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Whiskey Soured · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
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  Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales right
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  Speaker 1: there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome
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  Speaker 1: to the Cabinet of Curiosities. Animals seem especially in tune
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  Speaker 1: with the world in a way that humans can't begin
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  Speaker 1: to comprehend. In two thousand ten, nursing Home made headlines
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  Speaker 1: when the cat it kept on its premises was believed
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  Speaker 1: to have successfully predicted the deaths of fifty patients simply
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  Speaker 1: by sitting with them in their final hours. Scientists were baffled,
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  Speaker 1: but it was clear that the cat knew something nobody
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  Speaker 1: else did. Such occurrences sound far fetched, but they're actually
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  Speaker 1: quite common. Cats and dogs have been able to detect pregnancies, illness,
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  Speaker 1: is and severe weather all before their humans ever realized
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  Speaker 1: what's going on. And perhaps the greatest evidence of such
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  Speaker 1: intuition happened in China in nineteen seventy five. The city
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  Speaker 1: of High Kings, one million citizens, had never experienced a
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  Speaker 1: major environmental event. It was your average city, with the
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  Speaker 1: dynamic skyline filled with buildings of all shapes and sizes, shops, restaurants, offices, apartments,
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  Speaker 1: all within walking distance of Liaodong Bay. Seismologists had threatened
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  Speaker 1: the possibility of an earthquake over the previous few months,
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  Speaker 1: but it had never materialized, so when they came back
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  Speaker 1: with another dire warning, no one cared. Like the villagers
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  Speaker 1: who heard the boy cry wolf, the city's people had
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  Speaker 1: stopped listening. Then, in February of nineteen seventy five, residents
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  Speaker 1: noticed something bizarre going on around the city. It had
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  Speaker 1: been a particularly cold winter that year, and large bodies
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  Speaker 1: of water had frozen all over. However, a portion of
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  Speaker 1: the ice in a frozen reservoir had melted due to
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  Speaker 1: a sudden burst of high temperatures. Snakes and rats that
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  Speaker 1: had been hiding from the cold left their nests and
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  Speaker 1: quickly died as they succumbed to the ice. Cold. Ground
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  Speaker 1: water levels in lakes, ponds, and rivers fluctuated wildly elsewhere.
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  Speaker 1: An express train traveling from Beijing was on its way
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  Speaker 1: to High King when flashes of purple lights illuminated the
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  Speaker 1: sky above. The engineer applied the emergency brake out of
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  Speaker 1: fear of what was ahead, and in perhaps the most
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  Speaker 1: significant omen of impending doom, local livestock and pets started
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  Speaker 1: behaving abnormally. Cows and horses refused to stand still, pacing
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  Speaker 1: in their pens until they grew tired. The rats that
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  Speaker 1: hadn't frozen to death stumbled around like they had been drinking.
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  Speaker 1: Chickens stayed out of their coops, and other birds refused
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  Speaker 1: to come down from the safety of the sky. Then
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  Speaker 1: there were the dogs, who provided the greatest warning of all.
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  Speaker 1: They barked for hours, refusing to quit as they let
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  Speaker 1: their owners know what was about to happen. They sensed
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  Speaker 1: the ground shifting beneath their sensitive pause, and not long after,
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  Speaker 1: minor trembles started to rumble throughout the city. Authorities placed
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  Speaker 1: everyone on high alert and ordered a full evacuation of
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  Speaker 1: the city. Although there were a few who didn't listen
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  Speaker 1: to the order, most of the population did and they
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  Speaker 1: made it out in time. At seven thirty six pm
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  Speaker 1: on February four, it happened a seven point five magnitude
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  Speaker 1: earthquake hit the city, leveling roughly nine of its structures.
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  Speaker 1: Over two thousand people died and more than twenty seven
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  Speaker 1: thousand were injured, but thankfully, tens of thousands of residents
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  Speaker 1: had managed to evacuate before the quake struck. In fact,
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  Speaker 1: the quake was so large it was felt as far
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  Speaker 1: away as Soul in South Korea, as well as parts
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  Speaker 1: of Russia, and had the animals been ignored, scientists predicted
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  Speaker 1: that the death toll might have reached more than one
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  Speaker 1: hundred fifty thousand. But thanks to some loud pups and
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  Speaker 1: dizzy rats, almost everyone was saved and the city was
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  Speaker 1: able to rebuild. And perhaps the strangest thing of all
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  Speaker 1: is that similar events have happened throughout the world, although
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  Speaker 1: with far less successful results. One year later, the same
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  Speaker 1: symptoms that had preempted the quake in High Kang occurred
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  Speaker 1: in the city of Tangshan in northeastern China. Chickens stopped
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  Speaker 1: eating and clucked wildly, Goldfish nearly jumped out of their bowls,
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  Speaker 1: mice ran for cover, and of course, dogs barked incessantly.
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  Speaker 1: All of the animals sent something building below the surface
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  Speaker 1: of the city, yet no one did anything about it.
