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CLASSIC: What was the West Point Eggnog Riot? · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Folks, Welcome to our classic episode of ridiculous History. Shout
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: out to everybody who has ever attended West Point. It
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: is one of the top notch training institutions in the
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: United States and in the world. They're very buttoned up people.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: I almost had to go, and I'm with great respect
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: to people who did go to West Point. I don't know, man,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: they got a lot of rules exactly.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: And when you got a lot of rules, that means
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: sometimes you gotta unwind. And sometimes that unwinding can get
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: out of hand, especially around the holidays. You know what
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: do they call it? R and r ben which can
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: very quickly once you introduce spirits, not the ghosty kinds
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: into the mix.
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, eggnog, right, this is the proverbial feather on
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: the camel's back. We've talked at great length about George
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Washington's famous agnog recipe growing up kind of a square kid,
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: I did not realized that agnog historically contains alcohol. I
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: was not aware of that.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I grew up as just being a
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: tasty treat, you know, for kids. But as we also
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: friend of the show and our crack producer, Alex Williams
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: hip us all too. George Washington has a very famous
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: eggnog recipe that is like ninety percent the boozes, and
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: this would have been very close to what these these
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: cadets were consuming.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so join us as we retrace the absolutely drunken,
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: crazed escalation of these cooped up cadets who decided to
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: fight the power. One Christmas Ridiculous History is a production
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. One quart cream, one quart milk, one dozen
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: tablespoons sugar, one pint brandy, one half pint rye whiskey,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: one half pint Jamaica rum, one fourth pint sherry. Mix
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: liquor first, then separate yolks and whites of eggs. Add
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: sugar to beaten yolks. Mix well. Add milk and cream
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: slowly beating. Beat whites of eggs until stiff, and fold
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: slowly into mixture. Let's set in cool place for several days.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Taste frequently. That is a recipe for eggnow by none
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: other than George Washington.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: I only assumed that it was a James Bond villain's
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: egnog recipe from the voice.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, funny, funny story. All James Bond villains are based
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: on George Washington accent wise. Hey, everybody, welcome to the show.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: I'm Ben.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: That's that famous Mount Vernon accent I've heard so much about, right,
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: I'm knowl Yeah, this is ridiculous history. And we started
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: off with a really functional little nugget there that was nice.
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a recipe that is genuinely believed to be
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: George Washington's eggnog recipe. But there's one very important missing
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: part of this recipe. Did you catch it? No, he
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: doesn't say how many eggs should be in there. And
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: you'll see a lot of versions of this recipe wherein
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: someone has assumed, like based on the ratio of other ingredients,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: that it would be about a dozen eggs, But he
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: didn't actually say that.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: What's the batch? Which what's the yield on this recipe?
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Well, I guess that's up to how much you like eggnog? Man?
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: I guess. So? Doesn't the recipe typically.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Include number of surveyans? Yeah, it was a very different time.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: This wasn't from Tasty, right, This one wasn't Taste Made
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: Epicurious Now or Good Eats or anything. Yeah, what's funny
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: you should mention Washington's nog because our coworker and pal
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Alex Williams, who composed our theme Around the holidays, he
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: made a big old batch of Washington's nog and distributed
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: around the office in these delightful little Mason jars. I
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: was lucky enough to get my hands on one, and
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: it packed quite a wall up because a big thing
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: leading up to doing this episode is how could you
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: possibly get off your tits drunk on eggnog? Right?
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: Right? Because nowadays we typically associate eggnog ays this very
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: seasonally based cozy drink like you sip it by a fire.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: It's a comfort drink. It's a comfort drink, a gug
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: in drink form. Yeah, Yeah, it's a it's a it's
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: a slightly boozy atta boy for you around the holidays.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: But if you, as you could tell from the recipe,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: we started the show with eggnog back in the day
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: used to pack quite a punch. This was after it
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: evolved from a much older drink known as posset.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, which was also known as a milk punch, which
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: sounds disgusting so.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Bad, it's there's something in and please listeners, friends and neighbors,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: say hello to our super producer Casey pegram. There's something
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: that I heard of before. I've never tried, but I
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: want to learn about. It was called milk salad. Does
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: that not sound disgusting?
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: Really bad?
