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The Bizarre Tale of the 1909 Catnip Riot · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the man,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: the myth, the legend, Max the cat Slave, williams.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Oh Kiddy got Claws, and.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: There is none other than mister Noel Brown of Fellow
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Lover of Feline's. Noel, how are you feeling today?
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty good, Ben. We had a s we had
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: a mind meld off mic uh, And I'm just gonna
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: kind of tease it a little bit. I was walking today,
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: doing my little morning walk around this pond that is
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: also occupied by geese, and there is poop everywhere, and
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: every time I go, I think goose poop riot.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Ut talking about it.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: There you go. I'm not talking about goose poop riots. Today,
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: We're talking about cat net riot.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: My name is Ben Bollen, and we are talking about
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: something that is a riot. Today's episode is a riot.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: It's not in the way you might assume, Fellow Ridiculous Historians.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: We're excited for this one, and I love the way
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: you teas and we are excited because this comes to
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: us via a listener suggestion from a fellow ridiculous historian,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Stacey r. Over on our Facebook group page Ridiculous Historians.
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  Speaker 2: A shout out to all the ridiculous historians the world
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: over and Ben, if we do our job right or
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  Speaker 2: even a little right, today's episode may well also be
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  Speaker 2: a laugh riot.
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  Speaker 1: Hey, you know what, We're not going to force it,
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  Speaker 1: but I think we'll crack each other up a couple
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  Speaker 1: of times.
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  Speaker 2: That's all. That's all we can ask for.
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  Speaker 1: It's all we could ask for, Nola, and we hope
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  Speaker 1: it gives you a chuckle as well. Let us know
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: this episode is also for fellow fans of our third
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: feline friends. That's a little bit too much alliteration, but
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  Speaker 1: never if you ask me, there, you go there. So
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: we established this in previous episodes. Nol and Max housecats
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  Speaker 1: are somewhat unique in the world of domestication, and there's
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: this pretty convincing argument that they are barely domesticated or
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  Speaker 1: self domesticated at all.
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  Speaker 2: I can attest to that as the as a as
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  Speaker 2: A as a cat dad, there's still some fairal action
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  Speaker 2: going on in there in those kitty brains.
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  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you may have a cat that absolutely loves you,
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  Speaker 1: and then just wanders off for a few weeks and
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  Speaker 1: then comes back three weeks later, like, what's your big deal?
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  Speaker 1: What's your malfunction?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and discovers your rotting corpse and then proceeds to
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  Speaker 2: eat your eyeballs.
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  Speaker 1: Which dogs will do as well.
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  Speaker 2: Oh fair enough, Ben, I'm sorry to malign cats in
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  Speaker 2: this way. It's something that I always say. But Ben,
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  Speaker 2: I would argue that the cats would do.
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  Speaker 1: It quicker time to experiment, Max Dark.
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  Speaker 3: I think the cats would have a lot more fun
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  Speaker 3: doing it too.
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  Speaker 2: They'd play with you. They would bat you around like
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  Speaker 2: a cat toy.
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  Speaker 3: As a cat dad of a very precious, adorable feral
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  Speaker 3: cat who is ten years soon to be eleven years old, Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: you know, I look at her. I'm like, yeah, if
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  Speaker 3: you were gonna get not feral, it would have already happened, right, Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Old cat owners or cat friends have witnessed some anecdotal
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  Speaker 1: evidence about this lack of domestication at one point where
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  Speaker 1: another maybe your cat has Like our friend Lauren Vogelbaum,
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  Speaker 1: one of her cats decided that she was a crappy hunter,
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  Speaker 1: and so it started kill small animals and bringing them
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  Speaker 1: to the list of these events goes on and on.
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  Speaker 1: Share yours on our Facebook page. Cats are famously motivated
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  Speaker 1: by their own self interest. You know, you can train
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  Speaker 1: house cats to some degree, but they're not going to
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  Speaker 1: be like dogs capable of repressing instincts due to training.
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  Speaker 1: If a cat doesn't like what you're pitching, the cat's
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  Speaker 1: gonna throw all that crap out the.
