1
00:00:03,760 --> 00:00:08,000
Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history

2
00:00:08,039 --> 00:00:11,520
Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales right

3
00:00:11,520 --> 00:00:16,640
Speaker 1: there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome

4
00:00:17,760 --> 00:00:30,160
Speaker 1: to the cabinet of curiosities. It's called binomial nomenclature, and

5
00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:35,040
Speaker 1: it's how scientists classify species of living organisms. When someone

6
00:00:35,080 --> 00:00:39,239
Speaker 1: describes a great white shark as a car carridan car carrious,

7
00:00:39,680 --> 00:00:43,720
Speaker 1: they're using binomial nomenclature. In fact, your average four year

8
00:00:43,720 --> 00:00:47,600
Speaker 1: old probably knows all about the Tyrannosaurus rex, one of

9
00:00:47,640 --> 00:00:51,320
Speaker 1: the few things to be known only by its Latin classification.

10
00:00:52,800 --> 00:00:56,200
Speaker 1: And for this naming system we have one Homo sapien

11
00:00:56,280 --> 00:01:01,280
Speaker 1: to think. Carlus Linnaeus, also known as Car, a Swedish

12
00:01:01,280 --> 00:01:05,200
Speaker 1: botanist and scientist. Carl is often considered the father of

13
00:01:05,280 --> 00:01:09,440
Speaker 1: modern taxonomy. He spent his years in Sweden studying nature

14
00:01:09,600 --> 00:01:12,679
Speaker 1: and lecturing students on the subject of botany. In the

15
00:01:12,720 --> 00:01:16,520
Speaker 1: seventeen forties, he traveled throughout his homeland, collecting different types

16
00:01:16,560 --> 00:01:19,959
Speaker 1: of plants and naming them according to his new system,

17
00:01:19,959 --> 00:01:25,240
Speaker 1: eventually publishing his findings across several books. But Carl had

18
00:01:25,360 --> 00:01:29,320
Speaker 1: another book, one that he kept outside of his scientific wheelhouse.

19
00:01:29,760 --> 00:01:32,920
Speaker 1: He called it the Nemesis Davina, and he treated it

20
00:01:32,959 --> 00:01:37,039
Speaker 1: as a hybrid journal and commonplace book, away for him

21
00:01:37,080 --> 00:01:40,759
Speaker 1: to explore the things that couldn't be explained in the classroom.

22
00:01:40,800 --> 00:01:43,800
Speaker 1: He wanted to know how so much horror and tragedy

23
00:01:43,880 --> 00:01:46,440
Speaker 1: occurred in a world that believed in a just and

24
00:01:46,480 --> 00:01:51,360
Speaker 1: true God. Within the pages of the Nemesis Divina, Carl

25
00:01:51,440 --> 00:01:54,840
Speaker 1: collected passages from books that he found interesting and lines

26
00:01:54,880 --> 00:01:59,200
Speaker 1: of scripture that reinforced his worldview. He also recorded pieces

27
00:01:59,200 --> 00:02:02,400
Speaker 1: from his life, such as stories and happenings of the day,

28
00:02:03,400 --> 00:02:06,320
Speaker 1: and one such happening occurred on the night of July twelfth,

29
00:02:06,440 --> 00:02:10,160
Speaker 1: seventeen sixty five, in the museum attached to his home.

