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Weird People Who Built Weird Things · Ridiculous History

• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Let's begin today's episode with the busting of a popular myth.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: You have probably often heard that the proper amount of
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: walking average person should do a day works out to
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: ten thousand steps. Oh that's true. That's what your little
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: fitness trackers supposed to say at the end of the day,
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: right right. And that's a lot of corporate initiatives say,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: let's all walk ten thousand steps. You know, that's good
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: for you. But there's not a lot of really compelling
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: science that nails exactly ten thousand steps. It is a
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: digestible number, though, is it hunt And it is it is.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: It's a nice, easy, round number that sounds big and
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: ambitious but achievable. And we're bringing that up just to
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: set up a fantastic segue into a story about walking
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: and into a story about ambition. Several stories in fact.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: Oh in this iteration, they call me bet in this one. Okay, Yeah,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: there are alternate versions. I mean, you know, you contain multitudes. Hey, right,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: If I contradict myself very well, then I contradict myself.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: But enough about me, what about you? I don't want
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: to talk about me, But who are you? I'm no,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: this is ridiculous history. And we have clearly run out
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of ideas, which is fine, Which is fine, happens to
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the best of us. UM, but we're gonna do our
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: damn doist with this one talking about a dude, an
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: English guy who walked a lot and um had ambitions,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: And then we're gonna follow that up with a story
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: about another guy with ambitions, and then I think we'll
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: wrap up with some little nuggets about other weird people
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: that did weird stuff. I you know, I respectfully disagree.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I don't think we've run out of ideas. I think
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: we're definitely going weird with this one. I like it.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: It's it's gonna be a fun one. It's gonna be
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: a grab bag type episode, and and we're gonna wrap
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: it up with some surprises. Yeah. Yeah, we have something
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: special for you at the end. What is it? You
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: might ask? Stay tuned. Uh So, First things first, we'd
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: like to introduce you to a fellow named Simeon Ellerton.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: This guy is British and British listeners you may already
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: recognize his name because he's often referenced when someone talks
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: about the notable British eccentricity. Speaking of British listeners um
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: over on our Facebook page at Ridiculous History. I got
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: a real nice dang or we did, I guess for
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: um our guy Fox episode where a listener um said
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: that he cringed his way through the episode because we
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: pronounced um the guy who was in charge of the
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: gunpowder plot, who we pronounced as Catsby, it's apparently Catesby,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: And he said that just made him shrivel in horror.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: So hopefully we don't do that again. I'm sure I
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: don't think there's any other way to pronounce Simeon Simon.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: Maybe what if it's pronounced Simon and we don't know
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: the die is cast exactly? You know what, he's got
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: a double down. We just gotta roll with it. So
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: Simeon Ellerton was. He's often described in a couple of
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: ways in different accounts, one of which is a known
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: a noted pedestrian. That is my favorite. I love that.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: I wish I was known as a noted pedestrian or
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: a fitness enthusiast. Fitness enthusiast um. You know, the term
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: eccentric gets thrown around quite a lot. But let's just
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: give you the broad strokes who was Simme and Ellerton.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: He was employed by the gentry of his neighborhood, just
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: the general gentry, to execute This is a quotation to
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: execute commissions in the South. Were sort of an assassin,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: just of commissions, which he executed with fidelity and diligence.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Not that we're going to be vain about this, but
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: we want you to know that's a quote, because neither
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: of us would use execute or another version of it
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: twice in the same SENI where is that? Uh No,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: So I guess what that means in in in in
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: normal human speak, is that he he was kind of
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: a courier, and that was directly tied to his fondness
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: of the walk. Right, So it wasn't just that he
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: enjoyed a stroll, which a lot of people do. Uh.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: He liked to walk incredibly long distances. And when he
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: was on these meandering journeys, he picked up a weird
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: habit which literally involved picking things up. He collected stones
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: from across England and then he would just bring them
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: back with him. I'm assuming in some sort of pile
