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The CIA Paid War Spies with Stuff From the Sears Catalog · Ridiculous History

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
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Speaker 1: to the show Ridiculous Historians. As always, thank you for
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Speaker 1: tuning in. Hello. My name is Ben Bullen and I
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Speaker 1: am I. I don't know if I'm addicted, but I'm
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Speaker 1: going through a real serious shopping online phase. What about you, guys?
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Speaker 1: You know, can you hear my squeaky chair? You guys? Yes,
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Speaker 1: I can totally hear it. Do you think they shipped
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Speaker 1: me a chair? Is that a thing you can order online?
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Speaker 1: Or is that too big? We'll have to put it
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Speaker 1: together myself because I'm not down with that. What do
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Speaker 1: you think you can order them online? I think as
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Speaker 1: simply would be required, and I also think yes, they
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Speaker 1: probably would not ship it. At this point, I can
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Speaker 1: do some assembly. I can't. I mean, you know, if
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Speaker 1: you can send me, I'll put on the wheels, but
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Speaker 1: I don't want to have to put the back on
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Speaker 1: the chair, you know what I mean, A nice middle
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Speaker 1: ground level of assembly. I love. I love building furniture. Uh,
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Speaker 1: that's you. You're an old prout, that's me. So so
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Speaker 1: if you ever have furniture you want built, and you
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Speaker 1: have some kid or something, I will totally do it.
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Speaker 1: That stuff is fun for me. It's like legos. It
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Speaker 1: is true. It is true. It's like I don't mind
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Speaker 1: building like an Ikea thing. I got an Ikea bed
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Speaker 1: with like the drawers underneath, and those drawers were real
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Speaker 1: pain in the butt to get in place. But I'm
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Speaker 1: really glad I did it. I very much like my
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Speaker 1: Ikea schvarn Um. But no, I've been doing a ton
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Speaker 1: of online shopping, Ben, just you know, it's like it's
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Speaker 1: it's sort of an endorphin rush kind of. I think we're, like,
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Speaker 1: you know, giving ourselves these brain chemical rewards by shopping
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Speaker 1: online because it's just that instant gratification, you know. Yeah, agreed.
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Speaker 1: I don't know about you, super producer Casey Pegram. Have
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Speaker 1: you been ordering stuff online as well. I've actually just
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Speaker 1: stuck mostly to like groceries and you know, the occasional
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Speaker 1: takeout order, not too much in the way of like
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Speaker 1: buying stuff. I usually buy way more than I have
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Speaker 1: been buying recently. But it is nice to have at
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Speaker 1: least like one or two things that are pending you
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Speaker 1: can kind of look forward to it. It's sort of
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Speaker 1: differentiates the days a little bit. When you get something
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Speaker 1: in the mail so um a little bit, but but
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Speaker 1: not as much as it sounds like you guys are
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Speaker 1: wait wait, so you're ordering things online to help you
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Speaker 1: remember what day? It is just no, no, not so
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Speaker 1: much to remember the day. But it's like if it's
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Speaker 1: if it's coming on Friday and it's Monday, it's like, oh,
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Speaker 1: well Friday, I'm gonna get a thing and that will
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Speaker 1: that will sort of break up the monotony, the Groundhog
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Speaker 1: day nous of um, you know, every other day of quarantine's. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: just to mock the passage of time, like a like
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Speaker 1: a prisoner making a hash mark on the wall every
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Speaker 1: day or something. I made a really weird online order today,
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Speaker 1: just a very crazy grab bag. I ordered some led
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Speaker 1: wall strip lights for my daughter's room, ah, a new
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Speaker 1: shower curtain, kind of an artsy shower curtain. I wanted
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Speaker 1: to jazz up my bathroom a little bit and a liner.
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Speaker 1: And I ordered a new toilet seat because mine is
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Speaker 1: beyond repair. It's beyond help. You can't just the level
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Speaker 1: of grime on and is not coming off with a
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Speaker 1: scrub anymore. So I want to just get a little
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Speaker 1: refresh for the old back room. During during these lock
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Speaker 1: in days. Yeah, invest in yourself. I like that. Let's see,
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Speaker 1: I've ordered, uh, guitar strings, raspberry pie, homebrew kind of
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Speaker 1: emulator thing, a book that that I love called Around
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Speaker 1: the World in eight e Trees or something like that. Uh.
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Speaker 1: And then I've also I'm thinking of like the weirdest stuff.
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Speaker 1: I've ordered magnetic strips for various non sketchy reasons, stuff
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Speaker 1: like that. Maybe you know, we should ask folks you
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Speaker 1: listening along at home, what are some of the weird
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Speaker 1: things you've been ordering online? And what's the weirdest thing
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Speaker 1: you've ever ordered in the past. Also, maybe why are
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Speaker 1: we asking about online ordering? There's a reason it's it
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Speaker 1: is in fact a sequitur. It's not a non sequitor
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Speaker 1: um because you know, we take for granted how with
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Speaker 1: a click of a mouse we can literally get everything
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Speaker 1: from magnetic strips to guitar strings to toilet seats. Um.
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Speaker 1: But back in the day, this was a revolutionary idea,
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Speaker 1: and of course there was no such thing as the internet,
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Speaker 1: so it had to use this thing we used to
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Speaker 1: use called paper, where you read like words that were
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Speaker 1: printed on it, accompanied by vibrant illustrations that sort of
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Speaker 1: created this kind of culture of the American dream and
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Speaker 1: this aspirational notion of like, you know, keeping up with
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Speaker 1: the Joneses and all that, having to have the things
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Speaker 1: that were depicted in the pages of the Sears catalog. Ah, yes,
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Speaker 1: there we have it, the Sears catalog. Now, long time listeners,
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Speaker 1: fellow ridiculous historians, you may remember earlier when the three
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Speaker 1: of us dove into the strange story of our office building,
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Speaker 1: which was once a itself a Sears. Uh. Sears played
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Speaker 1: a huge role in American culture, and I like the
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Speaker 1: point you made, know about the American dream aspect. People
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Speaker 1: are kind of yeah, they're buying pants or even in
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Speaker 1: some cases true story houses, but really they're they're sort
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Speaker 1: of purchasing a share of this ideal, you know. And
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Speaker 1: Sears and its catalog changed the world. It's the predecessor
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Speaker 1: of online ordering. And we can only imagine, without ourselves
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Speaker 1: being neurologists, that when people ordered stuff from a Sears catalog,
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Speaker 1: they also got that same rush of feel good chemicals
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Speaker 1: and it became like this this bedrock of American commerce.
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Speaker 1: You know, it's it's weird because we talked about this
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Speaker 1: in our previous episode. These days, a lot of us
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Speaker 1: think of Sears as kind of like a cautionary tale
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Speaker 1: about the woes of brick and mortar stores and retail
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Speaker 1: in general. Right, it filed for chapter eleven bankruptcy. Uh,
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Speaker 1: and it's often now kind of portrayed as like this
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Speaker 1: capitalist wasteland. There's something you know, you walk into a
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Speaker 1: Sears and it's abandoned. But like you said, NOL, at
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Speaker 1: one time, this publication, the Sears Catalog was like you
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Speaker 1: might as well have been a best selling book. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it's true New York Times as a fabulous article about
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Speaker 1: the history of Sears leading up to this chapter eleven
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Speaker 1: bankruptcy you mentioned, um, and it makes a really good
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Speaker 1: point of how many not only brands it was responsible
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Speaker 1: for launching on elevating ones that have far outlasted the
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Speaker 1: Sears brand um in terms of you know, still being
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Speaker 1: kind of relevant, but also authors and artists creating this
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Speaker 1: platform where you know, these creatives were able to thrive
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Speaker 1: and uh a medium where their work was reaching you know,
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Speaker 1: millions and millions of people. Because the Sears Catalog was
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Speaker 1: a must must have item, every one wanted it. Even
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Speaker 1: if you couldn't afford the things that were in it,
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Speaker 1: you had the Catalog. It was sort of like, you know,
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Speaker 1: browsing window shopping, you know, from your home in rural America.
