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The Noble -- and Kind of Ridiculous -- History of Butlers · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Histories, a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to the show,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much for tuning in.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Let's give a shout out to our super producer, Max
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Jeeves Williams.
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  Speaker 2: I knew you were gonna go with Jeeves. This is
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: the best one. Best remember asked Jeeves? If you guys
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  Speaker 2: ever asked Jeeves about anything? Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: Remember I think I asked something stupid and dirty from
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  Speaker 3: ask Jeeves.
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  Speaker 2: But that's about it. Like, yeah, I remember the time,
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  Speaker 2: We're faintly thinking this is some sort of novel thing.
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  Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, wasn't asked Jeeves
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  Speaker 2: just kind of a subpar search engine.
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  Speaker 1: For its time. It was pretty dope, it was. But
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  Speaker 1: of course, you know, search engine technology has its ebbs
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  Speaker 1: and flows, and for a lot of people in the
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  Speaker 1: time that ask Jeeves came about, the idea that you
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  Speaker 1: would have this electronic butler or concierge kind of familiarized
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  Speaker 1: people with the idea of search engine. So I think
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  Speaker 1: for that reason it was pretty successfulness day. I'm Ben Bowling,
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  Speaker 1: You're Nold Brown. It is I and Ben. By the way,
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  Speaker 1: this very one for the folks listening playing along at home.
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  Speaker 2: His nickname in our video chat platform Thinking Today is
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  Speaker 2: mister Belvidere, and I would argue that the ask jeeves
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  Speaker 2: quid essential Butler logo or whatever the titular jeeves very
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  Speaker 2: much mister Belvidere kind of situation.
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  Speaker 1: Guys, this is part of the inspiration for today's episode.
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  Speaker 1: So peep behind the curtain. This idea, the idea of
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  Speaker 1: Butler's as an episode, came to us while Noel and
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  Speaker 1: r pal Matt and I were recording another show we
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  Speaker 1: do called Stuff that Will Wants You to Know is
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  Speaker 1: a true story. I was kind of a square, goody
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  Speaker 1: goodye as a child, and the first time I ever
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  Speaker 1: lingered or called in sick to school, it was to skip.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing was wrong. I skipped school and obsessively watched an
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  Speaker 1: all day Mister Belvidere marathon. I couldn't tell you what
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  Speaker 1: happens on the show. It's just I love the theme song.
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  Speaker 2: It's a good example of that golden age where sitcom
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  Speaker 2: theme songs gave you the whole rundown. They let you
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  Speaker 2: know the stakes right up front, and not to make light,
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  Speaker 2: but there is one thing, one little clip of mister
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  Speaker 2: Belvidere that has been making the rounds lately, and it
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  Speaker 2: is where this little neighbor kid who apparently has been
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  Speaker 2: diagnosed with HIV. It's one of those special episodes that
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  Speaker 2: deals with a hot button issue and the clip that
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  Speaker 2: goes around is just apropos of nothing. This little kid
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  Speaker 2: comes in and mister Belvidere goes, oh, hello, Johnny, how
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  Speaker 2: are you an? He goes, wow, pretty good, except that
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  Speaker 2: I have aids. Oh my god, just I'm sorry again
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  Speaker 2: not to make light at all in Golden Time. It
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  Speaker 2: makes me think of like Kelly Kapowski getting hopped up
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  Speaker 2: on speed and singing, I'm so excited. I'm so excited,
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  Speaker 2: you know. I mean a lot of these after school
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  Speaker 2: special aspects of these nineties sitcoms they did get dark.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, they're like, hey, this is usually the twenty five
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  Speaker 1: to twenty eight minutes during week that you're guaranteed to laugh,
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  Speaker 1: but this week it's human trafficking exactly, and they.
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  Speaker 2: Still don't change the theme song. Or Mark from Home
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  Speaker 2: Improvement wears a dog collar and a tool shirt, and
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  Speaker 2: all of a sudden, his parents are genuinely concerned for
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  Speaker 2: his immortal soul. I love those things.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe we should do an episode on weird special episodes.
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  Speaker 2: There's a dozens of them. Yes, yeah, I say one
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  Speaker 2: million percent. You know again, there was even an episode
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  Speaker 2: of Rosanne where like I believe they found out that
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  Speaker 2: or one of her daughters was Becky. I think was
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  Speaker 2: like do an acid or something like that. This is
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  Speaker 2: the whole thing. Wow.