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: that he maintained. Yeah, he would he we carry them
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: though on his head. Oh yeah, yeah right. But at
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: first he just started piling stones on his land. He
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: was so known us as being a enthusiastic walker. That's
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: probably what led him to be employed by the gentry
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: in the first place. They were like, well, simmyon'll go,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: he's already walking from Surry too, God Yorkshire English listeners.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: You can also school us on ridiculous history Facebook about
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: the geography of England. But hey, spoiler alert, I don't
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: know the geography of my country either, so you're not
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: gonna hurt my feelings. Man, oh man, I'm really bad
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: at geography. But no, he would go like fifty miles
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: on foot round trip, yeah, or eighty kilometers for our
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: friends across the pond, all while carrying these stones upon
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: his his head. Yeah yeah, which feels like a weird
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: way to carry stone. Surely not balancing though, you know,
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: one would think it depends on the size of the stone.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: But given the distance, you would imagine he would have
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: to hold it with both hands or have a contraption
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: that he was to strapped. To us, he wasn't a
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: noted contraptionist though, No, he was not a contraption air.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: You think that would have figured into his his CV, right,
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: That's something you would mention. I think in this time
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: period a contraption would also be notable. So he's got
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: this pile of stones, and we've been doing this for years.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: He's been doing this for years and years and years,
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: and eventually he looks around the pile and he thinks,
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: I should do something. I should do something other than
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: just walking and throwing these into a pile. Well, that
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: is one interpretation, Ben. The other would be maybe he
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: knew all along what he was going to do with it.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: I don't know, what do you think? The record is unclear.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: The record is unclear. I would like to imagine that
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: he had a plan, you know, wouldn't wouldn't you like
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: to imagine that that's what I'm doing, Okay, because other
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: otherwise it seems um indicative of something beyond eccentricity. Exactly
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: exactly that plan in question is was that he was
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: going to use these stones to build himself a little
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: stone cottage that he would also design himself. And this
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: was a brilliant plan financially speaking, because he didn't have
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: to pay for someone else to haul the stones. He
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: didn't have to pay for the stones himself. He was
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: just finding them. But you know, in the Hills by
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: the road and doing all the transit on his own power. This,
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: according to folks like Andy Staffer, the owner of stafford
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Son's Construction, puts him ahead of his time by a
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: matter of centuries. Yeah, very much so. I mean, the
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: idea of using reclaimed material to build a home UM
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: today is very much in fashion. Um Staffer says in
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: an interview with How Stuff Works that using material it
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: already exists on your land can be a huge advantage.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: And then the materials are free and you don't need
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: to ship them to your jobs like I can imagine
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: shipping masonry. You know, that's that's expensive, very very expensive. Yeah,
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: and he says, or your job site. And he says,
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: the challenge is that builders must ensure the items found
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: on a property can be used for structural material. Here's
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: the thing too, though, Ben, this was in you know,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: the seventeen hundreds, and I can't imagine that there were
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: exactly building codes and and did he own the land?
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: That's the thing, you guys. There's a lot of conjecture
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: here because there's precious little about this. This fellow UM
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: one of the most prominent sources of the very few
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: sources about him at all Um was a publication called
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: the Yorkshire County Magazine, UM, and it describes uh Simeon
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: by way of his death in sevent He's not dead
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: to us you have for the purposes of the story,
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: but I just want to read this to to you
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: for the sake of a little context. Um. He died
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: at Craig craikey Craig. What do you think, Ben, c
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: r A I k e right in let us know,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: go with Craig Craig. Yeah, I'm gonna do Craig in
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: the County of Durham. Now that one at the advanced
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: age of a hundred and four years old. No small
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: task in those days, right Ben? So now yeah, no
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: small task? And now we see uh the advantage of
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: his continual exercise that had to play some sort of role. Absolutely.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: And my whole question here is like what was his lineage?