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Speaker 1: We talked about that in the Serious Catalog episode, about
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Speaker 1: how popular it was in rural America, even if folks
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Speaker 1: weren't buying the stuff inside of him. But uh, folks
7:17
Speaker 1: like Edgar Rice Burrows, who wrote the Tarzan books, was
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Speaker 1: a copywriter, and uh, Lauren Bacall was a model for
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Speaker 1: the Serious Catalog, and the list goes on. I always
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Speaker 1: think of some of the images the kind of illustrative, um,
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Speaker 1: sort of Norman Rockwell esque kind of images of families
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Speaker 1: and stuff. And that's really what sold a lot of
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Speaker 1: Americans on this notion of what the American dream really
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Speaker 1: looked like. Uh. And it wasn't limited to just this
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Speaker 1: kind of aspirational window shopping. Turns out it actually played
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Speaker 1: a pretty interesting part in spycraft and the activities of
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Speaker 1: the c I A uh. And this story begins with
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Speaker 1: a man by the name of John Wyant. Yes, the CIA,
8:06
Speaker 1: the Central Intelligence Agency uh named in sincerity not satire.
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Speaker 1: We should note this is really fascinating because we said
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Speaker 1: sears went global, but maybe maybe not in the way
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Speaker 1: most people might assume John Wyant was an intelligence agents
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Speaker 1: and he was deep in the game. He was deep
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Speaker 1: in the spy game. And according to him, the SEARS
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Speaker 1: catalog was a quote almost obligatory thing to have with
8:42
Speaker 1: you because you see, they ran into a pickle in Vietnam.
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Speaker 1: They were conducting reconnaissance efforts during the Vietnam War and
8:54
Speaker 1: they wanted insiders. They wanted natives, locals to help gather
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Speaker 1: information espe actually along the border with Laos. John arrived
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Speaker 1: in the area in nineteen sixty six, right in central Vietnam,
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Speaker 1: and at this time American involvement in the war is
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Speaker 1: starting to escalate. This is just a year after the
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Speaker 1: US had deployed what two hundred thousand marines to the
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Speaker 1: country and started bombing the north part of the country.
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Speaker 1: And so John takes over this small operation where Vietnam
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Speaker 1: agents are bringing in, uh, you know, insider info about
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Speaker 1: the activities of the Viet Cong. Yeah. He was stationed
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Speaker 1: in a place called Hugh I guess the village or
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Speaker 1: a city. Really. It was in central Vietnam, and it
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Speaker 1: was a pretty wealthy place. It was lots of palaces
9:45
Speaker 1: there um, and it was a stronghold for the American
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Speaker 1: war effort there in Vietnam, specifically that the intelligence side
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Speaker 1: of things, and they had we had the US had
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Speaker 1: deployed two hundred thousand marines and we're bombing northern Vietnam. Um.
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Speaker 1: He was in charge of kind of maintaining this relationship
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Speaker 1: between the border of Vietnam and Cambodia. UM and he
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Speaker 1: got to Hugh in September of nineteen sixty six. Uh,
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Speaker 1: and he became kind of the handler of the handlers, um,
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Speaker 1: of the folks who were getting information from villagers, from
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Speaker 1: from locals about the Viet Cong and their movements and
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Speaker 1: their activities. And this was dangerous work. I mean, these
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Speaker 1: folks were essentially what do you call them snitches? I guess,
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Speaker 1: And you know what happens with snitches. They they end
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Speaker 1: up in in stitches. Uh. And so this was very,
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Speaker 1: very dangerous for these folks to be doing this work
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Speaker 1: in these North Vietnamese secret zones which were along the
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Speaker 1: border with Laos UM. And a lot of these folks
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Speaker 1: that were signing up for this kind of dangerous work
10:55
Speaker 1: certainly weren't going to do it for free. Um. They
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Speaker 1: were a grarian types, they were farmers, they were handmaking charcoal,
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Speaker 1: for example, or farming and gathering materials to make furniture,
11:09
Speaker 1: you know, like handmake furniture and crafts like retan, which
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Speaker 1: is a I believe been the stem of a palm
11:16
Speaker 1: tree of some kind. Yep. Yeah, so uh they were
11:20
Speaker 1: a kind of a barter based system. Uh them. The
11:25
Speaker 1: currency which was known as the piastre, which I had
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Speaker 1: never heard before, which is the national currency, wasn't really
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Speaker 1: something that entered into their their economic activities at all.