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  Speaker 2: Window literally sometimes, or the very least push it off
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  Speaker 2: the ledge aggressively while maintaining eye contact.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, they'll throw it all out the window. All that
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  Speaker 1: training is bupkus. If they decide they want to do
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  Speaker 1: something else, and back in nineteen oh nine New York,
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  Speaker 1: a bunch of cats banded together to do just that.
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  Speaker 1: This is the ridiculous history of the nineteen oh nine
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  Speaker 1: cat Nip Riot. And spoiler, this is also one for
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  Speaker 1: fans of our earlier Napoleon episode nol. I think folks
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  Speaker 1: will see what we mean in a bit, and you're.
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  Speaker 2: Talking about the the Bunny Mob.
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  Speaker 1: We're talking a bit about a bunny mob.
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  Speaker 2: Not to be confused with the Goodie Mob and the
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  Speaker 2: Dungeon family.
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  Speaker 1: Let's get into it. So a brief bit of foreshadowing,
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  Speaker 1: a brief bit of background and context.
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  Speaker 2: Here.
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  Speaker 1: You've heard the phrase gig economy.
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  Speaker 2: We all have, right, Yeah, it's become a bit of
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  Speaker 2: a buzz phrase in this our modern era, specifically referring
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: to folks who maybe are no longer able to maintain,
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  Speaker 2: you know, the old school type of employment, a salaried,
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  Speaker 2: full time job, and instead perhaps has to do multiple
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  Speaker 2: gig based things like driving Uber or delivering groceries for Instacart,
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: or being a task rabbit some I know, all the
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: ones that I'm listening are Internet based, but that is
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  Speaker 2: kind of what it's become. And I think usually how
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  Speaker 2: it's used.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, taken on other temp work. And it's weird because,
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  Speaker 1: at least here in North America, so in Canada, Mexico,
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  Speaker 1: and the United States, people are still divided on whether
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  Speaker 1: this is a good, neutral or a very bad thing.
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  Speaker 1: A lot of folks in power recently have tried to
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  Speaker 1: sell this gig economy thing as an overall benefit to
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  Speaker 1: public society. And they've said, hey, you know Ted talks
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  Speaker 1: around the world or at symposiums, they've said, hey, a
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  Speaker 1: lot of folks in this gig economy guys, they like it.
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  Speaker 1: They want it that way. It gives them more flexibility
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  Speaker 1: with their families or going to school, or pursuing hobbies.
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  Speaker 2: And there's some truth to that. It absolutely can be
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  Speaker 2: a flexible way of seeking employment, and I'm certain that
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  Speaker 2: there are folks that do it and are able to,
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  Speaker 2: you know, look at it in that exact way. But
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  Speaker 2: sadly the nature of our economy is moving further and
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  Speaker 2: further away from traditional type employments, especially as things like
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  Speaker 2: AI come into the picture and all of that good stuff,
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  Speaker 2: bad stuff.
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  Speaker 1: Really yeah, yeah, agreed, well put because a lot of
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  Speaker 1: other people are going to argue that these claims about
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  Speaker 1: this shiny penny of a gig economy, those claims are
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  Speaker 1: window dressing, smoke and mirrors. Pretty much everybody, the critics say,
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  Speaker 1: would prefer a reliable, well paid, single job with a
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  Speaker 1: clear growth path with stuff like benefits, equity, etc. Wherever
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  Speaker 1: you fall on that debate, it's a bag of badgers
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  Speaker 1: for another day. You might ask, why, oh, pray tell,
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  Speaker 1: are you bringing this up in the first place? Guys?
