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That Time We Erased a (HUGE) Waterfall · Ridiculous History

• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Ye, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, friends and neighbors. Back to the show.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: We'd like to begin today's episode with a snippet of
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: a stone cold jam from the nineties Total Snom Cold
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: classic And You're right, many of you may recall that
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: iconic hit by t l C Waterfalls, as in don't
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: go chasing Them High. I'm Ben, I'm Nolan Ben. Did
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I ever tell you that my first ever live concert
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: was t l C. You did mention that, not on
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: air though it was TLC opening for mc hammer, And
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: also Boys two Men was on the bill ABC BB
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: d UM and it was the era of TLC where
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: they wore really big, baggy clothes and had like condoms
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: taped all over them and stuff. Prophylactics is like sex
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: education exactly. Yeah. Yeah, I was definitely pre Waterfalls era
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: and creep and all of that stuff. But I felt
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: like I was a little ahead of the curve on
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: that one because they were sort of unknown. They were
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: the opener Opener, and then Boys to Men and then
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: uh mc hammer, which was right around the time Adam's
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Family soundtrack was out with the Hammer song. Remember they
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: do what they want to do, say what they wanted
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: to remember that one. Yeah, they didn't actually perform then
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I was kind of bummed. That's not true. He did
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: perform it, but I kind of thought there would be
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: a little more Adam's Family esque pageantry involved, being that
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the movie was, you know, fresh in theaters. But no.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: My very first concert that I can recall, so not
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: some kind of opry Land thing that the perform in
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: or something. The very first concert I went to as
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: a as a patron was when my parents took me
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: to see The Four Tops. And this was in the eighties,
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: so this was not there. You know, hey day per se.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry then, I think you buried the lead their
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: opry Land performances. Yeah. Yeah, Well, my first for a
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: into acting was a recurring role at an amusement part
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: called opry Land. It was from like six to seven
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: or eight years old. I learned that it was a
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: paying gig on my eighteenth birthday. Did they were they
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: stowing it away for you? I had no idea. Yeah, man,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: they were. They gave it to you. They gave you
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: your your earnings sort of. They probably took a finder's fee,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: But it was the eighties. It was a different time,
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: and some pretty good things happened in the eighties were
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: was song and dance. Man, I mean, what was your
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I don't mean the hardpumps. Oh. I I
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: was the hero who comes to town to clean up
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: the to clean up the craziness and stop the gunfights.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: They had a thing where they would randomly, I'm doing
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: air quotes here, fats. They would randomly pick a kid
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: out of the crowd, make you fight to pull no,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: to pull up, and say, oh, you're gonna be the
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: star of the show and the adult. So I was
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: just there every summer as their plant in the crowd.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: And then they would give me this cartoonishly big hat.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I'm smiling so big right now. This this, this, this
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: thrills me to no end. That's very kind of you, say.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: My my parents did make a framed picture of it
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: with some of the cash that they kept for decades.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Is it one of those old timey cp A tone
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: type pictures where you got your six guns on. Now
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: I have one of those of my family. But the eighties, right,
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: the eighties, Yeah, thriller. I feel like now we could
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: just say thriller. That was big hit, big hit, back
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: to the future. Yeah, big hit, big hits. Uh. And
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: we also have in an article from Lori l. Dove
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: a shout out to trapper keepers? Did you ever have
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: a trapper Keeper? Yeah? I had that? What was when
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: when we made It's Special? Just the brand and it
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: had like, you know, kiddies and stuff on it, like
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: it would be a Lisa Frank trapper Keeper. That could
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: be all kinds of different ones. Is the vel Crow
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: too right? They have? It was just like a binder,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: but it was a sort of a fancy binder and
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: everyone had. You had to have one. Oh, and speaking
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: and things we have to have. How do we get
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: so far without giving a shout out to our super producer,
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: Casey Pegrum for shame. We just got so distracted by
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: nostalgia today. I got caught up in opry Land and
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: picturing little Ben breaking up gunfights at the Okay Corral.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: To this day, noll, I remember all of my lines,
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: every single one. Maybe I will have to have a
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: reading later in the episode. I can do them right now,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: do it because they're all ye okay. It's like it
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: was like a twenty minute show. Anyway. Yeah, shout out
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: to opry Land. Uh, big big fan shout out to
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: the eighties. Yeah, did you have a cabbage patch kid?
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: I have been to that farm baby Land General in Georgia.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: That's very weird. It is extremely weird, very strange place.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: There's a tree in the middle of the main building
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: and they're just little baby cabbage patch heads sprouting up
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: out of the ground all around this tree with these
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: little leaves and they some of them kind of move
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: and um, but what do they do with the tree? Ben?
