Latest / Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities / On the Job

Transcript

On the Job · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Nke's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild.
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: is an open book, all of these amazing tales are
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. If you know a writer,
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: odds are that they've complained to you about how hard
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: it is to find time to actually write. Crafting stories
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: requires concentration, discipline, and often a decent amount of peace
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: and quiet. This has remained true ever since the first
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: scholar put pen to paper, and it's always remarkable where
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: throughout history people have found the time and space to
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: record their thoughts. One of the most commonplaces is in prison.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: In the thirteenth century, for example, a Venetian man was
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: captured by the Republic of Genoa and thrown into a cell.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: The man in question, who had allegedly fought on the
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: side of their enemies, was an explorer who had spent
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: twenty four years traveling from Europe to Asia. During the
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: months of his imprisonment, he told stories of his travels
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: to fellow inmates. One of whom was Rosticello the Pisa,
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: an Italian scholar and author who'd been responsible for the
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: first Italian versions of several Arthurian legends, and together the
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: two inmates began to produce the first record of all
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: the sites the Venetian had seen, the people he'd met,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: cultural knowledge that he had gained. The subsequent work became
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: a best seller, an extremely influential work of travel writing.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Although the authenticity of its stories are often dubious, the
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: explorer himself is still a household name, Marco Polo now
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: his co author Rosticello was not the only writer of
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: Arthurian myths who spent significant time behind bars. In fifteenth
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: century England, a largely unknown man worked quietly behind bars
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: while writing the most famous version of the Tales of
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: King Arthur, the one that collates all the disparate stories
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: into one grand narrative. It would be called Lamorte de Arthur,
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: and within its pages it would contain scant hints of
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: the author's identity. A handful of asides referred to the author,
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: Sir Thomas Mallory, as a Knight prisoner who was fluent
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: in both English and French. These asides contain pleas for
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: his health and safe deliverance, presumably from the prison in
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: which he was being held. Curiously, most of the pleas
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: are in the third person, implying that they were added
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: by the publisher, William Caxton prior to printing. Scholars still
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: debate who Sir Thomas Mallory actually was, what kind of
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: knights would find himself in prison yet still respected enough
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: to publish a work while behind bars, and whether he
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: was never able to leave this prison is something that
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: no historian has ever been able to definitively prove. It's
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: because of this mysterious man that every King Arthur's story
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: involves ex caliber, a quest to find the Holy Grail
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: and the doomed fall of Camelot chivalry, it seems, would
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: be on the mind of many a man behind bars.
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: One hundred years later, in the late sixteenth century, in
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: a prison in Algier, a Spaniard sat quietly waiting to
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: be ransom back home to his country. He had served
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: in the Christian Spanish Navy, participated in Famasya battles against
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: the Ottomans. He had lost all movement in his left
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: arm due to a battle wound, earning him the nickname
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: the one handed Man of Lepanto. His navy career had
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: been cut short when he'd been captured by pirates, and
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: while in prison, he attempted to escape four times, and
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: each time he was unsuccessful. But while his body remained
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: in prison, his mind wandered far back to Spain, where
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: he envisioned an the obelman who had a break with
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: reality and decided to become a knight errant, define reality
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: and seeking to live a life of chivalry. And upon
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: his release, Miguel de Cervantes went on to transcribe these
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: ideas with his one good hand. The resulting book, Don Quixote,
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: is often referred to as the first modern novel. Now,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: with all of that said, not every book written behind
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: bars has been as universally beloved as these three works
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: that I've just described.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: Prison is also where the Marquise de Sade wrote his
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: controversial book about hedonism. It's also where Adolf Hitler wrote
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: the bitter manifesto Mindkompf, the text that inspired the Nazi
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: Party and its atrocities. But all this speaks to a
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: strange paradox. Prison is where we put people to isolate
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: them from society, whether justly or in justly. The punishment
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: is to be removed from community with your fellow people,
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: and yet culture happens behind bars as well. Even if
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: they don't attempt to physically escape, a human being will
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: always attempt in a emotional escape from the cruelty and
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: dehumanization of a penal institution. The pen, it seems, is
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: not just mightier than the sword, it's also a lot
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: more flexible. If you've applied for a job recently, you
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: know that there can be a lot of hoops to
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: jump through, several rounds of interviews, mock pitches, and proposals,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: sometimes waiting weeks at a time to hear back from
