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Top Secret · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
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  Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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  Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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  Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. War is a time of action where men
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  Speaker 1: and women serve their country by putting their lives on
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  Speaker 1: the line. But wars are not won by fighting alone.
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  Speaker 1: Winning a war takes cunning and planning. It is a
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  Speaker 1: test of strategy as much as it is a test
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  Speaker 1: of metal on the battlefield. In fact, during World War Two,
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  Speaker 1: one division works so well as a team they didn't
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  Speaker 1: even have to use guns to succeed. The group wasn't
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  Speaker 1: formed until nine when men were hand picked to serve
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  Speaker 1: as part of a new unit. It was called the
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  Speaker 1: twenty third Headquarters Special Troop or Ghost Army, and it
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  Speaker 1: was tasked with some of the most difficult missions of
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  Speaker 1: the war. For example, in September of ninety, a couple
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  Speaker 1: of American divisions in France had been moving toward Germany
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  Speaker 1: for an assault. As they drove to Mets, a French
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  Speaker 1: city near the border. They found themselves vastly outnumbered against
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  Speaker 1: the German forces waiting for them, But they had a
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  Speaker 1: backup plan in the form of the sixth Armored Division,
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  Speaker 1: who had spent the night moving twelve M four tanks
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  Speaker 1: in a position along the tree line. Lieutenant Dick Syracuse's
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  Speaker 1: platoon listened to the sounds of their treads moving over
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  Speaker 1: the terrain for hours. The next morning, Syracuse woke up
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  Speaker 1: to a U. S. Cavalry colonel screaming about tanks among
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  Speaker 1: the trees. Syracuse asked the colonel to elaborate, just as
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  Speaker 1: the man had been saying, there was an array of
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  Speaker 1: M four tanks lined up several hundred feet away. The
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  Speaker 1: lieutenant pulled him aside and explained the truth of the situation.
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  Speaker 1: Those weren't the sixth Armored Division at all. Those tanks
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  Speaker 1: had been rolled in by the twenty three Headquarters Special Troop.
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  Speaker 1: Well rolled is a bit of an understatement. It was
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  Speaker 1: more likely that they had been picked up and dropped
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  Speaker 1: into place because they were made of rubber and had
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  Speaker 1: been inflated like balloons. You see, the twenty third Headquarters
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  Speaker 1: Special Troops weren't normal soldiers. They had specific talents the
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  Speaker 1: other divisions lacked. For one, the group was made up
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  Speaker 1: of artists and creative types recruited from ad agencies and
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  Speaker 1: art schools. They weren't expected to fight. They were expected
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  Speaker 1: to put their heads together to deceive the enemy, which
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  Speaker 1: they did. The sounds that the platoon had heard the
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  Speaker 1: night before were pumped in through a speaker system that
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  Speaker 1: had been mounted on a military transport. The noise itself
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  Speaker 1: had been recorded and mixed together to form the sound
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  Speaker 1: effects track meant to trick the enemy into thinking the
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  Speaker 1: Special Troops were much larger than they actually were. It
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  Speaker 1: was a technique known as sonic deception. Throughout the latter
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  Speaker 1: days of the war, the Ghost Army developed several ways
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  Speaker 1: of fooling the Germans, many of which looked like something
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  Speaker 1: one might have seen on an episode of The A
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  Speaker 1: Team decades later. They generated fake radio traffic they knew
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  Speaker 1: would get intercepted, providing the Nazis with fake positions for
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  Speaker 1: American troops. They also used their limited resources to inflate
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  Speaker 1: their presence as well. Along with their specially made sound effects,
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  Speaker 1: the Ghost Army would drive two to three real tanks
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  Speaker 1: around in a loop to make it look like they
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  Speaker 1: had a full convoy. They completed the deception by painting
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  Speaker 1: specific insignia on buildings and having some soldiers wear different
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  Speaker 1: uniforms to create what they called atmosphere. It was to
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  Speaker 1: give the illusion that there was more than one unit
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  Speaker 1: nearby at any given time. This was demonstrated in March
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  Speaker 1: of nine when the twenty three deployed a fleet of
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  Speaker 1: inflatable aircraft carriers along the Rhine River valley. Thanks to
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  Speaker 1: some fake radio transmissions broadcast over open channels, the Germans
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  Speaker 1: were convinced that the Allies were preparing to attack a
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  Speaker 1: particular spot in a valley at a particular time. They
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  Speaker 1: pulled all nearby troops and sent them to that location
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  Speaker 1: to prepare for battle. Instead, the Allies were six miles away,
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  Speaker 1: crossing the Rhine with ease, since the Nazi defense posts
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  Speaker 1: were now all but abandoned. Meanwhile, the twenty third had
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  Speaker 1: inflated over six hundred rubber tanks and dressed up a
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  Speaker 1: bunch of mannekins and uniforms from varying units. They wanted
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  Speaker 1: to show that they were not a small outfit of troops,
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  Speaker 1: but rather two separate divisions of thirty thousand Allied soldiers.
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  Speaker 1: The sounds of rolling tanks and bombers flying overhead rang
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  Speaker 1: out from giant speakers as well. The Germans bought it
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  Speaker 1: and attacked with full force. Countless mannekins lost their lives
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  Speaker 1: that day, but it was believed that tens of thousands
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  Speaker 1: of actual Allied soldiers were saved thanks to the efforts
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  Speaker 1: of the Ghost Army. They were the unsung heroes of
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  Speaker 1: World War Two, using their brains to overcome German braun.
