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Rolling Stones · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
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Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Among the many stories told of lost cities,
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Speaker 1: a few standouts. Plato spoke of a fictional island known
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Speaker 1: as Atlantis, which boasted a powerful navy that attacked Athens,
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Speaker 1: but was defeated and eventually lost to the ocean. Legends
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Speaker 1: about the tribal chief of the Muska people in Colombia
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Speaker 1: have changed over the years. At first, the chief was
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Speaker 1: a single man covered in gold. Over time, the stories
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Speaker 1: about the chief became stories out a great city than
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Speaker 1: an entire kingdom made of gold, known simply as El Dorado.
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Speaker 1: But as far as we can tell, they're all just stories.
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Speaker 1: Though they have taken on lives of their own through
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Speaker 1: various retellings and with the help of popular culture, they
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Speaker 1: are no truer than they were thousands of years ago. However,
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Speaker 1: not all lost cities are fake. One was found in
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Speaker 1: India in nineteen seventy five, though its creator probably wished
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Speaker 1: that it stayed lost. This place, known as the Divine
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Speaker 1: Kingdom of Sukrani, was discovered in the city of Chandagar
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Speaker 1: in northern India. How it had gone hidden for so
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Speaker 1: long is a mystery. As the kingdom had stretched across
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Speaker 1: twelve acres, Indian authorities who toured the site didn't know
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Speaker 1: what to expect, but were surprised by their findings. Much
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Speaker 1: of the kingdom had been comprised of large stone sculptures.
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Speaker 1: One area was home to a piece known as the
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Speaker 1: Dancing Girls, which was made up of dozens of stone
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Speaker 1: statues similar in height. Their skirts were all different, some
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Speaker 1: in black, others adorned with white or blue fragments of
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Speaker 1: unknown origin. Deeper into the kingdom, waterfalls cascaded over rocks
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Speaker 1: into small rivers and lagoons, which were bordered on both
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Speaker 1: sides by stone pathways. A temple like structure had been
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Speaker 1: erected over one of the waterfalls, and rocky bridges spanned
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Speaker 1: the rivers to allow passage from one side to the other.
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Speaker 1: Rocks had also been arranged into animal shapes, such as
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Speaker 1: cows and birds, which had been placed across the land
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Speaker 1: in herds. Ornate mosaics comprised of tiny ceramic pieces adorned
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Speaker 1: walls and walkways. All of these creations, made of pebbles,
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Speaker 1: rocks and boulders, gave the city its other nickname, the
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Speaker 1: Rock Garden of Chandagar. Walking along its surprisingly sturdy paths
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Speaker 1: was a joy as explorers took in the sights of
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Speaker 1: elaborate carvings and statues, all of which had been erected
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Speaker 1: on a tract of land that had gone unnoticed for ages.
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Speaker 1: There were so many individual structures to see it was
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Speaker 1: hard to know how many people it had taken to
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Speaker 1: build the kingdom. Well, one person knew. His name was
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Speaker 1: neck Chand, and he had built the whole thing himself.
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Speaker 1: Neck Chand came from simple means. Born in modern day Pakistan,
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Speaker 1: Chand worked as a roads inspector for the Chandagar Public
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Speaker 1: Works Department. In nineteen fifty one, an architect known as
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Speaker 1: Lacobusier had been hired to design Chandagar as the first
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Speaker 1: planned city in India. It was set to become the
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Speaker 1: new capital of Punjab. Chand would ride his bicycle several
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Speaker 1: miles from his home in Chandagar, where he supervised the
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Speaker 1: construction of the city's new highways. The chand wasn't only
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Speaker 1: a roads inspector, He was also a collector. He liked
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Speaker 1: to pick up small rocks and stones on his commute,
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Speaker 1: items he described as both ancient and alive, and deposit
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Speaker 1: them in a nearby gorge. His job at the public
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Speaker 1: works allowed him to access the tools and materials the
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Speaker 1: workers used to build the roads, and the local dump
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Speaker 1: provided him with even more elements to incorporate into his
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Speaker 1: vast creation. Jandagar's construction had caused the demise of two
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Speaker 1: nearby villages, whose homes and personal belongings had been tossed away.
