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Cook by Committee · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild. Our world is full of
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  Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
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  Speaker 1: of these amazing tales right there on display, just waiting
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  Speaker 1: for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: To be a rebel, you need a voice, and usually
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  Speaker 1: a loud one, whether you use a megaphone or a
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  Speaker 1: printing press. Making yourself heard is typically the first step
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  Speaker 1: in turning protests into revolution, but Valentine Silvestrov found another way.
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  Speaker 1: He rebelled with silence. Valentine was born in Kiev in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen thirty seven, when Ukraine was firmly tucked behind the
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  Speaker 1: Iron Curtain. He didn't set out to overthrow governments. He
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  Speaker 1: just loved music. As a kid, he dreamed of being
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  Speaker 1: a concert pianist and composer, But as he grew up
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  Speaker 1: and found his own musical voice, it turned out that
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  Speaker 1: voice didn't exactly harmonize with the authorities idea of approved art.
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  Speaker 1: In the Soviet Union, creative freedom was well non existent. Painters, writers,
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  Speaker 1: and musicians were expected to produce work that celebrated the state.
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  Speaker 1: Art had to be uplifting, patriotic, and safely traditional. Anything
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  Speaker 1: too experimental to western or too emotionally complicated was frowned upon.
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  Speaker 1: Now sometimes frowned upon meant censored, and sometimes it meant
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  Speaker 1: getting thrown behind bars or worse, and that was a
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  Speaker 1: problem for Valentine. By the nineteen sixties, his music had
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  Speaker 1: become downright rebellious, inspired by modernist movements sweeping across Europe.
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  Speaker 1: Valentine's compositions were confrontational, startling, and full of unexpected turns.
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  Speaker 1: One moment you might hear a gentle melody, the next
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  Speaker 1: a crash of dissonant chords. It wasn't uplifting or traditional,
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  Speaker 1: and it definitely wasn't Soviet approved, so pretty soon the
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  Speaker 1: authorities took notice. In nineteen sixty nine, he crossed the
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  Speaker 1: line by walking out of a public event in protest
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  Speaker 1: of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. The state responded swiftly,
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  Speaker 1: expelling him from the Composer's Union. They let him back
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  Speaker 1: in a few years later, thinking that he might have
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  Speaker 1: learned his lesson, but he still refused to temper his
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  Speaker 1: modernist music. As a result, he was expelled again in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four. This time Valentine took the rebuke. Personally
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  Speaker 1: embarrassed and fearing harsher punishment, he withdrew from public life.
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  Speaker 1: He still performed for friends and acquaintances, but he stopped
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  Speaker 1: doing shows for larger audiences. To many who had followed
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  Speaker 1: his career, it looked like the Soviet state had won,
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  Speaker 1: that the authorities had finally broken the avant garde composer.
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  Speaker 1: But in reality, something far more complicated and remarkable was happening.
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  Speaker 1: During his self imposed exile, Valentine's music went through a
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  Speaker 1: dramatic transformation. Gone were the furious outbursts and modernist shocks.