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: Where did he live before he built himself this this
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: stone hut? Yeah? What did it look like? Right? Did
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: people come visit him? Because he sounds just sort of
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: like a like a village oddball who people would throw
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: a couple of shillings to to carry their letters because
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: he was already going or really smart, determined guy with
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: like uh and d Dufrayne and Shawshank, redemption level, dedication
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: to a task and forethought right, very forward thinking. Um.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: It goes on to say, yeah, he was. So he
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: died of the advanced age of a hundred and four,
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: making him a centenarian. Yeah, centenarian over one hundred years
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: old or just a hundred, but in his case a
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: hundred and four, got it. This obituary really goes on
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: to say he was a noted pedestrian that one love that,
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: and was often employed by gentleman in the neighborhood on
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: commissions to London and other places, which he always executed
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: on foot. And as you said before, Ben with fidelity
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: and diligence, So you know he's a dependable guy, and
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: he's honest, very honest. He lived in a neat stone
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: cottage of his own building. And what was remarkable he
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: had literally carried it on his own head. And these
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: would be for journeys of over fifty miles, and that
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: would not be an infrequent amount of mileage for him.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: The story continues, so that account in the York Or
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: County magazine is expanded upon in the Historical Register of
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: remarkable events. That's true. And just a quick note, the
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: headline for Simeon's little entry in the Yorkshire magazine was
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: part of a list of Yorkshire Centernarians. Yes, yeah, yeah,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: and there's a surprising number there. I always feel like
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: it's surprising when there's more than one. Yeah. So, so
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: what happens after he builds this cottage? Uh? He continues
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: carrying stones, doesn't he? He does? And not only that,
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: even leading up to building the cottage, he was looking
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: for a particular type of stone. He wanted them to
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: be just so. And I haven't seen anything listed as
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: to what exactly the qualities were, but I would imagine
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: they had to be pretty smooth. Then they needed to
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: be able to be stitched together or stacked in a
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: way that would, you know, make them sturdy load bearing. Yeah.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: Not clear if he was using masonry or if he
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: was like, you know, putting them together with concrete or anything,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: or if he was literally just stacking them. I don't
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: know what do you think man going for an aesthetic?
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: He may have just collected rocks that he enjoyed as
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: well as rocks that you found suitable for construction. But yes,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: he would rarely come home without carrying stones, and he
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: became known for this throughout the county. And let's go
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: back to Andy Staffer for a moment here, because he
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: has an anecdote about a house he was working on
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: that was built in and had burned down and needed rebuilding.
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: And this gives us a little bit of a look
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: at the appropriate rock for this kind of foundation. Yeah,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: that's true. Um, he said the foundation of this house
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: was made of river rocks that have been taken from
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: the local river. But today you can't use rocks like that, um,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: because of things like building codes. Right. Um, he does
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: say that you could use these natural, beautiful looking rocks
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: to as decorative pieces. But Simeon clearly was you know,
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: he wanted to build this on the cheap, as in
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: on the no money. You know, his whole goal, I'm
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: hoping the long term goal was to build his house
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: out of these stones. Um. And then so Stiffer goes
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: on to add, quote, if we had wanted to build
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: a natural stone wall but didn't have access to this
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: collection of rock already on the property, it would have
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: caused a considerable amount to import them. So in this case,
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: having found material is a great benefit. For both the
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: cost efficiency and beauty perspective, because again he had you know,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: no one, no one has a lifetime to carry rocks
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: for a building job. But I mean seemed like he
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: had all the time in the world. He's a very
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: zen character. To me, I really I kind of dig
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: his old vibe. It's interesting to watch your interpretation of
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: him evolved even in the course of this episode. And
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: we don't have a ton of information about Ellerton as
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: we as we said at the top, but we do
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: know that he kept going in some way in a
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: symbolic way. So after he has his home built, he's
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: not carrying these heavy load bearing, potentially low bearing rocks
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: on his head, but he's still walking around with a
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: very interesting habit. He had a bag of rocks, right,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: And to me, this this is sort of the clue
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: I was looking for that he he had a plan.
