Latest / Ridiculous History / Roald Dahl: Children's Author and Secret Agent

Transcript

Roald Dahl: Children's Author and Secret Agent · Ridiculous History

• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, George didn't say a word. He felt quite trembly.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: He knew something tremendous had taken place that morning. For
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: a few brief moments, he had touched with the very
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: tips of his fingers the edge of a magic world.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: That's from George's Marvelous Medicine by the author Rolled Doll. Hi,
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: my name is Ben, my name is Noll. And what
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: a weaver of dreams that Roll Doll was. Yes, if
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: you're like millions of children in the United States, the
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: UK and beyond, then you grew up reading books by
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: Rolled Doll, stuff like not just George's marvel Medicine, but
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Yeah, George is a deep
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: cut for me. Um, I've never read that one. My
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: favorites growing up were Matilda, Um The Chocolate Factory books,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: including the Great Glass Elevator, which people kind of seem
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: to forget about. They go, they go up into space
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: and there's their space aliens and stuff. Um. The Witches
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: was super creepy and uh and the movie The Witches
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: movie really freaked me out. Fantastic. They pull their faces
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: off and stuff, and they all have wigs and he's
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: a mouse it's no, it's fun. It's fun movie, but
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: definitely um back when they made movies for kids that
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: gave kids nightmares. Yeah, And in the course of research
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: for today's episode, one of the things I discovered is
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: that there's this danger in young adult fiction without all
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: of the trappings of banality you find in so much
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: grown up adult, full adult fiction, you know, and we
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: see stuff that's so much more honest, visceral and candidly frightening.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Rule Doll wrote some pretty dark stuff. Uh. And it's
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: easy I think for maybe someone who just saw the
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: newest adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, right, I
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: think it's easy for them to say, oh, this is
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: just sort of kookie, but as most of us know,
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: the original one is frightening. Especially there's no way of knowing.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: In fact, Marilyn Manson sort did a did a redo
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: of that on one of his early records, UM, showing
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: how it kind of really worked on that absurdly creepy,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: dark level. Um. But yeah, Doll, I kind of look
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: at him is almost like a Dickens type figure in
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: terms of the characters and the absurdity and some of
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: the satire that he did, but it was in fact
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: for kids. And today we have, you know, this genre
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: of young adult fiction that tries to be a little
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: bit more um, dark and edgy. But these books were
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: written for children, right, Yeah, this isn't stuff like you know.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Edward Gorey, for instance, has a child's book formats, but
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: is pretty much clearly for adults. Roaldall was writing for children,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: but he was doing much much more than that. And
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: the true life story of Roald Dahl is as interesting
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: and strange, if not more interesting and strange, then some
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: of the fictional stories he wrote, because it turned out
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: that he lived during one of the most important, dangerous, magnificent,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: storied times in modern history, absolutely right in the thick
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: of World War Two. And Doll himself even described the
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: mission of Churchill and the British government and the Royal
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Air Force which he was a part of, as saving
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: the world. I mean, he really looked at it that way,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: and that's not too far from the true. And at
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: the time, um, the United States was not about that war.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: We were in a very isolationist period. Um. Guys like
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: Charles Lindberg really pushed for this America first ideology. U
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: ms that sound familiar um, but yeah, it was a
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: big deal to get the United States on board the
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: war effort to help fight the Nazis in what Doll
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: himself described as a battle against like good and evil
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: in the life or death situation that could literally result
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: in the end of the world as it was known
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: at that time. And so in today's episode, we're exploring
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: one of the most fascinating things about Rule Doll that
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: you might not know, which is that he was not
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: just a fight race. He was not just a military man.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: It was not just a fantastically prolific children's author. He
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: was a spy, not only a spy, like a super spy,
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: like the spy. Totally. Yes, So let's give just a
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: little bit of his background to get to the juicy
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: once top secret stuff. Oh and by the way, shout
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: out to our super producer for today, Ramsey Junt. Thanks
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: for coming. Ramsey much appreciated, saving the day, saving the day,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: saving the show. So Casey is out with the flu
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: and we wish him a quick convalescence. Yes, yes, uh so,
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: please feel free to write to Ramsey and Casey as
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: well as us if you would like Roll Doll though
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: Roll Doll here's the thing. Born in September of nineteen sixteen,
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: and he lived until nineteen nineties, so he he had
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: a full life. And he's one of those guys know
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: that when I read the biography or something, I feel
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: like I just haven't done anything. I'm like, what a jury?
