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How Human Cannonballs Work · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know
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Speaker 1: from house toff works dot com Kaboom and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant.
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Speaker 1: What are you doing now? You're doing the cheeks? Huh?
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Speaker 1: Have you ever captured that? Yeah? We did it once
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Speaker 1: and then people have asked occasionally liked the cheek thing again?
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Speaker 1: And I don't want to. I want to do it
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Speaker 1: like once every hundred and fifty shows. Literally that's a
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Speaker 1: good that's a good pace. I don't want to overdo that.
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Speaker 1: So that's that'll be the third time soon coming up,
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Speaker 1: I think so. Yeah, sure, four fifty right around the
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Speaker 1: corner head around company. Um, chuckers, have you ever had
0:48
Speaker 1: kaboom cereal? No, dude, that was such a thing good? Um, No,
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Speaker 1: it wasn't good. The marshmallows were good. They it was
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Speaker 1: basically like Lucky Charms. I don't know who ripped off who,
1:00
Speaker 1: but it was clown themed rather than you know, Irish themed.
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Speaker 1: That's genius. Yeah, But there was a clown on front
1:07
Speaker 1: and he had a cannon and that's where the name
1:09
Speaker 1: came from. Kaboom. It was a circus clown circus cannon.
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Speaker 1: But then they realized clowns where scary as heck most people,
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Speaker 1: so it failed miserably. I wrote this blog post recently.
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Speaker 1: Did you read it about it? Yeah, the clown giving
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Speaker 1: clown therapy. People seem to like it too. Yeah. I
1:26
Speaker 1: thought it was a nice one. Um, that wasn't my intro.
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Speaker 1: My intro was about hunter te. Oh, well, let's hear it,
1:32
Speaker 1: do you remember? Well, sure, you're probably gonna reference his
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Speaker 1: death wish. Yes, so he you know, he comes down
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Speaker 1: with the cancer and um shoots himself in the head.
1:42
Speaker 1: And regardless of how you feel about suicide, what happened
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Speaker 1: next was his um As you said, I guess his
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Speaker 1: death wish, which you made in life. Ironically. Yeah, there's
1:52
Speaker 1: two kinds of death wishes. There's a wish that you
1:55
Speaker 1: make upon your death that you would like for things
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Speaker 1: to happen after you die, and then there's the jolly
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Speaker 1: Brunson death wish. Nice. That's good, good, Chuck bron Well,
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Speaker 1: that's a Simpsons character too, But it's the Simpsons character, right,
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Speaker 1: the mustachioed sales clerk yes, but he clearly references Gerald's Brunson. Um. Anyway,
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Speaker 1: what happened to Hunter T was he Um, he he
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Speaker 1: was cremated and he had his remains shot out of
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Speaker 1: a cannon. Have you seen it? Yeah? Thanks to Johnny
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Speaker 1: Depp helped that dream come true because he has tons
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Speaker 1: and tons of money to make that happen. Yes, he does.
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Speaker 1: It is quite a cannon too. Um. And we've talked
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Speaker 1: before about how I want my dead body shot out
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Speaker 1: of a cannon. We have indeed, Um, I'm not so
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Speaker 1: sure anymore. Maybe who knows? It would be after reading
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Speaker 1: this article and the physical requirements, it would be kind
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Speaker 1: of gruesome. It wouldn't be like unless they stiffened you
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Speaker 1: up somehow, you would come out in a big like
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Speaker 1: a dead body would. That's what I've always imagined though,
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Speaker 1: that's what I see flying through the air. I thought
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Speaker 1: you saw yourself like shooting through a rocket towards the storm. No,
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Speaker 1: like flopping like through the air and doing like half
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Speaker 1: somersaults and twists. Think it's gonna be naked too. I
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Speaker 1: was gonna land on the Kansas Prairie and let the
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Speaker 1: vultures finish me off. All right, We'll see idea, bring it.
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Speaker 1: I got a backyard for you. I think that's how
3:22
Speaker 1: we met coop um he he offered. He was like, hey,
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Speaker 1: I I live in Kansas and I can get this done. Yeah, alright,
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Speaker 1: so we'll see. But I think that that's an image
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Speaker 1: that people can have in their head while we talk
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Speaker 1: about how human cannonballs work, right, because like you said,
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Speaker 1: there's a lot to it, but one of the things
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Speaker 1: that's not to it. And I think it's funny that,
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Speaker 1: um people wonder how this how you can shoot somebody
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Speaker 1: out of a cannon and the gunpowder doesn't blow them up.
