Speaker 1: Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history
Speaker 1: is an open book, all of these amazing tales right
Speaker 1: there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome
Speaker 1: to the Cabinet of Curiosities. In any endeavor, communication is
Speaker 1: the key. Relaying a clear, concise message will help educate
Speaker 1: and inform all the interested parties. Nowhere was communication more
Speaker 1: important than during the first two World Wars. World War
Speaker 1: One saw the earliest use of mass media and propaganda
Speaker 1: for both sides. For example, Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points outlined
Speaker 1: what America and its allies were fighting for in the
Speaker 1: first place. They boosted morale and helped the American people
Speaker 1: understand why the country had entered the war. They also
Speaker 1: so formed the foundation of a committee designed to infiltrate
Speaker 1: the newspapers, publishing industry, and higher education in order to
Speaker 1: change public opinion in support of the war from the
Speaker 1: ground up. The Fourteen Points gave way to what was
Speaker 1: known as atrocity propaganda, which depicted the horrible actions perpetrated
Speaker 1: by the German and Austro Hungarian armies against American and
Speaker 1: European soldiers. Similar tactics were used during the Second World
Speaker 1: War which now included newsreels, comic books, and music. Everywhere
Speaker 1: they looked, young men were being encouraged to enlist, while
Speaker 1: their family members back home bought war bonds to help
Speaker 1: support their efforts. And it wasn't just the good guys
Speaker 1: using propaganda to further their agendas. Nazi Germany hired directors
Speaker 1: like Lenni Riefenstahl and Karl Ritter to film propaganda films
Speaker 1: meant to inspire the public into supporting the war and
Speaker 1: Nazi policies. But perhaps one of the most unique methods
Speaker 1: of German propaganda during World War Two was Charlie and
Speaker 1: his Orchestra, also known as the Templin Band and Bruno
Speaker 1: and his Swing Tigers. Charlie and his Orchestra was a
Speaker 1: Nazi swing band. German leadership had noticed how swing music
Speaker 1: had captivated the American and European public on both the
Speaker 1: radio and in dance halls. Propaganda Minister Joseph Gebels saw
Speaker 1: an opportunity to use music as art designed to affect
Speaker 1: human emotion as a way to influence the people who
Speaker 1: heard it. He developed radio broadcast that aired every Wednesday
Speaker 1: and Saturday night. Record albums of the band were printed
Speaker 1: and sent to pow camps as well. From one to
Speaker 1: nineteen forty three, Charlie and his orchestra made over ninety recordings.
Speaker 1: They reworked popular tunes of the time with pro Germany
Speaker 1: lyrics that predicted the eventual defeat of the Allied forces.
Speaker 1: During performances, Charlie, the band leader would stop singing and
Speaker 1: begin a monologue about the plight of the German people
Speaker 1: and how important it was that the Master Race succeeded,
Speaker 1: all while the band continued playing behind him. When their
Speaker 1: original studio came under attack from Allied bombing raids, they
Speaker 1: moved their operations self. The band kept up its broadcasts
Speaker 1: as long as it could, but eventually the war spread
Speaker 1: to all facets of Germany. There was nowhere else to hide.
Speaker 1: Charlie and his orchestra performed right up until the very end.
Speaker 1: When we think back to the influential German parties of
Speaker 1: World War Two, Charlie and his orchestra don't get much
Speaker 1: of a mention. Ninety recordings doesn't mean much when the
Speaker 1: target audience doesn't want anything to do with the group.
Speaker 1: And I'm not talking about the German people. They loved
Speaker 1: Charlie but the band wasn't put together to appeal to
Speaker 1: German ears. It was meant to sway Americans and Europeans
Speaker 1: to the other side. Gebel's believed that by co opting
Speaker 1: jazz music, which he called degenerate, for use by the Nazis,
Speaker 1: he could hypnotize American and European audiences into supporting his cause,
Speaker 1: and the perform moments as were broadcast Canada, England, and
Speaker 1: the United States, where they fell on more discerning ears
Speaker 1: than he'd expected. Nobody was hypnotized. In fact, many laughed
Speaker 1: at the man yelling in German through their speakers. However,
Speaker 1: people did enjoy the music. Those German players were very talented,
Speaker 1: after all. When the war ended, the musicians from the band,
Speaker 1: still wanting to play together, even formed a new group
Speaker 1: under a different band leader. Unfortunately, everyone still recognized them
Speaker 1: as Gebel's band, which made finding a venue pretty tricky.
Speaker 1: Some of the musicians went on to success in other bands,
Speaker 1: but the Nazi musical experiment had all but disappeared by
Speaker 1: the end of World War two, deemed a complete failure.
Speaker 1: The old adage says that the show must go on,
Speaker 1: but thankfully that's not always true, and in the case
Speaker 1: of Charlie and his Nazi swing band that turned out
Speaker 1: to be a good thing. In a young girl named
Speaker 1: Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of The
Speaker 1: New York Sun. It was only a few lines, but
Speaker 1: it was a question heard around the world. Is there
Speaker 1: a Santa Claus? But it was what she wrote in
Speaker 1: the preceding letter that made the editor's answer even more powerful.
