Speaker 1: Bushkin. We can't. I have never had a single conversation
Speaker 1: where both you and I were not kind of grinning
Speaker 1: as we told charge all stories.
Speaker 2: Well, I think there's something kind of lovely about his
Speaker 2: un self consciousness. I mean, he's a rare breed in
Speaker 2: this day and age, the like, completely unself conscious man
Speaker 2: who never for a second doubts his abilities, even though
Speaker 2: there's so much evidence for why he should be doubting
Speaker 2: his abilities.
Speaker 1: I'm talking to Ben Adaph Haffring, my partner in our
Speaker 1: series on the nineteen thirty six Olympics, the most consequential
Speaker 1: Olympic Games in history.
Speaker 2: And he's also just a really excellent partner in the
Speaker 2: goal of mocking him, because he really preserves all of
Speaker 2: the evidence of his follies and he reads like a
Speaker 2: great character out of literature.
Speaker 1: This episode is about Charles Hitchcock Cheryl, the man who
Speaker 1: in the early nineteen thirties was at the center of
Speaker 1: the debate over whether the United States should go to
Speaker 1: the Berlin Games. In fact, if you ask why the
Speaker 1: Olympic Games are the Olympic Games, how it flourished. It
Speaker 1: endured over the course of the most tumultuous century in history.
Speaker 1: There are really only two people who matter. One is
Speaker 1: Avery Brundage, and we'll get to Brundage later in the series.
Speaker 1: The other is Charles Hitchcock. Cheryl. Cheryl is a forgotten figure. Today,
Speaker 1: traces of him persist only in little scraps here and there.
Speaker 1: But in his day, when Cheryl gave an after dinner
Speaker 1: speech somewhere, it made the Times. When Cheryl complained about
Speaker 1: his neighbour's dog, it made the Times when he died.
Speaker 1: The New York Times wrote no fewer than five stories five.
Speaker 1: He was everywhere. He knew everyone. He was friends with
Speaker 1: every American president, from Teddy to Franklin Roosevelt. He attended
Speaker 1: every reception of importance, every luncheon that mattered. In his
Speaker 1: sixty nine years, he crossed the Atlantic ninety times. He
Speaker 1: was in constant motion. He was Zelig.
Speaker 2: He's Forrest Gump.
Speaker 1: He's Forrest Gump. You know I'm about to you know
Speaker 1: who he is? Hold on, hold on, hold on, Oh no,
Speaker 1: wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait, he's polonious.
Speaker 1: I have to get this right here. We are okay.
Speaker 1: So this is from love song with j alf Proof
Speaker 1: Rock maybe T. S. Eliot's most famous poem, and proof
Speaker 1: Rock is a kind of self aware version of Charles Cheryl, Oh,
Speaker 1: yes here we are okay. No, I am not Prince Hamlet,
Speaker 1: nor was meant to be. I am an attendant.
Speaker 3: Lord, the one that will do to swell a progress,
Speaker 3: start a scene, or to advise the Prince, no doubt,
Speaker 3: an easy tool, deferential, glad to be of use, politic,
Speaker 3: cautious and particulous, full of high sentence, but a bit
Speaker 3: of cuse at times, indeed almost ridiculous, almost at times.
Speaker 1: The fool that's him?
Speaker 2: That is him? And also can I do another literary pe?
Speaker 2: This is he's also Pangloss, you know, Condide's sort of
Speaker 2: utopian philosopher who's completely fatuous. The Pangloss quote is it
Speaker 2: is demonstrable that things cannot be otherwise than as they are.
Speaker 2: We're all being created for an end, all is necessarily
Speaker 2: for the best end. And that's also Ryl's kind of
Speaker 2: that's his philosophy of inconsequence, why really bother because everything's
Speaker 2: so great and it's just how it ought to be?
Speaker 1: Zelig force Gump, polonious Pangloss. Oh, and one more.
Speaker 2: That reminds me of the Dorothy Thompson who goes Nazi
Speaker 2: quote that he has been treated to forms of education
Speaker 2: which have released him from inhibitions. His body is vigorous,
Speaker 2: his mind is childish. His soul has been almost completely neglected.
