really raw
Speaker 3: comedy albums, really profane, hilarious and that came in brown
Speaker 3: paper pat rappers because the art on them was really adult.
Speaker 3: But it was it was it was like a whole
Speaker 3: subgenre lifestyle. I mean, there was so much there, and
Speaker 3: so that to me is like irresistible as delicious because
Speaker 3: there's like a and at least two plots A and
Speaker 3: B plot. There's her life, and then there's the whole
Speaker 3: history of kind of comedy, you know, running in parallel
Speaker 3: with it. That's why, by the way, not to go
Speaker 3: over the top here, why I love doing my cooking
Speaker 3: show because I always thought there was like three plot
Speaker 3: lines going. There was the recipe, there was the life
Speaker 3: of the grandparent, and then there was my relationship with
Speaker 3: a grandparent, and all three tracks running at the same time.
Speaker 2: Not to mention, cooking in and of itself is such
Speaker 2: a performative thing, like a storytelling opportunity. It's living history. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's great. What we're seeing is.
Speaker 1: The deeper exploration of a public figure versus the lived
Speaker 1: experience of the person. And it reminds me of the
Speaker 1: first time I saw a rendering whatever of Abraham Lincoln
Speaker 1: without a beard.
Speaker 2: And I was like, it's like Alex Trebek without a mustag.
Speaker 1: I was as confused as my old dog used to
Speaker 1: be if it saw me wearing a hat.
Speaker 2: I was like, this guy was president. This isn't right.
Speaker 2: It's so funny.
Speaker 3: I love that. That's so interesting because I wonder, because
Speaker 3: I had that experience too with it. I wonder if
Speaker 3: that's so, if that's for for how many people that's
Speaker 3: a moment kind of an epiphany or a jarring moment
Speaker 3: or something. The first time do you remember the first
Speaker 3: time you saw Abraham Lincoln without a beard? Yeah, it's
Speaker 3: really wild. And he also looks without a beard. He
Speaker 3: it's a little spooky because he looks a little like
Speaker 3: Jefferson Davis and you're like, yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh no, and also a little known. In fact, all
Speaker 2: of his political prowess was contained within his beard, much
Speaker 2: like Samsung.
Speaker 3: It was Samson exactly.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 3: He was a facial Samson. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Abraham Lincoln noted amateur wrestler. Uh, comma on that guy.
Speaker 2: He was. It's a true story. That's true. We shout
Speaker 2: him out.
Speaker 1: He was also a president or something at some point.
Speaker 1: But you know, you get in situations and did a
Speaker 1: few things.
Speaker 2: Do we have time for any more dead things?
Speaker 1: We've mentioned floppy disk skew morph So that's our word
Speaker 1: of the day. We've got one for you that you
Speaker 1: will surely remember.
Speaker 2: Mom.
Speaker 1: What happened to the public payphone? Are there any left
Speaker 1: in New York City? Do you happen by them?
Speaker 3: I did a story on this for CBS Sunday Morning
Speaker 3: a few years ago, and I went to one on
Speaker 3: the Upper West Side. I can't quite remember what the
Speaker 3: count was when I did this story, which was nearly
Speaker 3: ten years ago, I think, but there were very, very few.
Speaker 3: The delight of doing this story was hanging out at
Speaker 3: a public payphone on the Upper West Side and having
Speaker 3: at least a couple of moms come by with their
Speaker 3: little kids, because the kids loved to visit it because
Speaker 3: it was such a weird artifact. They didn't know what
Speaker 3: it was for. They thought it was funny. They thought
Speaker 3: it was like a like a weird play booth or
Speaker 3: something that you go to Hogwarts or yeah. Yeah, but
Speaker 3: it was like and these, by the way, the ones
Speaker 3: that were remaining, at least at that point, weren't charging.
Speaker 3: And I'm not sure why anyway, but they weren't charging,
Speaker 3: and so the mother would hand the kid a quarter
Speaker 3: and the kid would put it in. It was hah,
Speaker 3: We're having a phone conversation. And you know, they weren't
Speaker 3: actually using them, but they were seen as such artifacts.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I don't you know. The it's funny because
Speaker 3: the phone I don't even remember that many phone booths
Speaker 3: because then there were the phone kiosks, the one that
Speaker 3: were that were.
Speaker 2: Never as relevated, right, it was sort of on a pole,
Speaker 2: like on a pole with a phone booth connected by
Speaker 2: a chain.
Speaker 1: Or they were like almost like semi detached homes like
Speaker 1: town homes. You'd see a row of the phones right
Speaker 1: at like an airport or something.
Speaker 2: And it goes hand in hand with the pager too,
Speaker 2: by the way, because that was what many people used
Speaker 2: to do, pag your communication that they'd put in the
Speaker 2: payphone number. And this is also, uh, it's such an
Speaker 2: important thing. It's no longer able to be used as
Speaker 2: a plot point in movies anymore. The payphone.