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Speaker 1: Of course, you know what they say, One man's trash
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Speaker 1: is another man's art installation. Beginning in nineteen fifty seven,
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Speaker 1: he worked under the cover of night, assembling his sculptures
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Speaker 1: and archways out of the rocks, bathroom sinks, forks, knives,
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Speaker 1: and other refuse. He did all of this far from
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Speaker 1: the prime eyes of his supervisors and Chandergar. Had they
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Speaker 1: known what he was up to, they would have stopped him.
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Speaker 1: You see, the gorge he had chosen to build his
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Speaker 1: sites had been designated as protected land. His art wasn't
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Speaker 1: just beautiful, it was an act of rebellion. Chand kept
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Speaker 1: at it for eighteen years until some health officials investigating
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Speaker 1: the area happened to come across it in nineteen seventy five.
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Speaker 1: By then, he had already planted trees and created almost
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Speaker 1: two thousand sculptures from things he'd found on his bike
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Speaker 1: rides to and from work. The city trying to have
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Speaker 1: it demolished, but people came from all over India to
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Speaker 1: see what Chand had built. Not wanting to kill a
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Speaker 1: possible tourist trap or admit that they had at and
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Speaker 1: paying attention to something going on right under their noses,
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Speaker 1: Jander Guard passed in order to let the rock gardens stand.
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Speaker 1: Jand was given the title of Chief Creator, which came
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Speaker 1: with a salary and fifty additional workers who would help
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Speaker 1: him expand and maintain his creation. He kept at it
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Speaker 1: until he passed away in two thousand fifteen. Not a
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Speaker 1: bad ending for the man who built his city on rocks.
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Speaker 1: That role privilege is a double edged sword. Those who
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Speaker 1: have it become accustomed to the comfort it brings, whether
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Speaker 1: that comfort is monetary or knowing they'll never have to
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Speaker 1: work as hard as others to get ahead, they believe
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Speaker 1: they're invulnerable to poverty, illness, and the rest of the
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Speaker 1: world's problems plaguing the less fortunate. For Michael Rockefeller, privilege
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Speaker 1: allowed him to travel the world and have the kinds
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Speaker 1: of experiences most people only dream of, but it also
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Speaker 1: came at a cost. Rockefeller was born in nineteen thirty
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Speaker 1: eight to Mary and Nelson Rockefeller. His father, grandfather, and
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Speaker 1: great grandfather had made their last name synonymous with wealth
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Speaker 1: and power, from Standard Oil to U. S Steel and
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Speaker 1: the US Vice presidency. The Rockefellers never knew anything but
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Speaker 1: a life where the best was rarely good enough. Michael
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Speaker 1: was one of seven children and attended the finest schools
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Speaker 1: growing up. However, he didn't coast on his family's name
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Speaker 1: or reputation when it came to his school work. He
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Speaker 1: was smart and had many varied interests. He gravitated towards
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Speaker 1: art and history, much to his father's chagrin. Nelson had
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Speaker 1: wanted his son to follow in his footsteps, which meant
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Speaker 1: putting on a suit and managing the family's business affairs. Michael, though,
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Speaker 1: chose a different path. By the early nineteen sixties, he
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Speaker 1: was working on his graduate degree in anthropology at Harvard
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Speaker 1: when he got the idea to visit a place rarely seen.
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Speaker 1: It was an island off the coast of Australia called
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Speaker 1: Papua New Guinea, known then as Dutch New Guinea. The
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Speaker 1: young Rockefeller had secured permission from the Dutch National Museum
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Speaker 1: of Ethnology in the Netherlands to take a trip to
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Speaker 1: the island. He would be traveling with the express purpose
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Speaker 1: of obtaining art made by the native Osmat people who
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Speaker 1: lived there, which he would then put on display back home.