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: It makes me think of our jello episode.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: Right, We got some great emails about that today. And
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: this beginning, folks may make you think that my co
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: host and I are delving into the history of agnog,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: and we do just a little bit, but it's to
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: set the scene for a ridiculous event, and we thought
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: this would be the yummiest, weirdest place to start.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: Well, first I just want to describe what passet is.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: We talked about milk punch and the precursor or the
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: spiritual cousin that predates eggnog called posset. That was a
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: hot milk punch using curdled milk, and it was curdled
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: with wine or beer or I guess you get curdles
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: when you heat it, and then eventually it was thickened
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: with eggs and kind of became more what we know
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: today as traditional eggnog. But our story is really about
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: a riot involving drunken cadets.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go with a quote unquote riot on
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: this would know. Really, Okay, at what threshold does fracas
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: or brew haha become a full on riot.
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: It's true. I was going to open the show with
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: the joke about how many eighteen hundred's West Point Cadets
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: does it take to assault to officers and break all
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: of the china And when we know the answer, we'll
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: get to that.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: We'll get to that. So let's talk a little bit
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: about west Point in general. West Point remains famous today.
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: It is a storied institution here in the United States.
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  Speaker 1: It is named west Point because, in a stunning plot twist,
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: it is located in West Point, New York.
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's about fifty miles outside of New York City,
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: and storied it was. However, it didn't used to be
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: the model of discipline and steadfastness fastidiousness that it is
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: today because in the early days of the school, it
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: was ridiculously easy to get in in that they let
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: anyone in and you could get join any time during
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: the year, and it was just kind of a loose
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: grouping of ramshackled little huts. And I think there's about
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: ten cadets that were taught by I think only three teachers.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: You know, a little thing called the War of eighteen
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: twelve happened, which was you know, against Britain, because the
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: Brits were attempting to restrict trade and they kept arresting
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: American seamen, which is not cool, as we know, and
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: also inciting Indian attacks on the US frontier. So that
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: aggression would not stand, my friend, So we decided to
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: go to war with the Brits. And that also led
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: to a need for disciplined.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: Soldiers, right, disciplined, professional, competent soldiers. And there's a character
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: here in the evolution of West Point that we must
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: absolutely mention, if only because he has an awesome name.
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: It's like a dumbledorean awesome name.
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  Speaker 1: Sylvanis Thayer, Ladies and gentlemen. In eighteen seventeen, then President
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: James Monroe ordered Fayre to become the superintendent of the
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: Military Academy after the resignation of the former superintendent, Alden
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Partridge and a pretty cool name also yeah by zone right,
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: not Harry Potter esque, but cool nonetheless and accidentally Ryan.
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  Speaker 1: Under Thayer's leadership, the Academy began to make incredibly impressive
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: leaps and bounds in terms of discipline, in terms of
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: quality of education. It became the nation's first college of engineering.
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  Speaker 3: Well, Thayer didn't take no guph, my friend.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: He didn't put up with any horseplay, shenanigans, or buffoonery,
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  Speaker 2: especially when it pertained to consuming or even possessing alcohol
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  Speaker 2: of any kind.
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  Speaker 1: Right, alcohol could not be possessed, sold, or brought into
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: West Point at all. And this was just another part
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: of his overall very strict regime. For instance, he kept
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: the students on a diet of beef, bread, and water
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: to accustom them to military rations. Their days were strictly
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: controlled as far as the way their time was organized,
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: and they had a lot of pressure on them. So
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: imagine these students like springs that are increasingly compressed, storing
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: up more energy and tension.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they weren't even allowed these some of these rules
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: are I don't understand. They weren't allowed to leave campus.
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: I guess I can get that, because if you leave
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: campus you can get booze. I guess that's n's that
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: in the bud. Also, they couldn't cook in their dorms
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: or duel right right, this team related. I made a
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  Speaker 2: note in the margins here in this uh this article
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  Speaker 2: from the Smithsonian eggnog. It's all fun and games until
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: someone starts a holiday riot. It said before they are
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: West Point sucked or was awesome whatever.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's uh, that's by Natasha Gealing. And yeah, this
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: article is very well written. And I noticed some of
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: the same rules you're talking about here, And to me,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: the dueling one makes a lot of sense because you imagine,
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: you know, they're in a homogeneous population, right, this was
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: strictly segregated, but for the time it started to become
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: relatively progressive because it was important for kids from a
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: lower income level, right, or a lower socioeconomic bracket to
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: receive the same caliber of education if they were qualified
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: for it. But with all the discipline in the harsh environment,
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: I can easily imagine that if duels were allowed, these
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  Speaker 1: kids would be punching each other up and pulling cards
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: left and right.