30
00:02:10,840 --> 00:02:14,000
Speaker 1: The facility most likely held various plant species that were

31
00:02:14,040 --> 00:02:17,119
Speaker 1: important to his work, so at the end of every night,

32
00:02:17,400 --> 00:02:20,200
Speaker 1: Carl would walk through and lock all the doors and

33
00:02:20,280 --> 00:02:23,520
Speaker 1: carry the key with him to bed. As the midnight

34
00:02:23,560 --> 00:02:28,359
Speaker 1: hour rang out and July twelfth became July, Carl's wife

35
00:02:28,480 --> 00:02:32,000
Speaker 1: shook him awake. She told him she heard someone walking

36
00:02:32,080 --> 00:02:36,880
Speaker 1: around the museum. Carl heard footsteps too, but couldn't understand

37
00:02:36,880 --> 00:02:40,080
Speaker 1: why he'd locked the doors. Just as he'd always done,

38
00:02:40,360 --> 00:02:43,600
Speaker 1: and the key was still in his possession. He knew

39
00:02:43,600 --> 00:02:46,880
Speaker 1: those footsteps too. They belonged to someone with a heavy

40
00:02:46,960 --> 00:02:50,840
Speaker 1: gate who tromped around wherever he went. Soon enough, they

41
00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:54,639
Speaker 1: faded away, and both Carl and his wife somehow went

42
00:02:54,720 --> 00:02:59,280
Speaker 1: back to sleep. Days later, Carl got some bad news.

43
00:02:59,680 --> 00:03:03,200
Speaker 1: It's her now that a friend of his, commissioner, Carl Clerk. Yes,

44
00:03:03,280 --> 00:03:08,040
Speaker 1: I know another Carl, had passed away earlier that week, specifically,

45
00:03:08,120 --> 00:03:13,680
Speaker 1: at midnight on July twelfth. Linnaeus froze. He suddenly realized

46
00:03:13,720 --> 00:03:17,519
Speaker 1: why the footsteps had sounded so familiar years earlier when

47
00:03:17,560 --> 00:03:20,359
Speaker 1: both men worked together. It was how Linnaeus could tell

48
00:03:20,440 --> 00:03:23,840
Speaker 1: his friend Clerk was nearby due to the heavy steps

49
00:03:23,919 --> 00:03:28,080
Speaker 1: of the Clerk's boots on the floor. But that isn't

50
00:03:28,120 --> 00:03:32,760
Speaker 1: even the oddest story recorded in Carl's nemesis Davina. Remember,

51
00:03:32,800 --> 00:03:36,360
Speaker 1: this wasn't a journal, but a repository of anecdotes, quotes,

52
00:03:36,400 --> 00:03:39,160
Speaker 1: and texts that resonated with him. And it just so

53
00:03:39,240 --> 00:03:41,840
Speaker 1: happened that one of the strangest tales that he kept

54
00:03:42,080 --> 00:03:44,680
Speaker 1: didn't happen to him at all, but rather it happened

55
00:03:44,720 --> 00:03:49,000
Speaker 1: in Philipstad, a town several hundred miles north of Karl's birthplace.

56
00:03:50,680 --> 00:03:53,080
Speaker 1: As the story goes, the mayor of that town was

57
00:03:53,120 --> 00:03:56,480
Speaker 1: a man named Rizal who lived there with his sizeable family.

58
00:03:57,000 --> 00:03:59,640
Speaker 1: Among the many children he had was a fourteen year

59
00:03:59,640 --> 00:04:02,840
Speaker 1: old her and in the story that carl Annaeus recorded

60
00:04:02,920 --> 00:04:06,040
Speaker 1: later in his book, this daughter had fallen asleep one

61
00:04:06,120 --> 00:04:10,680
Speaker 1: night while her mother was still awake. Roselle's wife watched

62
00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:13,400
Speaker 1: one of the other children walk into her fourteen year

63
00:04:13,440 --> 00:04:17,560
Speaker 1: old daughter's room in a daze, practically sleepwalking. The young

64
00:04:17,640 --> 00:04:20,440
Speaker 1: girl pulled a fancy dress down and draped it over

65
00:04:20,480 --> 00:04:23,479
Speaker 1: her sister's sleeping body. There had been no reason to

66
00:04:23,560 --> 00:04:25,680
Speaker 1: do so. It was not something that she had ever

67
00:04:25,760 --> 00:04:29,279
Speaker 1: done before, and typically such clothes were laid out the

68
00:04:29,360 --> 00:04:33,160
Speaker 1: night before special occasions like a wedding or a party

69
00:04:34,080 --> 00:04:38,080
Speaker 1: or a funeral. After the girl had left, her mother

70
00:04:38,200 --> 00:04:41,200
Speaker 1: peeked in and asked her daughter if she'd really been asleep.