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: a recruiter. Willie was put to the test when he
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: went looking for a job as well. He needed work
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: and was eager to find something that played to his
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: skill set. The problem was that he was an unusual
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: candidate for his job at the time, so his hiring
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: managers gave him a test. But it was a little
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: more dangerous than you might expect. If he passed, he
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: would get the job, but if he failed, he wouldn't
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: just miss out on the job, would end up dead
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: in the street. It was eighteen seventy four in a
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: small mining town called Yankee Hill, Colorado, a man named
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: Willie Kennard stood outside the local saloon, his hand wrapped
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: around the gun in his holster. He took a deep
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: breath and swaggered through the double doors that led into
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: the main parlor. Inside, the tables were full of men
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: playing cards and drinking whiskey. Someone plunked out a melody
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: on a piano in the corner, but as people noticed Willy,
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: the entire room fell silent. Willie was a stranger in
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: town and a black man, two things that made him
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: an oddity in Yankee Hill, but he didn't care. He
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: had a job to do. But first, let's back up
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: Earlier that day, you see, Willie rode into town to
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: ask about a posting that he had seen printed in
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: an issue of the Rocky Mountain News. He was pointed
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: to the local restaurant, Fat Sarah Palmer's Cafe, where four
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: city councilmen were having their morning coffee. Willie told the
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: men that he saw their ad saying that Yankee Hill
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: was in need of a new town marshal. The man
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: looked Willy up and down, one smirked and said that
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: he was surprised that Willy could read. The others burst
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: out laughing. The message was clear, though, this must be
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: some kind of joke. When they finally collected themselves, the
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: councilmen realized that Willy was serious, so they made him
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: a deal. He could have the job, but first he
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: would need to arrest an outlaw named Barney Kasewitz. Now
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Willy was vaguely familiar with Casewit. He'd been terrorizing Yankee
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: Hill for the last two years, and just a few
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: months before he had sexually assaulted a fifteen year old
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: girl named Bertie. Her father tried to avenge her, but
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: Ksewit shot first, killing the man. After that, the town
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: marshall tried to arrest Casewit, but Casewit killed him too,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: so Yankee Hill got a new marshal. It only took
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: three months for him to lock horns with Ksewit, and
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: pretty soon the new marshal was added to his growing
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: list of victims. Yankee Hill got assigned a third marshal,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: who promptly turned in him badge and ran out of town.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: So at this point it was proving difficult for the
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: councilmen to fill the open position. What they needed was
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: someone who could successfully wrangle Barney. Willie narrowed his eyes
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: on a scruffy card player at a back table. He
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: knew it was Barney, and he walked over to his
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: table to announce that he was under arrest. Barney and
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: his table full of cronies just cackled at him. Barney
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: almost choked on his own spit as he asked, I'm
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: just supposed to come with you. Where are we going?
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Willie had been laughed at enough for one day. He
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: told Barney that he could choose either jail or hell.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Now those were fighting words. K Switt jumped up to
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: his feet and quick as lightning, he moved to grab
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: his Colt forty five, but just before he could draw
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: the gun, Willie Kennard made an impossible shot. He fired
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: a bullet into Casewitz's still unholstered gun. The impact knocked
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: the butt out of Barney's hand and rendered the weapon useless.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: Two of kse Switz's cronies tried to reach for their gun,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: but they were too slow as well. Willie fired two
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: more shots and hit both of them right between the eyes.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: After that, nobody else came to Kayeswit's defense, and Willie
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: made his arrest. When he delivered the prisoner to the councilmen,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: they were shocked, to say the least, and when word
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: got around about his expert gunslinging, the whole town wanted
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: to know Willie's story. He told them that he had
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: been a corporal in the Civil War and in a
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: company made up entirely of black volunteers. After the war,
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: he served in the army for another five years, and
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: during that time he was an arms instructor and built
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: a reputation for being one of the best gun slingers
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: in the West. It was enough to convince the councilman
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: that Willie deserved the job. He became Colorado's first black marshal,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: and by most accounts, was well respected by the people
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: of Yankee Hill. After all, Willie had ended a two
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: year reign of terror, and his new neighbors were forever
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: grateful to the man who freed them from Barney kasewick.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Mankey, in partnership
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works, I make another award winning show
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: called Lore which is a podcast, book series, and television
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: show and you can learn all about it over at
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: theworldolore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.