Latest / Ridiculous History / CLASSIC: The Strange and Spectacularly Disgusting Story of the Great Kentucky Meat Shower

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CLASSIC: The Strange and Spectacularly Disgusting Story of the Great Kentucky Meat Shower · Ridiculous History

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Fellow Ridiculous Historians, We would love to share a classic
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: episode wherein we discovered what we suspect is a powerful
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: euphemism and it sounds so dirty, null Kentucky meat shower.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: You talking about the Kentucky meats shower. It'sull like a
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: Cleveland steamer. Yeah, no, I don't look that up. Yeah,
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: it does sound euphemistic.
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  Speaker 3: Af On March third, eighteen seventy six, residents of Bath County, Kentucky,
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  Speaker 3: were startled to find what appears to be chunky, flaky
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: bits of meat falling from the clear blue sky.
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  Speaker 2: Literally.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, this is a true story. This is something that
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  Speaker 1: absolutely arrested national attention, and people had all sorts of
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: theories about this. In this episode, we attempt to solve
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: the mystery.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Let's roll that meaty tape.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Let's start today's
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: episode with a quotation from the New York Times on
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: March tenth, eighteen seventy six. We'll just give you the
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: headline here, flesh descending in a shower, an astounding phenomenon
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: in Kentucky. Fresh meat like mutton or venison falling from
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  Speaker 1: a clear sky.
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  Speaker 2: Yum.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, they said, like mutton or like venison. But what
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  Speaker 1: was it?
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  Speaker 2: Hi? I'm Ben, Hey, I'm no, and it's rain and meat.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: I think of this rain and meat. You were not, yeah,
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: singing when I walked in. Why you gotta one on me? Ben?
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: Now you didn't even right. It's rating men, No, it's true.
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  Speaker 1: Oh but we are also joined by our super producer,
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  Speaker 1: Casey Pegram And this is the first time the three
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: of us have been back on the show together in
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: a little in a little while, isn't it.
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess it has been a minute, probably like
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  Speaker 2: a like a month or something. Oh yeah, that voice
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  Speaker 2: from the sky like like like showers of meat in
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  Speaker 2: our ears. Super producer Casey Pegram, Man, I've missed you, guys,
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: missed you.
• 2:32
  Speaker 4: I know.
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  Speaker 2: It's weird. Casey was in France for a while, and
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: then we were away, and then I was away last
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  Speaker 2: week and here we are.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Here we are, and we decided, now that the three
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: of us have reunited after far too long, that we
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: were going to pick up our continuing mission to do
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: an episode for every state in the United States. Uh,
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: and we're going to hopefully succeed. Where Soufion paused for
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: a second.
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  Speaker 2: He just I think it was a troll. Honestly, I
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: don't think he had any intention of doing it. He
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  Speaker 2: only made two.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe he's got a back catalog in years. Maybe he's
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: just really stuck on Rhode Island. You mean, like a vault.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe unreleased state records that no one's gonna ever hear.
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  Speaker 1: Sort of like JD. Salinger had all those stories that
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  Speaker 1: no one saw in Laughters Done. I didn't know about that, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: but hopefully a little bit different. Well, speaking of stories,
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  Speaker 1: Speaking of stories, nol we got one today, we do.
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  Speaker 1: We do so this episode will count for our Kentucky episode, right,
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  Speaker 1: and from this headline you can tell that we're describing
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  Speaker 1: something pretty bizarre. You see, back in March ninth of
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: what do we say? Eighteen seventy six? Yeah, back in
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  Speaker 1: March ninth in Bath County, Kentucky, there was someone named
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  Speaker 1: Alan Crouch. This guy lived about two or three miles
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  Speaker 1: from a place we've seen alternately called Olympian Spring in
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  Speaker 1: the original New York Times piece, but then later called
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  Speaker 1: what was that Olymps Springs?
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  Speaker 2: So who knows? Who knows?
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  Speaker 1: Probably the people that lived there, right, and missus Crouch
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  Speaker 1: was out in the yard at the time. She was
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  Speaker 1: making soap, and then she looked around. She heard the
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  Speaker 1: pitter pattern of what she thought was, you know, maybe
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  Speaker 1: the beginning of rain on a clear day without a
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  Speaker 1: cloud in the sky. And she looked around, and what
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  Speaker 1: was falling in her yard was not rain, not precipitation.
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  Speaker 2: It was meat. Yeah, in an event that would go
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  Speaker 2: down in history as the Great Kentucky Meat Shower, which
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  Speaker 2: is not some kind of crazy mullet right right, or
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  Speaker 2: weird euphemism.
