Latest / Ridiculous History / The US Camel Corps, Part One: Several People With A Really Weird Dream

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The US Camel Corps, Part One: Several People With A Really Weird Dream · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
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  Speaker 1: the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
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  Speaker 1: much for joining us. Let's give a big shout out
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  Speaker 1: to our super guest producer, Matt the Madman.
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  Speaker 2: Still o O la la.
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  Speaker 1: Now we are live in a new land for us, indeed,
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  Speaker 1: and you're no Old Brown. Yes, I'm Ben Bollen, and
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  Speaker 1: we're doing something extra special today, Noel. We are exploring
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  Speaker 1: a very strange story that doesn't often get talked about
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  Speaker 1: and is somewhat the matter apropos for us, wouldn't you say?
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  Speaker 2: I would say so.
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  Speaker 3: It is in relation to a different land, but there
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  Speaker 3: are some crossovers here in terms of the the type
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  Speaker 3: of pack.
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  Speaker 2: Animal in question. There there we go.
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  Speaker 1: And speaking of crossovers, we are and animals and absolute animals.
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  Speaker 1: We are joined with a very special guest that usually
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  Speaker 1: just shows up to ruin the show at the end.
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  Speaker 1: We couldn't be more happy, reluctantly so to welcome today's
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  Speaker 1: special guest, the Man, the Myth, the Legend, the notorious
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  Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland a k A.
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  Speaker 3: Well, hold on a second, now, I'm hoping that we
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  Speaker 3: could just get Jonathan as Jonathan, right, if you say
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  Speaker 3: the name, it's.
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  Speaker 2: Like be Actually, have you heard that? That's how we
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  Speaker 2: refer to it.
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  Speaker 4: I had not heard that, but it makes perfect sense. Hi,
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  Speaker 4: I'm Jonathan. Hey, Jonathan, Hey, I'm really excited. I hope
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  Speaker 4: we're talking about drum dairies.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, yes, yes, apparently the hump of the Dramedary is
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  Speaker 3: in some parts of the one, including the one we're
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  Speaker 3: in currently, which is Doha, Qatar.
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  Speaker 2: Quite the delicacy.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, it's like ninety fat and apparently you put it
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  Speaker 3: in stews and it just that good fat, just dissolves
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  Speaker 3: and gives.
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  Speaker 2: It a real o mami.
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  Speaker 4: Oh wow.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: It's also true that there's a long standing myth about
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  Speaker 1: our Dramedary friends. They do not store water in the hump.
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  Speaker 1: They store, as you were saying, noel, delicious fat. Let's
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  Speaker 1: be honest, and let's come from a place of great affection, you.
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  Speaker 3: Guys, which is, by the way, Doha, Qatar, where we
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  Speaker 3: are right with great affection. I don't know if we
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  Speaker 3: mentioned them. Now we are at web Summit, Qatar. We
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  Speaker 3: have been invited by the lovely folks at iHeart to
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  Speaker 3: help them do some educational tracks about podcasting here with
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  Speaker 3: some Middle Eastern creators, everyone we've met thus far.
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  Speaker 2: We just did our first session. By the way, I
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  Speaker 2: think it went smashingly well, so.
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  Speaker 4: Popular you standing room only.
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  Speaker 3: I was a little taken aback in the best possible way,
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  Speaker 3: and everyone's been super kind. We stuck around, answered a
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  Speaker 3: lot of questions, and I'm really proud of us. Ben,
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  Speaker 3: I'm proud of the crowd for sure. Crowd, proud crowd,
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  Speaker 3: proud first and foremost. And thank you, of course Jonathan
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  Speaker 3: for being our plant, being our random, random man in
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  Speaker 3: the audience.
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  Speaker 2: What do you think?
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  Speaker 1: So?
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  Speaker 2: What is it? What is it that? What's his name?
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  Speaker 3: Darren Brown? You know the mentalist? He says there are
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  Speaker 3: no stooges involved.
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  Speaker 2: You were? You were our stooge.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, no, I was. I was extra stoogie mostly but
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  Speaker 4: due to sleep deprivation.
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  Speaker 2: And yet flag you just arrived yesterday.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, well, we have had the pleasure and privilege of
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  Speaker 3: being here for a couple of days.
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  Speaker 2: I feel just about normal.
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  Speaker 1: And here's here's what we're exploring today. You guys, if
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  Speaker 1: you never saw imagine you've lived your whole life full
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  Speaker 1: of ridiculous historians. You've never seen a camel, narry a picture,
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  Speaker 1: narry an iconographic.
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  Speaker 2: Rendering, freaky beast.
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  Speaker 1: One day you saw one, your first thought will probably
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  Speaker 1: be camels are wacky looking. I say this with great effection.
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  Speaker 1: It's like the first time I saw in alpaca or
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  Speaker 1: a lama my or a giraft. To be fair, my
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  Speaker 1: first question was huh what why?
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  Speaker 3: How?
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  Speaker 2: And then a spit right in your mouth?
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  Speaker 1: So uh, look, they got that walk, they got that
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  Speaker 1: wonky sinuous neck.
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  Speaker 2: We'll get to that. That's for shadwy. Oh.
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  Speaker 3: You know it's funny though, Ben I always have you
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  Speaker 3: ever seen like, there's this guy on Instagram who creates
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  Speaker 3: artistic renderings of drawings that his small child has done. Yes,
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  Speaker 3: that is what a camel looks like.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, there's the wonky sinuous neck, the odd one
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  Speaker 1: or two humps, and what.
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  Speaker 2: Gives you one versus two? I breed thing.
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  Speaker 1: I personally, I will share this anecdote later. I am
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  Speaker 1: more a fan of the battory and camel, which is
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  Speaker 1: the double hump.
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  Speaker 2: I want the double hump because it makes for a
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  Speaker 2: natural sound, it makes for a natural saddle, and I
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  Speaker 2: think they have a better attitude in general, little less
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  Speaker 2: smouth spitting.
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  Speaker 4: Have you ever ridden one?