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: I know? Right, It's like, hey, I read, uh, I
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: read a lot of books, I guess, but I I
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: haven't helped in Jannier clandestine geopolitics, right, I haven't shot
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: people out of the sky yet. So Ruled was born
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: in Wales of Norwegian extract. His parents were both from Norway,
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: and he was named after the Norwegian explorer that we've
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: mentioned in previous episodes here Ruled Amondson. So that's r.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: O A L D. Actually his first language was Norwegian,
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: which was startling to to think of, you know, and
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: like many kids, he went to a boarding school and
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: some of the some of the experiences he had, they're
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: definitely informed the way he approaches authority figures in his books.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: And there's actually a book he wrote, I think his
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: only work of nonfiction as as in his later career,
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: called Boy, where he talks about growing up and he
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: talks about some really horrible experiences he had at that
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: boarding school, one of which included um being caned by
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the headmaster or by some high official until he was
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: bloody Yeah, Headmaster Geoffrey Fisher. And you're correct, boy. Tales
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: of Childhood was his almost an expose, you know, but
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: so far in the past, you'll always hear that thing. Oh,
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: it was a different time. That's how they disciplined them.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: But luckily for us and luckily for young readers around
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: the world, he did survive that horrific boarding school experience,
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: and in nineteen thirty four, when he finished school, he
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: crossed the Atlantic on the RMS Nova Scotia and highted
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: through Newfoundland and eventually he got a job. Yeah. That
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: was in September of nineteen thirty nine when he started
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: working for the Shell Oil Company in East Africa. Um.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: And it was at this time when England declared war
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: on Germany, and like many uh, you know, strapping youths
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: his age, he decided to heed the call of war
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: and go join his compatriots and serve his country. So
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: he drove from Dare S salam Um to Nirobi and
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: there was a Royal Air Force headquarters there and um
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: that is where he signed up to become a fighter pilot.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: And just want to say up front, some of this
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: information we got from a fantastic book called The Irregulars
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Roll Doll in the British Spy Ring in wartime Washington,
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: which was written by a journalist American journalist by the
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: name of Janette Connent. Yes, it's a fantastic book. It's
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: actually a fairly recent book too, and we can't recommend
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: it enough. It's the kind of thing that we would
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: read for fun, which is always a beautiful thing to say.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: But one thing that is definitely not beautiful would be
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: the reality of life as an aircraftman in World War Two,
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: especially his time. He was accepted, as Null said in
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: Nairoubi for flight training with sixteen other men, but only
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: four of those, counting Rule Doll, would survive the war.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: And it's interesting because they were so desperate for pilots
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: that even at six ft six uh quite lanky bean
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: pole of a man um he was accepted and in
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: in the Irregulars um it's described as he had to
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: quote curl up into a fetal position with his knees
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: tucked tightly under his chin in order to sit in
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: the cockpit and his head stuck out above the windshield
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: like some kind of cartoon character. But because the pilots
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: were so in demand, um, he was accepted. And then
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: he trained very quickly, I think two months doing test
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: flights Shake and Kenya exactly. And then next thing you know,
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: he is thrust into the fray, right, uh, flying an
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: obsolete crap gloucestered Gladiator, the last biplane fighter used by
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: the Royal Air Force ever. And if you have ever
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: flown in a biplane, uh, it's a it's a fantastic
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: experience and it's terrifying to imagine having to conduct any
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: sort of mission of war in one of those things.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: He almost died, as it turns out, right when he
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: again with this obsolete technology and we're talking obsoletely even
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: in the late nineteen thirties. Uh, he almost died because
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: he was flying and was low on fuel and he