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, fisticuffs and gun battles galore. It's interesting because
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: even though alcohol was forbidden at West Point, it was
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: surrounded by normal things that you have in towns, like pubs.
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  Speaker 2: And there were a couple there was one called Benny
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  Speaker 2: Haven and then another one called North Town, And those
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: will come into play in a little bit but Benny
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  Speaker 2: Haven is also known for being the main hangout for
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: Edgar Allan Poe when he attended West Point. Admittedly not
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: for a very long time, because he mainly just hung
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: out and got sloshed the whole time.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: That's the story.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: But there was a history of getting sloshed at West
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  Speaker 2: Point before our pal Fayer came in the days before
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: his iron fisted grip tightened around these cadets and tried
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: to whip those boys into shape. They had a yearly
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: kind of revelry kind of thing going on around the holidays,
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: didn't they.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Right, this is important. It may seem strange to day,
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: but in the past, in those days, heavy drinking was
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: or drinking in general was more common. It was something
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: that was normal for people to do. You'll also hear
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: some stories about early founding fathers and influential historical figures
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: being several mattress factory amounts of sheets to the wind.
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: And we're establishing this because when Thayer came in, he
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: wasn't creating out of whole cloth this strict set of rules.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: He was reacting to what he saws laxity in the past,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: and people, students, officers alike were well aware of the
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: previous traditions.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: Oh and you mentioned historical figures and founding fathers. One.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: A couple that are part of the story are boy
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: Jeff Davis Jefferson for long and Robert E.
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: Lee.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: We're both involved in this tale of debauchery and chastisement.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: Yes, okay, So here's how it happens. Up until eighteen
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: twenty five, Cadets alcohol was still banned, but there were
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: two days a year that they could drink. That was
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: the fourth of July. Makes sense, yep, go us right,
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: live it up, and then of course Christmas. And then
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: this changed because on the fourth of July eighteen twenty five,
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: a bunch of Cadets drinking led to a snake dance,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: which led to the hoisting of the school's commandant onto
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: the student's shoulders. And Thayer said, you.
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: Know what, this is too much a snake dance. Snake
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: dance like, is that some kind of is it a
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: conga line? Yeah?
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: Or is it a bunch of people just sort of
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: slithering up and down.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: They didn't like it because it just wasn't dignified.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: You know, it makes me think of remember when we
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: did the episode about the poison squad when Wiley got
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: booted from his professorship for riding a bike. So maybe
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: it was just the idea that this was such a
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: lack of discipline for them to put someone on their
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: shoulders that he said no alcohol.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: Ever, Well, yeah, I did say he was not fond
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: of horsing around. That sounds like the very definition of
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: horsing around, making around. There we go, So Ben just
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: want to get this straight. So yeah, he still allowed
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: this revelry at first and then shut it down after
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: one of these went awry by his standards.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, eighteen twenty six onward. No alcohol, not once, never,
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: not a drop?
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: Was he a teetotaler? Do you think or do you
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: think he would get in his cups? Privately? He seems
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: like a pretty straight shooter. He seems like a straight shooter.
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: But you know, you have to wonder if he applied
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: those same rules to himself.
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: Do as I say, not as I get hammered.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: Right right right, Drink as I say, not as I drink.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: And you know, I love that you mentioned these taverns
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: because they didn't magically disappear. Oh no, after eighteen twenty
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: six and Benny Haven is the really interesting one there
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: because of those two taverns we mentioned earlier, Benny Haven
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: was the only one that allowed a barter system.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: For the students. Oh, I know, this is really interesting.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: So they could like trade shoes and taloons and you know,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: maybe potatoes, who know anything. I guess that was on
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: the table, except if it came from the school. Right,
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: no uniform, No, because that would be that would be stealing.
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: And they do not want to get on the bad
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: side of Colonel Fayer. No, certainly do not, right, right,
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: and sounds like a tough customer that Colonel Fair.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, people took him seriously. But you also have to
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: wonder would you barter stuff for booze?
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: Yes, you would if I didn't have any pocket money, if.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: You didn't have thirty five cents on hand, which will
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: come into play later.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: Oh cool, okay, yeah, no, I don't know. I mean,
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't barter away the clothes on my back, but
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: if I had something of value that I could part
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: with and I wanted a nice stiff drink, I'm not
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: opposed to that.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: So when does judging me?
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: Are you silently judging me? Then?
