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185 | Super Soldier · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
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  Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales right
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  Speaker 1: there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome
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  Speaker 1: to the Cabinet of Curiosities. Paul like to help people.
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  Speaker 1: Born in two in New York City, He'd hoped to
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  Speaker 1: become a doctor, but the times were changing, and so
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  Speaker 1: was his trajectory. For one, the Great Depression wiped out
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  Speaker 1: any money his family had saved up for tuition. Then,
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  Speaker 1: when he was thirteen, Paul was diagnosed with polio. He
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  Speaker 1: spent a lot of time in bed recovering, and while
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  Speaker 1: he rested, he had his nose buried in magazines and
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  Speaker 1: comic books. One of those books had an advertisement on
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  Speaker 1: the back for a ventriloquism kit. Since his parents had
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  Speaker 1: no money for him to buy one, Paul asked his
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  Speaker 1: art chuer if he could receive extra credit from making
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  Speaker 1: a dummy himself once he'd returned to school. His teacher agreed,
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  Speaker 1: and Paul discovered a new passion. He finished his dummy
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  Speaker 1: and started writing down jokes that he found in his magazines.
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  Speaker 1: Then he took the routine he put together and entered
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  Speaker 1: an amateur radio competition, which he won. Ventriloquism shows aren't
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  Speaker 1: the hottest tickets today, but back in nineteen thirty eight,
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  Speaker 1: a talented performer with a funny act could get their
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  Speaker 1: own radio show, and in the nineteen fifties they might
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  Speaker 1: even end up with their own television program. Paul hit
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  Speaker 1: it big in the nineteen fifties with TV shows for
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  Speaker 1: both kids and adults. He was so popular he was
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  Speaker 1: invited to compete on a televised dance show against Ricardo
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  Speaker 1: Montablan Cohn from the second Star Trek movie. Amazingly, Paul won,
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  Speaker 1: and at the cast party after the taping, he met
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  Speaker 1: Dr Henry Heimlich. If that name sounds familiar, it's probably
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  Speaker 1: because the man behind it invented the technique for saving
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  Speaker 1: someone from choking to death, the Heimlich maneuver. Interesting side note,
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  Speaker 1: as a small boy, I called it the Heimlich remover,
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  Speaker 1: which is sort of a functional mistake right Anyway, Dr
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  Speaker 1: Heimlich rekindled Paul's love of medicine and told him that
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  Speaker 1: if he ever wanted to observe an actual heart surgery,
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  Speaker 1: all he had to do was ask. So Paul took
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  Speaker 1: him up on the offer. One morning, while watching another
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  Speaker 1: doctor perform open heart surgery. The patient went into cardiac
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  Speaker 1: arrest and died. Paul got an idea and ran out
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  Speaker 1: of the operating theater to tell his friend Dr Heimlich,
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  Speaker 1: what if there was a device with its own power
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  Speaker 1: supply that could keep the heart pumping during surgery. Dr
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  Speaker 1: Heimlich encouraged Paul to put his dummy making skills to
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  Speaker 1: use by building a prototype. He worked for months improving
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  Speaker 1: his design with advice from Dr Heimlich, until he had
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  Speaker 1: a working model. I'mlick then suggested Paul get his artificial
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  Speaker 1: heart patented, which he did immediately. Sometime later, Paul got
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  Speaker 1: word that the FDA had begun adopting his artificial heart
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  Speaker 1: for human use. His breakthrough netted him an appearance on
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  Speaker 1: MERV Griffin's television show alongside Dr Christian Barnard, the first
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  Speaker 1: cardiac surgeon to perform a heart transplant on a living
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  Speaker 1: human being. He told Paul a story of how he'd
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  Speaker 1: been performing open heart surgery on a close friend who
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  Speaker 1: had passed away on the table. If he'd had Paul's
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  Speaker 1: device at the time, the friend might have pulled through.
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  Speaker 1: It was an emotional moment for both Dr Barnard and Paul,
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  Speaker 1: who realized that his work would change the medical profession forever.
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  Speaker 1: Paul was a man who had begun his career as
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  Speaker 1: an entertainer, bringing joy to people's lives through his ventriloquist dummies,
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  Speaker 1: but through his artificial hearts, he had found a way
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  Speaker 1: to help people the way he always wanted to. In
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  Speaker 1: nineteen fifty nine, he enrolled in pre med at Columbia
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  Speaker 1: University before graduating as a Doctor of Acupuncture from the
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  Speaker 1: Acupuncture Research College of Los Angeles in nineteen seventy four.
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  Speaker 1: Most folks today don't know Paul for his medical work,
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  Speaker 1: but they sure do recognize the sound of his voice.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, he was the voice behind Jerry Mahoney and
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  Speaker 1: Knucklehead Smith, his ventriloque dummies, but he also was known
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  Speaker 1: for voice acting and countless animated cartoons in movies. Among
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  Speaker 1: his dozens of roles, he played Dick Dastard Lee on
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  Speaker 1: Wacky Racers and Gargamel on The Smurfs. But perhaps he
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  Speaker 1: is best remembered as the voice of the energetic Tigger
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  Speaker 1: in Disney's original Winnie the Pooh films. Born in New
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  Speaker 1: York City as Paul Wilchinsky, Paul Winchell was one of
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  Speaker 1: the most beloved and recognized voices in entertainment, and he
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  Speaker 1: devoted his mind to pursuing the greater good for the
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  Speaker 1: benefits of humanity. He was no dummy, just a guy
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  Speaker 1: with a lot of hearts. When the chips are down
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  Speaker 1: in a bad situation, your first thought might be to panic.