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  Speaker 1: That is because the gig economy is not a new thing,
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  Speaker 1: you know. No, I was thinking about this earlier when
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  Speaker 1: we're researching some various other episodes. At numerous points throughout history,
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  Speaker 1: the gig economy was normalized a ton of people, especially
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  Speaker 1: with the rise of merchant class. They were laboring under
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  Speaker 1: gig economies, just like the Lazarroti in Naples.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, much like the previously mentioned I think on stuff
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  Speaker 2: that I want you to know, folks that we see
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  Speaker 2: around here in Atlanta doing little pop up fruit stands
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  Speaker 2: or selling Easter baskets, or around the Easter holiday season,
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  Speaker 2: or to your point, pivoting to whatever holiday it might be,
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  Speaker 2: like Valentine's Day.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Lazaroni from our Supreme Pizza episode
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  Speaker 1: were not homeless, but they were living hand to mouth.
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  Speaker 1: They were searching for whatever daily work they could find,
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  Speaker 1: or a hustle we would call it in the modern day,
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  Speaker 1: just like the folks you were mentioning, you know, in
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  Speaker 1: gas stations across the United States, especially in city cidified areas,
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  Speaker 1: especially in our fair metropolis of Atlanta. Then we also
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  Speaker 1: historically see cases of nomadic seasonal labor fairly common in
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  Speaker 1: US history. You've got itinerant job seekers who would travel
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  Speaker 1: sometimes across the country, picking up one farm gig before
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  Speaker 1: moving on to another, and in some cases these folks
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  Speaker 1: would crisscross the nation multiple times, chasing whatever crop was
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  Speaker 1: in season. So the gig economy is very much not new.
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  Speaker 1: People often had a lot of different side hustles, and
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  Speaker 1: our hapless hero of today's story, ge Herman Gottlieb, He
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  Speaker 1: is no different. He is an early twentieth century businessman
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  Speaker 1: in New York City.
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  Speaker 2: Not quite a tycoon, but a bit of a hustler,
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  Speaker 2: bit of a self starter, you know, a bit of
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  Speaker 2: an early kind of startup type dude. And he came
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  Speaker 2: up with a pretty sweet hustle. We don't know a
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  Speaker 2: ton about him, as you said. What we do know
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  Speaker 2: is that he wasn't of that higher echelon class as
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  Speaker 2: you already said. Man. And so in the newspapers of
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  Speaker 2: the day, the term businessman was often used a bit
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  Speaker 2: more generally and diplomatically. Whereas you know today we might
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  Speaker 2: call someone like him a scrappy hustler. That would have
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  Speaker 2: been considered rude or at the.
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  Speaker 1: Very least somewhat demeaning. Right. You would usually only see
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  Speaker 1: papers calling a merchant of some sort a broke hustler
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  Speaker 1: or a tinker or a peddler if they had gained
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  Speaker 1: notoriety for doing something unseemly, you know, selling bad meat,
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  Speaker 1: or swindling people, or hawking illegal goods. So our guy Gottlieb,
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  Speaker 1: the best way to think of him is, like so
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  Speaker 1: many peers of his in New York during this time,
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  Speaker 1: Herman is a merchant at large. Think of like your
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  Speaker 1: modern day street vendor. We both spend a lot of
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  Speaker 1: time in New York City and other very highly developed areas,
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  Speaker 1: and what I think we have all noticed is that
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  Speaker 1: there are tons of street vendors actually in tourists, in
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  Speaker 1: the tourist streets and the tourist districts, and they're selling
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  Speaker 1: any number of things, and their wares may change day
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  Speaker 1: to day, and Gottlieb is kind of in this situation.
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  Speaker 1: It's unreliable income. Fast forward, we're in, you know, August
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  Speaker 1: of nineteen oh nine, and our buddy, Herman Gottlieb is
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  Speaker 1: hard up for cash.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a good point that you make, too, ben
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  Speaker 2: about the variety of wares because, as we know, in
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  Speaker 2: this day and age, short of skirting the law, which
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  Speaker 2: certainly can't happen, there's a lot more regulations around the
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  Speaker 2: types of things that one could, you know, get away
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  Speaker 2: with selling, especially in terms of you know ingestibles.
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  Speaker 1: Let's just there we go diplomatic as ever, No is
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  Speaker 1: this guy Gottlieb. I'm laughing because I was excellent. This
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  Speaker 1: guy Gottlieb. His usual means of income, whatever they may
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  Speaker 1: have been, had either dissipated or they were on pause.