Speaker 3: Well, I feel it's a great point because I think
Speaker 3: that you know, Melanie Daniels to go back to Hitchcock,
Speaker 3: Tippy Hedron's character and the birds would have been dead
Speaker 3: two thirds of the way through the movie because remember
Speaker 3: when she when they're in Butadega Bay and the birds
Speaker 3: start attacking in that sort of climax, like about two
Speaker 3: thirds of the way through the movie, and they're all
Speaker 3: hiding in that diner and then she steps out of
Speaker 3: the diner, but she has to go into a pay
Speaker 3: booth and that's where she you know, and then the
Speaker 3: birds start like.
Speaker 2: Just throwing you yeah, I mean her eyes.
Speaker 3: She would have ended up like Suzanne Plachette with like
Speaker 3: her eyes, eyeballs plucked out, and the movie, the movie
Speaker 3: would have just ended well, I love I mean, that's
Speaker 3: always been an interesting dialectic, like Suzanne Plachette and Tippy Hedgron,
Speaker 3: because I think people really ended up loving Suzanne Plischette more.
Speaker 3: But Hitchcock preferred blondes, so you know, he killed her
Speaker 3: off sooner.
Speaker 2: But anyway, got yeah.
Speaker 1: Also Hitchcock had some issues he did he did he
Speaker 1: really preferred blondes.
Speaker 2: That'd be a diplomatic.
Speaker 3: Well, however, I will tell you that I interviewed two
Speaker 3: Hitchcock blondes, Eva Marie Saint of course from north By Northwest,
Speaker 3: and Kim Novack from Vertigo. I have not interviewed I've
Speaker 3: only met Tippy Edron. I haven't interviewed her. But Eva
Speaker 3: Marie Saint and Kim Novac both loved Hitchcock.
Speaker 2: Just do you have to point that out? Nice? Okay?
Speaker 2: Who was it who made some kind of problematic reports
Speaker 2: that he is that was I thought, that's what.
Speaker 3: But I mean, after all, he you know, had all
Speaker 3: these birds attacker, so she wasn't gonna be abbey, but
Speaker 3: she didn't have a phone booth to protect herself.
Speaker 2: Really quickly, I didn't realize that the phone the original
Speaker 2: phone booth was erected in eighteen eighty one was known
Speaker 2: as the fans Kiosk in pots in Berlin. I was
Speaker 2: in Berlin. Yeah, that was a public plaza.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and do we know what it was made of?
Speaker 3: Because one thing I found in that story also is
Speaker 3: that the phone boots that were all made of steel
Speaker 3: were actually kind of terrible, like the the acoustics were
Speaker 3: really really bad, Like the ones he wanted were the
Speaker 3: British ones that were all wooden.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: Last time I was, I was over in London. I
Speaker 1: did the same thing as those kids in your in
Speaker 1: your CBS piece. We happened by you know, one of
Speaker 1: the At this point it's it's as British as like
Speaker 1: the famous black cabs or whatever. Uh So I'm an
Speaker 1: unrepentant basic tourist. So we saw the phone booth and
Speaker 1: I remember, uh, this is embarrassing, guys. But I remember,
Speaker 1: like on a cell phone, texting one of my friends
Speaker 1: in the US and be like, Hey, I'm gonna call
Speaker 1: you on a phone, and he was like, you have
Speaker 1: a phone, you're texting me. It was like, hold on
Speaker 1: for like eight minutes while I figure out this complicated
Speaker 1: series of numbers.
Speaker 3: And you actually placed a call from the phone booth
Speaker 3: phone to I think, wow, okay.
Speaker 2: That must have been pricey. I was. It was first.
Speaker 1: It was not the best financial decision a story, you know,
Speaker 1: But well, I think the three of us were way
Speaker 1: more impressed with the idea than the person I was calling.
Speaker 1: But still, you gotta get one under your belt. I'll
Speaker 1: tell you what I love and I bet you you
Speaker 1: do tum.
Speaker 2: And this is just something that I think of when
Speaker 2: I think of like the Golden Age of Hollywood is
Speaker 2: like those really elegant, wooden, kind of French door telephone
Speaker 2: boosts that you'd find in hotel lobbies. Yes, if you've
Speaker 2: ever been to sleep no more. The thing that the
Speaker 2: mckitchen Hotel, which is very much styled after that era,
Speaker 2: there's a there's these little phone kiosks you can go
Speaker 2: into and actually like, you know, pick up the little
Speaker 2: phone and there's a weird message that is spoken to you.
Speaker 2: But that is one style. And then of course we've
Speaker 2: got the They went through different evolutions. You have the
Speaker 2: kind of French store ones, you have ones that were
Speaker 2: really bad acoustically, and then they kind of landed on
Speaker 2: the ones that gave you a little more privacy. Originally
Speaker 2: they didn't give you privacy. Privacy became a big, a
Speaker 2: big concern. But it wasn't until eighteen eighty nine that
Speaker 2: these were actually coin operated. And originally the original ones
Speaker 2: you had to buy a ticket. Tickets. Yeah, Like, I
Speaker 2: don't even know how that would work logistically. It's interesting, Scalpers.