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  Speaker 1: Also, I love the fact that they added great to
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  Speaker 1: the name because it implies that there were some other,
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  Speaker 1: relatively mediocre.
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  Speaker 2: Ye there showers. There had to have been some lesser
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  Speaker 2: meat showers. But what what happened? Why why was meat
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  Speaker 2: raining from the And it wasn't. It wasn't just like
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  Speaker 2: little pieces of meat. It was like all kinds of
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  Speaker 2: different sized pieces of meat.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, the ones that missus Crouch saw were three
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  Speaker 1: to four inches square, so pretty substantial, you know. And
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  Speaker 1: other people saw this too, it wasn't just Missus Crouch,
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  Speaker 1: and people tried to immediately figure out what this could be.
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  Speaker 1: And we have to remember that the people in this
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  Speaker 1: area at this time were well aware of other anecdotal
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  Speaker 1: stories of strange things falling from the sky, rains of fish,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, you know, or a rain of stones, but
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  Speaker 1: these were often considered to be stories of old you know,
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  Speaker 1: things you would read about in ancient text.
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  Speaker 2: Is there anything in the Bible about a plague of
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  Speaker 2: meat rain? Surely there's some sort of supernaturaliesque rain. But
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  Speaker 2: I don't think it's just straight up meat. Was there? Frogs? Yeah? Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: frogs y's yeah, they will eventually become meat. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: if you're ambitious. Yeah. And here's the thing.
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  Speaker 1: Not only did other people see it, but two people
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  Speaker 1: in the area got their gumption up and they said,
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  Speaker 1: there's one easy way to figure out what kind of
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  Speaker 1: meat this is.
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  Speaker 2: Let's taste it. H Yeah. There was a guy named
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  Speaker 2: Harrison Gill who was nearby. And here the New York
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  Speaker 2: Times article refers to as having unquestionable veracity. So he
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  Speaker 2: spoke the truth. And he was seeing these pieces of
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  Speaker 2: meat like sticking to fences and all scattered every which way.
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  Speaker 2: And yeah, he was one of the ones that decided
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  Speaker 2: let's give it a taste. And it was kind of
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  Speaker 2: argued between some of the tasters. The intrepid sky meat tasters,
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  Speaker 2: whether it was bear or possibly venison, or A popular
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  Speaker 2: one was mutton.
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  Speaker 1: Right because they described a slightly gamey taste to it,
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  Speaker 1: and mutton and venison especially can be gamy.
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  Speaker 2: I've never eaten bear, no, I mean, but I would
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  Speaker 2: assume it's super dark meat, very very gamey. Although mutton,
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  Speaker 2: to me, it would be the dead giveaway because you know,
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  Speaker 2: lamb and then he kind of meat like mutton, has
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  Speaker 2: a very very distinct taste.
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  Speaker 1: It doesn't tastes like anything else. Distinct is the is
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  Speaker 1: the correct word I think there. And I don't even
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  Speaker 1: know if it's legal to eat a bear. That just
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  Speaker 1: I'm not living the kind of life where that's come
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  Speaker 1: up yet.
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  Speaker 2: What about you, Well, this is in the eighteen hundred,
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  Speaker 2: so that is probably the wild West as far as
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  Speaker 2: bear meats. That's a good point. That's a really good point.
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  Speaker 1: The first explanation from a man of science at the
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  Speaker 1: time comes from a guy named Leopold Brandice about what
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: three months after the incident, he is able to get
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  Speaker 1: a hold of some of the specimens, or it looks
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  Speaker 1: like a specimen, but he gets some of it in
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  Speaker 1: a jar preserved or a bottle preserved in glycerin, and
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  Speaker 1: he starts poking around at it, and then he makes
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  Speaker 1: the declaration that while this may appear to be meat,
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  Speaker 1: it is not actually meat at all. Wait what Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that's what he said. He said it was not in
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  Speaker 1: fact meat. He believed it was something called nostock no stock.
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  Speaker 2: Oh that's right. This is like a like a plant
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  Speaker 2: based organism. Yeah.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a cinobacteria that comes actually from the soil,
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  Speaker 1: from the ground. You can find it on moist rocks,
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  Speaker 1: bottoms of lakes and springs. It used to be called
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  Speaker 1: troll butter or which jelly back in Europe. You're joking, No,
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  Speaker 1: that's true. Those are amazing names for food products.