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  Speaker 3: Yes, but when I was very small, I was very small,
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  Speaker 3: three of us. I'm hoping that we can do it.
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  Speaker 3: Whilst we're out here. They have these desert safaris where
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  Speaker 3: you can hire a camel that will take you around.
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  Speaker 1: Well, you hire the person who's the camel's camel human,
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  Speaker 1: but the camel handler. You don't straight up hire the camel.
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  Speaker 2: No, that's true.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I just I just be sort of like hiring
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  Speaker 1: a car in the way British people say, correct, I'll
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  Speaker 1: hire a car.
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  Speaker 2: Indeed. So they also have feet that look like straight
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  Speaker 2: up clown shoes. Yep. Just this is like a Friar's
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  Speaker 2: Club roast.
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  Speaker 4: They nobby knees, they got knobby knees.
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  Speaker 2: Always be knocking.
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  Speaker 1: And for some reason, maybe I'm anthropomorphizing, these goofy little
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  Speaker 1: guys always look like they're smirking.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, they look like Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam and
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  Speaker 2: the Jeremy video.
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  Speaker 4: I don't know, I call him little, but I never
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  Speaker 4: fell they are.
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  Speaker 1: But it's weird because all of the stuff we just
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  Speaker 1: described as a roast of the camel is in fact
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  Speaker 1: a marvel of evolution.
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  Speaker 2: Boy, is it ever?
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  Speaker 1: Highly adapted to one of the most unforgiving biomes on
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  Speaker 1: the planet.
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  Speaker 2: They can not just survive, but thrive.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, they're like an anthropomorphic succulent Yes, yeah, So why
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  Speaker 3: are we talking about camels?
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  Speaker 4: I mean, yes, I agree they are wonders of the
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  Speaker 4: natural world, But what is it that is particularly ridiculous
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  Speaker 4: and were historical about them?
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  Speaker 3: Because they also have their own genre of music and
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  Speaker 3: it's called camel core.
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  Speaker 4: Yes, well, there's also a great Southern culture on the
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  Speaker 4: skids song called camel Walk.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. And then we'll do other references
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  Speaker 2: that I can't think of right now, but the.
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  Speaker 1: Rule of three we will hold sacracinct. Here's the thing,
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  Speaker 1: and here's the answer Jonathan's question. Back in the eighteen hundred,
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  Speaker 1: some pretty innovative, slightly weird guys in the US Army
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  Speaker 1: thinking outside the box, taking outside the box, thinking atop
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  Speaker 1: the hump. They looked around the US and thought, holy smokes,
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  Speaker 1: look at this. We got some deserts too. This is
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  Speaker 1: the story of the United States. Camel core, chemical camo core,
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  Speaker 1: and spoiler, we have an extra special cryptid thrown in
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  Speaker 1: for good measure, which I just I waited till you
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  Speaker 1: were really sleep deprived Jonathan, and then told you what
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  Speaker 1: we were.
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  Speaker 2: Going to take is the squonk does it tell me
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  Speaker 2: it's the squawk? It's got a squank five.
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  Speaker 1: A little bit. So okay, let's let's set the stage. Noel,
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  Speaker 1: can we can we get a beginning of the chemicals?
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  Speaker 3: I prefer to start in the middle in media rus Indeed, no, no, no,
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  Speaker 3: It's true, as you mentioned, Ben, at this point in
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  Speaker 3: the mid eighteen hundreds, we're not even yet a century
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  Speaker 3: into the bold experiment that is these or.
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  Speaker 2: Those United States.
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  Speaker 3: We are not currently there the first modern democracy in
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  Speaker 3: the Western hemisphere, the US is. Of course, it has
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  Speaker 3: its roots and imperialism, despite you know, being against those imperialists,
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  Speaker 3: the British, and they were very into expanding those territories
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  Speaker 3: and those latins that.
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  Speaker 1: They yeah, yeah, And there were a lot of ethically
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  Speaker 1: fraught indeed conquest and some sticky historical things that did
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  Speaker 1: not age well. Dark night of the soul many times
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  Speaker 1: over over the course of these what corporate America call
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  Speaker 1: big ups and downs.
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  Speaker 2: And big corporate America yes, and.
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  Speaker 1: Various let's be honest, war crimes, genocides and other stuff
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  Speaker 1: that wasn't bad all the slow jazz. The nation encompasses grows,
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  Speaker 1: and it encompasses a variety of unique, distinct ecosystems, including
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  Speaker 1: these massive swaths of desert.
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  Speaker 2: What will we do with the desert?
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  Speaker 1: Say, a lot of still European forces expanding into a
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  Speaker 1: place where they are not familiar with the desert.
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  Speaker 2: Well, and Jonathan, at this point, we do have the railroads,
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  Speaker 2: which is such an important innovation for that expansionism, but
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  Speaker 2: they don't really work super well in the dunes.
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  Speaker 4: Right, And also you have this issue with logistics, oh,
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  Speaker 4: with the United States Army right, right, so the army
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  Speaker 4: troops and supplies, right, supplies, Supply chain is the king
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  Speaker 4: is absolutely everything. And you have a lot of conflicts
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  Speaker 4: in the United States. Now, obviously we're going to be
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  Speaker 4: working our way to the eighteen sixties in the Civil War,
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  Speaker 4: but even before that we have conflicts. And this is
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  Speaker 4: what gives rise to a particular officer in the US
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  Speaker 4: Army who comes up with the idea of perhaps using
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  Speaker 4: the camel to tackle some of these supply chain challenges
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  Speaker 4: you face when you need to move large amounts of
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  Speaker 4: stuff across desert, you know, environments.
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  Speaker 1: Indeed, Yeah, these people are going on sojourns. Right, civilians
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  Speaker 1: is alike, you know, with far fewer resources than old
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  Speaker 1: Uncle Sam. And you can go to places like Armyhistory
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  Speaker 1: dot org and you can get these picturesque quotes one
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  Speaker 1: of them. In the eighteen thirties, America's westward expansion was
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  Speaker 1: being severely curtailed by the inhospitable terrain and climate face
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  Speaker 1: by pioneers and settlers. This was particularly the case in
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  Speaker 1: the Southwest, where every deserts, mountain peaks, and impassable rivers
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  Speaker 1: were proving to be an almost insurmountable obstacle to men
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  Speaker 1: and animals alike. Which is what we just said, but
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  Speaker 1: a little less.