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: Have you have you've been to the ceremony. I did
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: not stick around for the ceremony because in this old
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: building it's a is a hospital. Think it's hospital. So
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: they call it baby Land General like it's mean. I
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: think at least it's meant to feel like that's creepy
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: because they announce like births and stuff too over the intercom.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: Well they know they birth the baby out of the
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: hole in the tree. Well for some people that might
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: be really fascinating. And then there's a nurse that takes
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: the baby out, extracts it from the tree, holds it
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: upside down, and slaps it on the butt. I had
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: my kid's birthday party there one year. Oh yeah, I was.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: I was at a bluegrass festival. That's how I found it.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: That's an odd locale flue Us in Chili. It was great. Yeah, yeah,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: you know what else was great? The eighties? Hey, there
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: we go. We promised we're gonna get to the episode eventually.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: The thing is, we can look back at the past
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: with such rose colored glasses, with such nostalgia, and sometimes
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: we can forget the other things that happened in the
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: eighties that were not as awesome as Back to the Future,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: traffic Keepers or thriller. Right, there's a balance. We as
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: a species had some let's say, we've had some hilarious
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: missteps and we've had some tragic missteps. You know, there
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: were it was a drug crisis which continues today. Uh.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: A lot of the clothes looked really weird, although they're
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: coming back in style. Hyper color Was that a thing
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: that was one of a nineties thing? Was it hyper color?
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: I don't know, man, I was such a nerd as
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: a kid, surprisingly that I didn't really have a grasp
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: on the zeitgeist. Did you ever have a hyper color
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: shirt through the ones where you kind of touched it
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: and it would do, uh, your imprint of your hand
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: would be on it, Like, Yeah, I didn't know. The
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: texture really spooked me. That's right. You have very specific
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: feelings about textures, that's true. That's true, But but everybody does.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: What What are some of the things you remember from
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: the eighties? Knoll or things that when you look back
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: you think, whoa that was? That was crazy? Well, it's weird.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: Like when I was younger, I used to think that
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: the eighties were inherently bad and that all eighties music
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: was crappy because I just I just didn't know better,
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: and I was I assumed that the eighties were lame
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: because of the you know, big pop hits and like
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: Banana Rama and the stuff that I would see. But
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: I didn't have parents that like, we're into cool music,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: so I kind of had to find my own way. Uh.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: My parents were both professional classical musicians, so I really
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: did have to figure that out for myself. But now
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: I look back on the eighties with utter rose colored
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: glasses and joyous nostalgia. I remember the cartoons ThunderCats, all
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: the Deek cartoons like Specter Gadget and remember Deek Do
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: Do Do Yes. I remember that clip, but I couldn't
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: tell you a thing about the plot. I also thought
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: their cats. There was wasn't there a star hawk or something?
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: Starks silver Hawks. Deek was the production company and they
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: made most of their cartoons based on pre existing toys
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: and properties. And um boy, we are just going on
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: today's episode. It's not about any of this stuff. No,
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: we are mentioning the eighties because one very strange and
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: incredibly significant bad thing happened in the eighties. Many did,
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: but one is the subject of our episode UH. In
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties, while many of the people listening to
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: the show We're actually alive, humanity took one of the
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: largest waterfalls on the planet and erased it. Humanity, What
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: the hell does does the race? The whole thing? And
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: to tell the story, we have to journey to South America,
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: specifically along the border of Paraguay and Brazil, where once
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: stood an incredibly stunning, spectacular series cascade of waterfalls called
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: the Guaira Falls. Yes, the Guaira Falls, which produced in
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: their day, the greatest volume of falling water in the world.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: This is something we found out in UH some of
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: our earlier research. The definition of largest waterfall can be
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: pretty tricky, and it's got a couple of caveats, So
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: this is largest in terms of the amount of water
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: that fell. But there are other ones that might have
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: a higher elevation or longer dropped, like Niagara Falls. But
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: this one had twice the flow of Niagara Fall. That
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: sounds like a pretty cool compliment. We got twice the
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: flow of this other waterfall. It sounds like a strong
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: selling point. Yes, there were a total No you mentioned
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: it was a series of waterfalls. Uh, there were a
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: total of eighteen and all and seven of these were