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: No? No, no, no, I'm judging myself okay, fair enough,
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: me too. No, Ben, You're great, You're you know what.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: We're together, we're solid eight out of ten. And you
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: know we can never compare to Casey Pegram, which is
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: not a bad thing.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: Well, none can, few, can few, very few. Between the
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: two of us, we practically make a whole person. We're
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: getting there for sure. So, Noel, this situation is unsustainable
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: to the students, right to the cadets.
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: The afore mentioned winding spring ready to pop.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: So this all comes to a head when Christmas Eve
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: of eighteen twenty six rules around again. That's one of
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: the two days the cadets are allowed to drink, to imbibe,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: and this is the first time they can't and you.
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: Know, no one likes it when you tell them they
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: can't do something. Sure, tell me what I can't do, Ben.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, don't tell me what I can't do. I will
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: automatically go do it. Yeah. Reverse psychology is real, it's dangerous,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: and people know it works.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: It's clearly fair. That was not his style. He was
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: much more of a prohibitor than a than a mind manipulator.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: A mind wrangler.
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly.
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: So you know these cadets on Christmas Eve of eighteen
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: twenty six, about seventy of them, as it turns out,
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: which I think was someone in the neighborhood.
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: Of a third of the student body of West Point.
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: Decided to hatch a little plot where they were going
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: to go against old Colonel payers wishes and get themselves
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: some boozy egnog.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Right, So they decided that they would go off campus
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: and go to the place they knew that was going
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: to be the friendliest tavern, which was, of course Benny
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: Haven Benny Haven.
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: Maybe they brought some extra pairs of socks with which
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: to barter.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: However, Benny Haven proved without us remarking on the socks
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: or the pantaloons or whatever they brought with them, doesn't matter, right,
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: Benny Haven's was too expensive, too steep. Yeah, they could
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: buy a little little liquor, but not as much as
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: they wanted. So they had to go to Plan B.
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: They wanted to get rip and drunk.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Oh we should call it Plan H. I like it
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: because why because they crossed the Hudson River. Oh exactly,
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: that's the very very good foreshadow in their band. So yes,
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: they did in fact cross the Hudson River. I imagine
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: on some sort of sloop, perhaps a.
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: Barge, some sort of maybe surely they had vessels at
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: their disposal. Right, it's a military academy. What do you think,
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: what do you picture them crossing on?
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: One would imagine they wouldn't swim because of the weather. Yeah,
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: it'd be cold, So they were probably on you know,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: a small boat or something. Maybe they just rowed across.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: I like it. I like it.
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: I'm just trying to set the scene as all you know.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: So this is under the cover of night, no doubt.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: They go over to the pub we mentioned briefly earlier,
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: the tavern, I guess North's tavern where they made a
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: deal with the the bartender, the barkeep, and they procured
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: in the neighborhood of three or four gallons of whiskey.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they they want to do it. Yeah, they've got
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: They got gallons of whiskey. And while they were there,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: they had the historical quote, we found a few glasses themselves. Now,
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: this I think leads into this one for the chef.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: It leads to the domino domino effect we'll see later.
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: Because the size of those glasses as we record this,
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: that size is lost to history, so we have no
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: idea how large these glasses were. But anyway, the death's
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: knocked back a few They went back to the dock
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: and they found a soldier who was standing guard. But
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: they said, you know what, man turn a blind eye,
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: which wasn't unusual, right, And he said, what price do
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: you expect me to put on my morals? This conversation
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: is inspired by a true story, I should say, And
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: they they named a price, and he accepted. And what
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: was that price?
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: It was thirty five cents?
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: It was thirty five cents.
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: Do you want to plug that into your handy dandy
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: inflation calculator?
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: Ben, you're going to find this hilarious, and listeners, I
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: hope you enjoy this too. In eighteen twenty six, thirty
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: five cents was the equivalent of Casey, can we get
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: a drum roll please? Eight dollars and nine cents?
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: Okay?
• 21:29
  Speaker 3: So yeah, his cheap, cheap, cheap morals.
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: Eight dollars and nine cents.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: Wow, I mean.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: That's bizarre. I can't imagine a bribe that would work
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: at that price level.
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I can't either. I would have at least
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: asked for some of that whiskey, right, Maybe he did.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: Surely they plied him with booze. Let's editorialize here. I mean,
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: come on, no one's gonna take eight fit without a
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: little without a couple of shots first, right.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, so we go back to we go back
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: to Colonel Fair and sure it was a bit draconian,
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: but that doesn't make him a dunderhead. It doesn't make
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: him stupid.