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Speaker 1: They would trade with other agrarian workers, and so why
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Speaker 1: would it be any different when they wanted to get
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Speaker 1: paid by the CIA for doing these covert ups, right?
11:46
Speaker 1: These uh, these folks are not working for free. You know.
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Speaker 1: There are a couple of different motivations for spy, right
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Speaker 1: or for an asset. One motivation would be blackmail or extortion, right.
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Speaker 1: Another motivation would be idealism, help us overthrow the government
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Speaker 1: that you hate. And then, of course a third motivation
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Speaker 1: will be good old self interest. Let me have money,
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Speaker 1: let me have power, let me have stuff. And John
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Speaker 1: ran into a problem because they needed to figure out
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Speaker 1: a way to pay these spies these assets. It's similar
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Speaker 1: to the PEPSI deal with the USSR, you know, they
12:26
Speaker 1: couldn't get the currency to work. So the weirdest thing happened.
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Speaker 1: The CIA and these other intelligence officers, you know, they
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Speaker 1: do things any foreign visitor would do. They buy meals,
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Speaker 1: they go to hotels, they rent cars, and they'll also
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Speaker 1: foot the bill for people who are working under their purview.
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Speaker 1: But these folks that were in these secret zones that
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Speaker 1: Wyant was was trying to work with, they were in
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Speaker 1: a barter system, you know, they didn't really want a
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Speaker 1: huge stack of cash. Uh, And it the onus of
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Speaker 1: figuring out what these people want fell onto the agents.
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Speaker 1: The farmers, the agrarian people that they're speaking with barely
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Speaker 1: use money. They rarely use it, you know, they trade
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Speaker 1: what they've created with things that other people create. Right,
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Speaker 1: And they notice that the agents or the assets they're
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Speaker 1: trying to work with don't really want to get paid
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Speaker 1: in the local currency piastres. And they don't want to
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Speaker 1: get paid because local authorities, local district chiefs are putting
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Speaker 1: a thirty three percent tax on their income. And the
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Speaker 1: tax that people were paying was disincentivizing these agents. They
13:50
Speaker 1: were doing less work. And then there was also like
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Speaker 1: why should I put in an effort when I'm only
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Speaker 1: getting two thirds of what you guys said you were
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Speaker 1: gonna pay me. And then one of why It's best handlers,
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Speaker 1: according to an article he wrote about this event in
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Speaker 1: Studies and Intelligence, one of his best agents had an
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Speaker 1: unusual idea. He said, you know what, instead of giving
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Speaker 1: this one of my assets a local currency that they're
14:15
Speaker 1: going to be taxed on, let me get him this
14:17
Speaker 1: slick canvas hat. And the guy loved it. He loved
14:21
Speaker 1: it more than money exactly. And let's not forget that's
14:25
Speaker 1: the pretty practical thing. It's hot there. You know, they
14:27
Speaker 1: would keep protect them from getting the sun beating down
14:30
Speaker 1: on him or whatever. And this was an entirely new idea.
14:33
Speaker 1: They've done things like pay operatives with like bags of
14:35
Speaker 1: rice and other kinds of things that were just practical
14:38
Speaker 1: they could use. But it's when they start getting into
14:41
Speaker 1: the kind of uh that Norman Rockwell American aspirational idealism
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Speaker 1: that the Sears Catalog represented, the things start to get
14:50
Speaker 1: a little interesting. Right. Um, he gets this idea of
14:54
Speaker 1: what if we kind of created a system of currency
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Speaker 1: based on items in the Sears catalog, like tiers of things,
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Speaker 1: so for like a twenty day you know, recon mission
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Speaker 1: you can get. It's like prizes at Chuck e Cheese,
15:09
Speaker 1: you know, like with tickets, like if you like, spend
15:11
Speaker 1: this many tickets, you can get you know, a blowpop
15:13
Speaker 1: and if you spend a million tickets you can get
15:16
Speaker 1: that you know, xbox or whatever. But this was all
15:20
Speaker 1: stuff in the Sears catalog, and largely it was he
15:23
Speaker 1: picked out these items that he thought would work, but
15:26
Speaker 1: instructed his agents to let the uh the operatives brows
15:31
Speaker 1: the catalog themselves, and the stuff that ended up appealing
15:35
Speaker 1: to them is is pretty funny and interesting. Yeah, yeah,
15:39
Speaker 1: I agree. And this also reminded me of boy Scouts,
15:45
Speaker 1: because I spent a lot of summers uh selling popcorn.
