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CLASSIC: Feral Children and the True Story Behind The Jungle Book · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Folks.
• 0:00
  Speaker 2: We've talked about Rudyard Kipling before in the past. Old
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: Ricky Ticky Tappy, the author of one of our favorite poems.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: If also in Boots Boots Boots again.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah sorry, I'm very twenty eight days later trailer coded.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: Oh I love it. Also Ridgy Kipling. Just to be clear,
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: not a great dude as a but he did write
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: a bunch of stuff, one of the best young adult
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: spy novels out there, Kim. In this classic episode, we
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: also talk about his inspiration to write a little something
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: called the Jungle Book.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you may have heard of it. It turns out
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: that the story of Maugli was in fact inspired by
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: some very sad tales of feral children who were abandoned
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: by their human parents and actually, for all intents and purposes,
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: raised by wolves, or the very least raised in the wild.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Let's jump. I am.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Now.
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  Speaker 2: This is the law of the jungle, as old and
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: as true as the sky, and the wolf that shall
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: it must die. That is part of the law of
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: the Jungle. Roderi Kipling, Ben you know what I thought
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: you were gonna do. What do you think I was
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: gonna do?
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: You thought you were gonna do? Now, this is a
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: story all about how my life got flipped turned upside down.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Let me take a minute. Just sit right back on
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: the bell air. I think you nailed it.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: I guess if we wanted to do lyrics would be
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: like now, this is a story all about how my
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: parents left me in the woods across town. Like to
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: take a minute, just sit right there. Tell you how
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: I grew up with a cat and a bear. You
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: know what I mean.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: That's good, that's that's not I pulled up to. I
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: don't know. This is your bag, Ben, you did a
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: good job. Yeah, Because we're talking about we're talking about
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: sort of a slice of history, a type thing that
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: encompasses a couple of different periods. At the base of
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: our story today is one particular faral child that was
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: found in India and likely served as the basis for
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: one of your favorite racist works of fiction, Ben, He's
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: one of my my favorite I'm doing favorite and quotation fingers.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well it is. The Jungle Book is an amazing story.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: It's almost as amazing as our super producer Casey Pegram,
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: But you're right, Noel. The story of Dina Sanitchar not
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: his real name. As far as we know, our story
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: takes us to a part of India called Uttar Pradesh,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: which I may be mispronouncing. It's sort of like northern
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: central India, on the border of Nepal And. In eighteen
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: seventy two, there was a group of hunters who encountered
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: a pack of wolves bounding through the forest. But not
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: just any ordinary pack of wolves, right, no.
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: No, they say, what ho, I've sight hed a man
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: cub yes on all fours scamperings as though he were
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: a member of the pack. And then they proceeded to
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: smoke the wolf pack out of their cave, kill the wolves,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: and bring this man cub to like a local orphanage,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: because you know, he clearly couldn't possibly be happy living
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: in the woods, free and naked and with his animal brethren.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: I feel like you've got a personal steak in this blood.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Oh right, you're right back, I just think, you know,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's so sad. They literally there's different accounts
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  Speaker 1: of the story that they killed all of the wolves,
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  Speaker 1: or that they at least killed the mother wolf and
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: again smoke them out of the cave. But you know,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: it's such so presumptuous to me. He was like, what
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: six years old?
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  Speaker 2: I want to say, Yeah, he was six.
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  Speaker 1: I guess. I guess they felt like they were doing
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: their their Christian duty.
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  Speaker 2: They probably did. But you know, the wolves most likely
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: attacked them because first off, they set a fire and
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: then they were actively intruding into Like if unless a
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: wolf is threatened or starving, it doesn't care what you do. Human.
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  Speaker 1: Would these have been white hunters been or would these
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  Speaker 1: have been Hindi like people from the region. Is this
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: during colonialism or is this a little bit before. This
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: is during the British Raj, So it's not clear if
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: these were white hunters or if these were local men
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: and not that really matters, but we'll get to that.
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  Speaker 1: So the boy is brought to town, to the village
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  Speaker 1: and to a mission run orphanage that's run by a
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  Speaker 1: priest by the name of Father Earhart, who is very
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: much trying to convert the local population to his type
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: of his way of thinking, right, yeah, which is Catholicism.