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Speaker 1: There's no gunpowder, of course there's not. I don't understand
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Speaker 1: how someone cannot understand that intuitively. Yeah, because I think
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Speaker 1: people want to believe that they're being fired out of
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Speaker 1: a cannon instead of a a long piston enclosed in
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Speaker 1: a in a tube with a fake boom in a flash.
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Speaker 1: Yes for effect. Okay, so I guess it's the fake
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Speaker 1: boom in the flash they're they're buying it. Yeah, Well
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Speaker 1: that's the idea from the beginning. That was the idea,
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Speaker 1: so yes, and it has long roots back to the
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Speaker 1: nineteenth century, back to the UK which by the way
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Speaker 1: I've noticed. Did you notice from like this article in
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Speaker 1: doing any supplementary research, the UK is big into human cannonballs.
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Speaker 1: I think they're big one, just this whole circus experience.
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Speaker 1: They were the original showman. Yeah. Sure, they own the world.
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Speaker 1: Yeah that's true, you know, and they sold it. And
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Speaker 1: when you own the world, you have an obligation to
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Speaker 1: entertain the world, and they did so by human cannonballs. Specifically,
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Speaker 1: something called the projector is the is the I guess
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Speaker 1: grandfather of the human cannon ball cannon right, the Ferini
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Speaker 1: project Or seventy one, George Farini. Basically it was like
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Speaker 1: a we're like a catapult, like a spatula that would
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Speaker 1: just flip people and stop day and people would go
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Speaker 1: flopping and flying through the air. Yeah, oh god, I
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Speaker 1: regret this. Yeah. Uh. Specifically Lulu Um, who was a
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Speaker 1: man dressed as a woman, because that always adds to
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Speaker 1: the comic effect, right, put a dude in address and
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Speaker 1: he was the first person in America to get flapjacked
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Speaker 1: with Ferini's contraption. There. Yeah, and not only did he
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Speaker 1: do that, he was he sailed thirty ft into the
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Speaker 1: air and Um was caught by someone on a trampieze.
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Speaker 1: So as we go through this, I don't want any
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Speaker 1: just think about my dead body being shot onto the
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Speaker 1: Kansas Prairie. Uh. I want you to think about how
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Speaker 1: difficult it is to catch somebody on a trapeez who's
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Speaker 1: just been shot out of a cannon. While you're on
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Speaker 1: a trapeeze. You're swinging it just the right point, hitting
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Speaker 1: him just the right way, and then taking their for
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Speaker 1: momentum and yanking him another way on the trapeez. Yeah. Well,
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Speaker 1: this um, in fairness, Lulu wasn't caught by someone. She
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Speaker 1: he just actually grabbed hold of the trapeeze. But there
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Speaker 1: are people later on in this article who were caught
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Speaker 1: by people on the trampez. I just want to get
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Speaker 1: that so someone out there was like, no, no, Lulu.
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Speaker 1: I wonder there'd be one person who knew that. Um
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Speaker 1: so uh. The Farini projector was invented in eighteen seventy one.
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Speaker 1: It was obsolete by eighteen eighty because this is the
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Speaker 1: year that a fourteen year old girl named Rosa Marie
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Speaker 1: Richter whose stage name was Zazzle. All right, great great
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Speaker 1: grandmother to Andy Richter. No, I'm just kidding, um, great
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Speaker 1: stage name though, right Zazz. She's fourteen um and she,
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Speaker 1: at the behest of one P. T. Barnum climbed into
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Speaker 1: the first cannon human cannonball cannon um that that is
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Speaker 1: designed like today's modern cannons, and she was shot out
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Speaker 1: of it and um shortly after that, within a few performances,
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Speaker 1: she broke her back and was the first casualty of
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Speaker 1: the human cannonball in this first the first cannon used
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Speaker 1: the springs, and they employed the blast the fire in
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Speaker 1: the in the boom to make people thinking back then,
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Speaker 1: they probably really bought it. Oh how bad? You know,
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Speaker 1: people are so dumb back then. Uh. And there's a
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Speaker 1: very famous picture of her climbing into the cannon. It's
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Speaker 1: called like beautiful girl and huge gun or something like that.