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: But as we know, bill collectors are not famous for
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  Speaker 1: caring about that stuff. It's not as if your expenses
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  Speaker 1: take a vacation when your income peters out. So set
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  Speaker 1: the scene. One August day, our buddy Gottlieb leaves his home.
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  Speaker 1: It's at one eighty eight East ninety ninth Street, and
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  Speaker 1: he is armed with the clothing on his back, a
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  Speaker 1: little money for the subway to big empty baskets, and
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  Speaker 1: a crazy dream. He knew all the other street vendors
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  Speaker 1: in the area, He was aware of the industries through
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  Speaker 1: the city. He wanted to sell something other people weren't chilling,
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  Speaker 1: so we headed to this area off Dykman Street. Dyck
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  Speaker 1: Man Street, which at the time was woody, was forested.
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  Speaker 1: This is in the Inwood section of Manhattan, and there
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  Speaker 1: no Max Fellow ridiculous historians. He located a specific plant
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: he identified earlier. It is h it is constitutionals. In
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  Speaker 1: his walks around town constitutional right. He thought this special
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  Speaker 1: herb could turn his fortunes around. It is Nepotita kataria,
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  Speaker 1: commonly known as.
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  Speaker 2: Catnet cat nep It's true weed for cats.
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  Speaker 1: Basically what is catnip anyway?
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  Speaker 2: Well, it's a kind of mint, as it turns out,
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  Speaker 2: also referred to sometimes there's a different varietal of it, nepita, moussini,
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: double ass, double I, triple I actually but two eyes
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: right together there at the end. Cat mint. They're the
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: most readily available types, with common cat net being the
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: ones that cats seem to dig the most. You'll often
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: hear cat owners describing there and I gotta read I
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: gotta read this as written then their nip living feelines,
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: because that sounds like something else. It sounds like they
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  Speaker 2: just can't put down the teat. But as it is
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: seeming to be a bit, you know, a bit loopy
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  Speaker 2: on the stuff, rolling on the ground looking all blissed
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: out and goofy. You know, there's of course that video
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  Speaker 2: that you also reference here of David Hasselhoff lounging around
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  Speaker 2: and a drunken stupor with cheeseburgers.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, he looks like he looks like a human version
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  Speaker 1: of a cat in that video.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, and I don't know this video, Ben, but I'm
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: going to get me to a YouTube platform and check
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: it out. Of meeting. It's okay, fair enough, but you know,
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: you love to see it. David always seems like he's
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: got his stuff together so much. It's nice to get
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: a little glimpse into the real David Hasselhoff. So what's
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: happening here is, you know, is chemical stuff going on,
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  Speaker 2: and it's actually quite interesting. So if your cat's getting
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: high off the nip, it is actually just really getting
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  Speaker 2: high on smells.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, Yeah, it's it's just super vibing with these
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: aromatic oils that are contained in various species of what
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: we call catnip. The active organic compound that is fusing
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: with your cat and making it go hassle off is
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: something called nepata alasitone. It's correct because it's kind of
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: like huffy in human.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: It's a little bit like, uh, the ether scene in
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas where they're yeah, yeah,
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: sniffing the ether and.
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: Charlie Day huffing painter.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: Anybody does whipps, that's true, whip whipp its, that's correct. Man,
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: it is very, very similar to that type of bad
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: behavior in humans. Cats inhale the aromatic oils of the
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: nip because I'm never gonna stop calling it that, where
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: they then come into contact with receptors in the cat's noses.
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  Speaker 2: These receptors are linked directly to the brain and affect
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  Speaker 2: the cat's behavior and often silly willy ways.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: In such silly willy ways, and I love I love
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: that phrase. So this is why your cat will tend
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: to sniff, rub lick to the stuff. It's usually going
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: to be sold in a powdered or a dried variety, right,
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: and so you sprinkle it around and then the cat
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: goes crazy, the crowd goes wild. But you can also
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: get you can also get fresh versions of these herbs.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: The reason they're doing this is because doing so, agitating
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: the plant substance releases more of that volatile oil and
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: that mood modifying compound. Thanks to our friends at places
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: like vet West, we know the effects can be significant.