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: crashed landed in the desert in Egypt, and was able
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: to pull himself from the wreckage, from that fetal position,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: from the wreckage and get far enough away quickly enough
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: to avoid the subsequent explosion and the hail of machine
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: gun fire that was set off by that blaze. Can
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: you imagine, just like trudging through I think he was
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: picked up eventually by a patrol and rescued. And this
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: dodging of a conflagration of machine gun fires especially miraculous
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: we consider the piss poor condition he was in immediately.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: His skull was fractured, his nose was smashed. Most importantly,
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: he was temporarily blind, so he had no idea what
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: was going on, and he remained blind for some time. Actually,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: his face was reconstructed by a plastic surgeon, and you know,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: he sustained spinal damage which caused him significant pain that
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: would endure for the rest of his life. Yeah, And
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: as it turned out, the Royal Air Force made an
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: inquiry into the crash, and they learned that the place
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: he had been told to go it was the wrong place.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: It wasn't even supposed to be flying that way. Can
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: you imagine, just just like with the technology they had
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: at the time, managing all that, sending these you know,
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: squads and keeping things secret and having pet people end
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: up in the right place with these obsolete aircraft, I mean,
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: I think more people would be crashing in the desert
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: in this situation. You know, given the circumstances. That's a
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: really good point. Too. Fast forward to let's say nineteen
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: forty one or so. Uh, he finally gets out of
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: the hospital from this crash, and again because of that desperation,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: he's back in the air. Yeah he is. He is
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: rated fully fit for flying duties, although we will find
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: out later that's not exactly the case unfortunately. So what
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: happens next, well, next he is sent on what basically
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: amounted to a suicide mission. The Italians had German reinforcements
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: and the British were outnumbered in protecting Greece. Dall was
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: sent as part of the eighties squadron to basically protect
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: the island of Greece, and that was only one of
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: two R A F squadrons to cover this entire region,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: and they were severely outnumbered. Severely outnumbered is a great
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: way to put it. His first aerial combat occurs in
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: the same year in April, and he attacks uh six
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: other planes and once uh they're junkers JU eight eight.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: He these are bombers, right, He manages German planes, yeah,
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: German plans. He manages to shoot one down and later
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: the I think that next day it was like the
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: fifte and the sixteenth. So he shot down one plane
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: one day and another plane the day after, which does
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: that make him of fighting ace? Ye? No by my standards,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: sure yea. By our standards. I'm not sure what the
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: qualification for a status was, but Uh, certainly a badass, right,
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: and his career as an airman continues. He is in
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: a time him and in a position that is notoriously dangerous. Right,
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: he is not only surviving, but arguably he's thriving. Yeah,
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: it's pretty insane. In that campaign which ultimately the Germans
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: totally ousted the Brits from Greece, and one the day,
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: around thirteen thousand British fighter pilots were killed, wounded or imprisoned,
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: and as the Germans were advancing on Athens, Doll was
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: evacuated along with this folks to Egypt. Uh and the
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: squadron got back together. They put the band back together
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: in Haifa. From Haifa, he continued to fly, but in
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: June he began to get the worst most stabilitating headaches
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: you could imagine, like beyond migraines, to the point where
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: he actually blacked out a few times during fly Uh,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: and then he got checked out and the medics told
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: him it was probably because of altitude or like geez,
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: gravitational effects UM. But it turned out that was not
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: the case and it was just to holdover from that
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: head injury he got UM during that fateful crash back
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: in Egypt, his first flight UM. So he was discharged honorably, Yes,
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: it was honorably discharged. He was originally hoping that as
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: he as he recovered, he would be able to one
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: day in the future become an instructor for newer pilots,
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: newer air serviceman. But then something happened, A plot twist occurred.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: He had a meeting at a club with a very
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: influential figure named Major Harold Balfour, who was serving as
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: the Under Secretary of State for Air. Balfour was impressed.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: It was like, this guy is walking the walk, he's
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: a fighter race. At least Balford thought he was nice. Right,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: So Balfour appoints Doll, who was still a young cat
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: by the way at this time, is right, what are
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: we doing with our lives? We're doing this, I guess, yeah,
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: well you know we are. Uh So bal for gets
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: to do all a position as Assistant Air attache at
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: the British Embassy in d C. And this launches another
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: series of travels and incredibly important meetings. Initially, Doll is
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: amazed by all the luxuries in North America, but ten
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: days in almost two weeks in uh, he hates it.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: He thinks his job is pointless. He doesn't understand like
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: what he's doing. And while he's it was meant to
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: be like a public relations kind of a position, right,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: and he wasn't feeling it at all. He didn't want
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: to do in the first place. I mean, when Val
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: four basically insisted that this is the job for you, um,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: Dall is quoted as saying, oh no, sir, please sir,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: anything but that, sir. But Balfour was like, nope, and
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: he made it in order and said, according to the irregulars,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: that it was jolly important. Yes, he saw maybe through
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: just the way Dall kind of carried himself. He was
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: reported to be quite dashing and good at talking to
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: people and very ingratiating or whatever, so maybe you know
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: he saw him. Okay, well you can't fly. You were
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: a good soldier, but now I think we can use
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: you in America. Yes, and so Dall kept his stiff
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: upper lip, sucked it in and as as we say,
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: he crossed the Atlantic and he hated it. There's a
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: quote that there's a quote we found this pretty funny.
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: He notes how priorities had shifted. He said, I'd just
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: come from the war. People were getting killed. I had
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: been flying around and seeing horrible things. Now almost instantly
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: I found myself in the middle of a pre war
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: cocktail party in America. Not to mention that back in London,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: I mean they were getting bombed right by the Nazis,
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: you know. It was. There was even a period where
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: Dall lost track of his family, you know, when he
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: was away and he was told, well, they probably got bombed,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: you know, and he did eventually find them. But he
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: came from you know, this experience of everything is just
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: bleak and uh fallen, crumbling infrastructure. To being in d C,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: where they had not yet declared war on the Japanese,
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: you know, in Pearl Harbor is what brought them into
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: the fight. Um. But like you said earlier, there was
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: this isolationist thing and we're like, well, we're here in
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: d C, you know, living it up with the swells.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: Can you imagine you're someone saying, so ruled Doll, you're
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: from England. How's your family? And he's like, I don't know,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: they might be dead. Well, have you tried the shrimp?
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: It's it's a really disconcerting thing in this time him
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: in this sort of if we're going Joseph Campbell with it,
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: in this journey in the wilderness and this dark Night
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: of the Soul or whatever. Uh, this is when Doll
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: meets another person that will change his life an author
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: named cs Forrester. Cs Forrester had written this very popular
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: series of books featuring a character Horatio Hornblower, who was
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: a navelman, and you know, it was all these adventures
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: and Doll and his cohorts in the r A f
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: would have been super familiar with these, you know, in
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: their downtime reading these books. And he was approached by
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: this man who came directly to see him and wanted
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: to interview him about that crash in Egypt that we
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: talked about earlier, where he you know, went down and
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: had to run away from the explosion and very heroic stuff.
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: Because there was a newly established organization within the British
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: government that was based in the United States called the
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: British information s pervices, and their job was kind of
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: to helps sway American sentiment towards supporting the war effort
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: and aiding Britain, who had always been a huge ally
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: of ours, but yet because of that isolationist position, it
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: wasn't something that our government was interested in getting involved in.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: And one way of doing that and swaying that opinion
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: was with stories of heroism and these you know, these
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: moments like what happened to Doll And we'll say it propaganda. Okay, yes, yeah,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: it's it's propagand that doesn't mean it's not true. That
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: just means it's it's it's a narrative with an end goal.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: It's persuasive writing. So Forrester has a deal where he's
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: going to sort of ghost, right, is what they assumed.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: They assumed that it would be like Saturday Evening Post
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: features fighter Ace roled Doll as told to cs Forrester,
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: you know the way a lot of politicians today don't
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: actually write their own books. But turns out that after
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: Forrester read dolls account, he thought, I don't have to
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: change this. This guy is actually a bang up writer.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: He's top notch or the bee's knees or aces or
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: whatever people said at the time. The point is he
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: was surprisingly good, and they published the article with the
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: name shot down over Libya, and that was sort of
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a more sensationalized title that was different from Doll's original title,
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: which was the slightly more tongue in cheek A piece
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: of cake, which is a term that fighter pilots used
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: kind of jokingly to refer to like maneuvers. That's a
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: piece of cake, right. But the fun thing about this
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: is that it maybe in an effort to impress this
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: very famous writer who he looked up to, he fictionalized
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: the hell out of his account. Yes, yes, that's the
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: always the problem when somebody's reminiscing about their past events,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: isn't it. He was maybe a little more heroic, as
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: you recall friends and neighbors from earlier in the episode.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: He was not shot down, not in real life. He
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: was not. He ran a gas Yeah, he ran out
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: of gas. But it worked. He was actually promoted, and
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: I think it has something to do with his success
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: in this field and this this particular article a piece
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: of cake, Shotdown of Libya. They could have just combined
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: it into one sentence, A piece of cake shotdown over.
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: That would have been good. It would have been cool. Uh.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: This leads him to another significant meeting. He meets a
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: fellow named William Stevenson, and this is where the superspy
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: world kind of opens up for doll Um. Stevenson was
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: the mastermind behind this secret ring I guess of intelligence
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: agents called the British Security Coordination or be SC. This
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: was a top secret institution set up in New York
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: City by m I six in nineteen forty under the
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: authorization of Churchill and my six being sort of the
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: British equivalent of the c I A. Yeah, yeah, the
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: OSS at the time, Yeah there, Yeah, they're the uh,
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: they're the guys in the dark with the trench coats, right, or,
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: in the case of m I six, just fantastic tailored suits. Yeah, exactly,
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: the dashing young men in the tailor's suits with the
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: cocktails at the cocktail parties, betting influential heiressism politicians. Yes, exactly,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: and that is betting B E, D, D, I N G.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Let's be clear about that. Sir William Stevenson, as as
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: we noted, is the head of this organization that the
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: U United Kingdoms public and the U S public have
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: no idea exists. Uh was doing some things that were
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: technically illegal, like he was passing, you know, like UK
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: secrets to Roosevelt. He was passing US secrets to the UK.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: And he was also masterminding in a very serious way,
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: this push to alter the US opinion the average voter,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: given the way the US government works, the average voter
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: had to support this idea. We had to be persuaded
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: that it was somehow worth American lives two send people
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: across the seas and spend enormous amounts of money to
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: save other people in foreign lands, which today happens all
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: the time. Frankly, absolutely, But I mean it feels like
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: there's a real parallel between the attitude of the government
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: in our country right now and the way things were
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: back then, and so what have when Dall and Stevenson meet.
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: So what came of this meeting with Stevenson was Doll
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: being first kind of recruited as a freelancer for the
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: b sc um And a lot of that had to
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: do with his success at writing all of these pieces
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: that are ultimately propaganda pieces, including a piece about gremlins.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: He wrote a book, a short story about Gremlins that
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: got picked up by Disney, and he had like personal
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: meetings with Walt Disney and Gremlins if you I mean
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: you know, like obviously the Gremlins the movie, but the
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: Gremlins were originally these little creatures that would mess with
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: fighter pilots. And it was this lore, especially in in