Speaker 1: She wrote that her father often told her, if you
Speaker 1: see it in the Sun, it's so. The Sun is
Speaker 1: no longer in circulation, but in it's heyday it was
Speaker 1: considered as honest and serious as the New York Times.
Speaker 1: It was the first paper to report on such things
Speaker 1: as homicides, suicides, and divorces of everyday people, rather than
Speaker 1: news only about politicians and celebrities, just like every other
Speaker 1: paper at the time, which is why people took notice.
Speaker 1: In eighteen thirty five, two years after its debut, when
Speaker 1: The Sun printed a series of articles about a far
Speaker 1: away land, a land where creatures like bison, goats, and
Speaker 1: even unicorns roamed freely. Two legged beavers had been spotted
Speaker 1: as well. The dominant beings who lived there were humanoid
Speaker 1: in shape and covered in fur with wings on their backs.
Speaker 1: They built temples among the many hills and rivers that
Speaker 1: made up the area's geography. There were six articles in total,
Speaker 1: all written by a man named Dr Andrew Grant and
Speaker 1: reprinted from the Edinburgh Journal of Science. Grant wanted to
Speaker 1: make sure the whole world saw what he had dedicated
Speaker 1: months of his life to studying. He had worked alongside
Speaker 1: Sir John Herschel, an astronomer who had built an observatory
Speaker 1: in Cape Town, South Africa, one year earlier. Within this
Speaker 1: observatory was a telescope more powerful than any on Earth,
Speaker 1: through which Grant and Herschel made their discovery there was
Speaker 1: life on the Moon. They commented on the geography of
Speaker 1: the Moon's surface, noting giant craters and cliffs of amethysts
Speaker 1: jutting out of the ground as ocean waves crashed against
Speaker 1: them from below. Sales of the Sun skyrocketed once the
Speaker 1: public had started talking about the articles. They were reprinted
Speaker 1: in other papers along the East Coast, going as far
Speaker 1: west as Ohio in only two weeks. After a month,
Speaker 1: they were all over Europe as well. Moon fever had
Speaker 1: captivated the world. An Italian newspaper printed lithographs of what
Speaker 1: the men had been describing in their report. Plays were
Speaker 1: written about them. Artists painted what they imagined the creatures
Speaker 1: and colonies to look like. Yale University even sent a
Speaker 1: team of scientists to New York to get copies of
Speaker 1: the original journal articles for their records. When they arrived
Speaker 1: at the Sun, employees they're kept bouncing them from printing
Speaker 1: office to editorial office. It seemed no one had the
Speaker 1: original articles on hand, perhaps lost or misplaced, and visiting
Speaker 1: the observatory in Cape Town was a non starter as well.
Speaker 1: It and down after the telescope got the Sun in
Speaker 1: its sights, the light from which traveled down through its
Speaker 1: many lenses and started a massive fire inside the building.
Speaker 1: None of that matter did the end. All of that
Speaker 1: obsession about the colony on the Moon had been for nothing.
Speaker 1: Not long after their publication, the Sun came clean. The
Speaker 1: whole thing had been a hoax. Sir John Herschel really
Speaker 1: was an astronomer, But Andrew Grant was no doctor. He
Speaker 1: wasn't even a real person. It was a pen name
Speaker 1: for a reporter for the New York Sun. The story
Speaker 1: about the Moon had been a satire of recent astronomical
Speaker 1: discoveries of the time, such as that of a professor
Speaker 1: of astronomy at Munich University in Germany who had observed
Speaker 1: colors in lines on the lunar surface, which he theorized
Speaker 1: were part of a large city with roads and farms.
Speaker 1: Readers of the Sun didn't seem to mind being duped,
Speaker 1: though in fact, sales of the Sun didn't suffer at
Speaker 1: all after the newspapers in mission. One person, however, wasn't
Speaker 1: so pleased with Richard Locke Little ruse. Two months before
Speaker 1: The Sun published their Moon Hoax, a well known author
Speaker 1: had published a short story in the Southern Literary Messenger
Speaker 1: that told the tale of a man who voyaged to
Speaker 1: the Moon in a hot air balloon. Once there, he
Speaker 1: observed strange creatures of flourishing landscape and formed a bond
Speaker 1: with the lunarians who lived there. The Sun's articles had
Speaker 1: relegated this author's short story to obscurity, all because his editor,
Speaker 1: Richard Locke of the New York Sun, had stolen his
Speaker 1: work and his thunder and the author's name. Edgar Allan Poe.
Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
Speaker 1: of Curiosities, subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership
Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television
Speaker 1: show and you can learn all about it over at
Speaker 1: the World of Lore dot com. And until next time,
Speaker 1: stay curious. Yeah,