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Speaker 1: The Asthma people of the Aganop tribe greeted Rockefeller and
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Speaker 1: his team with trepidation. Many had never seen white men before,
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Speaker 1: nor had they ever seen technology such as cameras. Though
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Speaker 1: the indigenous peoples of the island tolerated the Americans documenting them,
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Speaker 1: one thing was clear. Rockefeller was not allowed to take
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Speaker 1: any of their art. Violators of this one edict might
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Speaker 1: meet an end similar to those of rival villages who
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Speaker 1: dared cross the Asthmats. Their heads would be cut off
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Speaker 1: and they would be eaten by the tribe. Rockefeller didn't worry, though,
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Speaker 1: to him, the Asma were primitive compared to his advanced
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Speaker 1: Western ways, he would have been wiser not to underestimate them, though,
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Speaker 1: as his hubris would be instrumental in his downfall. He
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Speaker 1: returned to America knowing that he'd have to make a
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Speaker 1: return trip to the island if he was going to
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Speaker 1: get the art he needed for his new exhibit. In
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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty one, Rockefeller boarded a boat with an anthropologist
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Speaker 1: neighbor in a Wassing for a second try. They had
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Speaker 1: almost reached the village when their boat was overturned in
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Speaker 1: a storm. The two men floated there, holding onto their
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Speaker 1: capsized hull, over ten miles from the island. As Rockefeller
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Speaker 1: bobbed in the water, weighing his choices, he decided he
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Speaker 1: would swim for it. I think I can make it,
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Speaker 1: he said, and then Wassing watched him take off, unaware
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Speaker 1: those would be his companion's final words. The future air
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Speaker 1: of the Rockefeller Fortune was never seen again. A search
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Speaker 1: was conducted over the following weeks for Michael Rockefeller's body.
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Speaker 1: It was never found. One theory suggested that he was
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Speaker 1: eaten by sharks on his way to shore, and that
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Speaker 1: premise was only half right. It took fifty years, but
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Speaker 1: journalist Carl Hoffman eventually got the truth rocket Feller's death
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Speaker 1: had been covered up. He learned from members of the
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Speaker 1: outs Janup tribe that Michael had the unfortunate luck of
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Speaker 1: being in the wrong place at the wrong time. You see,
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Speaker 1: three years before his first trip to the island, the
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Speaker 1: outs Janup had gone to war with a rival tribe,
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Speaker 1: and many on each side had been killed. The newly
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Speaker 1: installed Dutch colonial government couldn't have these warring factions threatening
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Speaker 1: their men, so they took matters into their own hands.
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Speaker 1: They attempted to subdue the rival tribe. Unfortunately, a miscommunication
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Speaker 1: led to four Janup war leaders getting shot instead. To them,
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Speaker 1: the other tribe was no longer the problem white men were.
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Speaker 1: Michael Rockefeller had in fact made it to the island
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Speaker 1: after his boat had capsized. Those who caught a glimpse
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Speaker 1: of him thought he was a crocodile at first, until
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Speaker 1: they got a closer look. When they saw that he
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Speaker 1: was a two on or white man, they figured he
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Speaker 1: was part of the Dutch colonizers who had come to
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Speaker 1: their village several years earlier. And to make matters worse,
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Speaker 1: the specific as Janup who had spotted him had been
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Speaker 1: the sons of the murdered war leaders, so they took
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Speaker 1: their revenge out on Rockefeller. Michael Rockefeller had been born
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Speaker 1: into a life of means. He believed himself to be
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Speaker 1: above others, especially those of a culture are different from
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Speaker 1: his own. None of it mattered in the end, though
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Speaker 1: no amount of privilege would have saved him that day.
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Speaker 1: It's a cautionary tale that teaches us a lot about
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Speaker 1: respect and valuing our differences. It shows us what can
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Speaker 1: happen when power gets in the way of peace, and
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Speaker 1: above all, it shows us just how curious our world
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Speaker 1: truly is, and sometimes that's enough. I hope you've enjoyed
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Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for
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Speaker 1: free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show
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Speaker 1: by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created
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Speaker 1: by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works.
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Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
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Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can
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Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the World of Lore
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Speaker 1: dot Come and until next time, stay curious. Yeah h