15:48
Speaker 1: That is the far inferior food that boy Scouts sell.
15:51
Speaker 1: It will never touch the girl Scout cookie industry, but
15:55
Speaker 1: when you would sell popcorn, you would get rewarded in
15:58
Speaker 1: these different tiers of stuff, you know. So it's a
16:01
Speaker 1: very good motivator. And I'm not knocking the popcorn, just
16:04
Speaker 1: saying the cookies are awesome and objectively better. Anyway, You're right,
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Speaker 1: it's a brilliant move. And Wyant gets messages back from
16:13
Speaker 1: the field, just like as soon as three days later,
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Speaker 1: he's hearing that this Sears concept is a fantastic success.
16:22
Speaker 1: And as a matter of fact, the only thing they
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Speaker 1: change are the recommended products, because the stuff Wyant thought
16:28
Speaker 1: people would like was not exactly what they ended up wanting.
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Speaker 1: When the assets browsed the catalogs, they would start requesting
16:37
Speaker 1: oddly enough boys clothing, like for instance, one person asked
16:42
Speaker 1: for six boys size red velvet blazers. These that were
16:48
Speaker 1: vest blazer vest with brass buttons, and each of those
16:52
Speaker 1: six vests, which sounds pretty snazzy and pretty loud, would
16:55
Speaker 1: be payment for a twenty day mission. Uh. They also
16:59
Speaker 1: asked for I think stamped leather cowboy belts, so funny
17:03
Speaker 1: and what I mean to me? Immediately, the thought that
17:07
Speaker 1: crossed my mind was aren't they going to be suspicious
17:10
Speaker 1: as hell looking to like, you know, the folks they're
17:13
Speaker 1: trying to hide from, if there's all of a sudden
17:15
Speaker 1: strutting around and like red velvet blazers, you can't where
17:19
Speaker 1: do you can't get those in lows? You know? Uh?
17:22
Speaker 1: Certainly not during wartime? Uh? And that that did end
17:25
Speaker 1: up being a thing that was mentioned didn't get too
17:28
Speaker 1: deep into that in the research. But yeah, it was
17:30
Speaker 1: so certainly a byproduct of this that it was could
17:33
Speaker 1: have put these folks in danger. But yeah, things like
17:36
Speaker 1: you know, denim jackets. A lot of it was seemed
17:38
Speaker 1: like kind of weird cowboy garb and uh the kind
17:42
Speaker 1: of stuff that like bell hops would wear. Very interesting. Um.
17:46
Speaker 1: But yeah, but it definitely was a success, and it
17:50
Speaker 1: didn't last super long. I think it petered out in
17:53
Speaker 1: around nineteen sixty seven, But it was largely because it
17:57
Speaker 1: was just too dangerous, uh in general for agents to
18:00
Speaker 1: even be doing anything, because all these bombing raids were
18:03
Speaker 1: happening much more frequently and it would be difficult to
18:06
Speaker 1: even get the shipment's there. Yeah, add to that the
18:09
Speaker 1: fact that the Marines began creating their own intelligence network,
18:14
Speaker 1: so eventually it was you know, as a question of redundancy, right,
18:19
Speaker 1: And the SEARS system was short lived, but it was
18:22
Speaker 1: very successful. Our our favorite, uh, one of our favorite
18:28
Speaker 1: items that they that they ordered uh during this time
18:31
Speaker 1: was a large bra. Wyant says that this brawl was
18:37
Speaker 1: not ordered to be used as clothing though. Instead the
18:41
Speaker 1: assets took it and they stuck the bra on this
18:44
Speaker 1: bamboo pole and they used it to harvest breadfruit from
18:47
Speaker 1: the trees. So they kind of made you know, like
18:49
Speaker 1: this old uh reach and grab pincher things. Yeah, they
18:54
Speaker 1: kind of made something like that. Uh. And to me,
18:58
Speaker 1: that's cool. That speaks to mcgivernus of the whole situation.
