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Lead Balloon · 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. Our world is full of
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  Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
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  Speaker 1: of these amazing tales right there on display, just waiting
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  Speaker 1: for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: In the year fourteen eighty seven, in southern Japan, the
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  Speaker 1: military governor of the Kaga Province returned home to a
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  Speaker 1: surprising but inevitable welcome. His people. The peasants of Kaga
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  Speaker 1: Province were an open rebellion. The governor, whose name was
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  Speaker 1: Togashi Masachika, had spent much of the last ten years
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  Speaker 1: suppressing these sorts of rebellions. The Ashikaga Shogunate was weakening,
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  Speaker 1: and feudal Japan had been erupting in challenges to the
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  Speaker 1: showgun's authority, both from rival lords and from bands of
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  Speaker 1: peasants like the ones that Masachika faced in the Kaga Province.
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  Speaker 1: These peasants formed themselves into grassroots militia known as Iki,
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  Speaker 1: and were comprised of Buddhist warrior monks as well as
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  Speaker 1: peasants who were dissatisfied with their rulers. Masachika hoped that
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  Speaker 1: he'd be able to extinguish this rebellion once and for
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  Speaker 1: all with the help of support from the Showgun, but
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  Speaker 1: no such reinforcements arrived. The peasant rebellion lay siege to
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  Speaker 1: the castle of Kaga in fourteen eighty eight. As his
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  Speaker 1: castle burned around him and with no prospect of rescue,
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  Speaker 1: Masachika committed sepuku. After that, he was replaced as governor
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  Speaker 1: by his uncle Yasutaka, but the real power of the
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  Speaker 1: world knew lay in the hands of the Iki. The
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  Speaker 1: Kaga region became known as Kagaiki, or less formally, the
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  Speaker 1: province ruled by peasants, and this would hold true for decades.
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  Speaker 1: While in Greater Japan the Showguns ruggle to remain in power,
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  Speaker 1: the Ashikaga Shogunate was weakening, and in Kaga the pretense
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  Speaker 1: of needing a military governor soon outlived its usefulness. The
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  Speaker 1: Kagaiki would become a primary ruling force in the region
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  Speaker 1: by the early fifteen hundreds, doing away with the role
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  Speaker 1: of governor altogether. It was the first time in Japanese
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  Speaker 1: history that province was ruled by someone other than a
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  Speaker 1: lord or a samurai. It's tempting to see this as
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  Speaker 1: the moment of utopia peasant rule in a feudal system. However,
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  Speaker 1: as the Kagaiki grew in power, so too did their
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  Speaker 1: disagreements among themselves. Without a common enemy, they began to fracture.
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  Speaker 1: Some of their members held differing loyalties among their neighboring provinces,
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  Speaker 1: and who should be the true power in Kaga Province
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  Speaker 1: was the big question. In fifteen thirty one, a civil
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  Speaker 1: war broke out among the Iki, ending with a man
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  Speaker 1: named ren June in power. They successfully fought back expansionist neighbors,
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  Speaker 1: consolidated power even further, and seemed on their way to
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  Speaker 1: securing their place in a new Japan. However, the Peasant's
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  Speaker 1: kingdom would remain unstable for the rest of its existence.
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  Speaker 1: It turned into a dynasty were the ruling class, rather
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  Speaker 1: than being samurai, were Buddhist priests, and it was in
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  Speaker 1: the fifteen seventies, almost a century after the first Iki rebellions,
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  Speaker 1: that Kagaiki would begin to fall. Oda Nabuaga, a warlord
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  Speaker 1: seeking to unify Japan, sent armies into Kaga Province to
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  Speaker 1: secure it. After a first few waves were defeated by
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  Speaker 1: the Iki, Nobunaga deployed a massive force led by his
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  Speaker 1: best generals. The siege lasted for ten years. It ended
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  Speaker 1: not with absolute conquest, but with a truce. Nobunaga agreed
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  Speaker 1: not to execute the Iki leadership, who in return ceded
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  Speaker 1: the province to him. Their main castle at Honganji was
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  Speaker 1: torn down and replaced with Osaka Castle, which still stands
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  Speaker 1: to this day. Many in the Kagaiki were not pleased
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  Speaker 1: with how this ended, and would continue a form of
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  Speaker 1: guerrilla warfare into the fifteen eighties against the greater Japanese forces.
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  Speaker 1: It's difficult to understand the Peasant's kingdom by modern standards.
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  Speaker 1: Though it was not a democracy or a socialist government.
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  Speaker 1: The Iki were driven by a form of religious fanaticism
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  Speaker 1: that overpowered any fear or reverence they had for the shogunates.
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  Speaker 1: But in a time of instability known as the Warring
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  Speaker 1: States period, any form of community felt more solid than
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  Speaker 1: the constantly shifting alliances that characterized their leaders. The Kagaiki
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  Speaker 1: survived in a sense by inverting the power structure that
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  Speaker 1: governed their lives, and for almost one hundred years they
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  Speaker 1: had a kingdom of their own. It may only have
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  Speaker 1: been a brief cul de sac in the middle of
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  Speaker 1: Japanese history, but it's a useful reminder that the power
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  Speaker 1: of a king or a showgun is not a law
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  Speaker 1: of the universe. It's an agreement like any other one,
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  Speaker 1: that only holds weight if the people agree. Thomas Midgley
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  Speaker 1: Junior is one of the most controversial men in history.
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  Speaker 1: If you ask some he was a great mind and
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  Speaker 1: a shining example of American ingenuity. If you ask others, though,
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  Speaker 1: he was a monster with a body count to rival
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  Speaker 1: Hitler or Stalin. But he wasn't a dictator or even
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  Speaker 1: a member of the military. No, he was an inventor,
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  Speaker 1: and he may have had more of an impact on
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  Speaker 1: the world than any other single individual in history. One
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  Speaker 1: day in early nineteen twenty one, Thomas's boss, a guy
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  Speaker 1: named Charles Kettering, came bursting into his lab at General Motors.