71
00:04:41,720 --> 00:04:44,640
Speaker 1: The teenager whispered back that she'd been awake the whole time.

72
00:04:45,080 --> 00:04:47,120
Speaker 1: She knew all about the white dress, but had no

73
00:04:47,240 --> 00:04:50,120
Speaker 1: idea why her sister had placed it upon her. She

74
00:04:50,160 --> 00:04:53,320
Speaker 1: certainly wasn't getting married and had no party to attend.

75
00:04:55,080 --> 00:04:57,880
Speaker 1: The Next day, the fresh faced fourteen year old girl

76
00:04:58,080 --> 00:05:01,200
Speaker 1: joined her tutor for lunch, having forgotten about the strange

77
00:05:01,200 --> 00:05:04,880
Speaker 1: incident the night before. She mentioned a bird outside who's

78
00:05:04,920 --> 00:05:08,320
Speaker 1: tweeting was bothering her during her meal, and she asked

79
00:05:08,400 --> 00:05:12,440
Speaker 1: him to fetch his rifle. The tutor obliged. He grabbed

80
00:05:12,440 --> 00:05:15,119
Speaker 1: his rifle, cocking it as he strode through the house

81
00:05:15,120 --> 00:05:19,120
Speaker 1: towards the bird. The rifle, however, malfunctioned as he passed

82
00:05:19,160 --> 00:05:24,400
Speaker 1: the young girl and it went off. She died instantly,

83
00:05:25,279 --> 00:05:28,920
Speaker 1: and waiting for her upstairs was the white funeral dress

84
00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:32,320
Speaker 1: her sister had picked out for her the night before.

85
00:05:46,080 --> 00:05:50,960
Speaker 1: No one had heard of erth Camera, Iowa. Before. According

86
00:05:51,000 --> 00:05:54,200
Speaker 1: to an article published in the Clarion soun Telegraph, a

87
00:05:54,279 --> 00:05:57,400
Speaker 1: paper from a neighboring town, a man had stopped for

88
00:05:57,480 --> 00:06:00,440
Speaker 1: gas in erth Camera before heading back out on the oad.

89
00:06:00,680 --> 00:06:03,640
Speaker 1: He only made it two miles before his car petered

90
00:06:03,640 --> 00:06:07,960
Speaker 1: out the tank had been empty. Angry at having paid

91
00:06:08,000 --> 00:06:11,400
Speaker 1: for gas he never actually received, the man walked two

92
00:06:11,400 --> 00:06:14,839
Speaker 1: hours back to town to get his money back, except

93
00:06:14,839 --> 00:06:18,240
Speaker 1: he never made it. No, nothing ever happened to him.

94
00:06:18,320 --> 00:06:20,919
Speaker 1: Don't worry, It's just that the closer he got to

95
00:06:20,960 --> 00:06:24,680
Speaker 1: Earth cameer the farther away he seemed. It was a

96
00:06:24,720 --> 00:06:27,640
Speaker 1: fellow traveler who eventually helped the man by giving him

97
00:06:27,680 --> 00:06:30,880
Speaker 1: some of his own guests, but the whole experience left

98
00:06:30,960 --> 00:06:33,960
Speaker 1: him feeling rattled, so much so that he checked himself

99
00:06:34,000 --> 00:06:39,200
Speaker 1: into a sanitarium A short while later. The pilots also

100
00:06:39,279 --> 00:06:42,120
Speaker 1: heard the rumors about the mysterious town and took it

101
00:06:42,200 --> 00:06:45,560
Speaker 1: upon himself to snap photos of it from above. What

102
00:06:45,680 --> 00:06:49,760
Speaker 1: he captured on film were unkept fields and abandoned homes.