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  Speaker 2: I know, I know troll jelly or witch butter, troll butter,
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  Speaker 2: which jelly, But I think either one, you know, they're
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  Speaker 2: both evocative. This is great. I'm going to use those, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: just for I don't know, I don't know why yet,
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  Speaker 2: but I love those. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I've been thinking the same thing. And when this stuff
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  Speaker 1: is dry, it's pretty easy to miss. But when when
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  Speaker 1: it's wet, it does have this jelly like I guess
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  Speaker 1: you could say maybe meat esque, meat esque appearance. But
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: Brandy said that it's pretty easy to identify the subject was.
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  Speaker 1: He was, also, by the way, convinced this was true.
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  Speaker 1: The Kentucky Wonder is no more or less than nostoc,
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  Speaker 1: And people have known about the nostoc since the sixteen hundreds.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, that's how you get nicknames like which jelly?
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  Speaker 2: But how did it? Where did it come from? Well?
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  Speaker 2: What was his what was his idea about how this
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  Speaker 2: stuff made it up into the atmosphere and then showered
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  Speaker 2: down upon this relatively small area.
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  Speaker 1: It goes back to when it is dry versus when
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  Speaker 1: it is wet. So when this stuff is dried so inconspicuous,
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  Speaker 1: people thought that it would float on the breeze until
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  Speaker 1: it rained, and then when it was raining, the nostoc
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  Speaker 1: would absorb the moisture and then it would fall from
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  Speaker 1: this guy as a jelly.
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  Speaker 2: Interesting, but that's not the only theory.
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  Speaker 1: That's not the only theory. That's not the only theory. Oh,
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  Speaker 1: we shall also mention those other nicknames, star slubber, I
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  Speaker 1: don't know, I want to care that one feels somehow dirty,
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  Speaker 1: and then star jelly, which is still I don't know,
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  Speaker 1: which is butter, which is jelly? Those are my picks,
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  Speaker 1: so he believed Brandy's of course, believed that this was
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  Speaker 1: the one absolute answer. But the problem is that for
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  Speaker 1: his theory to be correct, it would have had to
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  Speaker 1: have rained at some point, or there would have had
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  Speaker 1: to be at least some rain bearing clouds in the sky,
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  Speaker 1: you know what I mean, because the the nostuc would
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  Speaker 1: have to absorb this moisture. And there wasn't a cloud
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  Speaker 1: in the sky. It's perfectly clear day. And this meant
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  Speaker 1: that there were going to be other theories. Like you said, no,
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  Speaker 1: what was what was one of the other theories that
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  Speaker 1: came up?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a pretty gross one. It was this
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  Speaker 2: notion from a guy named doctor A Mead Edwards, who
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  Speaker 2: believed that this meat stuff was actually lung from a
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  Speaker 2: horse or possibly an infant, yes, a human shallow. Now,
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  Speaker 2: what's the deal with that? There was a lot of
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  Speaker 2: That is a lot of lung meat. You don't have
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  Speaker 2: to have a lot of babies to make that much
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  Speaker 2: lung meat. I mean we're talking like, you know, sticking
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  Speaker 2: to the fences, ben they scattered across the ground every which.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's the problem, right, that explanation. It's even
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  Speaker 1: tougher to believe, but there is truth to it.
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: They examined seven samples of this meat shower, and they confirmed,
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  Speaker 1: I believe two of them to be lung tissue, and
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  Speaker 1: three were muscle tissue, and two were made of cartilage.
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  Speaker 1: So there was lung tissue in there. But how would
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  Speaker 1: it come from human infant specifically or a horse? And
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  Speaker 1: also how similar are the lungs of a horse and
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  Speaker 1: the lungs of a human infant apparently quite apparently distressingly similar,
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  Speaker 1: So what gives People couldn't really answer that question, could they?
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  Speaker 1: They said, they just said, because it's lung tissue, we
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  Speaker 1: believe that it came from a human infant or a horse.
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  Speaker 1: They didn't really explain how it could have gotten there
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  Speaker 1: into the sky than onto the ground in Bath County.
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  Speaker 2: That's the thing that no one seems to be looking
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  Speaker 2: for that particular solution. They're more like, what's the meat?
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  Speaker 2: Is the mystery of the meat, not about how in
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  Speaker 2: the hell it ended up coming down from the sky. Right,
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  Speaker 2: that seemed like the least of people's concerns, which is
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  Speaker 2: strange because it makes you think about priorities, you know.