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  Speaker 1: I love it when a plan comes together. There's an
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  Speaker 1: old story told in executive leadership meetings everywhere. A young
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  Speaker 1: girl is in the kitchen with her mother watching her
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  Speaker 1: bake a ham for a big dinner. The mother cuts
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  Speaker 1: off the ends of the ham before sliding it into
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  Speaker 1: the oven. Why do you cut the ends off the
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  Speaker 1: ham before you put it in the oven, the girl asks,
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  Speaker 1: because that's the way my mother always did it, the
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  Speaker 1: mother says, So, the girl calls up her grandmother and
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  Speaker 1: asks the same question, why did you cut off the
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  Speaker 1: ends of the ham before putting it in the oven,
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  Speaker 1: And the grandmother responds with a familiar answer, that's the
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  Speaker 1: way my mother always did it. So finally, the girl
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  Speaker 1: calls up her great grandmother and asks why she used
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  Speaker 1: to cut the ends off the ham before she put
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  Speaker 1: it in the oven. The great grandmother says, because my
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  Speaker 1: pan was too small to fit the whole ham. Some
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  Speaker 1: traditions exist simply because their traditions small ceremonies that have
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  Speaker 1: gone on so long it seems strange to stop them now,
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  Speaker 1: because we've always done it. That way doesn't fly in
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  Speaker 1: a fast moving corporate environment. But traditions aren't always meant
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  Speaker 1: to be stopped or changed. They also connect us to
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  Speaker 1: our past, helping us feel closer to those who have
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  Speaker 1: left us and to a time gone by. Perhaps that's
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  Speaker 1: why the City of London still feels obligated to pay
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  Speaker 1: the Queen rent for two plots of land at first
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  Speaker 1: least eight hundred years ago. They're known as quit rents,
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  Speaker 1: and they are upheld by a person called a remembrance er.
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  Speaker 1: Yes that's a real word. Their whole job is literally
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  Speaker 1: to remember important things on behalf of the King or Queen,
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  Speaker 1: usually involving taxes and debts. It was a title first
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  Speaker 1: created by King Henry the Second in eleven fifty four.
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  Speaker 1: The remembrance or wears a judicial wig beneath a black
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  Speaker 1: tricorn hat a sign that they are a judge of
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  Speaker 1: the ex Checker Court. The ex Checker Court dealt with
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  Speaker 1: payments of rent and debt settlements. In fact, the name
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  Speaker 1: ex checker came from the checkered cloth covering the table
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  Speaker 1: behind which that remembrance or sat. He would use the
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  Speaker 1: squares in the pattern to keep track of the payments
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  Speaker 1: made and the debts that were still owed, sort of
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  Speaker 1: a cloth spreadsheet well ahead of its time. Of course,
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  Speaker 1: London has changed a lot over the last eight hundred years,
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  Speaker 1: and so the locations of the original properties have been lost,
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  Speaker 1: but what hasn't changed are the rents. One of the
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  Speaker 1: properties is known as the Moor's, a on acre plot
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  Speaker 1: located about two and a half hours northwest of London
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  Speaker 1: in Shropshire. It was leased back in twelve eleven, possibly earlier,
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  Speaker 1: and occupied by a man named Nicholas Damore, who paid
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  Speaker 1: the hefty sum of two knives for it, one sharp
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  Speaker 1: and one blunt. Eventually, the City of London became the
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  Speaker 1: tenants of the land and so were then forced to
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  Speaker 1: pay the two knife fee to maintain the rights, although
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  Speaker 1: these days, rather than the knives, the city pays using
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  Speaker 1: a curved farming knife known as a bill hook, as
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  Speaker 1: well as a sharpened axe, which are both taken possession
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  Speaker 1: of by the remembrance Sir. To verify the payment is correct,
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  Speaker 1: the blades are tested against a pile of sticks. If
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  Speaker 1: the bill hook is unable to cut through them, it
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  Speaker 1: is accepted. The axe must then slice through the same
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  Speaker 1: number of dicks with little effort in order for it
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  Speaker 1: to also be approved, at which point the remembrance as
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  Speaker 1: says good service and takes them. The other property used
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  Speaker 1: to be home to a blacksmith forage in the city
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  Speaker 1: of Westminster around twelve thirty five. The rent for this
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  Speaker 1: location total sixty one nails and six horseshoes For this payment,
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  Speaker 1: the City of London actually uses the same nails and
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  Speaker 1: horse shoes each year. Once the rent is paid, the
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  Speaker 1: remembrance or talies up the objects, says good number, and
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  Speaker 1: the items are loaned back to London until they're due
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  Speaker 1: again the following year. And best of all, folks today
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  Speaker 1: can witness the quit rent ceremony. It's open to the public,
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  Speaker 1: although it isn't highly publicized, not for any secretive reason,
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  Speaker 1: mind you, only because it's old news after all. It's
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  Speaker 1: been going on for over eight centuries, you know, because
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  Speaker 1: they've always done it that way. I hope you've enjoyed
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  Speaker 1: today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for
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  Speaker 1: me on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show
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  Speaker 1: by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created
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  Speaker 1: by me Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works.
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  Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore, which is
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  Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can
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  Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the World of Lore
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  Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,