103
00:06:50,279 --> 00:06:52,839
Speaker 1: A deserted town should have been on the lips of

104
00:06:52,880 --> 00:06:56,679
Speaker 1: every Iowan everywhere, but the local news took a back seat.

105
00:06:56,760 --> 00:07:01,600
Speaker 1: After the stock market crash, of or Camera faded once

106
00:07:01,600 --> 00:07:06,800
Speaker 1: again into obscurity. Stories emerged here and there over the

107
00:07:06,880 --> 00:07:11,000
Speaker 1: years from people passing through. In nineteen thirty, two farmers

108
00:07:11,040 --> 00:07:14,440
Speaker 1: fleeing the dust Bowl to California stopped in or Camera

109
00:07:14,520 --> 00:07:17,320
Speaker 1: to rest. Two men from the camp went out into

110
00:07:17,360 --> 00:07:21,840
Speaker 1: town in search of supplies, mainly liquor. Imagine their surprise

111
00:07:21,920 --> 00:07:24,800
Speaker 1: when the steps of the front door disappeared right beneath

112
00:07:24,800 --> 00:07:28,280
Speaker 1: their feet. One witness described it as those stepping through

113
00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:32,280
Speaker 1: a cloud. They returned to camp empty handed, and their

114
00:07:32,360 --> 00:07:35,280
Speaker 1: story was laughed off as a cheap ploy to pocket

115
00:07:35,320 --> 00:07:37,840
Speaker 1: the cash they had been given for the booze. It

116
00:07:37,880 --> 00:07:39,920
Speaker 1: was only when the men offered to give the money

117
00:07:39,920 --> 00:07:42,640
Speaker 1: back that the rest of the camp got worried. Soon

118
00:07:42,800 --> 00:07:45,760
Speaker 1: the two men turned into twelve who marched back to

119
00:07:45,800 --> 00:07:48,680
Speaker 1: the general store to see what was going on. They

120
00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:51,000
Speaker 1: too tried to climb the steps to the front door,

121
00:07:51,120 --> 00:07:55,400
Speaker 1: and once again they fell through to the ground. Next,

122
00:07:55,520 --> 00:07:58,080
Speaker 1: the men tried bridging the distance between the ground and

123
00:07:58,080 --> 00:08:00,600
Speaker 1: the door with a wooden plank, but ended up with

124
00:08:00,640 --> 00:08:04,000
Speaker 1: the same results. The board fell through the steps as

125
00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:07,080
Speaker 1: though nothing was there. When they had had enough, they

126
00:08:07,120 --> 00:08:10,440
Speaker 1: quickly returned to camp and instructed everyone to pack up

127
00:08:10,480 --> 00:08:15,400
Speaker 1: their belongings. It was time to go. State police finally

128
00:08:15,400 --> 00:08:18,200
Speaker 1: got word of the stories and did some investigating of

129
00:08:18,240 --> 00:08:20,960
Speaker 1: their own. They attempted to speak with the earth Camera

130
00:08:21,080 --> 00:08:23,960
Speaker 1: sheriff directly, but each time they knocked on the door,

131
00:08:24,400 --> 00:08:27,920
Speaker 1: their hand passed right through it like smoke. Contact with

132
00:08:28,000 --> 00:08:32,760
Speaker 1: anyone connected with the town seemed almost impossible. As the

133
00:08:32,840 --> 00:08:36,280
Speaker 1: years passed, it wasn't just stairs and doors that disappeared.

134
00:08:36,720 --> 00:08:41,960
Speaker 1: The houses did too, leaving behind fences, bathtubs, and overgrown fields.