Speaker 1: A yes. Remember Dorothy Thompson's parlor game where she describes
Speaker 1: going to parties, looking around the room and picking out
Speaker 1: which person was most likely to go Nazi. Thompson had
Speaker 1: two particularly interesting archetypes, misters B and C. Charles Cheryl
Speaker 1: was the embodiment of mister B. Mister B has risen
Speaker 1: beyond his real abilities by virtue of health, good looks,
Speaker 1: and being a good mixer. He married for money, and
Speaker 1: he's done lots of other things for money. His code
Speaker 1: is not his own. It is that of his class,
Speaker 1: no worse, no better. He fits easily into whatever pattern
Speaker 1: is successful. That is his measure of value. Success. Nazism
Speaker 1: as a minority movement would not attract him. As a
Speaker 1: movement likely to attain power, it would. My name is
Speaker 1: Malcolm Gladwell. You're listening to Revisionist History, my podcast about
Speaker 1: things overlooked and misunderstood. This is episode two in our
Speaker 1: series Hitler's Olympics, How and Why America went to the
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty six Games. Charles Cheryl grew up in Washington,
Speaker 1: d c. His father made a lot of money lobbying
Speaker 1: for the big railroad interests. He went to college at Yale,
Speaker 1: then worked for a time as a lawyer on Wall Street.
Speaker 1: He was tall, slender, with a long imperial nose, bright
Speaker 1: twinkling eyes, a full head of blonde hair, and a
Speaker 1: thriving mustache. He wrote twenty books, mostly about stained glass.
Speaker 1: It's his memoirs, though, that are ar tour de Force,
Speaker 1: an unpublished three hundred and sixty page compendium of every anecdote, accolade, witticism,
Speaker 1: and celebrity encounter in his entire life. Here is my favorite.
Speaker 1: In October nineteen thirty one, I had the honor of
Speaker 1: lunching alone at the White House with President Hoover because
Speaker 1: he wanted me to undertake a certain matter, which I
Speaker 1: guessed he thought me reluctant to do. That opening is
Speaker 1: very Charles Cheryl. He was not the sort who volunteered.
Speaker 1: That would be ghusch. He waited for opportunity to ask
Speaker 1: him to lunch. It was an excellent luncheon, he continues,
Speaker 1: and I was pleased to see upon each of the
Speaker 1: four corners of the table small silver dishes containing cherries.
Speaker 1: I am very fond of cherries, and so looked forward
Speaker 1: to indulging in them when the arrived. Therefore, while I
Speaker 1: was partaking out of a cup of soup, the President
Speaker 1: ate the cherries out of his dish and remarked to me,
Speaker 1: I see you do not like cherries, and then proceeded
Speaker 1: to eat all the cherries out of all four dishes.
Speaker 1: This stunned me, but of course I made a comment
Speaker 1: upon his disposal of all the cherries in sight. The
Speaker 1: President then makes a pitch for the post. He wants
Speaker 1: Cheryl to take some minor ambassadorship or blue ribbon panel.
Speaker 1: Cheryl demurs. The President is crestfallen, but as they leave
Speaker 1: the luncheon, Cheryl turns to Hoover and gently says, I think, sir,
Speaker 1: that you do not realize that a man does not
Speaker 1: always know just what the other man likes or does
Speaker 1: not like. For example, at luncheon, you said I did
Speaker 1: not appear to like cherries, But you are mistake, because
Speaker 1: I am very fond of cherries. But there might be
Speaker 1: something else which I would like to do to serve you,
Speaker 1: which I like as much as I like cherries, and
Speaker 1: possibly it is something that you have not thought of
Speaker 1: in connection with me. And then the kicker, perhaps this
Speaker 1: remark of mine has something to do with his subsequently
Speaker 1: asking me to undertake the embassy to Turkey. I mean,
Speaker 1: can you see why we are so fascinated with Cheryl?
Speaker 1: It's all there in the showdown over the cherry bowl,
Speaker 1: his willingness to speak truth to power, his will to succeed,
Speaker 1: his daring conversational gambits. Cheryl's most enduring fame, however, was
Speaker 1: as a sportsman. He was a champion sprinter at Yale.
Speaker 1: He never went to the Olympics, but he did briefly
Speaker 1: share the world record for the hundred yard dash. But
Speaker 1: that was just part of it. You know how sprinter's
Speaker 1: crouch at the start of every race instead of standing.
Speaker 1: Charles Cheryl invented the crouching start, or at least he
Speaker 1: says he did.
Speaker 4: Any One that looked at my hand will be that
Speaker 4: I have a luck line which surprises all of those
Speaker 4: who are wise in such.