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  Speaker 1: We also know that, Okay, butlers are iconic in film
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  Speaker 1: and fiction. The majority of people when they think of butler's,
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  Speaker 1: we think of fictional butlers because most people simply do
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  Speaker 1: not have personal household servants. But butlers are like the
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  Speaker 1: ambassador of servants, and it would be depay on your personality.
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  Speaker 1: I think it would be great to have a butler
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  Speaker 1: because modern life, I've been thinking about this a lot.
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  Speaker 1: You guys, modern life is kind of tough. If you're
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  Speaker 1: an adult, you essentially have two jobs minimum. You've got
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  Speaker 1: the one job you do that pays your bills, right
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: like in our case, producing and podcasting, and then you
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: have the second job of all the other stuff you
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  Speaker 1: have to do just to exist in society, laundry, chores, appointments.
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  Speaker 1: You know, if you're a parent, you know this struggle well,
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  Speaker 1: because you're done with your first job, and then your
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  Speaker 1: other job is you know, you have to make sure
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  Speaker 1: things stay on the level with your children, or if
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  Speaker 1: you have put paid your way through college, then you
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  Speaker 1: have to do college as a job, and then you
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: have to do your job as a job. So what
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  Speaker 1: if there were a way to outsource this? What if
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  Speaker 1: we let's get some fantasy music, Max.
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  Speaker 2: There it is.
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  Speaker 1: What if you came home from work and the kitchen
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  Speaker 1: was already clean, the cutlery was polished, the invitations for
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  Speaker 1: the birthday soiree was sent, the laundry was folded, the
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  Speaker 1: lawn was freshly trimmed. This brings us to the strange,
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  Speaker 1: at times disturbing history of butlers.
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  Speaker 2: And I didn't know this though.
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  Speaker 1: Their first job, Like if you go back through antiquity,
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  Speaker 1: the butler was the guy who was in charge of
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  Speaker 1: the booze.
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  Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, he maintained the wha and probably required a
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  Speaker 2: pretty deep knowledge of the finer things. I mean. Typically
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  Speaker 2: a butler occupies sort of a rarefied echelon of society. Right,
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  Speaker 2: you wouldn't even call it a butler if you were
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  Speaker 2: just like upper middle class, you'd have like maybe a
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  Speaker 2: housekeeper or like a yard man or something like that.
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  Speaker 2: It might even go so far as to call it
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  Speaker 2: a grounds keeper. But more or less, the butler is
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  Speaker 2: kind of the like major domo of the household in
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  Speaker 2: many ways, like if you look at the upstairs downstairs
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  Speaker 2: and ness of like a down n abbey type situation,
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  Speaker 2: the butler would be kind of the big boss, sort
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  Speaker 2: of like you know, who reports directly to the lady
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  Speaker 2: in lord of the house and sort of makes sure
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  Speaker 2: keeps tabs on the rest of the staff. Yeah. Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: one hundred percent.
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  Speaker 1: In the ancient days, In the ancient times, all the
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  Speaker 1: way up through the medieval period, alcoholic beverages, like you said,
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  Speaker 1: were stored in these earthenware vessels and then later in
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  Speaker 1: wooden barrels and casks. They were considered a huge part
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  Speaker 1: of an estate's wealth or prime among their possessions. So
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  Speaker 1: I love your example of these yeah assets. I love
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  Speaker 1: your example of the yard guy. A lot of people
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  Speaker 1: have you know, someone comes by once a month or
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  Speaker 1: whatever to move their lawn or do some landscaping, But
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  Speaker 1: you wouldn't let that person also be the guy to
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  Speaker 1: take your mercedes on a road trip. Right, That feels
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  Speaker 1: like a different job and so the butt take it
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  Speaker 1: to get it washed. Yeah, maybe to pay how well,
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  Speaker 1: you know the.
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  Speaker 2: Guy, right, I get I guess that's sort of the deal.
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  Speaker 2: It's it's not a matter of like distrust or whatever.
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  Speaker 2: This is also sort of like a at what point
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  Speaker 2: do you consider somebody worthy of being in charge of
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  Speaker 2: your precious precious things?
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  Speaker 1: Exactly exactly, that's a great way to put it. So,
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  Speaker 1: the care of these alcoholic containers or these beverage containers
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  Speaker 1: was generally only reserved for trusted individuals. Often these individuals
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  Speaker 1: were enslaved people. The job could go to free people,
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  Speaker 1: but if it did, it was usually because their father
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  Speaker 1: and their father before them was the butler for the family.