19:02
Speaker 1: I initially pictured them using it as like a wind sock,
19:06
Speaker 1: you know, till I see which which way the wind
19:08
Speaker 1: was blowing. Uh. A lot of these little, little more
19:10
Speaker 1: deeper cut uses come from a great article on Atlas
19:13
Speaker 1: Obscura called the American government's Sears for Spying payment plan Um.
19:19
Speaker 1: So yeah, Whyant told the New York Times quote, I
19:23
Speaker 1: thought it was extraordinarily clever at the time, but then
19:27
Speaker 1: he acknowledges that it did pose some security risks um
19:33
Speaker 1: in hostile zones if he got these uh agrarian folks
19:39
Speaker 1: um used to dressing a certain way. All of a sudden,
19:41
Speaker 1: rock and cowboy boots and denim jackets agreed. And add
19:45
Speaker 1: to this the fact that if we think about it
19:47
Speaker 1: from a spycraft angle, if all of those guys are
19:50
Speaker 1: wearing the same snazzy red brass buttoned vest, then it
19:54
Speaker 1: starts to look very much like a uniform which is
19:57
Speaker 1: uh not not a good look in this situation. Absolutely not.
20:07
Speaker 1: We felt one more thing to add that might I
20:10
Speaker 1: don't know. I think it's just something to think about
20:12
Speaker 1: as everybody is still going through the lockdown, which is
20:16
Speaker 1: that the Sears catalog had one other use that was
20:20
Speaker 1: pretty common back in the day, but was not, you know,
20:24
Speaker 1: officially condoned by Sears Roebuck themselves, and it's this apparently
20:31
Speaker 1: Sears catalog makes for great toilet paper. Yeah. I think
20:34
Speaker 1: it was, you know, not like something to do with
20:36
Speaker 1: the quality of the paper that it was printed on,
20:39
Speaker 1: more than the fact that there'd be a new one
20:41
Speaker 1: that would come out every month and you have the
20:43
Speaker 1: old ones, so you could just tear the pages out
20:45
Speaker 1: and put it in a little bin, you know, in
20:46
Speaker 1: your outhouse or whatever, and then there you go. You
20:49
Speaker 1: don't have to spend money on. I don't know what
20:51
Speaker 1: was the toilet paper market like back then. I mean, obviously,
20:54
Speaker 1: I don't know what's the history of mass produced toilet paper.
20:57
Speaker 1: I wonder you hear about things like corn cobs, which
21:01
Speaker 1: is I don't understand. I guess because it's textured. Maybe
21:06
Speaker 1: we're getting a little I don't want to get too
21:07
Speaker 1: gross here. I guess you know it. You know, God,
21:11
Speaker 1: I'm disgusting myself even thinking about it. Again, Let's just
21:13
Speaker 1: picture how you with the function of using a corn
21:16
Speaker 1: cob would be um And apparently sometimes they were tied
21:19
Speaker 1: to the outhouse with a string, implying that they were
21:22
Speaker 1: supposed to be reused. So I would say that the
21:26
Speaker 1: Sears catalog page is definitely a good alternative to that.
21:29
Speaker 1: But do remind me and and I'll do the same
21:33
Speaker 1: to you, Ben, I think we should look into the
21:35
Speaker 1: history of mass produced toilet tissue. Yeah, it's one of
21:39
Speaker 1: the uh it's one of those industries that hasn't left
21:42
Speaker 1: the United States, which is why, uh so I we're
21:46
Speaker 1: not actually going to run out of toilet papers and nation.