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  Speaker 1: No one evacuated. Over a million people were jostled out
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  Speaker 1: of bed by a magnitude seven point six earthquake. Tangshan
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  Speaker 1: was reduced to rubble in a matter of minutes. When
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  Speaker 1: it was over two hundred forty thousand people had perished
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  Speaker 1: if only someone there had listened to the animals. Some
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  Speaker 1: arguments start over little things the toilet seat was left up,
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  Speaker 1: or someone forgot to put gas in the car after
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  Speaker 1: they used it. Other times arguments stemmed from deep wounds
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  Speaker 1: inflicted during a time of strife. The murder of Asa
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  Speaker 1: McCoy at the hands of the hat Fields comes to mind.
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  Speaker 1: And occasionally disagreements turn into something more, something bigger than
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  Speaker 1: an argument or a feud. Sometimes they turn into all
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  Speaker 1: out war. You wouldn't know it based on the lack
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  Speaker 1: of news reports, but Canada and Denmark have quietly been
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  Speaker 1: waging war against each other since the early nineteen thirties.
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  Speaker 1: I know it sounds weird that Canada, America's friendly neighbor
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  Speaker 1: to the north, would be at odds with a country
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  Speaker 1: four thousand miles away that is often voted as the
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  Speaker 1: happiest place to live. But that's exactly what happened, and unsurprisingly,
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  Speaker 1: it's over a piece of land. It's known as Hans Island,
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  Speaker 1: and in the early eighteen hundreds it was considered part
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  Speaker 1: of Denmark's territories, along with nearby Greenland. That is until
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  Speaker 1: America purchased Alaska, and the British colonies within North America
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  Speaker 1: were combined into one dominion of Canada. After that, the
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  Speaker 1: US and the British started looking around for more land
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  Speaker 1: to take ownership of. Then, in eighty Britain gave all
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  Speaker 1: of the land within its British Arctic Territory to Canada
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  Speaker 1: to keep it out of American hands. Hans Island wasn't
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  Speaker 1: officially listed in the deal, but that didn't mean it
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  Speaker 1: wasn't part of the territory. It was simply overlooked. But
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  Speaker 1: then a new wrench was thrown into the mix. In
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  Speaker 1: the nineteen twenties, Danish explorers mapped the island and its
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  Speaker 1: location with respect to Greenland and Canada, and they found
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  Speaker 1: a problem. They discovered Hans Island had the unfortunate position
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  Speaker 1: of rising precisely between both countries. Under international law, any
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  Speaker 1: territory within twelve miles of a country shore belongs to
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  Speaker 1: that country. Can you guess where Hans Island falls exactly
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  Speaker 1: twelve miles from Canada on one side and twelve miles
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  Speaker 1: from Greenland on the other. The question of ownership has
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  Speaker 1: been contentious, to say the least. In nineteen thirty three,
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  Speaker 1: the Permanent Court of International Justice declared Denmark the owner
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  Speaker 1: of the island. However, after the court disbanded, the ruling
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  Speaker 1: was deemed meaningless and the battle over ownership over Hans
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  Speaker 1: Island continued. Things quieted down over the next few decades
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  Speaker 1: as both countries took care of more pressing matters. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: it's not like there was much to fight over. Hans
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  Speaker 1: Island stands roughly one mile wide, and it's entirely uninhabitable.
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  Speaker 1: There are no trees, no soil, and it's surrounded entirely
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  Speaker 1: by water. It's literally just an enormous rock in the
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  Speaker 1: middle of the rate. But none of that matters to
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  Speaker 1: the Danes and the Canadians. To them land as land,
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  Speaker 1: and in the mid nineteen eighties, the battle over this
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  Speaker 1: tiny island started anew. The Danish Minister for Greenland paid
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  Speaker 1: Hans Island a visit in four and brought with him
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  Speaker 1: two things, a Danish flag and a bottle of schnaps.
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  Speaker 1: He planted the flag and left the bottle at its base,
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  Speaker 1: along with the sign that said welcome to the Danish Island.
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  Speaker 1: Not long after, Canadian officials came to the island and
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  Speaker 1: brought their own gifts for their Danish neighbors. They tore
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  Speaker 1: down the Danish flag and dumped out the schnaps, and
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  Speaker 1: in their place they erected a sign reading Welcome to
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  Speaker 1: Canada and left behind a bottle of Canadian whiskey. And
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  Speaker 1: that's how the Whiskey War has raged on all these years.
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  Speaker 1: Each country's leader makes a pilgrimage to the island, replaces
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  Speaker 1: the other side's flag and alcohol, and then heads home.
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  Speaker 1: Canada and Denmark have tried working out new ways of
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  Speaker 1: dealing with the island, but nothing has stuck. They don't
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  Speaker 1: worry too much about it, though. Eventually both sides will
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  Speaker 1: come to an understanding about Hans Island and the Whiskey
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  Speaker 1: War will come to a bloodless, humorous end. Until that happens,
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  Speaker 1: just pour yourself another shot and maybe put on a movie.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: Might I suggest something starring The Rock. I hope you've
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe
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  Speaker 1: for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: I make another award winning show called Lore which is
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  Speaker 1: a podcast, book series, and television show and you can
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  Speaker 1: learn all about it over at the world of Lore
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  Speaker 1: dot com. And until next time, stay curious.