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: One of the big myths not every cat is affected
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: by catnip. Young cats seen cats, they don't dig it.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: No jump in here, Yeah it's one of them, Oh no,
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: or oh yeah, I don't know. I guess yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, but the cats to your point, there, no,
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: the cats that are affected may seem intoxicated, well in ecstasy, drooling,
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: rolling around on the floor, making that weird face when
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: they're exposing their smell receptors.
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: And licking, sniffing, and chewing.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is believed that this is a similar reaction
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: cats have when they are exposed to feel good pheromones,
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: the kind of things that get released during courtship or
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: sexual activity.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: I do think it's kind of funny that there doesn't
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: seem to be a negative stigma against the stuff, because
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: it does kind of seem like you're getting your cat high.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: You were very much getting your cat high. You're putting
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: it in an altered state of mind. Some will become
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: super super active, a lot of excessive vocalization. That happens
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: with some of my cats. They might chase and hunt,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: and their predatory behavior might go wild. They might just
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: get the zuomies, you know, And it's a short term high.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: The effects for nip sensitive cats we're talking about five
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: to ten minutes before wearing off, which again Noel reminds
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: me of humans huffing. I don't know how long whippets or.
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: Either lasts or short lived. Most things that you insulfate
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: or you know inhale in that way are typically quite
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: short lived. They're quite intense and quite short lived.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: Okay, And for the I read so, I read so
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  Speaker 1: we learned from the DARE program, which all totally worked
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: for us. So the thing with the cat nip exposure
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: to felines is that the effects are not repeatable for
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: around one to two hours, similar to how we have red.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: Certain hallucinogens are not effective if you keep taking them
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: over and over.
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  Speaker 2: Right, right, there's diminishing returns. You got to have a
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: little cool down period. That's what it is. The cool
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: down period is what we need. But the cats in
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: question don't know that. They tend to recognize the smell
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: from earlier and chase that dragon, chase that high of catnip.
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  Speaker 2: And people are already aware of this by nineteen oh nine.
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  Speaker 2: Our buddy, Herman G is no exception, and he knows
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: exactly where the nip grows wild. He knows also wild nip. Yeah,
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: wild nip, baby, I'm a wild nip. He knows.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: New York has a lot of wealthy cat owners. This
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: seems like a win win, And so, as we said,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: he's out there in Manhattan. He's gathering up these two
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: enormous baskets a cat nip. It takes most of his day.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: And he's not going to sell it there. No, he's
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: not going to sell it in the Broke neighborhood where
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: he lives.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Oh no, this is like a luxury for the Swells.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: And they're feline friends, they're feline familiars.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: And so Gottley takes the subway to Lenox Avenue at
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: one hundred and tenth Street.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: Ah, yes, the Upper west Side.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: Just so, he starts going house to house on Fifth Avenue,
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: super posh area, trying to sell catnip to well to
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: do families with spoiled pet cats. That's right, folks, a
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: door to door cat treat salesman.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: Really quickly, lest any New Yorker's out there ding me
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: for this. I don't think we're quite in Upper west
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: Side territory yet, but we are uptown so and you know,
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: we know, we know the old Uptown girls, uh trope.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: That's where the that's where the wealthier folks live uptown.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: Fifth Avenue, of course, the the shopping district with all
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: kinds of boutiques and fancy shops. So this is indeed
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: what's happening he is trying to It's like going trick
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: or treating in the in the rich neighborhoods. It is
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: exactly like that.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: That's well done yet, but it's a grand scheme. Unfortunately,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: in Herban's case, this does not go as planned, because
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: he was correct in recognizing that New York City has
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and had a lot of cats. But one thing he
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: missed is that, just like the human residents of the
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: Big Apple then and today, New York's feline population also
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: has a stark social divide. There are a lot of
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: There are loads of indoor cats living lives of luxury
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: in the city's finest brownstones, but there's so many other
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: cats living rough on the streets.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: Strays and company.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: Sure, or like in that cursed adaptation of T. S.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: Eliot's Cats. Oh good lord, I forgot about it. I
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: watched the clip of this clip of it for this.