21:50
Speaker 1: The weirdest thing here about the Sears Robot catalog, and
21:54
Speaker 1: it's dare I say, commodious use for households across America,
21:59
Speaker 1: was that people actually objected to the quality of the
22:04
Speaker 1: catalog improving because back in the day it was black
22:07
Speaker 1: and white paper. But when they started printing color pictures,
22:11
Speaker 1: they had to use a different kind of paper stock
22:14
Speaker 1: and they got like hate mail about it. Oh yeah,
22:17
Speaker 1: that'll chafe your your your you know your area. I mean,
22:22
Speaker 1: it wouldn't be super comfortable using this the newsprint, but
22:24
Speaker 1: the newsprint is a softer paper, and the glossy stuff
22:28
Speaker 1: you can't even really crinkle that up. R anyway, we
22:30
Speaker 1: don't have a lot of friction. Yeah, it's still better
22:33
Speaker 1: than a corn cob. I guess is is our moral
22:36
Speaker 1: for today? That's our takeaway, Better than a cork cop Ben.
22:40
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's just me and where my
22:41
Speaker 1: mind is right now, but I heard that as corn
22:44
Speaker 1: cob because we're all a little goopy. But I will
22:49
Speaker 1: tell you, Ben, and I'm we're not being sponsored by them,
22:51
Speaker 1: but we were in the past really happy we got
22:53
Speaker 1: our tushy bidays back when we did, because there was
22:57
Speaker 1: a period where I could not find toilet paper and
22:59
Speaker 1: I ran out entirely. And with the tissy bidet, you
23:02
Speaker 1: just need one little square, just a little dab, you know,
23:05
Speaker 1: and then you're clean as a whistle. So highly recommend
23:08
Speaker 1: you guys get one. It's a great way to conserve
23:10
Speaker 1: your toilet paper and and stay fresh and clean even
23:14
Speaker 1: during quarantine times. Yep, yep. You can also get on
23:18
Speaker 1: the mailing list for the ikea catalog, if you if
23:21
Speaker 1: you're not, if you're not too proud in the restroom.
23:24
Speaker 1: But uh, you know, this episode is a little on
23:27
Speaker 1: the shorter side, but it's such an interesting story and
23:29
Speaker 1: it touches on so many things we're going to explore
23:33
Speaker 1: in the future. We want to thank you for tuning in,
23:36
Speaker 1: ridiculous historians. We hope that this episode finds you well
23:40
Speaker 1: and finds you, you know, not in corn Cob level
23:44
Speaker 1: desperation in the restroom. Uh. But yeah, if you we'd
23:48
Speaker 1: like to hear your stories of a strange, strange spy arrangements.
23:54
Speaker 1: We'd like to hear your stories of the Sears catalog
23:57
Speaker 1: and other bits of odd Americana. Can find us on
24:00
Speaker 1: the internet. We're on Facebook, We're on Twitter, We're on Instagram,
24:04
Speaker 1: all the hits, all the good ones, except for a
24:06
Speaker 1: Pinterest page so far, you know, if But what better
24:09
Speaker 1: time than than the Quorn times to really dig into
24:13
Speaker 1: that vision board that we once talked about every episode
24:16
Speaker 1: and then uh very conveniently never mentioned again until right now.
24:21
Speaker 1: But you know what, Ben, maybe uh maybe we should
24:24
Speaker 1: team up on a vision board. I'll do dolphins and
24:26
Speaker 1: unicorns and you can pick your motive and we'll we'll
24:29
Speaker 1: come together, um and make something that we can all
24:32
Speaker 1: get behind right on. And I didn't know. I'm surprised
24:35
Speaker 1: to learn that about you. I didn't know you were
24:36
Speaker 1: a fan of dolphins and and unicorns. Is like all
24:41
Speaker 1: all horse light creatures are just specifically unicorns. Well, I'm
24:45
Speaker 1: mainly in the mythical creatures, so my dolphins also need
24:47
Speaker 1: to have some mystical quality to them as well. I
24:50
Speaker 1: don't really care for the real world ones. More of
24:52
Speaker 1: a Lisa Frank dolphin kind of guy. Okay, yeah, I
24:55
Speaker 1: can get behind that. Maybe throw a sulky in the mix,
24:58
Speaker 1: keep things interesting. I'm sorry, what a selkie s e
25:02
Speaker 1: l k I E okay? So it's this, Uh we
25:05
Speaker 1: don't have time for this, but it's it's it's like
25:07
Speaker 1: a were seal. Basically, they could change it to a seal.