Speaker 1: Such Cheryl was much sought after as an after dinner speaker,
Speaker 1: and he would often begin with a story or two
Speaker 1: of his halcyon days at Yale as a champion athletic innovator.
Speaker 4: Which brings me to the athletic thought that although I
Speaker 4: should play credit for the invention of the catching start,
Speaker 4: the real fact is that it's due more to luck
Speaker 4: than brain. I happened upon it and it turned out
Speaker 4: to be worth at least the yard, and I got
Speaker 4: credit or something with my luck really deserved.
Speaker 1: You know how you have an uncle who stole home
Speaker 1: in the little league to win the county championship and
Speaker 1: he's still telling that story fifty years later. Cheryl was
Speaker 1: like that with the crouching start.
Speaker 2: He has this glorious life that everyone in the world
Speaker 2: is basically supporting, because even he get has all these
Speaker 2: letters from presidents just being not saying anything important, but
Speaker 2: being like, Chaz loved your book on stayin Glass. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like three paragraphs from Teddy Roosevelt telling him how great
Speaker 2: his book on stained Glass is. And I believe that
Speaker 2: he actually read Charles Cheryl's book on Stained Glass. But
Speaker 2: for what reason other than to make Cheryl feel good
Speaker 2: about himself, which is just the mission of even the
Speaker 2: most powerful man in the world.
Speaker 1: Do you know about the Teddy Roosevelt. There's a great
Speaker 1: Teddy Roosevelt moment in uh oh, yeah, he goes to
Speaker 1: see Roosevelt. This is from his tires and he's he
Speaker 1: waits for half an hour before going into the president
Speaker 1: study because Booker Washington had been called called in to
Speaker 1: advise up upon a speech touching on the colored race.
Speaker 1: So just so we know, like he's.
Speaker 2: Like, something meaningful is really going on.
Speaker 1: Booker T. Washington was one of the most important African
Speaker 1: American leaders of his generation, and they're talking about the
Speaker 1: central problem facing the American public. And Cheryl is like
Speaker 1: waiting impatiently because he said, I followed him and after
Speaker 1: the purpose of my visit was concluded a rose to leave.
Speaker 1: The President asked my opinion of two bronzes. One was
Speaker 1: the Bronco Buster, which had been presented to him by
Speaker 1: the old Regiment, the rough Riders. The other was the
Speaker 1: Crouching Start by Tate McKenzie.
Speaker 2: Ah, that's that's what I found in the museum.
Speaker 1: We are deep into digression mode here, But at some
Speaker 1: point in our mutual obsession with Charles Cheryl Ben found
Speaker 1: himself in a community museum in some waspy corner of Connecticut,
Speaker 1: and stumbled upon a statue of a tall, handsome man
Speaker 1: in a crouching start. Chills went down his spine exactly exactly,
Speaker 1: I laughingly declared my inability to give any unprejudiced answer
Speaker 1: because I was the first runner to use the crouching start.
Speaker 2: Not true.
Speaker 1: By the way, come back here and sit down, snapped
Speaker 1: out the President, and then followed a rapid fire useilade
Speaker 1: as to why that start had been invented, its advantages, limitations, etc.
Speaker 1: Until I felt as if a stomach pump had been
Speaker 1: applied to my brain.
Speaker 5: Like just so we understand, Roosevelt has just met what
Speaker 5: Booker t WASHINGTD to discuss the central issue facing the Republic,
Speaker 5: which is the continued like crime be committed against the
Speaker 5: black people.
Speaker 1: Cheryl shows up, Now what does the president do? Finally
Speaker 1: comes alive with the question of the origin of the
Speaker 1: crouching start. Presidents were impressed by Charles Cheryl, and so
Speaker 1: was an organization that lies at the very heart of
Speaker 1: this story, the International Olympic Committee the IOC. The IOC
Speaker 1: is the governing body of the Olympic Games then is now.
Speaker 1: It is based in Lauzon, Switzerland, neutral territory. It has
Speaker 1: ultimate control over all aspects of the games, the rules,
Speaker 1: the events, the schedule, where the games are held, Who
Speaker 1: gets invited. The organization's founder was Pierre de Coupertan Baron
Speaker 1: de Cupertin, a French aristocrat. He got the modern game
Speaker 1: started in Greece in eighteen ninety six, planted the seed,
Speaker 1: and from the beginning he surrounded himself with his friends,
Speaker 1: basically other aristocrats. He referred to them as the trusted Men.