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  Speaker 3: Conversation, very very high falutine, I would say too that
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  Speaker 3: the animals in question you here are things like pack
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  Speaker 3: mules and horses, which are great and they can take
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  Speaker 3: a lot of punishment, but they are not particularly well
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  Speaker 3: suited to the desert climbs and terrain.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 4: The strengths of the horse are one thing, right, camel
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  Speaker 4: strengths are another where they're not a one to one replacement,
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  Speaker 4: as the army would discover. But if you do need something,
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  Speaker 4: a pack animal.
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  Speaker 2: That you caune needs something, if you do need something
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  Speaker 2: you shouldn't please do.
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  Speaker 3: If you're a Bena Jezarette, you need to get across
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  Speaker 3: travel without moving.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, what is it? The worm walk?
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  Speaker 4: Fear is the mind killing, that's for sure. Let's but
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  Speaker 4: as I'm going through every Frank Herbert reference, I could
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  Speaker 4: think sure, but no, no, it's it was clear that
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  Speaker 4: pack animals are not universally suited for every single environment,
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  Speaker 4: and that, unfortunately, you still have the need to get
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  Speaker 4: supplies across those environments.
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  Speaker 2: So what do you do.
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  Speaker 4: Well, you don't just throw more horses and donkeys, because
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  Speaker 4: they're gonna die, or at the very least they're going
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  Speaker 4: to suffer terribly, and you're not. It's not gonna be
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  Speaker 4: an efficient way for you to get your stuff across.
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  Speaker 4: You need to find an alternative, and he needs someone
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  Speaker 4: who thinks outside the box to push that alternative to
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  Speaker 4: higher ups who will probably not listen to us.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, that's tale as old as time.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, that is where we encounter another struggle. A guy
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  Speaker 1: named Major George H.
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  Speaker 2: Crossman.
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  Speaker 1: He is the reason the notion of camels in the
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  Speaker 1: American desert or the US desert dates back as far
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  Speaker 1: as the eighteen thirties. UH he got like, have you,
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  Speaker 1: of course the three of us have, and probably you
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  Speaker 1: listening along at home, folks, if you've forgotten super obsessive
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  Speaker 1: in a rabbit hole of something, you know, I think
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  Speaker 1: I think.
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  Speaker 3: Sort of our whole thing. I was about to say, Ben,
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  Speaker 3: we built careers on it. We built this city on
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  Speaker 3: rabbit holes.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, well done. And so this guy gets super into camels.
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  Speaker 1: We don't know what was going on in his life.
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  Speaker 2: At the time.
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  Speaker 1: Let's let's reword that this guy gets This guy becomes
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  Speaker 1: camilis no intrigued by the potential functionalities of the.
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  Speaker 2: Cattle and lady humps.
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  Speaker 4: I think the jet lag is really starting to kick in, y'all.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, And so okay, so ride it out, ride that
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  Speaker 3: train all the way to bell.
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  Speaker 1: He he does a renaissance man kind of thing, and
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  Speaker 1: he on his own, of his own volition, he creates
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  Speaker 1: a cartoonishly thorough study about camels in the United States
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  Speaker 1: in eighteen thirty six. He sends it to his bosses.
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  Speaker 1: Their response is lost to history, but we can we
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  Speaker 1: can tell you they probably said something like, hot dog, George,
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  Speaker 1: you're wild.
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  Speaker 3: For this kid.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're gonna for me. God, right on the fridge.
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  Speaker 4: Now I will I will say because I looked into
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  Speaker 4: Crosman further out of curiosity. He had a long and
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  Speaker 4: decorated career in the military. AB He actually received very
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  Speaker 4: high honors, even though he was never really like front
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  Speaker 4: of line battle. He was more again on the supply
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  Speaker 4: chain side, but because of his contributions in managing supply
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  Speaker 4: chains and logistics, he carried weight. He carried weight. Yes,
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  Speaker 4: So is he tired at this point? No, he would,
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  Speaker 4: he would continue to sir. Now he's dead though, yes,
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  Speaker 4: now he's dead in the point of our story, he
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  Speaker 4: is not. No, Actually he would still be technically in
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  Speaker 4: service during the Civil War, active for a while. Yeah,
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  Speaker 4: so he's some reason.
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  Speaker 3: This just strikes me as the kind of thing like
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  Speaker 3: that we're gonna pull him out of retirement to help
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  Speaker 3: solve the desert problem.
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  Speaker 4: Last job getting supplies to the Union troops. Yeah, we
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  Speaker 4: as we will discover it's not the Union that really
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  Speaker 4: gets into the whole camel.
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  Speaker 1: Thing, right, Yeah, this is so he is our predecessor,
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  Speaker 1: and he does bring expertise and wait to this idea,
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  Speaker 1: which in this case just means that he essentially was
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  Speaker 1: able to send the study and got the meeting, and.
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  Speaker 2: Then they ignored him.
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  Speaker 1: But he wouldn't have gotten that far had he not
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  Speaker 1: been so obsessed already with the poetry, the brutal poetry
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  Speaker 1: of logistics. It's not till like eighteen forty eight that
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  Speaker 1: someone else starts taking the idea seriously. This is where
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  Speaker 1: we meet another military man, Henry c Wayne, also a
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  Speaker 1: bit of a logistics guy himself.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah. Both of these guys were quartermasters, and so they
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  Speaker 4: were in charge of supplies and supply chains and figuring
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  Speaker 4: out how to get the stuff that soldiers needed to
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: them in conditions that, let's say, were mercurial dangerous.
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  Speaker 2: Oh yes, yes, quite literally.
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  Speaker 4: Mercurious, yes, sometimes quite literally.