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  Speaker 2: But again, there were more theories, right, some more plausible
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  Speaker 2: than others. So one of my favorite theories that actually
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  Speaker 2: does try to take a look at how this material
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: could have managed to make it up into the sky
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  Speaker 2: and rain down upon these hapless people of Olympia blames
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: this occurrence on a meteor shower. Do tell super medi
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: meteor shower. So here's a quote from the New York
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Times from William Livingston Alden. He wrote, according to the
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: present theory of astronomers, an enormous belt of meteoric stones
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: constantly revolves around the Sun, and when the Earth comes
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  Speaker 2: in contact with this belt, she is soundly pelted. Okay.
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  Speaker 2: He goes on to say, similarly, we may suppose that
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  Speaker 2: there revolves around the Sun a belt a venison, mutton,
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  Speaker 2: and other meats divided into small fragments which are precipitated
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  Speaker 2: upon the Earth whenever the latter crosses their path. Help
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: me unpack that, Ben, I mean, it sounds like what
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: it says on the tent. Mm hmmm. So how likely
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  Speaker 2: do you think that?
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  Speaker 1: Is?
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  Speaker 2: Not very I actually saw another version of this theory
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  Speaker 2: that said that this was like potentially like alien meat.
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  Speaker 1: So this is space venus space meat. Its space venis
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  Speaker 1: all right, space mutton. So that idea is fascinating. I
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: don't know if it's true. I'm just gonna say it.
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  Speaker 1: I don't want to be a pessimist, you know, I
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: don't want to shut the guy down.
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  Speaker 2: What do you think? Oh, I mean it's bonkers. You know,
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  Speaker 2: you don't want to live in a world with space venison?
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: I don't know, man, I mean, it's not that I
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: don't want to live in that world. It's just that
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: I don't know that that world exists. How do they
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: get up there? I don't know. It was a real
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: jump in this guy. He's like, so here, there's this
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: thing called asteroid's an asteroid belt. So if there's an
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: asteroid belt, why couldn't there also be a similar belt
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: of meat. Maybe the guy was just very pro belt.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: I think it was high. So, speaking of high, there
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: may be another explanation. And it's an explanation that involves animals, birds,
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: your favorite your favorites.
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  Speaker 1: But and this explanation originally came from an old farmer
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: in Ohio, who, upon learning of the meat shower, said,
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  Speaker 1: I have an explanation. It's not space venison. It's not
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: it's not human lung tissue. It's nothing that you guys
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: have said before. It is, in fact something that I've
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: seen vultures do in the past. He said that this
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: deluge of meat was actually a disgorgement of meat from
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: vultures who were flying too high to be visible from
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: the ground. And some vultures can fly as high as
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: like a little less than forty thousand feet or twelve
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: thousand meters geez, so it'd be tough to see them.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: And he said that this was vulture vomit. And then
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: a little bit later, a guy named doctor L. D. Castmbine,
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: writing in the Louisville Medical News, said, yeah, I think
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: the farmer's right. I think this is vulture vomit. And
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: he obtained his own sample and he lit it on fire,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: and he's like, ah, this is not just mutton, it's
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: rancid mutton. And this made him believe that the culprits
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: were vultures. They ate a dead sheep and they flew off,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: but due to the weight of the meat they were
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: carrying and their bodies, they were having a hard time flying,
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  Speaker 1: so they vomited in the sky to make it easier
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: for them to fly.
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: What was the thing that vultures do kind of on
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: the rag. They'll unburden themselves of a heavy load of
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: meat because you know, they eat this stuff raw. They
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: also have really acidic stomachs I've read to aid in
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: this digestion, and so sometimes they're so loaded down from
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: gorging themselves on you know, Lincoln dead sheep, like you
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: said that, they have to puke it up just so
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: they can fly properly.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: And some vultures even vomit on their feet to regulate
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: their temperature.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: That's disgusting. The vultures are filthy, disgusting creatures. They're very different,
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: they're very different things. Have you ever seen them up close,
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: just to the side of the road. Yeah, you know,
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: I don't go for the stop. I don't go check
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: out those vulture times. No, dude. Do you know what
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: a group of vultures is called? It's cool, there's there's
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: a different name for them depending on what they're doing.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, later on, So a group of vultures
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: is a committee, a venue, or a vault, Which which
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: do you prefer?