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Speaker 1: I thought that our fore fathers like invented everything and
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Speaker 1: like built the world, and we're like, they're so dumb
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Speaker 1: stupid people. Yeah, well, it's harder and harder to build
7:57
Speaker 1: and discover new things now because they're all that was
8:00
Speaker 1: all the easy stuff, Like you and I could have
8:02
Speaker 1: discovered all this stuff right now, it's just more and
8:06
Speaker 1: more difficult. You have to really look for subtlety, right,
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Speaker 1: So we say, thanks to no one Um. So the
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Speaker 1: the late nineteenth century, is this the human cannonball idea
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Speaker 1: just takes off? Right, thanks to Dazzle, thanks to George Loyal.
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Speaker 1: He was the one who was shot out of a
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Speaker 1: cannon and would be caught by a woman on a
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Speaker 1: trap at the Yankee Robinson Circus. Right, Yes, that's incredibly difficult.
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Speaker 1: It is, And you think about it, like, I think
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Speaker 1: I've even seen that before, like in person, at at
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Speaker 1: a circus when I was a kid. Um. But now
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Speaker 1: that I've researched and read this, I'm like, I can't
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Speaker 1: imagine how difficult that has to be, how everything has
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Speaker 1: to be totally precise, and that these circus performers must
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Speaker 1: spend like all day practicing every day just to make sure. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and not just the to the timing. There's a lot
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Speaker 1: of other stuff that you have to take into account. Right,
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Speaker 1: It's not just get in this cannon. We're gonna push
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Speaker 1: you out, no, Josh, Because the little sled that you're
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Speaker 1: basically in goes forward at a force of three thousand
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Speaker 1: and six thousand pounds per square inch of pressure. Right
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Speaker 1: that we should say pressed air is now the the
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Speaker 1: preferred means of shooting that little piston forward right, and
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Speaker 1: you're in a little capsule like imagine um Mark's egg,
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Speaker 1: but with the top cut off, so you're not you're
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Speaker 1: in the in the barrel in what amounts to a barrel,
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Speaker 1: a bullet in the barrel, a bullet with the top
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Speaker 1: cut off, and um that bullet is attached to the cannon.
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Speaker 1: So when the when the compressed air shoots it out,
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Speaker 1: the cannon stops, but you keep going, that's right, But
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Speaker 1: it shoots you out at a what did you say,
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Speaker 1: like three thousand to six thousand pounds per square inch
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Speaker 1: of pressure. Yeah, that produces some some force. That's a lot.
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Speaker 1: And that's why you can't just be like all limp.
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Speaker 1: You know, that would crush you. You know, you have
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Speaker 1: to be extremely strong and rigid, and your legs have
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Speaker 1: to be taught. Like. You can't just be like all right,
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Speaker 1: shoot shoot it off, or like your dead body. That's
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Speaker 1: why it would be so gruesome. I wonder if I
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Speaker 1: just explode in blood at the end of the can.
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Speaker 1: I don't know. Maybe, but with with the big daddy
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Speaker 1: cannons these days, you can go horizontally about two hundred
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Speaker 1: feet or vertically, which they say that's where the ooz
10:27
Speaker 1: and ods come from as high as two hundred feet
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Speaker 1: uh and then speeds up to sixty to seventy. Right,
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Speaker 1: So you're hauling, you are hauling. Um, you're also under
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Speaker 1: some tremendous force, right, oh yes, so yeah, you've got
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Speaker 1: about nine ges during launch and twelve jess and impact
10:48
Speaker 1: and we'll talk about that later. But chuck the dodoon
10:51
Speaker 1: paw right, it's a roller coaster in Japan. It has
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Speaker 1: the highest acceleration. UM. It's a two point seven geezez. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: so imagine nine right, Yeah, this is a this is
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Speaker 1: a this is you're putting this human body under a
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Speaker 1: lot of stress, right then, yes, and you fly out
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Speaker 1: a long way. And that's why you have to take
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Speaker 1: into account the things we briefly mentioned like wind speed,
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Speaker 1: body weight, obstacles like the guy wires and the tent
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Speaker 1: for the net and the poles for the for the tent,
11:23
Speaker 1: and we also we mentioned that in Sniper. Remember, yeah,
11:26
Speaker 1: we're talking about the bullet trajectory, and they have to
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Speaker 1: take into account like humidity. So do people who set
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Speaker 1: up human cannonball cannons. And usually I get the impression
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Speaker 1: the human cannonball is the manager in charge of this
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Speaker 1: whole act. They don't just come out and they're like,
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Speaker 1: all right, I'll get in it already, did it right? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: And some carnie like puts out a cigarette's like it
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Speaker 1: looks good to me. Uh no, that's not the case. Um.