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: No, no, no, no. He was clearly a pretty savvy.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: Fellow, and he knew that cadets had smuggled alcohol into
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: the academy before. In fact, one of our characters near
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: has a history that we'll get to in a bit.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: But he had always and the staff and officer structure
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: of West Point had always dealt with these on a
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: case by case basis. So he assumed, reasonably so that
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: there would be at least one bad or should we say,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: one drunk apple, one fermented apple out a bunch. So
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: he had talked about it with some of the staff
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: and the fellow officers, but he just took the regular precautions,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: like two guards ye Captain Ethan Allen Hitchcock and Lieutenant
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: William A. Thornton. They were to monitor the North Barracks.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: Old Hitchcock and Thornton. They have they're about to have
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: have some fun.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, they go to bed, They knock
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: off around midnight, right.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Yep, that's right, at which point the boys who set off,
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: who salied forth for the north, huh, the tavern, are
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: now back in their respective dorms. I guess they they
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: snuck into the kitchen and made the nog.
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: Speaking of which, what what part of the egg is
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: the nog?
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: Ben?
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: That's that's the question. I think everyone wants to know.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: What's a good question. Let's see is there an answer.
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: There is I was being a little koy, So no
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: one knows exactly. And it's certainly a bit of a
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: turn of phrase. There is no nog to the egg.
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: It's not it's not a part of the egg. I
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: think you will probably already knew that. But it turns
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: out that the word nog was an old English slang
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: for a very stiff beer. Oh okay, And you've also
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: heard like grog. Sure, and so I'm assuming that there's
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: there's some relation there. And then another one is that
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: the idea that these wooden mugs that you could find
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: in taverns all across the land were called noggins. Oh
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: and so apparently, and this is from an article on
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: a delightful blog called Sustainable Table about the history of eggnog,
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: and they conjecture that when you combine noggin with egg
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: you get eggnog. So I don't know.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a little aside that's solid. Oh, but we
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: should also add that the three cadets who went across
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: the Hudson were not alone in their endeavor. This was
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: a group effort. According to the Eggnog Riot on Laugham's
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: Quarterly by Michelle Legro, they were joined with conspirators colluters.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: You see, another group brought a gallon of brandy and
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: a gallon of wine, and another one, get this phrasal
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: organized a gallon of liquor on credit, and then someone
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: else bought the eggs, the milk, and the nutmeg. So
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: they had all the ingredients as symboled together and they
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: got wasted. They got so wasted that four hours after midnight,
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: the two officers we mentioned, Thornton and Hitchcock, woke up
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: with a very we're family show. So let's call it
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: a very OMG WTF reaction.
• 25:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a clamor a hubbub.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: There arose such a clamor.
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, but it was not jolly old Saint Nick. No,
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: it was a bunch of unruly, drunken military school cadets.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: Which has just gotta be the worst. They were, well,
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: let me correct here. So after the officers went to bed,
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: they start to drinking, the cadets, and then you'll hear,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: either around two am or four am, the feather of
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: drunken noise broke the proverbial camel of silences back.
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: We all know the sound if you've lived next door
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: to a frat house or anything, if you've ever had
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: any kind of unruly neighbors that are having a party
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: when you're trying to sleep, it's a very specific sound.
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: Sounds totally different when you yourself are drunk, sounds delightful. Oh,
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: it sounds just like the sound of fun.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: Sounds merry, you know.
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: But when you're when you're trying to sleep, sure, it's
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: an instant enrager.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: So they were making mary. Around two am, Jefferson Davis
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: and eight other cadets started singing very loudly. Another student
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: tried to do the eighteen twenty six version of sh
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: you guys, come on specheese, and by four am this
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: sounds blasting through the floorboards, and that triggers the investigation.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Do we talk about Jeff Davis?
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Jeffy, you're talking about Jeff Davis because we just mentioned
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: him as leading the singing. He was.
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: He was one of those kids with a past, absolutely
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: and the future.
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: He went on to become the president of the US Confederacy,
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: that's the one. But he was what you might describe
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: as an incorrigible drunk.
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, he had a history of being censured for
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: leaving his post to drink at the bar. In fact,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: he racked up an arrest. He did, He got arrested.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: I think he was the first student to be arrested
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: for sneaking away to go to Benny Haven. And not
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: long before the the egnog riot that we're talking about,
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: he was with some pals sneaking and he fell into
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: a pit and his pals cried out, are you alive?
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: And thankfully he was. He was alive.