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: I guess it depends on what they're doing. A vault, well,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: so then if they're in flight, they're a kettle. I
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: think I've heard that one.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And if they're feeding in a group, it's because
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: the best one. It's called a wake, yes, yeah, yeah,
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: But what's a vault. It's just like I said, they're interchangeable.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: A group of vultures can be either a committee, a venue,
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: or a vault. Do you know what a group of
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: ravens is called? It's an unkindness or yes, an unkindness
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: of ravens.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: So this vulture vomit explanation may not be particularly enjoyable
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: or I don't know, it's it can be pretty disgusting,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: especially when you consider those two guys ate it. But
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: it does give us the ability to conjecture a little
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: bit about how the vultures came to vomit over Bath County.
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: First off, vultures don't tend to fly of their own
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: free will after they because they are digesting. So this
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: means that something must have startled the vultures. We don't
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: know what it was. Was it a sheep on a
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: mission of revenge? Was it a farmer discovering the sheep
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: and shooting at the vultures?
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and this is coming from a great article from
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: Motherboard called the Mystery of the Kentucky Meat Shower by
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Kaylee Rogers, and she actually speaks to the vice president
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: for field Programs at the Wildlife Conservation Society, who says
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: his name is Joe Walston. He says, if you want
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: to take off quickly with a huge amount of weight,
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: the first thing you're going to do is vomit, which
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: I think applies to everyone, you know.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: So I also pulled some vulture facts from this excellent
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: book I want to recommend if you're ready for a
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: deep dive into human vulture relationships called Carrion Dreams. It's
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: written by a guy named Benjamin Joel Wilkinson, and as
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: far as I can tell, man he is just super
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: into the history of vultures, and he describes vultures in
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: folklore and mythology as well, you know, if you go
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: back to the ancient days of history. And one of
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: the interesting things is that when and where a vulture
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: vomits is also considered significant in certain cultures or folklore events.
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: It's a sign which is neat. You know. For instance,
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: here in Georgia, it used to be a common, you know,
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: folk tale belief that if you deeply desire something, all
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: you have to do is wish for it as you
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: throw a kiss at a vulture, and your wish will
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: come true. But you had to be careful not to
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: speak to a vulture while it was flying overhead, because
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: if you did and it hurt, you punish you by
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: vomiting on you.
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: No, so maybe is that really? Is that really in there?
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: That's really a thing? Yeah, I'm telling you. Carry and
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: Dreams is a great book. It's also a very weird book.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: But so if that's true, perhaps somebody spoke to a
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: vulture while it was flying over it can te Well.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Here's the thing too, It's like this would have had
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: to be a multiple a group puke session, like a kettle,
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: whole kettle. Yeah, yeah, yeah, the whole the whole kettle puking,
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: you know, en mass And in this Motherboard article they
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: also speak to a named Kurt Goad, who's an art
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: professor at Transylvania University in Lexington and a self professed
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: expert in meat showers. He proposes that this is definitely
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: the most likely scenario that would have happened because all
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: of the meat was different sizes it came so, which
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: would have made sense if it had come from different
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: animals that were you know, chewing and feeding on different
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: carcasses or whatever, and then ended up together. Uh. And
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: they couldn't exactly ever figure out what types of animal
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: that came from, but it would have been from all
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: different kinds, and that there was some you know, cartilage
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: and lung material in there as well. So it certainly
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: was a mixed bag of meat. And here's the thing,
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: we don't know exactly how much meat actually fell. We
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: don't have a measure of you know, x amount of
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: tons or this many pounds. Instead we have what's the
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: phrase they use in most of the news at the time.
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: They say it was enough to fill a horse wagon full.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: And for most people these days, that's it's not a
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: very easy rule of thumb kind of measurement, right totally.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: So there's a defense that Kirk comes up with in
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: this Doctor Goad. He says that in eighteen seventy six,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: if you said, oh, it was a horse wagon full
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: of meat, that was the equivalent now of saying it's
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: like a big gulp from McDonald's. So his argument is
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: that horse wagons were ubiquitous enough at the time that
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: most people would have a rough idea of what that
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: size meant.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: I'm trying to picture it. I'm sorry, I'm picturing this
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: wagon full of meat. That's the thing is a lot.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: Is it a wagon to horses or is it a
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: wagon that horses carry behind them?
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: That makes a difference. Oh, that's true, and I guess
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: I'm just picturing one of those standard UH wagons with
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: the little slats on the side that would be pulled
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: behind a horse. Yeah, where somebody sits up in. Yeah. Yeah.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: So either way, that's a distressing amount of meat to
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: fall from the sky. What do you think is the
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: mystery solved?
