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Flying Ace · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild.
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  Speaker 2: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
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  Speaker 2: is an open book, all of these amazing tales are
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  Speaker 2: right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.
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  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. They say, a story
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  Speaker 2: changes with the storyteller, and few tales have had more
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  Speaker 2: revisions than that of James Jesse Strang, the self declared
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  Speaker 2: King of Beaver Island. Depending on who you ask, James
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  Speaker 2: was either a prophet, a tyrant, a genius, or a madman.
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  Speaker 2: But what's certain is that he carved out one of
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  Speaker 2: the strangest footnotes in American history. Life for James started
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  Speaker 2: out conventionally enough.
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  Speaker 1: Born in upstate New York in eighteen thirteen, he spent
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  Speaker 1: time as a lawyer, a newspaper editor, and even as
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  Speaker 1: a Baptist minister. But in eighteen forty four he found
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  Speaker 1: something calling him in the words of a brand new religion.
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  Speaker 1: Following the words of founder Joseph Smith, he converted to Mormonism,
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  Speaker 1: a faith that was just fourteen years old at the time.
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  Speaker 1: Later that year, On June twenty seventh of eighteen forty four,
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  Speaker 1: Joseph Smith was killed by an angry mob, leaving the
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  Speaker 1: Church of Latter day Saints leaderless. Many members threw their
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  Speaker 1: heat into the ring to lead the religion, including James
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  Speaker 1: Jesse Strang. James actually claimed that Smith had named him
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  Speaker 1: his successor in a letter. Of course, this was a
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  Speaker 1: letter that he only revealed the existence of after Smith
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  Speaker 1: was gone, So most Mormons decided to follow a different leader,
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  Speaker 1: a guy named Brigham Young. While Brigham Young led the
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  Speaker 1: majority of the church west to Salt Lake City, Utah,
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  Speaker 1: James split off with his own faction. He claimed an
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  Speaker 1: angel came to him in the night, showing him what
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  Speaker 1: he called a land amidst wide water and covered with
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  Speaker 1: large timber. In eighteen forty eight, he led his followers
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  Speaker 1: to Beaver Island, a remote, force covered outpost in northern
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  Speaker 1: Lake Michigan, and there, in an audacious mix of prophecy
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  Speaker 1: and pageantry, he donned a crown, a scepter, and robes
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  Speaker 1: and declared himself King of the Kingdom of God and
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  Speaker 1: the Earth. The island quickly became a stronghold of James's
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  Speaker 1: particular sect of Mormonism. He banned alcohol, enforced religious laws,
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  Speaker 1: and punished descent. He declared all the Nishannabag, Native Americans
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  Speaker 1: and Irish settlers who were living there to convert or flee,
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  Speaker 1: and by eighteen fifty two most of them were gone.
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  Speaker 1: James quickly found that, as a newly minted king, his
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  Speaker 1: crown was already starting to gain enemies. Locals accused the
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  Speaker 1: Mormons of theft and threats of violence. Many claimed the
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  Speaker 1: Mormons were pirates, luring merchant vessels crossing Lake Michigan to
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  Speaker 1: shore before plundering their cargo. Whether this was true or
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  Speaker 1: merely a result of anti Mormon rumors isn't even clear today.
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  Speaker 1: What was clear was that James was not a beloved monarch.
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  Speaker 1: US President Millard Fillmore, alarmed by the stories about the
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  Speaker 1: Beaver Island King, dispatched his Attorney general to investigate James's sect.
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  Speaker 1: In eighteen fifty three, James successfully defended himself in court
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  Speaker 1: against federal charges of counterfeiting, theft, and treason, gaining himself
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  Speaker 1: a lot of positive name recognition After he won his trial,
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  Speaker 1: he parlayed this good press into political power, gaining a
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  Speaker 1: seat in the Michigan state legislature, and still this wasn't
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  Speaker 1: enough to keep James in the public's good graces. Tensions
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  Speaker 1: grew especially high after James embraced polygamy after years of
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  Speaker 1: denouncing it. In fact, James's support of monogamous marriage had
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  Speaker 1: been one of the original reasons why so many of
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  Speaker 1: his congregation had chosen to follow him over Brigham Young,
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  Speaker 1: who had fifty wives. There were other rumors about why
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  Speaker 1: James was unpopular, from firing a cannon into a crowd
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  Speaker 1: of Irish settlers, to animal sacrifices and stealing followers wives.
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  Speaker 1: In many of these tales, the legend may be taller
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  Speaker 1: than the man, but there was no evidence that he
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  Speaker 1: did any of these things. But the rumors spread nonetheless,
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  Speaker 1: and some of his followers began to push back. James's
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  Speaker 1: rule unraveled in eighteen fifty six after ordering the public
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  Speaker 1: flogging of two dissenters, one of them, a man named
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  Speaker 1: Thomas Bedford, plotted his revenge. On June twentieth, Bedford and
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  Speaker 1: two accomplices ambushed James on a dock as he was
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  Speaker 1: preparing to board a ship. They shot him in the
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  Speaker 1: back while the ships captain and crew stood by. The
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  Speaker 1: assassins fled to nearby Mackinaw Island, where they were celebrated
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  Speaker 1: rather than jailed. Strang lingered for weeks, paralyzed and in pain,
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  Speaker 1: before dying on July ninth. Without their king, his followers
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  Speaker 1: had no protection. Within days, a mob from the mainland
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  Speaker 1: invaded Beaver Island, burning homes and forcibly evicting every last Mormon. Today,
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  Speaker 1: Beaver Island is a peaceful tourist spot. Few visitors realized
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  Speaker 1: that it was once the seat of an American monarch.