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: But he you know, you don't know, man Ravine, right,
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: good lord, he.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: Could have hit his head on a that's sixty feet
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: so that's nothing to sneeze at. So this guy, when
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: they're when they're organizing this secret Christmas party. Jefferson Davis
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: is one of the top picks. He's like a veteran
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: of this sort of thing.
• 28:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he was totally on board.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: And our heroes, uh for all in disent purposes, heroes
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: or bus kills depends on what side of this. I'm
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: annoyed at the cadets, to be honest, that's where I stand.
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: I think they're being a little disrespectful. I feel you.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: But it's Christmas, eve Man.
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: No it's not. It's Christmas.
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, now it's officially Christmas. Okay, even more, it's
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: Christmas Day.
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: I have a little charity where Okay.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: So, but I'm saying, like I've been around drunk people
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: when I'm sober and trying to sleep enough that I
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: am feeling these two guards perspective here pretty hard. So
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: one of them, Hitchcock, leaps out of bed with a
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: start and finds a handful of the boys, six or
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: seven of them visibly sloshed, and he he I loved
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: the way this article puts it, the Smithsonian article.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: He ordered them to disperse, right, right right, and they refused.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: They refused to.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: Disperse, And it sounds so formal at this point, you know,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: it sounds as though they had a decision making process,
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: but that's it was. It had to be more sloppy
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: and more emotionally charged. He thought it was just that
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: one room at first, but it turns out it wasn't.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Oh no, no, it wasn't. He then went into another
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: room and he was actually followed by our boy jeff Davis,
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: who tried to give his compatriots the heads up by shouting,
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: put away the grog boys, old hitches, come in, old Hitchcock,
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: you know. But of course he was already there. He
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: was literally right behind him or right in front of him,
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: so you know, he looked like a chump. And then
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: Hitchcock ordered Jeffy to disperse and he agreed, which is
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: probably the one thing that saved him from getting court
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: martialed and expelled. So you know, we can thank Hitchcock
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: and his kind hearted nature for you know, Jefferson Davis
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: is a future in politics.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no one knew what was going to happen in
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: the time exactly. So Davis is arrested, others are arrested,
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: ordered to their rooms. And this is this is weird
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: because we asked at the top of the show what
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: constitutes a riot. Apparently Hitchcock read the group the Riot Act,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: which declared any group of twelve or more unlawfully assembled.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Wait, that's a real thing, the Riot Acts.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Well, they have it here.
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: You say, when you're reading someone the Riot Act, that's
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: literally like you're telling them their rights.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The original Riot Act again, real thing was passed
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: back in seventeen fourteen in Britain, and it essentially ruled
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: that if a group of a dozen or more people
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: got together and started acting unruly, an officer of the
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: law could approach them and tell them to disperse, but
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: to do so they literally had to read the Riot Act.
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: So the cadets are really poed right now because they
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: had this one party in their minds. It's one of
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: two nights they can let loose the entire year.
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because we can't forget that.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: It's you know, it's hard to come in and like
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: just change things overnight, like if they're used to having
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: these parties and then you've got this this killjoy fayer
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: coming in and denying them there two nights of revelry
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: a year. That's that stings a little. You know, this
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: was very refreshed for them.
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: So here's where I start to lose sympathy for the cadets.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: So after now they're angry at Hitchcock, were ruining the
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: soiree right right to get together. They decide to hunt
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: the captain down. They decide that vengeance is theirs. And
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: we have a great quote for how that segment of
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: the night began.
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Hitchcock took off and then one of the drunken
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: cadets screamed, get your dirks and bayonets and pistols. If
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: you have them before the night is.
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: Over, Hitchcock will be dead.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: So that's you know, that's a threat of bodily harm
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: to a superior officer. That's probably not not gonna fly.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: Right, right, right, right. So there's a book written by
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: James b Agnew called the Agnog Riot the Christmas Mutiny
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: at West Point. Maybe mutiny is a little better word,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: but again he did read the Riot Act. So so
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: this book gives a minute by minute treatment account or
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: estimation about how things went down and from that point.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: So let's say it's around four am. Over the next
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: two hours there was a cat and mouse game between
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: the drunk students, the faculty of West Point, and the
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: sober students, you know, the nerds who woke up to
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: side with the faculty against their fellow cadets.
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And then the other guy, Thornton, the other guard,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: he had a sword brandished in his face. He got
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: brained with a piece of wood, got knocked on his butt.
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: And I think Hitchcock was trying to break into a
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: door that had been barricaded and someone.