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  Speaker 1: He told Thomas that he wanted him to focus on
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  Speaker 1: one thing, and one thing only, inventing a type of
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  Speaker 1: gasoline that didn't knock engines. Engine knocking was a major
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  Speaker 1: problem for early automobiles. The simple gasoline of that time
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  Speaker 1: caused tiny explosions in the engine, which quickly wore it
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  Speaker 1: down and reduced the speed potential of the car. Thomas
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  Speaker 1: always liked to perform well for his superiors, so he
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  Speaker 1: immediately set about solving this problem. He added chemical after
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  Speaker 1: chemical to the gasoline, trying different compounds that might stabilize
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  Speaker 1: the gas. After months of trying, he finally landed on
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  Speaker 1: a solution lead because adding it to the gasoline seemed
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  Speaker 1: to cure the engine knocking problem, but of course it
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  Speaker 1: introduced another issue. Lead is toxic. People had known this
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  Speaker 1: since the days of the Roman Empire, when lead was
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  Speaker 1: used in everything from cookware to cosmetics. Some people believe
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  Speaker 1: it actually drove many Romans mad and contributed to the
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  Speaker 1: empire's downfall. But Thomas figured it would be fine to
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  Speaker 1: use in this case. I mean, no one would be
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  Speaker 1: drinking the gasoline. It would all get safely exhausted out
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  Speaker 1: the back of the car and up into the atmosphere.
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  Speaker 1: What could go wrong? Right? By nineteen twenty three, General
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  Speaker 1: Motors was fully behind Charles and Thomas's use of leaded gasoline.
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  Speaker 1: They opened a plant for producing the gas in New Jersey,
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  Speaker 1: with Thomas supervising. As Thomas sat in his office above
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  Speaker 1: the factory floor. Going over some paperwork, he was startled
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  Speaker 1: by the sudden sound of screams emanating from the work area.
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  Speaker 1: He got up from his seat, left his office and
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  Speaker 1: stood on the catwalk overlooking the plant, and there on
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  Speaker 1: the floor was a group of workers surrounding a man
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  Speaker 1: who was screaming and running around the factory wildly. He
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  Speaker 1: looked like he was fighting monsters that weren't there. He
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  Speaker 1: swatted at the air before curling up into a ball.
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  Speaker 1: Thomas called for the man's sister to come pick him
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  Speaker 1: up and take him home. But just a few days later,
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  Speaker 1: Thomas received distressing news from her the man had died
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  Speaker 1: in the hospital from lead poisoning. The fumes from the
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  Speaker 1: gas were toxic. After all, Thomas had a big press
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  Speaker 1: conference coming up where he was supposed to show off
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  Speaker 1: the wonders of leaded gasoline. The timing could not have
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  Speaker 1: been worse. What's more, over the next week, more and
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  Speaker 1: more of the factory workers began hallucinating and passing out.
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  Speaker 1: Four more people died and thirty five of the forty
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  Speaker 1: nine employees at the plant were hospitalized, and the press
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  Speaker 1: got word of this, and soon Thomas's press conference became
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  Speaker 1: less of an opportunity to show off the product, and
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  Speaker 1: more of a last ditch effort to show that it
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  Speaker 1: was safe. He went ahead with it, and in front
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  Speaker 1: of a room full of angry reporters, he did the
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  Speaker 1: only thing he could think of. He took out a
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  Speaker 1: small bowl of gasoline and used it to wash his hands,
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  Speaker 1: and then he inhaled the vapors, saying that he could
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  Speaker 1: do this every day to no ill effect. It was
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  Speaker 1: completely unscientific, but the press seemed to buy it. Soon
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  Speaker 1: leaded gasoline was being used by millions. No one noticed
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  Speaker 1: when Thomas took a sabbatical to Florida for some fresh air.
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  Speaker 1: The truth was he was now suffering from lead poisoning
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  Speaker 1: like all his other workers. But he did recover, and
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  Speaker 1: over the next several decades, scientists estimate that lead gasoline
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  Speaker 1: killed tens of millions of people, primarily children. Those that
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  Speaker 1: didn't kill had permanent, lifelong brain damage that has been
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  Speaker 1: linked to the rise in violent crime in the late
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  Speaker 1: twentieth century. And it wasn't even Thomas's only deadly invention.
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  Speaker 1: He was also responsible for free on the refrigeration chemical
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  Speaker 1: that damaged the ozone layer. Both it and leaded gasoline
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  Speaker 1: were eventually banned. Curiously, Thomas was eventually hoisted quite literally
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  Speaker 1: by his own hubris. He contacted polio in his fifties,
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  Speaker 1: and by the age of fifty five he was confined
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  Speaker 1: to bed. He designed a complicated system of pulleys that
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  Speaker 1: were meant to allow him to lift himself out of bed,
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  Speaker 1: but one day, when he went to use the contraption,
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  Speaker 1: the ropes twisted, wrapping themselves around his neck. He accidentally
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  Speaker 1: hanged himself, which some saw as cosmic justice. Unfortunately, this
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  Speaker 1: is just one situation where curiosity didn't simply kill the cat,
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  Speaker 1: but a whole lot of other people as well. I
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  Speaker 1: hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about
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  Speaker 1: the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show
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  Speaker 1: was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how
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  Speaker 1: Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore,
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  Speaker 1: which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and
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  Speaker 1: you can learn all about it over at the Worldoflore
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  Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious.