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Flying Colors · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Aaron Manky's Cabinet of Curiosities, a production of
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  Speaker 1: iHeartRadio and Grim and Mild. Our world is full of
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  Speaker 1: the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all
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  Speaker 1: of these amazing tales are right there on display, just
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  Speaker 1: waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: Sometimes you just want to pack your bags and get
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  Speaker 1: away from it all for a while, and a regular
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  Speaker 1: vacation just won't cut it. You need sun, you need sand,
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  Speaker 1: You need your own micronation. A micronation is a piece
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  Speaker 1: of territory whose residence demand that they be recognized as
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  Speaker 1: an independent nation. However, they're usually tiny and rarely considered
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  Speaker 1: self governing because they don't technically exist under international lot.
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  Speaker 1: Most micro nations never get the approval they need from
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  Speaker 1: the other countries. That doesn't mean people stop trying, though.
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  Speaker 1: Plenty of people have attempted to form their own micronations
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  Speaker 1: in the past hundred years, people like Lester. Lester was
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  Speaker 1: born on April first of nineteen fifteen and was the
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  Speaker 1: baby of the family. He already had an older brother
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  Speaker 1: far away fighting in the Great War, and four older
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  Speaker 1: sisters who didn't have much time for a toddler, with
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  Speaker 1: his sisters outmost of the day and his doctor father
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  Speaker 1: making house calls. Little Lester was largely raised by his
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  Speaker 1: mother and his grandparents. He became fascinated with his absent brother,
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  Speaker 1: always playing with his old toys, going through his books,
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  Speaker 1: and trying on his clothes. To Lester, there was no
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  Speaker 1: one better in the world than his big brother, Ernie.
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  Speaker 1: Ernie didn't always feel the same, as anyone with little
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  Speaker 1: siblings knows, they get on your nerves better than anyone else.
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  Speaker 1: Ernie called him Lester de Pester, which was later lovingly
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  Speaker 1: shortened to the Pest. Still, Lester watched everything his big
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  Speaker 1: brother did and even dreamed of being an ambulance driver
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  Speaker 1: and a writer when he grew up, just like Ernie.
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  Speaker 1: That would certainly come to pass. In nineteen forty one,
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  Speaker 1: when the United States entered World War Two, Lester served
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  Speaker 1: in both France and Germany, and those experiences would make
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  Speaker 1: up the bulk of his first novel, The Sound of
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  Speaker 1: the Trumpet, published in nineteen fifty three. He wrote six
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  Speaker 1: other books, but couldn't quite catch up to his brother.
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  Speaker 1: Of all his books, The Biography of his brother, published
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  Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty two was the most successful. You see,
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  Speaker 1: his brother Ernest Miller Hemingway had more influence on Lester
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  Speaker 1: than anyone, which made his untimely death in July of
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  Speaker 1: nineteen sixty one all the more heartbreaking. There was a
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  Speaker 1: hole in Leicester Depestor's life, and he decided to fill
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  Speaker 1: it with the money from the sale of his book
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  Speaker 1: My Brother Ernest Hemingway. Lester resolved to get away from
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  Speaker 1: it all. He would start his own country. He relied
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  Speaker 1: heavily on something called the Guano Islands Act of eighteen
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  Speaker 1: fifty six, which basically said any US citizen could claim
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  Speaker 1: and mine any unclaimed island that contained soil enriching guano deposits,
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  Speaker 1: guano being accumulated bird droppings, which certainly wouldn't make my
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  Speaker 1: top ten of beach destinations. But to each their own. Now,
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  Speaker 1: were there a large number of bird poop islands waiting
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  Speaker 1: to be claimed? No? But did that stop Lester from
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  Speaker 1: creating his own micronation also No. On July fourth of
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  Speaker 1: nineteen sixty four, Lester wrote a good sized homemade raft
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  Speaker 1: a few miles off the coast of Jamaica. Once he'd
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  Speaker 1: found his perfect destination. He tied his raft to an
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  Speaker 1: old car engine and dropped anchor. This, he declared, was
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  Speaker 1: the micronation of New Atlantis. Well, at least half of
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  Speaker 1: it was. The half of his raft was New Atlantis.