Speaker 1: The Baron's successor to run the IOC was Count Henri
Speaker 1: dubayers LeTour of Belgium. Someone once wrote of the Count's wife,
Speaker 1: the Comtesse Elizabeth von Clarie Unaldringen. She traveled widely as
Speaker 1: her husband was a passionate tourist. The comtest was also
Speaker 1: a Nazi, who wrote a personal note of thanks to
Speaker 1: Adolf Hitler after he invaded her country. But we're getting
Speaker 1: ahead of ourselves. Another Olympic committee member, his Excellency the
Speaker 1: most excellent, the Marquise of sam the Spanish aristocrat who
Speaker 1: ran the IOC for twenty one years. One biographical note
Speaker 1: on Samarank reads that quote. During his studies he practiced
Speaker 1: roller hockey, for which he created world Championships, which the
Speaker 1: Spanish team won roller hockey. He picks a sport no
Speaker 1: one plays, and then invents a world championships where he
Speaker 1: has to be the favorite. I mean, that is just
Speaker 1: about the most perfect description of enterprising white guy privilege ever.
Speaker 1: And let's not forget about Lord David George brownlow Cecil Berlin,
Speaker 1: heir to the Marquess of Exeter, who once ran around
Speaker 1: the upper promenade deck of the Queen Mary Ocean Liner
Speaker 1: in fifty seven seconds dressed in street clothes, a record
Speaker 1: that I'm pretty sure still stands. Burgley was the one
Speaker 1: who bestowed the golden bronze medals on the American runners
Speaker 1: John Carlos and Tommy Smith at the Mexico Games in
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty eight, where on the victory stand the two
Speaker 1: famously raised glove fists in a black power salute. When
Speaker 1: asked why Carlos and Smith wore gloves that day, Burley said,
Speaker 1: I thought they'd hurt their hands. These were the men
Speaker 1: of the Io Sea. They would meet every year or
Speaker 1: so in a grand hotel in one of the many
Speaker 1: storied capitals of Europe, put on long black coats and
Speaker 1: striped pants and bowler hats, drink a lot of Chateau
Speaker 1: Lafitte Rothschild, and regale each other with stories of past
Speaker 1: athletic triumphs. It was the greatest men's club in the world,
Speaker 1: and in retrospect, it was surely only a matter of
Speaker 1: time before the IOC set their sights on a certain
Speaker 1: dashing mustachiote sprinting champion from New York City who held
Speaker 1: the ear of Presidents. Let me read to you from
Speaker 1: the June eighth, nineteen twenty two edition of the New
Speaker 1: York Times. Olympic Committee Aleks Mister Cheryl will bring a
Speaker 1: vast store of athletic knowledge to the Committee. While at
Speaker 1: Yale he won the intercollegiate one hundred yard dash championship
Speaker 1: four years in succession. He was wait for it, the
Speaker 1: originator of the crouching start, which is now used in
Speaker 1: all sprints in every section of the world. Zelig Forrest Gum,
Speaker 1: Polonius Pangloss, Mister b and the Thomas Edison of the
Speaker 1: crouching start. Our man of parts has now been given
Speaker 1: his greatest role ever a member of the International Olympic Committee,
Speaker 1: and over the next decade his medal will be put
Speaker 1: to the test do I dare to introduce yet another
Speaker 1: literary analog, Hercules, of course, whom the Oracle of Delphi
Speaker 1: directed to perform twelve trials in exchange for immortality, the
Speaker 1: slaying of the Hydra, the cleansing of the augien Stables,
Speaker 1: on and on. You read the Greek myths and immediately
Speaker 1: your thinking of Charles Hitchcock Cheryl. And by the way,
Speaker 1: where is the most famous depiction of the labors of
Speaker 1: Hercules in a sculpture found in the Temple of Zeus
Speaker 1: at Olympia. It all fits. Adolf Hitler's rise to the
Speaker 1: leadership of Germany was swift. In nineteen twenty three, in
Speaker 1: his mid thirties, he makes an incredibly clumsy coup attempt
Speaker 1: in Munich and gets arrested. Spends nine months in prison,
Speaker 1: where he writes Mankomfe his vision for a new ary
Speaker 1: in Germany, cleansed of Jews and outsiders, and as soon
Speaker 1: as he gets out, his star ascends. By the time
Speaker 1: our famous American journalist Dorothy Thompson interviews Hitler at the
Speaker 1: Kaiserhoff Hotel in nineteen thirty one, the Nazis are the
Speaker 1: second biggest party in the German parliament, and gaining ground,
Speaker 1: and Thompson is trying to figure out whether Hitler can
Speaker 1: actually get elected Chancellor, especially since he makes it clear
Speaker 1: that he doesn't actually believe in democracy. Thompson wrote, people
Speaker 1: were to awaken, and Hitler's movement was going to vote
Speaker 1: dictatorship in in itself a fascinating idea. Imagine a would
Speaker 1: be dictator setting out to persuade a sovereign people to
Speaker 1: vote away their rights. In nineteen thirty three, Hitler pulls
Speaker 1: it off. It comes to power almost immediately. There's a
Speaker 1: boycott of Jewish businesses. People start beating up Jews in
Speaker 1: the streets. Jews get banned from professional organizations and sports clubs.