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: He was that Andy Dufrain level of like forward thinking.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: You know, there was a lot going on this. I'm like,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: you're right. My perspective on this guy really is evolving.
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: And the more we talk about him, I like him
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: very very much. And it's reported that he still felt
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: as though the extra weight was a requirement for him
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: to enjoy walking. And maybe we end this part of
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: weird people who built weird things. Uh, maybe we end
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: it with one of our favorite quotes that we found
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: from Ellerton. Yeah. I mean, you know, he was a
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: known dude around town and people would stop him. Seems
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: like he was probably pretty friendly because whenever someone would
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: inquire his reason for carrying these rocks are having a
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: weight upon his head? Um, he would all always reply,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: tis to keep on my hat. I mean, this guy
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: seems like he'd be fun to hang out. He really
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: really does. I I I want to build a religion
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: around this man. Ah. I'm glad that we're verging into
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: spirituality here or the more esoteric fields, because we found
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: another person that we wanted to explore, another weird guy
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: or visionary who built a weird thing or should we
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: say a visionary thing. The choice, friends and neighbors, is
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: up to you. We would like to introduce you to
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: something called Coral Castle, built by a man named Edward
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Leads Skeldon. That's a doozy of a last name there.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: He's Latvian. So there's a small town in Florida it's
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: called Homestead And in homestead is one of the most
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: bizarre structures in Florida. It's a tin acre stone park
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: called Coral Castle. By himself. Edward built this thing, and
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: he made it using around two hundred and forty three
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: tons of gigantic coral blocks. Okay, so he's upping the
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: annie here a little bit. And this is there is
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: about a hundred years later than our boy sime In,
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: and some technology does come into play for this man's story.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: But set the scene for us, Ben sure, sure? So uh,
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: let's let's lead up to the construction of the castle.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: You see when he was around twenty six. Edward was
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: born in January eighteen seven in Latvia. We don't know
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: too much about his childhood other than he wasn't super
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: well off, He wasn't part of the lat via an elite,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: and he only had a formal education going up to
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: about fourth grade. But he was real bookworm. And when
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: he was around twenty six, he was engaged to marry
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: a lady named Agnes Scuffs. She was about ten years
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: younger than Edward, and when she broke the engagement, he said,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: blasted all and he decided that he was going to
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: move to the United States. So he immigrated to North America.
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: Originally he arrived in New York City and then he
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: originally after that traveled to Oregon, but he caught tuberculosis
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: and this inspired him to move to Florida for the climate,
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: right yeah, yeah, for the climate. Then he purchased an
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: acre of land, and according to newspaper reports at the time,
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: he was going to construct a home and an acre,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: and that was affordable. He didn't have to be a
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: swell to afford an acre, right, yeah, exactly. Everyone had
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: an opportunity. It was land of opportunity in those days. Now,
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: you know, buy me an acre in Atlanta, I'll show
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: you a square that costs a million dollars. Oh yeah,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: too true, and that might be a deal. So, like
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: our earlier example with Ellerton, there's not a whole lot
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: known about this guy's early life, but there's a there's
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: a lot of conjecture. What we do know is that
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: instead of building a normal house quote unquote normal house, uh,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: he spent over twenty years the net almost the next
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: three decades expanding this strange, bizarre stone garden. Uh. And
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: he worked in secret and by himself, and even today
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: some people will argue that he had some sort of
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: mysterious insight into construction. Well, he was carrying a torch