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Speaker 1: A lot of planning goes in because they make a point.
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Speaker 1: It's pretty easy to get into a cannon and get
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Speaker 1: shot out, although, like we said, you gotta be really
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Speaker 1: strong and stuff. But the landing part is the crucial part, obviously, right,
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Speaker 1: because of fifty byt net look pretty big when you're
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Speaker 1: standing on it, but when you're two hundred feet away
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Speaker 1: and two hundred feet up, it might look like a
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Speaker 1: postage damp to you. And I mean, this is a
12:13
Speaker 1: big deal, and you want to hit that net. You
12:15
Speaker 1: you want to hit it in just the right place
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Speaker 1: to sure. Um. Yeah, So to make sure that the
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Speaker 1: person hits the net, um, test dummies are used. The
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Speaker 1: test dummy is a human cannonball's best friend because you
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Speaker 1: can shoot a test dummy out as much as you
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Speaker 1: want until you figure out whether or not you've got
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Speaker 1: the barrel trajectory just right that the temperature is a problem.
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Speaker 1: What have you adjustments early, right, And so they just
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Speaker 1: shoot a test dummy at the net until they have
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Speaker 1: it just right, and then they I guess they feel
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Speaker 1: that they're confident they're going to try their luck at it. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: and like you said, you gotta hit the net at
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Speaker 1: the proper place too, which is generally the rear third,
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Speaker 1: because when you hit something going down in an angle
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Speaker 1: like that, you're gonna bounce backwards, not like pop straight
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Speaker 1: up or go forward. So you don't want to hit
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Speaker 1: it on the first third because then you'll bounce backwards
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Speaker 1: off the net. So yeah, it's pretty specific. It is
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Speaker 1: um So Chuck, who does this crazy circus people, circus families.
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Speaker 1: It's always families. Yeah, you know, like once you get
13:16
Speaker 1: into circus then you've almost guaranteed that your kid is
13:19
Speaker 1: going to do that. So you want to talk about
13:22
Speaker 1: some of them, Well, yeah, the one I think I've
13:25
Speaker 1: heard of these people even before this um this article,
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Speaker 1: But the Zucchini family Zacchini zucchini zucchini zacchinis have been
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Speaker 1: doing uh while, They've been performing in circuses since the
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Speaker 1: nineteen twenties, and apparently they stopped in the nineties They're like,
13:42
Speaker 1: seventy years is enough for us. The Zipchinis are hanging
13:45
Speaker 1: up our little fancy shoes right. Uh. And in that time, um,
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Speaker 1: there were seven brothers in the family. Five of them
13:53
Speaker 1: became human cannonballs. And that's just the brothers. There was
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Speaker 1: also a sister to who human cannonballing. Yeah, I'm just
14:01
Speaker 1: dying to know what those other two dudes. It's like
14:05
Speaker 1: Eli and Peyton Manning's brother that most people go, there's
14:09
Speaker 1: another brother, right, like, well, what does he do? He
14:13
Speaker 1: he's the oldest budn't he And he's like he was
14:16
Speaker 1: like a big man on campus at Old Miss, but
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Speaker 1: that was it. He didn't he just parted. Doesn't play
14:20
Speaker 1: football though, so he's not beloved by his father Archie. Yeah,
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Speaker 1: so not true probably. Uh. They worked with the Ringling
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Speaker 1: brothers that the Zucchini's did, who obviously a big name
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Speaker 1: in circuses, and uh, they sort of pushed the envelope.