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  Speaker 1: The rest belonged to the United States, in keeping with
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  Speaker 1: the Guano Act, which said that any claimed island had
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  Speaker 1: to be claimed on behalf of the US of A.
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  Speaker 1: Couldn't just have American citizens creating new countries, willy nilly,
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  Speaker 1: could we? Lester took his new country extremely seriously. He
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  Speaker 1: wrote an institution, or he borrowed one anyway. Really it
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  Speaker 1: was just the United States Constitution, with New Atlantis replacing
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  Speaker 1: United States in the text. His wife Doris, created a flag,
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  Speaker 1: and Lester even created a national currency of carabeans and
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  Speaker 1: shark teeth, which he called scruples. Oh yeah, Lester wasn't
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  Speaker 1: Alane out there. Sure, the raft was small, but he
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  Speaker 1: had plans to expand. For the permanent residence. His wife
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  Speaker 1: and two daughters lived there with him, as well as
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  Speaker 1: his assistant and a PR specialist named Edward K. Moss.
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  Speaker 1: Lester was elected president amazing right, though the idea seemed ridiculous.
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  Speaker 1: Most described Lester as decent and well meaning. He even
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  Speaker 1: received a letter from the White House calling him acting
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  Speaker 1: President of New Atlantis allegedly, but his term as president
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  Speaker 1: didn't last. Lester had trouble securing investments and new residents,
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  Speaker 1: and money disappeared quickly. Unfortunately, the mainland didn't accept scruples.
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  Speaker 1: New Atlantis was trying to raise money for marine research
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  Speaker 1: by producing and selling their own st amps. However, despite
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  Speaker 1: some lovely designs, the Universal Postal Union didn't recognize their
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  Speaker 1: legitimacy and the stamps were void. Disaster struck in nineteen
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  Speaker 1: sixty six when a storm blew in and the tether snapped.
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  Speaker 1: High winds and waves dragged New Atlantis out to see. Luckily,
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  Speaker 1: no one was injured, but New Atlantis was no more.
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  Speaker 1: A few pieces of the micronations still survived, though, including
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  Speaker 1: its stamps, thanks to the attention of a dedicated librarian.
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  Speaker 1: Lester never lost hope in New Atlantis and tried to
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  Speaker 1: track her supposed trajectory around the Caribbean, but it was
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  Speaker 1: never discovered. Maybe it's floating out there somewhere, waiting, like
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  Speaker 1: all good micronations, to be recognized. Music, arts, and literature
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  Speaker 1: are important components of the human experience. All three our
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  Speaker 1: avenues to our emotions and help us better understand the
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  Speaker 1: world we live in. A song has the ability to
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  Speaker 1: let us process heartbreak or grief, while a good book
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  Speaker 1: may open our eyes to perspectives we never would have
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  Speaker 1: considered before. But one thing we don't often think about
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  Speaker 1: is actually something we interact with every day, even when
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  Speaker 1: we don't realize it. It's on our walls and ceilings,
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  Speaker 1: our phones, our purses, and our cars. It's literally everywhere.
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  Speaker 1: What is it color? We tend to only notice color
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  Speaker 1: during certain activities, such as picking an outfit out or
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  Speaker 1: painting a room, but color plays a greater part in
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  Speaker 1: our lives than we know. Certain colors like red can
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  Speaker 1: evoke love and romance, while blues and greens can make
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  Speaker 1: a person feel calm and relaxed. And when he expanded
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  Speaker 1: his Mount Vernon home, George Washington chose bold colors for
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  Speaker 1: the rooms inside to show off his status. But during
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  Speaker 1: the nineteenth century, one woman believed that color could do
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  Speaker 1: more than convey wealth or alter moods. She believed that
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  Speaker 1: emotions and mental states themselves could be charted along a
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  Speaker 1: color scale. In other words, that feelings and colors were
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  Speaker 1: connected spiritually. Her name was Annie Bessant. Born in London,
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  Speaker 1: England in eighteen forty seven. Bessant was a socialist and
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  Speaker 1: women's rights activist for much of her life before joining
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  Speaker 1: the Theosophical Society around eighteen ninety three. Theosophy was a
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  Speaker 1: religion founded in New York City in eighteen seventy five.