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  Speaker 1: So this was an intergenerational thing. It's even it even
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  Speaker 1: shows up in the Bible. The Book of Genesis contains
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  Speaker 1: a reference to a chief butler or chief cup bearer.
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  Speaker 2: It's the cup bearer, and not to mention this is
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  Speaker 2: also requires someone of a trusted standing because it was
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  Speaker 2: often a means of poisoning or doing harm individuals you
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  Speaker 2: know that are in high ranking positions or whatever. So
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  Speaker 2: you see, of course we know the little story of
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  Speaker 2: the like food taster or whatever. But oftentimes the cup bearer.
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  Speaker 2: You needed someone in charge of the uh so, the
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  Speaker 2: supply chain and the flow of these things that the
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  Speaker 2: low lady of the house would be consuming. And you
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  Speaker 2: need that person to be someone who you would literally
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  Speaker 2: trust with your life, that cup bearer exactly. Yeah, and
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  Speaker 2: let's play.
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  Speaker 1: This also happened in ancient Greece and Rome, and then
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  Speaker 1: they're in the medieval era. They had something called the
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  Speaker 1: pinserna who would do the same thing, the cup bearer
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  Speaker 1: for the court. If you look at the let's play
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  Speaker 1: the etymology game. As a matter of fact, Butler, the
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  Speaker 1: word we use today comes from a Middle English word
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  Speaker 1: bouteller and some old French words. No, I think I'll
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  Speaker 1: need your help with this phrase.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, it makes me think if I believe it's
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  Speaker 2: a poet, the French poet Baudelaire. Oh yeah, Bodlier, I believe,
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  Speaker 2: you know, but you know, you gotta wonder if that
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  Speaker 2: is if Baudelaire is maybe almost one of those nominative
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  Speaker 2: determinism type situations like Bolin or Baker. Yeah. Maybe.
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  Speaker 1: And before that, there was another word that led to butler.
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  Speaker 1: It is Middle Latin particula, which is hilarious wasn't there
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  Speaker 1: a young adult book about a vampire rabbit Banicula.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, but Barticula is a vampire, but it just comes
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  Speaker 2: for you. It sucks out your life's essence in the night.
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  Speaker 2: That would be an amazing story.
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  Speaker 1: I think we we put that in our back pocket
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  Speaker 1: because we've been coming up with some great cinematic pitches
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: and no spoilers, folks, but one of our one of
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: our friends of the show actually wrote to us recently
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  Speaker 1: and said, Hey, remember that weird riff you guys were doing.
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  Speaker 2: What if we tried to make it real? It's already
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  Speaker 2: real in our minds. Guest, that's all that matters to me.
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  Speaker 2: But it would be fun for sure. Man. There was
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  Speaker 2: a whole universe around Banicula. There was the Celery Stalks
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  Speaker 2: at Midnight. Oh here, Lauren Vogelbaum in front of the show,
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  Speaker 2: actually has a Banicula t shirt that she wears out
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  Speaker 2: and about. It was a very popular series of young
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: adult kind of comedy, cuddly horror books. You know, there
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  Speaker 2: were quite a few. But yeah, Latin uh Budtists, busies,
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  Speaker 2: I'm gonna say Buddhists, referring to that that very specific
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  Speaker 2: uh vessel, the cask that would be used to store
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  Speaker 2: the fine wines in the cellar. And the modern English
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  Speaker 2: butler therefore does get its origins from bottles and casks.
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  Speaker 2: Just clap your hands, yeah, your hands, Just clap your hands.
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  Speaker 1: Also, it does sound a little bit more dignified than
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  Speaker 1: bottle boy or buttle boy. But boy, bye boy, we
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  Speaker 1: had somebody had to say, yeah, somebody stop us please.
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  Speaker 2: It is interesting though, but you know, I think it's
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  Speaker 2: easy to be dismissive of just the idea of boy,
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  Speaker 2: bring me wine, you know, but there really is a
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  Speaker 2: certain trust in this chain of custody of like, you know,
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  Speaker 2: from being the person that oversees receiving these barrels to
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  Speaker 2: make sure a they're very pricey, they need to be
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  Speaker 2: taken care of and stored correctly in all of that
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  Speaker 2: so they don't spoil. But it really is important to
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  Speaker 2: have someone that's very trusted that providing you with this
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  Speaker 2: thing that could potentially kill you. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: And originally the European butler was kind of a middle
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  Speaker 1: ranking member of the servants in a great house or
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  Speaker 1: big estate, and they were just in charge of what
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  Speaker 1: was called the buttery, which is where you would store.
