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Downpour · 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 are right there on display, just
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  Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: It was a clear spring day in eighteen seventy six,
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  Speaker 1: and Missus Crouch was outside in the front yard of
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  Speaker 1: her home making soap. She took a gray scoop of
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  Speaker 1: lye from the barrel to her right and added it
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  Speaker 1: to the kettle over a fire in front of her,
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  Speaker 1: And then she reached over to her left and cut
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  Speaker 1: off a big white piece of hog fat from the
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  Speaker 1: block she had placed there. She then added this to
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  Speaker 1: the kettle as well, and then started to stir. And
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  Speaker 1: as she watched the solution boil, she thought that it
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  Speaker 1: looked like it could use a bit more animal fat.
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  Speaker 1: She reached her hand back over to the table, but
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  Speaker 1: was shocked when a mysterious red, gelatinous substance suddenly splattered
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  Speaker 1: against the top of her hand, staining the white animal
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  Speaker 1: fat beneath. Now, at first she thought that she might
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  Speaker 1: have been injured somehow, or that someone, maybe her husband,
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  Speaker 1: was throwing some sort of food at her. When she
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  Speaker 1: looked around, though, there was nobody in sight. But what
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  Speaker 1: she did see made her stomach churn more. Red globs
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  Speaker 1: of mysterious substance were falling all over her yard. They
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  Speaker 1: smacked against the fence, the porch, and the roof with
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  Speaker 1: a sickening squelch. And they weren't being thrown, No, they
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  Speaker 1: were falling from the sky. Now I have to pause
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  Speaker 1: for a moment, for just a little bit of housekeeping.
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  Speaker 1: In a turn that was sadly really typical for her era,
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  Speaker 1: missus Crouch's first name was never recorded, so just for today,
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  Speaker 1: for this story, to lend her a bit more humanity,
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  Speaker 1: let's call her Margaret. It was a very common name
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  Speaker 1: at the time, and if her husband can have a
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  Speaker 1: first name, well then so can she. Right, So back
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  Speaker 1: to the strange shower. It only lasted a few seconds
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  Speaker 1: and it was over before Margaret could even think to
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  Speaker 1: run inside. As soon as the red globs stopped falling, though,
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  Speaker 1: she called out for her husband Alan, because honey, he
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  Speaker 1: was not going to believe this, But the red globs
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  Speaker 1: were too many and too large, about two to four
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  Speaker 1: inches across to ignore. Alan called up some of his friends,
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  Speaker 1: and soon enough there were several people from town in
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  Speaker 1: their yard trying to identify the mysterious substance. Most people
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  Speaker 1: thought that it looked like red meat. In fact, two
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  Speaker 1: young men there were brave enough to even eat some
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  Speaker 1: of it, and they said that it tasted a bit
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  Speaker 1: like venison. Of course, Margaret and Alan weren't about to
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  Speaker 1: go that far. Instead, they preserve some of the substance
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  Speaker 1: in a jar, and they sent it off to a
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  Speaker 1: man named Leopold brandeis Now his credentials are lost to time,
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  Speaker 1: but it seems that he was somehow a member of
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  Speaker 1: the scientific community. He analyzed the substance, which at this
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  Speaker 1: point had turned a dark color, and put forth the
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  Speaker 1: explanation that it was nostoc, a type of bacteria that
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  Speaker 1: blooms when it rains. The only problem with this explanation
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  Speaker 1: is that it hadn't been raining at the time of
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  Speaker 1: the event. The stuff literally was raining down by itself.
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  Speaker 1: It was also reddish when it first fell before drying out.
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  Speaker 1: Gnostic is always a dark green, and it doesn't fall
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  Speaker 1: from the sky. Although that was a common misconception in
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  Speaker 1: ancient times. Basically, Leopold Brandeis was providing an easy explanation
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  Speaker 1: from an unrelated phenomenon, but he still did play an
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  Speaker 1: important role in the story because he sent samples of
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  Speaker 1: the substance to two different histologists, which is a type
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  Speaker 1: of doctor that studies tissue. According to them, the samples
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  Speaker 1: were definitely animal remains. However, the odd thing was that
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  Speaker 1: the different samples appeared to be from different animals and
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  Speaker 1: different body parts. There was lung tissue, cartilage, muscle, fiber.