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  Speaker 1: In their place came something far more dangerous to an
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  Speaker 1: oppressive regime restraint. He began composing his Silent Songs, a
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  Speaker 1: cycle of pieces that leaned into fragility and subtlety, incorporating
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  Speaker 1: moments of tranquil silence. The voice was still Valentine's, but
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  Speaker 1: he wasn't shouting anymore. He was whispering, And somehow that
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  Speaker 1: whisper carried even further in a world where political slogans, speeches,
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  Speaker 1: and propaganda were constantly being weaponized. Choosing to say less
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  Speaker 1: became its own form of protest. The Silent Songs spread,
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  Speaker 1: gaining critical acclaim in the West. The Soviets tried to
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  Speaker 1: limit their popularity in Valentine's home country, sometimes outright banning
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  Speaker 1: the pieces, but they couldn't stop his rising fame. His melancholic,
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  Speaker 1: nostalgic pieces resonated with the Ukrainian people, who themselves were
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  Speaker 1: grappling with sadness and regret, and slowly Valentine's music transformed
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  Speaker 1: again in a way that he never expected. It became
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  Speaker 1: a voice for Ukraine. Fast forward a few decades, Silvestrov
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  Speaker 1: continued composing, gradually gaining international recognition. In nineteen ninety one,
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  Speaker 1: as the Soviet Union dissolved, he took to the streets
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  Speaker 1: with his countrymen to celebrate Ukrainian independence. It was an
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  Speaker 1: incredible victory for the country and the composer, but Valentine
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  Speaker 1: never fully escaped the specter of violence. In twenty twenty two,
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  Speaker 1: at the age of eighty four, he found himself uprooted
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  Speaker 1: by conflict. As Russian bombs began falling on Kiev. He
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  Speaker 1: fled his beloved homeland, becoming a refugee in Germany. It's
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  Speaker 1: heartbreaking to think of someone who had already overcome so
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  Speaker 1: much being forced from his home again, and yet Valentine's
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  Speaker 1: response was not one of rage, but of reflection. Today,
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  Speaker 1: as Ukraine endures unspeakable suffering, his music has taken on
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  Speaker 1: a new resonance. His delicate, consoling compositions offer a kind
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  Speaker 1: of healing that loud slogans and anthems can't provide. In
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  Speaker 1: a time of deafening violence, his music reminds us that
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  Speaker 1: silence can be its own kind of resistance. Valentine Silvestrov
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  Speaker 1: never needed a megaphone to be a rebel. He just
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  Speaker 1: needed a piano, a stubborn heart, and the radical belief
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  Speaker 1: that freedom and beauty are always worth defending, even when
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  Speaker 1: it seems like no one is listening. For decades, American
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  Speaker 1: cooks knew that if their soufles fell flat or their
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  Speaker 1: muffins tasted musty, there was just one person to ask
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  Speaker 1: for advice. It was a woman who everyone knew. She
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  Speaker 1: smiled from grocery store shelves, spoke over the airwaves, and
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  Speaker 1: even published her own cookbook. I'm talking, of course, about
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  Speaker 1: Betty Crocker. So when Americans wrote, called, or emailed Betty,
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  Speaker 1: they were often getting responses from someone else entirely because
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  Speaker 1: you see Betty Crocker, the face of American baking, never
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  Speaker 1: actually existed. Betty's origins traced back to Minneapolis, Minnesota, in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen twenty one. Back then, at the bustling offices of
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  Speaker 1: the Washburn Crosby Company, the marketing department had a problem.
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  Speaker 1: Washburn Crosby's main product was gold metal flour, and to
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  Speaker 1: promote it, they would run a contest in a magazine.
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  Speaker 1: Readers could solve a puzzle in an ad and then
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  Speaker 1: send the answer in for a prize. The issue was
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  Speaker 1: that people weren't just sending in completed puzzles. They were
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  Speaker 1: asking questions, and over the past few days, Washburn Crosby's
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  Speaker 1: all male advertising department had received nearly thirty thousand cooking queries. Now,
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  Speaker 1: they had dealt with something like this before, but on
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  Speaker 1: a much smaller scale, and at that time they had
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  Speaker 1: simply asked female staff who baked for advice and then
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  Speaker 1: sent those answers off. But the deluge of questions this
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  Speaker 1: time brought to light a concern that Samuel Gail, the
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  Speaker 1: head of advertising, had quietly been worrying about. He believed
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  Speaker 1: the mostly female customers who were writing in wanted to
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  Speaker 1: hear from another woman, someone who they, as a consumer,
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  Speaker 1: would trust to give good advice. Since baking was seen
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  Speaker 1: as a female activity at the time, he thought they
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  Speaker 1: wouldn't want tips in a letter signed by a man,
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  Speaker 1: even if the advice was actually coming from the female
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  Speaker 1: office staff. So Samuel's idea to create whole Cloth a
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  Speaker 1: fictional woman in charge of answering baking questions. Her last
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  Speaker 1: name would be Crocker, after William G. Crocker, the recently
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  Speaker 1: retired company director, and her first name well, something friendly,
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  Speaker 1: something wholesome, something like Betty. After that, a Washburn Crosby
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  Speaker 1: secretary wrote out a signature for the new fake baker,
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  Speaker 1: and just like that, Betty Crocker was born and she
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  Speaker 1: was an instant hit. By nineteen twenty four, she had
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  Speaker 1: a radio show where a home economics expert named Marjorie
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  Speaker 1: Child Husted brought her to life. In nineteen thirty six,
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  Speaker 1: he finally got a face to go with the voice.