Speaker 2: I love the idea of a phone call.
Speaker 1: Scalper. He's like outside the.
Speaker 2: Booth, you know what I mean, hold out for weeks.
Speaker 2: You can't get into this booth. You cannot.
Speaker 1: So there there are other things. I think we've got
Speaker 1: to go to you with this. Given your expertise, what
Speaker 1: you have been teaching us about the nature of obituaries
Speaker 1: and indeed the way that the past stays with us
Speaker 1: even when it seems perhaps ephemeral, we have to ask you,
Speaker 1: what are some non human things that you believe the
Speaker 1: future might miss, you know, similar to similar to our
Speaker 1: jfk impersonator, similar to the pager, even though the page
Speaker 1: is still sort of around.
Speaker 3: But you know what I'm saying, mean things that are
Speaker 3: around now that people might miss, Yeah, things that were
Speaker 3: already missing.
Speaker 1: Right, things that in the in generations from now will
Speaker 1: be yeah, will be missed.
Speaker 2: Or curiosity if way.
Speaker 1: Like going you know, going the way of the Dodo.
Speaker 1: In some respects, I feel like it was ethical and
Speaker 1: responsible of us to mention one of the big downers,
Speaker 1: which is that print is often in trouble in terms
Speaker 1: of like newspapers and stuff. But what what do you think, like,
Speaker 1: if we're sending this as a time capsule to the future,
Speaker 1: what what will people miss?
Speaker 3: I mean this might seem really obvious and it just
Speaker 3: occurs to me now, but I mean I think that
Speaker 3: in twenty or thirty years, you know, our kids and
Speaker 3: grandkids might think it's funny that people actually drove cars,
Speaker 3: actually drove them. If the self driving thing happens, I
Speaker 3: can imagine that I think they might.
Speaker 2: So risky, it's so dangerous. My kid is fifteen and
Speaker 2: it's about to you know, get a driver's license I
Speaker 2: live with in Atlanta. I'm terrified. It's just it's always
Speaker 2: been such a risky proposition. I hope it goes that way.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry it's been on my mind.
Speaker 3: So well, that's that's interesting, and I also wonder and
Speaker 3: for real downer, but I think in fifty years people
Speaker 3: will look back at cancer treatment. I hope they do
Speaker 3: and think, are you guys crazy that you would pump
Speaker 3: chemicals into your body? Like then think it was just
Speaker 3: Barb barrack and like yeah, and think it was just
Speaker 3: kind of crazy, like the equivalent of like, you know,
Speaker 3: drilling a hole in your.
Speaker 2: Head or using leashing leaching, Yeah, leaching.
Speaker 3: So I think it could be that, and I think
Speaker 3: it could be the you know driving as well, Like
Speaker 3: so people would get behind a wheel and then every
Speaker 3: year tens of thousands of people would die on the highways,
Speaker 3: you know, like.
Speaker 2: Roll the dice.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh, I love that you mentioned this because I've thought
Speaker 1: of this one too, and totally think to me, the
Speaker 1: most bizarre explanation to like future grandkids or generations would
Speaker 1: be no non autonomous vehicles, Right, we used to drive
Speaker 1: by ourselves and see, well, how many people died oh
Speaker 1: a lot. But we had this honor system.
Speaker 2: You see.
Speaker 1: There were lines that were painted on the road and
Speaker 1: you just sort of agreed that you wouldn't.
Speaker 2: Go over them.
Speaker 1: And they're like, oh, so, like you would hit them
Speaker 1: if you turned, and like, no, no, it was just paint.
Speaker 2: People went nuts. That's funny.
Speaker 3: And I wonder about eyeglasses too.
Speaker 2: One thing.
Speaker 3: Not to gross everyone else out, but this is more
Speaker 3: like something that I remember from the past that and
Speaker 3: maybe maybe I've just been fortunate, but I remember pack
Speaker 3: it on fifty five. I remember in the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 3: I totally use this kind of gross. But in the
Speaker 3: nineteen seventies everyone had BO. I just remember that.
Speaker 2: Like it just was so stinky London, the great stink
Speaker 2: of London before sanitation. I mean, it's just you.
Speaker 3: Know, yeah, and of course it was mixed in with
Speaker 3: cigarette smoke and all that.
Speaker 2: People just had.
Speaker 3: Like summer in the nineteen seventies just everyone had BO.
Speaker 3: And I was like, you know, if you went down
Speaker 3: this Smithsonian, it was like bo from all over the
Speaker 3: country was coming down to the air and space being Yeah,
Speaker 3: it really was like a stew and like and and
Speaker 3: it was you know, Washington's already kind of very swampy
Speaker 3: and human, but the whole city just stank. And I
Speaker 3: I think what happened is maybe deodorant became much and
Speaker 3: it became much more accessible or something because better and
Speaker 3: better and better because people don't stink in the same way.
Speaker 2: Do they know? You run out much more so if
Speaker 2: you're the one you can usually people speak it out.