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  Speaker 3: Could we also just point out that the precedent for
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  Speaker 3: the use of camels dates back a very very long time. Sure,
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  Speaker 3: they are thought to have been first domesticated by human
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: beings in Somalia or South Arabia, very close to the
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  Speaker 3: region that we are currently sitting in, during the third
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  Speaker 3: millennium BC. Also in the Bactrian in Central Asia, around
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  Speaker 3: twenty five hundred beings.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Ben, correct.
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  Speaker 4: I also would like to just remind us, because it's easy,
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  Speaker 4: at least for me I don't want to speak for you,
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  Speaker 4: but easy for me to forget that. You know, horses
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  Speaker 4: are not native to North America. No, they were introduced
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  Speaker 4: in the sixteenth century. So while the thought of camels
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  Speaker 4: being introduced can seem to us to be somewhat ridiculous
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  Speaker 4: and foreign, we had already done that with horses. So
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  Speaker 4: and horses ended up flourishing in North America. So I'm
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  Speaker 4: sure there were people will say why not camels?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, or just.
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  Speaker 1: Like you know, narco bosses a little further south said
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  Speaker 1: why not hippos?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: Also true, And I mean we also just take a
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  Speaker 3: second to appreciate what a perfect adaptation the camel is
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  Speaker 3: compared to the horse when it comes to the desert.
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  Speaker 3: Those knobby knees and skinny legs and the clown shoes
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  Speaker 3: great at not sinking into the sand, helping stabilize. Yep,
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  Speaker 3: you know those little points like in the knees, they're
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  Speaker 3: essentially like shock absorbers.
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  Speaker 2: Right, That's part of why they're always smirking. So they're like,
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  Speaker 2: you're having a hard time out, I got one on you.
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  Speaker 2: You got a hard time And.
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  Speaker 3: Then whatever, whether the water is stored in the hump
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  Speaker 3: or not, we do know that they are able to
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  Speaker 3: store a lot of a lot of caloric energy. That's
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  Speaker 3: the most important part, less about the water.
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  Speaker 4: So we've got a couple of different people coming forward
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  Speaker 4: shocking these suggestions, but so far we're still not quite
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  Speaker 4: at the point where the US Army is ready.
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  Speaker 2: To get it a go.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, you need a patriot. And this is where Henry C.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: Wayne is contacting a guy who was at the time
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: Senator of Mississippi. His name Jefferson Davis. Wayne pitches to
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: Davis based on Crossman's work, and he has an even
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: more thorough study and he's going, Jeffy, baby, help me
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: buy some camels. Let's make this official. And Wayne is
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: is targeting Jefferson Davis for this pitch specifically because Davis,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: who goes on to do a couple of other things,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: not great stuff, you know, not great stuff, but he
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: goes on to do a couple of other things. And
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: he Davis had previous firsthand experience in the Mexican American War,
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: which had just and it had started two years ago,
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: it had just ended, and he had been in the desert.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: He had seen that harsh unforgiving calliche.
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: He know, yeah, that hard Callechi. Yeah, sorry, that's from
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: no country for old men. That's where that comes from.
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: Very cormack MacCarthy, end of you.
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: Ben.
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: But this dude knows the merits of what is being pitched.
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: He understands like where this is coming from, that it's
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: not just a hair brain scheme.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but he's he's doing that thing where someone has
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: a good idea amid a crisis. Because at this point
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: his pitches to his colleagues on the congressional sphere, they
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: are unsuccessful because Congress already is very sensitive to a
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: fell wind. You know, the North and South are increasingly
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: reaching serious loggerheads on multiple fronts, economic disagreements, ideological differences,
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: and the great sin of chattel slavery.
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: Right, Yes, so we've all heard the phrase necessity is
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: the mother of invention. We get to a point in
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: history where it looks like there may be a pressing
• 19:16
  Speaker 4: need to come up with some supply chain solution and
• 19:19
  Speaker 4: to get one up on the opposition exactly. So there's
• 19:23
  Speaker 4: your motivation. Like if you if you need to get
• 19:27
  Speaker 4: your hair brain scheme funded, wait until your your money
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: bags is in a desperate situation more.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: Likely to get it happen. Okay, so we're we're absolutely right.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: Seven years later, eighteen fifty five, right, Davis finally, due
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: to this growing need, persuades Congress to shell out thirty
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: thousand US dollars.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Can we Dad?
• 19:53
  Speaker 3: Oh geez geez inflation calculary sim as Max. We really
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: like Matt though, but it's not the same as Max.
• 20:01
  Speaker 3: If Max were here, he would have set a boop boop.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, Well, but now we have Jonathan joining us
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: in this.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: Can you give us a boot? Jonathan? Sure, dude, boop? Okay, okay,
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: you're really good at that.
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: Thirty thousand US dollars eighteen fifty five, by today's inflation
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: calculation would be.
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: One million, eighty eight thousand, two hundred ninety three dollars
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: and ten cents in twenty twenty five.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: Wow, okay bad. What were we going to use that
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: cash alla for?
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: Ben?
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: Well, they were going to use it, Noel, to buy
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: a boop ton a boatload, a boatloads of come outs.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: And I like a boop to a boop tons.
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Good.
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: It's a lot of camels you can get for a
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: million bones.
• 20:50
  Speaker 4: Now, Interestingly, the military would continue, ourt least people in
• 20:53
  Speaker 4: the military would continue to spend a lot of money
• 20:55
  Speaker 4: on camels. But in that case, I think I'm talking
• 20:57
  Speaker 4: specifically about the cigarets.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: This is perfect. This is you would get issued them,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: wouldn't you.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah it was Yeah, yeah, it's still in a couple
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: of militaries. There's still I'm not going to name names,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: but the mrs no names, No I collect them, you
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: know what I mean. They they will still have for
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: a long time. France would have one cigarette as part
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: of your rash.