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: for at this right this whole time, this was all
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: an act of of sadness kind of right, or it
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: was like meant to be a monument to her in
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: some way, even though she totally screwed him over. Yeah. Yeah,
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: almost like a dirt h a breakup love song in
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: stone form. And you can see the sheer scale of
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: these things today. It's also strange that Ed you want
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: to just call him Ed for this? Yeah, Eddie, Yeah, Eddie,
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: there we go. Uh Eddie was five ft tall and
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: only around a hundred pounds. Yeah. No one saw him work,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: like literally, no one ever saw how he constructed it.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: And when we say a rock garden, we're not just
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: talking about several large slabs of coral stuck, you know,
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: thirty feet apart from each other or something. He was
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: carving this. He even made furniture, these oversized beds, rocking chairs, fountains, tables,
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: sun dials, a throne. So I guess he made the
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: I guess he made like a chair and then said,
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: you know what, decided that asked to rock or look
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: regal and do we talk about the fact that he
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: started this in one location and moved it about ten miles,
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: we should mention that, yeah, because he had to expand it,
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: because he started with that one acre and he ended
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: up with ten He needed more room. Where's his money
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: coming from, Ben, Where's his money coming from? Well, he
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: did make some pamphlets, So what you're saying is questionable. Questionable,
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: No questionable. We know that he did publish pamphlets on
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: a number of subjects that people have paid for, including
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: pamphlets on his beliefs about magnetism. He was another eccentric
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: and because of these pamphlets he published where he remarked
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: on his perception of the nature of you know, forces
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: in the universe, a lot of people had thought that
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: he had some all they would call it an ancient
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: insight into gravity or magnetism. It did not help that
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: in one in one response, when people asked him how
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: he built Coral Castle, all he said was that he
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: had quote learned the secrets of the pyramids? Cool vague.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: So does this mean that he had you know? For
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: some of the more conspiracy minded folks, would this mean
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: that he had access to some ancient wisdom? I mean maybe,
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: according to writers like Benjamin Radford, the secret of the
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: pyramid maybe a real thing, largely forgotten construction techniques. But
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: instead of like strange electromagnetic forces or anti gravity or
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: any of that jazz, maybe he just built police tripods
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: and winches to exert leverage and provide mechanical advantage. And
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: this is still there, right, Yeah, this is still there.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: You can go see it. Uh. The average weight of
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: the stones about fourteen tons each. He also made a
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: tower twenty two ton obelisk. And he was a master
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: of balancing things. So there's like a door that opens
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: and stuff all made of coral, all fragnes, scruffs, old
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: scruffy um. And so you know, he passed away um
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: in I think fifty one. UM and his nephew, who
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: had been living in Michigan at the time, inherited the castle.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: And this is a kind of a creepy part Um
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: when the ownership was being was switching hands. After the
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: death UM, they found a box of old eddies, uh stuff,
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: personal stuff, and it had a list of instructions that
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: led to the discovery of his life savings, which was
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: thirty five dollar bills. Inflation has been right here we
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: are thirty five hundred dollars in nineteen fifty three, is casey,
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: could we have a drum roll please? Thirty two thousand,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: seven hundred sixty dollars and nine seven cents. Okay, So
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: not a rich man, but very much a kindred spirit
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: to Simmey and Ellerton. Big time forward thinking um in genuitus?
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: Is that? Is that a word? I mean, English is
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: a living language. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm making
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: it a word, go for it, coining it right now?
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: It in. But you said, don't you think they're both? Like?