Speaker 2: People notice also, I do. I do love that shout
Speaker 2: out to this Smithsonian. Uh and the idea that every
Speaker 2: summer they had an accidental bo curation, right.
Speaker 3: Well, they work creating. It's so interesting. You're right, they
Speaker 3: work curating a lot of BO there. And partly was
Speaker 3: because it remained and I think it remains free as a
Speaker 3: taxpayer dollars free, so a lot of tourists would just
Speaker 3: use it as for the free air conditioning, just so
Speaker 3: it come in there.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That is a pro travel tip, y'all. If you
Speaker 2: if you like, have a flight that's late and you
Speaker 2: need somewhere to stash your bags, go to a museum.
Speaker 2: They'll hold your bags for you like a hotel, and
Speaker 2: then you can just wander around the museum, even leave
Speaker 2: and have lunch, come back, then get your bags go
Speaker 2: to the airport, and that secret stays with just us.
Speaker 2: Just us, do not contact the Smithsonian, folks. I just
Speaker 2: wanted to really quickly add for my last last bit here.
Speaker 2: A lot of this makes me think of that scene
Speaker 2: with Little Elijah Wood and Back to the Future too,
Speaker 2: where he does, you know, Martin McFly does his thing
Speaker 2: with the guns the video game cabinet with the like pistols.
Speaker 2: It's like an old and it's at this point in
Speaker 2: the in the you know, the timeline of the films.
Speaker 2: It's the future. This thing is a blast from the pass.
Speaker 2: He's in this bar or this restaurant, Dino if. It's
Speaker 2: like very nineties throwback. And he does it and like
Speaker 2: bbbble knocks him all down, hits all the targets, and
Speaker 2: then you know, puts him in his holster like he
Speaker 2: does in the first movie. And then Lille Elijah Wood,
Speaker 2: wearing his weird future headgear, says you have to use
Speaker 2: your hands. It's never clear what that actually means, like
Speaker 2: what would the alternative be to use your mind or what.
Speaker 2: But I just always that always stuck with me, and
Speaker 2: it's exact what we're talking about here. You know, the
Speaker 2: way something that was so obvious and so the only
Speaker 2: way to go could in five, ten, fifteen, twenty years
Speaker 2: be just like absurd to a new generation.
Speaker 1: Grandpa's got this weird obsession with using his hands for stuff,
Speaker 1: Like I know he's from a different time.
Speaker 2: Mo.
Speaker 1: This is been amazing. We have just we have just
Speaker 1: like two quick last questions. Yeah, that's all right, okay,
Speaker 1: So uh, fellow ridiculous historians, we are literally hanging out
Speaker 1: with the gentleman who wrote the book on presidential dogs.
Speaker 1: I can't believe we didn't mention that, Matt.
Speaker 2: I didn't know that. Ye be we love presidential pets,
Speaker 2: ridiculous system. Yeah, I mean, we've done a couple episodes
Speaker 2: on it.
Speaker 1: We uh we mentioned your book previously, All the President's Pets,
Speaker 1: the story of one reporter who refused to roll over
Speaker 1: with this mode. We have to ask you our producer Max,
Speaker 1: he met Max. He's gonna kill us if I don't
Speaker 1: ask you this. Who's your favorite presidential pooch?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 3: I I always I have some affection for Warren Harding's
Speaker 3: Airdale Laddie Boy, and I love that the newspaper boys
Speaker 3: of America each gave I guess pennies or was it Yeah,
Speaker 3: I guess, and that was I think that what went
Speaker 3: into the statue that was in Maid of Laddie Boy
Speaker 3: when Warren Harding died before they realized that he was
Speaker 3: one of the most corrupt residents in history. I loved
Speaker 3: the Kennedy's romance between Charlie the Welsh Terrier, who was
Speaker 3: kind of he was sort of he was pretty hot
Speaker 3: that dog and Pushinka, the beautiful fluffy Russian dog, because
Speaker 3: I always imagine, I mean, and I say this having
Speaker 3: never sat through all of Doctor Shivago, but I love
Speaker 3: the theme music, Lara's theme and and I always you know,
Speaker 3: I mean, we actually told the story on a podcast
Speaker 3: about Nepo babies because Charlie the Welsh Terrier was the
Speaker 3: nephew of Asked from the Thin Man series, and Pushinka
Speaker 3: was the daughter of Strelko, the first dog to come
Speaker 3: back from space alive, because the Soviets before then, right
Speaker 3: when the first dog they sent out like yeah, like
Speaker 3: I just died out there, that's you know, and but.
Speaker 2: You know, into a camera after or maybe it was
Speaker 2: the other way.