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  Speaker 2: He's a missionary, right, And he says he actually gives
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: the kid his name the kid doesn't have a human
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  Speaker 2: name yet, and so he names him Dina and Sonni
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  Speaker 2: Char and Sonny Char means Saturday.
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  Speaker 1: It's right, which is the day of the week that
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  Speaker 1: he was delivered to this guy.
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  Speaker 2: Which I think that checks out. It's not a huge
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: burst of creativity. But I also think I also this
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: is just a personal aesthetic, Noel. But I think it's
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: really cool when people have names. There are days of
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: the week like Wednesday, Adams. I thought that was great.
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  Speaker 2: That is cool somebody's last name is Saturday. They just
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: feel kind of fun to me.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I like the idea of his girl Friday,
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: you know.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: And also mister Wednesday from American Gods.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, mister Wednesday. I don't know any I don't
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  Speaker 2: think I know anyone named Tuesday. If you're listening and
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: you happen to be named Tuesday or after any day
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: of the week, or after any day of the week,
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  Speaker 2: we don't want to discriminate.
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, let what happens next.
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  Speaker 2: So what happens next is that Father Earhart says some things.
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: We have a quotation from him that I think encapsulates
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  Speaker 2: the condescending attitude so prevalent at the time, he says
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: that he thinks Sona Char is undoubtedly what he called pagal,
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: meaning idiotic or slow. But he says, despite this, Santa
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  Speaker 2: Char still shows signs of reason and sometimes actual shrewdness.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: But what we know now with the benefit of retrospect,
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: is that Sona Charg's behavior had a lot in common
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  Speaker 2: with the behavior of other case similar cases of feral children.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's the thing, the most important takeaway from
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  Speaker 1: this and the interaction with some we'll talk about some others,
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  Speaker 1: but they there's a window, very crucial window for language development,
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: and this child had soundly missed that window. So it
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  Speaker 1: basically means that developing any kind of spoken in language
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: or being assimilated into speaking with you know, the folks
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: in the village, was going to be nigh on impossible. Right.
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  Speaker 2: That's that's the problematic part. You're absolutely correct about this,
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: not just this concept of language learning or language acquisition,
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  Speaker 2: but also the concept of certain other behavior acquisitions. So
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: Santa Char allegedly would not express himself in ways that
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: seemed innately human. For instance, for a long time, we
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: as a species assumed that smiling or laughter were innate things,
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  Speaker 2: sort of how like people used say all babies are
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: born knowing how to swim.
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  Speaker 1: You know what I mean.
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  Speaker 2: I thought you were gonna say swear all babies are
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: born knowing how to swear.
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  Speaker 1: And if look who's talking, is any indication?
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  Speaker 2: Right? Right? A fantastic series of documentaries. But the problem
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  Speaker 2: with Santa Char is that he did not seem to
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: laugh or smile, and he didn't seem to bond with people.
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  Speaker 2: With one notable exception, he would only bond with animals.
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  Speaker 2: There was a kid that he bonded with, which was
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: another fairal child who came to the same orphanage. By
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  Speaker 2: this time, Santa Char had learned to wear human clothing.
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  Speaker 2: He could reportedly dress himself quote with difficulty, and keep
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: track of his cup and his plate. But he showed
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  Speaker 2: this younger kid. They would hang out, and he showed
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  Speaker 2: him how to drink from a cup.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and apparently he also became quite the chainsmoker. Yes
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  Speaker 1: later in life.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that was his uh, that was his one big
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  Speaker 2: human habit he picked up, right, Yeah, what a what
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  Speaker 2: a one to pick up? That's you know, it's it's
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  Speaker 2: heartbreaking when you think about this because in other case
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  Speaker 2: or other alleged cases, we should say, because we can
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: get into the the science of this a little bit later.
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  Speaker 2: In many other cases where something like this is alleged
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  Speaker 2: to have occurred, there's not a way to fix it.
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  Speaker 2: You can mitigate some of the some of the issues,
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  Speaker 2: but you can't repair them. This, this guy, Santa char
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  Speaker 2: was likely incapable of, you know, going on to become
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  Speaker 2: a priest himself or make a ted talk.
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  Speaker 1: Here's my question for you, Ben, this is why I
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  Speaker 1: had such an axt to grind at the top of
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  Speaker 1: the show, with these horrible, horrible men smoking out the
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  Speaker 1: lovely wolf and family that had raised this young lad.