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of it's a bummer that Ed's
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: story is a little bit more sad. Although we don't
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: know what happened to Simmy and Ellerton, we don't know
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: why he was carrying those stones. He could have been
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: carrying them as some kind of ritual for someone that
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: he had lost. As well. The legend that I just
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: made up is that you can still find him out
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: there in the hills walking today. A shiver just went
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: up my spine, man when you said that. So, so, uh, yes,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: we do not know what happened to sim and Ellerton.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: We do know a little bit more about Edward passing away.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: But we can end on a positive note with his
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: story by saying that he did not just construct something grandiose,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: ambitious and weird. He constructed it to a high degree
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: of competency. During Hurricane andrew In, not one of these
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: stones shifted. Uh. The eight foot wall that rings the
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: property is still at the same height. And today people
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: will still tell you, with varying degrees of credibility, what
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: they think his secret method actually was. And he himself
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: claimed to harness a perpetual power to move the stones.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: He certainly possessed a perpetual power to move me, my friend. Um.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: And and you know another connection between Simeon and Edward. Um.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: I wish we knew a little bit more about Simmy
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: and how long it took him to collect all those stones.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: We do know, though, however, about Edward, that it took
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: him from nineteen three to nineteen fifty one to knock
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: out that that coral castle. And you know, if you
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: ever find yourself in the area, do pay it a visit.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: You know, it's it's a part of obscure history that
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: a lot of people miss. But he was not the
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: only person who built a weird thing. I want to
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: give a shout out to just a couple of people. Please.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: We promised that at the top of the show. We
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: can't let people down right, Well, shout out to rich Art.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: That's Uh, Richard with a T instead of a D.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: Rich Art. So A s O w A who built
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: the very inspiring Spiral Island and its replacement, Joyce Island
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: U j O y x e E. These are built
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: out of sustainable materials. He built the island by himself.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: The first one was sixty six ft in diameter, made
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: out of a hundred thousand bottles. And then I expanded
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: as he planted mangroves growing on the island. It's got
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: a beach house grow. Is that like a mango? It's
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: a It's a type of small tree that grows in
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: coastal waters or you know, brackish semi salty waters. So
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: he continued growing this uh, partially as an artistic statement
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: and partially as an aim towards, you know, an example
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: of how we could live more sustainably. There's another man
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: named Astavao Silva Knau who built on his own a
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: house made of found materials. You can see in the
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: walls yeah, cups rocks sculpture. Uh and of Sea Rock City. Oh,
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: that's a good call to That's so cool. I wish
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: you wish this was an audio podcast. So this is
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: just this is just probably titilating you in a negative way.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: But look, what's it? What's it? How do you? How
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: do you find this? Ben? Uh? You can you can
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: find this. There's a great thing you can see. Uh
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: on Reuters called Brazil's homegrown Gaudi by Paolo Whittaker because
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: this is located in uh Favela in sal Polo, and
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: it drew comparisons to a famous Catalan architect named Antony Gaudi.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: And the guy who built it had never heard of
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: this architect, He had never seen any photos of that work.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: He had just built this home for himself and then
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: later started a family in it. And you know, personally,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: I find these stories incredibly inspiring and we'd like to
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: hear some more stories from you. Is there anybody in
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: your neck of the Global woods who has built a strange,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: fascinating structure, edifice of their own power? And you know what,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: you know what, let's let's open it up a little.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: I think let's maybe not say just a single person,
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: but maybe like a family. There's some siblings or something.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: And speaking of broadening the net, I think it's time
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: for our first ever attempt at a new segment we'd
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: like to call extra Credit. Yes, that's right, Friends and neighbors.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: Extra Credit, the segment where we are expanding the typical
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: show that we might normally do you know. And uh,
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: we've been talking back and forth about this one, and
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: we're excited because what better way to kick it off
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: than with a very very special guest. Yes, we have
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: a child, a human child here, I guest studio smartest
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: one in the room. She is the smartest one in
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: the room. Um, and and she's actually we're related. Nepotism
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: going on here. This is uh, ladies and gentlemen, Eden
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: Eden Brow Um, hello, you just waved. Um. We don't
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: really know what this segment is all about. We're just
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: gonna play it by ear Are you Are you into it? Okay,
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: because we're gonna ask you some questions. Okay, Well you've
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: got this seed and so so thank you so much
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: for coming on this show. And we're really we're really
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: thrilled to have you. And you heard earlier we were
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: talking about these people who built these crazy things out
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: of stone by themselves. If you were going to build
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: something like that, what what what kind of thing would
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: you build? I would build the sculpture of a unicorn?