Speaker 3: And Pushenka then was given as a gift because Khrushchaub
Speaker 3: was termed by Jackie, I think in Vienna and gave Pushinka,
Speaker 3: the daughter of Strelka and Belka Belka interestingly, because Belka
Speaker 3: I didn't I don't think Belka went into space. I
Speaker 3: think Belka was like a stay at home dad, and
Speaker 3: you know, well, Ostrelka was off in space. But Pushenka
Speaker 3: was very beautible, and she was extremely fluffy and as
Speaker 3: you'd hope, and she came to the White House and
Speaker 3: the Kennedy's had a managerie pet. But it was Charlie
Speaker 3: who went in for the kill. I mean, he just
Speaker 3: I actually thought the clipper of the German shepherd, he
Speaker 3: probably wanted Pushenka and probably thought he was going to
Speaker 3: get her. But Charlie just had that swagger and you know,
Speaker 3: and I've always imagined them with the single string of
Speaker 3: spaghetti like I have to believe that they did that
Speaker 3: lady in the tramp thing. But when they when when
Speaker 3: they they they made love to each other. Pushinka and
Speaker 3: Charlie de Welsh Terrier. They had their offspring were called
Speaker 3: Pupneck and so I've always loved that story that the
Speaker 3: pup knicks were given away during a letter writing campaign,
Speaker 3: So I've always loved them. I do love Fido, who
Speaker 3: was the first, of course fighter, and that was you know,
Speaker 3: that was Lincoln's dog. And Fido is the very first
Speaker 3: presidential dog to be photographed, and there is a photograph
Speaker 3: of post photograph with him on what looks like sort
Speaker 3: of a plinth that sort of draped. And the thing
Speaker 3: that always saddens me about Fido is that after the
Speaker 3: president was murdered, that a drunk killed fighter with a bottle,
Speaker 3: and so that always has upset me. But Fido is
Speaker 3: just has the soul of Lincoln, as does Lincoln's horse,
Speaker 3: Old Bob. Like the name of the horse was Old Bob,
Speaker 3: and he looks like just so kindly. You know, we
Speaker 3: don't have enough kindly people. It's the word I always
Speaker 3: associate with, what is it, mister Brownlow and Oliver Twist.
Speaker 3: He's kindly, like we need more kindly, Like I'm sick
Speaker 3: of kind I'm wrilli into kindly, and.
Speaker 2: Also like doing poorly, I'm doing poorly kindly. I just
Speaker 2: remember as a kid, like hearing Fido as just a
Speaker 2: stand in for dog tunes cartoons. It was just such
Speaker 2: before I even had any idea what the history was.
Speaker 1: It was like an eponymous trademark or whatever result where
Speaker 1: you just google something.
Speaker 3: Now there's I think it's I think it's time for
Speaker 3: a fighter comeback. Yeah, I think it is. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: think it's time for a fighter. But I think that
Speaker 3: those are among my favorite. I mean, I love the
Speaker 3: Coolidge's dogs. I mean it's like Rob Roy and what
Speaker 3: is the other one. They're in the first Lady Portrait
Speaker 3: of Grace Coolidge and they're just beautiful, those dogs. And uh,
Speaker 3: but yeah, there have been there. It's really hard to
Speaker 3: choose a favorite presidential it was a presidential dog or
Speaker 3: preessential pet. Yeah, yeah, way, Max is saying what about
Speaker 3: what what is Max saying? I can't here we go?
Speaker 1: Max's mask is saying, what about the raccoon? Coolidge is raccoon?
Speaker 3: Well, the Coolidge raccoon. Uh yeah, I'm forgetting the name
Speaker 3: of the raccoon.
Speaker 2: And just get the reccoon.
Speaker 3: Isn't the raccoon? Didn't the raccoon have something to do
Speaker 3: with like a local softball team or something.
Speaker 2: But Rebecca, Rebecca, now Rebecca the raccoon.
Speaker 3: I do remember Rebecca And yeah, Rebecca, yeah, because I
Speaker 3: was maybe conflating some of the Hoover's pets with the
Speaker 3: Coolidge's pets. The Coolidges had the second most pets. The
Speaker 3: most pets belong to Teddy Roosevelt, who had thirty six pets.
Speaker 3: What is Max saying there now right? The cow Pauline
Speaker 3: Waynees is the name of the cow. She's a Holstein
Speaker 3: and she belonged to Taft. So Taft had the cow. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then then Wilson had the ram old Ike and
Speaker 3: then who developed a tobacco addiction from eating cigarette butts
Speaker 3: and was retired to a Maryland farm where he.
Speaker 2: Died different time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a really imperdent time.
Speaker 1: Max just wants us to know that they got another
Speaker 1: another pet, raccoon, I believe Ruben, and Ruben was apparently,
Speaker 1: according to our chat here, Ruben was severely a second
Speaker 1: tier pet.
Speaker 2: He was just overshadowed by but he was.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's like the second Darren of raccoons. You know,
Speaker 3: if you you're a fan of be which But you know,
Speaker 3: I'll tell you one thing that in this is I
Speaker 3: have not disclosed this anywhere, and this is hot off
Speaker 3: the presses from Kinderhook, New York. I recently did a
Speaker 3: story on Martin van Buren's home, linden Walled, named after
Speaker 3: the beautiful Linden trees in the Hudson Valley, and I
Speaker 3: one of the things I was so excited about was
Speaker 3: that Martin van Buren had been given tiger cubs by
Speaker 3: the Sultan of Oman during his presidency, and he was
Speaker 3: known as the little Magician, so I always imagined him
Speaker 3: sort of as a sincreed or roy, the one who
Speaker 3: wasn't mauled. Sorry, but I always imagined. And when I
Speaker 3: went up to Linden Wall to do this story, I
Speaker 3: asked the ranger about the tiger cubs, and the ranger said,
Speaker 3: without any warning, without any trigger warning, he said, that's apocryphal.