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  Speaker 1: These butts severage. Yeah, they call them butts of liquor.
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  Speaker 1: And then if we go to the Elizabethan era, we
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  Speaker 1: see the steward becomes a little bit closer to the
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  Speaker 1: modern butler. And then if you go through the eighteen hundreds,
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  Speaker 1: the Victorian era in particular, you see that there is
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  Speaker 1: an explosion of butlers and other domestic servants in different countries,
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  Speaker 1: including the United States. The butler, by this point evolves
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  Speaker 1: to be that senior male servant of a household staff.
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  Speaker 1: But of course butler's today it's a gender neutral term.
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  Speaker 1: There are female and male identifying butlers. Back in the day, though,
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  Speaker 1: this guy was like almost a little emperor of the downstairs,
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  Speaker 1: you know, like like you said with Downtown Abbey. By
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  Speaker 1: this time, your butler is going to be in charge
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  Speaker 1: of the wine cellar, the pantry, and something I had
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  Speaker 1: no idea existed, because I am not the one percent
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: the owery.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: Have you ever heard of an owery? No? I have
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  Speaker 2: not been. Okay, I don't feel bad. I don't think
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  Speaker 2: that's in my wheelhouse.
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  Speaker 1: It's it's the place that just has napkins and basins
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  Speaker 1: for washing and shaving.
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  Speaker 2: I see, Okay, So maybe a little antiquated at this point,
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  Speaker 2: would maybe call that more like the boudoir, yeah, or
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  Speaker 2: the laundry room. You know. But it is funny how
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  Speaker 2: when you get to a certain level of wealth, terms
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  Speaker 2: like laundry room and bathroom, they just don't apply to
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  Speaker 2: you anymore. You need fancier terms and a whole staff
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  Speaker 2: to maintain them. Mm hmm.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I think my favorite from any of those weird rich
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  Speaker 1: people things we've looked at over the years is still
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  Speaker 1: the orangery.
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  Speaker 2: That's where all the orgies happen.
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  Speaker 1: Well, it is where elite maybe, but I think technically
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  Speaker 1: it's where they grew oranges.
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  Speaker 2: Ah. Yes, of course, common mistake of common misunderstand how
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  Speaker 2: you can tell we're low class and a manual of
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  Speaker 2: sorts was published in Britain in eighteen sixty one with
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  Speaker 2: the fabulous title Missus Beadon's Book of Household Management, and
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  Speaker 2: it put you know, know, the whole evolving nature of bottling. Thusly,
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  Speaker 2: the number of male domestics in a family varies according
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  Speaker 2: to the wealth and position of the master from the
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  Speaker 2: owner of the ducal mansion with a retinue of attendance
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  Speaker 2: at the head of which is the chamberlain and house
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  Speaker 2: steward to the occupier of the humbler house, where a
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  Speaker 2: single footman or even the odd man of all work
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  Speaker 2: is the only male retainer the scandal. The man of
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: all work is what we might today call a handyman.
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, or a dogs body or of la Yeah, did
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: you say dog's body.
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: I don't know this one.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: That dog's body, as one word, is another term for
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  Speaker 1: kind of your general assistant.
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  Speaker 2: It doesn't sound very uh, it does sound very yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Sure, But they're like do menial work all the basically
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  Speaker 1: all the unpleasant jobs that you don't want to do
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  Speaker 1: if you can afford to hire someone else to do.
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  Speaker 2: It, sort of a jack of all trades type, you know,
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  Speaker 2: who can get the job done. The footman. However, I
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  Speaker 2: guess when I think of footmen, I think of people
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  Speaker 2: that are attending to like a coach, you know, or
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  Speaker 2: like running alongside it. Perhaps I don't know, I'm thinking
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  Speaker 2: I'm getting it's giving big Cinderella vibes. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: They might also be the person who meets you at
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  Speaker 1: the door. They might serve for fancy dinners. They might
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: play the role of waiter. This leads us to the
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: question of what a butler actually does. So now they're
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  Speaker 1: the head of this pretty hierarchical system of servants, and
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  Speaker 1: they are more they're increasingly managerial instead of hands on.