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, how big would it be? Dude? Can you
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: give us some specific measurements? Could you sketch it out
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: for us? Hang on, ladies and gentlemen, she's sketching. We're handy,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: Miss Brown's some pen and paper. Okay, no, could you narrate? Okay,
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: she's drawing a line here. It looks like that's the
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: of corns. I'm thinking that's it's but no, that's the horn.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: Excuse me, excuse me? Okay, I think we get the idea.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: So Eden, Why why a unicorn? And what would this
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: mean to you? What would you want? You're obsessed with unicorns? Orn? Really?
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Is that true? Do you? Um? What is? What? What
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: is it about unicorns that you enjoy so much? They're
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: magical and there they dance on rainbows? Do that? Yes?
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: I did not know this, so I would you know what?
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: I am inspired by that. I would definitely go see
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: a massive unicorn. Where would you Where would you build
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: this unicorn? M hmm? I would build it in my backyard,
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: and would you charge admission? Because that is one thing
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: these two stories are. Second guy with the coral castle,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: it did eventually start making a little money off of tours,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: That's true. You know his heart was in the right
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: place about just like making it. And then once it
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: was done, it's like, well, you know what I mean,
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: I did all this work, I might as well make
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: a little scratch so when you eat, and I know
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: that you upfront would be doing it just for the
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: pure joy of doing it. But once it was done,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: how much would you charge for people to come see
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: this giant stone unicorn in your backyard? I would cost
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: five dollars to come and see it. That seems a
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: little steep. Do you get a shirt? Yes? Okay, I'm
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: back in Okay, So, uh, I've got a question. I'm
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: sure all the all the listeners out there are wondering eating,
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: and that is would the unicorn have colors to it?
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: Would it be I would paint the rocks and yeah, fantastic,
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: and see me, I would hope you get a little color.
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: All right, Well, okay, I guess this is what extra
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: credit is. Thank you so much, Eating for coming onto
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: the show and hanging out with me and your dad
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: and our super producer Casey. Spoiler alert, Um Eden took
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: a sick day to day and that's why she's here yea,
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: and before she infects us all um, we better get
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: a move on. Um. We hope that you enjoyed the show.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: We hope you enjoyed our Running Out of Ideas episode,
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: which actually turned out to be kind of chock full
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: of ideas. I'm still weird a doubt that you call
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: it the running out of Ideas episode. It's just a
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: subtitle I'm working on. All right, Well, I I am
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: still a fan of weird people building weird things. That's fantastic,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: weird people building weird things. The running out of Ideas episode,
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: it's a little log. We'll we'll workshop and maybe our
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: next episode of extra credit will take us to Coral
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: Castle itself anywhere, Chuck e cheese, you know the mall? Yeah,
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: David Busters, whatever you got, the Grand Canyon. No, it's true.
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: The thing about extra credit is that it's very open
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: ended and it's just a good way to do something
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: a little different at the end of the show. And
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: of course, as always, we would like to thank our
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: super producer, Casey Pegram while we're recording this, uh and
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: Eden saw this earlier when she was staying outside of
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: the booth. We sometimes turned to Casey and raise our
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: eyebrows to check to see if he's if he's giving
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: his look of approval, and he seems okay. Overall, I
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: think it seems like he's in a very fine chipper mood. Um.
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: So definitely big thanks to Casey. Big thanks to Alex
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: Williams M who composed our theme. Most importantly, big thanks
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: to you for tuning in and hanging out with us
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: for another episode of ridiculous history. If you have any thoughts, comments, complaints,
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: keep the complaints, just just give us the nice stuff.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: You can write to you us a ridiculous at how
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Oh and we do have a
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: new complaint department. You can write directly to our complaint department,
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: Jonathan dot Strickland at how stuff works dot com. You
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: can find us on Instagram, Facebook, uh, Twitter, and various
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: other internettings. I'm gonna just go with interneting. I like
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: it the Internet. It's a net and and of course
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: a very special thanks to our inaugural guests of extra credit, uh,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: Eden Brown, No, what say we give her the last
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: word Today, goodbye,