Speaker 3: He didn't It's been proven that he did not have
Speaker 3: tiger cubs from the Sultan of Oman. And I gasped
Speaker 3: so hard that my producer acted like like as if
Speaker 3: this was like I was finding out who deep Throat
Speaker 3: was for the you know, like in Watergate, Like I
Speaker 3: like that this was so so earth shattering or like
Speaker 3: such a major like like should be on like all
Speaker 3: networks at once.
Speaker 2: That's the kind of story you just inherently believe because
Speaker 2: it seems right to just see. Oh, of course that's true,
Speaker 2: you know, and you just kind of move on.
Speaker 3: Well, I just with his mutton chops and which they
Speaker 3: call Martin chops there like to buy gravity. He looked
Speaker 3: like he looked like he should be in a circus,
Speaker 3: Martin Vamberen. So it just con It's one of these
Speaker 3: things that we have to in the news business to
Speaker 3: be skeptical that just because something seems to fit the narrative,
Speaker 3: we can't accept it right away. And for me, tiger
Speaker 3: cubs from the Sultan of Oman underlined affirmed everything I
Speaker 3: assumed about Martin van Buren, and I should have gotten
Speaker 3: a second source on it.
Speaker 1: Martin van Buren Kama, who did not, in fact own
Speaker 1: tiger cubs.
Speaker 2: Comma, you heard it here first God today, that is
Speaker 2: that is the circle. I was just going to say,
Speaker 2: speaking of folks that did or did not get mauled,
Speaker 2: any quick hot takes on Commander the German shepherd that
Speaker 2: apparently likes to eat secret service agents the White House
Speaker 2: You major, right, well, no, commander as well. Believe yeah,
Speaker 2: there's there's two. I don't know if they're both problematic,
Speaker 2: but the news that I've been seeing is referring to
Speaker 2: commander the German Shepherd, who I believe like has had
Speaker 2: multiple attacks, one of which involved a bite so deep
Speaker 2: that the Secret Service agent had to get six stitches.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, so my service on that beat and
Speaker 3: did when the book was published in two thousand and four,
Speaker 3: So I'm not really great with posts. With post two thousand,
Speaker 3: I moved on to grandmothers and the Ravioli at that point.
Speaker 3: Jules Jusseran was the French ambassador to the US during
Speaker 3: the administration of Teddy Roosevelt, and he had the seed
Speaker 3: of his pants ripped out by a dog that one
Speaker 3: of the kids had. I think it was a dog
Speaker 3: that did that. Yeah, can Max check on that Jules
Speaker 3: Juiceran and that his pants were literally torn by a
Speaker 3: dog that attacked his ass and want to do Yeah,
Speaker 3: so can you can we check on that? Get just
Speaker 3: a quick Google search because it's it did happen? I
Speaker 3: don't or or maybe it was an evil cat, but
Speaker 3: I do know that we had all to say that
Speaker 3: there is a precedent for presidential pets attacking people, attacking officials.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Dollie Madison apparently had a very violent McCaw she
Speaker 2: had Oh wait, wait, what did Max say.
Speaker 1: Max is coming in hot with the facts.
Speaker 2: That seeking in the phone and peacefull in knowledge. It's
Speaker 2: just for you right now. It is Pete. Uh.
Speaker 1: Pete tore the pants off Jean Jules Jusserande.
Speaker 2: What a name for a diplomat.
Speaker 1: And he also, Pete was a fighter. He was a
Speaker 1: bull terrier, according to many reports baby a bulldog, maybe
Speaker 1: a Boston bull terrier. But he's a real hard case
Speaker 1: Pete uh. And in nineteen oh seven in May he
Speaker 1: got a little bit of not amazing press for because
Speaker 1: he had a penchant for fighting another dog that would
Speaker 1: get in fights with him on the White House grounds
Speaker 1: and then run away and then come back and fight
Speaker 1: another day. That's a very interesting thing. Pete had a nemesis.
Speaker 1: I wasn't aware of that.
Speaker 3: And I have to say, I mean, I wish I
Speaker 3: had the discipline for it. It would be an interesting
Speaker 3: piece to write with the news about the Biden's dog.
Speaker 3: So you know we've been here before.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, I like that. You bring it back
Speaker 2: to history, as we do to always do here on
Speaker 2: ridiculous systems. Yeah, the thing with history of the name.
Speaker 1: One one more question for you, please, almost a question?