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: Britain in the R A F that they would uh
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: make their planes malfunction and they blamed it on gremlins
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: and throw a red and chare. One great example of
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: that lore in fiction comes from The Twilight Zone in
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: the famous episode uh Yeah with William Shatner who sees
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: a gremlin on the wing of a plane. Although it
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: is a commercial play which makes it creepy, Twilight Zones
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: a great show. I love it. Um. But yeah. So
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: that was probably what got Stevenson's attention was Doll's success,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: and he wrote a lot of different pieces that ended
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: up in a lot of different places that were perceived
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: as being successful propaganda. UM. And part of the b
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: sc S mission was similar to what the British Information
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: Services Mission was, was to turn that public opinion towards
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: supporting the United Kingdom in that war effort, but he
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: only freelanced for like a handful of months before he
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: was made a full fledged member of this group known
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: as the Baker Street Irregulars, which was named after the
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: spy ring that Sherlock Holmes kind of managed um in
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: those books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. And they were
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: sort of street urchins that were sort of like, uh,
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: if you're a Game of Thrones fan, his little birds
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: that would, like, you know, whisper things and and find
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: secrets and and tell him so he could be on
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: top of He had eyes and ears everywhere, and that
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: was what Doll was a part of. And he wasn't
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: the only um soon to be beloved author that was
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: in this group, right. One of them was a little
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: guy into the name of Ian Fleming, right, the author
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: of the famous James Bond series. But today Ian Fleming
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: is a little bit more well known as a guy
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: who was a spy. Rural Doll was doesn't get some
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: of the credit that he deserves for this, especially when
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: you consider that they were living undercover at the time,
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: just like a CIA agents or CIA assets might have
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: a job in an embassy, as the I T guy
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: that actually does happen. Uh. He was working as a
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: public relations dude, a PR man, that was the front.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: But when you when you hear some of the stuff
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: we're about to tell you, UM, I don't think you'd
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: be too hard pressed to believe that James Bond may
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: have been based on Doll himself. That's that's how I
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: see it, I really do. He's definitely part of it.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: I absolutely completely agree. I love the way that our author,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: uh Lori L. Dove, writing for a House of Works,
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: describes Doll's spy career. Did this sentence stick out to you?
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: By all reports, he was both very good and very
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: bad at it. He was living extremes, I know, because
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: a big part of it was, you know, obviously keeping secrets.
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: And in a biography called Storyteller, Um, Doll's daughter actually
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: sort of said, yeah, Dad was a pretty bad gossip
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: and and really didn't know when to keep his mouth shut. Um.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: But the part that he was really good at was
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: ingratiating himself two powerful people, and that included, as we
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: said earlier, powerful women who he let's just go ahead
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: and say it, seduced. Yeah, we were talking about this
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: off air. Doll was a phenomenally talented lothario, a ladies man,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: and this really came in handy. This was a skill
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: that could be applied to sway in the opinions of
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: important people. But uh, Noel, I know there was a
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: quote that you have been waiting to bring to the air.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: I gotta do it, I gotta do it. Um. In Storyteller,
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: the Authorized Biography of Roll Doll by Donald Sturten, he
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: has a quote from one of Doll's close friends, a
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: man with a gloriously British name, Creek Moore Fat, who
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: described Doll as being quote one of the biggest coxman
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: in Washington. I'm just gonna leave that there, all one word,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: by the way, all one word. Uh. And you know
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: he is in the same way that you know, and
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: it's it doesn't quite hold up today. And some of
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: the James Bond movies, the way we see Bond manipulating
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: women and and being a bit of a rake, right,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: that was Doll. Yeah. So he had numerous affairs. Uh.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: One with the heiress to the Standard Oil Fortune, one
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: with a congresswoman named Claire booth Loose who later became
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: an ambassador. Uh. And this is just the beginning but
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: you have to wonder how effective of a spy he
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: was because he was swaying opinions, but then he was
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: talking about it, so it was probably not a secret,
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: or at least a very open secret that he was
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: sleeping around d c oh for sure. And he eventually
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: became pals with a guy by the name of Charles
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: Marsh who was a Texan UH newspaper tycoon UM who
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: was a huge fan of Churchill and a big proponent
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: of allying with UM the UK in support of the
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: fight against Hitler. And this was the big goal, right,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: so he was probably able to kind of help sway
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: that in some of the reporting in Marsha's papers. UM.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: He also became close to a lot of other prominent