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: Took a shot at him from the other side of
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: the door. Yeah, the pistol. I mean, this is I
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: think riot is absolutely fair.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: Right, And just to go back a second to establish
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: how drunk these cadets were when Hitchcock originally busted them.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Several of them, Noel, try to hide under blankets, like
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: while he's there, Like, if I just hide under this blanket,
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: no one will see me, right.
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: I think some of them took their hats and covered
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: their faces, Like you think that's gonna work.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: Right, right? Right?
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: What's going on?
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: So this is where they start doing incredible physical damage,
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: not just threatening the officers, but damaging the property as well,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: breaking windows, ripping banisters off a staircases.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just like shredding the curtains, whatever they could get
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: their hands on. I mean it was a melee, and
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: so Hitchcock and Thornton decided they better call in the cavalry.
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: And it was these guys called the bombadiers, who were
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: the guards that always kind of stood watch to make sure.
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: It's sort of like internal affairs for cops. You know,
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: it's like nobody likes internal affairs if you're a cop,
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: because they're like, it's like a snitch. So the cadets
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: did not care for the bombadiers, and once they got
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: called in.
• 34:50
  Speaker 3: Things just got even even nastier, right, because the cadets
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: hated these artillery men and they thought Hitchcock summoning them
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: was this quote affront to their integrity. And if you
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: read between the lines of history here, it sounds like
• 35:06
  Speaker 3: they were just sloshed enough that they were were going
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: to get angry about anything.
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: Well, they were obviously having delusions of grand are too.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: It's like, who the hell do they think they are?
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: You know, they were trained in warfare. What I mean's
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: saying like they're students at this school. These are their
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: commanding officers. There is a you know, two nights of
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: partying a year or no, there is a military structure
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: in place here, right, Yeah, like this just seems like
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: a you know, a mass hysteria kind of situation.
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And as things went further off the rails,
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: it turned out that the bombadiers or these artillery men
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: never actually showed up. And slowly, painfully, I would imagine,
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: these cadets began to sober up, but not successfully, not
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: in enough time to be up at their scheduled hour,
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: which was six.
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: Am, six am.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: On a regular day.
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: They would exactly. They were probably not feeling super well.
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: And finally, a man who was the Commandant of Cadets.
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: Sounds like a really intense name, sort of like the
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: King of Cartoons from Pewey Herman.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there we go, the.
• 36:17
  Speaker 3: Commandant of Cadets. He struck enough fear.
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: Into the hearts of these boys that they they'd chilled out.
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: They stopped breaking stuff.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: They were probably also getting tired, Yeah so and puky Yeah.
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Jefferson Davis, according to the accounts, had missed the bulk
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: of the Knight's events because instead of resisting arrest, when
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: he was put under his arrest, he stumbled to his room,
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: threw up a little bit, and passed out. So that
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: actually turned out well for him because he wasn't party
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: to a lot of the more violent events. In his memoirs.
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: He would later claim that he didn't name names or
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: you know, snitch on other people, essentially yea. But the
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: record show he indicated that his roommate was involved in
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: the conflict when the cadet returned to their dorm, waking
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: Davis up as he loaded his gun. So his roommate
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: was the one who fired the shot.
• 37:13
  Speaker 3: Not a good look. So Thayer was rightfully pretty upset.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: He gathered all of his staff for an inquiry on
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: the next night, and then over the following weeks they
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: placed twenty two cadets on restriction, and then they started
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: to develop an investigation a court of inquiry, and that
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: was issued by Major General Alexander McComb, who was the
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: Chief Engineer of the Army and Inspector of the Academy.
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: And this is actually from an article on the US
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: Army's website in the eggnog Riat and they have access
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: to it. Is apparently a whole lot of ink that
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: was spilled over this thing in terms of internal records.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: This is a big deal, right, Oh, yeah, of course
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: is a huge deal. He's a premier institution and we
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: have the names of the cadets that we could list off.
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: I'm going to do it very quickly.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: The cadets were ainswith Berry and Bamford, Burnley, Faarreley, Fitzgerald, Guard, Guyon, Humphries, Johnson, Lewis, Mercer, Murdoch, Norvelle,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Robert Scriven, Stocker, Swords, and Thompson. They all stood trial,
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: and other cadets, including Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee,
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: testified for the defense. Eleven of that group were dismissed,
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: and the remainder were allowed to stay, although three of them, Guard,
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: Murdoch and Norvelle chose to leave the academy anyway. You
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: can't fire me. I quit indeed.