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  Speaker 1: Some was probably from a horse, but it was hard
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  Speaker 1: to tell. But that was enough for one of the
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  Speaker 1: doctors to reach a different conclusion. He believed the substance
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  Speaker 1: was partially digested meat regurgitated from an animal's stomach, and
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  Speaker 1: since it had come from the sky, his theory was
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  Speaker 1: that it had been regurgitated by a vulture. Now, for
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  Speaker 1: those of you who love weird niche facts that are
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  Speaker 1: fun to bring out at parties, this one is a
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  Speaker 1: doozy is he. Vultures are known to spit up their
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  Speaker 1: food when they're startled or when they need to become
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  Speaker 1: lighter for flight. They're also sympathetic vomitters, meaning that if
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  Speaker 1: the group sees one vomit, the others will follow suit.
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  Speaker 1: Looking back, it seems that Margaret simply got really lucky
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  Speaker 1: that day out in the yard. There was apparently a
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  Speaker 1: group of vultures flying overhead, and they all sympathetically vomited
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  Speaker 1: on her after eating a big meal of dead horse.
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  Speaker 1: And yes, that also means that those two neighbors of
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  Speaker 1: hers sampled vulture vomit. Today the event is known as
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  Speaker 1: the Kentucky meat Shower, quite possibly the single most descriptively
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  Speaker 1: gross title in all of history, all because a few
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  Speaker 1: vultures happened to lose their lunch. I guess what they
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  Speaker 1: say is true. What goes up must come down in
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  Speaker 1: more ways than one. It was November twenty second of
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  Speaker 1: seventeen eighteen on an island off the coast of North Carolina.
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  Speaker 1: The sounds of cannon and musket fire filled the air.
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  Speaker 1: Within a small inlet, a pirate ship called the Adventure
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  Speaker 1: was beset by a pair of Royal Navy sloops. The
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  Speaker 1: skirmish that followed would be one of the most iconic
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  Speaker 1: and pirate history. The captain of the Adventure, a guy
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  Speaker 1: named Edward Teach was slain on deck along with around
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  Speaker 1: a dozen of his men. Now, those that were not
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  Speaker 1: killed during the fight would stand trial for piracy. Their leader,
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  Speaker 1: who went by the name Blackbeard, was infamous for taking parts,
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  Speaker 1: would be steep among the men put on trial with
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  Speaker 1: someone whose existence still frustrates historians to this day, a
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  Speaker 1: sailor of African descent who went by the name Caesar.
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  Speaker 1: According to Captain Charles Johnson's book A General History of
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  Speaker 1: the Pirates, Caesar was left in the hold by Teach
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  Speaker 1: during the fighting, and he was given a match and
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  Speaker 1: told to ignite the ship's gunpowder stores if they lost
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  Speaker 1: the battle. Prisoners kept nearby in the Adventures brig implored
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  Speaker 1: Caesar to stay his hand, and so he did. It
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  Speaker 1: seems that Caesar was not the sort of man who
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  Speaker 1: threw his life away on the orders of his captain.
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  Speaker 1: No matter how fearsome Blackbeard might have been, he was
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  Speaker 1: a legend in his own right, one that would be
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  Speaker 1: memorialized in Florida folklore centuries after his death. He was
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  Speaker 1: known by the moniker Black Caesar, and it said that
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  Speaker 1: he left a vast trove of silver in the area
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  Speaker 1: that is now Biscayne National Park. One of the rivers,
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  Speaker 1: Caesar Creek, was named for him, as was Caesar Rock
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  Speaker 1: and imposing boulder at the end of the creek. According
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  Speaker 1: to history, Caesar was once a chiefs in back in Africa.