25:11
Speaker 1: They could go on land. It's a whole thing. It's
25:14
Speaker 1: it's worth you know what, it's worth a read. There's
25:17
Speaker 1: some pretty cool selkie stories out there. I'm inspired. I'll
25:21
Speaker 1: try to find something as well. Uh you know what,
25:24
Speaker 1: what should we put on our vision board? That's a
25:26
Speaker 1: good one, Uh, tell us over ridiculous historians on Facebook.
25:30
Speaker 1: We'd love to hear from you. You can also find us,
25:33
Speaker 1: not just as a show, but as individuals here on
25:36
Speaker 1: the old internets. It's true. You can find me and
25:39
Speaker 1: my quarantine adventures um, which lately have involved a pink
25:44
Speaker 1: and green haired child and things like making tight I
25:47
Speaker 1: shirts and homemade lip bombs. Yeah, I know, you really
25:50
Speaker 1: gotta get creative during these times. You can find me
25:53
Speaker 1: on Instagram exclusively at how Now Noel Brown, and you
25:56
Speaker 1: can find me on Twitter at Ben Bolan h s
25:59
Speaker 1: W or at Ben Bolan on Instagram. I've been, uh,
26:04
Speaker 1: I've getten into some weird things. Um. I think by
26:08
Speaker 1: the time I get out of here, I'm going to
26:10
Speaker 1: have a old Testament level beard. I forgot how quickly
26:14
Speaker 1: it grows and how red it is. If it's so
26:16
Speaker 1: red that even I can tell it's red, that things
26:19
Speaker 1: like a fire engine on my face. So check it
26:21
Speaker 1: out before I shave it. Well, it looks ravishing, Ben.
26:24
Speaker 1: I'm a fan. Thank you man, Thank you so much,
26:27
Speaker 1: and thanks as always of course to Alex Williams. I'd
26:30
Speaker 1: like to also know if you're cool with us mentioning this.
26:33
Speaker 1: I'd like to give a special thanks to our good
26:37
Speaker 1: I r L real life pal Ryan Lambert, who sent
26:41
Speaker 1: us a pretty neat surprise earlier. He did not for
26:44
Speaker 1: this show, but for our show stuff. They don't want
26:46
Speaker 1: you to know. Ryan, um did a kind of a
26:49
Speaker 1: wreath imagining of that theme, um, which we've had for
26:53
Speaker 1: for many, many many years, back back as far as
26:55
Speaker 1: the YouTube days. Uh. And we're toying around the idea
26:57
Speaker 1: of at least letting folks hear it, and who knows,
27:00
Speaker 1: who knows what could happen? All bets are off these days,
27:02
Speaker 1: but yeah, big thanks to right he actually sent me
27:04
Speaker 1: an updated version of it today that I'll send to you.
27:06
Speaker 1: Add in a little part and adjusted some mixed stuff. Um.
27:10
Speaker 1: So yeah, thanks a lot, Ryan, always. Thanks to producer
27:13
Speaker 1: Casey Pagram. Thanks to Christopher Hasciotes here in spirit, Gabe
27:16
Speaker 1: Louisier Um our research associate extraordinary who we are promising
27:22
Speaker 1: uh and and will honor that promise to have on
27:24
Speaker 1: the show very soon. Yeah. And also thanks to Jonathan Strickland,
27:29
Speaker 1: a k a. The Quister. I was talking with him
27:31
Speaker 1: a little bit yesterday. Uh. He says hello to everyone,
27:35
Speaker 1: and he will of course return. Had some point with
27:40
Speaker 1: a scenario, so stay tuned for that and and of course,
27:44
Speaker 1: as always, uh no, thanks to you man, Thanks for
27:47
Speaker 1: hanging out. Oh man, it's been a pleasure. See you
27:49
Speaker 1: next time, folks. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,
27:59
Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever
28:01
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.