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: the most powerful waterfalls right right, And that's where it
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: got the nickname seven Falls. Right. So these the series
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: of falls is located just twenty kilometers from another quite famous,
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: more famous arguably waterfall called the Iguaza Falls um and
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: that is again along the border of Brazil and Paraguay.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: Um and you could consider this could have considered this
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: a natural wonder of the world, and and many considered
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: it to rival the Iguasa Falls um. And it was
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: again a series of eighteen massive waterfalls. And it's on
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: the Parana River right at the point where um there's
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: like a gorge and the river gets kind of squeezed
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: through the gorge. Yeah. And the total height of these
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: falls was fet with the largest individual fall or cataract
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: being a hundred and thirty feet You could hear the
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: sound of the water for miles and miles and miles away.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: It's right around thirty kilometers away. Um. And the reason
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: that flow was so strong is because that gorge we
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: were talking about it actually narrowed abruptly from to sixty meters,
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: which created that intense flow that we talked about earlier.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: And you can check out a map of the site
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: from a book called A New Gateway to the Heart
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: of South America written in eighteen seventy one. Wait, guys,
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: you might be saying that sounds pretty outdated. Yes, but
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: it uh, it's a more accurate depiction of the waterfall
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: then you would find nowadays, because again, guiral falls no
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: longer exists. Yeah, it's what they would call an ex waterfall. Yes.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: And there's one other thing that sounds almost too sappy
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: to be true, but is magnificent and it's a true story.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: And it has to do with the midst of the waterfall, right,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: it's true. Um. Apparently you could go to these falls
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: anytime during the day and there would just be this
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: like perma rainbow there. It just sounds like a magical land,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: a perpetual rainbow, ye called the care bears. So what
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: do we do as as humanity? We see this amazing,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: gorgeous wonder of nature and we decide, let's let's let's
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: blow it up, right, yes, so build some kind of power. Yes.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: So what happened what made us, uh take this particular
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: paradise and put up a parking lot for water? There
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: we go, we got there. You know you got there,
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: my friend. It's a damn. I'm here to support you.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: It's a damn. And you're you're right about the electricity.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: The government of the area decides to build a damn,
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: a huge damn, a four point eight mile long damn
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: called the dam. Yeah, it's true. Um. And before doing
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: that again, they had to blast out with dynamite those
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: rock faces that the falls fell fell down, So no more,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: no more waterfall. Um. And what happened was the falls
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: were submerged when the four point eight mile at Tiapo
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: Dam was built down river. Uh. And this is the
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: seventh largest river in the world. Just just to make
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: that clear, um, And it started to be diverted in
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: nineteen actually caused about ten thousand families to lose their homes,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: have to relocate. Yes, what is that like? Emminent doma?
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: How do they how do they make people do that? Well?
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: Eminent domain is the practice that we in the United
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: States would be most familiar with in terms of like
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: roads widening and stuff like that. But laws like that
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: do exist in other countries, and you know, it's it's
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: very tough to be an individual, family or household against
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: lack of a better term, big government, big big electric,
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: big electric, because it is government, right, this is a
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: government said, this is a government infrastructure you know where Yeah, exactly. Um,
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: So obviously they would have had to pay them something.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: I can't imagine they just you know, say get out. Yeah.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: And there's probably a lot of paperwork involved because it
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: is a joint undertaking by Brazil and Paraguay. And I
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: believe Argentina originally raised ruggis about it, but ultimately the
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: damn got built. On October two, they finally closed the
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: dam and this allowed the river to flood the falls,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: the seventh largest river in the world. Again, as you
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: point out, to finally flood the falls. So the waters
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: began to rise, and this did not happen overnight. In fact,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: thousands of tourists came to the area to get one
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: last look at the falls. And then I have to
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: correct myself here. I mentioned earlier that they dynamited those
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: those rock faces that did not happen until later, um,
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: after the whole thing was underwater, because they wanted to
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: promote safer navigation of the river. So that was that
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: was the deal there anyway, though, So these people are
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: walking over this precariously maintained footbridge and it collapsed and
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: eight people lost their lives. Holy smokes, Yes this is true.
