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Shifting Sands · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Menkey's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
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  Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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  Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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  Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. If there's one thing that TV sitcoms and
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  Speaker 1: films have taught us over the years, it's that get
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  Speaker 1: wretch quick schemes never work. Whether it's one of Ralph
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  Speaker 1: Kramdon's many failed attempts at a fast fortune or the
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  Speaker 1: true story of Frank Abcneil Jr's millions in fraudulent checks,
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  Speaker 1: it's clear that the real path to success is hard
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  Speaker 1: work and persistence, unless, of course, you're Fred Smith. Fred
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  Speaker 1: came from a successful family that knew the value of
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  Speaker 1: a hard day's work. His father had been the founder
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  Speaker 1: of both a popular restaurant chain in the thirties and
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  Speaker 1: the Smith Motor coach Company a few years prior. The
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  Speaker 1: latter was eventually bought by another company in nineteen thirty
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  Speaker 1: one who most people have heard of, Greyhound. His son
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  Speaker 1: Fred was accepted to Yale in nineteen sixty two, a
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  Speaker 1: time when computers were changing the landscape of engineering and business,
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  Speaker 1: and he took notice of that. However, Fred didn't have
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  Speaker 1: his eyes on space the way others did at the time.
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  Speaker 1: His aspirations were a little more grounded. He wrote a
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  Speaker 1: paper on how computers were allowing people to perform tasks
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  Speaker 1: and learn things at a faster rate. Because of that,
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  Speaker 1: they needed a faster version of a common service that
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  Speaker 1: they'd been using for decades. His professor didn't share his enthusiasm,
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  Speaker 1: though he thought Fred's idea wasn't feasible given the monetary
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  Speaker 1: and technological constraints of the time. The professor gave him
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  Speaker 1: a ce for his efforts, but Fred refused to give up.
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  Speaker 1: After he graduated Yale in nineteen sixty six, Fred was
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  Speaker 1: drafted into the Marines and served for three years, where
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  Speaker 1: he performed two tours of duty in Vietnam as both
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  Speaker 1: a leader of a platoon and a forward air controller.
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  Speaker 1: He loved the feeling of zooming through the sky, something
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  Speaker 1: he'd done years earlier as a teenage pilot. He carried
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  Speaker 1: that passion for flying with him even after leaving the
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  Speaker 1: military in nineteen sixty nine. It was one of several
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  Speaker 1: important ingredients in getting his business literally off the ground.
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  Speaker 1: But Fred never forgot about the paper he had written
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  Speaker 1: back in his Yale days, the one his professor called
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  Speaker 1: a pipe dream. Rather than listen to his teachers, he
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  Speaker 1: spun his optimistic idea into a full fledged business plan.
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  Speaker 1: The idea was modeled on the bank clearing houses of
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  Speaker 1: the time, where banks would come to exchange securities, payments,
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  Speaker 1: and other kinds of transactions safely and securely. But Fred
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  Speaker 1: didn't want to get into finance. He centered his business
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  Speaker 1: around more tangible assets. His first attempt in nineteen seventy
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  Speaker 1: one nearly failed. Using a four million dollar inheritance bequeathed
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  Speaker 1: to him after his mother passed away and million dollars
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  Speaker 1: in venture capital, Fred opened for business and he almost
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  Speaker 1: went and broke, having burned through most of his funding
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  Speaker 1: in less than two years. He was left with five
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  Speaker 1: thousand dollars in the bank and a debt of twenty
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  Speaker 1: four thousand dollars that he needed to pay back. Fred
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  Speaker 1: had to make a difficult choice. He could either cut
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  Speaker 1: his losses and close up shop, or he could throw
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  Speaker 1: a hail Mary and try one more time to win
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  Speaker 1: the game. With the last of his company's funds in hand,
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  Speaker 1: he hopped a flight to Las Vegas. If he couldn't
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  Speaker 1: earn the money he needed, he would win it. Instead.
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  Speaker 1: Fred walked up to the blackjack table and sat down.
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  Speaker 1: No one knows exactly how long he was there or
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  Speaker 1: how many hands he played. All they know is what
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  Speaker 1: happened afterward. Remember when I said that those get rich
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  Speaker 1: quick schemes never work well, Fred might be the only
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  Speaker 1: exception to the rule. He walked into the casino with
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  Speaker 1: five thousand dollars and walked out with seven thousand, enough
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  Speaker 1: to pay back his at and keep things afloat for
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  Speaker 1: just a little bit longer. And a little bit longer
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  Speaker 1: was just what the doctor ordered. After his miraculous win
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  Speaker 1: at the tables, Fred was able to secure another eleven
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  Speaker 1: million dollars in funding. Business picked back up. Just one
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  Speaker 1: year later. He pulled in revenue of seventy five million
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  Speaker 1: dollars before taking the company public In Today, the idea
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  Speaker 1: that began as a c economics paper at Yale now
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  Speaker 1: generates almost seventy billion dollars in annual revenue and employees
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  Speaker 1: over four hundred thousand people all over the world and
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  Speaker 1: that global team is essential to the main service provided
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  Speaker 1: by Fred's company to ship something overnight. In January of
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  Speaker 1: two thousand, he had the brand change from its original name,
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  Speaker 1: Federal Express to something much more simple, bad X. So
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  Speaker 1: was it worth the huge gamble? You bet. We sometimes
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  Speaker 1: upset our friends and family without even thinking about it.