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  Speaker 1: So for example, the butler might greet a guest officially
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  Speaker 1: and announce their arrival to the shindig, but the door
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  Speaker 1: is actually opened by the footman, and the hat and
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  Speaker 1: coat of the visitor are actually handled by the footman
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  Speaker 1: if there was, if there was a pressing need, the
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: butler was not above pitching in, like during a staff shortage,
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  Speaker 1: and they would do whatever they could to make sure
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  Speaker 1: the house ran smoothly. But they were kind of above
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  Speaker 1: the physical work. They were sort of liaisons between the
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  Speaker 1: wealthy employer and the servants.
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  Speaker 2: I guess it would also depend on the situation, because
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: you know, one could argue that Alfred in the Batman
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: universe is Bruce Wayne's butler. But like I think, by design,
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  Speaker 2: Bruce Wayne doesn't really have a whole hell of a
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  Speaker 2: lot of other staff. You know, he might have like
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: a housekeeper that comes and goes, but it would seem
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: that Alfred cooks his meals, you know, serves him dinner
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: and and and does all of the above. So a
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: butler can also be a bit of a catch all term.
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  Speaker 3: So to jump in here, I was thinking about it, like,
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: so Dark Knight Rises, the third Christopher Nolan film, there's
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: actually a scene at the very beginning of this big
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: thing happening at the Wayne estate and Alfred's like running
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  Speaker 3: the whole crew and Boston people around and being in
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  Speaker 3: charge of which kind of thing. Is like he like
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: these people, I'm like look at him, like they're.
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  Speaker 2: Not always there.
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  Speaker 3: So he's like, oh, it's the having of this, the
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: fact I'm gonna go hire all these people out, and
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  Speaker 3: very much his managerial thing. But the day to day yeah,
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  Speaker 3: I mean.
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  Speaker 2: He he's cooking eggs. I think they're like and they're like,
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  Speaker 2: get there.
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  Speaker 3: Like his job is to make sure we get to
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  Speaker 3: this certain place that the head of the household is
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  Speaker 3: cared for.
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  Speaker 2: Right, that's the end goal.
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  Speaker 1: There's a lot of anticipation at this level of service.
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  Speaker 1: And maybe we'll talk a little bit about how to
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  Speaker 1: become a butler at the end of this. But I
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  Speaker 1: think you guys are putting it perfectly because it becomes
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  Speaker 1: a more generalized term. It is an official role, but
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  Speaker 1: the duties of that role can be pretty pretty varied. So,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, in a household that doesn't have an official
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  Speaker 1: head housekeeper, the female servants and kitchen staff are also
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  Speaker 1: directly under the butler's management. And then you know, the
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: smaller the householder estate gets, the more the butler actually does.
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  Speaker 1: And I remember the episode we stumbled upon this with.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: It was the disappearing billionaire Carl Eric. Remember, because he
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: had a butler situation.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: He had two butlers, But even in that situation, one
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: of them felt a little more like the head of
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: household type cat and the other one was a little
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: more of a catch all jack of all tray's handyman
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: who would like mow the yard and things like that.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: So it really does kind of there's a bit. It's
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: a bit of an umbrella term as it's used today.
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: But speaking of as it's used today, I did just
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: want to mention that buttling is still very much a thing.
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: I literally googled our butler is still a thing, to
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: which I received yes, yes, no, butlers very much are
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: still a thing. In fact, there is a professional society
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: of butlers called the International Guild of Professional Butlers, and
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: this organization estimates that there are in fact millions of
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: professional butlers worldwide today with an actual pretty significant uptick
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: over the past thirty years. I imagine as that one
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: percent has gotten a little more one percent. Y.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's a lot of international demand too. That
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: played a huge role in this, because there were more
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: and more millionaires, billionaires and people who could afford butlers.
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, there's an interesting thing we
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: can talk about a little bit later where you can
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: see the rise in butlers as a profession. It ties
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: pretty closely with the rise of economic inequality.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: So the more.
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: Unequal society gets financially, the more butlers there are, because
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: there's a higher demand for them and more people are
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: pretty much searching for any kind of job.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: I don't think we've mentioned this little bit another term
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: as maybe often used or was in the past for
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: a butler didn't know about dog's body.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: How do you feel about manservant? I think it's okay.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: There are some things that sks me out a little
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: bit about it, but I think that's a me thing.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: I think it's totally a respectable title and it's not
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: weird unless you make it weird. And now we have
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: to talk about one of the one of the things
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: that's a little bit disturbing regarding butlers. If we travel
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: across the Atlantic to the United States, we know that
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: from the beginning of slavery in America in the early
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: sixteen hundreds, many enslaved people and the African Americans were
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: put to task as domestic servants, and some of those
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: did become butler's and in some cases, far from every case,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: but in some cases they attained a level of power
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: right in their estate that might not have been accessible
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: through other means. And we even see another author, a
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: guy named Robert Roberts is an African American butler and
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: created a book called The House Servants Directory in eighteen
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: twenty seven. It's like the book household Management. It's manual
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: for butlers and waiters. And it was a smash success.