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  Speaker 1: Those who followed its teachings believed in a secret cabal
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  Speaker 1: of spiritual experts who called themselves the Masters, who were
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  Speaker 1: based in Tibet. Bessant, along with fellow theosophist C. W. Ledbetter,
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  Speaker 1: compiled a series of Theosophist teachings into a book called
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  Speaker 1: Thought Forms, A Record of Clairvoyant Investigations, published in nineteen
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  Speaker 1: oh five. One of the book's core concepts centered around
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  Speaker 1: color and its meaning. It taught that thoughts are things,
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  Speaker 1: and that the quality of the thought determined the color
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  Speaker 1: attributed to it. For example, a certain shade of light
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  Speaker 1: blue might signify a devotion to a noble ideal, while
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  Speaker 1: black was equated with malicious thoughts. Soon enough, this juxtaposition
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  Speaker 1: of colors and thoughts bled out from Theosophy into the mainstream.
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  Speaker 1: Artists jumped on board and came up with a new
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  Speaker 1: movement called synchromism, which tied colors to music. In shorts,
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  Speaker 1: a painter could create a painting using a specific arrangement
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  Speaker 1: of pigments, similar to how a composer would arrange notes
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  Speaker 1: in a symphony. The synchromism movement didn't gain a large following,
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  Speaker 1: but the idea that colors affected moods certainly did. Eventually,
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  Speaker 1: other industries found ways to make color a putter of
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  Speaker 1: their marketing strategies. Art Deco buildings were suddenly being adorned
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  Speaker 1: with dyed concrete and terra cotta in different hues. DuPont
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  Speaker 1: invented a new kind of lacquer they called Duco, meant
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  Speaker 1: to give automobiles a vibrant boost. To brighten up the road,
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  Speaker 1: Magazines began printing ads in color rather than black and white,
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  Speaker 1: allowing readers to get a good look at the new products,
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  Speaker 1: all in their technicolor glory, and the paint company Sherman
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  Speaker 1: Williams started pitching the idea of painting one's house multiple
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  Speaker 1: times a year, using different colors depending on the season. Suddenly,
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  Speaker 1: color wasn't something to be disregarded or ignored. Henry Ford
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  Speaker 1: even walked back his famous line about the Model T
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  Speaker 1: being available in any color the customer wanted, as long
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  Speaker 1: as it was black. He started selling his Model A
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  Speaker 1: in a variety of hues to keep up with the
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  Speaker 1: new color forward movement sweeping the nation. Many companies also
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  Speaker 1: looked in nature for inspiration. According to a nineteen twenty
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  Speaker 1: eight issue of The Saturday Evening Post, motor cars and
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  Speaker 1: I quote are borrowing their hues from the waters of
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  Speaker 1: the Nile and the sands of Arabia, the plumage of birds,
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  Speaker 1: and the fire of gems, and nothing has changed ever since.
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  Speaker 1: During the nineteen fifties, typewriters, which had been instruments of
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  Speaker 1: productivity found in the office, came in colors like those
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  Speaker 1: used on automobiles. Color became an important part of the
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  Speaker 1: equation for a large swath of consumer goods, and for
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  Speaker 1: many people it's still the most important opponent. Even now.
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  Speaker 1: When we go to the hardware store to buy paint,
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  Speaker 1: we're not buying red or yellow or green. We're buying eggshell,
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  Speaker 1: vermilion or dead salmon. That last one is a real
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  Speaker 1: paint color, by the way. And we have Annie Bessant
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  Speaker 1: and the Theosophist movement to thank for it. I hope
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  Speaker 1: you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities.
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  Speaker 1: Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about
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  Speaker 1: the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show
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  Speaker 1: was created by me Aaron Mank in partnership with how
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  Speaker 1: Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore,
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  Speaker 1: which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and
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  Speaker 1: you can learn all about it over at the World
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  Speaker 1: of Loore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.