Speaker 1: The Nazis, it turns out, care a great deal about sports,
Speaker 1: about physical fitness, about vigorous competition, and their vision of
Speaker 1: sports does not include Jews. Germany's best tennis player at
Speaker 1: the time is Jewish doctor Daniel Prenn, and he gets
Speaker 1: kicked off the country's Davis Cup team. In the spring
Speaker 1: of nineteen thirty three, the head of the German an
Speaker 1: organizing committee for the Berlin Games, Teodolibald, is stripped of
Speaker 1: his post because there were some Jewish people in his
Speaker 1: family tree. In May of nineteen thirty three, the German
Speaker 1: Sports Commissioner gives an interview where he says that German
Speaker 1: sports are for arians. The American Jewish Congress sends a
Speaker 1: telegram to the American delegates to the IOC. It says,
Speaker 1: no jew in America or in other countries could, in
Speaker 1: self respect undertake to appear in Germany under present conditions.
Speaker 1: The Olympic ideal and the Nazi agenda are on a
Speaker 1: collision course. Now it's June nineteen thirty three. The IOC
Speaker 1: has its big meetings set for Vienna. It was almost
Speaker 1: certainly at the Hotel Imperial, a magnificent building in the
Speaker 1: Italian Neo Renaissance style, marble lobby, coffered ceilings, crystal chandeliers.
Speaker 1: No other place would be up to the IOC's standards.
Speaker 1: Little known fact about the Imperial, by the way, Hitler
Speaker 1: worked there briefly as a janitor when he was bombing
Speaker 1: around Vienna in his twenties. Sixty six delegates are coming
Speaker 1: for the IOC meeting from every country of significance in
Speaker 1: the world. The Men's Club has gathered in their long
Speaker 1: black coats, their striped pants and bowler hats. A special
Speaker 1: program is printed up for all in attendance, which begins
Speaker 1: on its opening page with a questionnaire. Are you a sportsman? One?
Speaker 1: Do you play the game for the game's sake? Two?
Speaker 1: Do you play for your team and not yourself? Three?
Speaker 1: Do you carry out your captain's orders without question or criticism? Four?
Speaker 1: Do you accept the umpire's decision absolutely? Five? Do you
Speaker 1: win without swank and lose without grousing? And then the
Speaker 1: crucial one six would you rather lose than do anything
Speaker 1: which you are not sure is fair? The Vienna meeting
Speaker 1: focuses squarely on that sixth question. A true sportsman would
Speaker 1: rather lose than do anything that wasn't fair, And the
Speaker 1: delegates are perfectly aware of what's going on in Germany.
Speaker 1: Not letting Jews compete simply because they are Jews is
Speaker 1: for the sportsman surely the definition of unfairness.
Speaker 4: But our International Committee does not concern itself with internal
Speaker 4: athletic conditions in any country, but only with the choice
Speaker 4: of that country's members for its Olympic team.
Speaker 1: This is Cheryl in a speech outlining the Commission's dilemma
Speaker 1: that week in Vienna.
Speaker 4: Now that's very important to remember with that choice, we
Speaker 4: insist that race, religion, color, and sofar shall.
Speaker 1: Not interfere cognitive dissonance upon us. And the Olympic committee
Speaker 1: members have four ways they can resolve it. They can
Speaker 1: move the game somewhere else. They can cancel the games
Speaker 1: the way they did in nineteen sixteen in the middle
Speaker 1: of the First World War. They can keep the games
Speaker 1: in Berlin and simply let everyone boycott. Or they can
Speaker 1: convince the Nazis to have a change of heart when
Speaker 1: it comes to their Jewish athletes. What should they do?