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: And you know, and you might think there were way
• 38:41
  Speaker 3: more people involved.
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: In this than went down for it, right, yeah, but
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: you gotta think this was like a third of the
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: population of the school. And he was just getting things
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: moved away from the old ways, the old debaucherous ways
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: of West Point. That sounds funny, getting things on track
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: for his government.
• 39:00
  Speaker 3: You know, he'd been given some outa boys.
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: And he didn't want to lose everybody. He just wanted
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: like the main aggressors to take the fall and have
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: it be a teachable moment which I can appreciate.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, tough but fair. And so the
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: riot included, as Nolan I believe you point out earlier,
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: nearly one third of West Point students, and it changed
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: the change the approach in the face of the academy
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: for decades to come. But West Points command historian Sherman Fleek.
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: That name is on Fleek?
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: Is it is literally on Fleek famously was incorrect when
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: he said.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: Hardly anyone knows about it if pooled among forty four
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: hundred cadets, I don't know why I think he talks
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: like this a three thousand federal employees, fifteen hundred military
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: staff and faculty. I doubt thirty people will know a
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: thing about it. This guy's not even old Timy. He's
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: in our current DNA. It doesn't matter supposed to. Why
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: would I not do.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: A voice right? But way more than thirty people know
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: about this, and you know, more than thirty people should.
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. I think nowadays Eggnog is maybe
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: remembered less as the source of drunken, riotous revelry at
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: West Point and more of a non alcoholic kind of
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: holiday drink. You know, my kid likes agnog. They have
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: agnog milkshakes at Sonic and you know egnog frappuccinos.
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's Starbucks.
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah yeah.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: An agnog is certainly not associated with crazy college parties
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: gone wrong. That's more of a Jaeger bomb thing, that's true.
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: My whole thing with eggnog is it's got so much
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: sugar and milk and cream in it. It just seems
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: like it would make you sick before you'd get drunk enough.
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: It feels like a Labowski drink to me, Just drink
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: the whiskey, man, Yeah, just drink the whiskey.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: Is that our PSA? Is that our moral for this
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: today's episode?
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: Why not just.
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: Drink the whiskey, the rum and the wine, whatever you got.
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: We are going to wrap it up. We would like
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: to hear from you. Does this change the way you
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: feel about West Point? I don't know why we're going
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: we're going with that question. We want to hear about
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: your experience with agnog. Do you have your own eggnog
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: recipe because a lot of people do you know our
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: composer Alex Williams, As you said, modeled his after George Washington,
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: but he had to figure out the amount of eggs himself.
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, And why not make a batch of your
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: own George Washington eggnog and send us a note and
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: let us know how you liked it. It's ridiculous At
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: HowStuffWorks dot com. You can also write us on the
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: facebooks where we are Ridiculous History, and we have a
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: nifty new Facebook group called the Ridiculous Historians.
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: Where you can find your fellow listeners hipping each other
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: to ridiculous stories throughout the span of human civilization. You
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: can also find us two jokers on there as well. Well,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: yeah we lurk, Yeah, we lurk. Hey, we comment as well,
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: and we do also look to this page for inspiration
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: for future topics. So thanks to everyone who's already made
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: so many excellent suggestions. You can also find us on Twitter,
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: you can find us on Instagram. You can find us
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: wherever you get podcasts. Oh gosh, that's right. We even
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: have a website nol.
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: Do you know that I did know?
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: That?
• 42:24
  Speaker 2: Isn't it Ridiculous historyshow dot com?
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: Spot on my friend that's where you can find every
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: episode that we have ever done, so check it out
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: and let us know what you would like to hear next.
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: We're be getting some fantastic emails and it always makes
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: our day to read them. And as always, we want
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: to thank our super producer and agnog enthusiast. Wait, let
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: me check Casey No, Okay, super producer Casey Pegram who
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: is not a fan of agnog No, not.
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: Not an NOD guy. I think Casey would probably agree
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: with me and saying, just drink the whiskey, man, Just
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: drink the whiskey.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: And we want to thank Lori L. Dove, our regular contributor,
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: for her excellent article on how stuff works.
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: And I guess most importantly other than thanking.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: You, Ben, oh, thank you.
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: No, let me do this every time.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, Let's not force it, Let's
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: just let it happen.
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'm up into that. We'd like to thank you
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: folks for listening to the show, and we hope you'll
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: join us for our next episode, where.
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: We talk about weird people who built weird stuff.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: That is literally going to be the title.
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: Yep. See you then. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: your favorite shows.