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  Speaker 2: I think I know where you're going.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, wouldn't Eve has been better off frolicking in the forest,
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  Speaker 1: free and naked with the wolf pack.
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  Speaker 2: Rather than the Seicandra mission orphanage.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a good question, like stuck between two worlds? Right,
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  Speaker 1: he can't fully be human and he can't fully be
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  Speaker 1: an animal. It's it's just it's really heartbreaking if you
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  Speaker 1: think about it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, And we have to ask ourselves what
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  Speaker 2: is the ultimate priority? Is a quality of life?
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  Speaker 1: Is it?
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  Speaker 2: Because our civilization is doing something that are we conflating
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: living the way we do with living the correct way,
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  Speaker 2: you know what I mean.
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  Speaker 1: That's right. I think it's a I think there's an
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  Speaker 1: inherent judgment call at play here. Is it about protecting
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  Speaker 1: the life of the child? I don't know. Obviously, a
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  Speaker 1: six year old orphan running around with a bunch of
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  Speaker 1: wolves probably isn't the most safe thing in the world.
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  Speaker 1: But I'm not sure. Man, I'm of two minds of it.
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  Speaker 1: It's clearly causing me some conflict internally.
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  Speaker 2: There are arguments on both sides. You know what when
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: you see pictures of the guy, because there are actual
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: photographs of Dina Sano chart, which is why we can
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: put some more weight into this story in comparison to
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: other stories like Romulus and Remus raised by a wolf
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  Speaker 2: that's mythology, there are any photographs of them. This guy, though,
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: when you look at the pictures, it's heartbreaking. Man. He's
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: clearly uncomfortable having to wear these clothes. He doesn't look
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: like he's super comfortable standing on two feet, no, stand
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: on two legs.
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  Speaker 1: Rather, and apparently he continued like he did learn to
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: eat from a plate, like you said, but he continued
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: to prefer raw meat to anything else. And he would
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: still sniff it before eating it up until he passed away,
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: I believe at a pretty early age, if I'm not
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: mistaken from what's thought to have been tuberculosis. Why don't
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: we talk a little bit more about some other famous
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: feral children throughout history, Ben, and kind of do a
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: little contrast and compare.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: Sure, Yeah, uh, let's go with Let's see, do you
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: wanna where don't we start with children who had also
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: been quote unquote raised by other animals? How's that sound?
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: That does sound good to me? Ben?
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: All right, Well, we have that, we have that other
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: feral child that was found and brought to the same
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: mission orphanage. But then we have we have examples such
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: as the Lobo wolf Girl from eighteen forty five to
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: eighteen fifty two. In eighteen forty five, she was seen
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: running in Mexico on all fours with a pack of
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: wolves attacking herd of goats. A year later, she was
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: seen with the wolves eating a goat. People tried to
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: capture her. She was captured, but she escaped, and then
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: she was seen in eighteen fifty two suckling two wolf cubs,
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  Speaker 2: at which point she ran into the woods and was
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: never seen again, and I just.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Want to backtrack just slightly. India in particular has a
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: history of producing these feral children. In addition to Santa
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Chier there and his buddy who was at the orphanage,
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: over the years, there have been several other cases including
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: wolf children, panther children, dog children, chicken children, and even
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: gazelle children. So this this is kind of mythology that RUDYERD.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: Kipling would continue to kind of inject into the minds
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  Speaker 1: of the West. There was some truth to it.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is this is where we get into a
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: little bit of a speculative thing. But I believe it's
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: safe to speculate here. Rudery Kipling was aware of the
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: story of Dina and he then went on to write
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: The Jungle Book with a character of Mowgli.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: Now did we talk about We kind of alluded pretty
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: harshly to Kipling's imperialist leanings and his kind of inherent
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: not greatness. What was he trying to communicate with the
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: story of the man Cub beyond just the kind of
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: lighthearted story of a of a boy, you know, connected
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: back to nature.