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Speaker 1: Hugo and Victor the brothers did a little double barrel
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Speaker 1: gag that went over pretty well, and Mario would get
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Speaker 1: shot over Ferris wheels, like two Ferris wheels, Mario Zucchini
14:53
Speaker 1: two Ferris wheels, not on top of one another, No,
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Speaker 1: one after the other. That's quite a weird quite a beat.
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Speaker 1: And then um, John Weiss human bullet. Yeah, he started
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Speaker 1: out as a clown apparently, really, he did five years
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Speaker 1: as a clown and then made the very rare jump
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Speaker 1: to human cannonball, from clown to cannonball this year and
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Speaker 1: apparently his first first shot sent him six ft really, yeah, yeah,
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Speaker 1: that was his first Did you do it as a clown?
15:28
Speaker 1: You know? I think that that would have been a
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Speaker 1: mockery to the human cannonball um tradition. Okay, yeah, I
15:35
Speaker 1: don't want to do that. And then there's the Smith family,
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Speaker 1: also a very popular circus cannonball family. Did you talk
15:41
Speaker 1: about John Weiss, Well, he was. He was one of
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Speaker 1: the most prolific cannonballers. Did he die doing it? No?
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Speaker 1: Did you mention how many times he's done it? Five thousand?
15:52
Speaker 1: That is a lot of time to be shot out
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Speaker 1: of a cannon. I did just kind of breeze over
15:56
Speaker 1: that five thousand times. And he started in nine teen seven. Yeah,
16:01
Speaker 1: so he was doing it for a little while there.
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Speaker 1: For years, I guess he was doing it once a day,
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Speaker 1: six days a week, fifty weeks a year. Yeah, you're right,
16:09
Speaker 1: that's a lot of blasts. There is a lot. That's
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Speaker 1: a lot of I mean, especially what we know about
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Speaker 1: what the pressure and it exerts on a body. I mean,
16:18
Speaker 1: that's that's rough work. Yeah, and it's uh, I mean
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Speaker 1: we've pointed out how it is safe. But more than
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Speaker 1: thirty people have died doing this over the years. Okay,
16:27
Speaker 1: so the that that that pops up in this article,
16:30
Speaker 1: thirty people have died as human cannonballs. There's a British
16:34
Speaker 1: historian who died a few years back. His name is A. H. Cox.
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Speaker 1: He Um says that there's been only about fifty people
16:43
Speaker 1: to ever be human cannonballs. Thirty have died. Really, yeah,
16:48
Speaker 1: I thought that's kind of significant enough to be put
16:51
Speaker 1: into this article. Ward me off of human cannonballs. So
16:55
Speaker 1: thirty out of fifty have died, and that's just who
16:58
Speaker 1: died others, you know, like back, Zazzle broker back, Um, Yeah,
17:03
Speaker 1: we'll get into that gruesomeness soon, zazz Alright, So back
17:12
Speaker 1: to the Smith family. They are the modern um cannonball
17:15
Speaker 1: family that are pretty awesome. Um. David Cannonball Smith Jr.
17:20
Speaker 1: Has spent much of his life inside of a cannon. Yes,
17:23
Speaker 1: have you been on their website? Pretty funny. He just
17:27
Speaker 1: he's described as having a dynamic personality. I like that.
17:31
Speaker 1: It's better than saying he has a dynamite personality to
17:34
Speaker 1: be pretty bad. But David the Bullet Smith Jr. Is
17:38
Speaker 1: a son and I'm sorry, he's the one with the dynamics. Okay,
17:42
Speaker 1: his dad was a real snooze. I don't know. Uh,
17:44
Speaker 1: he bested his dad's record of by flying a hundred
17:49
Speaker 1: ft Yeah, but his dad still holds the highest. I
17:54
Speaker 1: think two hundred and three two and that's friends outside
18:00
Speaker 1: of America. That's one of those over two Ferris wheels. Yeah,
18:03
Speaker 1: that's crazy. Yep. Oh, should you mention the DARPA thing.
18:06
Speaker 1: I thought that was completely stupid and ridiculous. Did you
18:09
Speaker 1: think so? Yeah? I think it's kind of cool. I
18:13
Speaker 1: think if DARPA could perfect this, then it could take
18:16
Speaker 1: the human cannonball art to a whole new level. Spill it.