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, well there's also the finish breakfast, right, which I
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: believe is a shot of vodka, espresso and a single cigarette.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, super healthy, right, good? And so think of it
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: this way.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: It still feels very blue sky brainstorm mode. It's like
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: a few in your homies or partying or right like
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: in college maybe and you know you have an exam
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: coming up soon. That would be the civil war.
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: In this space. But you're still in the long weekend,
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: right your p s a ts. Yeah, so you're just
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: so you're brainstorming. Anything's possible. I'll have one more beer.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: But Senator Davis gets this month, Jeff d Jeffy duh.
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: He follows up with his own study in eighteen fifty seven,
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: and he's at least partially motivated just to prove this
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: is a real, a real thing, and that it's not
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds version of someone getting blitzed and watching
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: Discovery Channel.
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: Gotta be scalable, guys, to use corporate speak, you know.
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: So yeah, well, I mean, like again, getting back to logistics,
• 22:26
  Speaker 4: like how do you Yes, where let go would be ideal,
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: but they're not killing us. They're not native to North America.
• 22:35
  Speaker 4: You're not going to go to the camel store, so
• 22:38
  Speaker 4: round yere right, you got to reach out to the
• 22:40
  Speaker 4: contacts abroad.
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: Yes, I mean at this point, I love that.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: I love that because at this point it's kind of
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: like if we were in a situation where we said,
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: you know, it would be perfect right now, a rock
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: from the moon, right, it would solve our problem, right,
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Like that's great, let's let's get that way. Way so
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: they have this is like active of a heist film.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: You raise the point that they have to go somewhere else.
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: So Major Wayne not to get conspiratorial. Major Wayne also
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: happens to know that there's a fellow camel nut named
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: David Dixon Porter, which makes me wonder if there's this
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: cottage community or this circle camel enthusiasts of people who
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: are friends entirely based on there enthusiasm. Yeah, for Camel's well,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: I mean the camel Lover's Society okay, oh yeah, the CLS.
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: So porter was.
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: The son of of like an investador, was a diplomat, yes,
• 23:40
  Speaker 4: and so he actually had spent time in the Middle East,
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: which means that he had seen camel's firsthand. And uh,
• 23:48
  Speaker 4: my guess is that the love of camel's is somewhat
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: based upon their very foreign appearance to people of the
• 23:56
  Speaker 4: you know, from Western countries who had never been exposed
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: to it, and you have that initial reaction of well,
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: what the hell is that damn thing over there?
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: Exoticism?
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: Yes, that's true, and so part of it is probably that,
• 24:11
  Speaker 4: you know, one, you have that that element of uh,
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: this is amazing, I've never seen anything like it.
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: Then you also have the element of.
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: WTFS well yeah, yeah, but also you'd see you see
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: how the the indigenous peoples are able to make use
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: of the creatures in ways that no other creature would
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: be able to.
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, withstand and and then there's that power of nostalgia,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: like you're saying, and.
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: So they sort of commission a study, right, or at
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: the very least, a paper, a proposal.
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: They start, they start brainstorming, because now fast forward, Porter
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: is the commander of a ship called the USS Supply.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: A little bit on the note, I also love that
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: the story has involved so far three major studies and
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: a major a major one of those stories.
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: Actually from a major, but three, three massive studies into
• 25:12
  Speaker 4: the possibility of bringing camels over. It's I just love
• 25:16
  Speaker 4: that it spanned multiple decades and studies there and the
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: very first study was saying, hey, this would be a
• 25:23
  Speaker 4: good idea.
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: Two more and then well that's bureaucracy for you.
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: Is the most recent one, by the way, as you
• 25:30
  Speaker 3: point out, then, in a burst of creativity, it was
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: titled Purchase of Camels for the Purpose of Military Transportation.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: And so you know, I think we're also being very
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: generous with the word study.
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: I don't think there were a ton of proposal, right,
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: This was.
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: More of a daddy may I. You know that's at
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: least on some level. Now, these guys were bringing expertise
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: the field. They were able to object a sales pitch.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: It was a sales pitch. Three studies in the making,
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: and so uh, Major Wayne through the Camel Lover Society
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: contact Porter.
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: We can only imagine and says, hey, man, where we go?
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: And they they say, okay, cool. From what I remember
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: about camels, they're kind of big.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: So let's take a look at.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: The boat boys, right, and we got to figure out
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: how we get them across the Atlantic, then through the
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: East Coast, then I go over land through non desert,
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: through a lot of don desert.
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: Uh, and don't kill them on the way. Yeah.
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And it's a lot more complicated than just making
• 26:37
  Speaker 4: sure those humps match up with each other so you
• 26:40
  Speaker 4: can stack them up exactly like I can't. Yeah, you
• 26:43
  Speaker 4: think you just to lay down, I mean, like we're joking.
• 26:48
  Speaker 4: But obviously this is a non trivial matter. Like the
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: logistics mid mid nineteenth century, crossing the Atlantic alone is
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: already a herculean effort. And you still, as you said, Ben,
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: you still have I don't know, almost all of North
• 27:05
  Speaker 4: America to cross before you start getting to the desert
• 27:07
  Speaker 4: park right.
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: Well, And in the same way that the horses and
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: pack mules were not suited to the desert, these ships
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: of the desert.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: Were not suited to the route to the getting. Yeah.
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: Yeah, this is where our story. Uh, if you are
• 27:24
  Speaker 4: an animal lover like me, gets a little.
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: Sad, it gets it gets a massive sad ossity in
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: some ways because we know, Okay, so Porter is already
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: doing stuff with his ship, the USS Supply, and Major
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: Wayne just hops aboard as as as an add on,
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: a bonus buddy, and the Supply is going to an
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: unrelated mission to Italy during this trip. The Major just
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: pops away. He just says, okay, uh, you know, TTYL,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: thanks for the ride. I'm gonna learn about camels. He
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: went hardcore on camel.
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: Journey of Discoveries. Sounds like such an awesome job. A
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: little bit yeah, and he does his homework for sure.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: There's a gap in your resume, sir. Oh, yes, I was.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: That was my camel year studying. It was my camel year.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: Sort of a gap between the huts. Yea exactly of
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: a career. So how does he go about this? He's
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: got to visit a bunch of different places.