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: It's an interesting question. So this guy is most well
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: known for things like the Jungle Book, maybe that Mongoose story,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: the poem if, which is a wonderful poem. But he
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: is also the author of a poem called the white
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: Man's Burden, and this was not a sarcastic comment on
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: his part or a sarcastic statement. When he is writing
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: the Jungle Book, he is writing in a context of
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: rampant othering and rationalization. So British forces at this time
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: are thinking the implicit problem is you cannot subjugate people
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: in entire culture and then say, oh, they are equal
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: to us. We're just doing it because we want resources
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: and we're you know, we're no better than robbers. You
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: have to say that we are somehow better, we are
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: somehow more human, for lack of a better statement.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: So the white Man's Burden is that like the inherent
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: harness of the white man and their mission to kind
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: of indoctrinate anyone that they see as being lesser.
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's the idea. It's that they are somehow
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: ideologically freeing people who've existed thousands of years before.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: With that being backward or something that right.
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: Right, bringing them forward, awakening to them to what they
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: thought was the true religion. Which would be something like
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: the aristocracy, Christianity, capitalism, kind of all in its marass,
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: in its own mix, uh, and then over time making
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: them a little less bad. Never white, never as good
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: as the British, just a little less bad. Right, And
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: this theme resonates in some of the ideas of things
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: that would would be depicted in the US as well,
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: the concept of the noble, the quote unquote noble savage.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: You've heard that, you know, on touched by the fetters
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: of true civilization.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Which is kind of what Mogli is meant to be.
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: Mowgli is kind of this innocent babe in the woods
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: who has this nobility, but of course, at the end
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: of the story pursues his destiny in the world of men.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: Because it's inevitable, because that's what you're supposed to do.
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: And this leads us to some other stories. You had
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: mentioned that India seem to have a higher frequency of
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: feral children. There was one named Mdioh in nineteen seventy two,
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: which is pretty recent, right.
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he was.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: About four years old. He was found in forest in
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: India playing with wolf cubs. Apparently his skin was very dark.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: He had long hooked fingernails. I don't know how much
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: of this is true, because they also say as sharpened teeth,
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: which feels a little out there for me. But he
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: had callouses on his palms, elbows, and knees. He never talked,
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: He learned sign language. He also was eating raw meat.
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: He was admitted to Mother Teresa's Home for the destitute
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: and died in luck. Now who was renamed Pascal. He
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: died in nineteen eighty five, A lot of times after
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: being apprehended, at least in these stories. Feral children don't
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: do well in society. Like you said, I really appreciate
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: you bringing up that praisnal. They don't fit in to
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: either world completely. They're in this what's called a liminal space.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: They're on the border between the world of humanity and
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: the world of animals that raise them. We also know
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: that there's a what we call tantalizing science about feral children.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: There's not as much research on them as there should be.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: While there are several confirmed cases, there are a lot
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: of speculative ones. And look, this is kind of dark,
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: ridiculous historians, but it needs to be said. Sometimes when
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: children appear to be feral, they may have run away
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: because they experienced severe abuse or trauma. A girl in
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: the Ukraine whose parents were very very serious alcoholics. Her
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: name was Axanda Malaya. In nineteen ninety one, she was
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: found living with dogs in a kennel. She was eight
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: years old. She had been living with the dogs for
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: six years because her parents left her outside one night
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: and she crawled in with the dogs. Oh wow, So
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: that's something that And just like we mentioned earlier with
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: the language acquisition window, she ran on all fours pant
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: with her tongue out, communicated like a dog. She only
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: knew the words yes and no, and she was luckily,
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: with intensive therapy, able to learn some basic social verbal skills.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: Now or at the last report, she lives in Odessa
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: and works with farm animals under the supervision of her caretakers.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: So that is a happy ending. But we have to remember,
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: as easy as it is to romanticize this idea of
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: someone raised with animals and having this innate bond with them,
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: this kind of bond can occur because of some very
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: terrible things.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Absolutely, absolutely we don't know where the boy who would
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: go on to be called Dina, what his story was,
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: but surely I mean it sounds like he spent enough
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: time with these creatures and they did not eat him,
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: and he developed their traits that he was relatively safe.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I keep beating the drum for this
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: hole let the kid live in the forest line of thinking.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: And I'm probably going to get some people yelling at
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: me about that, But I stand by my position.