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: They soldiered on with the project though, and you could
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: have you know, as you can imagine, at this point,
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: they've spent millions of dollars, They've already sunk so much
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: time and effort into this dam, and they say, you
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: know what, We're gonna stick it out. The first electricity
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: is generated by the damn in nineteen eight four before
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: it was even fully completed, which was I don't know,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: are we being too hippie dippy about this bend? I mean,
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: it did create an awful lot of power. Maybe that's
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: a good thing. I don't know, is it is it
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: a is it a worthwhile sacrifice? You know? It really
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: depends on what perspective somebody wants to take. I'm sure
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: there are people who are receiving the electricity who think
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: this was more than worthwhile. But there are also a
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: lot of people, I imagine, who feel like the damage
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: to the ecosystem isn't justified. But there's no arguing that
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: this provides a massive amount of energy, both to Paraguay
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: and Brazil. Yeah, it's in the neighborhood of a hundred
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: terawatt hours of power each year, which is seventy five
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: of Paraguay's electricity and seventeen percent of Brazil's. So you know,
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: it's it's a big deal. Yeah. By comparison, that's enough
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: to power just this one damn creates enough power to
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: uh supply the state of California. How much power does
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: a rainbow generate? It? Sterrings a power of love, bro,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: you can't measure that, I know, I know. Well that's
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: the thing. I came off a little test. No, I
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: like it. I like, I'm passionate about it too. Uh
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: And unfortunately, yeah, no, not none, none power other than
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: you know, power of love doesn't doesn't turn on lights,
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: my man. That's true. That's true. And you know, it's
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: also it's a very difficult argument to make if you
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: have to tell people who don't have electricity that you're
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: not you're able to provide it, but you're not going
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: to you know, that's that's a real dilemma. But we
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: do have good news, as we said, as providing this
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: enormous amount of electricity and it's still a tourist destination. Yeah,
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: more than eight hundred and fifty six thousand people visited
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: the damn. You know, some possibly paying homage homage. Oh
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: help us out here. It is homage if you're staying
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: with the French pronunciation and that has been casey on
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: the case I love it. It's so great. Um. But yeah,
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: I mean it's sort of you know, probably a bitter
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: sweet thing. Although people do go to like the Hoover
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: dam and stuff. Maybe it's probably like the doll tourists
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: that just want to go see a cool damn and
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: then they're the ones that are pining for the old
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: way and because the rock face has been destroyed underneath
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: the water, these waterfalls are not coming back. They're done.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: So is actually a really funny statement. I think it's
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: funny from the director of the company that built the
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Damny issue to say, we're not destroying seven Falls, We're
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: just gonna transfer it to It's hip po Damn whose
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: spill way will be the substitute for the falls beauty.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: And you can see the spill way that they're talking
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: about here. It's it's it's like a venting system, you know,
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: and it goes off at an angle down this concrete slope.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: Not no premier rainbow though, no, no, no beautiful scenery.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: And this this inspired a lot of art and a
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: lot of again nostalgia. Arning We cannot verify that Don't
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: Go Chasing Waterfalls is about this event, but you know,
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: we should probably talk a little more about that song though,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: so we get the fair use privileges. That's true, that's true.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: It is an excellent video. It is warning about living
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: life too fast, the impulsive decisions, a life of vice.
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: And we could relate that even to this event by asking,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: you know, I'll in balance hundreds of years from now,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: what will have been the correct choice? You know? Don't
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: it always seem to go that you don't know what
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: you got till it's gone. Yep, yep, it's true, and
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: reference the episode today. This is but I think we're
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: you know, I think we're actually nailing it. I think
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: we're doing okay job. A little more background on waterfalls
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: produced by the Atlanta hip hop collective Organized Noise, who
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: worked with the Goody Mob and the Dungeon Family crew
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: all that um and they actually recently did an event
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: sponsored by Lulu Lament. We return to the old dilemma
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: of progress versus progress versus preservation really because although this
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: has been, on balance a very good thing for many
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: residents of Paraguay and Brazil, it is by no means
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: the only time events like this occur. In fact, twenty
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: eight thousand rivers waterways have disappeared in China in recent history.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: You can you can read about it an article by
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Angel Sue and William mow on The Atlantic called Thousand
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: Rivers disappeared in China. What happened? And without going too
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: far into this, a lot of it goes back to
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: environmental damage, soil loss, erosion, climate change. But then China
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: also built an enormous damn the Three Gorgeous Dam. And
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: you're encyclopedic knowledge of the dams of the world never
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: ceases to amaze me. And you know what, one day
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: it'll it'll be remotely useful. I mean, you've talked about
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: two damns so far, and to me, that is encyclopedic. Wait,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: we got the three because we said Hoover damn. Well,
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: that's right, we did say we did mention Hoover dam.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: Remember then the babus and but head to America when
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: they go and visit the Hoover dam. That's a good part.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: That's all I got. We should totally go take an
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: extra credit segment and the three of us go a
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: head out to see the Hoover Dam. Well, we've been
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: to Vegas for various work related projects before, but I
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: have never been to Vegas. You've never been never been
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: to Vegas? You were there? No man? Who was that
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: my doppel oh man? Okay, well, maybe we should just
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: fly into Vegas do a night. A lot of my
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: friends called Vegas a three day city. Can we do
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: kind of a fear and loathing kind of situation? We should?