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  Speaker 1: Washburn Crosby put together a composite of all the women
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  Speaker 1: at the company, the result being the first ever Betty
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  Speaker 1: Crocker official portrait. Betty's influence was felt in homes across
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  Speaker 1: America all through the twentieth century. During World War Two,
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  Speaker 1: she published cookbooks and ran a special radio program teaching
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  Speaker 1: home cooks how to make do with ration foods. And
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  Speaker 1: she continued to educate new cooks, giving lessons over the
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  Speaker 1: radio and sponsoring cooking schools. It's no wonder that in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen forty five, Fortune magazine named Betty Crocker the second
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  Speaker 1: best known woman in America. The first was, of course,
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  Speaker 1: Eleanor Roosevelt. Betty even came to the small screen in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen forty nine when actress Adelaide Holly played her on TV.
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  Speaker 1: For the next fifteen years, this real life Betty would
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  Speaker 1: pop into TV shows on CBS and ABC to teach
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  Speaker 1: television characters and celebrities to bake with the best of them.
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  Speaker 1: Besides teaching consumers, Betty quickly began to sell to them
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  Speaker 1: as well. Now, while you might instantly recognize Betty with
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  Speaker 1: boxed cake mix or frosting, the first product bearing her
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  Speaker 1: name was actually a dried soup mix that launched in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen forty two. Quickly after that came cake mix, cookies,
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  Speaker 1: and the other Betty Crocker products that we all know
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  Speaker 1: and love. While Betty was never a real person, the
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  Speaker 1: researchers behind her advice were. Over the years, a series
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  Speaker 1: of recipe developers, nutritionists, and housekeeping experts were the brains
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  Speaker 1: behind Betty and Washburn Crosby, which later became General Mills,
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  Speaker 1: was wholly dedicated to making sure Betty's advice and products
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  Speaker 1: worked perfectly for home cooks. In nineteen forty six, General
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  Speaker 1: Mills created the Betty Crocker Test Kitchens at their office
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  Speaker 1: in Minneapolis. These were replicas of home kitchens, complete with
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  Speaker 1: the ovens, tools, and other equipment that a typical customer
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  Speaker 1: might have in their home. They used these kitchens to
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  Speaker 1: test out recipes and advice. So if a Betty Crocker
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  Speaker 1: recipe said bake for twenty five minutes, you better believe
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  Speaker 1: someone tried it at twenty three, twenty four, and twenty six,
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  Speaker 1: just to be sure. Although she's over one hundred years
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  Speaker 1: old today, Betty Crocker's cooking advice is still as fresh
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  Speaker 1: as ever. She has helped generations of home cooks coddle
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  Speaker 1: their eggs and cram their brulets. Back in the nineteen twenties,
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  Speaker 1: Washburn Crosby took a gamble, hoping that people would like
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  Speaker 1: advice from a character and not a committee, and today
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  Speaker 1: it's still paying off, which just goes to show you
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  Speaker 1: when it comes to cooking, there is no reward without
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  Speaker 1: a little whisk. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour
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  Speaker 1: of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts,
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  Speaker 1: or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast
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  Speaker 1: dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Manky
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  Speaker 1: in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award
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  Speaker 1: winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series,
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  Speaker 1: and television show, and you can learn all about it
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  Speaker 1: over at Theworldoflore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.