Speaker 1: Let us put ourselves in the mind of our hero,
Speaker 1: Charles Hitchcock Cheryl. He has sailed the Atlantic ninety times.
Speaker 1: He has written a book on German stained glass windows.
Speaker 1: He knows the Teutonic soul and did not Charles Hitchcock
Speaker 1: Cheryl stare down the President of the United States over
Speaker 1: the thorny issue of the disputed cherrybyl Why bow to tyranny?
Speaker 1: Why not compel tyranny to bow to you? The last
Speaker 1: option to convince the Nazis to be less Nazi was
Speaker 1: the only choice. Cheryl sends a telegram home to the
Speaker 1: American Jewish Congress, rest assured that I shall stoutly maintain
Speaker 1: the American principle that all citizens are equal under the law.
Speaker 1: The key business of the Vienna meeting was conducted by
Speaker 1: a six man executive committee headed by the Belgian count
Speaker 1: Henri du Baye LeTour, and Cheryl, by virtue of his
Speaker 1: stature as a diplomat and storied athlete, is the key
Speaker 1: player in that inner circle. They meet behind closed doors.
Speaker 1: Imagine a room full of mustachio gentlemen in an ornate
Speaker 1: conference room festooned with portraits of other mustachio gentlemen. Cheryl
Speaker 1: by LeTour and the English delegate on one side of
Speaker 1: the long oak conference table, the Germans on the other.
Speaker 1: It was a trying fight, Cheryl explains later in a
Speaker 1: letter to a friend. The British said, let the Germans be,
Speaker 1: but Cheryl would have none of it. The Germans yielded slowly,
Speaker 1: very slowly. First they conceded that the other nations could
Speaker 1: bring Jews. Then I went at them hard, insisting that
Speaker 1: as they had expressly excluded Jews, now they must expressly
Speaker 1: declare that Jews would not even be excluded from German teams.
Speaker 1: He would tell this story often in the intervening years.
Speaker 4: I personally fearing unfair treatment of Jewish athlete in the
Speaker 4: selection for the German nineteen thirty sixth Olympic team. Made
Speaker 4: it my business who pushed the points so far that
Speaker 4: our committee received from the German Ministry of Interior Ministerium
Speaker 4: dos Center a letter of three short paragraphs, third of
Speaker 4: which reads, as a principal German Jews shall not be
Speaker 4: excluded from German team at the game of the eleventh Olympia.
Speaker 4: At his next year, I had the honor of drafting
Speaker 4: that third paragraph. Perhaps you will agree that I felt
Speaker 4: everyone at home and abroad thought that I was thus
Speaker 4: doing my best for the Jews.
Speaker 1: In Vienna, there are reporters gathered at the hotel waiting
Speaker 1: for news to break. Cheryl emerges, triumphant that games will
Speaker 1: go on. A cheer goes up around the world. The
Speaker 1: New York Times, Charles Cheryl's newspaper of record, calls him
Speaker 1: a hero. The straightforward character of the promise obtained from
Speaker 1: the German government came as all the greater surprise, and
Speaker 1: the opinion was expressed that a real blow had been
Speaker 1: struck in the cause of racial freedom, at least in
Speaker 1: the realm of sports. Charles Cheryl confronts the contradt of
Speaker 1: the Berlin Games, the cognitive dissonance of a pure competition
Speaker 1: in an impure place, and he resolves it how not
Speaker 1: like Dorothy Thompson. She said, you resolve it by not going.
Speaker 1: He says, no, you resolve it by making the impure
Speaker 1: place pure, by staring down his German counterparts across the
Speaker 1: negotiating table, and through sheer force of personality and intelligence
Speaker 1: and courage and good old fashioned New York City moxie,
Speaker 1: bending them to our will. The Vienna Declaration was Charles
Speaker 1: Hitchcock Cheryl's finest hour. The controversy over the Games faded,
Speaker 1: The Olympics were saved. Problem solved, right, Oh, no, problem
Speaker 1: is just beginning.
Speaker 2: I want to keep talking about what's funny about Charles Cheryl,
Speaker 2: because I do think he's hilarious and he brings me
Speaker 2: so much joy. I think he also raises a number
Speaker 2: of very complicated moral questions. Yeah, and I found myself
Speaker 2: at the end of the second day that I went
Speaker 2: into the archives. His scrapbooks are at the New York
Speaker 2: Historical Society.