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: And apparently there's a secret cut of it where they
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: have buttholes. Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's an urban legend.
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: I do know the id.
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: Sure, there's a story about somebody having to go back
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: and like a rat shop out all of them.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, That's what I'm saying. So therefore there
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: must be some at least version of the SFX shots
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: that maybe one day we'll see the light of day.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: I don't need to see that it was already cut.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: We need to see it. I yeah, I know real
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: life animals that already have buds.
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: So that is not a good movie.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: Guys, I didn't love it. Take you love the I
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: do love the original poetry.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: The poetry is great. I wasn't even I'm a big
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: musical guy, but I just I didn't even get the musical.
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: It was such a cocaine coked out fever dream like.
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: It was clearly someone was quite high on their own
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: supply of human catnap. I think, yeah, it teaches us
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: by someone, I mean Andrew Floyd Webber.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: It teaches us something that a lot of nineteen eighties
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: pop music taught us, which is sometimes drugs make you
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: want a yes and too much.
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: A little too much. And also both nostalgia and cocaine
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: are hell of drugs, right, And so here's what happens.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: We've got this massive population of strays that got Leeb's
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: not really thinking about and I'm this is going on,
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: I'm scared in some way to exercise empathy or in
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: some way we could say these strays are very similar
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: to Herman Gottlieb because they're working their own day to
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: day gig economy of survival. They're out to get whatever
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: they could get, you know, pick up the scraps, you know, right,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: and a few perfect, a few scraps, A few leaves
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: of catnet fell from Gottlieb's baskets, and stray felines in
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: the area honed in on this. They began rolling and
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: chewing and nipping their little hearts away, and soon after
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: their other friends joined them, drawn by the spell. At first,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: Gottlieb is like shoe shoe or whatever music away with you,
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: Away with you, shoe thou. And it didn't work. He
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: couldn't shoe the cats away because he was walking. He
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: was like a walking ice cream machine.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: Or here was a bit of a pied piper of cats.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: That is what. That's what. Hatching cat nyc, a great
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: source for this story, tells us even though he was
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: pushing these cats away, he was probably just to be honest,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: because of the time, he was probably lightly kicking some
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: of them, you know, or just pushing them with his
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: calves and his ankles, but they were still rubbing against
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: his legs. They were.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: And then under the most sober of circumstances, you know
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: what happens when you push a cat away when it's
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: got a mind to be rubbing up on you.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Now, now you've put it in a situation where
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: it's like the human doth protest too much.
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: Right, I mean, like god forbid, you're trying to play
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: a video game or something or watch a movie. They
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: have no that makes no never mind to them. They
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: will climb right up on my chest when I'm on
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: a bean bag and obstruct my view of my borderlands.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: And no matter how many times I pushed him away,
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: he comes right on back.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: I've got a cat doing that right now, shout out
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: to doctor Rankman. So in no time at all, at
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: least forty cats were following this guy. That's why people
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: start calling Gottlieb the pie Piper of catnip after this.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: If you also, if you go to contemporary reports from
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: newspaper dot com or so on, you'll see things like
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: the New York Herald and the Washington Times from August
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: nineteenth nineteen oh nine, and they're having a lot of
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: fun with how they good writing?
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, classic early turn of the century newspaper writing, all right,
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: do a voice, please, I'm gonna add think I'm gonna
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: just do it straight because the words are enough to
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: push you in. You know what I'm talking about. Of
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: course I'm gonna do voice. Uh. Shamefaced felines whose permanent
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: addresses were alleys and backyards came stealthily forth, all of
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: them rich and poor aristocrats from the sofa cushions near
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: the front windows, and then plebeians from the area ways
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: struggled mightily to get into the two baskets of nip.
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: I had to say it that way. It was actually
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: written cat nap, but two baskets of nip.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: Come on, I've been having too much fun with usually
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: the word nip here. But yes, yes, and perfect voice.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: Could we get applause Q from old maxequ thank you?