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, with the most logical explanation being vulture
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: of Voman, I wonder how those towns people felt about having,
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: you know, snacked on some of that stuff out of curiosity.
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: I think at the time eating raw meat wasn't quite
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: as you know, frowned upon, or they weren't really worried
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: about food borne illnesses so much.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: I think, yeah, And I believe the idea was that
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: one wouldn't get sick if you just tasted it, rather
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: than you know, consuming a large amount of it or
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: the amount that would be equivalent to a meal.
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: This certainly wouldn't have been like, oh, free food. I
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: don't know, man from heaven. Yeah, Manna is not a
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: meaty man situation.
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: There is a question here that we have for you
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: ridiculous historians. Which explanation do you think is the most
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: plausible or which do you wish was the true story.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: So we've got let's see, we've got human flesh, we've
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: got nostoc, we've got space venison, space meat, we've got
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: a curse from a vulture, and then of course we
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: just have a panic vulture, a panics kettle of vultures
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: attempting to fly. I'll tell you, man, my favorite My
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: favorites personally are either the space venison or the vulture curse.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: You are all about this space venison. M h yeah,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: that's what people say about me. I guess we should
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: add there are a couple more details that we can
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: add to these theories. One in terms of vulture behavior
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: is that have you ever seen those episodes of South
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: Park or Family Guy. It's on so many comedy shows,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: this trope of one person throwing up and then everyone
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: seeing them throw up, and then they throw up as
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: well in reaction.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: Oh god, yeah. Yeah.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: So vultures really do that. That's the thing when they
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: are flying in a group. If one goes, they all go.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: See this has got to be the answer, right. This
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: doesn't invalidate a vulture curse. It may mean that the
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: vultures vomit swarmed on them, cursing everyone in the town.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: So I guess the moral of the story, if that
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: theory is true, is don't talk to vultures while they're busy.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't go anywhere near the ugly bastards.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: We had some more details tho on is it a
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: whole new theory or is it something to add to well.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: I was trying to find a little more information about
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: this supposed meat media shower, but there's really not a
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: whole lot out there. It all kind of comes down
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: to that quote about how there may be a belt
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: of venison, mutton, and other meats divided into small fragments
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: that are revolving around the sun, which is bizarre. But
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: there's another one woman, I believe her name was Mary Crouch,
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: who was making soap. She apparently initially was scared that
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: her husband and son I believe, had been sucked up
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: into the sky and shredded and eviscerated by an angry
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: god and then rained down upon her in retribution for
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: what soap? Who knows? Who knows? Just being a sinner.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: It's an angry god up there, Ben, Yeah, yeah, did you.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Ever read that original sermon? Yeah, sinners in the hand
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: of an angry God.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: It's a wild one. We should do an episode on that.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: We should, We should. Actually I have a lot of that.
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: I have a lot of the work from that time.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: But for now, we believe that we have solved to
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: a great degree the mystery of the Kentucky meat shower.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: No, we didn't do it. I say we as the
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: human species. Yeah.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Whatever people say we, they usually mean in a global event,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: like the human species.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: Right, I agree? I agree. And if I thought of
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: a better music theme for this episode, actually better than
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: it's raining meat. What is it? Red rain is coming down,
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: red rain has fallen in, which is a totally useless
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: Peter Gabriel song to me, but completely useful in this context.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Well, you're welcome, Peter, And what better note to end
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: our show on today? Thank you so much for listening.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: Let us know it, especially if you happen to live
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: in this area of Kentucky. Let us know if people
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: still talk about this strange event in eighteen seventy six,
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: and if so, what do they say about it?
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: And have you heard of any of the lesser meat
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: showers of other locales. I'm very interested to hear that.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Or have you heard of any other extraordinary stories
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: of things falling from the sky in your neck of
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: the Global woods? If so, let us know. You can
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: find us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, especially on our one
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: of our favorite places on the internet, our Facebook community page,
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians, where you know we see some cool stuff.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Stuff happens there. It's a place in our hearts and
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: also on the Internet. That's a great way to describe it.
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: Additionally, we'd like to think, as always super producer Casey Pegram,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: I would I think Alex.
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: Williams, who composed our theme, our research pals Christopher Hasiotis
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: and Eve's Jeff Coo, and I believe Ben we have
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: a new member to the Ridiculous History research team as
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: Christopher and Eves kind of move on to start working
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: on some stuff of their own.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: Yes, thank you to Gabrielle Luzier, who a funny story
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: used to also work with Mental.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: Floss that's awesome. I love that. Man. We're happy to
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: have you. Yeah.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: So that's it for today, but stay tuned for next
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: time when we reveal Wait.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: Wait, did you hear that? You know I heard it, Ben,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: I was gonna just keep going. It's time, gentlemen A
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: Stricklyn the Quist. He really leaned into that with you.