135
00:08:42,520 --> 00:08:45,520
Speaker 1: After the last vestiges of the town had evaporated, a

136
00:08:45,520 --> 00:08:48,280
Speaker 1: group of Romani travelers set up camp in one of

137
00:08:48,280 --> 00:08:51,560
Speaker 1: the empty fields. It didn't take long for them to

138
00:08:51,600 --> 00:08:54,840
Speaker 1: realize something was amiss about the area, and just as

139
00:08:54,880 --> 00:08:57,440
Speaker 1: soon as they arrived, they set out again on the road.

140
00:08:57,920 --> 00:09:00,120
Speaker 1: The leader of the group told a local official that

141
00:09:00,160 --> 00:09:04,120
Speaker 1: the area was and I quote, saturated with the tears

142
00:09:04,160 --> 00:09:07,400
Speaker 1: of the dispossessed and with the despair of those who

143
00:09:07,440 --> 00:09:12,000
Speaker 1: had never borne names. In all of their statements, not

144
00:09:12,080 --> 00:09:14,520
Speaker 1: a single person who had ever been to the town

145
00:09:14,600 --> 00:09:19,440
Speaker 1: ever remembered seeing a soul. No locals, no shopkeepers, no

146
00:09:19,640 --> 00:09:23,760
Speaker 1: children playing in the fields. Erth Camera, from the very

147
00:09:23,800 --> 00:09:29,040
Speaker 1: beginning had been deserted. So after all this time, the

148
00:09:29,160 --> 00:09:34,120
Speaker 1: question remains, what happened to erk Camera, Iowa. The truth

149
00:09:34,240 --> 00:09:38,840
Speaker 1: is nothing. The newspaper in which it was mentioned didn't

150
00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:42,240
Speaker 1: actually exist. The first anyone had ever heard about the

151
00:09:42,280 --> 00:09:45,280
Speaker 1: town was in two thousand fifteen. The story of Erth

152
00:09:45,320 --> 00:09:49,680
Speaker 1: Camera circulated around the Internet so quickly and organically people

153
00:09:49,760 --> 00:09:52,840
Speaker 1: began to assume it had existed for hundreds of years.

154
00:09:53,960 --> 00:09:58,200
Speaker 1: And that's the funny thing about modern folklore. Our technology

155
00:09:58,360 --> 00:10:02,160
Speaker 1: has made it possible to di still generations of storytelling

156
00:10:02,240 --> 00:10:06,280
Speaker 1: and mythology into just a few years. An entire town

157
00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:09,640
Speaker 1: that has only existed for less than a decade has

158
00:10:09,720 --> 00:10:13,800
Speaker 1: become a historical touchstone as real to readers as Shangri

159
00:10:13,920 --> 00:10:17,760
Speaker 1: La or El Dorado. So while or camera might have

160
00:10:17,800 --> 00:10:20,920
Speaker 1: come and gone within a few short years, it doesn't

161
00:10:20,920 --> 00:10:24,920
Speaker 1: look like our knack for telling compelling stories will disappear

162
00:10:25,120 --> 00:10:29,400
Speaker 1: anytime soon, as long as we never forget the golden rule,

163
00:10:30,559 --> 00:10:37,640
Speaker 1: don't believe everything you read on the Internet. I hope

164
00:10:37,640 --> 00:10:40,960
Speaker 1: you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities.

165
00:10:41,280 --> 00:10:44,360
Speaker 1: Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about

166
00:10:44,400 --> 00:10:48,959
Speaker 1: the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show

167
00:10:49,160 --> 00:10:52,480
Speaker 1: was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how

168
00:10:52,520 --> 00:10:56,120
Speaker 1: Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore,

169
00:10:56,360 --> 00:11:00,080
Speaker 1: which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and

170
00:11:00,080 --> 00:11:02,240
Speaker 1: you can learn all about it over at the World

171
00:11:02,280 --> 00:11:06,640
Speaker 1: of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.

172
00:11:09,240 --> 00:11:09,280
Speaker 1: H