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  Speaker 1: They might be something we say or something we do
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  Speaker 1: that offends them. If our faux paw is bad enough,
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  Speaker 1: there might not be enough apologies in the world to
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  Speaker 1: set things right. Of course, the worst we might do
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  Speaker 1: is end a relationship or a strange a loved one.
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  Speaker 1: We'd never start an actual war, would we. Libya and
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  Speaker 1: Tunisia haven't always seen eye to eye. The two countries
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  Speaker 1: have been in conflict for a very long time, even
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  Speaker 1: though they both share a border. At one point, they
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  Speaker 1: were ruled by Carthage. Then they were under the Ottoman
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  Speaker 1: Empire's control before eventually regaining their independence in the mid
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  Speaker 1: twentieth century. With independence, however, came an uneasy piece between them.
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  Speaker 1: For example, their tenuous relationship was shattered in nineteen eighty
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  Speaker 1: when Libyan forces invaded the Tennesseean city of Gaza. They
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  Speaker 1: attacked the local police and the military station there. Libya's
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  Speaker 1: goal was to as an uprising among the citizens of
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  Speaker 1: Tunisia who were displeased with the country's government. This day
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  Speaker 1: long attack claimed the lives of dozens and was an
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  Speaker 1: expression of tension and anger that had been a long
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  Speaker 1: time coming. But it could have come a lot sooner
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  Speaker 1: than If it had it would have been the American's fault.
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  Speaker 1: Four years earlier. You see, in nineteen seventy six, an
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  Speaker 1: American crew came to Tunisia to build new homes in
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  Speaker 1: the desert. Along with tools and construction materials, the Americans
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  Speaker 1: had also brought a team of cameramen to document the
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  Speaker 1: whole thing. Libya noticed the work going on across the
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  Speaker 1: border and kept an eye on things, assuming the Tuniseans
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  Speaker 1: were working on a new military project. They weren't quite
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  Speaker 1: sure what exactly was being built, so they waited to
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  Speaker 1: act until they knew for certain what they were dealing with.
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  Speaker 1: Weeks into construction, Libyan forces watched as a massive industrial
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  Speaker 1: vehicle rolled across the sand. Their worst fears had come true.
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  Speaker 1: Tunisia was getting ready to strike, and they had a
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  Speaker 1: state of the art weapon at their disposal. Libyan leader
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  Speaker 1: Momar Gaddafi issued a statement to Habib Borgeba, the president
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  Speaker 1: of Tunisia. He demanded Borgeba's forces stop what they were
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  Speaker 1: doing and moved their tank like vehicle away from the border.
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  Speaker 1: Failure to comply would be considered an act of war.
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  Speaker 1: Borgeba didn't know what Gaddafi was talking about. He had
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  Speaker 1: no soldiers at the border, and his army certainly hadn't
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  Speaker 1: built any new kind of rolling weapon. What the Libyans
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  Speaker 1: had seen was a relic from a long, long time
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  Speaker 1: ago in a galaxy far far away. It was a
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  Speaker 1: sand crawler, a sixty foot tall armored mining vehicle the
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  Speaker 1: jaw Is called home in the Star Wars movies. The
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  Speaker 1: Americans who had come to Tunisia were a film crew.
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  Speaker 1: The hut that they'd built had been part of the
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  Speaker 1: Lars Homestead, a moisture farm on the desert planet of
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  Speaker 1: Tattooing where we're first introduced to the character of Luke Skywalker.
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  Speaker 1: Had the movie been made today, the sand Crawler would
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  Speaker 1: have been generated by a computer, nothing more than a
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  Speaker 1: bunch of ones and zeros on the screen. Back in
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  Speaker 1: ninety though, the actors playing the jahwas had to have
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  Speaker 1: something real to interact with, so Lucas's team built a
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  Speaker 1: full sized prop, well, at least part of it. Plans
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  Speaker 1: were drafted for an enormous vehicle with actual Panzer tank
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  Speaker 1: treads at its four corners. A rust colored metal base
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  Speaker 1: was built on top. The partial prop measured two stories
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  Speaker 1: tall and eighty eight feet long. An artist then created
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  Speaker 1: a matte painting of the top two thirds of the
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  Speaker 1: sand Crawler, which was placed over the footage during post production,
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  Speaker 1: giving the illusion of a complete vehicle in the final film.
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  Speaker 1: The Libyans didn't realize the giant treads and reddish frame
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  Speaker 1: belonged to a movie prop. They really believed Tunicia was
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  Speaker 1: constructing a weapon of war against them, and at that size,
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  Speaker 1: who could have blamed them? George Lucas just wanted to
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  Speaker 1: finish his movie. He didn't want to be responsible for
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  Speaker 1: starting an international conflict, so he had the crew rolled
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  Speaker 1: the sand Crawler to safer ground, far from Libya's prying eyes.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, he only had two options, do or do not?
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  Speaker 1: There was no try. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided
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  Speaker 1: tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on
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  Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting
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  Speaker 1: curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me
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  Speaker 1: Aaron Mankey in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make
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  Speaker 1: another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast,
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  Speaker 1: book series, and television show and you can learn all
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  Speaker 1: about it over at the World of Lore dot com.
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  Speaker 1: And until next time, stay curious. Yeah,