18:20
Speaker 1: But basically, DARPA the Defense Research Project, Right, there's an
18:25
Speaker 1: a in there somewhere. Yes, thank you, Um they were
18:30
Speaker 1: looking at I think they filed the patent for a
18:34
Speaker 1: basically human cannonball cannon that has like a sled chair
18:39
Speaker 1: right that shoots you up. I think they said they
18:43
Speaker 1: can get a first responder special ops a firefighter on
18:47
Speaker 1: top of a five story building in two seconds. So
18:51
Speaker 1: basically their idea is to take the human cannonball concept
18:54
Speaker 1: and just shoot people on top of buildings to go
18:56
Speaker 1: fight fires or to go snipe people or whatever. So
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Speaker 1: I get that. It's the landing thing that they say
19:01
Speaker 1: is the hardest part in real cannonballing. So what what's
19:04
Speaker 1: going on there? Well, that's what I'm saying. I have
19:05
Speaker 1: no idea. I don't know if they were like, well,
19:07
Speaker 1: we've got this part, now, let's go figure out the
19:09
Speaker 1: other part. But that's that's kind of the big um
19:13
Speaker 1: joke or the big underscore among human cannonballers is it's
19:18
Speaker 1: not a problem shooting somebody out of a cannon. It's
19:20
Speaker 1: the landing that's the important part. Yeah, right, Or in
19:23
Speaker 1: this case, if you're shooting someone on a building, if
19:27
Speaker 1: you're off there, then it's all of a sudden, you're
19:29
Speaker 1: a cartoon and you smack into the building and then
19:32
Speaker 1: slide very slowly down, except unlike a cartoon, you leave
19:36
Speaker 1: a trail of blood when you slide down. Yeah, And
19:38
Speaker 1: you slide down fast and then there's more blood and
19:41
Speaker 1: body parts on the street. Yes, which has happened. I'm
19:44
Speaker 1: sure it has. There's there's been a lot of accidents.
19:47
Speaker 1: As we've said, out of fifty, uh thirty human cannonballs
19:51
Speaker 1: have died, right, it's a lot and um to to
19:56
Speaker 1: prevent this. You know, these people stay in tiptop shape,
20:00
Speaker 1: right Um. You have to work out your core. You
20:03
Speaker 1: have to have a strong back. You need to be
20:05
Speaker 1: able to brace yourself like you said, and really just
20:07
Speaker 1: go totally rigid so when you're shot out, you don't
20:10
Speaker 1: just you're not crushed. You need to become a projectile,
20:14
Speaker 1: right um, because all you're wearing a helmet, maybe a
20:15
Speaker 1: little padding. Yeah, but Alma's not gonna do much if
20:19
Speaker 1: you miss your net, no, um, and the net is
20:23
Speaker 1: very important. A lot of people use air bags as well,
20:26
Speaker 1: right um. There was a guy who's named Elvin Bale
20:31
Speaker 1: and it's the human Space Shuttle. He used air bags
20:35
Speaker 1: and he is a victim of circumstance if there ever
20:38
Speaker 1: has been one. Right. He was big in the seventies
20:41
Speaker 1: and eighties until I believe seven, when he went through
20:48
Speaker 1: all the the tests shot his crash test dummy out. Um,
20:53
Speaker 1: it landed fine in these air bags where he calculated
20:57
Speaker 1: they should be. And um, what he didn't know is
21:00
Speaker 1: that his crash test dummy had gotten wet, which made
21:03
Speaker 1: it much heavier, which completely changed the dynamics of its
21:08
Speaker 1: test run. So when he shot himself out, he missed
21:12
Speaker 1: the air bags right, he did, He was he sailed
21:16
Speaker 1: right over him. This is in Hong Kong. And he
21:19
Speaker 1: said that he knew quote, I could see where I
21:21
Speaker 1: was going and that it was too far, too fast,
21:24
Speaker 1: so he knew in mid air he was conscious enough
21:27
Speaker 1: to be like, oh crap, I'm not going to hit
21:30
Speaker 1: the air bag and apparently the dummy, because when I
21:33
Speaker 1: read that, I was like, well, how does this happen
21:35
Speaker 1: when that's the only safety thing you can do. How
21:37
Speaker 1: do you have a soap dummy? Apparently it was left
21:39
Speaker 1: in the rain and they're filled with sand, and so
21:43
Speaker 1: the outside of it dried, and but the sand was
21:46
Speaker 1: still wet on the inside, so it didn't like feel
21:48
Speaker 1: wet to the touch when they were testing it, And
21:51
Speaker 1: he said he remembered it feeling like it was in
21:53
Speaker 1: slow motion and that his brain actually thought he could
21:58
Speaker 1: solve this problem in mid airrow aerodynamically like do something
22:02
Speaker 1: like I can do this and shorten the trip and
22:05
Speaker 1: land upright, which might save me. But instead he overshot
22:08
Speaker 1: it by just a few yards and slam feet first
22:12
Speaker 1: into the floor, shattered his ankles, knee, a leg in
22:15
Speaker 1: his spine, and he's paralyzed from the moist down and
22:20
Speaker 1: that is very sad. Uh. He mentions the aerodynamics right, like,
22:25
Speaker 1: there is a specific way you want to land. Yeah,
22:28
Speaker 1: you want to do that little easy somersault and land
22:31
Speaker 1: on your back, which is that's the way to land.