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  Speaker 1: Running away sounds like a great option, but it's not
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  Speaker 1: always possible. Sometimes you just have to stay and fight.
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  Speaker 1: As Robert Frost put in his poem A Servant to Servants,
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: the best way out is always through. Alvin hailed from Tennessee.
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  Speaker 1: From a young age, he managed to see his way
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  Speaker 1: through some tough times. His parents owned farm and his
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  Speaker 1: father was a blacksmith. Alvin had ten other brothers and sisters,
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  Speaker 1: but life was rough for such a large family in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen fourteen, everyone had to pitch in around the farm,
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  Speaker 1: and when their father died, Alvin got a job as
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  Speaker 1: a logger and construction worker to help support the family.
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  Speaker 1: He also had a chip on his shoulder. There wasn't
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  Speaker 1: a bar in Tennessee. He couldn't fight his way out
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  Speaker 1: of but after a brush with religion, he swore he
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  Speaker 1: changed his ways. Then he was drafted into World War
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  Speaker 1: One in nineteen eighteen, and he didn't let his internal
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  Speaker 1: peace stop him from fighting for his country. Alvin got
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  Speaker 1: his start as an infantry privates in France before heading
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  Speaker 1: into German held territory with the Army's eighty second Airborne Division.
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  Speaker 1: Sixteen other soldiers joined Alvin on a special mission on
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  Speaker 1: October tenth of nineteen eighteen. They'd been tasked with capturing
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  Speaker 1: German soldiers in Chattel Channer Ree, France, as part of
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  Speaker 1: the Muzargone Offensive. It was the largest offensive in World
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  Speaker 1: War One and in all of US military history. Alvin
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  Speaker 1: had an important role to play. He just didn't know
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  Speaker 1: it yet. He was one of four officers and thirteen
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  Speaker 1: privates under the command of Sergeant Bernard Early. Their goal
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  Speaker 1: was to cross into enemy territory and take out the
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  Speaker 1: German machine guns. The men snuck in and accomplished their mission,
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  Speaker 1: capturing a large group of enemy soldiers. However, while Early
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  Speaker 1: and his team were corralling their prisoners, they were ambushed.
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  Speaker 1: The Germans had come out of nowhere. They fired from
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  Speaker 1: the hills above. No one on the ground could see
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  Speaker 1: where they were positioned, though six American soldiers were killed
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  Speaker 1: in the gunfire and three more were injured. Among the
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  Speaker 1: casualties was Sergeant Early. Seven other men ran for cover
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  Speaker 1: and took their German prisoners with them. Alvin, however, knew
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  Speaker 1: that they'd never get out alive if he didn't take
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  Speaker 1: immediate action. He got on his stomach and aimed his
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  Speaker 1: rifle at the one German soldiers standing above who were
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  Speaker 1: firing down at him. He knew he had very little
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  Speaker 1: AMMO left, so every shot needed to count. One by one,
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  Speaker 1: he picked off the gunmen. Those who couldn't see him
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  Speaker 1: would peek out, exposing their position. In an instant, Alvin's
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  Speaker 1: bullet would fire, and down went another one. A smaller
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  Speaker 1: group of Germans separated from the larger pack and charged
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  Speaker 1: at him with their bayonets pointed forward. Alvin dropped his
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  Speaker 1: rifle and reached for his pistol. He started by taking
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  Speaker 1: out the enemies at the back of the group to
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  Speaker 1: make those in front think they still had rear cover,
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  Speaker 1: and with each shot, York kept telling them that they
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  Speaker 1: could surrender at any time. The German soldiers wouldn't stop firing, though,
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  Speaker 1: but their commander couldn't stand seeing his men getting killed.
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  Speaker 1: So easily, so he told them to stop firing, and
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  Speaker 1: he told Alvin that he would surrender if he stopped
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  Speaker 1: shooting his men. Alvin agreed. The commander blew a whistle,
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  Speaker 1: and the remaining Germans and from their hiding spots, throwing
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  Speaker 1: down their guns and emma all except one. One of
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  Speaker 1: the commander's men hadn't gotten the message and tossed a
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  Speaker 1: grenade at Alvin. It detonated in mid air. Alvin wasn't hurt,
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  Speaker 1: It just ticked him off. He killed the offending German,
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  Speaker 1: which sent the message to the others that he wasn't
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  Speaker 1: messing around. Alvin and his men marched the captured soldiers
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  Speaker 1: through enemy territory straight toward the front lines. More machine
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  Speaker 1: gun men fired at them until Alvin ordered the commander
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  Speaker 1: to blow his whistle again at gunpoints lest he wanted
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  Speaker 1: to lose his head. The German agreed, and more enemy
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  Speaker 1: soldiers dropped their weapons and joined the parade. By the
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  Speaker 1: time York and his men made it across German lines,
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  Speaker 1: they were in charge of over one thirty enemy soldiers,
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  Speaker 1: which they delivered to military police for holding. Sergeant Alvin
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  Speaker 1: York earned a Medal of Honor for his heroic actions.
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  Speaker 1: That day, he saved the lives of seven fellow soldiers,
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  Speaker 1: killed twenty five Germans, and captured one thirty two more,
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  Speaker 1: almost singlehandedly. He was a real life Captain America, except well,
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  Speaker 1: you know, a sergeant. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided
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  Speaker 1: tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on
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  Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting
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  Speaker 1: Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me
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  Speaker 1: Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make
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  Speaker 1: another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast,
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  Speaker 1: book series, and television show, and you can learn all
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  Speaker 1: about it over at the World of Lore dot com.
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  Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,