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: We should bring you bring the ether, my friends. We
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: should definitely have a lawyer casey are you? Are you
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: a lawyer by a day chance? In addition to your
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: many other talents as your attorney, I advise you to
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: get into town very quickly. I don't know what that
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: that exactly line. Okay, so we have some kinks to
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: work out, but this sounds like a promising expedition. We
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: would also, of course, love to hear your take on
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: this dilemma. And if you have ever been to the
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: site of the falls, or if you have visited this
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: damn on the border of Paraguay and Brazil, we'd love
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: to hear from you. What was it like? Yeah, I
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: want to know. Inquiring minds want to know. We can
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: relay it to the inquiring minds after we have satiated
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: our inquiring minds. Um, you can write to us a
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: ridiculous at how stuff works dot com. You can hit
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: us up on social meds, the Facebook, the Instagram, or
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: we are ridiculous History. Hey, why not join our our
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: Facebook group called the Ridiculous Historians having some good convos
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: on there with some with some fun folk. Um, and
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: you know what, we haven't mentioned this in a while.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: To us a solid write us a nice review on
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: iTunes or whatever pod catcher app you use. Yeah, please
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: do because it's because man, you know the way this is.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna gott a bone to pick go
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: for it with iTunes. Apple podcasts what they have the
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: old reviews first forever in all times. So we have
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: a podcast, for example, that's been going on for twenty years.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: The reviews for day one are the first ones you see. Yeah, man,
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: come on, no one's firing on all cylinders on day one. Yeah.
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: And a lot of our older shows were originally five
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: minutes long maximum. You mean the old how Stuff work
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: shows exactly? So I just I don't know, Apple, help
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: us out how Let's have a little sort by date
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: tab or something like that. And in return, we have
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: a gift for you because you may be saying, uh,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: the guys are wrapping up this episode now I have
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: to wait for another episode to come out, but I
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: want to learn more. I want to learn more strange,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: ridiculous stuff throughout history. We have a podcast recommendation for you.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: We really do. Our compatriots, April Callahan and Cassidy Zachary,
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: who are fashion has Dorians. They have written literal books
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: on the subject of the history of fashion. Um have
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: a really cool podcast called dressed or. They talk about
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: all things fashion history, very very very cool, deep dive
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: stuff and as it turns out, super producer Casey Pegram.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: He produces that show too. You've got to leave something
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: for the normal people, you know, Man, you can't do
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: it all, but he will sure try his best. Um,
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: and we have a specific EPP to recommend. That is right.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: If you would like to tune into Dressed and explore
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: the who, what, when, and why of what we wear,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: we think you will love their episode that came out
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: this April about smuggling bustles. During the nineteenth centuries, the
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: Americans would smuggle French goods into the country to avoid
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: paying ridiculously expensive duties. But he said duties. It's no, no,
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: don't cut it, keep it. But it is true that
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: one of the most commonly smuggled items might surprise you
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: because it wasn't you know, gold or onions or whatever.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: What's a bustle? Is that like a boostier or a brazier.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: It's the thing that goes on the back of the dress. Oh,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: that's right, the up I got the ruffle. Yeah, as
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: you get tell, neither of us are fashion historians by trade.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: Were barely like we. We barely can dress ourselves the morning.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I'll speak for myself. We've been I've
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: been upping my game a little bit though, thanks to
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: hanging out with April and Cassidy, who I'm actually going
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: to visit. They're based in UH, New York City, and
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna go hang out with them tomorrow. So let
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: me pick up this thread though, because one of the
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: commonly smuggled items it wasn't gold er onions. They were
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: French fashions or items like bustles. Uh. They were packed
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: in trunks, they were smuggled under clothing. You can learn
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: all about it by tuning into Dressed Available wherever you
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: listen to this podcast and leave them a nice to
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: you too. They're a new pod cast and they're really
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: doing cool things. Um, we're big fans. Tell them we
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: sent you to UH. In the meantime, we hope that
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: you enjoyed this episode. We would like to give a
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: big thanks, of course to Casey, of course to Lori L. Dove,
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: who wrote a fantastic article on this event, this tragedy
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: or this great step in progress on how stuff works
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: dot com. It's true, And we'd like to thank Alex
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: Williams who composed our theme. And we hope you'll tune
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: in next time when we take a dive into banned
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: scientific texts. It's gonna be a laugh riot. It's gonna
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: be a big old time, big old So that's all
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: for today, folks. Most importantly, thank you so much for listening.
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: We hope to hear from you very soon. Wish us
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: luck as we go on our fear and loathing inspired expedition.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Now that's gonna be a big time of four