Speaker 1: The New York Historical Society is a massive bozar building
Speaker 1: on Manhattan's Upper West Side, right by the Natural History Museum.
Speaker 1: If you were a man of Charles Cheryl's stature, there
Speaker 1: is no other place worthy of your collected papers.
Speaker 2: So we found out that Charles Pitchcock Cheryl had lovingly
Speaker 2: documented his entire life. You know, most archives you go to,
Speaker 2: they're just boxes of stuff that was left to a library,
Speaker 2: and then they had to figure out some kind of
Speaker 2: archival organization's scheme for it. Not Charles Cheryl's papers. Everything
Speaker 2: that he kept was preserved in a scrap book, in
Speaker 2: actually four four scrap books that then when he died
Speaker 2: in nineteen thirty six, his wife be queathed to the
Speaker 2: New York Historical Society.
Speaker 1: Ben spent days at Historical Society archives digging to the
Speaker 1: Cheryl mother lord.
Speaker 2: I mean they're all like six inches wide. And the
Speaker 2: thing is, the legacy of Cheryl continues in the pristineness
Speaker 2: of these scrap books. I mean, his ink doesn't fade,
Speaker 2: the glue he uses to bind this stuff doesn't give,
Speaker 2: and all of the paper was still so crisp and weighty.
Speaker 2: Everything is written on these like robins egg blue and
Speaker 2: pearl thick stock pages, or like silky diary pages. He
Speaker 2: just had the best of everything, and it's all withstood
Speaker 2: the test of time.
Speaker 1: Was the wife in donating these materials? Let's accept for
Speaker 1: a moment the premise that the wife may not have been,
Speaker 1: the relationship may not have been. Should we say conventional?
Speaker 1: Do you think she's Do you think she knows what
Speaker 1: she's doing? Oh? The wife? We haven't talked about her yet.
Speaker 1: She was the heir to the Berkshire Cotton manufacturing Company,
Speaker 1: which would later merge with Hathaway to create you guessed it,
Speaker 1: Berkshire Hathaway, which her family would turn around and sell
Speaker 1: to a young Warren Buffett. Yet another way in which
Speaker 1: the world turns around. Charles Hitchcock Cheryl. Anyhow, missus Charles
Speaker 1: Hitchcock Cheryl takes the complete set of her husband's papers,
Speaker 1: has them preserved in perpetuity, and apparently never checks to
Speaker 1: see what's in them. Or maybe she does and she's
Speaker 1: fine with it. Now. It's crucially important that he dies
Speaker 1: in thirty six right.
Speaker 2: The former head of manuscripts that the New York Historical
Speaker 2: Society points out that this is the rare occasion on
Speaker 2: which a American who really fell in love and hard
Speaker 2: with the Nazi Party was unable to then sanitize his
Speaker 2: records after seeing what happened in World War Two. So
Speaker 2: what we have here is a perfectly preserved in amber.
Speaker 2: It's like the Jurassic Park Mosquito of nineteen thirties American fascism,
Speaker 2: because nothing there was, you know, already a very high
Speaker 2: bar for self consciousness in Charles Cheryl's life, and so
Speaker 2: the full force of his love for the Nazis is
Speaker 2: on display in volume thirty five of his forty four
Speaker 2: scrap book collection.
Speaker 1: In our next episode, we delve into the buried treasure
Speaker 1: of scrap Book thirty five, the uncensored journal of a
Speaker 1: man in the process of going Nazi.
Speaker 3: I'm an attendant lord, one that will do to swell
Speaker 3: a progress, start a scene, or do advise the Prince,
Speaker 3: no doubt, an easy tool, deferential, glad to be of use, politic,
Speaker 3: cautious and particulous, full of high sentence, but a bit
Speaker 3: of cute at times, indeed almost ridiculous, almost at times.
Speaker 1: The fool Well Yes Religious History is produced by ben
Speaker 1: Na daph Haffrey, Tolly Emlin and Nina Bird Lawrence. Our
Speaker 1: editor is Sarah Nix. Fact checking by Arthur Gomberts and
Speaker 1: Jail Goldfein. Original scoring by Luis Gara, mastering by Flan Williams,
Speaker 1: Sarah Buger and Jake Gorsky. Engineering by Nina Bird Lawrence.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Jacob Smith. Special thanks to Karen Chakerji.
Speaker 1: I'm Malcolm gladwa