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: Well, it's been a long time. I have to it
• 27:51
  Speaker 4: has to make up for lost time.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: It has been a long time.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: And although we are sworn nemeses, I just want to
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: check in real quick, how you've been doing it?
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: Pretty good?
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: Good?
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: Kids are great, you know, just like kids in general,
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: just in general.
• 28:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah. I don't have any children of myself, but you know,
• 28:06
  Speaker 4: they seem to be going to school, and I understand
• 28:09
  Speaker 4: that's a good thing. Yeah. Things are you know, things
• 28:12
  Speaker 4: are fine.
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: Did they learn about the Great Kentucky Meat Shower in
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: school or any of the other showers that are implied
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: by that title.
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: Well, in fact, we're going to be exploring a shower
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: of our own. My friends, get in the shower with me,
• 28:24
  Speaker 4: my buddies, no, come.
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: On in, okay, a shower of the mind.
• 28:29
  Speaker 4: The weird animals are just fine. Now listen, we know
• 28:35
  Speaker 4: that I am part of the most cringe worthy segment
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: in all the podcasting, in which I the quizitors show
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: up and I pose a scenario to the two of you,
• 28:47
  Speaker 4: and you determine whether or not it is actually representative
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: of a real thing, what happened in history, or I'd
• 28:54
  Speaker 4: done made it all up? Seas right, you get three minutes.
• 28:59
  Speaker 4: You can discuss amongst yourselves for three minutes.
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: A friend, can we can we rope Casey into this?
• 29:05
  Speaker 4: No? If you had friends, you could in fact phone them,
• 29:07
  Speaker 4: But I know for a fact that that's hurtful.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: We're not friends, are you kidding? Oh right? Confuse this?
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: Okay, Okay, But in addition to that, you also add
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: one arbitrary rule, right.
• 29:21
  Speaker 4: So that if you wish to ask any question to me,
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: you must first obey a rule of arbitray nature that
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: I make up typically two minutes before I come in here, okay,
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: and you have to do that in order to ask
• 29:33
  Speaker 4: a question. I will tell you what that rule is
• 29:36
  Speaker 4: after I have given you your scenario.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: All right, you know what I'm feeling good, I'm feeling
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: all right. No, Casey, I think we got this.
• 29:44
  Speaker 4: I will I'll give you the scenario. Okay, I will
• 29:47
  Speaker 4: give you your arbitrary rule, and then time will begin.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: At which point I will vault over to that gigantic
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: grandfather clock.
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: You'll pull the pull.
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: Cord which diesel engine going. Yeah, all right, all right,
• 29:58
  Speaker 4: it gets really few meon here, all right, here's your scenario.
• 30:03
  Speaker 4: In fourteen hundred and two, in Shropshire, England, locals were
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: perplexed by what they described as a rain of worms
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: falling upon the village in what amounted to thousands of worms,
• 30:16
  Speaker 4: covering the entire area, including the rooftops of several buildings.
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: The odd weather was met not with superstition and fear,
• 30:24
  Speaker 4: as we'd usually guess, but with a sort of bewildered amusement. However,
• 30:30
  Speaker 4: this historical event would later be immortalized by none other
• 30:34
  Speaker 4: than William Shakespeare, who fudged the date so that it
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: happened more than a year later, on the eve of
• 30:41
  Speaker 4: the Battle of Shrewsbury, which features in Henry the Fourth
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: Part one in act for scene one, Harry hotspur Percy,
• 30:49
  Speaker 4: the leader of a rebellion against Henry the Fourth, says,
• 30:52
  Speaker 4: yester een, they do say that worms fell as though rain.
• 30:56
  Speaker 4: Fortune is so disposed to us, that nature herself to
• 31:00
  Speaker 4: against this pretender king. In the mid nineteenth century, when
• 31:04
  Speaker 4: Shakespeare's plays became more popular, Shropshire began what would become
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: an annual tradition, a festival day celebrating the Rain of Worms.
• 31:13
  Speaker 4: It happens every year on the second Saturday of April.
• 31:17
  Speaker 4: And your arbitrary rule is you must quote Shakespeare, any
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: Shakespeare before asking me a question.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: Begin the time. I'm taking a run for it and
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: we are okay, we're god. You've made worms meat of me.