Speaker 1: So you were also in addition to your many works
Speaker 1: of journalism, the shows, the podcast Mobituaries from Morocca, you
Speaker 1: were also in what I think we can agree is
Speaker 1: objectively the best episode of Law and Order SVU Authority,
Speaker 1: which is season nine, episode seventeen. So we have to
Speaker 1: ask what lessons did you give that up and coming
Speaker 1: actor Robin Williams about showbiz?
Speaker 2: You know, it's so funny.
Speaker 3: First of all, I know that that episode replays a
Speaker 3: lot because I get a check for four cents like
Speaker 3: every few months, because I mean, it's aired so many times.
Speaker 3: The flash mob that I was the leader of in
Speaker 3: that episode, we shot that scene. One of the scenes
Speaker 3: at least in Bryant Park. The other one I think
Speaker 3: was in Grand Central Station. I guess where the two were.
Speaker 3: And all I remember is that Robin Williams was It's
Speaker 3: interesting because he was entertaining all the extras and there
Speaker 3: were so many because there was a flash mob, and
Speaker 3: you know, when the cameras weren't rolling, but I was
Speaker 3: standing sort of behind him, and I remember that he
Speaker 3: kept opening his body up. I really is when I
Speaker 3: haven't thought about this since then, but he kept sort
Speaker 3: of opening up his body to bring me into it,
Speaker 3: and I was sort of a little bit frozen because
Speaker 3: I thought I can't possibly like join in with you
Speaker 3: to start trying to like keep these people entertained. So
Speaker 3: I kept shrinking back. But I thought it was really,
Speaker 3: I mean it was it was. It was very telling
Speaker 3: and incredibly generous that he kept doing that, like like
Speaker 3: you get in here too, and you you know, you
Speaker 3: be funny with me, and that he was very very approachable.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, ok, sorry, No, I was saying, by
Speaker 2: all accounts of exactly what you're describing.
Speaker 3: I also remember that when we did the scene like
Speaker 3: Grand Central Station, Chris Maloney was a really nice guy.
Speaker 3: I don't know him. I only dealt with him on that.
Speaker 3: Every single woman, it's felt like who walked through their
Speaker 3: rush hour was like when they would just come into
Speaker 3: his orbit, was like ready to just abandon their husband
Speaker 3: and just like.
Speaker 2: Throw him onto the track. I mean completely.
Speaker 3: I mean like and also like we're talking like New
Speaker 3: York Long Island, like women who were like you know,
Speaker 3: you know all types, but like you know, an Italian
Speaker 3: broad who was like I got a husband at home,
Speaker 3: but he can feed himself. I mean like like just
Speaker 3: it was just the energy that was, I mean, how
Speaker 3: he handled it. It was miraculously the energy at him.
Speaker 3: He was kind of crazy and.
Speaker 2: It sounds like it was none too subtle.
Speaker 1: But the one of the things here that I think,
Speaker 1: speaking of form and function, one of the things that
Speaker 1: we have just encountered here towards towards the end of
Speaker 1: our show is your gift for storytelling. You bring people
Speaker 1: back to these moments, right, whether it's whether it is
Speaker 1: maybe more recent past, maybe it is further into the
Speaker 1: years of your And we just have to say, and Nola,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I derailed us to talk about law and
Speaker 1: order escue.
Speaker 2: We love it. We're professional big fanc here. We stole
Speaker 2: the sound cue for the longest time with our previous producer,
Speaker 2: Casey Pegrams Casey on the case and we do the
Speaker 2: dump dumb. But then we were eventually alerted by legal
Speaker 2: that that was probably some very pricey ip and we
Speaker 2: shouldn't be playing with fire with Dick Wolf because that
Speaker 2: guy'll come for you. So we just replaced it with
Speaker 2: us going dump dumb.
Speaker 1: We were told in a very kind way, we got
Speaker 1: a a our pages went off. We got a three
Speaker 1: six thousand asterisk eight four.
Speaker 2: And one seven. Yes, and we got a wolf he
Speaker 2: means business.
Speaker 3: It's I actually was driving my truck and I heard
Speaker 3: about it over the CB.
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, I'm with you, Ben. I mean, and
Speaker 2: it's interesting how that need or that drive to tell
Speaker 2: stories comes from the place of wanting to share with
Speaker 2: people and wanting to communicate with people. And it could
Speaker 2: be talking about a one off acting gig you did
Speaker 2: in two thousand and eight, or it could literally be
Speaker 2: delving into the archives of obituaries and history and presidential dogs.
Speaker 2: And the impulse I think comes from the same place,
Speaker 2: and that's one of connectedness and wanting to share and
Speaker 2: be part of the world, you know, And I think, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you're excellent adit mode.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you both. This is I really enjoyed this.
Speaker 3: This has been a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: Speaking of generosity, so thank you for being so very
Speaker 1: generous with your time. We do like to deliver.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: The documentary about obituary writers for the New York Times
Speaker 1: is and this was tricky to me too. It's literally
Speaker 1: named oh bit.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, it was right there, the whole right in
Speaker 2: my backyard.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so where can uh this is a question. I
Speaker 1: feel like we're obligated to do. It's part of the
Speaker 1: you know, it's part of the show. But uh, you
Speaker 1: have so many projects, you have so many endeavors. Where
Speaker 1: can people learn more about your work not just with
Speaker 1: mobituaries with Moroka, but your your many other projects.