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: American journalists and uh several big time US officials, including
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: the Vice President Henry Wallace, who he played tennis with
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: on a regular basis. Uh he he also there there's
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: a quote from Marsha's daughter, Antoinette marsh Haskell that I
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: I love. In a piece written by Chris Irving over
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: at the Telegraph, he quotes Antonette marsh Haskell is saying
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: girls just fell at Rold's feet. I think he slept
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: with everybody on the East and West coast that was
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: worth more than fifty thousand dollars a year. And uh
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: he also, by virtue of knowing these titans of industry
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: and government, he was able to function as uh, not
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: just a propagandist, but a clan destin avenue of information,
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: of transmission of information. So he told, He told Stevenson
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: and the other folks of the UK that he believed,
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: for instance, the president, President Franklin Roosevelt, was sleeping around
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: with the Crown Princess of Norway who had been granted
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: asylum in the US. He also I think gave first
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: word to the UK that the US was going to
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: the moon. Yeah, he was telling people important things. I mean,
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: he even worked his way up to becoming so cozy
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: with Roosevelt himself that he was pretty regularly invited to
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: vacation with the man at his Hyde Park estate in
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: New York. Yes. And in nine he began experiencing back
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: pain and underwent a series of treatments that kept him
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: in traction for several months. While he was recovering, President
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: Roosevelt unfortunately passed away and Germany lost the war. Well,
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: that part was fortunate. That's very fortunate, but it's it's
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: sad that Roosevelt passed away. But yeah, imagine being rolled
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: dall And and coming out from this dreadful recovery, this
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: hard earned recovery, and then find and then learning that
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: you know, he won the war. I would say it
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: was probably a little bitter, sweet, ben um, but then
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: you know, it did give him the opportunity to leave
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: that spies life, that swashbuckling couxman life behind him. Yes,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: he settled down. He married Patricia Neil in ninety three. Uh,
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: their marriage lasted for thirty years. And this episode is
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: not about the subsequent career that dall would had, but
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: as we as we know, he became a giant of
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: of literature and beloved very much to this day. And
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: not a lot of people know where where a lot
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: of that stuff came from. And Ben, do you like
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: the term fabulous? Yeah, isn't that a fun one? It's
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: a good one. It's a you know, I'm torn because
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: fictionist was another one that we discovered on this show
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: that I really enjoyed. But fabulous as well, I would
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: describe him as such, but basically dull. Even with that
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: fictionalization of his you know, war efforts and that plane
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: crash in Egypt. He was kind of a professional liar,
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: which is what a spy is. And ultimately what a
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: good author is right is to tell a convincing lie
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: or to find the truth of the human experience through fiction,
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: which is a lie. I completely agree, And I also
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: have to wonder what would have happened had he not
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: been in the hospital for those few months. Would he
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: have continued because as we know when he when he
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: comes out of the hospital, he's lost sort of his
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: taste for the spies life, and he's ready to go
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: home and settle down, and he feels he served his country.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: But what if he continued, how would our image of
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: James Bond have changed? I'd like to hear some fabulousm
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: from you folks, let us know. And while you're at it,
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: we cannot recommend the book The Regulars enough. If you
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: want to read something related, we'd also like to recommend
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: Churchill's Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare by Giles Milton. And it's
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: about the Other Front, not This is about Churchill's clandestine
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: activities to try to assassinate Hitler and our pals Holly
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: and Tracy over stuff you miss in history class. Actually
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: just recently did a two part episode on the ministry
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: of ungentlemanly warfare, So pop over and check that out
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: and definitely pick up the book. And I would just
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: like to end with a nice quote, uh from dol
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: himself that I think ties a lot of this together.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Quote truth is far too precious a commodity to be
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: used lightly. And with that, huge thank you to our
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: friend and super produce Ramsey gunt our super producer Casey Pegram,
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: thanks to Alex Williams for composing our theme and sound cues,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: and thanks to Lori L. Dove for writing the article
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: for how Stuff Works that we refer to several times
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: in this episode. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: We're we're on the usual Internet places you'll you'll see
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: us there Ridiculous History, or you can get us anywhere
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: that you get your podcast. You already know that you're
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: getting it from wherever you're going to get it. You
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: don't need us to tell you. But most importantly, thanks
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: to you for listening, and we really hope that you'll
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: join us for the next episode of Ridiculous History. Have
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: a great day. Everyone