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: It was a runaway hit. A second edition got published
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: in eighteen twenty eight, and a third got published in
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: eighteen forty three. People were buying this book left and right.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: There were also people who were not technically slaves, but
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: we're indentured servants, so they were kind of still enslaved, right.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what was the deal with indentured service? They basically
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: you got paid a wage like a stipend, and a
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: lot of it had to do with like you basically
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: were beholden to your uh to your employer, like you
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: relied on them for every aspect of your life, for
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: the for for intensive purposes.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the way it would work when everybody was acting
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: in good faith is this. They would pay for a
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: person's passage from Europe to the Americas, and the deal was,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: you know, once you land there, you will be an employee,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: an unpaid employee of ours, will give you room and board,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: and you'll work for either a set number of years
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: or you'll work until we believe you have paid off
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: your debt. So it could be, it could be a
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: rough situation, but we know. The thing that we know
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: for sure is your experience as a butler is going
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: to vary widely, both in the past and today, almost
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: entirely depending on the vibe of your employer. So if
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: your employer is kind of a chill person, then you're
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: gonna you're gonna probably have a good job, and you'll
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: even form a friendship with that employer.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I just I mean, I mentioned this thing about
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: the professional society, and I'd be really interested to see
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: what they're you know, a lot of times the job
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: of societies like that, much like unions, is to determine
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: exactly what the scope of a butler's work would be
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: like to me, I think more of like if you're
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: looking at like Hollywood, for example, people have assistance, you
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: know what I mean, they have personal assistance. Who in
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: the scope of that job can can vary widely if
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: you've ever watched like you know, Entourage or whatever. So
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: it starts to become this kind of interesting gray area
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: where it's like, what is it to buttle? You know,
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: obviously it is can be a verb even though we
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: know the etymology kind of calls that into question. It
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: makes it not make a whole hell of a lot
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: of sense. Basically means to bottle, you know, right, Yeah,
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: I don't know, it's it's it's It does become this
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: kind of interesting like shifting definition, you know, over the
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: course of history, and what does that leave us with today? Oh?
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: You know another phrase I like, and I'm glad you
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: mentioned the Butler's Guild. There's a phrase I learned from
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: their website, Gentlemen's Gentlemen.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like like chapel roone is your favorite artist's favorite artists.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: You know, I'm looking at the available staff on the website,
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: and everybody's got just the one name, like Henny or
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: Golf or Rocco. There is one couple, Paul and Jessica,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: if you want to hire them or.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: Package tag team. Yeah.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: Uh, they're probably twice as expensive too, right, I would imagine,
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: But they can't. You can't have one without the other.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: It's not all right exactly. In the nineteen twenties, there
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: was this sharp decline in domestic service occupations, including butler's
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: in Western Europe, and there was an even more precipitous
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: decline of these positions in the United States. In the UK, though,
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: butlers were still very much a thing. By World War Two,
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: there were around thirty thousand butlers employed just in the
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: United Kingdom, which makes sense because they have a lot
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: of aristocrats, right.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: But I mean, frankly, you know, Ben, when I think
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: of butler in general, I think of the United Kingdom same. Yeah,
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: but I feel like it's a European export. Like the
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: folks over here were like, well, we want to be
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: more like the Swells, you know, the Royals or whatever,
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: so we're going to have butlers too. Exactly.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's definitely this is definitely during the period of
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: American history where you know, seventeen seventy six was sort
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: of a distant memory for a lot of people, and
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: now they were aspiring to be as good as their
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: idea of Europeans, right, and that's what you see a
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: lot of weird, a lot of weird cultural stuff.
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean that goes back to the American Revolution though,
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know, there's this whole concept of like
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: we need to escape, you know, get out from under
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: the yoke of our British oppressors. But then enough time
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: passes not to mention. During that Colerci of independence, although
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: there were certain factions within the new government, the founding
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: Fathers that wanted to have kings, that wanted to be
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: more like the aristocrats of you know, Britain, But then
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: as time went on, it almost became like a badge
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: of honor to be like, you know, maybe we had
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: those Brits wrong. It was actually kind of awesome to
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: have these mansions and these galatial estates, and this staff
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: and the attendants.