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  Speaker 1: Like many of his family, he found himself captured by
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  Speaker 1: slave traders during the voyage across the Atlantic. However, his
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  Speaker 1: ship was struck by a storm off the coast of Florida,
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  Speaker 1: which provided Caesar the opportunity to escape on a longboat.
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  Speaker 1: He and one other man were the only survivors. Using
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  Speaker 1: weapons they'd taken from the ship, the two men started
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  Speaker 1: a career of piracy. They would pretend to be shipwrecked
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  Speaker 1: sailors and then break out their muskets and cutlasses when
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  Speaker 1: a ship attempted to rescue them. Carried out in this
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  Speaker 1: small Florida channel, it was less like the daring scenes
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  Speaker 1: that we might imagine in pirate fiction and more like
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  Speaker 1: basic highway robbery. Over the many years, their wealth began
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  Speaker 1: to grow, and so too did their ambitions. More men
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  Speaker 1: joined their enterprise and their ship became a bigger one.
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  Speaker 1: In turn, Caesar and his original partner in piracy would
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  Speaker 1: have a falling out some years later, leaving Caesar to
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  Speaker 1: go to a lie for many years to come. But
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  Speaker 1: if Florida lore is to be believed, he did very
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  Speaker 1: well by himself. He had a whole island as well,
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  Speaker 1: where he eventually buried his treasure. So how did such
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  Speaker 1: an enterprising, successful pirate wind up in the bottom of
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  Speaker 1: Edward Teach's hold in seventeen eighteen. Well, that's the thing
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  Speaker 1: that Vex's historians. It's very likely that he didn't. There
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  Speaker 1: is no historical evidence to corroborate the existence of Black
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  Speaker 1: Caesar as a fearsome solo pirate who had escaped enslavement.
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  Speaker 1: The man who joined Blackbeard's crew was most likely a
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  Speaker 1: slave himself whose enslaver happened to join up with Teacher's
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  Speaker 1: crew out of curiosity. He was in the wrong place
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  Speaker 1: at the wrong time. Fortunately, by the time the rest
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  Speaker 1: of Blackbeard's crew was sentenced to hang, this man, whatever
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  Speaker 1: his real name was, was acquitted of piracy. He subsequently
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  Speaker 1: vanishes from the historical record, and the name Black Caesar
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  Speaker 1: would then later appear in early twentieth century as the
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  Speaker 1: hero of a pirate novel. Trust spots in Florida began
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  Speaker 1: spreading the legend, and soon it overtook the lack of facts.
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  Speaker 1: The Golden Age of piracy was in some ways a
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  Speaker 1: reflection of how we want to see history. Most of
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  Speaker 1: the men who became household names led extremely short careers
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  Speaker 1: and died in disgrace. It would take centuries for brief
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  Speaker 1: criminal conspiracies to turn into the stuff of legend. Black Caesar,
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  Speaker 1: even if he did or did not exist, represents an
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  Speaker 1: aspirational view of this period of time. Many African men
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  Speaker 1: could not go home after they'd been taken by enslavers,
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  Speaker 1: and thus had to find the best circumstances they could.
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  Speaker 1: Service on a pirate ship meant that they could vote,
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  Speaker 1: had an equal share of treasure and a certain degree
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  Speaker 1: of protection in the form of a common enemy. Sadly,
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  Speaker 1: most of these men's names are lost to time. But
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  Speaker 1: if history leaves us gaps, it's the role of folklore
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  Speaker 1: to fill those in. It's a common human impulse yearning
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  Speaker 1: for underdog stories that we can root for, swashbuck tales
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  Speaker 1: that ignites our imaginations and remind us that empires do
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  Speaker 1: not rule our hearts, even when they control the Seven Seas.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities, subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
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  Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
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  Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Mankey in partnership
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  Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
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  Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,
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  Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the
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  Speaker 1: Worldoflore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.