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: I think it's good to have a position. I could
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: see the validity of the argument. You know, it's weird
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: because this is not a perfect comparison. But back when
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: I lived in Central America, there was this huge epidemic
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: of stray dogs in particular, and they were running packs,
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: they had you know, matted hair, they had all the
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: problems that you would have if you were a stray dog.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: You didn't go to the vet, and you were outdoors
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: all the time. And I was talking to another ex
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: pat and I asked them, you know, what do you
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: think about all these dogs? Should they round them up?
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: Do people adopt dogs the way they do in the US?
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: And all this other stuff? And he said it used
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: to really bother me, but look at them. There's so
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: much more free than they would be in a kennel
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: or something, and their lives are hard, but they're still
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: their lives.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: I'm still conflicted about that, you know what I mean?
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: Because are their lives that good?
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: How? First off, how long would he have lived like
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: this in the woods if those hunters hadn't intervened, He
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: would have lived longer than the wolves, who would have
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: ultimately been alone.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Again, that's very true, and I do see all that.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: So it's hard to say.
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: I don't know. Yeah, it's tough to say which life.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: Is better, I guess, is what I'm getting at what
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: I'm struggling with.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'm right there with you, man, Although you
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: know what, I think we should mention. You mentioned gazelle,
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: the gazelle kid. You did that. Yeah, So this gazelle child.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: The story comes from someone named Jean Claude Alger who's
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: an anthropologist and was traveling across the Spanish Sahara in
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: nineteen sixty when he met some nomads who told him
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: that there was a wild child living a day's journey away,
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: so he followed their directions. Next day, he sees this
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: naked kid galloping in gigantic bounds along with a quote
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: long cavalcade of white gazelle's. The boy walked on all fours,
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: sometimes assumed an upright gate, but he twitched his muscle,
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: scalped nose and ears like the rest of the herd
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: eight desert roots. He appeared to be herbivorous, and his
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: teeth were level like that of an herbivore. But he
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: lived this way for at least another six years. People
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: tried to catch him in a net suspended by helicopter,
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: but unlike so many other paral children, according to this story,
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: he was never removed from his companions.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Good.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so he liked that story. That's a happy and
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: he lived life as a gazelle. But you know, I always,
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: even from a young age, I always thought the life
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: of something like a gazelle or a deer must be so.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Oh rife with panic in the paranoia and just you know,
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: death around every corner. So you know what, maybe I'd
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: take it back. Running with the wolf pack might have
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: been safer.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like befriending and some tigers, although that could you
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: have to work pretty hard to stay on their good side. Right,
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: Very true, And just to clarify, there was more than
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: one gazelle boy. And there's also a rumor The gazelle
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: stories are interesting because there are rumors that the entire
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: thing was a hoax made by board reporters.
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: I see.
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: So I don't know because it sounds it sounds kind
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: of unusual, right.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: It really does.
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: So what are some what is? Were there any examples
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: that really stuck out to you of children raised by animals?
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there were a few, But I do want to
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: take an opportunity to point something out, and it's more
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: of me pointing out that I'm kind of a dummy
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: when it comes to this. I did not realize that
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Noam Chomsky was like this pre eminent linguist. He kind
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: of like wrote the paper that figured out about that
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: window of language acquisition that we were talking about earlier.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: I only knew him from his political talks and his
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: you know, anti government rhetoric, but apparently early on in
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: his career he was this like incredible linguist. Generative grammar, yeah,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: generative grammar.
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Chomsky doesn't always get the credit he deserves, at
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: least in that field, you know what I mean.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: I feel like it's not something that was super out there,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: but it's fascinating if you look into his work in
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: that field. He did some really important stuff. So moving
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: on to some of my favorite feral children, I got
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: one that stood out to me at least it kind
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: of and it sort of falls in line with what
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: you were talking about earlier, Ben, about how you'd want
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: to befriend some lions and definitely more likely than being
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: a gazelle boy. We've got Leopard Boy, who was supposedly
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: taken in by a leopardess in nineteen twelve and lived
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: with her for three years. Of course, surprise, surprise, Matt
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: anders the picture and kills the leopard and found her offspring,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: one of which was this boy who is now five
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: years old, and they found his family. And again this
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: was in India and is very very similar to the
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: wolf boy where he was most comfortable running around in
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: all fours. He had callouses to the point of almost
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: like paw pads on his hands and feet, and he
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: had a very tough hide just from you know, can
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: you imagine scampering through the woods and getting nicked by
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: tree branches and I'll call manner of ruffage, you know,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, you would have to really develop some thick
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: skin literally.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: Right, crawling up trees as well, right yep.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: And he was a bier and a fighter, as you
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: might have to be, and he would eat live chickens
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: from around the village.