• 31:35
  Speaker 4: You have a question?
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: No I do? I do? I don't know. I just
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: wanted to quote some Shakespeare. Don't really have any question.
• 31:42
  Speaker 4: That's a that's a good quote.
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: Very well. I bite my thumb at you.
• 31:47
  Speaker 4: Romeo and Juliette reference Go ahead.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, So this festival, what's the name of it again?
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: It is known as the Rain of Worms Festival, and
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: it is second Saturday of every April.
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: In your story, it's on going.
• 32:00
  Speaker 4: It is ongoing in your story. It is ongoing, Casey,
• 32:06
  Speaker 4: what do you think?
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: Oh just for so wait, wait, we're letting Casey come
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: into this earlier and you ignored me and said I
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: had no friends for everything.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: Sure, everybody listening, what happened when you heard that dead
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: air and those pauses between the quister and myself? I
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: was staring at him to read body language somewhat unsuccessfully.
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: All right, Casey, what's what's your take?
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: Man?
• 32:29
  Speaker 5: Oh boy? See, I hate this because whenever you and
• 32:32
  Speaker 5: knowl are not in agreement on something, I'm gonna be
• 32:35
  Speaker 5: the tiebreaker, and I'm probably gonna get it wrong with this.
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: We usually tend to be on the same page pretty quickly.
• 32:40
  Speaker 4: You do rock paper scissors every time.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: So we've got to We've got to stick. That works, man.
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: But that means that you're at opposition with one another.
• 32:48
  Speaker 4: If you were an agreement, you wouldn't have to do
• 32:50
  Speaker 4: rock paper scissors.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: That's what you can only really do rock paper scissors
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: with friends. I don't know if you have a lot
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: of friends, Jonathan, but if you have friends and you
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: play rock paper scissors, Okay, Look, we're at a minute twenty.
• 33:04
  Speaker 5: I kind of think this is true, but I could
• 33:06
  Speaker 5: be completely wrong, or it could be from a different Shakespeare.
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: I'm just that's kind of how this works, you know.
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: I'm just skeptical that they're of the Initially, I'm skeptical
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: of a festival built on worms because people in general
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: aren't wild about worms. Oh wow, okay, this is this
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: one's taken the longest because usually we've nailed something down
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: by now we're at fifty seconds. I'm gonna say, peel,
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: you know what. I'm tempted to say the same thing,
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: just because it was so detailed. Do you want to
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: lock it in? Let's lock it in and you'll come
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: back if we're okay, all right? Three two one false
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: false false, Sorry, you'll correct.
• 33:53
  Speaker 4: Yeah, there was no rain of words in Shropshire English,
• 34:00
  Speaker 4: and I made up the line from Henry the fourth
• 34:03
  Speaker 4: part one. There's there is a line that does say
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: that that fortune is disposed to us, but Hotspur says
• 34:10
  Speaker 4: it in a completely different context. There's no festival of
• 34:14
  Speaker 4: the Rain of Worms.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: It's I would think I would have heard of this.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: It's a little love crafty from the band or England.
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: You probably wouldn't have heard that.
• 34:24
  Speaker 4: I had I had prepared an explanation or description of
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: the festival, but you you, you had susted out so
• 34:30
  Speaker 4: early that I didn't have a chance to.
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: Where is this further? Where is the count Now where
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: does this put us? Oh, you're getting a little closer.
• 34:36
  Speaker 4: I want to say that maybe I'm one or two ahead. Honestly,
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: it's been so long that I just declared myself supreme
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: winner of all things for old Hey.
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: I've got an idea you should you should come back.
• 34:46
  Speaker 4: So you want to have yet another matching of wits.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: Oh that's that's a strong word. I just I thought
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: I would give you another chance to do a little better.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Next time.
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: I'll go and count them up if you want me to.
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: I'm I'm pretty sure I've at least one or two ahead.
• 35:02
  Speaker 4: But it is on like the Donkey Kong, mister Bowlin.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: Fantastic, fantastic. Well, no, we got a win. We did
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: get away. Sometimes you just need a win. And thanks, Casey,
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: Thanks thanks for intervening in there too. That was really cool.
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: I appreciate that you believe in me, Casey.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: So this concludes our episode, but not our show. Stay
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: tuned next time when we explore the strange, hilarious, somewhat disgusting,
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: definitely ridiculous method that scientists use to trace the path
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: of the Lewis and Clark expedition.
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: It's the smell test. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: your favorite shows.