22:36
Speaker 1: But you also said something, um, that brought to mind
22:40
Speaker 1: the idea that this the g force that we talked
22:43
Speaker 1: about earlier that's been shown to produce a loss of
22:46
Speaker 1: consciousness and people. So that's another danger that you you know,
22:50
Speaker 1: when you're sailing, you want to like stay like a
22:53
Speaker 1: projectile and if you're blacked out, you're gonna be like
22:56
Speaker 1: a dead body like you yes, um. And Elvin Bell
23:03
Speaker 1: is not the only person that something horrible has happened
23:05
Speaker 1: to obviously, Yeah, Matt Cranch just this year a month
23:11
Speaker 1: in April. Yeah, he and this is just a nightmare scenario.
23:15
Speaker 1: He got blasted off and right after he blasted off
23:18
Speaker 1: the net collapsed. Yeah, so how does that happen? I
23:21
Speaker 1: don't know, that's probably what he's asking. Well, he died,
23:24
Speaker 1: He landed on his head and died. He did die,
23:28
Speaker 1: so that is not what he's asking. That is what
23:30
Speaker 1: his family is asking, probably via a lawsuit. It would
23:33
Speaker 1: be my guest that was in Great Britain too very sad.
23:35
Speaker 1: And remember I mentioned a Zichini's sister. Um, she the
23:40
Speaker 1: Zichinis used to do these double barrels stunts where they
23:43
Speaker 1: two would be shot out at the same time, usually
23:46
Speaker 1: next to one another, right along parallel one another. Well,
23:49
Speaker 1: she and another brother had a had an act where
23:54
Speaker 1: they'd be shot in the same direction as when it
23:56
Speaker 1: had passed by and like high five. Yeah, well they
23:58
Speaker 1: collided and she broke her back. That's just a bad idea.
24:02
Speaker 1: That was a bad idea. But the same thing is
24:04
Speaker 1: that if you if you look at modern people, like
24:07
Speaker 1: the modern cannonballers, they are safety conscious. Um they were
24:12
Speaker 1: just like a net collapsed or the dummy was was wet,
24:17
Speaker 1: which that that makes it even sadder to me. If
24:19
Speaker 1: you could shot, you know, two ft into the air
24:23
Speaker 1: at your brother sixty close break your back then something. Yeah,
24:29
Speaker 1: that was part of the equation. I wonder how close
24:31
Speaker 1: they intended to go to one another, because obviously the
24:35
Speaker 1: closer the better, Like if they were apart, it's not
24:39
Speaker 1: it's impressive. So they probably wanted to get it tight
24:42
Speaker 1: for the effect. But can you imagine all of a sudden,
24:46
Speaker 1: like when you see that coming straight at you probably
24:50
Speaker 1: have the same realization, like a crap that I'm gonna
24:53
Speaker 1: die by hitting my brother sister brother. Very sad. Yeah,
24:59
Speaker 1: anything else, that's it? Man, I did a do we
25:02
Speaker 1: ever did the thing on Daredevil's Uh no, I wrote
25:05
Speaker 1: an article on Daredevil's and maybe we should do that
25:07
Speaker 1: at some point. Or we've been talking about our Evil
25:09
Speaker 1: Evil kin Evil podcasts. Maybe because he's a big part
25:12
Speaker 1: of that one, maybe we can just cover it all songs.