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: And then we see these numbers EBB and flu again
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: kind of correlating to equality or inequality in society, and
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: if we go to the nineteen eighties, we see the
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: rise of globalization. Right the world is getting smaller and
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: more and more people are actually becoming wealthy, which means
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: there is an overall global demand for butlers, and that
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: demand seems to continue to rise. Honestly, if you look
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: at people like Charles McPherson, who was a vice chairman
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: of the International Guild of Professional Butlers.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: He says the same thing we've been saying.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: He says, Look, people are searching for butlers. It's a
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: hot commodity because there are more millionaires and billionaires who
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: want to have that aspirational service. In some cases, their
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: estates are so big that one person literally couldn't run it,
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: so they need help. It's also butlers are huge in
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: China right now.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: Oh interesting. Can we just take a minute not to
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: like wealth shame anybody, but do you ever think about
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: how ridiculous it is to have a house that you
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: can't even like, you you'll never even see most of
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: What is the point? What is the point of having
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: ten bathrooms and like fifteen bedrooms. It just seems like
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: a waste of space and like a waste of money
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: that could be used to like maybe, like I don't know,
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: help people.
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. I think about that too, Like if I
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: end up living in a in a big, big house
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: or you know, a mansion that I would be hard
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: pressed to find a use for every room, you know,
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: I would end up like renting stuff out, telling family
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: members to just come live with me, you know, because
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: otherwise you're wandering alone in this cavernous space that you
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: will never be able to fully clean.
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: Goes back to Batman. It makes me think of him
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: the first Tim Burton Batman movie when he has Vicky
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: Vail over for dinner and they're sitting on opposite sides
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: of this like giant, obnoxious dining room table, very putent style.
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: I'm thinking also, like you know, the in the Nolan
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: Batman movie is like there's like every time he's walking
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: through the house, everything's just covered up in the house,
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: always because he's the only one that lives there.
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: Exactly. I've been in situations where I spent time in
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: these big, like proper estates, and one of the things
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: they got me about it is for houses of that size,
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: a lot of times they just shut down wings of
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: the house and they like, don't bother to take it
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: out of the cleaning equivalent of a deep freeze until
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: there's a big Christmas.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: Gathering or somebody's birthday or something like that. It probably
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: saves on heating and cooling bills too. Yeah, they're a
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: huge about that. I was at this.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: I told you guys about this when I was at
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: this creepy, beautiful but kind of creepy villa in rural Italy,
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: and half of it was just half of it they
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: would rent out to parties, people who come by and
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: like the west wing, and then the other half is
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: where the family occasionally lived when they weren't at one
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: of their other many mansions. Yeah, exactly. It's just a
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: different world, man. And we know that there's also a
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: big demand for butlers in India, in some Asian countries
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: and of course in the Middle East. You're gonna have
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: very different experiences again, depending on your employer.
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: We know that. We know that now.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Butlers, of course, do much more than just look after
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: the booze. There are a lot of what they're trying
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: to do is anticipate their employer's needs or desires before
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: the employer voices them. That's considered you know, the top
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: tier of service there, you're you're nearly telepathic because you
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: know your employer so well well, I mean.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: You know, and that translates even to like high level
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: service industry folks like I remember. I can distinctly remember
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: being in New York on my first trips as a
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: you know whatever, early twenties person with some friends New York,
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: and we went to this really fancy Italian restaurant and
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: I just distinctly remember the person that served us had
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: this way about him that was, like you said, borderline telepathic.
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: That was just a certain kind of attentiveness and kindness
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: and almost, like you said, predictive, you know, like just
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: literally knowing what you went. I had that similar situation
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: in Spain recently with We're very lucky you got a
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: reservation in this new place, and it was early because
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: they dinner late this so we were one of the
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: only folks there, and this guy just gave us his
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: every inch of his attention and it just felt It
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: made you feel like a million bucks, It really does.
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: And so I mean, there is something to be said
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: about a life of quote unquote service, whether you're you know,
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: a waiter in like a fine dining establishment, or perhaps
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: somebody overseeing someone's home worst date.
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I remember when I was first starting to up ourtend.