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  Speaker 1: As for James Jesse strang his story remains a slippery one,
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  Speaker 1: half legend, half history, shaped by those who loved him
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  Speaker 1: and by those who didn't. Looking back, the legend of
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  Speaker 1: the Mormon King of Beaver Island has some truth to it,
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  Speaker 1: but there's no denying that it's definitely a little strang.
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  Speaker 1: Ever since the dawn of aviation, human pilots have had
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  Speaker 1: to face an unshakable reality. Although aircraft may be the
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  Speaker 1: biggest thing in the sky, they aren't the only ones.
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  Speaker 1: If you've ever spent any time reading about airplane hazards,
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  Speaker 1: you may have heard the term bird strike. It means
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  Speaker 1: exactly what it sounds like when a bird collides with
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  Speaker 1: a plane, doing some degree of damage and forcing a landing.
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  Speaker 1: They're relatively rare these days, but still a present concern
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  Speaker 1: among the designers of airplane. For that reason, manufacturers test
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  Speaker 1: rigorously to make sure that their planes are as resistant
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  Speaker 1: as possible to encounters with birds at extremely high speeds.
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  Speaker 1: When a plane is built, it will be taken to
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  Speaker 1: a facility that has a chicken gun, an air powered
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  Speaker 1: cannon that fires boneless chickens at stationary aircraft to simulate
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  Speaker 1: a bird strike, because chickens have higher bone density than
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  Speaker 1: most high altitude birds. If the hull of an airplane
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  Speaker 1: can resist this weapon, it is deemed safe to fly. However,
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  Speaker 1: some aerial hazards are too esoteric to plant for as
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  Speaker 1: one test pilot found out in nineteen fifty six. The
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  Speaker 1: pilot's name was Thomas Atridge. He was employed to test
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  Speaker 1: the combat capabilities of the new Grooman F eleven Tiger
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  Speaker 1: jet engine. It was a plane capable of supersonic speeds,
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  Speaker 1: flying faster than seven hundred and fifty miles per hour,
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  Speaker 1: a speed designated as mock I. Nobody had ever engaged
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  Speaker 1: in aerial combat while flying this fast. They didn't even
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  Speaker 1: know if it was possible. Atridge took the plane out
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  Speaker 1: over the Atlantic, bound for a designated firing range. His
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  Speaker 1: altitude was twenty thousand feet. The plane's four guns were
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  Speaker 1: loaded with dummy rounds, and as planned, he turned into
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  Speaker 1: a dive, descending to thirteen thousand feet and firing a
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  Speaker 1: four second burst with the plane's guns. He paused for
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  Speaker 1: a few seconds, and then he dove again, emptying the
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  Speaker 1: guns as he went. So far, everything was going smoothly,
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  Speaker 1: but when he reached seven thousand feet, everything went wrong.
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  Speaker 1: The windshield cracked and then it shattered. The plane started
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  Speaker 1: losing power, its engines stuttering. Atridge did his best to
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  Speaker 1: maintain a level head. He reduced the speed to two
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  Speaker 1: hundred and thirty miles per hour, turning the plane back
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  Speaker 1: toward the groom in Factory. The engine was weakening with
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  Speaker 1: each passing minute, and he had to hold the windshield
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  Speaker 1: in place with one of his hands while he flew.
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  Speaker 1: Aside from the very obvious damage to the glass, there
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  Speaker 1: appeared to be a hole near the engine, but he
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  Speaker 1: couldn't tell what had caused it. The jet continued slowing
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  Speaker 1: before finally stalling out more than a mile short of
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  Speaker 1: his landing zone, the plane caught fire and plummeted the
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  Speaker 1: rest of the way into a crash landing Atridge was
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  Speaker 1: severely injured in the crash, but he managed to pull
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  Speaker 1: himself free of the wreckage. The mechanics were left to
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  Speaker 1: determine what had happened to cause the plane to falter
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  Speaker 1: so suddenly, but the answer was simple. It was the
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  Speaker 1: dummy rounds from the F eleven's guns. You see. Atridge
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  Speaker 1: had opened fire while in a downward dive, just as instructed,
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  Speaker 1: and the bullets had slowed due to intense wind resistance.
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  Speaker 1: By the time he reached seven thousand feet, he was
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  Speaker 1: traveling at well over eight hundred miles per hour, and
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  Speaker 1: the bullets that he had fired were traveling closer to
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  Speaker 1: four hundred, So the jet had caught up with its
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  Speaker 1: own bullets, running face first into a handful of non
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  Speaker 1: lethal but still very solid projectiles. The US Air Force
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  Speaker 1: did wind up using the groom in F eleven Tiger
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  Speaker 1: in the late nineteen fifties and early sixties. After its
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  Speaker 1: retirement as a fighter jet, it would be employed by
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  Speaker 1: the Blue Angels for aerial performances throughout the rest of
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  Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties, all at all a relatively short career
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  Speaker 1: for a fighter jet, quickly surpassed by subsequent models. In
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  Speaker 1: a way, you could say this aircraft peaked early. After all,
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  Speaker 1: the F eleven Tiger is the first, and to date,
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  Speaker 1: the only aircraft that has ever managed to shoot itself down.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
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  Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
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  Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership
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  Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
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  Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,
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  Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the
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  Speaker 1: Worldoflore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.