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, let's name a few.
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, Pisa, where he hangs out with a camel caravan.
• 28:25
  Speaker 3: He goes to Paris where he has a little hang
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: with a French colleague, about the French Camel Corps, which
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: I believe was run by the French Foreign Legion, or
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: at the very least there was use of camels by
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: the French correct exactly, so these are used in an
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: imperialist activities. This is also considered an off the books,
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: a bit hush hush.
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: Meeting for reasons.
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: I have to admit that if I have to research anything,
• 28:53
  Speaker 4: Paris is way up on my list of places to
• 28:55
  Speaker 4: research stuff, even if it has nothing to do with
• 28:57
  Speaker 4: whatever I'm looking into.
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: Well place, Yeah, interesting history.
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, we're gonna be honest with you, folks. I
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: don't want to call you guys. I don't want to
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: speak for you, but I have that multiple times tried
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: to pull kind of a major Wayne to Paris move
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: with our own with our own bosses over at iHeart.
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, say you know what would be awesome for this?
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: There is a world Expo in Osaka, and I think
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: we could get some great shows out of it. Okay,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: that's my next one, by the way, pitching that if
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: you guys.
• 29:29
  Speaker 4: Well, it's also sometimes sometimes our company comes to us
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: and say, hey, guys, would you like to to be
• 29:35
  Speaker 4: part of a group that we're sending to Katar the
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: web summit and we're like, that's incredible.
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: Uh huh.
• 29:43
  Speaker 4: So yeah, it works both ways, it does, but in
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: this case. So then we get we get the reunited
• 29:51
  Speaker 4: and it feels so good, and it feels so good
• 29:53
  Speaker 4: between Porter and Wayne.
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: Can I just say so, I stopped thinking about every
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: time I read Major Wayne, I think of Major Pain
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: starring Marlon Wayne.
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: I'm not true, brother, That's exactly right.
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: Sorry, I just had to say it out loud so
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: that maybe it would get out of my head.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: But fair enough.
• 30:07
  Speaker 4: Carry on, So we get Wayne and Porter getting back together.
• 30:09
  Speaker 4: They're still not done with their fact finding mission, right,
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: They want to go a few more places, learn as
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: much as they can. Honestly, while I was joking about
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: all the different studies, et cetera, the fact that they're
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: taking this so seriously is a good thing.
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: Well, I mean it's also they're protecting their investment. You know,
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: this is a million dollars by today's math. So they
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: did not want to get the right. They did not
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: want to lose their cargo, their precious cars.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: They also need first hand accounts of military experience with
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: camels right in supply chain, so they go to crime
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: They visit Egypt, Malta, like you were saying, know, some
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: of the North African areas where the camel has been
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: a part of life for a long time. They go
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: to Turkey and while in crimea major Wayne meets up
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: with these British officers, picture the stereotypes of favorite British
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: officer at the time, and then say, oh, you know,
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: tell me old being about your experience with camels in
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: the Crimean War. And I'm being a little bit glib
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: with that, but it is important to your point, Jonathan,
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: because they need someone who can say this worked, ye.
• 31:19
  Speaker 4: Right, because otherwise they're going to if things go south. Right,
• 31:26
  Speaker 4: if things go south, they okay, I'm not trying.
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: To be they are ultimately going south.
• 31:31
  Speaker 4: I'm not trying to force out here. But if things
• 31:34
  Speaker 4: go south then they did not do this part of
• 31:37
  Speaker 4: the fact finding mission, then obviously they are going to
• 31:40
  Speaker 4: be held accountable for making a terrible decision. But if
• 31:43
  Speaker 4: they said no, we spoke with multiple people who have
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: used camels and supply chains in the past. It worked,
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: we had That's why we continued forward with this.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: And they're being very honest because before these fact new missions.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: Part of the reason, I would argue they're so thorough
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: before they set upon this adventure. These guys loved camels,
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: but they didn't know the first thing about actual camels.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: The reports, anecdotes, nostalgia. They had kind of a vibe,
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: A bit of a vibe.
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: Check. Yeah, I like the film the masterpiece that is Vibes,
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: starring Cyndi Lauper and Jeff Vibes.
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you, Please check it out. I'm pointing to
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: someone outside of the studio. Hello, Vibes is an amazing
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: movie from the nineteen eighties.
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: Oh a strong world to take better than Ghostbusters. Oh,
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: amazing means a lot of things.
• 32:42
  Speaker 3: I've I've ruined ourk careers. Then it's a movie that
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: exists and it's worth your time. It is a it
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: is a product of the time that in which it
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: was created. But these fact finding missions are all in
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: all a success. They're about ready to drop this cash
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: on some camels, about thirty thousand dollars USD.
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: The question I have for you, then, is your mid
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: nineteenth century You got thirty grand how many camels does
• 33:08
  Speaker 4: that buy?
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: I'm so glad you asked. This is why we have
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: fun at parties together. It will purchase thirty three camels.
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: But wait, does Billy Mays was wont to say? There's
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: more you with that? You get a price break. You
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: also get some saddles to throw them in some fair
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: crossing the little whippy thing. They also are able to
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: use some money to get some drivers, some trainers. This
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: doesn't cost them thirty grand. They get all this for
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: to get this, folks, the low low price of eight
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: thousand dollars us.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: Why that's a steal? It sure is.
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: I'll take two Wait wait, well I'm sorry. Where where
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: what the rest of the money go? They pocket the rest?
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, guys, we're not taking questions for moving on.
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: So I love to say we're not taking questions anyway. Yeah,
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: so they get they don't just get one kind of camel, right,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: They also get the they get the Bactrian, they get
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: the single humped camel. We already talked about some of
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: the differences. Now let's talk some anecdotes. Because Jonathan, you
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: said something interesting that we're I'm not going to.
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: Let it go. Uh you asked us if we had
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: ridden camels.
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and you said that you have, I have would
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: you like to tell us about that on the record?