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: I'm so.
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: It continues, so the paper says, when mister Gottlieb saw
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: police Sergeant John F. Higgins on one hundred and fourteenth Street,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: he cried out with joy. At last he thought someone
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: could help him disperse this band of felines. Sergeant Higgins
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: wasn't so kind, though, and he immediately arrested this cat
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: re pedler for causing a crowd to collect, which was
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: against the law.
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: It was against the law exactly. It goes on though,
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: with Gottlieb making a bit of an absurd statement. I'm
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: gonna say, right up right here, why don't you arrest
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: the cat nip that is collecting the crowd, not me? Bro.
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: I think you're missing the point here.
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: I think, yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree. But to be clear,
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: Herman's big hustle is not going the way he wanted
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: it to go. Like he hasn't sold all the cat up.
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: The strays are after him, and now the police are
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: on his case, and he's like, ah, god, why am
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: I in a what's that? What's that Adam Sandler film
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: about jewelry?
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: Oh?
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: Oh, uncut gems? Yeah, he's in like an uncut gem situation.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: He's going, why is this getting worse? Sergeant Higgins again
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: per the papers, replied, come on before the cats from
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: the Bronx and Jersey get here, and they He takes
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: Gottlieb to the police house on East one hundred and
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: four Street. Cats are still following these guys aggressively, and
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: they follow them inside the station house and Sergeant Higgins says, Okay,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: I've got to go to my superior, a guy named
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: Lieutenant Laski. He reports the arrest. He's like, you know,
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: Lieutenant or Moss, you're not gonna believe this one. You
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: can look around the police station. You see how they're
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: like more cats than usual. It's this dude's fault. And
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: then Lieutenant Laski says, you know, we can't hold this man.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: The law says a man must not cause a crowd
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: of people to collect. The law doesn't say anything about cats,
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: and Higgins is also having a bad day at this point.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: He's kind of pissed.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: He says, the law doesn't say anything about people, Sir.
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: It says a crowd. A crowd of cats is certainly
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: a crowd. So they start arguing over how to interpret
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: the laws, and more and more cats are coming into
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: the station because they're following the scent of those cat
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: nip baskets. The police do have two feline officers of
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: their own. One is asleep at the wheel and the other,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: one named Pete, starts fighting off the intruding kit.
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: Wait police. Cat's ben that's absurd.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: Police cats, Well, a lot of things are absurd.
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: That's true, man, that's true. The human police did join
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: Pete and eventually driving out the mob of nip crazed kitties.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Authorities put Godleb and his baskets into a paddy wagon.
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: Then they escorted him back to his home at one
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: eighty eight eighth ninety ninth Street. I think it's okay,
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: we're not doing him because he's not alive anymore. And
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: then of course the cats hotly pursued. Oh yeah, oh yeah.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: They were no match for the speed of the wagon,
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: most of them.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: This is very Napoleon Carriage, Jurassic Park bunny mob coated,
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: is it not.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: Cat nip Bryan. So the thing we have to remember
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: to just logistically, is that as the wagon is moving
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: through town, it's encountering other stray cats who catch the
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: smell of the nip. Right they want to chase that
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: herbal dragon. So Gottlieb finally gets back to his place.
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: As far as we can tell, he did not himself
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: own a cat. There was one single old Tom from
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: across town, still in dogged pursuit. According to the story,
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: catted pursuit cated pursuit even better. According to the story,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: herman g is running to his front door, or is
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: running to the door of his place, and he turns
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: around because he sees this one last cat after him,
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: and he's mid run. He throws a handful of cat
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: nip leaves Sandea exactly, and he yells, he apparently yells,
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: don't tell your relatives or your friends, and then he
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: slams the door shut. This is the ridiculous history of
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: the nineteen o nine cat nip riot. I mean, is
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: that not similar to the Napoleon Rabbit?