25:15
Speaker 1: Human cannonball, Yeah, we've got that one covered done. Okay, Well,
25:20
Speaker 1: if you want to learn more about human cannonballs, including
25:23
Speaker 1: how long it takes to accelerate a human cannonballer to
25:26
Speaker 1: their top speed, do you want to know one bit
25:29
Speaker 1: of a second? Really? Yeah? You can find all that
25:33
Speaker 1: by typing human cannonball onto the search bart how stuff
25:37
Speaker 1: works dot Com and from what you say, Chuck, it
25:39
Speaker 1: sounds like that will bring up more than just one article. Yeah,
25:43
Speaker 1: my daredevil sing like pop up Um, I said handy
25:46
Speaker 1: search bar at house divorce dot com. That means it's
25:49
Speaker 1: time for a listener mail. That's right, Josh, I'm gonna
25:54
Speaker 1: call us underground Railroad. Uh, I'm writing in about underground Railroad.
26:00
Speaker 1: Wanted to share a little bit of my childhood summers
26:02
Speaker 1: in upstate New York. My great grandfather, Louis Loveland made
26:07
Speaker 1: a home in Johnsburg, New York, in the Adirondacks. What's
26:11
Speaker 1: so funny? Like you know him? Yeah, Louie. The home
26:16
Speaker 1: itself is incredibly cool and haunted. There's a very cluttered
26:19
Speaker 1: and dimly lit room hidden away behind the kitchen, which
26:22
Speaker 1: has a small organ buried beneath h decade stored and
26:27
Speaker 1: forgotten items. Family legend has it that the organ would
26:30
Speaker 1: mysteriously start playing it all hours of the night thanks
26:33
Speaker 1: to spirits. As if that weren't enough, there's a very
26:36
Speaker 1: large barn behind the home, which has seen its better days.
26:39
Speaker 1: My sister and I were always warned to be careful
26:41
Speaker 1: when we went near the barn. Uh. The reason because
26:44
Speaker 1: the earth beneath our feet could give away at any moment. Well,
26:47
Speaker 1: this sounds a good, terrifying house. But there's a hidden
26:51
Speaker 1: tunnel beneath the barn. Because there's a hidden tunnel beneath
26:54
Speaker 1: the barn, running from the back of the home, below
26:55
Speaker 1: the barn and out into the mountains, right next to
26:59
Speaker 1: a strawberry patch that my great grandfather planned a hundred
27:02
Speaker 1: years ago. The tunnel was a part of the underground railroad,
27:05
Speaker 1: and I've been told it's one of the last stops
27:07
Speaker 1: in the adder on decks that is still intact today,
27:10
Speaker 1: although it varies. The tunnel is roughly three to four
27:12
Speaker 1: ft below the ground, about five ft tall, four ft
27:15
Speaker 1: wide and seventy five yards long, packed with dirt and rocks,
27:20
Speaker 1: and an absolute death trap to navigate without a flashlight.
27:25
Speaker 1: The entrance from the home it's just too dangerous to
27:27
Speaker 1: use anymore. But there is a way to drop into
27:29
Speaker 1: the tunnel vi a hidden door in the barn, as
27:31
Speaker 1: long as you don't mind a many landslide of dirt
27:33
Speaker 1: and hay following you into the tunnel, which I would
27:37
Speaker 1: um that's it. Once you carefully make your way through
27:39
Speaker 1: the tunnel, you emerge into sunlight and a strawberry field. Nice.
27:44
Speaker 1: That's little treat if you're somebody A warm wet towel,
27:48
Speaker 1: moist towel and that is from Alice in St. Louis. Wow.
27:52
Speaker 1: Thanks Alice. You could do that, couldn't you? Chuck the
27:55
Speaker 1: you've gone caving before. I could do that as long
28:00
Speaker 1: as it's buttressed. I wonder if it is buttressed. If
28:04
Speaker 1: Charles Bronson anything, do what it is? Uh. If you
28:09
Speaker 1: have a great recipe for fresh strawberries, we want to
28:12
Speaker 1: hear it. You can wrap it up in an email,
28:16
Speaker 1: spanking on the bottom, kiss it good night, and send
28:20
Speaker 1: it to Stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com.
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