Speaker 3: Oh gee whiz. I think like on X the platform
Speaker 3: formerly known as Twitter. No, I mean if you, I
Speaker 3: mean I'm on I'm on CBS Sunday Morning, you know,
Speaker 3: a couple of a couple of episodes each month. Uh,
Speaker 3: and the podcast is through there. I have a new
Speaker 3: book coming out in June because I can't stay away
Speaker 3: from puns called rock to Genarians about out people who
Speaker 3: had triumph slate in life, so and so sort of
Speaker 3: the pre dad, if you will. But yeah, I'm around.
Speaker 2: Well, we appreciate you being around with us on ridiculous history.
Speaker 1: And holy smokes. As much as we want to keep going,
Speaker 1: we're going to have to call it a day.
Speaker 2: What a ride, nol.
Speaker 1: I think we were both we came in with like
Speaker 1: high expectations. I think we're both even more surprised.
Speaker 2: Oh man, we well, I mean, first of all, you know,
Speaker 2: we had all this whole plan about what we were
Speaker 2: going to do and when mo Roka, you know, is
Speaker 2: on your podcast. God laughs at your plans when up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's some stuff we didn't we didn't get to,
Speaker 1: but it was just so so much cooler to learn
Speaker 1: about kind of this history of obituaries, the ephemeral nature
Speaker 1: of the past, and peak behind the curtain.
Speaker 2: Folks.
Speaker 1: We're recording this like a week after we did the
Speaker 1: actual show.
Speaker 2: Still reeling, and Max is here stif Yeah, yeah, Max, just.
Speaker 1: Take you super producer Max and h we It's funny
Speaker 1: because we got for anybody who's been a performer in
Speaker 1: the past. You know, when you do live shows, you
Speaker 1: get something sometimes called a show high. And I think
Speaker 1: we had a show high, man. I think we just
Speaker 1: like high fived each other and then left. I'm still high, bro,
Speaker 1: definitely from the show thing. By the way, I was
Speaker 1: scrolling around when I realized that I have like secret
Speaker 1: like sort of faux cable through my Roku. It's like
Speaker 1: the whole menu system and everything like on the old Exfinity,
Speaker 1: you know, systems where you can like scroll through the
Speaker 1: different things that are on quote unquote regular TV.
Speaker 2: And little bar popped up said Celebrity Jeopardy and guess
Speaker 2: who was on him.
Speaker 1: Was it.
Speaker 2: It was Morocca? Oh okay, I didn't know if it
Speaker 2: was a shot Aalan twist. Funny thing is though the
Speaker 2: other three like what do you call contestants? Never heard
Speaker 2: of them, so to me it was the only celebrity
Speaker 2: featured in this edition of Celebrity. Are they still doing
Speaker 2: co hosting duties with Ken? It's just Ken. This must
Speaker 2: have been a rerun because I think Miam Biolic was
Speaker 2: on it, so I guess that was sort of a
Speaker 2: trial bassess thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this brings us to anytime we mentioned celebrities. This
Speaker 1: brings us to our ending credits, the celebrities of Ridiculous
Speaker 1: history that we would like.
Speaker 2: To thank for making this show possible.
Speaker 1: Super producer mister Max Williams, Thank you, Noel, and of
Speaker 1: course famous famous arch villain of the show who aspires
Speaker 1: to be on Celebrity Jeopardy one day, Jonathan Strickland, a k.
Speaker 2: Thequister. Do you think the Celebrity Jeopardy contest and still
Speaker 2: have to take that brutal test that mortals have to take?
Speaker 2: Probably not they probably, I.
Speaker 1: Think it depends they might get softballed.
Speaker 2: Mo absolutely did and probably absolutely past it a million percent.
Speaker 2: The reason I even brought up Mo being on Celebrity
Speaker 2: Jeopardy is that guy is just a polymath of information.
Speaker 2: I mean, he is a font of data and as
Speaker 2: you mentioned, Ben can deliver it and tell stories with
Speaker 2: such precision and personality that it was just absolutely a
Speaker 2: joy to get to spend some time with that fellow.
Speaker 1: Thanks so thanks to Mode. Thanks also to Eve's Jeffcoat.
Speaker 1: Christopher hasiotis Gabe Blues. Yay, I'm saying his.
Speaker 2: Name different now, his backcent on the Gabe, you know,
Speaker 2: with a little vibe to it, like a like some intonation.
Speaker 1: Big big things course, yeah, big big thanks of course
Speaker 1: to Zarah and Elizabeth and Dave over Ridiculous Crime and
Speaker 1: of course no big thanks to.
Speaker 2: You, sir Ah. Yes, of course, thank you Ben and
Speaker 2: to you as well. We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 2: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.