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: Hugely so? And if anyone needs reminding you, you should
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: go back and check out the episode, if only to
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: see what we were like in the earliest days. I
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: actually stand behind that one. I think it was pretty
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: damn good. But yeah, it was about Napoleon, of course,
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: in his opulence, basically demanding a sort of staged rabbit hunt,
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: and of course nobody knew about domestications, so they just
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: like had all of these kind of wild rabbits who
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: did not behave as expected, and they ultimately created like
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: that movie Critters, you know, where they become a giant
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: ball of critters. It was very similar to that, Ben,
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: I want to try something out on you in Maxwell quick.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Sure, let's go for it.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: The idea of being surprised by someone while in the bathroom,
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: calling or doing that, you either are Jurassic parked or
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: you Jurassic park somebody, like that scene when the lawyer
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: you know is in the toilet and gets a t rext.
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: Can we make this happen? Man? Can we make can
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: we make Jurassic parks happen?
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, I got your six.
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: Okay, thanks, buddy, I appreciate it.
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: That so to be clear for all of us listening,
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: all right, if you are surprised while you're in the restroom,
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: you got Jurassic parked. If you surprise someone AFO, then
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: you are Jurassic parking them. Awesome, Yeah, got it. Let's
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: mint it. That's up there with straight seahorse teeth. Let's
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: let's get that now.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: Ideally, either of these actions would be completely by mistake.
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: You don't want to do this to somebody on purpose.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: That would be I have problematic problem.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: I've had to do it before in emergency situations, and
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I didn't really like it. I've been on both sides
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: of the stall or the latrine there, but it is
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: a super awkward moment when you know somebody is pooping,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: which is a very vulnerable position, and because of an emergency,
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: you have to be like, sorry, man, bad time, but
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: the building's on fire. So not saying now, but finish
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: up when you can. Just get off Reddit.
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: Please, we want.
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: You to live. We want you to live. We're gonna
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: keep this one short. This war is self contained, one
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: part with big, big thanks to again our listener who
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: inspired this, Stacey r Over on our Facebook page, Ridiculous Historians.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: Now before we do our autros, Max, I see you
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: pop back in the chat. What's up man?
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: Oh, just confirming that I am down with the term
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: Jurassic parking and also facusar facusar.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: Is another one we're trying to get going. What's that
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: remind me?
• 33:44
  Speaker 4: Falcasar falcasar, falconsar like falcon falcon and okay, maybe what
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: does the aportmanteau help me out? I want to wait
• 33:52
  Speaker 4: a part of this no one knows, no one knows
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: you you also, you know, I know where we're wrapping
• 33:58
  Speaker 4: it up, and I'm totally down with that. But you
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: did find a handful of really, really fun other kind
• 34:04
  Speaker 4: of unusual riots from a piece over a mental flaws.
• 34:08
  Speaker 4: I do propose perhaps that maybe we save those for
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: one of our kind of leftovers episodes.
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, agreed fully, Let's let's keep those other historically weird
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: riots or ridiculous riots for a story in the future.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: But Folks, as Nol was saying, spoiler, it turns out
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: that history is chock full of ridiculous riots. This one
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: was with kats, the other one was with bunnies. There
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: are so many others out there. Thank you so much
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: for tuning in, Folks.
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: Don't forget about the zootsuit riot.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Don't forget never never forget about the suit suit riot?
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: Why does that sound somewhat offensive? Big thanks to our
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: super producer mister Max Williams. Big thanks to Alex Williams'
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: biological brother who composed.
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: This Yes, and our brother in arms and in song.
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: Huge thanks to Chris Frosciotis and Eves Jeff cos Here
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: in Spirit, Jonathan Strickland, the quiz Stir and A. Jbahama
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: Jacobs the Puzzler.
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: Doctor Rachel Big Spinach, Lance the Rude Dudes a ridiculous crime.
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: If you dig us, you'll love them I've been our
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: research associate for this episode, and big, big thanks Nol,
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: not just to you, you know, you're like one of
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: my main guys, but also big thanks to all the
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: cats in our lives who have yet to eat our eyes.
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: Oh Ben, that's really great rhyme and a really lovely sentiment.
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: Let's see you next time, folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: to your favorite shows.