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: Sure? Uh.
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: I rode a camel when my parents took me to
• 34:28
  Speaker 4: a Renaissance festival in the state of Georgia where there
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: were camels that would take children on a very slow,
• 34:37
  Speaker 4: methodical circle around the field.
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: Don't they still do that at the right fair? They
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: do it now?
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: Yes, I thought it so. For many years they didn't.
• 34:45
  Speaker 4: They had instead they had ponies, Yeah, and the little
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: pony carousel essentially for real zies. Sure, putting the polls
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: through them was just heartbreaking, But they have they now have,
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: they've had They've had camels on and off over the
• 35:02
  Speaker 4: last several years.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: Got it, I went, I was able to have a
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: similar experience for a long time. You guys know the
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: musician Conway Twitty. Of course, yes, okay, good because otherwise
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: well it doesn't matter. But Conway Twitter for a Twitter
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: show he had, he had a big compound in the States,
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: in the state of Tennessee, and he turned this into
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: like a Christmas themed fair every year called Twitty City Twitter.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: The only that's fine, that's fun with Dollywood thing with.
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: Arguably off the books branding from Tweetyburg. So is Twitty
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: city that was arguing, and they had the big draw
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: was I could get my camel license writing in a
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: methodical circle as long as it was renewed each year.
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: And I was convinced for way too long that I
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: really was qualified to write. It came like you had
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: a legit. Oh they told you this, Yeah, they told
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: you this. As my parents went along with it, and
• 36:05
  Speaker 1: they would tell me, you know, we've got to go
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: back because your camel license will expire.
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: Aspiring that would be a real shame.
• 36:12
  Speaker 4: Then finally learned the real truth at age of thirty two.
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: At thirty two, when they were no longer let me
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: into the now long closed twenty City and the caretaker said,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: you know, with a little bit of pity.
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you you experienced pity in twitty City.
• 36:30
  Speaker 4: Was the back of your neck getting dirty and gritty?
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: Oh jesus, it was a hot time in the city. Guys.
• 36:40
  Speaker 3: All, I recall, my only recollection of my camel experience
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: is back when I was a small German boy, and
• 36:46
  Speaker 3: it was at some sort of fun and fair in Deutschleans.
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's awesome. So you you have also encountered that.
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: And to be clear, other than Porter, most people have
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: not had any of the experiences we're naming in the
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: US or in Germany on us. Very very true.
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: And there are, of course things that even their fact
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: finding mission perhaps held back, which is the somewhat cantankerous
• 37:11
  Speaker 3: nature of these creatures.
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: They're sassy boys. They're sassy boys. So all right, they
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: get these.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Five camel drivers, and these guys are functioning as trainers,
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: the ideas we can teach you as soldiers how to train, ride,
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: and care for these animals, so we'll be completely new
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: to them. And then they also said, yeah, we've got
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: to do We've got to really modify our ship. We
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: gotta do some serious improvements because, like you said, they
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: can't just stack them.
• 37:40
  Speaker 4: Horizontally playing Tetris with camels. Yes, yeah, So they retrofit
• 37:48
  Speaker 4: the supply, so the supply becomes the camel supply. And
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: I love that you have in here in your in
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: your notes here Ben about the ventilation system they make,
• 38:00
  Speaker 4: which sounds to me like that was something that should
• 38:04
  Speaker 4: have been necessary on a lot.
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: Of ships of the time, absolutely, but was not. Uh
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: they are chonky and sanky. Yeah, so they.
• 38:12
  Speaker 4: They used they used the sails to redirect wind down
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: into the hold in order to provide some ventilation.
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: Cas and they and they also this is an interesting point. Okay,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: I'm going somewhere with this. We know how in descriptions
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: of sea monsters or naval battles sea monsters, especially.
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: Uh, the in the margins of old maps.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, here be spur serpents, spurpens. Here be serpents.
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: So these you're not gonna let me no, okay, spurpens
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: is too good.
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: It's fine to say. Listen, we're all tired. It's okay,
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: I'm loving it.
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: Tell us if spurpens lands and define what a spurpoents
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: is for us, we'll open that door.
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: It has lovely Lady Luscius lady humps. Yeah. Well, here's
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: the reason why, at least why some of those giant squid,
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: which are a real thing or colossal colossal squas should say,
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: Davy Jones giant squid. Yes, yes, uh wait, which one
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: is that?
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: It's the Michael Bolton Lonely and this is the song
• 39:16
  Speaker 3: of Jack Sparrow.
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: Yes, so they.
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: Looked bigger, and some of those paintings were not as
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: inaccurate as they may seem, because the ships are much
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: smaller than we imagine them. The ships you see and
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: pirates of the Caribbean are incredibly rare in the historic.
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: I didn't know that. Yes, so these are more like
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: little schooners.
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: I mean you would have like galleons and stuff in
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: the Spanish da which were truly massive, but not everyone
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: was he seeing galleons.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: And that's exactly why this supply ship has to rebuild itself,
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: rebuild his deck to allow these camels in.
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: I had a little hot moment of confusion myself, so
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: I'm just going to remind the listeners at home.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: This is a supply ship that is called the supply Yes.
• 40:01
  Speaker 4: Yeah, well I had to look at our notes like
• 40:03
  Speaker 4: five times because then I saw that the supply ship
• 40:06
  Speaker 4: left Smyrna, and that's like north of Atlanta.
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: It is indeed a suburb of Atlanta where we are.
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: Where isn't it?
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: Also?
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: Is it in in Greece? Turkey? Turkey or Turkey Hey
• 40:18
  Speaker 2: turkeyk Yeah, yeah, thank.
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: You thinks and so on May fourth, Oh, they have
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: to there's one battory and camels so big they just
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: give up and they say, okay, We're going to cut
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: a hole in the deck.
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: Everybody just be careful.
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: Just walk around the hump, Just walk around the home.
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: Mind the gap and mind the gap, mind the hump.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: May fourteenth, eighteen fifty six. They arrive at Indianola, Texas
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: with thirty four total camels.