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: Straight up seahorse teeth, My man.
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: Big time, you're bringing it back.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: I'm bringing it back.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: I knew you would.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: One of us had to if we did, in case,
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: he would probably have jumped in right before the end.
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: But this story is so sad. He actually apparently gradually
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: lost his sight due to cataracts, but that was just
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: a coincidence, had nothing to do with his upbringing or
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: his jungle days. So you know, I put it to you,
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: would he have been better off hanging out with the
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: leopard family in the jungle? I see how a man
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: hadn't swooped in and murdered his mother.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a philosophical question at this point. You know, now,
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: what were there any other ones that really stuck out
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: to you?
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: I think we mentioned a chicken boy.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: We did, we should follow, we should deliver on that.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: This particular chicken boy came from Fiji and he was
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: dubbed Sujeit's Kumar, the Chicken Boy of Fiji, and was
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: found in nineteen seventy eight. And this is one of
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: the sad ones like you had mentioned earlier, very very sad.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: In fact, he had a very tragic, dysfunctional childhood. His parents,
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: as punishment locked him in the chicken coop, and his
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: mother took her own life, and his father was killed,
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: and apparently his grandfather, who sounds like a terrible twisted man,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: kept him in the chicken coop and was there for
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: eight years. He was found in the middle of the road,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: clucking and flapping his arms and pecking at his This
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: is dark, dude. I don't want to end on this one.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: Well, it does have a happy ending because he got out. Yeah,
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: then he has human assistance, and you.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: Know, according to everything that I've found, he's still living
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: and he is cared for by the woman who rescued
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: him from the home, a woman named Elizabeth Clayton. So
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: good good on her. Is dark one though, Well.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: I'm just saying nowadays, were I out in the wilderness
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: and I saw a dirty, naked kid running around with
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: any sort of animal, I would feel responsible. I feel
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: like I have to call the authorities, yes, in case
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: the kid had been lost or separated from their parents.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: It's true, it's true, Ben, I don't know why I've
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: got says n next to grind about this. I think
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: a lot of it has to do with just man
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: thinking he knows best.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: Now. But here's the thing. I mean very age just
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: about this, because if I walked out and I saw
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: somebody our age running around naked with some wolves or whatever,
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: I would just say, keep going, man, more power to you,
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: you know what I mean. They've clearly made their choice.
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: But let us know what you think would Age matter
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: if you saw somebody running naked through the woods with
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: some animals with the type of animal matter you know,
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: And we want to hear your stories of any feral children,
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: whether you think they're anecdotal or whether you think they
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: are backed up by evidence, because as we were looking
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: through this, we found a lot of these were either
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: I hate to say, sensationalized, but maybe exaggerated in some cases.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: Sure you know, in some cases there were some actual
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: i'll call them con jobs in Europe in days of yore.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: But we as always want to hear from you. You
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: can find us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. We especially like
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: to recommend our community page, Ridiculous Historians, which has really
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: been cooking with gas.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: Really has, so please join us over there. We'd like
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: to thank our super producer Casey pegram as always for
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: being straight. Seahorse tea our favorite new expression. We gotta
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: use it like once an episode. Now now we don't want to.
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: We don't wanna.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: We don't want to, we don't want to burn out.
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: I don't want to wear it thin. We'd like to
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: thank our buddy Alex Williams who composed our theme, our
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: research associates Christopher Eves and Gabe and.
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: I would like to thank you NOL because I've been
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: sneak eating Dorito's this entire episode. Try not to be rude.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: I just haven't eaten.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: To spoiler alert? Wasn't that sneaky brown? Oh?
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: Could you hear it?
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: I can smell the dust.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: Well, hopefully it doesn't translate to the to the podcast.
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: Let us know. Did you hear Ben sneak eating? Shame him?
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: Did you congratulate me?
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Here you go?
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: You always have to be you know, it's better to
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: be positive.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: Very true, Ben, very true. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: to your favorite shows.