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: You know, I worked food bad for ten years being
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: told that being in service industry is more about having
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: like a knowledge in like psychology, that it is in
• 31:59
  Speaker 3: like knowledge and kind of stuff like just knowing what
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: people want and need before they know it.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: Yes, us, and that's that is a very particular set
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: of skills. Now you may be hearing this ridiculous historians
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: and think, well, darn guys, this does sound great, But
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: I'm a regular person. I can't afford to pay somebody
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: eighty thousand to one hundred thousand dollars a year just
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: to wait on my whims. The good news is you
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: can also rent a butler. Now you can temporarily live
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: the good life. You'll see rent a butler services in
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: corporate settings, sometimes on embassies, right where there's not a
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: specific you know, high net value person, but there is
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: an institution they represent. You'll see them on cruise ships
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: and yachts. Also, butlers have and I think this is
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: good for the butler's. Butlers have always been associated with
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: pretty formal, somewhat stuffy clothing in uniforms. But now that's
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: relaxing a little bit. And it depends on what part
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: of the world you're in. I recently learned the butlers
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: in the United States will often rock a polo shirt
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: and slacks instead of a top siders, no doubt, yes, yes, yes, oh,
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: because you always need to look like you're on the
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: way to a boat or have just left a boat.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: That is one of the key American rich looks. Right, Yeah,
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: it looks like you're associated with sort of you know,
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: it's like your resort ware, I guess. And with this,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: you know, there's so many other things to get into.
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: We were having a lot of fun talking about this
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: off air with our favorite fictional butlers and things of
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: that nature. So we may return to this in the future.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: But Noel, I've got to ask, is we're wrapping up,
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: would you ever go to butler school? I don't think
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: I have the people skills to be a butler, to
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: be quite honest with you, Yeah.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's my thing, but I do expect
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: it as a trade. I really do. And the more
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: we talked about it, and I'm really not being sarcastic,
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: like there is part of me that sort of scoffs
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: at the idea of needing that level of attention. But
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: I also understand that sometimes when you have that much wealth,
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: maybe you're just very, very busy and you need someone
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: to take care of your basic needs in that fashion.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: So who am I to judge? But yeah, I don't know.
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: More power to all the butlers out there. I hope
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: your bosses aren't buttholes.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: And if you want to read some first hand accounts,
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: they're easy to find online. There's a great ama on
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: Reddit Ask Me Anything thread from a butler who has
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: worked for multiple very very wealthy people. And because we're
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: a family show, we're not going to read a lot
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: of the stuff this guy says. But he seems pretty uh.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: He seems pretty set in his opinions. And he notes
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: that an experienced butler can earn eighty to one hundred
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: grand a year. The hours are really long, you only
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: basically get five days off, and he said the way
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: he got into this gig was taking a butler training course.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: It cost around thirty thousand and it's two years long.
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: And then you sign up for a recruitment agency who
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: will place you with an employer and butler's in very
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: high demand because there were so many more wealthy people
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: who wanted to live the good life or have someone
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: manage their estates. It's kind of it's been kind of
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: tough for people to find butlers, which is interesting. I
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: never thought that would happen.
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: Can you imagine, Ben, we had to go without a butler? Right?
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: What do we do? Savage reminds me of that line.
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: It's like a Mister Show's sketch. I think it's coupon
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: the movie, where it's a bunch of movie executives and
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: they think that coupon the movie is gonna tank. It's
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: this who green lit this picture? It's the whole thing.
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: And one guy goes, that's where if I have to
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: go from being super rich to just rich, I'll kill myself.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: It also reminds me of that line from the amazing
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: comedy show thirty Rock where someone someone points out Alec
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: Baldwin's character is just suddenly wearing a tux and they say,
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: are you wearing a tuxiot? And he says, of course
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: I am lemonnutes after seven pm? What about a farmer?
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: And of course the classic Lucille Blue How much could
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: a banana cost right exactly.
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: And this is not to dunk on people in different
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: social situations, but it is a world that is relatively
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: obscured to most people, and it turns out there's a
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: lot of ridiculous history behind this truly noble profession. We're
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: gonna call the day here, folks. We are so excited
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: for some upcoming episodes we've in working away in our
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: secret podcast lab and we can't wait for you to
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: hear them in the meantime, Big big thanks to super
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: producer mister Max Williams.
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: Alex Williams who composed our theme, Christophraciotis Needs, Jeff Coats
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: here in Spirit, Jonathan Ricklin, the quizt A. J. Bahamas,
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: Jacob's the.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: Puzzler, Doctor Big Spinach Lance the world expert on underwater explosions,
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: which is one of our favorite things to brag about,
• 37:12
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• 37:15
  Speaker 1: pals Side Door check out their excellent show with Lizzie
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Peabody and No Big Big Things to.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: You and you as well, Ziah. We'll see you next time, folks.
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,