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: But wait, wait, wait wait thirty three started with thirty
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: three the very least I would have thought we'd maybe
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: have lost a few and rude, what happened?
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: This is this is uh, this is what Jonathan was
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: telling us all about, how this this is the part
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: that's not great for animal lovers.
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, okay, specifically not great for camels. Something of
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: a trigger warning here.
• 41:03
  Speaker 4: Yeah, So we had some losses, obviously, we also had
• 41:08
  Speaker 4: some gains all on that. But as I said, crossing
• 41:11
  Speaker 4: the Atlantic herculean effort mid nineteenth century. It took a
• 41:15
  Speaker 4: long time to do. It is not something that one
• 41:18
  Speaker 4: does not simply cross the Atlantic Ocean. So we have
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: start with thirty three. One of the camels does not
• 41:26
  Speaker 4: survive the crossing, so we're down to thirty two. All right,
• 41:29
  Speaker 4: but we have six camels born during the crossing. Woh
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: okay on life, only two of which survive. Ah yeah,
• 41:40
  Speaker 4: bummer right, all right, so that's what brings us up
• 41:43
  Speaker 4: to the thirty four in total.
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: Which is a net gain. That's true.
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: Game.
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: But then don't they decide they still need more?
• 41:53
  Speaker 4: They do decide they still need more. It turns out
• 41:56
  Speaker 4: that you can't solve all your supply chain issues with
• 41:59
  Speaker 4: just thirty four camp.
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: Right, okay, well yeah again early days, right, brainstorming, no
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: wrong answers. This is where we see the brass considering
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: this a cost effective success, right yeah, and remember doing
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: they're counting the beans and counting the camels. And remember
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: the entire time these guys are coming back from the Atlantic,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: the tensions in the United States are ratcheting up, so
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: there is an increased concern, which means an increased budget.
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: And thus it comes to pass that they land and
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: the US government tells old porter, great job, buddy, good hustle.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: Turn around like today, go back to the Middle East.
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: Buy more camels, just like that. You know, we need
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: more cow bell sketch.
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: Did they re up the budget as well, and they
• 42:45
  Speaker 2: gave them a few more checkles. They didn't even spend
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: all the money, that's right. They did really well. They
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: got good camel deals, so they.
• 42:51
  Speaker 4: Were able to go on back and this time they
• 42:54
  Speaker 4: decide they're going to be even more ambitious. They don't.
• 42:57
  Speaker 4: They don't just buy thirty three camels, they go up
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: to forty one, one short of the answer to life,
• 43:04
  Speaker 4: the universe and everything.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: And in the business, that's what we call a cliffhanger. Folks.
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: This is Part one of the US Camel cor We
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: could not be more pleased that you joined us. We
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: are going to be returning later this week with Part
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: two and the Legend of the Red ghost.
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: Ugh, so metal camel Core and the Red Ghosts.
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: And big big things do you, fellow ridiculous historians. Also
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: big big thanks to our guest super producer Matt the Madman.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: Still Matt, I should have checked with you before giving
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: you that nickname.
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: But we're in it now.
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: We're not in it.
• 43:37
  Speaker 3: Names work were in it. They're bestowed upon you. You
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: don't get it.
• 43:41
  Speaker 4: You didn't hear what I What I said about him
• 43:43
  Speaker 4: and my introduction are all sorts of monikers.
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, yeah, And speaking of monikers, big big things
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: of course, to the one and only Jonathan Baby Jay Strickland,
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: thanks for coming on the show.
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: I know that's one of your least famous.
• 43:57
  Speaker 4: Oh there's a video on YouTube. From the old stuff
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: works days. If you want to see my reaction to
• 44:02
  Speaker 4: that can has cookie, I'm going to get you. Yeah. No,
• 44:07
  Speaker 4: thanks so much for having me on.
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: Also, spoiler alert, we have already recorded part two.
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: Stop it.
• 44:14
  Speaker 4: We're coming back from the future. It's just like Looper
• 44:18
  Speaker 4: Ben and I have to say, uh, this might have
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: been the most fun.
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: I've had on the show. It was a good time.
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: And but by the way, we are also technically coming
• 44:27
  Speaker 3: to you from the future because where we sit in
• 44:29
  Speaker 3: Doha Guitar we're eight hours ahead of where we live
• 44:34
  Speaker 3: and looks like Blade Runner, like Blade Runner outside wild.
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: You know, I think one of the people we're riding
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: with from the airport here's that all the time? Yeah,
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: because there's one building in particular that's quite angular, a
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: gigantic triangle.
• 44:50
  Speaker 2: A sword.
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, like an anime sword of Final Fantasy. And
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: they said, wow, it looks just like Blade Runner, and
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: the guy who was driving.
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: Said, yep. So that's like what someone says, have you
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: been bulleted lately?
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: But we do have some more people to think of course,
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: thanks to Chris rossiotis the legendary us Jeff Cots here
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: in spirit and who.
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: Else woh gosh, Jonathan Strickland aka the Quist, who also
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: exists in human form currently and sits before me corporeally.
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: I love it.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: It's been a pleasure having you, sir, as well as
• 45:23
  Speaker 3: Max Williams, our super producer, long suffering.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: Thanks for the hot edits on this one from afar.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: We really appreciate you, and of course also Alex Williams,
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: who composed this bang and Bob we call a theme.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: Big big thanks of course to the rude dudes over
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: a ridiculous crime. Big thanks to everybody who made this possible.
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: And I just want to get in front of this
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: because it's very personally important.
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: Big thanks to say Man, Yeah, Camel's in general, Camil kind.
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: Big thanks to Citee. I think we're on the way. Yeah,
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: I think so.
• 45:56
  Speaker 4: No one's going to know what that is until part two,
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: That's all.
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: Right, And that's why I'm like, Yeah, there's a method
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: in the ground.
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: It's like Looper. It's just like Looper.
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we're gonna make that reference as many times as
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: we can.
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: We'll see you next time, folks.
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple
• 46:19
  Speaker 3: Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,